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Drafting from Nomination Slot 1 ($60+): Getting the Most From the Elite Tier Tier

Auction logic centers on budget allocation: how many dollars are left after each nomination.

Nomination Slot 1: Elite Tier ($60+)

PlayerPosTeamTier
Bijan RobinsonRBATLA2
Jahmyr GibbsRBDETA2
Puka NacuaWRLARB1
Full 16-Tier Budget Ladder
SlotTierRange
1Elite Tier$60+
2Elite Tier$50-$59
3Stud Tier$42-$49
4Stud Tier$36-$41
5High-End Starter$31-$35
6High-End Starter$27-$30
7Solid Starter$23-$26
8Solid Starter$20-$22
9Value Starter$17-$19
10Value Starter$15-$16
11Flex Value$13-$14
12Flex Value$11-$12
13Bench Depth$8-$10
14Bench Depth$6-$7
15Depth Bombs$3-$5
16Depth Bombs$1-$10

Trade Logic

Nominating into the Elite Tier ($60+) at slot 1 is a budget call, not a pick trade — auction has no draft-slot trading, only dollars left after each nomination. Skip the top of this bracket and the same Elite Tier keeps going right behind it at $50-$59 — reallocate those saved dollars to the cheaper half of the exact same bracket instead of paying its top price. Spend up here and you lock in the top of the Elite Tier outright — there is no richer bucket above it to chase instead. Nomination order is the whole game at this budget level: throw this tier out early while every room still has money, or hold back and let the market's own dollars do the work of driving the price up on someone else's turn.

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Sleepers & Fades

Amon-Ra St. Brown (DET, WR) is the budget-risk-allocation case at this nomination slot: he sits in the cheaper half of the Elite Tier bracket at $50-$59, against $60+ for the pricier half of that same tier. Tier B1, ECR 12, his std_dev of 1.3 is tight enough that the room has already priced him correctly — no discount left to find. Same name-quality range, different dollars — the whole allocation call is which half of the Elite Tier bracket you buy into, not which player. Nominate him early while the room still has Elite Tier money on the table, or hold your bid and let the cheaper half of the bracket come to you once the tier thins out and owners start shopping down. Either way, the dollars you save inside this one bracket are the entire edge — there is no separate skill read to make on top of it.