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The punt blocks build isn’t nearly as well-known or as popular as builds like punt FG% or punt FT%. It’s a championship-winning strategy when implemented properly, but it’s usually not the first choice of many fantasy managers. Expect that to change over the next decade. In fact, this could end up being the go-to punting strategy for a majority of fantasy players as soon as next season. All it will take is one more jump from Victor Wembanyama to make this build arguably the most attractive build in category leagues. Given what we saw from the MVP favorite over the second half of the 2025-2026 regular season and during the Spurs’ run to the finals, the leap could come very soon. While the Frenchman is going to dominate the fantasy landscape for the next decade, the nature of his game makes the teams built around the big man easier to attack than teams built around the league’s other top fantasy options. There is no way to turn Nikola Jokic or Shai Gilgeous-Alexander into just another first-round player. The lines the two MVPs produce are too balanced. At least for now, you can nullify much of the advantage the Wembanyama-led team has on most of the league by ignoring swats. The center will still be a top-end fantasy weapon when blocks don’t matter, but he will be much less scary to face off against if your path to victory isn’t dependent on winning swats. To give you an idea of how effective punting blocks is at taking the former first-overall pick down a notch, let’s take a look at Wembanyama’s 2025-2026 final per-game rankings with and without blocks.
Nine-category: 2
Nine-category without blocks: 11
Eight-category: 2
Eight-category without blocks: 12
Punting blocks is not just about neutralizing Wembanyama. This is a classic build that has become even more effective as the NBA has transitioned to a more perimeter-oriented league. With very few teams running double-big lineups these days, finding quality sources of swats has become more difficult than ever. If you are working with a different build that is aiming to win blocks consistently, you will be competing with every other team in your league for a very small group of players who often don’t produce a ton of value outside of swats. When you pick up a player who can help lock up the category, you are often putting multiple categories at risk.
Punt blocks can be especially lethal in eight-category leagues. Turnovers not counting means that five of the eight remaining categories are categories that guards and wings tend to excel in. That unbalanced setup strengthens all small-ball builds. While punt FG% tends to be the go-to for most fantasy players looking to build a small-ball team in eight-category leagues, you shouldn’t commit to that strategy without first sitting down and figuring out whether a punt blocks setup would be a better approach. There are strong arguments on both sides of that debate. Punt FG% has a higher ceiling because it increases the value of guards more than the punt blocks strategy does. However, it is also a harder strategy to pull off and comes with a lower floor. That lower floor is due to the popularity of punt FG% and the lack of obvious big man targets for the build. In most competitive 12-team leagues, there will be three or four punt FG% teams competing for the same small group of bigs. All it will take is one unfortunately-timed big man run to put you in a very tough spot. When you punt blocks, missing out on bigs is less of a worry. It’s rare for a draft to contain more than one or two punt blocks teams, so you should be able to get your top big man targets around their ADP.
Even if you don’t plan on utilizing this strategy, you should familiarize yourself with it. It is a strategy that works very well as a mid-draft pivot. The early rounds don’t always go your way, so it’s important to have a backup strategy or two going into your draft. Punt blocks tends to be one of the easier builds to switch to after the first few rounds because there are not a lot of early-round options that make a switch to the strategy inadvisable. It pairs nicely with almost all of the first-round guards and is only a no-go zone if you come away from the first two rounds with one or more of Wembanyama, Anthony Davis, Scottie Barnes, or Chet Holmgren on your roster.
For access to the full guides, follow these links:
2026-2027 Punt Blocks Guide (Yahoo)
2026-2027 Punt Blocks Guide (ESPN) – To be added shortly
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