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Fantasy football – you’ve probably heard some of your guy friends talk about this at some point over beer and wings. It’s a game that allows you to be the owner, general manager (GM), and coach of your own football team. Fantasy football involves competition against your friends, each drafting a team of National Football League (NFL) players, for example, and scoring points based on their on-field performance in a given week. The person with the “fantasy team” with the most points at the end of the week is the winner. Not too complicated, right? There are online betting sites for fantasy football fans as well. Check Bet 88 and other sites out before rolling out your dollars.
All About Fantasy Football
Game Types
Season-long and daily fantasy are the two main game types in fantasy football. Moreover, different sub-categories fall under the two. For instance, re-draft, dynasty leagues, and best ball (the newest sub-category) fall under season-long. Daily fantasy has cash and tournament.
How To Play
The traditional format of playing fantasy football is head-to-head (H2H). First, owners will select players from a pool of available NFL players. One’s team will generally be broken down into quarterbacks, running backs, tight ends, and wide receivers – also called “skill” positions. Most league owners will only select from those positions.
Standings are calculated like in a traditional sports league where one competes for a playoff entry based on standings. Then, when the playoffs begin, the teams left standing must compete head-to-head in a tournament format that determines the league winner. Aside from team drafts, auction leagues are also there at the beginning of a season. Also, if a chosen player is struggling, you can release him, just like in the NFL. Trading with other teams is also allowed. Fantasy football has a postseason as well.
League Types
- Re-draft is the most common type of league. Every year, you draft a new team.
- Keeper league is when some owners stick together to form a group or league and play together every season. It starts similar to a re-draft, but each owner keeps a certain number (e.g., three or four) of players from their previous year’s roster. Players that don’t become keepers are eligible to be drafted by any team.
- Dynasty league is similar to the keeper league in that owners stay in one league for several years. However, instead of keeping just a few players for the upcoming season, one can keep their entire team. In a Dynasty league, younger players are more valuable because they have the potential to play many more years than veteran players – making trading more fun.
All of this activity takes place within the 16-game NFL season. The fantasy regular season is typically the first 13 or 14 weeks of the NFL season. Weeks 14-16 are when fantasy playoffs are usually played. Then, of course, a champ is crowned during the final week. Anyone can play fantasy football for fun or money. Either way, the game has grown, and so have the players (or owners) and their fantastic complexity.
