This article is part of our Fantasy Football Draft Strategy series.
Last year I wrote an article for RotoWire featuring seven tips to give you a winning edge in guillotine leagues. Apparently my league mates didn't read the article because I rode that strategy all the way to winning the championship with just a couple of scares along the way!
This article is intended to help you build your draft board with the unique rules of a guillotine league in mind. When you're drafting in a 17- or 18-team league, your roster is going to be stretched thin, and every team is going to have weaknesses. There are a few guidelines you can follow to give yourself the best chance to last until the end.
What is a Guillotine League?
In a guillotine league, you don't face just one opponent each week. Instead, you compete against every team in your league. The objective is simple: don't be the worst team in any given week. The team with the lowest score each week is eliminated, and their players are put on waivers, giving the remaining teams a chance to claim them. This process continues each week until one champion remains.
Typically, you will start with 17 or 18 teams, with no divisions or set schedule, but you could start the league or end the league at any point, so the number of teams is up to you. There are fantasy sites that specifically offer guillotine leagues, but you really can play on any platform. (We run my guillotine league on ESPN, and the commissioner just has to manually drop the players from the eliminated team each week. We also have several bench spots available, while some other leagues don't.) Some variations include starting a team defense and kicker, while others may exclude these positions. Always check your league's specific rules and settings to ensure you're fully prepared.
Guillotine League Strategy & Advice
1. Draft a balanced roster.
Although strategies like "Zero RB" can be effective in traditional redraft leagues, a more balanced approach is advisable in a guillotine league. Focus on assembling the strongest starting lineup you can in the early rounds. You can focus on building depth as the season progresses.
2. Make "safe" draft picks.
You don't need the highest-scoring team; you just need to avoid being the lowest scorer. Instead of going for big risks, focus on players who get consistent touches. Aim for stability in your lineup by selecting players with reliable, high floors.
- Draft Chris Olave, not Marvin Harrison
- Draft Jake Ferguson or David Njoku, not Brock Bowers
3. Avoid pairing and stacking players who have early bye weeks.
An A.J. Brown, Jalen Hurts and Dallas Goedert stack may seem like a great idea, but it will backfire when you've got them all on bye in Week 5. Unless you are going to be very aggressive with waiver bids in the first month of the season, you probably will not be able to build enough depth to make up for multiple star players sitting in Weeks 5 or 6. Nearly every Chargers, Eagles, Titans, Lions, Vikings, Chiefs, Rams and Dolphins player takes a slight dip in my rankings because of an early bye.
- Draft Chase Brown, not Tyjae Spears
- Draft Jonathan Taylor, not Jahmyr Gibbs
4. Pick players with favorable schedules and avoid players with tough schedules early in the season.
I refer to RotoWire's Strength of Schedule tool to find advantages. It helps me find the best matchups using rankings that are adjusted for quality of opponent, and I can custom sort by any time period. For this exercise, I looked at the first four weeks.
- Draft Baker Mayfield, not Justin Herbert
- Draft Najee Harris, not Kenneth Walker
- Draft Mike Evans, not Davante Adams
5. Monitor injury reports and suspensions.
This may seem obvious, but it's especially crucial in a guillotine league. With player depth being a concern during the early weeks of the season, a single poor performance could end your season.
- Draft Jaxon Smith-Njigba, not Marquise Brown
- Draft Javonte Williams, not Jonathon Brooks
6. Try to grab a top-5 TE.
Gain an advantage by focusing on a scarce position. With the emergence of Dalton Kincaid, Trey McBride and Sam LaPorta, I don't feel as strongly about this strategy as I did in previous years because I believe there are more 900-yard potential tight ends than ever before. However, in a league like this, the gap between the No. 5 tight end and the No. 18 is still massive.
As teams are eliminated, you'll have ample chances to pick up their top QBs, RBs and WRs from waivers.
- Draft Mark Andrews over Malik Nabers
- Draft Travis Kelce over Davante Adams
7. Push QBs down the draft board.
I absolutely want to have either Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts or Lamar Jackson on my roster by midseason, but I won't be drafting any of them. I would rather draft positional players who I can count on to get targets or carries early in the draft. I feel confident that there are about 20 different quarterbacks who will produce enough the first few weeks to keep me alive, which means I wouldn't be surprised if I'm the last person to pick a QB in my guillotine league this season.
8. Act swiftly on the waiver wire when a team is eliminated and a top player at a position becomes available. But don't go "all-in" until late in the season.
Mahomes, Allen, Hurts, Jackson, Christian McCaffrey, Breece Hall, Bijan Robinson, Justin Jefferson, Ja'Marr Chase, Tyreek Hill, CeeDee Lamb, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Travis Kelce and Sam LaPorta are players that I want to get on my roster as soon as possible. However, I expect to compete deep into the season and need to make sure that I maintain a budget that will allow me to keep getting better every week. I avoid spending more than 25% of my budget on any one player during the first half of the season, unless I have an injury to one of my top players and am desperate to replace him.
