Its that time of year again. DRAFT DAY!!! Nothing like dynasty rookie drafts to get back into the dynasty state of mind. I must admit I’ve been out of the loop as of late in the dynasty world. I know, dynasty is a year-round activity. But, between dealing with a significant increase in real life work activity (and the stress that goes with it) and not knowing if there will even be a season this year, I haven’t been nearly as engulfed in my dynasty teams as I normally would be this time of year. That has to change now since I’ve got the $1250 FFPC and the $750 FFPC rookie/free agent drafts going on and I need to be sharp.

This is a good opportunity to talk about my $750 FFPC Dynasty team (since, unlike the $1250 team, I actually have a few rookie picks left including the 1.2).

As you might have noticed, I don’t write about this team nearly as much as the $1250 team. For one I had a miserable 2010 season in a league where I made short-sighted efforts to draft a win now team at last year’s startup draft. Despite collecting 4 1st round picks in the early part of last year’s startup draft, I really felt like an opportunity was there to draft a bye-level team which led me to draft Tony Freaking Gonzalez in the 6th round (1.5 PPR for TE can make you do stupid things). Then I made another “win now” move of trading Hakeem Nicks for Marques Colston a week before we found out Colston had another knee surgery. That alone made it painful for me to look at this team knowing what could have been. Still, going into the 2010 season, I really thought I had a top 2 team on my hands for 2010. Unfortunately, things did not go as planned. MJD played hurt in the early part of the year and Sidney Rice was lost for large chunk of the season, and after a 1-4 start, I decided to tear down the team and regroup for a run in 2011. Unfortunately, that led me to trade Greg Jennings for a 1st rounder that was slotted at the 1.1 but, after a massive run to end the year, ended up being the 1.8. It was silly of me to trade a player of Jennings caliber for a 1st rounder since I left myself with no margin of error...it was the 1.1 or bust. And bust it was.

It goes to show that however unlikely, with some luck, a team can turn around its fortunes in fantasy football at any time...including mine. As it turned out, MJD turned his season around, Darren McFadden became a PPR stud (oh, did I mention I traded him away too - sigh), Jennings had an incredible 2nd half and even Colston was pretty good. Had I patiently waited on this team, I would have made the playoffs and possibly could have contended for the title (as I have been painfully reminded by a league mate on more than one occasion).

Anyway, even with all the sulking over the bad trades and over having torn down my team a tad early, I still managed to come out with a decent team for 2011 helped by the 6 1st round draft picks I accumulated (4 during the startup draft and an additional 2 during the season). A few key offseason moves included trading Vincent Jackson, Shonn Greene and the 1.3 rookie pick for Jamaal Charles and the 1.10 rookie pick. I then traded the 1.7 and 1.8 rookie picks for Owen Daniels (a solid value at 1.7 in a 1.5 PPR TE league) and a random 2012 1st rounder. Next was the 1.6 and Golden Tate for Josh Freeman and Braylon Edwards. Finally, just last week, I traded the 1.5, 1.10 and Jacoby Ford for Brandon Marshall, Dustin Keller (whose perceived value, even in a 1.5 PPR league, has been in the gutter lately but whom I still believe will be the stud many predicted he would be) and Fred Jackson (I have Spiller).

Accordingly, at the start of the draft, the team was as follows:

QB: Freeman
RB: Charles, Spiller, FJax, Sproles
WR: Marshall, Desean, Maclin, S.Rice, Braylon, Benn, Danario
TE: Daniels, Keller

Surprisingly, I ended up with a pretty good team going into 2011, one I could feel good about.

With the 1.2 pick, I was sure to be able to add some additional fire power and long term value. I knew about 24 hours in advance that the 1.1 would be Mark Ingram, a pleasant surprise given that most other PPR leagues had AJ Green going at #1. I gladly took AJ Green and was happy with how the team looked with him on it as the WR5 for 2011. Nevertheless, within a matter of hours, AJ Green was gone! The trade: AJ Green, Jeremy Maclin, my 2012 2nd rounder, and my 2012 3rd rounder for Roddy White, a 2012 1st rounder (from the team that had the fewest VPs in 2010) and his 2012 4th rounder. That was a lot to give up to get Roddy and the 1st, but I like what the trade does for my team. Here it is now (first week starters in bold):

QB: Freeman
RB: Charles, Spiller, FJax, Sproles
WR: Roddy, Marshall, Desean, S.Rice, Braylon, Benn, Danario
TE: Daniels, Keller
2012 Rookie 1st Round Picks: 3 (including my own)

I don’t have another pick until the 7th round so this is bye for now, but I’ll be back if I am able to trade my way back into the draft.