Here at DLF, we constantly strive to improve the fantasy experience for our members and visitors. To that end, we seek to establish best-of-breed partnerships within the industry, partnerships that we feel bring the same level of excitement, dedication and commitment to taking the game to the next level.
We are extremely excited to announce our newest partnership: Â RealitySportsOnline.com.
Reality Sports Online (RSO) is seeking to take the Auction/Salary-Cap fantasy format to new heights, bringing unprecedented automation, ease of management and realism to the dynasty format.  Until now, management of an auction/salary-cap league and format is commonly mired in inefficiency, frustration and complexity.  With RSO’s just-released engine, the complexity of league setup, draft and salary cap management have all been seamlessly automated and are, for lack of a better term, painless.  From filling  the league, configuring the scoring system, preranking the players and performing the draft, RSO has struck the perfect balance between realism and simplicity.
RSO was founded by former NFL front-office personnel who sought to bring the detail and  general manager experience to the fantasy format.  In CEO Matt Papson’s own words:
“On some level, everyone who plays Fantasy Sports does so to recreate the GM experience. Over the last decade or so, fantasy participants have become knowledgeable, analytical users. But the platforms on the market have not kept pace with the increased aptitude of the dynasty demographic. Users have been forced to try to add layers of realism to the games they play on their own. Reality Sports Online is the next step in the evolution of Fantasy Sports, designed for fantasy elite.”
What’s the best part about being a real-life GM? It’s trying to build a championship team by picking the talent, negotiating contracts and signing players. RSO provides this experience by enabling fantasy team owners to negotiate multi-year contracts in real-time online in the Free Agency Auction Room. The Free Agency Auction Room is RSO’s most innovative feature, simulating real-life Free Agency over the course of 2 to 3 hours instead of 2 to 3 months.
Having spent time within the system, we’re genuinely excited about the experience that RSO has created.  It is, without a doubt, every bit of revolutionary.  To use their own words, the fantasy elite who strongly desire to play within an auction/salary-cap format now have a system and engine to take care of the mundane aspects of managing such a league.  It really couldn’t be much easier.
While RSO is in their first year and has just now released the system to the masses, they remain committed toward continual and greater development. Â More options, greater flexibility and continual upgrades can be expected from this point forward. Â But for those looking at starting up a first-year auction/salary-cap league today, there’s nothing significant missing from the system. Â Following are just some of the features available:
– Â Customizable Scoring, Roster Requirements & Contract Settings
– Â Rookie Draft with Slotted Contracts by Draft Position
– Â NFL Based Salary Cap System
– Â Partially Guaranteed Contracts
– Â IDP Availability
– Â Customizable Nomination & Auction Timers
If we’ve missed something, be sure to check out the 11 things you need to know about Reality Sports Online.
To help persuade you to get started today, RSO has generously offered DLF members and visitors two promo codes that provide a discount on your league or team creation:
1)  Use “DLF20%OFF” if you’re the commissioner and want 20% off the entire league fee or if you’re a coach wanting 20% of your team fee.
2)  Use “DLFCommish” if you”re starting the league and want YOUR team for free.  Your coaches could then use the promo code from #1 above for a discount off their individual team fee.
We here at DLF are genuinely excited about this first-of-its-kind fantasy engine and our partnership with RSO. Â Combined with our other partnerships, we feel that we’ve got all of the bases covered toward bringing you the best possible fantasy experience.
Check out RealitySportsOnline and take your league to the next level!
Ken
September 3, 2012 at 7:55 pm
I know it’s late but how can I get in a dynasty league? Or where?
Ryan
November 20, 2013 at 1:05 pm
So how has the experience been so far for any DLF writers/members who have used this site?
Craig
November 29, 2013 at 9:32 am
Hi guys,
I learned about RSO from your podcast and I thought I would leave a few comments for those who haven’t tried it out yet…
First of all, they indicated that they are filing a patent to ensure that they are the only league with such a system. I checked the PTO filings and couldn’t find it, but that was my amateur search. If they do file, I have prior art of a FFL that has been using multi-year salary cap auction system for 4 years. This concept is not unique, just not implemented wide spread.
The Draft: Without reservation, this was the most enjoyable draft I have ever been a part of with 20+ years of FFL experience. Draft engine grade: A- (only because we had some intermittent lag issues that may have been local network or their servers. I’m a sys admin professionally, and I think it was a combination of both. However, this only affected a few picks and we recovered)
In Season: This I give a D- grade. Only because it works somewhat. I would compare their management engine to that of ESPN or Yahoo, 2003, not 2013. Some basic things… If you cut a player you eat the entire salary unless another owner picks them up during the waiver process, however, the only way for other owners to see if a player is on waivers is by going to the league home page (not your team page) and view the current transactions. If you go into the player pool and select Available, these players don’t show up. You have to go to the Waiver section of the player pool to “search out” for players on waivers. Player status updates, wow, it is poor. I use every other site out there to get reliable info. I have examples of many other shortcomings, but don’t want to bash them completely.
Cost: High, $10 per team. This is 2x the amount that MFL charges, and they have the best league management system around. If MFL and RSO could combine forces, that would be an awesome thing. Not sure if we’ll be back to RSO next year as several of my owners have just overlooked this league since its inseason management is so poor. And these are guys who are competing in 4-5 leagues apiece.
If you are an experienced owner and think this would be a great place to play, maybe wait until it is a more mature system.
Richard M.
November 30, 2013 at 6:57 pm
Valid points, Craig.
I’ve been using RSO since launch- was actually following it prior to go-live, thinking it was some form of NFL/fantasy manager game.
Though Contract/Salary leagues are far from unique/new, I find RSO’s product does have a market. It is definitely not trying to be everything to everyone. They cater their hosting to those who wish to run NFL-sim format leagues w/ as little administrative headache as possible. I find it offers enough format customization while still retaining its NFL-sim foundation.
My experience w/ this type of fantasy format has evolved from Excel-run leagues to what MFL offers. MFL does support most of the features necessary to successfully run a Salary/Contract league but a lot of the dirty work falls on the Commissioner(s) there- requiring the use of their subpar message board, a third-party forum solution or some other coordinated communications system to enforce and track things such as contract designations, etc.
I’ve got to agree that both Draft and Free Agency are a blast and well executed. Majority of the information is easy to discern and the layout is solid. The only problems I’ve had my GMs encounter are those related to placing/increasing live bids (i.e., there are moments where the bid-click is too late as someone has already increased it but the button still reflects the previous contract details). Encountering this problem is an exception to the rule, of course, and the Free Agency interface holds up very well given that it’s being assaulted by a handful of GMs trying to out-bid/out-click each other. Overall it’s one of the highlights.
At its core, RSO’s fantasy format works great and provides exactly what their target market wants/needs- running a Contract/Salary league with as little overhead(aches) as possible. I think that’s their foundation… well, that and providing a format that (though free to customization) stays as close to emulating the NFL’s way of doing things within the fantasy realm. It has made my administrative work much, much easier since it automatically takes care of tracking each contract detail, each GM’s post-transaction related fallout, etc. I once started an ambitious dynasty format w/ varying contract types, simulated free agent contract *desires* (i.e., contract length + contract type + contract salary = free agent’s evaluation of said contract value) and a host of other cool, headache-inducing complexities. Ultimately and despite best intentions, that league died due to its complex nature- both GMs and Commissioners found it more “work” than “play.” Though RSO can’t/won’t ever support all of the systems in said league, they do simplify and automate those systems they do support.
The community/communication interfaces/systems are definitely still behind the ball, Craig. Waived player notifications get buried within a rather small transactions window and getting to them does seem like excessive work (and this really sucks when you’re dropping an overpaid stud who you *know* will get picked up by someone w/ enough cap room to shrug off the hit… only to have said waiver go unnoticed). Yes, some fault here lies with the GMs who should have enough motivation to constantly track these things down but, alas, fault is shared with the implementation of said tracking. The message board is bare-bones and has forced me to go through other avenues to communicate important information to my GMs. None of these things is game-breaking but it would seem all of these “issues” shared by my GMs and myself are, for the most part, easily fixed.
I can deal with having to hunt down free agents on waivers. But I can’t deal with bare-bones community tools. To me, the GM community is crucial… it is key. As Commissioner, I need the ability to quickly, easily and clearly communicate with existing GMs and prospects. This is, quite honestly, the only RSO area in need of major work.
What it comes down to — for me — is that the base systems are fully functional, streamlined and working as intended. The only issues are in presentation, organization and use of real estate… aesthetics. That and a fleshed out communications systems. Provided that it’s their sophomore season, I’m willing to work around the aesthetic issues as I understand/believe they’ll be addressed sooner than later. When launching, it’s important to get the core game in place and working flawlessly. Now that the game is operational and stable, I’ve no doubt they’ll address the UIs, etc. As a senior software developer, I would be shocked and very disappointed if they dropped the ball there.
True, MFL tries to be everything-to-everyone and does support many of the features critical to running this type of format via its extensive customization… but it does not support everything. RSO has room to grow and, assuming they’re hungry enough, has a bright future. As-is, one could use either host for their NFL-sim needs depending on the complexity of the format and the admin work the Commissioner(s)/GMs can stomach. Unfortunately for RSO, we Commissioners can stomach a LOT of admin work because that’s how we’ve done it for a long, long time. They need to sell the NFL-sim experience, sell the administrative automation, address their community tools and address their presentation.
Though the cost of running a RSO league starts to make MFL’s costs look favorable the more teams the RSO league adds, I attribute the difference to the automation. So it’s on RSO to sell it, to justify this additional expense. RSO’s NFL-sim product is really a niche/specialty. Neither host’s fees are “cheap” compared to the ever-growing, generic fantasy games but I continue to pay them because I’m a sucker for features and quality. MFL sold me on customization years ago and I continue to use them. RSO is selling me on providing that *sim* experience I’ve been pursuing. Though I’m fine with the costs, I must admit that they do prove daunting to some qualified GM candidates.
In my eyes, MFL is a sandbox… RSO a themepark. I like both, use both and hope both continue to succeed.
Damn… very sorry, mate. This turned into a much longer reply than intended.
Ryan
December 31, 2014 at 7:50 am
Richard,
Did you use RSO or MFL for the 2014 season? We’ve been with MFL for 6 seasons. The MFL online auction draft last year was by far the worst ever fantasy football experience we’ve had.
Curious to see how RSO allows for customization of rules, scoring.
Lou Glab
February 8, 2016 at 10:58 am
Sign me up for the DLF Newsletter!
Johnny
September 12, 2020 at 5:48 am
Checking in from 2020. I see not much has changed or improved with RSO; based on everything I read in the older comments. Player updates are horrendously poor and sometime weeks behind reality or sometimes don’t update at all. I seriously had a few players placed on PUP that never showed on RSO; had to confirm elsewhere. For this reason I would give RSO a F- in that category. My biggest complaint is the free agent pool. What a joke. It is a disaster and filled to the brim with players that have been out of the league or retired for several years yet still show as rostered both on RSO and on a NFL team. Peyton Manning and Tony Romo were seriously available during the free agent auction…in 2020. It was clear early on that many GMs use this flaw to their advantage and start signing the Tony Romo players to minimum bids just to fill out their roster requirements only to dump them after the auction for zero cap hit. I’m baffled why there is no “watch list” option for free agents or any kind of useful sort option to remove said free agents from the free agent pool. Instead, you need to use third party software or Excel to track players of interest and scour the dregs for any kind of talent remaining (32 team league so there is very little remaining). This year, RSO partnered with FantasyPros for the first time and I thought it would be a milestone achievement. Nope. Complete and utter disappointment there.
FantasyPros will list best available free agents that are already rostered in the league but say they are available to add. Maybe it’s because I use the free version of FantasyPros but if that is the case, they aren’t doing themselves any favors trying to lure customers in. Lastly, during our rookie draft, I noticed there were several upper-mid tier players that were not in the system and I had to ask RSO to add them so I could draft them. Their response was “we are still working on adding players”. This was 3 weeks after the NFL draft. There is just no excuse for that kind of negligence. Oh, and it’s now $13/yr to use RSOs crappy website.
I’m in a multi-year commitment with the league but I’ll probably bow out at the end of it simply because of the terrible website and app. 7 years and not much has improved or changed. Is MFL any better over that same amount of time? I enjoy the salary cap feel of the league but cannot tolerate RSO any longer than I have to.