I’m sure you ALL have heard of fantasy football and maybe accepted an invitation to play this year by your husband or friends…and secretly are freaking out cause you don’t know what’s going on!? Definitely me a few years ago 😂 I now have been playing with my family and friends for many years now (one championship under the belt 🙌🏼🏆🤣) and have come up with some quick tips for you to impress your hubby or friends this year in your fantasy football league…ESPECIALLY if there’s money on the line!!
The Draft
You still have a bit of time if you want to set a league up on the ESPN Fantasy Football App. The draft usually takes 1-2 hours! You typically want to wait till AFTER the third preseason games (due to injuries and surprise retirements…Tony Romo…) and of course before the first regular season game.
How to draft-
You’ll have several rounds (usually around 15) to pick players- 9 for your weekly lineup and the rest are bench/back up players.
Typically each week in your lineup you need:
- 1 Quarterback (QB)
- 2 Running backs (RB)
- 2 Wide Receivers (WR)
- 1 Tight End (TE)
- 1 Flex (FLX- This player can be a running back, wide receiver, or tight end)
- 1 Defense (D)
- 1 Kicker (K)
Now I know your tempted to pick the one name you may know like Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady in round one, DON’T. A quarterback is not going to be where most of your points come from.
Rounds 1-4 You’re going to want to get running backs (RB) and wide receivers (WR). Look for “projected points”- the higher the better. Around round 4 or 5 you can try and grab one of the top quarterback’s if they’re available- Aaron Rodgers, Patrick Mahomes, Desean Watson… I probably would only stick to those 3 in these rounds (suprisin. Any other quarter back will pretty much get around the same amount of points each week, so you’re okay holding off a few more rounds. Same with tight ends- Travis Kelce, Zach Ertz, George Kittle, are the three you would want to snag early, any others you can typically hold off.
Pay Attention to Bye Weeks!
About Round 5 you can start looking at best player available and start filling the rest of your positions and back ups- you want to check each player’s BYE WEEK. If your top wide receiver is Antonio Brown and you see his bye week is week 7, you need to get a back up wide receiver who does not have a bye week on week 7 so he can fill in. You definitely need backup wide receivers and running backs.Kickers and defense you can pick up later in the season (I’ll talk about that soon) so you don’t necessarily need backups for these positions.
Know the Lingo
This is a must if you want to be successful! You have to pay attention to your players before the first game of the week (THURSDAY). If you ever see a red Q, SSPD, P, D, or O…you need to check it out:
Q= Questionable-
Click on your player, scroll down to “recent news” and read to find out why he’s questionable and the severity of the injury. A lot of times it will say things like…”may not be the best version of himself” or “did not practice Thursday.” If it’s unclear whether or not he will play-you need to keep a close eye and look at which bench players would be able to fill in. If you don’t have a bench player that can fill in if need be- you need to pick one up. Most importantly pay attention to his game time.
If his game time is 11 AM Sunday morning, typically at least 10 minutes before game time you will have a clear answer and will know whether or not to keep him in or put a bench player in. If the player doesn’t play until Monday night, you will need to put a different player in before all games start if you think he’s unlikely to play. REMEMBER- You can NOT change a player in your lineup if their game has already started or ended!
So if your backup has a game BEFORE the game of the questionable player- you will probably want to just put him in and take out the questionable player-just in case.
SSPD= Suspended
This is a big one to pay attention to in the draft especially. For example, a player could be suspended for four games for drug use. If he’s a TOP player you’ll want to decide whether you can afford to keep him on your bench for his suspension or if you need to drop him to get another player.
P= Probable
You’ll see this typically after a player was questionable and is on the up and up and most likely playing. This is a good thing and a sign to keep him in.
D=Doubtful
Just like probable, you’ll see a “Q” turn to a D and that’s a sign you need to take him out of your line up and replace with someone on your bench
O= Out
Self-explanatory! If you see this he’s out, replace with someone on your bench! You also want to check out HOW LONG he is projected to be out. Read up on the injury…for example if it’s an ACL tear that means he’s out for the season, you’ll want to pick up a new player and get him off your team.
BYE
I talked about this briefly in the draft section, but if your player doesn’t show projected points and it says BYE, that means his team does not play this week and you need to put him on the bench and put in your back up.
Setting your Lineup
Each week before the first game (ALWAYS on a Thursday!) you’ll want to go in and set your lineup. That means you need to make sure you have none of the above issues (Q, SSPD, BYE etc…) and check your projected points for each position and make any necessary changes! Projected points are the numbers shown to the right of the players, you’ll typically want the players with the highest projection for that week to be playing.
Another thing to remember is if you had one of your top running backs on the bench last week because of a bye week, make sure to put him back in your lineup.
Picking Up New Players
A couple of scenarios here for picking up a player each depending on the day of the week….
Scenario 1- It’s Wednesday or Thursday before game 1 of the week, you’re setting your lineup and one of your players has a bye week or is out and you don’t have a back up.
That means you’re going to need to DROP a player to make room for someone to replace that person. Let’s say it’s a kicker or defense.If you have just an average kicker or defense, consider just dropping your current and picking up the best available. You do this by clicking “Players”, scroll to the needed position and see if you can get the best available.
Now let’s say it’s your quarterback or you have a really good defense… and you don’t have a back up- you’ll want to pick your worst player on your bench-probably someone you never play-drop him and pick up the best available quarterback for the week.
Scenario 2- The Waiver Wire
Another term you’ll hear a lot is “waiver wire.” This is basically the order in which players would be given out when multiple people try to pick up the same player. Each fantasy team in your league has a position on the waiver wire. This comes into play typically Monday-Wednesdayish when games are complete and everyone is trying to pick up the best players for the following week if necessary. It’s also important to watch because when another player in your league DROPS a player, they end up on the waiver wire. A lot of times you can find some really good players when this happens!Whether you get the player or not depends on your order in the wire:If you’re third in the waiver order and whoever is second in the waiver order tries to pick up the same player as you, they will get the player. If you were desperate for that player…that’s where the next part comes in! ⬇️
Making Trades
Something else you may encounter or can try to do is make trades with other teams and teams may try and make trades with you. Why would someone want to make a trade? Well first of all it’s fun to actually interact with the people your competing against! But let’s look at a couple more scenarios.
Scenario 1- Someone proposes a trade with you.
Let’s say you get a notification that someone wants to make a trade with you. See what they are offering and who they want in return
Let’s say they’re offering a good running back in exchange for one of your better wide receivers. At this point you need to really consider, what you need. Will that running back get you more points each week than the receiver you would give up? If not, I would say no. But if you’re really in need of a good running back, consider it
Scenario 2-
Your quarterback just got injured and is out for the season.
Well obviously you need a new quarterback! Look around at other peoples teams, a lot of times a team may have 2 pretty decent quarterbacks (one for backup) that are better than those available to pickup. Let’s say you see a team with Tom Brady and Andrew Luck on his bench. Take a look at their line up and see what player they could benefit from receiving. If you offer up your worst player, they obviously aren’t going to take it. You may have to sacrifice a better player to make the trade happen!
When I first started playing fantasy, I didn’t make any trades because I wasn’t confident and didn’t really have a good idea of who the players were and that’s totally fine! You can work up to this point.
I know it totally seems overwhelming at first but trust me- it makes this season SO MUCH MORE FUN!!! You will no longer dread sitting around while your husband, friends or family watch Sunday Football. You’ll actually have a reason to watch and players to root for! If you encounter more questions throughout the season please drop a comment below so we can work it out! I also love hearing good fantasy team names… so share those as well! Good Luck!!!