Top 6 Fantasy Football Draft Strategies In 2025 (Best Ball)

Fantasy sports news, analysis, and waiver wire advice.

By Fantasy Roundup · August 29, 2025

If you're heading into your 2025 best ball fantasy football drafts, it's essential to approach them with a plan.

Whether you’re drafting from the 1.01 or the back of the first round, finding a winning draft strategy changes every year in fantasy football.

Fortunately, I’ve drafted well over 100 teams in 2025. After winning $19k last year including a 4th place finish in the Rottweiler tournament, I’m feeling great about 2025. I’ve paired historical advancement rates with my gut instincts to identify 2025’s best strategies.

In this article, I’ll break down the top six most effective fantasy football draft strategies for 2025, complete with historical advancement rates, positional trends, and the player targets that make each build powerful.

Hero RB Strategy (RB1, WR1, QB1, WR2, WR3) 📊 Advancement Rates: 24.8% to the playoffs

4.35% to the semifinals

0.24% to the finals

This is one of the most dependable draft strategies in 2025, especially if you're drafting from the 1.03 to 1.05 slots.

You can often grab Bijan Robinson, Saquon Barkley, or Jahmyr Gibbs as your anchor RB. Then target Rashee Rice as your WR1—a player poised for a breakout season after getting screwed out of it in 2024. Stack that with Josh Allen or Lamar Jackson in Round 3, and you’ve got three high-ceiling, high-floor players to build around.

Best ball demands explosive upside. That’s why pairing this strategy with Jameson Williams, DK Metcalf, or Jaylen Waddle in Rounds 4 and 5 provides massive boom potential in your WR2 and WR3 slots.

✅ This draft strategy gives you: An elite RB1

Three high-upside WRs

A dual-threat QB with league-winning upside

It's not just theory—this strategy has one of the highest historical playoff advancement rates, and it’s easy to execute from the early-middle first round.

2. Double RB with Elite QB & TE (RB1, RB2, QB1, WR1, TE1) 📊 Advancement Rates: 23.2% to the playoffs

2.75% to the semifinals

0.34% to the finals

This build is harder to pull off in 2025 but potentially the most rewarding.

The key is securing George Kittle in Round 5—but his ADP is rising to the 4th on Underdog, making timing crucial. If you nail two top-tier RBs early, and then land a top-3 QB and Kittle, I truly believe this will be the winner in 2025.

Even if your WR1 underwhelms, Kittle can give you positional leverage most teams can't match.

I firmly believe this strategy could be the winner in 2025. If not the big winner, a top 10 winner ($125k ain’t bad).

🛠️ It’s tough to build, but worth chasing. After drafting 100+ teams, I’ve still only landed this build once. Why keep trying?

Because I believe it can be the $2M winner in 2025.

And if you miss on Kittle? There’s a pivot…

3. Balanced Core with Two Hero RBs (RB1, RB2, QB1, WR1, WR2) 📊 Advancement Rates: 23.3% to the playoffs

2.37% to the semifinals

0.06% to the finals

This build may not look special at first, but it provides stable advancement into the playoffs and semis. While it has the lowest finals rate of the strategies so far, you can hack that.

🔧 Tips to improve success: Draft four tight ends to spike the finals rate up to 0.21%.

Go with one QB (the one you took in Round 3). That alone boosts your finals rate to 0.90%, up from 0.06%.

This unorthodox build often flies under the radar, but in best ball, contrarian strategies often pay off the most.

4. WR Early and Heavy (WR1, TE1, WR2, QB1, WR3) 📊 Advancement Rates: 22.4% to the playoffs

1.59% to the semifinals

0.11% to the finals

This strategy struggled historically - but 2025 is different.

Thanks to the emergence of Brock Bowers and Trey McBride, both of whom can be drafted in the 2nd round, this build has new life. Start with CeeDee Lamb in the first 5 picks or Nico Collins in the last 3, take your elite TE in Round 2, and snag Jalen Hurts in Round 4.

🔥 If Hurts and your tight end hit, you’ve built a monster with a dominant positional edge and elite WR depth.

This is an aggressive build, but it has real upside this season.

5. Triple WR Start with a 4th Round QB (WR1, WR2, WR3, QB1, RB1) 📊 Advancement Rates: 17.7% to the playoffs

2.28% to the semifinals

0.08% to the finals

Don’t let the low playoff rate discourage you—2025 draft boards bring value with this draft strategy that wasn’t there in previous years.

If you land three top-15 WRs, you can afford to wait and draft Jalen Hurts in Round 4. Just make sure your RB1 has top 10 upside. Think Chuba Hubbard, Kenneth Walker, TreVeyon Henderson, or Alvin Kamara in round 5.

🎯 This is a gut-feel draft strategy. While it's not historically dominant, the player pool in 2025 supports it, especially for drafters willing to lean on WR value early.

6. WR Avalanche Strategy (WR1, WR2, RB1, WR3, WR4) 📊 Advancement Rates: 21.6% to the playoffs

1.47% to the semifinals

0.13% to the finals

This WR-heavy approach is risky but can be extremely rewarding in best ball—if all your wideouts hit.

The trade-off? You won’t draft many more WRs later, so your early picks must deliver. One RB option to anchor the backfield here is Omarion Hampton in Round 4.

✨ The idea is to let your WRs carry the early season, then count on a rookie RB with fresh legs to shine in the playoffs. You’ll need to backload 2–3 more RBs between Rounds 6–10. Watch my Surprising League-Winning RBs video to round out this build with high-upside running backs at beautiful draft prices.

Final Thoughts: Which Strategy Should You Use? Your best 2025 fantasy football draft strategy depends on: Your draft position

Underdog ADP trends

Injury news and training camp reports

Your comfort with risk vs. consistency

Best ball is about upside, correlation, and exploiting positional value. Which is why if you have a little more of a risk-free type of personality, I encourage you to take risks. Risk-taking is the only way to win in best ball, and the way I banked $19k in best ball last year.

If you’re new to Best Ball, or even new to fantasy football, you’ve come to the right place. Not only does Underdog best ball offer the highest financial upside in fantasy football tournaments, it also automatically logs your highest score at each position every single week.

No weekly lineup maintenance. No trades. No waiver wire. Your best possible team score on a weekly basis automatically.

Join Underdog’s best ball tournaments here using code ‘FFR’. They’ll match your first deposit 50% up to $1,000 in bonus credits when you use our code and get in on a draft.

Happy drafting!

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