Fantasy Sports – The Basics
What is a fantasy sports team? Even if you don’t know what it is, you have probably heard about them or listened to others talk about how their team is doing. A fantasy sports team is a virtual team made up of real people or players from a particular sport. Fantasy Football is probably the most well known but fans can participate in leagues from almost any sport – Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, Soccer, Racing and more. I will use Fantasy Football to explain everything but all the sports use the same concepts for a fantasy league.
Many websites are available to help set up or participate in a fantasy league. The websites make it easy for participants because it does all the scouring for you, usually in real time. A league usually selects someone in the group to be the “Commissioner”. With input from the league members, the commissioner (or Commish) will set up a league on a website, select the rules/scoring for the league and also settle any disputes that may occur. League members are also called “owners”.
Before the real NFL season starts, the owners will draft (select) players for their virtual team. Some leagues will let the website computer auto-draft for the owners (this is the best way for newbies!). Some leagues have a real-time draft where each owner picks each player individually over several rounds, just like the NFL draft (This method is much more difficult for those new to the fantasy football world).
Teams are made up of players from different NFL teams and different positions. Scoring for the fantasy team depends on how the real player does in his game that week. Depending on the league rules, fantasy team players earn points for touchdowns, yards gained, passing yards, sacks, etc. Within the league, owners/teams are divided into brackets and each team plays agains one other team each week. Fantasy teams will win if their real players score more points than the players for the other fantasy team. During the season, owners can drop players that aren’t helping their team and add new players based on the league rules. Before the end of the real NFL season, the fantasy teams with the best scores or records will continue in “playoffs” to determine a final winner or Champion (just like the Super Bowl). Leagues can recognize Champions and Losers with awards.
