If you have played fantasy football for at least a few years now, it is probably evident to you that conquering the waiver wire is critical to winning championships. Sure the draft is incredibly important, but when injuries occur or hidden gems break out, raiding the free agent pool is just as vital. Basically what I'm saying is that winning in fantasy football is just as much about hitting on your early draft picks as it is about weathering the storm in your roster management towards the bottom of your depth chart.

With a widely accepted understanding of that, it surprises me how many people set their lineups each week simply based off of the previous week's box score and baseline ESPN or Yahoo! projections.

Let me give you some advice:

Watch more football and read less box scores.

When looking on the waive wire, it is rare that a player with consistently good stats each week will just be sitting there, but rather guys with inconsistent targets or reps will more often be available for the taking. It's the fantasy owner's job to sift through misfits and find the gems.

Take Jay Ajayi last season for example. The guy began camp as the starter, quickly lost his job to Arian Foster and the committee of fantasy football nostalgia, then subsequently bottomed out before Week 1 when he was disgruntled to the point of deactivation for the team's trip to Seattle. Safe to say that Ajayi went undrafted in about 99-percent of leagues after that rollercoaster preseason. Fast forward to Week 6 however, and beyond belief of the casual football fan, he busted out for 204 rushing yards against the Steelers and then followed it up with a second consecutive week of 200-plus rushing yards against the Bills in Week 7. After starting just 12 games, Ajayi managed to rack up over 1,200 rushing yards and eight touchdowns, cementing himself inside the top-five at the fantasy running back position for 2016. What a surprising season, well for those who don't attentively watch football. However, for those of us who had watched Ajayi in preseason, in the season prior, and far back to his Boise State days, we knew what kind of talent that he possessed and how well his game would translate into the NFL. What us football watching few also knew was how bad the Steelers looked in the three weeks prior against the run -- despite them allowing over 100 yards just once -- which would eventually allow for Ajayi's breakout performance.

Gaining the edge against the rest of your league when looking to find bargain waiver pickups before they pop is to watch games and use context like you should have with Ajayi last season. He was in a situation behind an injury prone running back who was handed the starting job without earning it. The second I watched Foster's first game of the season I went out and picked up Ajayi -- and the guy wasn't even on the active roster at the moment. I had confidence in my ability to evaluate talent when watching games to the point that I knew that Ajayi was the most talented back that the Dolphins owned the rights to, and that Foster had nothing left in the tank. As the weeks wore on and it became clear to a stubborn coaching staff that Arian Foster didn't have it anymore, Ajayi was eventually activated and slowly worked back into the running back rotation. You would have missed it if you just looked at the box scores, as the Dolphins running game was producing close to nothing at all, but after just two weeks with Ajayi as the "starting back," it was clear that he wasn't giving it back. The fantasy community's beloved Foster up and retired after reality set in, confirming Ajayi's arrival.

Getting that type of dominance from a waiver pickup is what wins fantasy championships. And making sure that you got J-Train and started him in time for the Steelers game takes a trained football watching eye as much as it takes hours of reading fantasy football articles and much more than it takes of just minutes reading little blurbs next to players names on your roster.

In hopes of grabbing yourself another Jay Ajayi in this upcoming season, make sure to take the actual game of football more seriously. Watch the damn games and do it with a purpose.

- Take note of a team's starting skill position players and if they seem vulnerable or not -- whether through being banged up or ineffectiveness.

- Take note of a team's defense. Look to see if their defensive tackles fall for traps easily and use that to your advantage when they play an offense that likes to pull their offensive linemen often.

- Can their linebackers cover? If not, maybe you should stream your tight end based off of matchup for the week.

- Keep an eye on cornerbacks and see if they get beat deep. Only completions show up on the stat sheet, but if a corner gets beat off the ball a lot, he is likely to give up touchdowns eventually.

- Keep an eye on a team's nickel defenders. If they don't have an effective slot corner or hybrid safety, it might be time to start Cole Beasley that week.

- And most importantly, keep track of how backups perform when given opportunities, or even when they are on special teams. Limited reps on offense and special teams reps certainly don't pop on box scores, but consistent positive performance in these types of situations gives coaches confidence in reserve players as the season progresses.

Follow these tips and use context when watching football going forward rather than just looking for touchdowns and postgame box scores, and you are sure to hit on the next Jay Ajayi.