Fantasy Football League Types & League
Fantasy Leagues and Draft Types
There are many types of fantasy football leagues that you can join. These days, the majority of leagues are done online, which as previously mentioned, facilitates the draft, the scoring, as well as hosting other tools to manage your league. Really, the only way to go.
But, you can still do offline drafts, which are a blast, as all of the players are in one room, and much revelry (and seriousness) will be present. When I first played fantasy football, this is how we did it, a designee writing down the players selected/owner on big white sheets of paper hung on Baron's Beef and Brew's window panes. Offline draft draft information (results) can also be added to an online host ex post-facto, meaning that you can get the best of both worlds. My current league members are spread across the country now, so we only do the online draft.
The biggest differences in the types of leagues is the method on how you develop your team's roster each year. Below are the most common types of fantasy football leagues:
Redraft Leagues: These leagues give you a fresh start every season. They may also be known as "Traditional" leagues, and are the most common.
Auction Leagues: Teams in these leagues are formed through an auction. Each team may have an imaginary "budget" of, say, $200. A nominating order can be established in the same way as a Standard Draft. An owner can bid on a player, as long as they still have money in their bank roll. Bidding can go back and forth, so an owner has to manage his money wisely to maximize his roster, and still have enough to fill it. During the auctioning of each NFL player, the owner opening the bidding also should serve as the auctioneer. Bids must be made in even dollar amounts. Trades are permitted during the auction, but teams may not release purchased players until after the auction.
With a $200 budget, the highest players may go for $40-$50. Good players may run $15-$25, and so on. If you do not have experience with this type of league, it may benefit you to participate in a mock draft (see below) to determine the estimated cost of each player.
It is also possible to have a combination auction/redraft league whereat you auction off the first, say, 4-5 players on each team, then complete your roster in the conventional snake draft.
Keeper Leagues: In keeper leagues, each team can keep a pre-determined amount of players from their team from the previous season (2-4, e.g.). The amount of "kept" players varies by league. The pros of this type of league is that you can feel more invested in certain players, the cons being that you may never get a chance to own a great, or one of your favorite players.
Dynasty Leagues: Team owners can take their entire roster into the next season. Players that are dropped each year should be filled with their current and future prospects in mind. Dynasty Leagues provide owners with the real experience of managing a team - rather than for just one short season.
Guillotine Leagues: These are leagues where you can play in kind of a LMS (Last Man Standing formats):
Draft Types
Standard Draft: Most often, the draft order is picked randomly by the online hosts, but some leagues prefer to set the draft order based on the previous year's final standings, or other unrelated competition such as a video game tournament, golf match, card game, beer pong, etc.
Most standard drafts are performed in "snake" order, meaning that if you are the first player to draft in the first round, then you will be the last player to draft in the second round, then the first player to draft in the third round, and so on. There are pros and cons to every draft spot. The first picker gets the first pick, fun, but, their second pick is a long time coming. Conversely, if you are in the middle of the order, your pick positions are more leveled out. It can also be fun being the first or last pick of the draft, as you get two picks in a row when it is your turn again. For example, in a twelve team league, the first team to pick would get picks 1.1 and 2.12 in the first two rounds, and the last pick would get picks 1.12, then 2.1 in the first two rounds. See the section about Draft Strategy regarding on how to pick depending on your spot in the draft order.
Some drafts also let the #12 pick restart the draft by being the #1 pick in the third round, then re-snaking after that.
Salary Cap, or Auction Draft: See Auction Leagues mentioned above.
Auto-Pick Draft: This is a version of the Standard Draft, except the online host picks the teams from the list of players in the host's system. The players have been ranked by their experts, better players have a lower number, and when it is your "turn" to pick, you get the best available player. You can pre-load the order of players that you want, should they still be available during your next turn. There is some strategy here, as you can arrange your picks by positions as well, e.g.: RB, RB, WR, QB, etc. Auto-picking is also used for players that are unable to attend the live draft. From my experience, the auto-picked teams are probably as good as any, but you do not have the satisfaction of building your own roster.
Mock Drafts: Basically, a mock draft is just what it says. You sign up with a group of players, and run through the whole draft. Doing this prepares you for your real draft day as you can see where certain players leave the "board". It can give you an idea of a player's "ADP", or Average Draft Position. I've never participated in one, as drafts are unpredictable, and I don't care THAT much. Here is an image of the Yahoo! mock draft room where you can make a reservation to participate:
There are many types of fantasy football leagues that you can join. These days, the majority of leagues are done online, which as previously mentioned, facilitates the draft, the scoring, as well as hosting other tools to manage your league. Really, the only way to go.
But, you can still do offline drafts, which are a blast, as all of the players are in one room, and much revelry (and seriousness) will be present. When I first played fantasy football, this is how we did it, a designee writing down the players selected/owner on big white sheets of paper hung on Baron's Beef and Brew's window panes. Offline draft draft information (results) can also be added to an online host ex post-facto, meaning that you can get the best of both worlds. My current league members are spread across the country now, so we only do the online draft.
The biggest differences in the types of leagues is the method on how you develop your team's roster each year. Below are the most common types of fantasy football leagues:
Redraft Leagues: These leagues give you a fresh start every season. They may also be known as "Traditional" leagues, and are the most common.
Auction Leagues: Teams in these leagues are formed through an auction. Each team may have an imaginary "budget" of, say, $200. A nominating order can be established in the same way as a Standard Draft. An owner can bid on a player, as long as they still have money in their bank roll. Bidding can go back and forth, so an owner has to manage his money wisely to maximize his roster, and still have enough to fill it. During the auctioning of each NFL player, the owner opening the bidding also should serve as the auctioneer. Bids must be made in even dollar amounts. Trades are permitted during the auction, but teams may not release purchased players until after the auction.
With a $200 budget, the highest players may go for $40-$50. Good players may run $15-$25, and so on. If you do not have experience with this type of league, it may benefit you to participate in a mock draft (see below) to determine the estimated cost of each player.
It is also possible to have a combination auction/redraft league whereat you auction off the first, say, 4-5 players on each team, then complete your roster in the conventional snake draft.
Keeper Leagues: In keeper leagues, each team can keep a pre-determined amount of players from their team from the previous season (2-4, e.g.). The amount of "kept" players varies by league. The pros of this type of league is that you can feel more invested in certain players, the cons being that you may never get a chance to own a great, or one of your favorite players.
Dynasty Leagues: Team owners can take their entire roster into the next season. Players that are dropped each year should be filled with their current and future prospects in mind. Dynasty Leagues provide owners with the real experience of managing a team - rather than for just one short season.
Guillotine Leagues: These are leagues where you can play in kind of a LMS (Last Man Standing formats):
- The lowest scoring team each week gets chopped, and their roster goes into free agency (creating a waiver wire pandemonium). The process continues through the season until there is only one team (Champion) left.
- I have also heard of leagues that only let you play an individual player only once per season.
Draft Types
Standard Draft: Most often, the draft order is picked randomly by the online hosts, but some leagues prefer to set the draft order based on the previous year's final standings, or other unrelated competition such as a video game tournament, golf match, card game, beer pong, etc.
Most standard drafts are performed in "snake" order, meaning that if you are the first player to draft in the first round, then you will be the last player to draft in the second round, then the first player to draft in the third round, and so on. There are pros and cons to every draft spot. The first picker gets the first pick, fun, but, their second pick is a long time coming. Conversely, if you are in the middle of the order, your pick positions are more leveled out. It can also be fun being the first or last pick of the draft, as you get two picks in a row when it is your turn again. For example, in a twelve team league, the first team to pick would get picks 1.1 and 2.12 in the first two rounds, and the last pick would get picks 1.12, then 2.1 in the first two rounds. See the section about Draft Strategy regarding on how to pick depending on your spot in the draft order.
Some drafts also let the #12 pick restart the draft by being the #1 pick in the third round, then re-snaking after that.
Salary Cap, or Auction Draft: See Auction Leagues mentioned above.
Auto-Pick Draft: This is a version of the Standard Draft, except the online host picks the teams from the list of players in the host's system. The players have been ranked by their experts, better players have a lower number, and when it is your "turn" to pick, you get the best available player. You can pre-load the order of players that you want, should they still be available during your next turn. There is some strategy here, as you can arrange your picks by positions as well, e.g.: RB, RB, WR, QB, etc. Auto-picking is also used for players that are unable to attend the live draft. From my experience, the auto-picked teams are probably as good as any, but you do not have the satisfaction of building your own roster.
Mock Drafts: Basically, a mock draft is just what it says. You sign up with a group of players, and run through the whole draft. Doing this prepares you for your real draft day as you can see where certain players leave the "board". It can give you an idea of a player's "ADP", or Average Draft Position. I've never participated in one, as drafts are unpredictable, and I don't care THAT much. Here is an image of the Yahoo! mock draft room where you can make a reservation to participate:
League Structures
There are two main ways to play Fantasy Football: Head to Head or League-Wide (points only).
Head to Head: From my experience, the most common type of league. Typically the teams will be organized similar to the NFL, where there will be two conferences, with 2-4 divisions in each conference. Each week, one team in the league will go against one other team in the league. A playoff is held during the last few games of the season, often ending before the last week, due to many of the good NFL players being benched so they don't get injured in a game that they do not have to win. Division winners and wild card teams (did not win division, but had next best records) will play in the first rounds. Then Conference champions will play in the league's "Super Bowl" which will be held in week 17 this year, as the NFL added an extra game (18 total weeks as each team still gets one "bye" week). It is common for these leagues to have their championship the week before the NFL season ends, as mentioned above, NFL teams that have a playoff lock often rest their best players and also to protect them from injury. I do not subscribe to this methodology, as playing through the entire season is more interesting! Wussies.
League-Wide (Points Only): These leagues play each week against every other team in the league. Prize pay-outs can be done weekly for the highest score, then at the end of the season to the Champion, second and third places. This is the type of league that I am in, and our league will be described in detail later.
My opinion: I have played in both types of leagues, mostly the League-Wide version. My problem with head to head is that you may blow up and have a great week, but still lose to another team that had an even better one. So you get a loss, when in another game in your league that week, two teams could both have lower scores than your team, but one of them gets a win! Not fair! But conversely, if you have a mediocre week, you can still sneak out a win from a team that bombs. Luck plays heavily in these leagues. In league-wide, you are rewarded by high scores and consistency. Top feeding teams deserve to be there, and the bottom feeders are where they belong.
One note - A head to head league can modify their playoff structure to let in the top two teams as wild cards that didn't qualify through head to head wins, but had the top highest total points for the season. This would eliminate some of the luck that goes with head to head matchups.
Daily Fantasy Football
Daily fantasy football (DFF) is a subset of fantasy football games. Basically, it is an accelerated version of traditional fantasy football games that are conducted over short-term periods such as a week, or even a single day of competition, as opposed to the previously mentioned leagues that are season-wide in duration. Typically, DFF are online competitions, referred to as "contests", where winners receive a share of a pre-determined pot funded by entry fees. A portion of entry fee payments go to the provider as rake revenue.
Unlike smaller traditional leagues, DFF contests will have many players who can pick from the same pool of players. Therefore, many teams will share certain high value players, but the chance of any two competitors having the same roster would be very small. Two of the big online providers to DFF are Draft Kings and Fan Duel.
I have never participated in DFF, nor do I intend to. On that note, some Fantasy Football players/owners/managers have several teams that they manage during the year. Inevitably, you are betting against yourself during any particular weekend, and it is an awful lot to administer. I like just having one team, but to each their own. The players that manage more than one team may be the same people that fill out more than one March Madness Division I basketball bracket. Sigh.
League Structures
There are two main ways to play Fantasy Football: Head to Head or League-Wide (points only).
Head to Head: From my experience, the most common type of league. Typically the teams will be organized similar to the NFL, where there will be two conferences, with 2-4 divisions in each conference. Each week, one team in the league will go against one other team in the league. A playoff is held during the last few games of the season, often ending before the last week, due to many of the good NFL players being benched so they don't get injured in a game that they do not have to win. Division winners and wild card teams (did not win division, but had next best records) will play in the first rounds. Then Conference champions will play in the league's "Super Bowl" which will be held in week 17 this year, as the NFL added an extra game (18 total weeks as each team still gets one "bye" week). It is common for these leagues to have their championship the week before the NFL season ends, as mentioned above, NFL teams that have a playoff lock often rest their best players and also to protect them from injury. I do not subscribe to this methodology, as playing through the entire season is more interesting! Wussies.
League-Wide (Points Only): These leagues play each week against every other team in the league. Prize pay-outs can be done weekly for the highest score, then at the end of the season to the Champion, second and third places. This is the type of league that I am in, and our league will be described in detail later.
My opinion: I have played in both types of leagues, mostly the League-Wide version. My problem with head to head is that you may blow up and have a great week, but still lose to another team that had an even better one. So you get a loss, when in another game in your league that week, two teams could both have lower scores than your team, but one of them gets a win! Not fair! But conversely, if you have a mediocre week, you can still sneak out a win from a team that bombs. Luck plays heavily in these leagues. In league-wide, you are rewarded by high scores and consistency. Top feeding teams deserve to be there, and the bottom feeders are where they belong.
One note - A head to head league can modify their playoff structure to let in the top two teams as wild cards that didn't qualify through head to head wins, but had the top highest total points for the season. This would eliminate some of the luck that goes with head to head matchups.
Daily Fantasy Football
Daily fantasy football (DFF) is a subset of fantasy football games. Basically, it is an accelerated version of traditional fantasy football games that are conducted over short-term periods such as a week, or even a single day of competition, as opposed to the previously mentioned leagues that are season-wide in duration. Typically, DFF are online competitions, referred to as "contests", where winners receive a share of a pre-determined pot funded by entry fees. A portion of entry fee payments go to the provider as rake revenue.
Unlike smaller traditional leagues, DFF contests will have many players who can pick from the same pool of players. Therefore, many teams will share certain high value players, but the chance of any two competitors having the same roster would be very small. Two of the big online providers to DFF are Draft Kings and Fan Duel.
I have never participated in DFF, nor do I intend to. On that note, some Fantasy Football players/owners/managers have several teams that they manage during the year. Inevitably, you are betting against yourself during any particular weekend, and it is an awful lot to administer. I like just having one team, but to each their own. The players that manage more than one team may be the same people that fill out more than one March Madness Division I basketball bracket. Sigh.