Pig in a Poke: Why Brandon Aubrey Is Aubrey-ously Not Worth the Draft-Day Cost
Here at PigskinFantasy, we’ve built a website designed to help you become a better fantasy football player, make you laugh once in a while, and occasionally leave you with a little piece of knowledge you can use outside of fantasy football.
It’s been awhile since our last “Pig in a Poke”. If you need a refresher on what the heck we are talking about, check the end of the article.
Otherwise, lets dive in:
Yes, kickers are people too. And just like RBs and WRs they can lull you into drafting them above their value.
Brandon Aubrey — K
Brandon Aubrey is the ultimate example of a kicker who is too good to ignore but too expensive to draft. Aubrey has been outstanding since entering the NFL, finishing among the top three fantasy kickers in each of his first three seasons. In his first three seasons in the NFL, Aubrey has finished as K1, K1 and K3. He has more 50 yard field goals over the last three years than any other kicker and holds the record for most field goals over 60 yards.
PFF currently considers him the one kicker worthy of being drafted earlier than the final rounds. The problem is that fantasy managers are now paying a premium for that consistency: Aubrey is the No. 1 kicker by ADP and FantasyPros Real Time ADP has him being drafted at pick 9.10. That’s the 9th round for those of you who get confused by decimals.
Aubrey’s leg isn’t the concern. The draft capital is. Kicker production is heavily dependent on opportunities, and even the best kicker in the league needs his offense to consistently move the ball into scoring range without finishing every drive with a touchdown. More importantly, waiting until the final rounds allows you to find a kicker capable of producing a surprisingly small number of points fewer than the position’s elite options. Current fantasy draft strategy, by those that know what they are doing, generally recommends waiting until the final round to select a kicker.
Aubrey entered the 2025 season as the consensus No. 1 kicker after finishing as the top fantasy kicker in each of his first two NFL seasons. Fantasy managers responded by drafting him well ahead of the rest of the position. The assumption was simple: if you wanted the best kicker, you had to pay for Aubrey.
Except that’s not quite how 2025 worked out.
Aubrey finished the season as K3, while Ka’imi Fairbairn led all kickers in fantasy points per game and Jason Myers led the league in total fantasy points by a kicker.
That’s the problem with drafting Aubrey early. You’re not just betting on him being great (he probably will be). You’re betting that he will be great enough to justify the opportunity cost of the pick.
The fantasy community is once again treating Aubrey as a premium pick at the position. But the difference between Aubrey and the kickers available later in the draft simply isn’t large enough to justify spending meaningful draft capital on him. Fairbairn and Myers demonstrated that point perfectly last season: the kickers who were drafted significantly later (on average three or more rounds later) wound up producing better than the guy everyone paid a premium to acquire.
PigskinFantasy isn’t interested in making the same mistake twice.
Don’t pay top dollar for the pig when there’s plenty of bacon left on the shelf.
A Pig in a Poke Explained
Like the merchants of the 1500s, fantasy managers who buy into a player without fully inspecting what they’re purchasing may discover they’ve drafted a pig in a poke.
Unless you’ve got a little gray in your beard, you’ve probably never heard the phrase.
Dating back to the 1500s, a pig in a poke referred to buying something without inspecting it first. Merchants sold pigs tied inside bags—called pokes—but dishonest sellers would sometimes substitute a cheaper animal, like a cat, leaving buyers disappointed and lighter in the purse.
The lesson? Never buy something sight unseen.
That same principle applies to fantasy football.