So here's my narrative, fwiw, which is not much considering prior years' results
Concept #1 Correlation
We know from DFS that correlation will drive your score up, but this is via variance which has a downside. So, good for the finals but not necessarily good for the contest regular season.
So, if you can get multiple instances of correlation, this helps mitigate the negative variance potential from the regular season.
But, it also means you should not be thinking about correlation from Burrows/Chase/Mixon because you wont be able to fund multiple instances of correlation.
That's how I arrived at having Rodgers/Wilson/Conklin/(kicker), Goff/Gibbs/LaPorta/(defense), Pickett/Warren/Pickens and some lesser correlations in my final roster.
More than 75% of my cap is from multiple players from the same teams.
I don't know if this will prove to be a winning strategy or not, but it's new for me and I haven't seen anyone advocate such, so at a minimum it will yield interesting results.
Starters:
QB Platoon Rodgers, Goff, Pickett
RB
Chubb,
Gibbs
WR
Wilson, Pickens
TE
Waller
Flex Dotson, Davis
PK Elliott (PHI)
TD Seattle
Flex Pool: Warren, Mosfert, Elliott, (Bourne, Dell), LaPorta, Conklin
Concept #2 Surviveability
Spent a lot of time and effort trying to "manage" bye week coverage. I ended up with most of my risk concentrated in W13 with Waller and Gabe Davis. However, with a roster of 22, 6 WRs and 3TEs I'm actually pretty comfortable with W13. Given Waller is 38% owned, and I only have 2 players from Ravens, Bills, Bears, Raiders, Vikings and Giants, I think I'm in relatively good shape.
Concept #3 Decent Floors without premium cost
Diversification with reasonable floors versus uber studs. In the RB/WR/TE pool, I'm only carrying one blue chip player in Chubb ($30), two near elites in Gibbs ($25) and Wilson ($29) and mid-high range at TE (Waller, $17). From there, the spend per player drops precipitously to Warren, Mostert and Elliott at RB ($7-$11), Dotson and Davis at WR ($12-14) and Conklin and Laporta at TE ($7-9). Bourne and Dell ($3-4) I don't think of as part of my flex pool, but I might get 4-5 weeks out of Bourne and a couple weeks out of Dell.
Concept #4 Known path to possible ceiling
You want reasonable floors from your flex pool so you can count on some amount of modest scoring from your flex pool when starter(s) are on bye or become injured....but ultimately you want to find players with a known path to exceeding expectation, as such:
Warren - LOTS of carries from Najee last year...will those tires get bald?
Mostert - Wilson and the rookie are already gimpy...it could stay that way
Elliott - does he squeeze out a larger touch % by solid performance in short yardage?
Dotson - young player growth, what happens to his targets if scary terry gets injured?
Davis - apparently played most of last year gimped up...remember his playoffs the year before
LaPorta - the new tight end in Detroit. hello.
Conklin - when Rodgers trusts his tight end, the relationship because second favorite target.
Bourne - the competition is Parker, JJSS and Gesiki (all gimpy), Henry and rookie WRs
Dell $3 splash maker in pre-season. Houston won't suck as bad as Arizona. lol.
Correlations and flex pool bye week details are here:
Roster Analysis