Dynasty Roster Review: 5 Questions to Consider for Your Team
On the most recent Fantasy Footballers Dynasty Podcast, we talked through the process of how to review your dynasty roster.
The goal was to give some actionable advice based on five questions that could help you review your team. This article dives deeper into that discussion as well as highlights how you can use the projections in the Ultimate Draft Kit and rankings in the Dynasty Pass to give you a leg up on the competition.
Editors Note: Want more dynasty content? Check out Andy, Mike, and Jason’s exclusive rookie rankings, production profiles, and startup rankings found only in the Dynasty Pass, part of the UDK+ for 2026.
1. What is the season of your team?
I’ve shared this concept of “seasonality” many times on the podcast and with my friends. Seasonality is a great way to view many things in your life noticing the series of times and predictable changes within a calendar year.
For your dynasty team, are you rebuilding? Are you a contender? Are you unsure?
How are you determining the overall outlook for your team? The worst place to be is thinking you should be rebuilding when you have 4-5 players on your team ready to compete right now but you discredited them for “age concerns”. The other scenario could be equally as frustrating if you think your team can compete, you trade future assets, and you wind up being a bottom-5 team this year. We’ve all been there! There is also nothing wrong with being unsure about the trajectory of your team. It is better to be honest than delusional!
It starts with having conviction and a plan in place. Ask someone in our Discord to evaluate your team and observe if you are seeing your team in the right light. You might think you need to rebuild when the assets are there for your team to go for one more championship run. All you might need is another bench piece or two to take your team over the top!
Does it make sense to hoard a 27-year-old WR on his 4th team on your bench knowing your bench lacks any upside? Guys like Van Jefferson might have a shot to be the WR2 for Washington. However, he isn’t helping your team at all. Dropping players is often a fear-based game (“you can’t cut that guy!”) while recognizing 85% of your roster could be turned over within 3-4 years if you are in an active league.
2. Who is the core of your team?
This may be too simple of a question as you might scoff at listing the top 3-to-5 guys on your team.
The real task is doing that for every team in your league and then comparing. There are sites that rank your teams in each league and provide quantitative metrics but making a simple list or spreadsheet should not be overlooked.
Before someone else tells you how you should rank your league, what does your gut tell you? Write down the 3-5 players at first glance for each team in your league.
Afterwards, you can certainly compare with other sites to verify or cross reference our Dynasty Startup Rankings. Ask yourself:
- If you are in a SuperFlex league, do you have two of our top-15 QBs?
- At RB, do you have one of the top-10 guys?
- Do multiple WRs show up in your core?
- Do you have a positional advantage at the TE position?
There are endless questions you can ask but identifying your core comparatively to the rest of the league can can hopefully temper your fantasy hubris or squash your fears. I cannot tell you how many people live in “I don’t have any RBs”-ville but when they zoom out, they realize the rest of the league also is in a similar spot.
3. Who are you hoping “levels up” this year? Who are you counting on a breakout?
Is this the most tantalizing and addicting part of dynasty? We all have players sitting on our rosters we hope and pray could break out and prove everyone in our league wrong. Jack Bech anyone?
I put it out to X and the responses were wide ranging:
Name a player from your dynasty team you hope "levels up" in 2026.
Curious which names emerge…
— Kyle Borgognoni (@kyle_borg) June 22, 2026
Keep in mind there is a big difference between “I believe this player could level up” and “I need this player to level up”.
In this format, you are projecting over multiple years starting a dance between talent, age, pedigree, production, team situation, and contract status. There isn’t a perfect method but we are trying to set expectations regarding the possible results of a player while also recognizing there are so many more variables at play in football outside of our control.
Ask yourself the following questions trying to write down anything from generalized reactions to actual counting fantasy numbers.
- What is the most likely outcome?
- What is the best case scenario?
- What are you counting on for your team?
After gathering your short list together, ask a non-biased source to compare with you. Ok, let’s be honest: all of us are biased about dynasty. We bring in our pre-conceived notions and priors about talent evaluation and our experience rostering a player.
Take for instance Lions WR Isaac TeSlaa. The surprising 3rd round pick in 2025 is a tantalizing player in dynasty. You’ve seen flashes of upside and yet what you are hoping for might be very different than what is realistic as perhaps the 4th or 5th option in the Detroit passing game.
Cara Owsley/ The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
Maybe you are like me and you’ve faced these same questions:
- Is your blind optimism still causing you to hold onto a player?
- Is their NFL Draft capital or college highlights still ringing in your mind?
- Did that one quote from the head coach that one time stay with you?
- Are you still hot and bothered by that one training camp puff piece by that one beat reporter whose name is escaping you at the moment?
- Is their a chart you maybe saw one time scrolling through X but you can’t seem to find it anymore?
- Are you terrified of them going off after you’ve traded them to someone else’s team?
I get it. The emotional turmoil all of us undergo for a person we not only personally do not know but also likely will not be involved in the consciousness of fantasy football within 2-3 years is downright maddening (and stupid). I’ve tried to find the right word to describe this phenomenon in fantasy and I love the word myopia. It is essentially as synonym for “near-sightedness” or not seeing the whole and focusing on the part. Zoom out and see how this player fits historically and not just on your dynasty team.
I wrote a rather lengthy article entitled Dynasty WR Thresholds That Matter identifying a few thresholds for WRs finishing Year 1 & Year 2 in the NFL. I focused on routes-based data and compare them to their peers in the Dynasty Pass. It is so easy to experience #takelock with any prospect but instead of burying our heads in the sand, a year or two gives us data to work with and some semblance of reality.
4. What are your team’s biggest needs?
It might be as simple as a WR2 or a QB3 in a SuperFlex. Write them out. Put them in front of your face. However, I do want to give you a couple of categories to consider:
You Probably Need More RBs
Join the club! This problem isn’t exclusive just to dynasty. Most leagues start two RBs and given the scarcity of the position and the injury rates, we know it is a position that begs for depth. Actually, this is more than begging because dynasty managers will do desperate things just to find anyone to plug into an RB2 spot. For your bench, you want to be overweight (in comparison to QBs & TEs) with a mix of stand alone RBs, young insurance and lottery tickets.
Count By Targets
It can be fairly easy to peruse your roster and quickly check off a list “I have my WR1, WR2, and WR3, etc.” You can put your WRs to the test by analyzing your team in terms of projected targets and projected target share. If you are playing in a league that starts 2 WRs and two FLEX, do your top-4 WRs project to see at least an 80+ percent combined target share for 2026?
Using our projections in the Ultimate Draft Kit, perhaps your 4-pack at WR looks like this:
That is a solid group in dynasty but it is clear this team is counting on both Alec Pierce and Matthew Golden to be “nitro boosts” for the team and level up in 2026. The upside is immense for both but there also is a clear need for projectable targets and a weekly floor at the WR3 & WR4 spots. Perhaps sneaking in a veteran floor-based WR as part of a package deal (Jakobi Meyers? Wan’Dale Robinson?) gives your team flexibility and a chance to diversify the type of WRs you have on your roster. In dynasty, those older WRs do not carry much shine but they can also provide FLEX-worthy weeks for this roster.
How Old is Too Old?
Our Dynasty Lifecycle Series by Marvin Elequin is an excellent place to start if you want some cold, hard data on your aging players and the windows to try and trade them away. If you haven’t already, check out our breakdowns for each position:
- The Dynasty Lifecycle of Running Backs
- The Dynasty Lifecycle of Wide Receivers
- The Dynasty Lifecycle of Tight Ends
- The Dynasty Lifecycle of Quarterbacks
I simplified the data into this chart if you want a quick reference.
5. What are your trade window assets?
I wrote an article last year entitle (Dynasty Trade Windows: Timing the Market) which went into great detail about figuring out the when of dynasty trades. It is one thing to want to trade but timing your trade is incredibly important
Here is a general chart to file away, print out, and put on your fridge. Show your parents!
| Months | NFL Calendar | Rookies + Picks | Veterans |
| February | Coaching Hires + Rookie Scouting | Rising Value | Be willing to sell playoff darlings |
| March | Free Agency + Combine | 90+ % of value | Free Agency Boon |
| April | NFL Draft | Highest Value… maybe 120+ % | Overshadowed by rookies, undervalued |
| May | Post-NFL Draft | Post Draft Hype | Slight hit to older RBs and WR2s with incoming rookie hype |
| June & July | OTAs & Training Camp | Mix of summer hype + fluff pieces | Sell camp hype |
| August | Pre-Season | Depth Charts bring rookies out of the clouds | Backup RBs are volatile |
| Sept & Oct. | NFL Kickoff | Contenders can trade rookies/picks for productive vets | Now is the time to trade away before your league’s deadline |
| Nov-Dec. | End of Regular Season | Expect a sifting of your league: who is in and who is out for picks | Sell off aging or injured players for future assets |
| January | Playoffs | Get ready for things to rise | The value drops off a cliff |
Here are the quick takeaways worth adding:
- After the NFL season, we know the value in rookie picks only continues to rise.
- The cheapest rookie picks to acquire are further in the future.
- Create a list of future draft assets and compare how the rookie drafts have fared recently in your league. Future picks can be alluring but putting actual names and a range of outcomes to these players takes you out of fantasy land.
- Find a range of what a player might be worth, not one number from a website.