Ian Allan

I’m participating in a career-high eight fantasy leagues this year. That might be too many. Due to the volume of leagues (and increased time required for lineups and roster adjustments), I’ve made a few bone-head slipups – the kind of mistakes I haven’t made in the past.

I’ve never intentionally missed submitting an actual lineup or just given up on a league. I don’t do that. If I’m in a league, I’m in a league – I give it an honest effort. But I have, in the eight leagues, accidentally twice started guys on bye weeks. Somehow I started Larry Fitzgerald in a league last week, for example; not sure how that happened. Maybe I set the lineup but didn’t hit the “save” or “send” button. And on two or three occasions, I’ve missed waiver-wire deadlines. With all of the various leagues and time zones, I’m not 100 percent certain when the deadlines are in a few of the leagues – easier to just get the picks in well in advance.

I am, however, doing pretty well this year. Below is a brief rundown on each of my eight leagues:

FANTASY INDEX MOCK AUCTION
Currently in first place out of 12 with a record of 58-19-0 (in this league, you play every team every week). I like this league because it requires no maintenance. Each team purchased a roster in mid-May, and lineups are automatically submitted, using a best-ball format. I got some nice buys in this league – Matt Forte and Chris Johnson for 8 percent of my cap. I don’t know, however, that the team is deep enough to hang on and win the whole thing. Tom Brady is out for the year; he was my highest-priced player. That hasn’t hurt me much yet because I also purchased Drew Brees, but I’ll take a zero at quarterback when Brees has a bye and I’ll be out of it if Brees gets hurt. In each of the last two years, I’ve been leading this league at this point in the season, only to have my team fade. I have a feeling that will happen again. In this format, it’s a battle of attrition.
For league website, click here.

FANEX ANALYSIS DRAFT
A lot of fantasy leaguers swear by strategy that you have to take running backs in the first and second rounds. This is particularly true in the “FAD” experts league hosted by Fanex Football. But last year, I drafted receivers in the second, third and fourth round and won this league by a mile. I used the same strategy again this year, and I have a commanding lead at the halfway point. It’s a total points league, and I’m basically a week ahead of everyone at this point. You start three wide receivers and have the option to start a fourth as a flex player, and I’m rolling out Steve Smith, Andre Johnson, Calvin Johnson and Wes Welker every week – I’m killing everyone at that position. It helps, of course, that I managed to get a good pair of running backs anyway – Steven Jackson with the 6th pick, and Matt Forte in the 6th round. This is also a maintenance-free, no-moves leagues, and I’ve been able to avoid any serious injuries thus far.
For league website, click here.

FANEX: LEAGUE PLAY
Another league hosted by the guys at www.fanexfootball.com. In this one, you make moves and submit lineups, and you play head-to-head games. PPR league. Start QB, 2RB, 3WR, TE, PK, D and 1 RB-WR-TE. I used the same sort of strategy, loading up on the premium pass catchers. Team is going fine so far, but has just a 4-3 record because of the luck of scheduling. Of the 24 teams, my squad ranks 4th in scoring despite missing Brian Westbrook for half of the games. The team hopefully will rebound and make the playoffs; we’ll go from there. There are some other good teams in my division, however, so I don’t have a lot of margin for error. Only four teams in my 12-team conference will make the playoffs.
For league website, click here.

FANTASY FOOTBALL OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP (league #600)
The guys at Fanball contacted me and asked me if I’d like to have a comp team in their new startup fantasy contest. This is the one with a $1 million winner and Jerry Rice serving as the commissioner. I said sure. I’m in a 10-team league. This is a draft, not an auction. You play one head-to-head game each week, plus you get a win each week if you’re in the top 5 in scoring. The league works pretty well. I don’t like that with the standings, you can’t see the total points scored by each team. Scoring system is fairly standard, but teams are allowed to use a QB as a flex player. For this reason, I drafted three good quarterbacks – Romo, Garrard and Aaron Rodgers. Garrard has underachieved, but Rodgers has been better than expected. Brady got hurt, which damaged my selection of Randy Moss in the first or second round. Because of his suspension, I think, I was able to get Brandon Marshall at the end of the third. In a draft, though, sometimes you get stuck with some guys you don’t really want. At one point in the draft, I pretty much had to take a running back, and Larry Johnson (ugh) was the top guy available. I tried to cut Johnson last night, but the system has some kind of lock on him – he’s too valuable to cut, they say. Another slight glitch. Right now, I’m sitting at No. 3 of 10 in this league. I need to move up to No. 2 by the end of week 9. At that point, the top two teams play in the championship game. (One of the top 2 in this league, by the way, is one of our subscribers – goes by the name of Vanilla Bear).
For league website, click here.

FANTASY FOOTBALL OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP (league #423)
My least favorite league. Same as above, but there was some kind of technical glitch during the draft. I could not get into the cyber draftroom; I believe other owners were locked out as well. So I got a team of pretty much random dudes. I think the first few picks might have been weighted by some pre-draft preferences I listed. Anyway, my name is on this team, so I’ve played out the thing out anyway. I’ve made a bunch of moves and re-worked the team. As with the other team (which was given to me as a make-up for this glitch team), I am in third place after seven weeks. Need to move up a spot in the final two weeks of the regular season.
For league website, click here.

THE DAILY FOOTBALL LEAGUE (22nd year)
My original fantasy league. TD-only, which is a completely different animal. Made up mostly of guys who went to the University of Washington in the ‘80s (and wrote for the student newspaper there – The Daily). I’m sitting at 3-4 right now and fifth in scoring. Doesn’t feel like a championship team. Might not even make the playoffs. Most of my money is tied up in Tomlinson ($43), Calvin Johnson ($15) and Braylon Edwards ($15), and all of those guys are underachieving – particularly Tomlinson (man, is it annoying to see him in so many commercials when it’s becoming more and more apparent each week that he’s not an elite player anymore). About half of the guys in this 12-team league are active on the waiver wire, so it’s been hard getting those Flavor of the Week free agents.
For league website, click here.

LEAGUE OF CHAMPIONS
I don’t know any of the other 11 owners in this league. I was contacted by e-mail about joining this league and opted to give it a shot because I like the format of the player allocation. It’s an auction run at myfantasyleague.com, but it’s a time-delay auction, with the action spread out over about three weeks. So once or twice per day, you go in and enter bids. I strongly prefer auctions over drafts, and this is an even better type of auction, since everything is slowed down, allowing you to carefully calculate and track player values. My team is going by the name “Pale Force” in honor Jim Gaffigan’s work. After seven weeks, the P-Force is 6-1 and leading the league in scoring. There are some other quality teams in the league, but I’m in the running.
For league website, click here.

NBC SPORTS: $100,000 FANTASY CHALLENGE
It’s not really a fantasy “league”, but it plays like one. It requires 5-10 minutes of lineup work each week. For this one, you submit a lineup of 10 players each week. Can’t use any player twice. At the end of 11-13 weeks, the top 5000 guys advance to playoffs. About 25,000 people are in it. I was in the No. 2 spot overall after the first week, then bombed with a couple of big misses in week 2, dropping me down to something like 2,500. I’ve been slowly chipping away since that time. Now I’m up to 1,854. But I’m not putting too much effort into it right now. I’ll be in the top 5000 at the end of the qualifying gig, and at that point they wipe the slate clean. No advantage to finishing 1st in the qualifying versus #4783. Once the real competition begins, I’ll take a closer look at the deal, weighing where to use each player.
For league website, click here.

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