How to play nba fantasy basketball yahoo

Fantasy Basketball - Beginners Guide on How it works? How to Play?

Expanding your views on fantasy sports sounds like a great idea.

Learning the ropes around fantasy basketball will only help.

My guide’s primary goal is to educate you about how to take the right approach to fantasy basketball.
 
 
With that in mind, this beginner’s guide will lead you through:

• How fantasy basketball works
• How to play it
• Where to place bets
• How NBA fantasy works
• How Yahoo fantasy basketball works
• How to draft in fantasy basketball
• Fantasy basketball tips
• Fantasy basketball FAQ

Learn how to create strategies to win your fantasy contests and leagues and achieve ultimate success.

Construct a serviceable team and win a league even if you haven’t been an active NBA fan. Fantasy basketball strongly resembles the real sport. The rules are almost the same.

Let’s delve deeper into the world of fantasy where the never-ending adventure awaits.

How Does It Work?

To play fantasy basketball, you need to draft real players from the National Basketball Association, but more importantly, you’ll need to pay special attention to earning points with those players.

To earn points, you need to analyse the performance of each player on the court. That aside, the game pretty much follows the same basic principles as all other fantasy sports games.

Fantasy basketball requires you to form teams from the respective league. The players earn points based on their performances, and eared points determine losers and winners on a daily, weekly, and seasonal basis.

Since the regular format of the game includes drafting fewer players than in other similar fantasy games, it’s safe to say that getting into fantasy basketball is a lot easier than getting into any other fantasy game.

How to Play Fantasy Basketball

To play fantasy basketball, you first need to understand your format. All fantasy sports follow the same patterns – the most valuable players are determined based on the league format.

How Players Score Points

Typically, there are four ways to score in fantasy basketball:

• Points
• Head to head Points
• Head to head Roto
• Roto

Points

For Points, it’s all about simple math – the team with the most points wins. The scoring system determines which team has accumulated the most points. This is determined weekly, and there is also a lineup deadline. The winner is the team that collects the most points for the season.

Head to head Points

The Head to head Points game is almost the same as the Head to head Roto concept except for one detail. To achieve victory, you have to total the most fantasy points. This is the main difference between HTD Roto and HTH Points – rather than separating the statistics by categories, the preset value determines the total for each statistic.

The values are:

• Points (+1)
• Rebounds (+1.2 or 1.25)
• Assists (+1.5)
• Steals/Blocks (+3)
• Turnovers (-1)

The Head to head Points game follows the format that’s more similar to fantasy football. It’s essential to keep in mind the way your commissioner assigns values. Understanding this will help you achieve success.

Head to head Roto

Head to head roto includes games weekly, where you’ll be required to play against other members of your league. You have only one winner and one loser, but it can also be a tie. It depends on your commissioner. The losses and wins determine who makes it to the playoffs, just like in real basketball.

To determine who is a winner or a loser, you’ll need to take a look at each of the statistical categories – steals, assists rebounds points, etc. Those players who accumulate the most statistics in each of the categories are the winners.

Let’s take a look at the following situation: your team accumulated 100 assists, 200 rebounds, and 300 points compared to the other team’s 99 assists, 150 rebounds, and 450 points. The victory is yours because you’ve won the matchup by two categories. This is the format that is mostly associated with fantasy baseball.

Rotisserie or ROTO

Roto includes each category receiving a unit each time your players contribute to that event in the game. If a player scores a rebound, the rebound category gets one point more. To score points, you need to compare your categories with all other teams in the league.

The number of teams in the league determines the number of points. The more teams there are, the more points there will be. It works like this:

The team with the best statistics for a category in the league receives points based on how many teams there are in the league.

If there are 10 teams, the winning team receives 10 points while the second-best team receives 9 and so on. To determine the team’s position in the league, you can total all points in all categories.

Head to Head Scoring

In fantasy basketball, teams compete against each other to receive points. These points are based on the on-field performance of the NBA players. The team that amasses the most significant score every week is the winner.

There are two methods of deciding which team is the winner:

• Most categories: depending on the number of categories taken into account, fantasy basketball teams receive points. The team that scores the most points for each of the categories is the winner.
• One category: here, fantasy basketball teams can also be winners in a particular category. All they have to do is collect the most significant number of points for that category. At the end of the season, all weekly results are totaled to set the seasonal results.

Fantasy basketball teams that use the head-to-head scoring method usually aim at the playoffs through which losers are eliminated till a champion emerges.

Scoring through Fantasy Points

Fantasy points are awarded for specific statistics and decisions regarding awarding of points are taken by the commissioner alone. For example, the commission may say that a steal will get two fantasy points. In this way, fantasy points are earned every night on the basis of NBA players’ performance on the field, and the team that earns the largest number of fantasy points at the close of the season becomes the winner.

Season-Long Leagues and Keeper Leagues

Keeper leagues refer to multi-year leagues where you’re allowed to stick with players from season to season. Typically, each league comes to a close at the season’s end, with the only exception being keeper leagues.

Your commissioner determines the number of players you’re allowed to keep. When it comes to this, there is no one-size-fits-all solution as each commissioner is different. Some might let you keep all your players from the previous season. Some might allow you keep a few or just one.

The strategy is seldom the same, and it varies the most during the draft. If it’s a season-long league in question, only a player’s performance in the current season is considered. This is somewhat a standard in season-long leagues.

Things look a little bit different for keeper leagues, as this is where future production matters the most. In keeper leagues, well-established, older players are quickly replaced by younger players in the making.

Rule Variations

There is no specific set of rules in fantasy basketball. Instead, there is a range of rule variations. The most common variations include:

Number of Categories: there are three to eleven categories in fantasy basketball leagues. Three-category leagues only include points, assists, and rebounds. This is a basic form of a fantasy basketball league. In some leagues, the commissioner is the one who sets the terms of how many categories will be taken into account.

Number of Teams: fantasy basketball leagues can be public or private. Private leagues are invitation-only and can consist of any number of players. The players are usually already well-established, seasoned, and experienced. Public leagues, on the other hand, consist of either 10 or 12 teams.

Draft Types: there are two methods to draft players in fantasy basketball players – the snake draft and the auction draft. The snake draft includes two rounds of NBA players – the first one is drafted in a particular order while the second one is reversed.

• Snake Draft – In case of a snake draft, the first round of NBA players is drafted in a particular order, which is reversed in the second round. The GM who had the opportunity to make the last pick in the previous round will be making the first pick in the next round. The order is reversed so that the GM who gets the chance to make the first pick in a certain round will not get this advantage in the next round.
• Auction Draft – In case of auction drafts, each GM starts with a pre-determined budget, which is the same as that allotted for fantasy baseball. GMs must use this budget to draft the entire roster. GMs auction off players and the GM willing to pay the largest amount for a player gets the chance to draft that player.

One of the biggest advantages of auction drafting over snake drafting is that all GMs have equal access to all players in case of the latter. On the downside, it takes long and may scare off beginners.

The commissioner who made the last pick in the second round gets to choose the first pick in the next one and vice versa. The auction draft is the case where each commissioner has a predetermined budget to start with, just like in fantasy baseball.

This budget allows GMs to draft the entire roster. The commissioner willing to pay the most for a player on the auction is the one who gets to draft that player. In auction drafting, all commissioners have equal access to the players in the snake draft. There’s a downside to this drafting type – it takes too long, and that’s the biggest reason why beginners avoid it.

Where to place bets

Just like with real basketball, you can bet on fantasy basketball if you love mixing entertainment with an excellent opportunity to earn some extra cash on the side. There are so many fantasy basketball sites on the net, offering a wide variety of free and paid contests.

These contests include 50/50s, guaranteed prize pools, and heads-up. That means that you got everything covered from NBA games to college basketball games. This is more than enough betting opportunities to go home with incredible amounts. To make it a bit clearer – you can earn from a few hundred up to a few million from betting on fantasy basketball contests.

Some of the professional fantasy basketball players play fantasy basketball games for a living daily. So, you can figure how much potential there is in betting on fantasy basketball. Pay a visit to Fantasy Sports, where you will find many different rooms for betting on fantasy basketball.

How Does NBA Fantasy Work?

The basics of NBA fantasy include selecting players from the NBA league with the primary goal of creating your super team. Based on their on-field performance, your fantasy team will score points.

To play NBA fantasy basketball, get your fantasy NBA dream team through the fantasy basketball season and set a real challenge for all who have the guts to stand up to your selection. To create your team, you’ll need one coach, 2 centers, 4 forwards and 4 guards.

Your budget is 95 credits. Each matchday has several game rounds, which are groups of matches that are played daily. You need to manage your roster in between the game rounds by making substitutions from and to the bench.

You can also buy and sell players but only at the end of the matchday. Aside from creating your own NBA team, you can step your game up and create your own NBA league or even leagues and become the champion. One of the newest and simplest ways to play Fantasy NBA is by giving a try Dunkest Fantasy Basketball.

Pick your favourite NBA players, create a team of winners that will win the championship, and use private or public leagues to become the best of the best. The glory is waiting, so take it.

How does Yahoo Fantasy Basketball Work

To score points in Yahoo fantasy basketball, you need to set a points-scoring format that pretty much follows the primary form of NBA fantasy. Based on their performance on the basketball court, your selected players score points.

These points accumulate and determine which team is the winner. In Yahoo fantasy basketball, there are a couple of ways to distribute the accumulated points:

• One real-life point scored equals one fantasy point
• Every rebound grabbed is 1.2 points
• Every assist registered is 1.5 points
• Every steal swiped is 3 points
• Every shot blocked is 3 points
• Every turnover committed is -1 point

You need 13 players to form a standard Yahoo fantasy team with three players on the bench and ten active players in the game. Those players who are active need to give their best to help your team win a total score for the week. Only points accumulated by active players are taken into account.

Fortunately, it’s possible to move players from the bench slot to the active slot during the week, but you have to be smart about it. The main goal is to make every player so that they give their best to maximize the total of fantasy points scored.

There are matches during the whole week, and you’ll get a chance to show your quality against other teams led by other managers. The team that scores the most fantasy points at the end of the week will take the matchup as the winner.

Structure Your Fantasy Team Like a Pro

There are 13 sports on a standard Yahoo fantasy roster – three reserve positions and 10 active slots. Each of the ten active players can be chosen from the positional designations. Each fantasy basketball player can play up to three positions in an NBA game. An NBA court includes five positions:

• Point Guard
• Shooting Guard
• Small Forward
• Power Forward
• Centre

Each roster has to fulfill the following requirements to make sure your drafting is approved:

• 1 Point Guard
• 1 Shooting Guard
• 1 Small Forward
• 1 Power Forward
• 2 Centers
• 1 shooting guard or point guard
• 1 power forward or small forward
• 2 flex player who can play on any position

To complete your drafting successfully, you need to make sure you pick the right candidates for every position required. Once you’ve filled your 10 active slots, your roster is ready. Now, all that’s left is managing your fantasy team. You’ll be required to change your team during the season. There are two ways to do that:

• Trade negotiation
• The waiver wire

Trade negotiation allows you to set the terms of the trade with another league member. You choose to send one to three players to another team of your league and get the exchange players in return. While you’ll have to work on your negotiation skills to make this work, a successful trade can change a lot for the better.

The waiver wire

The free-agent list or the waiver wire allows you to trade any player who didn’t pass the initial selection in the draft. You can trade, exchange, or drop your players to add another from the free-agent list, but there are limitations.

You can only make a restricted number of moves weekly. So, use the waiver wire only in situations when your player is under-performing, gets injured long-term, or a surprise player is performing better than you’ve expected.

Here is a great and useful tip: if you want to win a fantasy league, the key to success is in making sharp-witted moves on the waiver wire.

If you want to win a fantasy league like a real champ, there are three things you need to keep in mind – always look for players who can contribute to your team on the waiver wire, make trades with other managers, and switch players in your active slots.

Fantasy playoffs

There are always 4-6 teams that are at the top of every season. At the end of each season, these teams earn their playoff qualifications. They play in matchups, and the teams that lose, go home. This goes on until there are only two best teams left.

These top teams get a chance to play for the fantasy championship. This is the summit of fantasy basketball, and it should be your primary goal. To get to the finals, you need to learn the ins and outs of fantasy NBA. This is where the real action is.

How to Draft Fantasy Basketball

Think of the draft as of the core of your fantasy league. You’ll need to form 10-12 teams, each team consisting of 13 roster spots or players.

Each fantasy owner or general manager has 13 roster spots available. They select their players to fill in the spots, and they can do it using the waiver wire, a trade, or the draft.

Each manager can select up to 13 players. Drafting takes place before the beginning of the season. The league varies in size, and it can consist of 10 or 12 teams. The teams in the league are selected on a random basis, or some predetermined method can be used.

The selected teams take participation in the drafting, where they can pick players from the NBA that will play for them.

Standard drafts

Drafting is all about flexibility. Depending on your strategy, whether you plan to focus on blocks and rebounding categories, you can draft three players for the same position in a row.

Let’s say you draft three centers. Your goal is to dominate the blocks and rebounding categories. To do so, just play all three of them every night. However, things look a bit different when it comes to leagues.

The rules vary from league to league. Some leagues allow you to include just one player at a traditional position with a deep bench and a utility while others allow for one bench spot and all utility players. These things depend on two things – league management and fantasy contest systems.

Fantasy Basketball Tips

Let’s share some words of advice for you to ensure that you make the most of it. Here are some tips to make sure you master fantasy basketball like a true professional.

1. Check the ranking and know the rules

   If you fail to make the right choice with your rankings, you’re doomed to fall. Never forget that a players’ ranking is his value that he brings to your team.

   The rules of your league, or shall we say, the format determines a players’ ranking. Always check the league rankings and make sure you understand the rules.

2. Go for the best players in your drafting

   Draft only the top choices available. Why? Because they excel at every position. The key to finding the best players is in analyzing the teams that make it to the championship.

   Pay attention to the draft rankings in your league to find out what the positional availability is as this will give you a clear insight into an oversupply or shortage of good players.

   Here’s an excellent tip – start your drafting as early as possible as this will allow you to draft the best players before they’re already taken.

3. Pay attention to roster movements and offseason trades

   Keep an eye on roster movements and offseason trades. There are two things you need to worry about in fantasy basketball – usage, which is a statistic, and opportunity, which is a characteristic.

   The more time the player spends with the ball, the more he produces the much-needed stats. The players that moved to a new team get more opportunities for increased usage.

   You need higher fantasy value in terms of blocks, steals, threes, rebounds, assists, and points to win. The more usage, the more stats, which means more value.

4. Take injury risk into consideration

   Players get injured in fantasy basketball, just like in real life. NBA basketball is a game of high impact, and the risk of injury is not only high but always present.

   Some players are prone to injury, and you’ll want to avoid those because you don’t want to end up drafting players who will miss games every season due to being injured. You need fresh players, so avoid players with high injury risks.

Conclusion

As you can see, playing fantasy basketball and betting on it can be a lot of fun. I can tell you from my personal experience as a professional gambler that betting on fantasy basketball can be more exciting than placing bets on real basketball.

This guide is aimed at all those who are willing to give fantasy basketball a try and discover how immersive it can be.

Have you ever placed a bet on fantasy basketball? Have you ever played it? What is your strategy for creating fantasy basketball teams? Are you a passionate gambler like myself? Leave the answers in the comments, and let’s discuss useful tips that can help become better at fantasy sports.

Fantasy Basketball FAQs

Q1. What is daily fantasy basketball?

Answer:

Daily fantasy basketball is similar to traditional fantasy basketball. In case of daily fantasy basketball games, players have to build a team of NBA players and earn points based on their performance on field. As mentioned above, a variety of scoring rules and methodologies are used to award points. While traditional basketball lasts throughout the season, daily fantasy basketball games last only for a day.

Q2. Are free fantasy basketball games available?

Answer:

Yes, there are plenty of free basketball games available. You can learn the various aspects of playing fantasy basketball without taking risks. However, you must note that you will not win any real money prizes if you are playing for free.

Q3. Is it safe and legal to play fantasy basketball for real money?

Answer:

Fantasy basketball is 100% safe and legal as the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 does not mention fantasy sports in its list of prohibited games. The fantasy websites we recommend are safe and legal as they do not even operate in the handful of US states that consider fantasy sports to be illegal.

Q4. Where do I find fantasy basketball games?

Answer:

You can find fantasy basketball games at any of the fantasy sports websites we recommend. Major sports portals such as NBA.com, ESPN.com, CBS Sportsline, and Yahoo! also offer free or affordable fantasy basketball.

Q5. Can I play fantasy basketball on my mobile?

Answer:

Yes, you can play fantasy basketball on mobile devices as all fantasy sports sites are mobile friendly.

Q6. How does scoring work in fantasy basketball?

Answer:

In fantasy basketball, scoring is determined by scoring type. If your chosen format is a win/loss league, a win or loss for each category allows you to score players. Then you total the points at the end of the season, and the player with the highest point value takes the victory for that league’s season.

Q7. Is there a way to win NBA fantasy?

Answer:

Yes, but it takes skills and practice. Know your league well, make sure you understand the rules, know which players to choose and when. Pay special attention to positions, don’t waste efforts trying to win every category, avoid rookies, and never think like a fan.

Q8. Is there a position I should consider first when drafting?

Answer:

Yes, of course. I always advise you to start your drafting as early as possible and go for the power forwards. If you’ve chosen a 10-team format, every other position will do fine for the starting slots. If you have to choose between other positions that hold equal value to the power forward, your choice should be a power forward.

Q9. How to start my NBA fantasy league?

Answer:

Find the fantasy basketball tab and select Create League. It’s essential to pick the desired league name that’s easy to remember and attention-grabbing. Aside from the title, enter your draft date and time, draft preference, scoring preference, and the number of teams.

Fantasy: 5 tips to help you nail your basketball drafts

LeBron James and the Lakers will look to bounce back this season.

The NBA season starts next Tuesday, and if you’re like me, you will be knocking out your final fantasy drafts this weekend. Here are five tips below that will help you cram last minute and dominate your drafts!

Utilize Yahoo’s Draft Analysis Tool

Do you want to know where players are being drafted? The Draft Analysis tool is the easiest and best way to do so. By evaluating the Average Draft Position (ADP) for a particular player, Yahoo is essentially conducting a market analysis across their draft platform for when players are being selected. ADP is a valuable data point when constructing a fantasy team because you’ll want to make decisions based on the latest trends in the market. Which, at times, may be viewed as an overcorrection (an opportunity to capitalize on falling value) or a reaction to new information (such as LaMelo Ball’s recent ankle injury).

Rankings are not one-size-fits-all but similarly to ADP, they are another data point that can help fantasy managers come draft time. It’s impossible to predict the correct outcome for every player. However, you can get a feel for which players are higher or lower than the ADP. If I’m higher on a person, there’s a good chance I’ve mentioned them in my positional tiers articles, my guys, or sleepers columns.

These guys are the NBA insiders that you’ll want to follow for the latest NBA news that may impact your fantasy draft. From injuries to player absences, projected starting lineups and more, it’s critical to get an understanding of the latest news so that you can go into drafts with the most updated information as possible.

[Get in on the fun this fantasy hoops season: Create or join a league now!]

I prefer to evaluate players on their per-game value instead of their total value because injuries are, unfortunately, part of fantasy basketball. Players like Mikal Bridges are often ranked higher in head-to-head leagues because of their ability to play in a majority of games each season. Using Mikal Bridges as an example, he finished last season 24th in total value, but if you look under the hood, he finished outside of the top 50 (54th) in per-game value. So he got a significant boost by simply playing more games.

On the flip side, if you look at LeBron James from a season ago, he finished fourth in per-game value versus 16th in total value. You have to be somewhat optimistic and look at the ceiling before heading into drafts. Several players in the first three rounds of fantasy basketball drafts will be load managed this year, but that doesn’t mean they won’t produce. Availability is certainly something to consider, but don’t bypass a player’s upside. Basketball Monster is a great resource that allows you to toggle between the per-game and total values from last season.

Are you wondering who might be the Ja Morant of last season? Or who makes the All-Star leap? Well, I often use betting markets to determine those candidates. Evaluating the player award markets and their respective odds of winning provides another data point for consideration. The markets I’d be most interested in viewing would be most points, assists, rebounds, steals, blocks, most improved player, MVP, rookie of the year and defensive player of the year.

[Try Yahoo Fantasy Plus for free to get premium basketball tools]

It may seem trivial, but I’m confident you’ll see several of the names listed for those markets emerge as viable candidates to win their respective awards and be valuable fantasy assets this year.

Where to play fantasy NBA?

Since the season in the most spectacular basketball league has already started, which means that the most attentive daily fantasy sports sites have already taken care of that part of their players who follow this sport, and have launched tournaments within which you can play fantasy NBA.

We have made for you a selection of DFS sites where you can play fantasy basketball for money or for free. But first, we offer a refresher on the basics of NBA daily fantasy so you can approach the game fully equipped.

How to play fantasy NBA?

Below is the general principle of NBA Daily Fantasy. However, we ask you to be careful, as the details may vary from site to site. Therefore, before you start playing on a particular DFS site, study its rules. In general, daily fantasy basketball is the following.

NBA Fantasy Team Recruitment

In each tournament you get a certain budget to create your own fantasy team, which on most sites will consist of 9NBA basketball players. The list of available players will include the participants of the matches of the selected game day.

The cost of a player usually depends on:

• Average points for the season
• Number of points earned in the last game
• Popularity (% player ownership)

Normally your team will consist of 9 players from the following positions:

• Point Guard (PG) - Point Guard
• Shooting Guard (SG)
• Small Forward (SF)
• Power Forward (PF)
• Center (C)
• Guard (G)
• Forward (F)
• 2 Utility Players (UTIL) - Player of any position

What are points awarded for in NBA Daily Fantasy?

In Daily Fantasy Basketball, during matches, your team members earn or lose points for their actions on the court. On most DFS sites where you can play fantasy NBA, when scoring the following events are taken into account :

• Point
• Three-Point Shot (3pt FG Made)
• Effective transmission (Assist)
• Rebound
• Blockshot (Block)
• Interception (Steal)
• Double-Double (Maximum 1 per player)
• Triple-Double (Maximum 1 per player)
• Loss (Turnover)
• Technical Foul
• Flagrant Foul

Before recruiting players to a team on a specific DFS site, study the available positions and the scoring system, as they differ on different sites.

Where to play NBA Daily Fantasy?

Now that you've got the NBA Daily Fantasy Rules in mind, check out the main articles from the Daily Fantasy Basketball Strategy section, as well as tips from DFS pro Peter "DraftCheat" Christensen . After that, you can start choosing a platform for playing daily fantasy basketball for money or for free.

Among the sites that provide the opportunity to play fantasy basketball, and the NBA in particular, we want to mention the following sites where you can play daily fantasy NBA from Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Ukraine, Latvia or other European and CIS countries.

Sites where you can play NBA Daily Fantasy for money

The above sites accept players from Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and other CIS and European countries, and provide an opportunity to play NBA fantasy for money or for free.

There are other sites besides these sites, but it is not possible to play for money there if you do not live in the US or Canada. On such DFS sites, you can register using special programs to bypass blocking and play fantasy basketball for free. We do not recommend depositing money on such sites, as it may be difficult to withdraw winnings.

Sites where you can play fantasy basketball (including fantasy NBA) for free

How to choose a site where to play fantasy basketball (NBA)?

You are now pretty well prepared to start playing fantasy basketball. You know the basic rules of the game, refreshed your memory of the strategy, and received complete information about all the existing DFS sites where you can play NBA daily fantasy. It remains only to choose one or more, make a deposit and enter the game. Here are some guidelines to help you choose the right DFS site for your needs:

• Look in what language is the platform interface . If you are uncomfortable playing on a site where most of the information is in English, pay attention to the DraftGaming site, which has a Russian-language interface. There is also Zweeler, where the main part of the site is machine translated. The rest of the sites presented in this review are created for an English-speaking audience, so you will need at least a superficial knowledge of English to play there.
• Read the reviews of our members of the forum in the Daily Fantasy Sports Sites section. You can ask for advice or take an interest in their opinion about this or that DFS site, as well as leave your feedback, which will help other players.
• Chat with the site's support team. Ask a few questions that interest you and wait for an answer. If the support service answers clearly, politely and quickly, this is a big plus.
• Learn the daily fantasy basketball rules on the websites and the scoring system. When it comes to fantasy NBA, there aren't as many differences across sites as there are, for example, in fantasy football. However, certain details in the scoring system can significantly influence your choice. If you are a beginner, choose the simplest scoring system to make it easier at first.

That's all we wanted to tell you about where to play NBA Daily Fantasy. Now you can register on the selected site and start playing fantasy basketball for money or for free. We hope that this review was useful to you, if you want to know about something in more detail, write about it in the comments, and we will supplement it.

Now stop reading! It's time to start playing!

Choose a site and play NBA daily fantasy!

Why am I playing fantasy on ESPN? - World of Fantasy Basketball

Intro (you can skip it if you're lazy)

Many times in my articles and speeches, I have said that the Yahoo engine is the best option for a dreamer and all other engines are simply not worth using. I had to play on other engines in the past years. NBAcom, PASPN and the same ESPN. I swore off playing on any other engines except Yahoo. But in vain. Twelve years ago, on the NBAru forum, I had the signature "Never say never." Time passed, other thoughts and signatures appeared. And the first signature, the meaning of which concerns many issues, remains true.

Before the start of this season, I was going to play in four leagues: EDL, SLS, BUGAY'7wl, AEL. As a last resort, the fifth league was to be AEL-2. And all these leagues were planned, of course, on the Yahoo engine. As a result, I play in seven leagues, and two of them are on ESPN. How did it happen?

It all started with Ansverman - a man known for a large number of leagues. He is an EDL commissioner and one of his ideas was to introduce a two-week matchup into the playoff setup. Indeed, everyone knows the probabilistic nature of shoot-out games in a fantasy game. These games take place at the end of the NBA season and are characterized by unpredictable player performance. The top players on some teams are gaining strength before the NBA PO and don't play at all, while the permanent residents of the pool put out incredible statistical performances. Plus, the brevity of the matchup in the software makes the result more random and unreliable. One of the interesting partial solutions to the problem was offered by the ESPN engine - a two-week matchup in software. Ansverman wanted to include it in the EDL, but Yahoo does not provide such a setting. As a result, Ansverman cursed the Yahoo engine a lot and removed software from the EDL altogether, which adversely affected the league. But most importantly, this is the first time I've heard that some engine gives some useful customization that Yahoo doesn't have. It used to be said about PASPN that it allows you to build a dynasty from season to season, in terms of player cost and using many of the player management rules in the NBA. But I tried to play there. With all the pluses, this is a serious departure from fantasy, almost a different game. And ESPN offers a progressive setting just for the classic fantasy. By the way, when I tried to play on ESPN before, it was an “only points” league, also “not that fantasy”, so I naturally didn’t like it. Now the situation has changed, ESPN organizes classic fantasy games quite well.

Knowing the new cutting edge setup on ESPN didn't move me to play there. All off-season, I was solving another question: how many AEL leagues should I play in? Last season, there were 12 applicants who did not want to be divided into two leagues. The system was not built. Then we played in one league for 12 participants, with the expectation that in the new season only the best 8 will get into the AEL. So four had to fall off. Eight of the best have been identified, but where are the rest? Do all the same the second league? With transitions or not? Do you play it yourself? Recruiting 16 willing participants for two leagues so that they are ready for transitions between leagues at the end of the seasons is not so simple. Not in the mood to do it. Nerves, the years are not the same. At the same time, it is quite possible to fill two leagues with active volunteers, non-unique, capable of playing at least three leagues at the same time with such settings. I myself am one of those. But does it make sense? And then Ansverman shows up again and says that if I created a league on ESPN, then new members who do not play on Yahoo would join there. Why not try? Moreover, to study the new engine, so as not to overgrow with moss at all. So I created a league on ESPN with AEL settings. In the meantime, people who didn't get into AEL-1 and didn't play on ESPN signed up for AEL-3, on Yahoo. As a result, three AEL leagues came out unpredictably, two on Yahoo and one on ESPN. And I got 6 leagues.

It would seem that the season has begun, the number of leagues is determined. But new acquaintances playing on ESPN invited me to one of their leagues, where the participant dropped out. That's how I got 7 leagues, two of which are on ESPN. So, why did this happen, what good did I find in the new engine?

ESPN Engine Benefits

As I said earlier, the ability to set two-week fights in the software. To enable this option, in the "Weeks per Playoff Matchup" setting, select the value "2 weeks per round". In the AEL league for 8 participants, it is convenient to make 4 teams enter the PO and go through both of its rounds in 4 weeks. In a long personal meeting, they decided who was stronger. This, of course, does not completely solve the problem of “sluggish fantasy software”, but makes the results more reasonable.

The ESPN engine opens a season earlier than Yahoo. For those who are in a state of rest from fantasy until the middle, or even until the end of September, this does not matter. I belong to the category of fantasy people who are looking forward to the start of the new season. In the last days of August, I check daily to see if leagues are open on Yahoo. Moreover, in the EDL league, drafts are already underway in August. So in September there is already a desire to make the first moves, to correct the mistakes of the draft. Even to those who don't play in a league with an early draft, information that comes out early can be important and welcome. ESPN, with an early opening, satisfies the primary informational hunger of active fantasists.

Among the information appearing on the engine, a special place is occupied by "Projections" - predictive statistical indicators of players compiled by the site's specialists. Fantasists often struggle with the universal formula for the utility of players, forgetting that it should be applied not to last year's statistical indicators, but to expected ones. Modeling predictive statistics yourself for each player is extremely troublesome. You can use paid resources, such as the notorious BM, but everything here is free. And the Yahoo engine uses projections very carefully, and already during the season.

After the opening of the season on the engine, usually everyone looks at what rating this or that player has. I like ratings. Different, all. The rating is a ready-made guideline for the order of choice in the draft. Of course, one should not take any rating as the ultimate truth. Among fantasists, it is customary to scold ratings. It `s naturally. Scolding LeBron, as if towering over him, at least mentally. By swearing at the ratings, you rise above all the site's analysts (ESPN, Yahoo or whatever) and above all other fantasy people. And you don’t even have to prove something with personal victories. The principle "Oh Pug, know she is strong, that she barks at the elephant" applies. I like ratings. And the more of them, the better. You can compare, analyze the difference, find the average, or otherwise form your rating. So, the ratings of Yahoo and ESPN differ. Not so globally that Wiggins was number 1 on one of the engines. But still, there is a difference. And both sites are respected, so there is something to think about, there is something to compare.

In continuation of this paragraph. Recently, online drafts have become more commonplace. The engines analyze all the drafts going through and helpfully offer an average, which is a good guideline for newbies. By the end of October, these numbers are such that you can draft them without thinking about anything at all and without preparing at all. That's why I started liking the draft auction. He's less predictable. Although now there are average and forecast prices from the engine at auction prices. However, the real prices depend on the course of the draft and the tactics of the participants. But the main thing is that these prices differ on the engines! When drafting auctions at the same settings on Yahoo and ESPN, I took into account which players were given a lower forecast (and boldly traded for these players), and which ones were higher (and bypassed them). And it wasn't the same players on different engines.

The ESPN site, I don't know how to put it, "easier." It loads faster, there are no such heavy components that slow down the work. Previously, the NBA sinned this. I stopped going there. Now it's Yahoo's turn. It is clear that the authors are counting on the increasingly accelerating Internet in developed countries and are trying to interest the client as much as possible with beautiful graphics. But for me, those days are long gone when a new game is described by rave reviews like "Everything is drawn in detail, everything is like the real thing. " In any toy, playability and functionality are important. Heroes of Magic and Might 3 remains a model game for me. Everything that happened before and after is not so interesting. And I still play it with pleasure. As for the design of the fantasy engine, it certainly wasn't perfect twelve years ago. Rearranging the players in the roster by selecting a position from the drop-down list, then you press the confirm button and it turns out that two players were mistakenly sent to the same position by you, and all over again. Over time, the procedure for transferring the player was facilitated, and it became good. But now all the innovations only make the site heavier. In contrast, ESPN's design looks like the old Yahoo design, minus the mess.

What a fantasy engine! Even the Scores / Schedule tab on the site, and when you go to the box score of a particular match, it loads the video. At home I'm still fine, but at work it even hangs right. Either the speed of the Internet is limited, or the farwall fights off any encroachments from the site, but the fact remains that it is loaded reluctantly. Recently, the Daily Fantasy ads have been getting more and more. It's also on ESPN, but again, not as intrusive.

The simplicity of displaying information, I repeat, does not affect its quality. Even more than that, in some cases, ESPN has seen a great deal of thoughtfulness in the display.

An additional "+/-" column has been added to the Players and My Team tabs. The value there shows how much the percentage of owners of this player has changed. A cheap and effective replacement for the Research function, while retaining these functions for the need for deeper analysis.

Similarly, when watching friendly, alien or free players, you can see news - the latest available news on the player, but in one short line. Yahoo highlights when there is fresh news for a player. But usually, there is a lot of news and all of them are too lazy to read. Sometimes someone is interesting, and you start to select everything according to him. And so, to shortly and quickly, for all players at once, and it doesn’t matter if the news is old or new, but the latest one is available, and everything is in front of your eyes at once on one page, this is convenient.

Another trick for viewing players is in the Player tab on ESPN. You can select and sort those who play on a specific day. Why is this needed? It's no secret that one of the reasons for moves can sometimes be cheating human games. Even if this is not a specific goal, it can still be a decisive factor for the move. Why do you need a pool player who plays on the same day as most players on your roster? On Yahoo you can see who has matches on the next day, you can also look at the calendar of all players for the week. But if you start sorting, then there will be porridge. On ESPN, you can safely select any day, remove non-players on it, and then sort by any column.

On Yahoo, the current account change can be viewed on StatTracker. I remember the times when it was paid, almost no one used it and everyone either counted the account change manually, or waited for noon when the stats were updated in the main part of the engine. Now StatTracker is free and everything seems to be fine. But on ESPN, the Scoreboard tab lets you see the current score update across all of the league's matchups on one page.

You can also look in more detail for your matchup.

At the same time, there is also Launch FantasyCast - an analogue of StatTracker, with no less, even greater functions. And it loads faster.

When I created the league, I did not find the setting for who makes the decision on the trade. Yahoo has this setting: either the commissioner decides, or the "league veto" rule is used. At one time, I promoted the “league veto” rule, for which I was scolded by everyone. But really, is a commission agent always able to be both impartial and competent enough to evaluate any trade? I, as a commission agent, simply would not even want to spend such a responsibility on myself. There were cases when strong, authoritative managers had absolutely opposite opinion on any trade. And no matter what decision you, as a commission agent, would make, you would remain guilty. So I was upset when I didn't find "league veto" on ESPN. However, it turned out that the engine gives the commission agent the right to decide in each specific case whether he is ready to take the decision on this trade on himself, or he gives this trade at the mercy of the league. That is, if the commission agent is sure that the trade is exactly equal, then he can easily conduct it himself. If he is sure that the trade is unequal, he can reject the trade himself. And if he doubts, then press one button, and the trade will go to the vote of the league. It seems nothing new, on Yahoo the commission agent can also manually carry out any manipulation with the lineups. Or arrange a golosilku on the forum. But it will look like an interference with the compositions, like an artificial adjustment to the engine. And ESPN does it naturally. Indeed, it's been a long time since I've seen accepted unequal trades in my leagues. A league veto has one unpleasant feature - the loss of time. By accepting good trades quickly, we save time. By submitting incomprehensible trades to a vote, we do not allow an act of voluntarism and deceit to be committed.

Another plus regarding exchanges. True, subjective, and perhaps controversial. I'm generally wary of exchanges. But many say they love them. However, any fantasist, with an honest answer to the question of when there were more trades, will say that in the first season, when everyone was young and inexperienced, there were a lot of trades. For some reason, in the first year or two of the game, everyone is somehow more frivolous towards the players, they think less, it is easier to agree to trades. As it were, youth is characterized by significant and thoughtless actions. With age, everyone becomes smarter, tighter, meaner. This applies not only to age, as such, but also to fantasy. It is not uncommon for leagues where there is not a single trade at all during the season. There are talks, many express a desire to trade (as a hidden desire to hurt someone), but the negotiations do not bring results. So, I don't know what the experience of those I first encountered on the ESPN engine was, but it turned out that a bunch of trades went through at once. That is, new people, new experience, more opportunities for trading and an interesting game.

Well, from the little things, I will note the presence of a chat on the engine. This is also a debatable advantage. It would be more useful for a forum when all communication is within itself. And so that everything written is preserved, increasing a certain intellectual capital of the forum. Therefore, chat, even within the forum, impoverishes the forum itself a little. A bunch of beautiful statements and smart thoughts can disappear in the chat and no one will see them, except for those who were in the chat at a given time. However, the presence of a chat facilitates the process of negotiating trades, making other operational negotiations. Therefore, those new acquaintances that I have made also communicate in Skype chat, which has its pluses and minuses.

Speaking of cons.

Cons of the engine ESPN.

One of the factors that prompted me to write the article is the statement that the ESPN engine is inconvenient.

Perhaps this is out of habit. I quickly managed to figure out the engine. If you remember what was unusual, then I note that in the league on ESPN I am not a commission agent, but a "League Manager", abbreviated as LM (almost like cigarettes). Therefore, I did not immediately find the “LM Tools” tab.

But this, of course, is a trifle.

The main, and the only serious disadvantage of ESPN, like any other engine, is the lack of history. I have not yet found a list of leagues for past seasons on ESPN at all. I didn't play last season though. But there must be some page. Maybe there is. In any case, it (when available) will not compare with the similar one on Yahoo, where I have been playing for 13 years. And even taking into account that I had two more accounts, and not all leagues were included in the current one, there are many of them, there is something to remember and something to be proud of.

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