Readers who want to share their thoughts on daily/weekly fantasy
football still have time to write in, as I will continue to collect
that feedback for a column to be released at the beginning of the
regular season.
For my August column, however, I'll be focusing on the question
I raised in late July: What simple techniques can commissioners
use to combat apathy in fantasy leagues. Let's start with Scott's
response:
I'm the commissioner of the UII FFL in the Boston
area, a very competitive 12-team league now entering its eleventh
season with a very solid core of owners.
One very simple thing that we did a few years ago to keep our owners
interested was to keep the possibility of winning cash flowing right
to the end of the season. Quite simply, the possibility of cash
coming back to an owner in a losing season works. We do this in
two ways:
1. We have a weekly cash prize that is equal to 20% of an owner's
league entry fee for all regular season games (Weeks 1-13)
2. Half of our 12 teams make the playoffs, but the other 6 vie for
the "Sickly Six" contest, which offers approximately a
winning pool equal to just below 50% of the league entry fee to
the team that wins a straight-up total "most points" battle
over the three weeks from Week 14-16. That means that a manager
can be 1-12 going into week 14, have his awful season record reset
back to 0, and still come away with a decent prize by besting the
5 other teams in the runner-up bracket.
Through the last weeks of the season and through the Sickly Six,
it is satisfying for me as a commissioner to see those teams claiming
free agents off the waiver wire (ahead of the playoff teams!) right
up through Week 16. It means the competition stays heated from start
to finish in the league. And that's all any league commissioner
really wants, isn't it?
When money talks, it looks like apathy walks, as Gary echoes:
What we have done for many years is [use] the
last week of the NFL season as a free-for-all for cash. High score
wins. Regular lineup, blah blah blah. It’s not perfect, but
it’s nice for the many who actually do put in a fresh lineup.
Many times over the years, it has been the poor teams that would
win. I named it SITYMTWG week (see I told you my team was good).
That acronym stuck!
James mixes monetary incentives with draft choice implications to
keep owners with losing records from losing interest:
What we have done is this: 1/2 pot goes to Super
Bowl winner in playoff format, 1/2 pot goes to overall point getter.
Next year's draft order is determined by finish of total points---best
first, worst last. But the best team does not get 1st pick, best
team gets first CHOICE of where they will pick.
Teams out of playoff contention still try to better their draft
status for next year. In 3 of the last 4 years a team out of playoff
contention either won the total points pot or came in top 3.
We also give money to division winners and Super Bowl loser which
gives money opportunities to more people.
Of course, cash doesn't have to play any role at all in motivating
owners to stay active throughout the season (no matter how poorly
their teams may be performing). Joe takes an approach that may not
be simple for him as a commissioner, but nevertheless feels simple
to the participants in his league because the anti-apathy measures
are woven into the structure of the schedule:
My friends-and-family league is entering its
17th season. For the last decade we've been a keeper league, which
has its own competitiveness issues at times, but before that we
were an annual league and owner apathy was one of the biggest issues
we faced. While not asking repeat offenders to play again next year
must remain an option, it's better for everyone if you can stop
the problem before it starts. Owners give up on leagues because
they're out of the running. So, anything that can keep leagues competitive
longer is a good thing, and sometimes commissioners structure their
leagues in a way that encourages early dropouts.
Look at playoff systems, for example. In 12-team leagues where only
4 make the playoffs, a team can be 8-4 or 9-5 and still miss the
playoffs. So if someone starts 1-3, that owner is going to look
at the situation and probably say "forget it." Inclusive
playoffs with at least 50% participation keep owners interested
longer because there's more hope for merely good and mediocre teams.
If your playoffs are too big then you run into the regular season
not mattering, but that's a different subject.
Another factor we've used is the schedule composition. I like to
weight the division part of the schedule more heavily into the back
half of the season. All of our teams play 3 of their 6 division
games in the final five weeks of the season. Not only does this
allow teams to make up ground quickly and keep playoff hopes alive,
but it also gives each division the thrill of a pennant race. The
division winners automatically get our top three playoffs seeds,
the top two with byes, so division titles are something everyone
shoots for.
This is really something that's only applicable to other friends-and-family
leagues out there, but we end the regular season with Rivalry Week.
Each owner plays someone that he is particularly close to, like
a brother or best friend. This turns what is often a meaningless
week for many owners into a big annual event. It also has an impact
on the playoffs because every Rivalry Week game is also a division
game.
Those are some examples of things that can easily be done before
the season starts to make a league more competitive and cut down
on bailouts. The best part is they do not require any additional
complication - just a bit of extra commissioner planning. Owners
usually don't even realize that these are anti-apathy measures at
all!
My thanks to everyone who wrote in to help combat apathy. I was
surprised by the amount of thoughtful feedback I received on the
question considering that the football season isn't yet underway.
The other question I posed (concerning quality journalism about
the NFL during the offseason) provoked a much narrower range of
responses. Martin wants to know why I am spending the summer in
search of engaging NFL articles in the first place. "Instead
of looking for articles about the NFL," he thinks I should
"pry [my]self away from the computer and step outside, where
[I] might discover a thing called the sun."
Cute.
To his credit, Martin was straightforward about letting me know
that he thought my search for quality NFL journalism was a waste
of time. Jarrett responded a bit more sarcastically:
What do you mean you can't find interesting
articles about the NFL in July? I just devoured this absolutely
fascinating
piece.
Okay, guys, I get it. But my search for more quality NFL
reading material was driven by the fact that I had already stumbled
across an excellent
piece of analysis by Larry Holder concerning Jimmy Graham's
appeal to be paid as a wide receiver instead of a tight end.
Holder's piece warrants the attention of anyone curious about the
implications of using a franchise tag on a player who doesn't always
(or even usually) line up at his "official" position.
When I heard that Graham was asking to be re-categorized as a wide
receiver, I thought his argument was fairly sound. After all, he
lined up as a wideout roughly two-thirds of the time in 2013 and
as a tight end only one-third of the time.
"If you're gonna play him like a WR," I felt like tweeting
to the Saints, "you had better pay him like one."
Through a meticulous review of stats, however, Holder makes it clear
that no matter how often Graham lines up at wide receiver, he is
far more dangerous catching passes against coverage appropriate
for a tight end. He can routinely beat safeties, linebackers, and
defensive ends to the ball, but his success rate vs. cornerbacks
is poor. Holder makes a solid case that being an elite receiver
in the NFL isn't just about running certain routes and lining up
at particular spots on the line of scrimmage; elite NFL receivers
also have to beat NFL cornerbacks as a matter of course. By any
measure, Jimmy Graham is an elite pass-catching tight end. But based
on the statistics Holder examines, it's easy to see why the Saints
were reluctant to pay him the salary of an elite wideout.
I hope a few readers out there enjoy the Holder article, but I'm
sure all the readers of this column will be glad to know that LMS
guru Matthew Schiff has agreed to return for the 2014 season. You
can look forward to seeing Schiff's picks for week 1 at the end
of the next Q&A column.
Until then, try not to get too much sun.
Mike Davis has been writing about fantasy football since 1999.
As a landlocked Oklahoman who longs for the sound of ocean waves,
he also writes about ocean colonization under the pen name Studio
Dongo. The latest installment in his science fiction series can
be found here.
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