Play Fantasy Even If You Hate Football

No. I'll stick to the RPGs that I enjoy, thank you very much.

The way this is written makes it sound like in American fantasy football it's not tied to the real games, is that right?

I don't follow football (the British kind) but for the first time this year I'm playing fantasy football. It started as a very clever marketing hack my business partner came up with. See, in ff there are league tables so you can see how you're doing against other people you know. The industry we're breaking into all play this game so they see our names and our company name every week while checking the scores. It also provides an instant talking point - "bit of banter".

Aside from that I've been enjoying playing. It's a game of chance and there is advantage to be had from knowing about the teams / players. There's stack loads of data though. More then you can handle. Everything about every player is tracked. The performance of each player in real life each week determines the points they win you.

There's a whole other aspect too - a market for players. Based on demand the cost of a player changes each day. So you can play the markets to build team value so you can afford more expensive players.

There's a lot going on and even those of us who have no interest in football itself (I'm yet to watch a game) can find plenty to enjoy in the fantasy side of the game.

So in the author's words, deceive your co-workers and troll them. Because they're sports fans. Got it.

If you're looking at fantasy sports as a way for "geeks" to play a part in the social interactions which revolve around sports, I think baseball is the one to focus on. We're talking about a game that is seemingly designed for stats nerds and which understanding of basic statistics concepts actually gives you a huge competitive edge.

The rise of sabermetrics (defined as "empirical analysis of baseball" by wikipedia) has been pretty amazing given that its just math, and it has gotten to the point where TV/Radio commentators talk about this stuff every game.

Some tips for "hacking" fantasy football...

* Don't draft a kicker before the 16th round

There is very little difference between the #1 and the #10 kicker and predicting future performance from past performance is a crapshot. Plus if you draft a kicker early, you will be exposed as a fraud :) Every year there are no-name players that have breakout seasons, so use your late round picks trying to hit the lottery.

* Try out Value Based Drafting

This is a more advanced metric for optimizing your drafting strategy. The basic idea is to not pick players based on the raw number of points they are projected to get, but rather how much better than a "baseline" replacement. It's very nerdy but something that the traditional "office jock" isn't going to bother with. If you want to dig a little deeper, read this: http://sports.espn.go.com/fantasy/football/ffl/story?page=nf...

* Set aside time to manage your roster every week

You only need 20 min to do the minimum each week: set your lineup based on expert rankings and add waivers/free agents to replace injured/non-performing/bye-week players. If you do this every week, I can almost guarantee you won't come in the last place (the ultimate objective!). Pick a single source of rankings (ESPN is fine) and don't worry about reading 50 different blogs.

* Remember to have fun and don't talk shit

If you don't follow sports at all, now you can get a taste. It's pretty fun! If you normally follow the hometown team, congrats - you will now find yourself caring about 8-12 other NFL teams every week - if only for your one fantasy player. And don't be an asshole. No one likes playing fantasy with jerks.

PS Be careful, you've just stepped into the most addictive hobby I've experienced since World of Warcraft :)