NFL lockout symbolizes America's political split

The NFL lockout has made it clear just how much control a few rich guys can have over an entire country. You read me right. These are the two sides to the NFL lockout saga. On the right we have the NFL owners who opted out of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) back in 2008. All of whom are filthy rich dudes looking to get an unreasonably bigger piece of the pie. On the left are the players, coaches, staff and, don't forget, over 100 million fans. Let's just modestly call it, "half of the county."

How is this legit? The NFL's popularity increases year after year. It is the #1 past time in the US, making tons of money. Players, coaches and staff are to take pay-cuts. Fans spend more money. Owners hoard all the dough. Are we really supposed to abide by this? It's an outrage and I don't get it.

Surely our judicial system has our backs, right? They should be able to sort this mess out. Oh! That's right. They can't because we have a total split of political ideologies in our country. Government represents its people and vise versa. Damn!

On one side of the split, we have those who are mislead to believe that we need to reinforce capitalism by supporting greed. The other side, those who are mostly neutral, also struggle with this theory because being rich is often confused with achieving the American dream. "If I made it rich then I wouldn't want anyone to take it away from me," is the notion. So, owners are just doing what anyone else, with that notion, would do if they were in their situation. These convictions make the filthy rich false symbols for the American dream. Contemptuously call them, "the real American idols."

If we conclude our reasoning about the NFL lockout this way then we will give in. The 2011 season will commence thanks to our sacrifice. We will pay more money. We will give plenty to those who already have it all. We will watch our favorite players get more injured (Cole, Yahoo Sports). This is not the base for the original American dream where everyone was supposed to get "a piece of the pie." That's true capitalism. Instead we live in a type of structure where we always owe to someone. It is debt-ism.

I will go further to the left than most are willing to. The teams should belong to the fans. We should be allowed to invest in our own hobby as a committee of owners. It's fitting that the winners of the Superbowl, the Green Bay Packers, are the ones that prove that concept can be a reality (Murray, NPR). Congratulations to them. They deserve it.

A Sign of Humanity from an Owner

The Baltimore Ravens owner, Steve Bisciotti, at first cut pay to the team's coaches and staff then refunded the money. "Until those owners get religion the way Bisciotti did, I'm going to regard them as sinners . . . " (Silver, Yahoo Sports).

Sources

NFL owners opt out of CBA

Owners bullying coaches, staffers with pay cuts

Expect injury totals to rise following lockout

In Green Bay, Packers Fans Are 'Owners,' Too

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A cure for lockout blues

With the NFL lockout presumably bumming everyone out, it's refreshing to see certain things carry-on as planned. "Yahoo Fantasy Football is open for sign-ups" was found in my in-box today. Exciting! I plan to reinstate my league this evening. Let's stay optimistic. Believe that, this fall, we will be playing fantasy football and not fantasizing about football.

It's game time!

Every year I'm excited for the new features in Yahoo FF. It seems they always add about a dozen new things. Many end up being quite useful. Like they were reading my mind. Here are some this season's new features that caught my eye.

New Live Auction Draft App
Draft your team by bidding on players with a fixed auction budget
Stay organized and nominate wisely with our Roster Grid
Use commissioner controls to pause the draft and undo picks

I do a standard draft but I'm really interested in trying out the auction method. It seems more intuitive. For more info on Yahoo's Live Auction App go to:
What is the difference between a Standard and Auction live draft?

Android App
Set your roster from your Android device
Get real-time fantasy score updates
Add and drop players

Updated iPhone App, iPad (coming soon)
Set your roster from your iPhone
Get real-time fantasy score updates
Add and drop players

Every year the mobile fantasy apps get more capabilities, which makes me think, "I need to join the 21st century and get a phone with internet access."

New Scoring Categories
Award bonuses for long passing, reception, rush plays and touchdowns
Penalize quaterbacks for pick sixes thrown
Add defensive stats for yards allowed, 4th down stops, tackles for loss, 3 and outs, and more!

I pretty much have a lock on the scoring system for my league but if I were to make changes, it would be to spice up the defensive teams scoring a bit.

Franchises
Invite league members to manage their teams from last year
Invite new managers to run one of last year's teams
Finalize your league's team list for easier draft and keeper management

With this new capability, allowing one or two keeper players may end-up being a reality.

Upgraded Message Boards
View messages by topic, upload images, format text, and post unlimited messages

Cool.

Transfer Team Ownership
Change the manager of a team so that teams can continue to be actively managed throughout the season

Where has this been?

Configurable Draft Pick Times
Change the time allowed per draft pick to speed up or slow down your live draft

Finally! This one is very necessary.

I can't wait to get started!

Yahoo Sports Fantasy Football
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ESPN's Fantasy Baseball Vs. Yahoo's

A friend of mine recruited me to join his fantasy baseball league on ESPN. "Thank God the Steelers Lost" is a 20 (units) buy-in, head-to-head weekly match-up with 10 teams. Usually, I run my own fantasy baseball on Yahoo for free. "Fourth Place Haters" (in honor of my unfortunate MLB team the Orioles) is also head-to-head weekly match-up with 10 or so players. Because I've always wanted to switch to a paid fantasy baseball league, needed a break from the commissioner duties and loved the name of his league; I joined.

I must say the I'm totally satisfied with this league. ESPN has a leg-up on Yahoo when it comes to fantasy baseball because scoring structure is more like traditional h2h fantasy football. In your weekly match-up versus the other player, the result is either one win or one loss. It's that simple. Yahoo's h2h set-up does not do this. Instead you compete separately for each stat category: hits, runs, home runs, steals, wins, losses, saves, etc. You either win or lose in each category. These wins and losses are added to your total for the week and for the season. For example, your match-up for one week could result in 6 wins and 4 losses. Your year-end record could be something like 144-56, if you're lucky.

Yahoo's h2h scoring system doesn't feel genuine like fantasy football, which results in only one win or one loss for that week. It's hard to tell what you're worth in the standings, difficult to strategize and way too overwhelming for beginners.

ESPN's fantasy h2h baseball works a lot like traditional fantasy football. Each stat that a player can record is worth a set amount of points, for example a hit is 1, a home run is 4, a win is 10 and a save is 5. All of these points are added to your total for the week. If you have more points then you opponent for that week you get a win. If you have less then it's a loss.

I don't know exactly ESPN has been hosting fantasy baseball this way. I recommend it over Yahoo. If you are looking for the second best fantasy game after traditional head-to-head fantasy football then, in my opinion, it's ESPN h2h Fantasy Baseball.

I'm excited. My team "The Essex Meat Sox" are currently 5-2. So far I'm winning this week 239-230. I got first pick in the draft and landed some really good players: (in draft order) Pujols, Hamilton, Pedroia, Kershaw, Weaver, Jimenez, Santana, Jeter, Berkman, Shields. Hopefully I can hold this team together and get in to the playoffs for a chance to win a cool 100 units.

The Feast is Mine!

For the first time in my fantasy football prize league era, I'm taking home the Superbowl trophy. I must say that it was a lot of fun and very difficult to do. There were a lot of witty team managers in the league fighting-it-out but in the end my team proved to be reliable when it counted. Here is my championship squad (honorable mentions):

QB-Joe Flacco
QB-Matt Cassel
WR-Calvin Johnson
WR-Mike Wallace
WR-Dwayne Bowe
WR-Vincent Jackson
WR-Donald Driver
RB-Jamaal Charles
RB-BenJarvus Green-Ellis
RB-Frank Gore
TE-Owen Daniels
TE-Dustin Keller
TE-Brent Celek
K -Matt Bryant
K -Sebastian Janikowski
D -CHI
D -NE
D -KC
D -DAL

What an awesome year for fantasy football! It was probably one of the most dramatic NFL seasons ever. I'm looking forward to next year being just as good.
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Dumping Players Rule

In a professional fantasy football league, where playing for a prize is on the line, a good foundation for sportsmanship is crucial. The league must have rules. Most of the rules in a fantasy football league derive from one basic principal; play to win or don't participate.

For example, team managers should not purposely lose to help another team, no team manager should own two separate teams, and no collusion - where one team makes a transaction to improve another team without trying to improve their own. Roster dumping is also an act against good sportsmanship that makes the list of don'ts.

In my league, the BFFL, it has happened a few times where one team manager has dropped many significant players into the free agent pool without picking anyone up. Each time it has been a team manager who did not make the playoffs. And each time this occurred during the first week of the playoffs.

This act can drastically effect the dynamics of a league at its most crucial period. For instance, team managers who have survived to the playoffs have done so by successfully managing a roster that's based on their draft and available players in a competitive environment. Bottom line: it's unfair, and totally unrealistic, for the remaining playoff teams to calibrate their roster by comparing their team with a whole new batch of available starters.

Why do team managers dump players? I'm not totally sure. Maybe it's an attempt to undermine the league in retaliation of not making the playoffs. Maybe its to make their good players available to a friend in the league since they won't be needing them. My concern is not to know, "why" but to uphold professionalism in my league and promote good sportsmanship.

Here are a few other fantasy football sites that cover the "dumping players" topic and confirm my understanding.

ESPN - RULES: FAIR PLAY / CONDUCT


Foxsports - General Rules


Spurstalk - Controlling League Laws


Antsports - Sportsmanship


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Fantasy Football League: Ladies Only

I find it pleasantly strange that so many woman are becoming true NFL fans. It seems where ever I am watching the game there are just as many woman around as there are dudes. They're cheering hard and getting just as pissed as men do. They're pigging out, wearing jerseys and talking trash. What's next? A street game afterwards. Are they pretending? What the hell is going on?

The biggest surprise came while recruiting team managers for my league this summer. I told my girlfriend that I may need to use her as a weight. Meaning, if I ended up with an uneven number of teams I would need her to join in order to even it out. You cannot run a league with an odd number of teams. But it looks like everything is going to be fine. I should have a round number of ten teams in the league. I told my girlfriend the good news that I would not need her to join. To my surprise she seemed very disappointed. Really?

I thought she was joking but she wasn't. I admit her argument seems reasonable. She has to deal with me hogging up the TV with football games every week. And if she was forced to watch football then she wanted some stake in the game. As you know, that is where fantasy football comes in.

She is not the only one. More and more I am asked by woman if they can join my fantasy football league. My female friends, my girlfriend's friends, my sister, the list goes on. So I'm going to put this female fantasy football craze to the test. I've created the perfect fantasy football league for ladies only. It's free and it's game settings are much more forgiving than my original league. It's perfect for beginners. I'm going to invite all the ladies and see what happens. What the heck. I'm interested to see how this thing turns out. Sunday night is now Ladies Night!

Max Moves = NO MAXIMUM. HURRAY!

In the past 2 seasons I've set the maximum number of moves to 10. Meaning that dropping and replacing a player on your roster would count as 1 move against your 10. The spirit of this setting was to prevent team owners from making too many rapid impulse moves. Team owners who do this are also known as free agent vultures. With the limit in place team owners would have to consider how the move would effect their team for the long term. Thus putting more thought into making moves.

It just wasn't popular. It made dealing with bye weeks and injuries too difficult for some team owners. The limit of 10 resulted in many teams needing just 1 more move at the end of the season but they were all tapped out. As commissioner I could not help but feel a little guilt over this.

The experiment I had in last year's league helped me realize a good alternative to setting max moves. When 2 of the team owners quit in the beginning of the year I came up with a plan to divide up the players on those teams. I set weekly waiver from Sun-Tue and gave everyone 200 pts in a free waiver acquisition budget. Then I dumped all the players from the 2 forfeited teams. This allowed everyone a few days to make bids on the players they wanted. It worked out pretty well. Hmmmmm.

This year I happy to say, "max moves are set to NO MAXIMUM." Instead I've set free agents to go on waivers every week from Sun-Tue. And everyone gets 1000 pts in their free waiver budgets. Hows that?

I believe this change will not only make everyone happy but it will also add another cool element to the league, the free waiver budgeting. Can't wait to see how it plays out.