Becoming a Best Ball Bro: What Have We Learned?

JJ Zachariason (0:00)

Rich, man, it's the last Becoming a Best Ball Bro episode. How are you feeling?

Rich Ryan (0:05)

You know, I can't believe we made it. I both think it's been a very long summer, but you blink and it's all over. The last drafts are popping off, and then just before you know it, the ball will be in the air, and the NFL will be under way.

JJ Zachariason (0:20)

Yeah, look, I gotta say, it's been a pleasure doing the show with you. You know, chopping it up every week. One of the highlights of my week each week. With that being said, the end of Becoming a Best Ball Bro means that it's the end of best ball season and drafting season. And one thing I won't miss, Rich, is drafting Drake London and Kyle Pitts and having some moron draft Kirk Cousins in the eighth round for absolutely no freaking reason. I'm JJ, and I've been playing in best ball leagues for years. But there are people out there who play a lot more than I do, and there are people out there who have won a lot more than I have. And I want to learn from them. This season, I'll be documenting my journey of Max entering Underdog's Best Ball Mania Contest. And I'll be doing so with guidance from some of the most successful best ball players on the planet. This is the year where things start to change. This is the year where I officially become a Best Ball Bro.

Welcome in to another episode of Becoming a Best Ball Bro. I'm JJ Zachariason, joined as always for one final time, hopefully just this summer. Maybe we'll run it back next year. But one final time, Rich Ryan. Rich, what's going on, brother?

Rich Ryan (1:39)

If I'm so lucky, it's been a blast potting with you. I'm gonna savor the next 40 minutes or an hour. Had a great draft weekend back east, back west, to finish up these drafts, get the season ready, and yeah, I can't wait.

JJ Zachariason (1:52)

That's right, you had your draft, I had my home league draft as well over the weekend. Did everything go well for you?

Rich Ryan (1:58)

Yeah, I mean, night one, everyone went a little too hard. We forgot that we're all in our mid to late 30s, and we're all dads now. I think we counted, I think combined, we all have 16 kids now. I mean, it's a 14-team league, but just kids everywhere, and yeah, everyone thought they were a little younger than they were on night one.

JJ Zachariason (2:16)

Oh yeah, that's always how it goes, always how it goes. I had my homelink draft too, walked away, I had nice cheap keepers in Tankdell and Devon Achan, two guys that I was pretty into last year. And so, it was nice starting the draft with above average keepers, it was a nice little auction draft. And it was just, we're all over the country, like I said, so we were all on like a video call, just talking you know what to each other throughout the entire draft as it goes.

Rich Ryan (2:45)

I was sweating the drafts order randomization for us, because I kept Breeze in the first round. So obviously, I want as late a pick as possible. So I actually ended up getting pick 12, and on the return, I got Drake London, which like 20 players were kept. And for me to get London at 16 was pretty an amazing start, better than I could have asked for.

JJ Zachariason (3:05)

Yeah, you should feel good about that for sure. So look, Becoming a Best Ball Bro, this is I think episode 15 that we've done this summer, started in May, ending here at the end of August. We've had amazing guests throughout the summer. We've had former BBM winners. We've had complete nerds and stat nerds that dig into this stuff. Shout out Mike Leone. We've had folks who have more of a vibes-based approach. We just had really, really smart people on this show. I feel very lucky that I've been able to talk to them and we've been able to dissect some of that stuff. But I think the thing that we need to do is just talk about some of the stuff that we've learned throughout this journey. Because I know that this journey is a JJ Zachariason branded journey, but it's a journey for you too and a journey for everyone who's been listening to this show over the last few months. When I was at the Fantasy Football Expo, so many people were coming up to me talking about how much they appreciated the show and how much they were learning from it. And it was awesome.