January ADP Risers And Fallers: Top 5 Rounds Edition

Welcome back! We’re just a month and change away from those glorious “Pitchers and Catchers Report” days. But draft season has gone full throttle pretty much since the 2025 regular season ended. I personally had the discipline to wait and wait and wait….until the World Series ended and the NFBC flipped the site over to 2026. 

What can I say, I love drafts. But for you saner folk, maybe now is the time to start checking in. Well, if that’s the case, I am here to fill you in on some draft trends that have taken place in the last 3.5 months. I am going to compare Average Draft Positions (ADP) from NFBC Draft Champions that ended by 12/31/2025 vs. ADPs since the new year. For today, I look at the first 5 rounds, and since it’s a 15-team format, that means it’s the top 75 players. I’ll highlight movers that I find interesting.

Ryan Bloomberg has an ADP tracker as part of the “Bubba and the Bloom” Patreon subscriber service. I use those for January ADPs, as these include drafts that are still ongoing. Also, a plug, subscribe to their Patreon! (no I don’t get a commission, but they do great work and are super nice guys).

And a refresher if you are not familiar with NFBC Draft Champions. They are almost exclusively slow drafts where you pick 50 players each. There is no FAAB, so this is your roster for the season. 

Interesting Risers

Ryan Helsley 110.16 to 61.6

Devin Williams 77.13 to 45.1

Closers as a group have their own economy, as Rotowire’s Jeff Erickson often says. They can go in very different spots depending on the dynamics of a draft. I only looked at draft and holds for this exercise, and that format tends to push closers up since there’s no FAAB to pick up guys that get a gig during the season. When FAAB leagues start, these prices likely decline.

But even though it’s apples to apples here, the top finishers have pretty much all flown up the boards from early draft season to now. Still, it makes some sense that they’ve popped even further as a group. 10-12 teams do not have an obvious set guy right now, so the ones that have clear jobs really come at a premium. In a 15 team draft with an overall contest like Draft Champions, you need to make sure to get one and maybe 2 of them.

The top two movers stand out above all, though. Ryan Helsley started 2025 as the Cards closer and one of the top guys in the league. He ended it as a low leverage reliever on the Mets. I’m a Mets fan, I loved the acquisition and that they kept letting him enter to “Hells Bells” even though he was ostensibly the 8th inning guy and they usually don’t get the whole light show treatment. But ouch, what a dumpster fire as he finished his 20 innings in Queens with a 7.20 ERA and 1.80 WHIP. When the season ended, it was unclear he’d land a closer gig.

Well, he did, and in an excellent spot as the Orioles look primed to contend, and he’s the unchallenged guy. I’m just not sure he’s still a good pitcher. He had a pitch tipping issue for the Mets, so presumably, he will fix that in the offseason. But his K-BB% declined for the 4th straight season. It was a lights out 31% in 2022, but just 15.1% by 2025. He still throws 99 mph heat but his SwStr% peaked at 18.9% and is now 14.9%. I’d probably still draft him at cost. He lines up to go around the 4-5 turn, and if I’m sitting near there, I’d have to wait nearly two full rounds until I pick again, so there’s a good chance I’m taking a closer where he goes.

Devin Williams had the opposite trajectory. He began as the Yankees closer but gagged that spot up early. But then he ultimately thrived in a setup role. He had an ugly 4.79 ERA and subpar 1.13 WHIP on the year, but from August 10th on, it was 2.50 and .89 with a lights out Airbender-ific 48.6% K%. He entered the offseason likely to get a closer gig, but it’s never an absolute certainty (see, Suarez, Robert). But of course he signed up for a good one with the Mets. If you believe he “can’t handle the New Yawk spotlight” you probably listen to WFAN sports radio too much. I will admit it’s possible, who really knows? It just seems more likely he had early season sample size hiccups in the Bronx before returning to his career form. I don’t love taking a closer in the first 3 rounds though, like Helsley, I’d consider Williams if I picked on the 3-4 turn. 

Ben Rice 62.3 to 49.7

Rice, Rice Baby! I really can’t argue with this one and have indeed drafted him at cost. He’s going to get every day AB’s at first base for the Yankees, and we can slot him in at Catcher in Fantasy. Sign me up! Oh, and he’s a Statcast God

There’s just one question mark. Will he get a full run vs. lefties, and if yes, is he any good at it? Ok, that’s technically two question marks.

In 119 PA’s vs. southpaws last year, Rice hit just .208 with a 104 wRC+, vs. .269 and 141 vs. righties. The Yanks don’t have an obvious platoon partner on the roster right now unless they want to shoehorn Paul DeJong in there. Let’s hope they just let Rice cook.

Jesus Luzardo 77.31 to 69.2

The big question with Luzardo is always health. When he’s on the mound and not ailing, he’s generally excellent. He threw 183.2 IP last year with a 3.92 ERA and 1.22 WHIP, and that’s despite an insanely bad 2-game stretch in late May-early June where he gave up 20 ER and 26 H+BB in just 5.2 IP. On the year, his 28.7% K% to 7.5% BB%, 30.8% Whiff% 3.34 xERA, and 3.40 SIERA suggest he pitched like a near ace. He’s coming off the board at about SP18, so he’s ideally your SP2 but a risky SP1 given the sturdiness concerns.  Other SPs in his range include Blake Snell, Kyle Bradish, and Spencer Schwellenback, and they have similar upsides with durability concerns, so it’s a nice spot to take a shot on a potential ace.

Interesting Fallers

Mookie Betts 48.97 to 61.8

The Dodgers versatile bowling superstar had already taken a tumble vs. last year as he was a mid 2nd rounder in 15’s in 2025. Now he’s dropped more to the early 5th round. We always seem to get early victory laps on the X machine when a pick like this goes well. And hey, it could happen. He’s 33 years old and hitting at the top of the Galacticos batting order. His accumulation stats will look great assuming he stays upright. Mookie still controls the strike zone like a zen master as he had a career low 10.2% K% and a 9.2% BB%. Unfortunately, that came with a career low 35.8% HardHit%, 5.5% Barrel%, which was his worst since 2016. He hit a career low .258 with 20 homers in 663 PA’s. 

The bull case here is that it was not physically right, as he had that stomach bug in Japan that caused him to drop a lot of weight. And he’s a relatively small guy to begin with. An offseason filled with kegging and protein, maybe, gets him right? The bear case is that he’s on the downslope of a HOF career. He doesn’t run much anymore, as he had just 8 steals, and that’s not optimal for a Fantasy MI. My theory on these kinds of decliners is that you need a much bigger dip to make it worth taking a shot. George Springer and Byron Buxton won many a league for their owners last season, but they went much later than this.

Rafael Devers 55.64 to 68.5 

I’m not 100% sure why Devers has dropped. He’s just 1B eligible now and moved to a tougher ballpark with the trade to San Francisco. But we knew all that in October. He still popped 35 homers last year with 99 runs and 109 BI’s. His Avg dipped to .252, his worst since 2018, with a career high 26.2% K%. He also walked at a career high 15.4%, which helps in real life, but I guess suggests an issue in SF as he’s a guy that can get pitched around in this lineup. He’s got 5th percentile sprint speed, so he’s not stealing any bases or scoring from 1st on many singles. 

My best guess, though, is that he dropped when projections came out, and they all suggest he will hit in the .250 range again. That drops him to essentially a 3 category guy in a mediocre lineup and a tough hitters park. Michael Busch, to name one guy, has a similar skill set 50 picks later. I’d still take Devers at cost, though.  I can also make the case that Matt Olson is similar too, and he goes a round ahead of Devers.

Blake Snell 61.93 to 71.2

There’s no particular reason Snell should drop. He’s absolutely an ace. Snell has two Cy Youngs and a 3.15 career ERA with a 30.1% K%. His only bugaboo is that he walks guys, but it’s not a control thing with him; he just does not give in. And he can get away with it since he’s got a good chance to whiff the next guy up. Snell does not get priced as an SP1 because he’s only exceeded 130 IP twice in his career, his Cy Young 180 IP seasons. And there’s little chance he’s a workhouse in 2026. The Dodgers only care about how they line up in October. Lots of teams say they’ll run a 6 man rotation, but the Dodgers will actually do it. And anyone with the slightest ding will hit the IL and stay there as long as possible. Snell is projected for about 155-160 IP, but I would take the under. I’m fine drafting him here, but if I do, I really need to pair him with a workhorse or three. I would rather take a shot on Luzardo at the same price. Both have injury concerns, but the Phillies do not have the luxury of slowing Luzardo down.