Are You Ready for some Football pools?

For all of you Football widows out there, here’s a little information to help make sense out what it is your husband is jabbering on about at this time of year.

Or, if you’re like me and love football, but are a little overwhelmed about the types of fantasy offerings that are out there I’ve tried to make sense out of the different options. I play in a Weekly Team Pick’Em one every year and love it. I find that you don’t have to know a ton about the players or the teams – usually the person who picks based on which city they’d rather visit out of opponents wins at least one week. The great part is that because I have picked a winner it gets me more into the games.

So, below you will find some of what’s available out there and who knows, you may even decide to join one of them!

The Weekly Team Pick’Em

The Weekly Team Pick'Em is the typical office pool and I am in one every year (last year I didn’t win a week, but I came 5th overall). In this game each member of the pool must select the winner of each game that is going to be held each week of the season. The twist here is that you have to factor in the spread. A point spread is the predicted scoring difference between a game's two opponents (thank-you Yahoo! Sports). So, if Dallas is favoured to beat the Giants by 8.5 points and I select Dallas to win, in order for me to be correct Dallas has to win by more than 8.5 points. While if I had selected the Giants to win, as long as Dallas doesn’t beat them by more than 8.5 points I am correct. (Dallas could win by 3 points, but because they didn’t beat the spread of 8.5 points, anyone who selects the Giants will win.)

The point of this pool is to get the most games correct. There is usually a winner each week and then a running tally is taken over the weeks so that there will be an overall winner at the end of the season.


Draft: Live Draft vs. Auto Draft

In a fantasy game that offers a live draft, the participant will have to first join a league. Each league will have its own rules such as the number of players required at each position, the points given to passes, yards gained, touch downs etc. Each member of the leagues drafts their own team of football players. The goal is to select players that will earn you the most points. For example, if a Quarterback gets points in 5 different categories while a Running Back will earn you points in only 2 categories, it’s important that you have a high ranking QB since that’s where you’ll earn the most points.

A draft date and time will be assigned for the league; all participants should be logged in at the designated time ready to draft their team. The drafting order will be pre-determined by the League Manager. Once a player has been selected he becomes unavailable to the other teams.

This is the closest to the normal pub or office draft.

The Auto-Draft is very similar to the live draft. The difference here is that there is a tool on the website for this fantasy product that allows the participant to pre-select the players he or she wants for the team. The tool allows the participant to rank the players. There is an assigned draft date; however, no one needs to be logged in for it to run. The draft runs overnight on the assigned date. Again the draft order is pre-determined by the League Manager (the site) and just like the Live Draft one player can only be on one team. If two participants have asked for the same player whoever drafts first will get the player, the second participant will get the next highest ranked player on his or her pre-selected list.

It is important to remember that even though the site you are using may rank a player that does not mean that he will get you the most points for your particular league. It’s important to review the categories for garnering points and then select players that you think will earn the most points based on the parameters set by your League manager.

Leagues can either be Public leagues where anyone can join or Private leagues where everyone knows each other.

The Pick’Em

Another option of fantasy football games offered on the ‘Net are pick ‘em games. The basic concept is that the potential fantasy participant joins the site; he or she is then put into a league and is able to select a team from the database of players provided by the site. The site will determine how many players are required to make up a team, as well as how many players are required per position. Scoring will also be determined as Rotisserie, Straight or Head to Head.

The Salary Cap

As a twist to the regular Pick’Em game the Salary Cap forces the fantasy participant to be more selective when fielding a team. In a game with a salary cap, the players are all given specific market values based on their previous season’s performance. Each fantasy participant has a specified budget to use to select players, the catch is that the participant cannot go over the amount he or she has been given. The participant is forced to develop a strategy: to pick one or two expensive players and then fill in the rest of the roster with lesser players or to try and take a more moderate approach. The key here is for the participant to know how the team will be scored, if touch downs are more highly valued than rushing yards you may want to spend more money on a Quarterback than a Running Back.

Note that in some instances the Salary Cap is not given in monetary terms, there are instance where the player is given a fantasy ranking value and each team is given a maximum fantasy ranking value that cannot be exceeded.

Types of Scoring:

Rotisserie

This type of scoring allows for statistical averages such as the Completion Percentage to be factored into the standings. This form of scoring ranks the players in the league based on different categories for example, Touch Downs, Sacks, highest Completion Percentage, Rushing Yards, and Interceptions. If there are 10 players in a league, the available points go from 1 point for the lowest ranked participant to 10 points for the highest ranked participant per category.

The participant with the highest number of points at the end of the season will win the league.

Example

A league has Touch Downs, Sacks, highest Completion Percentage, Rushing Yards, and Interceptions as its categories. In a league of 10 participants, George Smith ranks 1st in Touch Downs, 2nd in Sacks, 2nd in Completion Percentage, 1st in Rushing Yards, and 2nd in Intereceptions. His total points will be: 10+9+9+10+9=47

Straight Points

In a league using straight points all categories are given a specific points value. For example, using this scoring approach touch downs could be worth 2 points, while rushing yards are worth 1 point or a fumble is given –1 point. This scoring system does not account for any statistic given in the form of an average. Hence, the Completion percentage will not be a category for this type of league.

The participant with the highest number of points at the end of the season will win the league.

Head to Head

Head to Head uses straight scoring, but it pits fantasy participants against each other. Different categories are given different point values the same as would be done in a game using straight scoring. The league is divided into conferences and on a weekly basis different fantasy participants’ teams play against each other. The points are tallied for that week period and whoever has the most points at the end of the week wins the week. In the standings, the win is noted under the appropriate team and the loss is noted for the other team. At the end of the season the teams with the best records for their conferences play off against each other, until one team is ultimately named the overall winner.

Good Luck!