Fantasy Football Draft Analyst (MCP Server)

A live draft assistant. Connect it to Claude, sync your ESPN or Sleeper draft board, and ask "who should I pick?" at every turn. It answers with a recommendation, the reasoning, and the odds each player survives to your next pick.

Tested end to end against live data: 631 players (551 veterans, 80 rookies) modelled from 247,284 plays across five seasons, priced against real 2026 preseason consensus.

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Quick start

git clone https://github.com/OWNER/ff-draft-mcp.git
cd ff-draft-mcp
pip install -e .

# One-time data build (~3-6 min; downloads 5 seasons, then caches)
python setup_data.py

Add to claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fantasy-draft": {
      "command": "python",
      "args": ["-m", "ffdraft.server"],
      "env": {
        "FFDRAFT_SEASON": "2026",
        "ESPN_SWID": "optional-for-private-espn-leagues",
        "ESPN_S2": "optional-for-private-espn-leagues"
      }
    }
  }
}

Then in Claude:

Set up my home league: 10 teams, full PPR, I pick 4th.
Set up my work league: 13 teams, half PPR, I pick 11th.
Switch to home. Sync my Sleeper draft 1234567890. Who should I pick?

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Documentation

Guide	What's in it
Quickstart	Install to first recommendation in ten minutes
Tool reference	Every tool, argument and environment variable
Methodology	How projections work and why the defaults are what they are
Troubleshooting	When something looks wrong
Examples	A full draft session, prompt snippets, sample ADP file
Security	ESPN cookies, network access, what's stored locally
Contributing	Tests, lint, and the bar for model changes
Changelog	Release history

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What it does

Recommends picks by opportunity cost, not raw value. Knowing a player is good is easy; knowing whether he'll still be there at your next turn is what decides who to take now. For each position the model walks the board top-down, accumulating the probability every better player is gone, and values a pick by its marginal gain over waiting.

At pick 6 with the top five off the board, that means recommending Amon-Ra St. Brown over Josh Allen — Allen grades as the highest-value player left, but has a 73% chance of lasting to pick 19, and the receiver has 8%.

Projects players from five seasons of open data. Offensive line from adjusted line yards and pressure allowed, neutral-script pace and run/pass split, five-year defensive strength by position, divisional schedule, injury history crossed with workload burden, positional aging curves. Computed from raw plays rather than scraped from ranking tables, so it recomputes under your scoring and doesn't break when a website changes its HTML.

Optimises for consistency. The default leans toward week-to-week reliability over raw ceiling. Tune it with one number.

Handles your actual leagues. PPR, half PPR, standard, superflex, TE premium, any size, any slot. Multiple leagues side by side with separate boards and drafts.

Separation and route efficiency from NGS tracking data — the open-data stand-in for paywalled charting. Validated against a published PFF table: TPRR within a few hundredths, ordering correct.

Rookies projected from draft capital, fitted to ten years of first-year outcomes.

Live sync from Sleeper (public API, no credentials), ESPN, or paste from anywhere.

Name matching that survives real drafts — JSN, CMC, Bijan, Hollywood Brown, Joshua Palmer, and typos. Ambiguous names name their candidates rather than guessing.

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Tools

Tool	What it does
configure_league	Create or update a named league; makes it active
list_leagues	All your leagues and which is active
switch_league	Change active league; board and draft resume instantly
remove_league	Delete a league and its draft history
refresh_data	Rebuild the board from source. Run once before draft day
sync_draft	Pull the live board from Sleeper, ESPN, or pasted text
who_should_i_pick	The main one. Recommendation + reasoning for the pick on the clock
best_available	Next best players, sortable by value, consistency, or ADP bargain
record_pick / undo_pick / reset_draft	Manual board management
draft_status	Your roster and where the draft stands
prewarm	Build all caches before draft day so nothing computes on the clock
rookie_report	This year's rookie class, projected from draft capital
resolve_names	Check how names resolve before trusting a paste sync
separation_report	Separation, cushion, YPRR, TPRR — the open-data PFF analogue
value_picks	Where the model disagrees with the draft market
draft_value_history	Backtest: preseason rank vs actual finish, by round and position
persistent_value_players	Players who beat their draft cost year after year
player_report	Every modelled factor for one player
compare_players	Head to head, up to four
team_context	O-line ranks, pace, run/pass split, schedule for an NFL team
defense_report	Fantasy points allowed by position, 5-year view
plan_my_draft	Simulate all 16 of your picks from your slot
model_settings	Retune factor weights

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Data attribution

This project computes everything from open sources and ships no third-party data:

• nflverse — play-by-play, weekly stats, snap counts, injury reports, rosters, schedules, draft picks, combine.
• NFL Next Gen Stats (mirrored by nflverse) — separation, cushion, YAC over expected.
• dynastyprocess/data — FantasyPros expert consensus rank history.

Please respect the terms of those upstream projects. Nothing here scrapes paywalled sources, and no proprietary data is redistributed.