The Scouts Desk

How the Zero RB strategy can win your fantasy football championship

by
Scoops
August 26, 2026

The “Zero RB” strategy involves prioritizing wide receivers, tight ends, and quarterbacks in early fantasy football draft rounds.
This approach intentionally passes on top running backs, capitalizing on their high injury rates and performance volatility.

One of the most-repeated pieces of advice for fantasy football drafts is that in order to win, “you need to zig when other people zag.”

While that’s pretty easy to remember, it’s a little more difficult to accomplish. How does one go about all this zigging and zagging?

Well, it’s easy to follow the crowd – whether you’re using a popular fantasy cheat sheet or focusing on average draft position (ADP) when you’re picking. But if everyone is doing the same thing, the person who bucks the trend has an opportunity to gain a significant advantage.

That’s where the Zero RB draft strategy comes in.

What is the Zero RB strategy?

What’s now known as the Zero RB strategy was first introduced in 2013 by fantasy football analyst Shawn Siegele in his groundbreaking article “Zero RB, Antifragility, and the Myth of Value-Based Drafting.”

While it’s impossible to outline his complete theory here (without the threat of legal action), the basic idea is that fantasy football drafters have historically placed too much importance on running backs. Sure, the big stars rack up huge numbers both rushing and receiving. But they often get hurt and/or underperform, making it hard to live up to their high draft position.

Siegele’s revolutionary idea was to use that volatility to one’s advantage by passing on not only the top running backs, but most all of the projected starters at the position in the early rounds. In place of them, target high-volume receivers (who typically get hurt less frequently) to gain a significant advantage at the position over every other team in the league. Focus exclusively on wideouts – and even get a starting tight end and quarterback – before turning to the running back position last. (Hence the “Zero RB” name.)

The running backs remaining on the draft board are going to be almost exclusively backups or role players. But that’s fine. Try to find the ones with the highest upside when injuries to the starters eventually come. Throw as many darts as you can and then scour the waiver wire for replacements during the season.

Does Zero RB really work?

Siegele certainly has an impressive track record with the strategy, winning the 2013 NFFC Primetime championship, as well as 11 NFFC Main Event league titles.

The idea behind it is to have an advantage over your opponents at all the other positions, while gradually improving your stable of running backs by the time the league playoffs roll around. That’s the primary takeaway: Your main goal isn’t to have the best team coming out of the draft, it’s to have the best one at the end of the season.

Zero RB wins in 2025

While no strategy is foolproof, fantasy managers who embrace Zero RB in the draft will usually be more aggressive in finding potential breakouts. Even though 2025 wasn’t a banner year for many Zero RB targets, some were still able to deliver second-tier production after pick 100 last season:

Statistical info from FantasyData.com

2024 wins included Chase Brown (RB36 to RB10), Chuba Hubbard (RB42 to RB13), Bucky Irving (RB54 to RB15)