Fanatic, Frequently Asked Questions

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We only require your name, address, e-mail address, and your acceptance of our terms of service and rules governing our leagues. We do not ask for your SSN or any Credit Card information on the Membership Form. If we need that information we will contact you via e-mail first asking you to call our office with the needed information. That way your sure your talking to someone from FanaticFantasyFootball.com LLC .

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The optional information helps us serve you better. It let's us know what type of league(s) you like best. Then we concentrate on making those leagues our top priority. We also like to know how you found us, so we can target our advertising in the right places to reach out to others like yourself who want to play fantasy football in a great environment.

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How to Play:

Fantasy football is a game of skill. It's a way to show your passion for the professional game of football translated into a fantasy football world. Your challenged to research the players, be it rookies or seasoned professionals, so you can draft a team that can win you a championship. The avid fantasy football players know the professional coaches and their coaching philosophies. Is he a defensive minded coach? or is he a coach that likes to air it out often? or maybe he loves to pound the rock with an aggressive running game!
There are many ways to play fantasy football depending on which site you choose to play on. Here at FanaticFantasyFootball.com, we create a competitive game between league members in individual leagues but we also kick it up another notch by offering awards for being the best among the best. As time goes along we'll be creative in keeping the game interesting, challenging, and rewarding.
First you should decide if you want to play in a private league with just your friends or if you want to play in a public league and make new friends from around the world.
What type of league should you join? We offer four types of leagues. See following descriptions of leagues.
Redraft Leagues: Draft a full 18 man roster each year. The league members tend to stay in the league year after year. The draft experience itself is one of the exciting parts of these leagues. Redrafting each year gives individuals the opportunity to draft highly sought after players they didn't have the previous year. One team can't keep the same player or players year after year like the total keeper and partial keeper leagues do. Throughout the year players may be traded, dropped into the waiver / free agent pool, or kept for the whole year. When a new year draft starts all players are available to be drafted. The draft order is determined randomly by computer approximately 60 minutes prior to the beginning of the draft.
Empire Total Keeper Leagues: Total keeper just means the fantasy coach may keep all the players on his roster as long as he wants to keep them (till death do they part as I say). Of course he always has the option to trade any or all of his players or drop them in to the waiver / free agent pool. Our Empire Leagues offer the closest thing to the NFL experience you can find. Players in these leagues stay for the long term. When they draft players the first year (20 per roster) they are on that roster as long as the owner desires to keep them. There is no trading of players or draft picks during the draft the first year. Starting in the second and following years the team owners may trade players and or draft picks during the draft process. Each league has what is called a Rookie / Free Agent draft in the 2nd and following years that lasts for six rounds. This is an e-mail draft spread out from May right up to the September kickoff of NFL games. The first year draft is randomly determined by computer approximately 60 minutes before the draft starts. Second and following years the draft positions are determined by the final league standings and playoff finish. The worst team will draft first and so on to the league champion drafting last. Basically your in the game the whole year because when the NFL Super Bowl ends the fantasy football coaches begin researching rookies entering the NFL draft in April and watching for anything (coaching changes, etc) that might affect a players value + or -. Empire Leagues are the only leagues to use an Injured Reserve player. If one of your players get injured and is out for the year you may place that player on injured reserve and pick up another player to take his place. This is the only time your roster may exceed 20 players. This 21st player may stay on your roster only until the injured player is taken off the NFL IR list. The IR player cannot be traded as long as you have him on injured reserve.
Dynasty "Partial Keeper" Leagues: Team owners in Dynasty leagues usually compete against each other year after year. They draft 18 players per roster during the first year draft. Beginning with the second year they have a designated time period to select 0, 1, 2, or 3 "keepers" (part of their current roster). Players they want to "keep" from the previous year. Any player not designated as a "keeper" is dropped back into the waiver / free agent pool and may be drafted by any team owner when their turn to draft comes around.
Auction "Partial Keeper" Leagues: Auction Leagues are like the Dynasty leagues except the players are auctioned. The highest bidder receives the player put up for auction. The team owners also have a designated time period in which to designate 0, 1, 2, or 3 keepers prior to the new year auctioning period beginning. Team owners may have 18 players on their roster during the regular season and the playoffs.
Sign Up: After deciding whether you want to play in a private or public league and whether you want to redraft every year or keep all or some of your players each year, it's time to sign up. You just go to our buy teams page. We used a little color in the headings on our buy teams page so you will be able to identify each group type (Redraft, Empire, Dynasty, Auction, GridIron Spectacular™, Cheap Seat™) to help you easily identify the different league types. You'll also see a column that tells you if the draft is a live draft (done in real live time with all members present on computers drafting their teams) or an e-mail draft where each team owner makes his/her draft pick and it is sent via e-mail to all other owners alerting them of the player drafted and who is on the clock next. After you make your team purchase it's time to make one of the most important decisions you'll make for your team. Give your team a NAME!
Grunt Work: Okay, I have a fantasy football team! Now what? Now you begin the work of showing the other members of your league that your the best fantasy football coach on either side of the Mississippi River. Check out your league rules to make sure you bring your A-Game to the Fanatic Stadium™ turf on Game Day. You need to dive in to the scoring rules. How will points be awarded? Check out the Top Performers report (under Reports on your league pages) from the year before, to see which players performed the best. Plan for your leagues draft. The league draft is one of the most important events of the year. It lays the foundation for your fantasy football season and your hopes for a Fanatic-Bowl Championship! Know which players you want to draft. Have a backup plan ready in case you don't get the player you wanted. Plan for every possible drafting position, #1, #2, #3, and so on. Find some good fantasy football information web sites to gather important player information from. (Examples: www.kffl.com free information; www.draftsharks.com pay for information). There are many others out there for you to use.
League Play: We have 12 team owners in each of our leagues. Each league consists of 3 divisions with 4 teams in each division. Your team will play each team in your division 2 times and each team outside your division 1 time. All games are head to head. The team scoring the highest point total after all NFL games are complete for the week wins the game. His/Her team adds one in the win column. The losing team adds one to the losing column. If the game ends in a tie it is counted as a tie for both teams (during regular season play; no ties during the championship playoff weeks). Your team plays fourteen regular season games in 13 weeks. Each team plays one doubleheader in week 7. You only submit one lineup to be used against both teams you play against in week 7. Your score for that week will count double for your year to date total points. (Example: you have 900 points going into the week 7 games, you score 150 points in week 7, we double the 150 points making it 300 points added to 900 = 1200 total points for the year to date). The 150 points will be used to determine your win, loss or tie against each of your opponents (Example: your team A, your playing teams B and C, team B scores 155 points and team C scores 100 points, team A splits the doubleheader beating team C and losing to team B adding 1 win and 1 loss, team C with only 100 points loses to both team A and B and adds 2 in the loss column, team B wins both games and adds 2 in the win column).
Setting your lineup: During weeks 1-16 each fantasy coach must maintain enough players at each position to field a legal lineup. A legal lineup will consist of nine players with your team defense counting as one player. You must start one Quarterback, one Place Kicker, and one Team Defense. That leaves 6 positions to be filled by various combinations of Running Backs, Wide Receivers, and Tight Ends. (Example 1: You could start 2 RB's, 3 WR's, and 1 TE, Example 2: 1 RB, 3 WR's, and 2 TE's). To see more lineup combinations please go to Gate# 09 Rule Book. The Playing Field Rules link will take you to more legal lineup combinations. When your ready to submit your lineup for the week you just put a checkmark in the box next to the player you want to start. The computers take care of totaling your score each week.
How to Score Points: We have 17 offensive point scoring possibilities and 10 defensive point scoring possibilities. You can find a list of all the various ways to score points by clicking the Gate# 08 Point Scoring link under the Stadium Guide. We award points to these positions (QB, RB, WR, TE, PK) in all 17 offensive categories. In our leagues we use the TEAM DEFENSE to score points in the 10 defensive categories. On offense you can score points for touchdowns, extra points, field goals, number of rushing attempts, number of receptions, number of completions, length of touchdown scored. See complete list at Gate# 08 Score Board. Offensive point scoring example: Your QB throws a 5 yard TD to your WR. Your QB gets 4 points for throwing the TD and 1 bonus point for the 5 yard toss giving him 5 points total. Your WR gets 6 points for catching the TD pass and 1 point bonus for a 5 yard catch for a total of 7 points on one play. Your total for that play is the QB's 5 points + the WR's 7 equaling 12 total points on one play. If you only had the QB and someone else had the WR you would get 5 points and the other person would get 7 points. On defense your team receives 1 point each for blocked punts, blocked field goals, blocked extra points, sacks, interceptions and so on. You get 2 points each time your defense records a safety. The less points your team defense allows it's opponent to score the more points your fantasy team scores. The same is true for yardage allowed. Your defense can score touchdowns too, and be awarded bonus points for the length of the touchdown. Let's say your defense records an interception and runs it back for a 85 yard score. You get 1 point for the interception and 10 points for the 85 yard scamper for a TD for a whopping 11 points on one play!
Victory Points: Victory points are not added to your teams point total for game play. Victory points are only used to help break ties for playoff seeding. Each week the 4 highest scoring teams receive 2 victory points, the four teams scoring the next 4 high scores each receive 1 victory point, and the lowest four scoring teams receive no points. This is the #5 tie breaker.
How to make the Playoffs: If your team is one of the top 6 teams in your league you get to play in the championship playoff for a chance to win the Fanatic-Bowl Championship. The six teams with the best records and highest point totals (determined by tie breakers) move on the the championship playoff bracket. The best 2 teams receive a 1st round bye. The other four teams play for the right to move on to play the top 2 teams and the winners of the 2nd round games move on to play for the Fanatic-Bowl Championship. The 6 teams not making the championship playoff play in a consolation bracket playoff.

Fantasy Football Dictionary:

AUCTION LEAGUE: a league in which players are not drafted in the traditional way such as the NFL draft or other fantasy football league drafts. In auction leagues each fantasy coach is allotted a certain amount of fantasy dollars (fanatic dollars) to bid on players. You must spread your money out so as to be able to purchase enough players to field a legal lineup. Beginning in the 2nd year each franchise owner may keep 0, 1, 2, or 3 players from their previous years roster. Our partial keeper auction leagues are referred to as Auction Leagues and are identified [APF $75 team entry, AEF $99 team entry, ASF $149 team entry, AMNL $199 team entry].
AUCTION LIVE: the auction takes place in real live time. All team owners need access to a computer and the internet to participate. The auction is conducted using Fantasy Auctioneer. A given amount of time is set and all team owners may bid on the players services. At the end of the allotted time the player is awarded to the highest bidder. A live auction takes hours to complete (approximately 5-7 hours).
AUCTION E-MAIL: the e-mail auction is not a live auction. All team owners need access to a computer and the internet to participate in the bidding. Players are put up for bid by the commissioner and in some cases the team owners. A time limit is set for the bidding process and at the end of the time limit the players are awarded to the team that bid the highest amount. All player bidding and awarding is handled via e-mail notification.
AUCTION COMBO: The auction combo leagues require team owners to have access to a computer and the internet. The first 9 player positions are filled using the e-mail auction. The last 9 player positions are filled using the e-mail draft. Once your team reaches 9 players during the auction process you cannot bid on any more players put up for auction. Each team owner must end the auction portion with 9 players on his/her roster. The final 9 player positions are filled during the e-mail draft.
AUCTION BLIND BIDDING: When a player is placed on the auction block by the commissioner or a league member, any of the fantasy coaches interested in obtaining that player may bid on him. A certain amount of time is set for the auction of that player and at the end the highest bidder is awarded the player. It is called blind bidding because coaches cannot see what other coaches are bidding.
CHEAP SEATS™ LEAGUES: redrafts a whole new roster of 16 players every year. All previous year players are dropped back into the waiver/free agent pool for drafting.
CHEAT SHEETS: used by fantasy players to rank players for drafting purposes. Can be on printed media such as paper or might be a list of players stored on a website. Makes drafting easier because drafted players may be crossed off if using a list on paper or if using a computer list the host draft site usually has drafted players grayed out or hidden from view. Some cheat sheets are free of charge. You can purchase subscriptions from online fantasy sports information companies that include cheat sheets as part of their subscription price. If those options don't work for you then you can compile a cheat sheet yourself. Free cheat sheets can be found at www.kffl.com . A subscription source that includes cheat sheets in the subscription price is www.draftsharks.com . A couple of good magazines to find cheat sheets in would be Fanball Magazine and the Fantasy Football Index.
DRAFT: The act of one fantasy coach choosing a NFL player to be on his roster of players. Collectively the act of all team owners choosing NFL players to be part of their team rosters. Drafts are conducted in all Empire, Dynasty, Redraft, GridIron Spectacular, and Cheap Seats leagues. Auction Combo leagues also have a 9 round draft at the end of the 9 player/roster auction.
DRAFT E-MAIL: E-mail drafts are just that. You go to your league page and make your draft selection. The information is then sent via e-mail to all other fantasy coaches in your league notifying them of your draft pick. The next coach is then put on the clock (usually a 12 hour time limit) to draft a player. This type of draft takes longer (days or weeks) but is popular with people who don't want to or just can't participate in a 5-7 hour live draft. All Auction, Dynasty, and Empire league drafts are e-mail drafts in the 2nd and following years. Requires all participants to have access to a computer and the internet. No need for participants to be in the same location. The draft order for first year e-mail drafts is determined randomly by computer approximately 60 minutes before the start of the draft. The draft order for the second year and following years is determined by the previous years finish in the league and playoffs.
DRAFT LIVE: A live draft is when all or most of the league members meet online at a predetermined time and date to draft players. It requires each fantasy team owner to have access to a computer and internet access. The draft order is randomly determined approximately 60 minutes prior to the drafting action beginning. Takes approximately 5-7 hours to complete. No need for participants to be in the same location.
DRAFT OFF-LINE UPLOADED: Off Line drafts can be held only when you can get all league members together in one place to hold the draft. No computers or internet connection is needed. When the draft is finished you upload the results to the league commissioner at FanaticFantasyFootball.com and he will load the rosters. This is not a recommended way to hold a draft due to the possibility of incorrect information being transferred during the process. The commissioner does not take responsibility for correctness of information transferred.
DRAFT POSITION: Draft position is the position 1-12 that you occupy for the drafting process. All first year drafts use the serpentine draft. If you have the 1.01 draft position then you will get the first pick of the draft. If you have the 1.05 draft position you will pick 5th and so on down to 1.12 which is the last draft position of the first round. The second round is in reverse order so the person with the 12th (1.12) draft pick in the first round gets to draft first in the second round (2.01). The fifth place drafter in the first round drafts again in the second round at 2.08 and the team that drafted first in the first round drafts last in the second round (2.12). This serpentine order continues for 16 to 20 rounds depending on the type league your in. Draft position in Empire total keeper leagues for second and following years is determined by your teams previous year finish in the league and playoffs. The worst team drafts first on down to the league champion drafting last. This draft order continues for all 6 rounds of the draft. In Redraft and Partial keeper leagues the draft proceeds in serpentine order every year.
DYNASTY LEAGUES: are partial keeper leagues. beginning in the 2nd year each franchise owner may keep 0, 1, 2, or 3 players from their previous years roster. For each player kept the owner must forfeit a 1st, 1st-2nd, or 1st-2nd-3rd draft round pick.
EMPIRE LEAGUES: are total keeper leagues. Franchise owners may keep as many players (from 3 up to and including 20) as they wish to keep from the previous years roster.
FANTASY FOOTBALL FANATIC: one possessed by excessive zeal for the game of fantasy football.
FANATIC DOLLARS: imaginary money used in our auction leagues for bidding on players.
FCFS: First Come First Serve period of free agent player pick up. FCFS is NOT used at FanaticFantasyFootball.com because we believe it gives an unfair advantage to some players who have easier access to computers than other players do.
FREE AGENT POOL: Free agent pool and waiver pool are the same thing at FanaticFantasyFootball.com because we don't really offer a free agent pick up time period. We just use and call it the waiver / free agent pool. Some sites like Yahoo separate the pools. They have a waiver wire request period and after that one waiver wire run is awarded the pool is open on a first come first served player pick up period. We have 2 waiver wire player pick up periods each week. The first on Wednesday evening and the second early Saturday. We don't use the first come first serve (FCFS) free agency because a lot of players don't have access to their computers during the work week and would be at a disadvantage.
GRIDIRON SPECTACULAR™ LEAGUES: upper budget redraft leagues. Each franchise owner drafts a whole new roster of 18 players each year. No players are kept from the previous year.
GRUNT WORK: The act of grunting while digging up information on NFL players, coaches, and your fellow franchise owners.
LAST WEEKS POINT TOTAL: Last weeks point total is tie breaker number 6. We use this to break ties between teams competing for playoff seeds. Our interpretation of last weeks point total is the "year to date point total" of all games from week 1 through week 12 and NOT just the "single game total" scored in week 12 only.
ORPHAN / FREE AGENT TEAMS: are teams that are abandoned by the previous owner for one reason or another. We offer these teams on a first come first serve basis. It offers the opportunity to join an already established league looking to fill the opening created when one of it's fantasy team owners leave.
PARTIAL KEEPER LEAGUE: partial keeper leagues allow fantasy coaches to keep a certain number of players from the previous years team or they can draft a whole new team if they don't want to keep any players from the previous year. Usually the maximum number of players allowed to be kept is 3. If you keep one player you forfeit a pick in the first round of the draft. If you keep 2 players you forfeit a first and second round pick and if you keep 3 players you forfeit picks in the first three rounds. The league commissioner sets the cutoff date for designating keepers. If you do not designate any players as keepers by the cutoff date and time they will be dropped back into the waiver/free agent pool and may be drafted by anyone during the next league draft. Players may be traded during the regular season. Trades are allowed during the off season if all teams involved in the trade have renewed their teams for the new season (2009). Our partial keeper leagues are referred to as Dynasty Leagues and have the following identification [DPF $75 team entry, DEF $99 team entry, DSF $149 team entry, DMNL $199 team entry]. The draft order for the first year is determined randomly by computer approximately 60 minutes before the start of the draft. The draft order for the second and following years is determined by the previous years finish in the league and playoffs. Worst team drafts first (1.01) on down to the league champion drafting last (1.12).
REDRAFT LEAGUE: redraft leagues conduct a complete new 18 player draft every year. All players from the previous years roster are dropped back into the waiver/free agent pool to be drafted by anyone when it's their turn to draft. Examples of Redraft leagues at Fanatic Stadium are our Cheap Seats™ Leagues [$49.95 team entry], GridIron Spectacular™ Leagues [$500 team entry], and Redraft Leagues with the following identification [RPF $75 team entry, REF $99 team entry, RSF $149 team entry, RMNL $199 team entry]. The first year draft order is determined randomly by computer approximately 60 minutes before the draft begins. The draft order for the second and following years is determined by the previous years finish in the league and playoffs. The worst team drafts first (1.01) on down to the league champion drafting last (1.12).
ROOKIE DRAFT: drafting period for dynasty and empire leagues that takes place after the NFL Draft and before the new fantasy football season (2008) begins. Free Agents may also be drafted during this period.
SEEDING: the act of matching playoff teams and placing them in a bracket for the playoffs.
SERPENTINE DRAFT ORDER: referred to as serpentine draft order because of it's snake like procedure through the drafting rounds. The odd numbered rounds 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, and so on draft first from the top of the order down to the bottom of the draft order. The even numbered rounds 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, and so on draft first from the bottom to the top of the draft order. That continues for 16 to 20 rounds depending on the type of league your in.
SLEEPER: (1) a NFL player who, for any number of reasons during a league draft, doesn't show up on anyone's radar as a player worthy of being chosen. If they are picked by someone it's usually in the last round or two as added depth. Then all at once they get a break. Maybe the player in front of him on the depth chart gets injured and is out for the year. Suddenly the no name guy starts posting some real nice fantasy football numbers. In some cases they are directly responsible for someone winning a league championship. It's a blessing from the fantasy football gods. (2) name also given to one or more persons in your league who pass up a good draft pick for someone already injured and won't play one down during the season. What?! Yep, I've seen it happen many times over the years. Snooze and you lose.
TD ONLY LEAGUE: in TD Only leagues you receive points only when a touchdown is scored. We do not offer these leagues due to the fact that they are not popular with most players.
TIE-BREAKER: system used to break ties when two or more teams tie for a playoff seed. We use 8 tie-breakers if needed in this order:
1. Overall Winning Percentage
2. Total Points Scored
3. Head-To-Head Record
4. Divisional Winning Percentage
5. Victory Points
6. Last Week's Point Total
7. Power Rank
8. Reverse Order of Opponent Total Points Scored
TOTAL KEEPER LEAGUE: total keeper leagues allow fantasy coaches to keep their entire roster of 20 players if they want to. They are not required to designate keeper players from one year to the next. Coaches are free to drop players off their roster if they desire and add other players from the waiver/free agent pool or work a trade with another team in the league. They may also drop a player(s) in order to select a rookie or free agent during the new year (2008) e-mail draft which lasts for 6 rounds. Players may be traded during the NFL off season if all teams involved have renewed their teams for the new season (2008). Our total keeper leagues are referred to as Empire Leagues and have the following league identification [EPF $75 team entry, EEF $99 team entry, ESF $149 team entry, EMNL $199 team entry]. The drafting order for the first year is determined randomly by computer approximately 60 minutes before the draft begins. The draft order in the second and following years is determined by the previous years finish in the league and playoffs. The worst team drafts first (1.01) on down to the league champion drafting last (1.12).
VICTORY POINTS: we use victory points to help break ties for seeding in our Fanatic-Bowl Championship playoffs and our consolation bracket playoffs. Victory points are not added to your weekly point total in head to head competition. This is tie breaker #5 among our 8 tie breakers.
WAIVER POOL: this is a pool of players that are undrafted or dropped from the rosters of the fantasy football coaches in your league. These players become eligible to be picked up during the scheduled weekly waiver request period. We run 2 waiver request periods each week. The first waiver run is on Wednesday evening and the second waiver run is early Saturday. Waiver pool and Free Agent pool refer to the same thing at FanaticFantasyFootball.com because we don't have a free agent pick up option like Yahoo and a few other sites. They specify a certain time period when players may be picked up on a first come first serve basis (FCFS). We feel the FCFS is unfair to the players who can't be at their computers easily during the work week. Having 2 waiver request periods allows everyone a fair chance at players.

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