Overall I have to be very happy with my first ever fantasy football league. I scored the most points in the entire league during the regular season ... but unfortunately I also had the most points scored against me by nearly 100 points. Despite having so many points scored against me I finished 2nd in the regular season with a 10-4 record just a game back on the league leader.
I ended the season in 6th place after a first round loss in the playoffs to the second highest scoring team that week (and only second because of a nearly 150 point performance from the highest scoring team). That's certainly not how I hoped to finish given the strong regular season but should have been what to expect given that everyone seemed to have some of their best weeks against me.
I did enjoy it quite a bit and learned some things along the way. It also increased my interest in the league as I became more interested in how teams and players were doing because they had a direct effect on my match ups. I watched more football this year than in past years though I don't know that I enjoyed it any more than usual, it was just that I had a bigger interest in what was going on. I think next year I'll definitely join again and may even get into a second league for fun.
Some things that I learned or discovered this season...
- First off you can only control your own team. You can't stop your opponents from scoring however much they will so you just have to focus on having your team score as much as you can.
- Running backs are key and much more important than receivers. They will see regular action and get a bulk of activity in games. Receivers will be much more hit and miss depending on how much they are thrown to and can more easily let you down. Having solid reliable backs to start, then getting good receivers is a good plan but the more surefire receivers are still worth a look.
- A good quarterback can get you a lot of points, but if you draft late focus on your backs because outside a few that will get big points regularly there are plenty of QBs generally that you can get a good option after a good back or two.
- Don't draft defense until late unless you're getting one of the best in the league, and even then it can wait until later on. Kickers don't draft until the last round as they don't get a great deal of points generally anyway and can always be picked up later. It's not a bad idea to keep backups in the QB, RB, and WR position over having a second kicker or defense. Even if they don't play it keeps them out of the hands of your opponents.
- Watch trends. If someone becomes a starter that wasn't expected to be a starter they could end up getting big points later on and be available after the draft. Don't wait too long or someone else could snatch them up. Example this year, Vick ... who just happened to get 50 points against me the first week of the playoffs for the team that didn't hesitate and picked him up early on when he became starter.
- Players are streaky. They can get you 25 points one week and then get you 5 the next, especially receivers. Try to judge best who will perform and who won't but don't be surprised when those flip-flop and don't get down because you choose wrong one week because this will happen.
- Having too many playoff teams while extending the fun for more isn't a good way to go. Our 10 team league had 8 playoff teams allowing the 1st and 2nd place teams to finish 5th and 6th in the league. Six would have been a good number in a 10 team league and is probably the right number in a 12 team league as well. Allow the others to play in a consolation bracket to extend their season.
I'm glad you started a blog! I plan to post comments on several entries, but for now I'll just say I agree with most of your points except the importance of the kicker. I had Sebastian Janikowski and he was one of my most reliable sources of points. He only odd thing with kickers is that the best kicker won't necessarily score the most points, because some great kickers are on teams that are good at scoring touchdowns. So what you want to look for is a team that is good at moving the ball into the red zone but poor at actually punching it in.
ReplyDeleteTo clarify that last point, you want teams who have to kick field goals instead of TDs & extra points . . .
ReplyDeleteTrue, kickers can get you good points and are important but given that normally your late round kickers and your early round kickers might only average out a few points different through the year per week whereas a good back or reciever can get bigger points, the kicker's value drops.
ReplyDeleteThis could of course be a difference in leagues but in the league that I just played in the top 20 kickers in the league were seperated by only 40 points at the end of the season, a difference of less than 3 points per week. The highest scoring kicker would have place around 40th in the WR/TE catagory and about 35th in RBs (Foster btw scored nearly 100 points more on the season than the next highest RB).
Also when you figure that most people are only going to carry 1 kicker, in a league with 12 teams you're going to have nearly 19 kickers to choose from which is a pretty big selection to choose from.
Kickers can get you good, important points (and you're right about trying to find the teams that have trouble finishing drives to select from) but in the draft I just feel you're better off going for a solid backup in a scoring position or a rookie that could play himself into a starters role and then grabbing your kicker(s) at the end.