Tips for a FF rookie needed?

[Ryan]

Originally Posted by b0ng

Depends entirely on when your draft was held that year. Early in the preseason he was undrafted, by the time the regular season was coming on he was a later round flyer pick.

I can understand him being undrafted in early july and all of that, but i'm surprised he was still on the waiver wire by week 1 in his league. Foster was the toast of the town in all the fantasy articles leading up to the season.

[PapaL]

Goes to show, different strokes for different folks. We as fans of a team tend to overvalue players just because we know more about them than nonfans. I try to make it a goal not to take any Texans players. I'd rather have my real team win than my unlucky curse ravished ff team(s).

[Scooter]

any advice for rookies on where to play? nfl.com has hosted leagues that seem relatively simple, are there better options?

[ArlingtonTexan]

Originally Posted by Scooter

any advice for rookies on where to play? nfl.com has hosted leagues that seem relatively simple, are there better options?

I would suggest to play with in one of the legues advertised by memebers on this board. Most are 'private" leagues on NFL, yahoo, fleaflicker, etc. also, you get to play with people you "know." making trading more likely, but still be able to get legetimate advise from someone in the league. there is also more general banter which is fun for some people.

The public leagues on any of those sites are fine for helping you learn the game, but are pretty faceless.

[Texecutioner]

Originally Posted by LondonTex

Haha thanks guys ! I'll certainly take the advice to pick those who score regularly. I'm better off keeping it simple as I'm still quite green when it comes to the NFL.... Not sure my wife would let me spend 30 hours or so lol ..will have to see how much time I can spend ... Can't wait to get into my first season!

The biggest thing that I can tell you is to learn how to use the waiver wire and the free agent wire to improve your team all of the time. That is where FF is won in many cases. It's very seldom that a player has such a great draft that he can win a FF league or have the best team with a draft alone. Well not in any league where a bunch of vets are playing that know the ins and outs and if there are 14 members playing, than talent will be spread thin. 10 team leagues suck, because any dumbass can read a mock draft list and pick stars and get lucky. A 14 man league requires a lot more knowledge and research though.

1. DOn't pick your favorite players because you like them. Pick guys on great offenses that get a lot of touches.

2. Play your match ups from week to week depending on what defenses your guys are going up against.

3. Drafting a high end QB in many cases can carry your team to the post season. Brady, Rodgers, and Manning have done that many times for poor teams.

4. Handcuff your RB's.

[LondonTex]

Originally Posted by Texanmike02

I haven't played much fantasy football for the last 6 years (played in one league 2 years ago) but I used to win my league routinely. If you want to really have a good draft you need a system. I've got a spreadsheet that I built (somewhere) that I'll look for that will calculate points by every player from last year based on your scoring system. The next thing that it did was calculate the opportunity cost of picking every player (based on how many you start at each position) vs picking other players. It only worked for the previous year's stats but it gave you a great idea of how valuable each position actually is in your league. Everyone will tell you that "must have a top flight QB" or that "RBs are over valued" or that "Receivers are the most important" but in reality it varies based on several things. If you are in a league that puts a premium on different types of yards (rushing vs passing) or rewards special teams performances (some leagues don't) then the most valuable commodities change. The nice thing about the calculator was that it would update as people were drafted to give you the most valuable player (and the most valuable player based on who you had). For example(situation not realistic just for illustration purposes) if you have Foster/Johnson/AD and in a 1QB 2RB 2WR system and had to choose between MJD and Brees it would tell you to go with brees but if you had Foster/johnson/manning and choose between mjd and brees it would tell you to take brees.

Of course it wasn't perfect but it was really helpful I drafted using it exclusively one year and won the league with only one trade (traded for a new rb when edge went down).

Hopefully even if I can't find it the process it went through will help you build a draft strategy. If you were able to go in and modify for predictions (older players regress, younger most likely progress, for example [I had a program to calculate standard deviations for that too]) then you could develop a killer tool. I've thought about turning it into an Android app before.

Mike

Sounds great. Tho I'm still getting to grips with the NFL in general so maybe this would be awesome for me after a rookie season in FF, getting used to how it works and getting the basics down pat. A lot of FF seems overwhelming at the mo....all the different ways to score points, stats, players etc. I'm going to have a hard time keeping track of players and filling my starting places in correctly each week ...(I'm guaranteed to make a dumb move by putting an inactive or bye week player in at some point LOL).... I have a feeling my first year will be a 'groping around in the dark' kinda year for me lol....hopefully my second year will be more competitive....having said that, I may surprise my league and win it! Thanks for this tho...I'll keep this in mind

[LondonTex]

Originally Posted by Scooter

any advice for rookies on where to play? nfl.com has hosted leagues that seem relatively simple, are there better options?

I have a spot free in my rookies ESPN league...I created it and so far have 5 spots (Including me) filled...one left. Give me a message if you want an invite

[LondonTex]

Originally Posted by Texecutioner

The biggest thing that I can tell you is to learn how to use the waiver wire and the free agent wire to improve your team all of the time. That is where FF is won in many cases. It's very seldom that a player has such a great draft that he can win a FF league or have the best team with a draft alone. Well not in any league where a bunch of vets are playing that know the ins and outs and if there are 14 members playing, than talent will be spread thin. 10 team leagues suck, because any dumbass can read a mock draft list and pick stars and get lucky. A 14 man league requires a lot more knowledge and research though.

1. DOn't pick your favorite players because you like them. Pick guys on great offenses that get a lot of touches.

2. Play your match ups from week to week depending on what defenses your guys are going up against.

3. Drafting a high end QB in many cases can carry your team to the post season. Brady, Rodgers, and Manning have done that many times for poor teams.

4. Handcuff your RB's.

Thanks ...I wish there was a way to practice waivers and free agency etc...I guess by the end of the first week I'll have a better idea

[Dutchrudder]

Ok, some real advice. Don't put a lot of money on your team your first year. Learn the ropes, learn from your mistakes, learn from others successes, and most importantly have some fun. You probably won't do well your first year or two, I know I didn't, but once you get a handle on things, dive right in with some bigger buy-ins. Personally, I don't spend more than $250 on a single league, because I don't like to gamble that much, but I'm in several 20-50 dollar leagues and they are fun. Only 1 big money league for me to pay close attention too, and the others are mostly for fun.