Fantasy Football Draft Guides Set Out 2026 Rankings Advice
FantasyPros and The Athletic have published their 2026 draft kits, laying out rankings, positional strategy and the players their experts back or fade.
Two Draft Kits, Two Approaches
Fantasy football, the game in which participants pick real National Football League players and score points based on their on-field statistics, has entered its 2026 drafting period, and two major outlets have published guides to it.
FantasyPros released a draft advice article on 30 August 2026 setting out the general strategy its experts follow. The Athletic published a draft kit on 28 August 2026 built around rankings from Jake Ciely, whom the publication describes as among the most accurate prognosticators in the game.
The Athletic says its kit will keep expanding each week, and often each day, until the first regular-season game.
FantasyPros on Early Rounds
The FantasyPros writer identified as Fitz says his early-round approach is governed by league lineup rules. If a league requires three starting wide receivers each week, he attacks that position early. If it requires only two, he leans toward running backs.
Fitz says he will not draft a quarterback in the first four rounds of a league that starts one quarterback. He calls Josh Allen terrific but argues the position is deep, naming at least 14 quarterbacks he would accept as a starter.
He names three tight ends he expects to go in the first four rounds: Brock Bowers, Trey McBride and Colston Loveland. He says he is willing to draft Bowers and Loveland at their cost, but not McBride.
Receiver Depth and Player Calls
Fitz disputes the common view that wide receiver is a deep position. He argues that many receivers play snaps and run routes without producing useful fantasy totals, and that late-round hits there are rare because an injured receiver's targets scatter among several pass catchers rather than passing to one replacement.
The Athletic's kit lists specific calls. It flags James Cook and Courtland Sutton as underpriced, and warns against overpaying for Bhayshul Tuten and A.J. Brown, though Ciely separately lists Tuten among 18 players he most wants in drafts.
Other sections cover regression candidates including Jeanty, Shough, Stafford and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, backup running back tiers featuring Tank Bigsby and Blake Corum, and late picks such as Malik Willis, Romeo Doubs, Braelon Allen and Parker Washington. Neither source states how these players performed once the season began.
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