Fantasy basketball

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Fantasy League Basketball was inspired by fantasy baseball. Originally played by keeping track of stats by hand, it was popularized during the 1990s after the advent of the Internet. Those who play this game are sometimes referred to as General Managers, who draft actual NBA players and compute their basketball statistics. The game was popularized by ESPN Fantasy Sports, NBA.com, and Yahoo! Fantasy Sports. Other sports websites provided the same format keeping the game interesting with participants actually owning specific players.

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[edit] League Settings

There are many rule variations when playing fantasy basketball. The rules used in a particular league are determined by the rule settings. Some common rule variations are discussed below.

[edit] Categories

Commonly, fantasy basketball leagues may track as few as three or as many as nine categories. Three-category leagues usually account for only points, rebounds, and assists. Five-category leagues generally add blocks and steals. Eight-category leagues usually add field goal percentage, free throw percentage, and either three-point field goals made or three-point field goal percentage. Nine-category leagues usually add the category of turnovers. Rarely, other statistics such as fouls are counted.

Some leagues allow the league "commissioner" to determine which categories will be tracked. If these categories are chosen poorly, the league may be unfairly weighted for or against certain positions. For example, a league that tracks points, rebounds, assists, steals, and three-point field goals would be weighted toward guards, who typically have higher numbers in many of these categories, and against power forwards and centers, who typically have higher numbers in the block and field goal percentage categories, which are not counted.

[edit] Number of teams

In public leagues, the number of teams in a league is typically ten or twelve. In private leagues, which are invitation-only and usually utilized by players who want to compete against a group of people they know, the number of teams will vary substantially.

[edit] Roster size and composition

"Roster size" refers to the number of players that may be assigned to any given team. The roster size is the same for all teams in the league. "Roster composition" refers to the number of players from each position (point guard, shooting guard, small forward, power forward, and center) that a given team may use.

Some leagues require as few as five players per team (one from each position), challenging the player to assemble the best starting lineup from week to week. Other leagues may allow as many as twelve or fifteen players per team. These leagues usually designate one or more "bench" positions. Statistics accumulated by players assigned to the bench do not count for the team, but no other team may claim a player on another team's bench for their own team. Leagues with larger roster sizes challenge players to manage their rosters internally.

[edit] Scoring style

There are many variations used when scoring fantasy basketball. The more common variations are detailed below.

[edit] Rotisserie

In rotisserie scoring, the real-life statistics accumulated by the players on a team are aggregated and ranked against the same statistics for the other teams in the league. Fantasy points are earned based on these rankings. For example, in a twelve-team league, the team with the highest number of rebounds over the course of the season to date would be awarded twelve fantasy points. The team with the next highest number of rebounds would be awarded eleven fantasy points, and so on, with the team with the fewest number of rebounds being awarded a single fantasy point. For negative categories like fouls or turnovers, the team with the fewest statistics are awarded the most fantasy points. This is done for all categories counted by the particular league. The team with the highest number of fantasy points at the end of the season is the winner.

Rotisserie scoring encourages balance on the team's roster. Winning the rebounds category by one rebound or by one thousand rebounds counts the same, while winning the steals category by one steal and the assists category by one assist is worth twice as many points as winning the single rebounding category by one thousand rebounds. Successful teams must fare well in several categories to win in rotisserie leagues.

[edit] Head-to-head (H2H)

In head-to-head scoring, teams are scheduled to "play" each other over the course of a week. During that week, the real-life statistics of the players on each team are accumulated.

There are two styles of head-to-head scoring:

Most categories is a win — whichever team has the more favorable statistics in the categories chosen (most points, fewest turnovers, highest free throw percentage, etc.) is awarded a point for that category. One can also weight each category, for example: winning scoring earns you three points, winning rebounds wins you two points, winning steals wins you one point. The team with the most points wins that game.

Each category is a win — whichever team has the more favorable statistics in a category (most points, fewest turnovers, highest free throw percentage, etc.) is awarded a "win" for that category. The other team is tagged with a "loss". The results of these weekly matchups are accumulated to provide a seasonal win-loss record.

Head-to-head leagues often employ a "playoff" system, with seeding based on the seasonal win-loss record. Matchups are determined via a bracket, with the winners of each matchup advancing and the losers being eliminated until a winner is determined.

[edit] Fantasy points

In fantasy point scoring, the commissioner determines the number of fantasy points that a particular statistic is worth. For example, the commissioner may determine that a steal is worth two fantasy points, where a rebound is only worth one, and a turnover is worth negative one. Fantasy points are accumulated nightly based on the real-life performance of the players on each team, and the team with the most fantasy points at the end of the season wins.

As when choosing categories, care must be paid in assigning fantasy point values to categories. Failure to achieve balance will result in weighting the league for or against players at certain positions.

[edit] Where to play

  • NBA.com offers a variety of fantasy basketball games, including customizable leagues with real-time stats.
  • Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Basketball offers free, fully customizable leagues. Has a neat real-time fantasy stat-tracker, available for a fee. You can play in public or private leagues.
  • ESPN Fantasy Basketball charges players a franchise fee, but awards prizes to the best players.
  • CBS SportsLine Fantasy Basketball also charges a league fee - the main drawback is that their stats are slow and presented in a difficult-to-read format. They also have frequent stat errors that are fixed following the game.
  • CDM Sports offers a wide-variety of fantasy basketball games, ranging from a paid league Commissioner product to various pay-to-play games where users can pay an entry fee and attempt to win cash prizes.
  • YourFantasyTeamSucks Fantasy Basketball Just because your fantasy team sucks, doesn't mean your league has to. Customizable leagues with live stats and cell phone/PDA interaction.

[edit] Fantasy basketball tips and information

Rick Kamla, an NBA expert for NBA TV, has pioneered fantasy basketball with his show, NBA TV Fantasy Hoops. NBA TV Fantasy Hoops is a half hour long informational show dedicated to fantasy basketball. Mr. Kamla's show airs daily on NBA TV, during the NBA season.

Examples of successful online fantasy basketball news sites include:

[edit] NBA.com's Premier Fantasy Championship

Starting in 2006, NBA.com fantasy has instituted a global competition known as the Premier Fantasy Championship. Self proclaimed as "The World's Most Exclusive Fantasy Competition", the PFC mirrors the real NBA in having 30 teams managed by 30 experts selected from over 9000 applications worldwide. The PFC is a H2H league of the standard eight categories with weekly transactions. Each team has a total roster of eight players of which six are starters in the positions of point guard, shooting guard, small forward, power forward, center, and utility. Each team has $100 of free agent bidding dollar for the entire season to sign free agents in an auction format. The twist of the league is that for the first three months of the season, every team with a losing record in that month will be subject to an internet public vote where the general managers with the most votes will be replaced by another general manager from NBA.com's PFC Developmental League. The winner of the competition will be the enshrined in the NBA.com Fantasy Basketball Hall of Fame and enjoy a lifetime's worth of bragging right as the top fantasy basketball players in the world.

[edit] External Links

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