This was a big week in fantasy football. You learned how many teams are in your league. You thought you were in a 12-team league, or 10-team league, or whatever number you had when you drafted. But after week 4, you might find that's not the case.
Bye weeks can be annoying for fantasy owners, but they reveal a lot about your league. If the Kendall Wright owner was 0-3, and kept him in the lineup last week, they might have already bailed on the league.
It sounds terrible, but it happens. Not because 0-3 is insurmountable, but because in one of their other 20 leagues they're 3-0, and in a couple others they're 2-1. Those teams will start getting all their attention and your league will become an afterthought. And now you have to deal with a pile of driftwood for the next few months.
In a way, this could be your league's fault. Maybe your league had an opening and and some guy said they'd join. And they did the same thing at work, and with their neighbor and with a fan message board. They didn't care about your league, and their record gives them the perfect excuse to abandon their unsuccessful team.
At least early bye weeks give you a chance to identify them now rather than later. If you noticed a team like that this week, notify the commissioner and get it resolved before week 5. Reach out to the owner and see if there was a valid reason why they took an unnecessary zero. Maybe something happened and they're still active. That's possible, at least. But if not, now is the time to do something about it.
Hopefully, you know a good person who would be willing to take over a team and be active. But if not, the league should take the team over, put in the highest projected points each week and let it play out the season. At least it will be a real opponent for the remaining weeks of the season.
The one thing you shouldn't do is nothing. You can't let an unmanaged team offer up easy wins to the remaining teams on its schedule. Bye weeks, demotions and injuries can make them a shell team with guaranteed goose eggs each week. That's not fair to other teams, and can mess up playoff runs later in the year. If a team gets an easy win to make the playoffs, you forfeited a lot of the drama that makes fantasy football great.
Please, resist the temptation to let it slide another week if you're about to play an abandoned team with some zeroes in their lineup. I know the easy win is appealing, but you're hurting the league. Yes, you. By not saying anything, you're contributing to the problem. You don't have to be the commissioner, either. If you want the league to be a legitimate form of competition, you can't let things like that go. Every owner should be on the lookout for it, and help fix the problem before it further damages the competitive balance of the league.
It's bad enough that you already went through one week with an abandoned team. Do something about it as soon as possible, and be on the lookout for other owners who will do the same thing in the future. An owner might be willing to fight through 0-3, but they'll fold the tent at 0-4 or 1-5. Pay attention the next few weeks and try to limit the harm these irresponsible owners cause with their apathy. You owe it to your league, and you might just save it in the process. Good luck this week.
How does your league handle teams who leave bye week players in the lineup? What do you do with abandoned teams, if anything? Should the league intervene, or leave it alone? Share your thoughts below.
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