Now that the lockout is finally over and players are reporting to training camps across the land, fans can start to think about what really matters this coming season – their team’s chances to win it all. It’s not uncommon to see football fans immersed in NFL Network programming while also researching players, schedules, and bye weeks on their laptop. But look carefully and you’ll notice how seemingly uninterested they may be in their favorite actual team. A diehard Giants fan looking up the Cowboys’ bye week? A Patriots fan combing over the Jets’ wide receiver depth chart? A Raiders fan reading, intently, a report of how Denver quarterback Tim Tebow has prepared this off season? These things 20 years ago would’ve been blasphemy, enough to warrant a CAT scan and possibly a permanent relocation out of the rabid fan section. These days, they’re musts for any fantasy football manager with a shot to bring home the title.
In preparation for fantasy football drafts, we’re going to do a quick course in all things fantasy. We’ll start off slowly, with the basics, before getting a bit more into team setup & draft strategy, and weekly transactions.
What is Fantasy Football?
Fantasy football allows anyone to construct a virtual football team made up of actual NFL players and compete against others in a league. The players’ performance on the field is reflected in your team’s stats, so in a head-to-head league whichever team’s players accumulate better statistics on the field will win. Note that fantasy football is all about statistics, not results. A running back on a 16-0 team might yield far fewer fantasy points (and wins for his virtual manager) than a running back on a 4-12 team. It allows players to focus on multiple games and follow the league in a more broad manner than they would otherwise. As a Vikings fan, I might watch their game and maybe one other that I had particular interest in. As a FF manager, I have an interest in any game involving my players, as well as my opponent’s players.
How are the teams set up?
Teams typically have 1 quarterback, a number of running backs and receivers, a tight end, a kicker, and a team defense/special teams to accumulate points in a given week. These players do not have to be from the same NFL team. It’s entirely possible that you may not have more than one player from any actual NFL team on your roster, so the result of your fantasy game depends on many games over the weekend. Most teams will have the aforementioned starters with a bench of 5-7 additional players from any position. This allows FF players to make substitutions during bye weeks (where one of your good players has the week off) and for tough matchups. Without a bench, you might have to drop Peyton Manning during his bye week to pick up another quarterback, leaving him open for anyone else to take. The bench allows for some shifting without having to drop/add for every move (more on this in League Structure, part II).
Players are added to your team in one of three ways – drafting, trading, or signing from free agents. Drafting is the first official act of any fantasy league season. The FF player draft order is usually randomly selected, and each team gets one pick during each draft round. All NFL players are included in the pool of available draftees, and teams choose one player from those available at each draft turn. The draft ends when all FF players have filled every starter and bench spot. There are ALWAYS many, many more players available to be drafted than are drafted, which creates a pool of players from which to add and drop. If one of the players you drafted gets hurt or is having a terrible season, you can drop him into the free agent pool and pick up a replacement. If you find a player on another FF team that you’d like to have, you can trade one of your players for that player. Two years ago, the running backs I drafted all performed really well while my receivers completely stunk up the joint. The result was I had underperforming WR slots while running backs were generating points on my bench that didn’t count (because I didn’t have room to start them). Another player had the inverse situation. I swapped one of my excess running backs for an excess wide receiver of his, and the trade worked out for both of us.
How does the scoring work?
Your FF team scores points based on the statistics your players rack up during their games. If Peyton Manning has a huge day for Indy, and you started him that week, things are looking good for a win. Points are awarded differently for different positions, but the basic breakdown is usually as follows:
- Quarterbacks: + Passing/Rushing Yards, ++ Touchdowns, – Fumbles, – Interceptions
- Running Backs/Wide Receivers/Tight Ends: + Rushing/Receiving Yards. ++ Touchdowns, – Fumbles
- Kickers: + PAT/Short FG, ++ Medium FG, +++ Long FG
- Defense/Special Teams: + Sacks, + Interceptions, +++ Touchdowns, ++ Holding opponent to few points, + Holding opponent to medium points, – Allowing opponent many points.
Once all games are played, the total points accumulated by your starters is matched against your opponent(s) and the highest total wins the week. In our example, if Peyton Manning had a huge day then you’d be in a great position to win. But if your receivers and running backs (usually 4 or 5 compared to just one qb in a week) perform really poorly, they’ll more than offset Manning’s good performance. Likewise if one player really struggles but your others have above-average days you still might have a great chance to win.
A key point – the players on your bench will “earn” points, but they will not contribute to your FF score. Only players you start contribute points to your weekly score. This is a key point for people playing FF for the first time. One of the most important parts of playing fantasy football is deciding who among your team will start or sit in a given week.
Is it really complicated?
Most leagues are set up on either ESPN or Yahoo!, which make it very easy to join a league and set up a team. If you want to play and never have before, find a friend who has played for a few years and ask them to explain how their league works. There’s nothing to score, no math to do, the website automatically uploads every player’s stats and calculates scores. The great thing about FF is that players can put however much (or little) time they want into it. There were busy work weeks last year where I checked on my team once on Sunday morning, made start/sit decisions, and didn’t look at it again until Monday morning. Other weeks, I spent hours planning out the next few weeks in terms of players I should pick up or drop. Two years ago, I spent so much time on Yahoo! that I had the rotator ads memorized. I finished 9th in a league of 12. Last year, I was a lot less involved and lost the championship game.
Do I have to be a diehard football fan?
No, not at all. It certainly helps (and you’ll probably have more fun) if you love football but just understanding how the system works and paying attention to bye weeks and injuries can lead to great results. The nice thing about the major online systems is that they’ll tell you when a player is injured or when it’s his bye week. Even if you did only log on once each week, you’ll see which of your starters and bench players will or won’t be playing that week.
Drafting is also made a lot easier, as pre-draft rankings of the best players are there for you to see. Experts who watch all preseason work on the rankings, so there’s not much guesswork involved. You can even set your team to autodraft (you will be made fun of, but more on that later) so it automatically takes the best player from the available pool. This works really well in the first few rounds but results in later rounds are a little more dicey. We’ll get more into draft strategy in the coming weeks.
That wraps up the crash course in fantasy football and some of the basics behind the game. In the next few weeks, we’ll take a deeper look into aspects of FF – team setup, draft strategy, different players, and weekly transactions. The goal here is to bring as many people into the FF realm as possible, with the hopes that maybe we could start a CT Fantasy Football league. Along the way, if you have any questions please throw them in the comments. I know there are a few of us here who have played before, so we should be able to get you squared away.
