Dynasty Diaries: League Variety
Welcome to dynasty diaries. In this series, I will give you an inside look at all of my teams, their history and my plans for the future. I’d like to provide some insight into struggles I’ve faced, and reveal weekly thoughts and feelings on anything and everything football. Join me as I succeed or crash and burn. For more information on the leagues, check out the introduction. If there is anything more you’d like to see or any questions you have, please let me know in the comments section.
We’ve had six articles in the ‘How I Play‘ series so far, and something that tends to pop up in response to “What is your favorite league and why?” is leagues with exciting formats (along with playing with friends or colleagues and long-running leagues). Naturally, it’s extremely enjoyable to compete against the people you know, and tradition makes a league grow stronger, but for me, having a number of unique leagues with a number of different settings and rules makes playing this game a whole lot more fun.
Variety keeps the mind fresh. Monotony can suck the life out of you.
If I set up a dynasty league now with what I’d regard as ‘traditional’ settings, it might look something like this.
- 12 teams
- PPR scoring
- Start 1QB/2RB/2WR/1TE (plus flex spots)
- Snake rookie draft
- Head-to-head scoring
Not everyone will agree with these, and there are a few more settings prevalent in most ‘normal’ leagues, but this is just a snapshot. The issue is, it might not require too much preparation and research to draft a good team and achieve success in this league. Don’t get me wrong, good owners shine through in dynasty fantasy football, and those who don’t work hard, stay active or invest in the game tend to fall off, but the general strategies and approach to the league would be similar for every owner. Every owner could use the DLF Rankings and adopt the most-advised strategies (wait on quarterback and running back, build around receivers, etc) and have it work out.
But I want more. I want to be rewarded for research and planning. I want a scoring system that allows all positions to be valued more equally. I long for rewards for point-scoring, and not simply head-to-head scoring. What if I play against the top-scoring team every week but score the most points over the year? I want an auction draft, so I can decide how to use my capital and everyone is on equal footing from the day the league begins.
I might not have all of these wishes come true in every league, but with tweaks and alterations here and there, you can spice things up and add a whole new element of fun to your dynasty experience. Hell, I don’t want to value every player the same in every league. Do you?
Here are some of the non-traditional settings my leagues have, and how I advise approaching them.
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The Leagues
International Dynasty League (4-4)
Non-traditional settings:
- Non-PPR
- Start 2QBs
- 25 roster spots but only 20 players can be kept
- Rookie and FA draft combined
Coming from an NFL.com fantasy football background, my first dynasty league is a non-PPR one. Right from the off, it showed, as Adrian Peterson, Doug Martin, CJ Spiller and Arian Foster were the first four picks in the 2013 startup. While dynasty teams are generally built around wide receivers in almost all formats because of their longevity and consistency year-to-year, running backs obviously play a larger role in a team’s success here. For me, it’s a breath of fresh air in a wide receiver-dominant world. Do you play in a non-PPR league? Don’t deny running backs simply because most advice dictates you do – that advice will be geared towards PPR leagues.
The 2QB format is an even bigger game-changer, and it goes without saying I’d strongly recommend trying out a 2QB or Superflex league. Teddy Bridgewater was taken over Mike Evans in 2014, Jameis Winston over Amari Cooper and Todd Gurley in 2015, and only Ezekiel Elliott went before Jared Goff in this year’s rookie draft. The whole league’s approach to player value changes, especially at quarterback. I tend to think there are three different ways to attack the position – ‘QB heavy’, ‘one stud and one other’ and a ‘revolving doors’ approach. All can work, but all change how owners construct the rest of their roster. In this league, I invested early in Aaron Rodgers and Russell Wilson and haven’t looked back, but it’s a start contrast from Groundhog’s Dynasty, which I will touch on below. The bump in value of both quarterbacks and running backs brings a fine balance to the league, and a multitude of team-building strategies can lead to success.
How many of you play in leagues that require a roster ‘cut-down’ before the rookie draft? Here, we cut at least five players, and you draft to fill however many spots you have free after those cuts. While it is not what most would consider ‘full dynasty’, the 20 spots mean a lot of keepers and the free agent pickings are still very slim. I interpret this as only two or three ‘tough cuts’, because at least two of my spots will be filled by kickers and defenses who will be the first to go. If anything, the cut-down encourages me to ‘package up’ with trades, and invest more in my starting lineup and top 15-18 players, because I know I will replenish the bottom half of the roster every year. How do your roster settings work? How does it affect your strategy?
The rookie and free agent combined auction doesn’t alter things too much – rookies still dominate the early rounds, but it allows owners to decide where they value veterans versus the youngsters. A plus side is that if you cut a deep stash you liked, you may have a chance to snap him up again. I recommend separate drafts where possible, but it’s a unique exercise to combine your own rookie rankings with the league’s free agents (and unique is good).
Non-traditional settings:
- 0.5 PPR
- 16 teams
- Start 3WRs
- No K/D
#Twinvit is my baby, I guess. I wanted to include as many owners as possible, make things slightly different from normal scoring (0.5PPR) and have deep rosters (20 spots, 16 owners). In my mind, outside of scoring unique to positions, 0.5 PPR is ideal. Full PPR can overpower wide receivers, but I believe there should be some reward for receptions. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of requiring three receivers in starting lineups. In such a deep league, they became extremely essential again, taking away the balance achieved with 0.5 PPR.
How do you approach a 16-teamer? I’ve gone back-and-forth on this. Sometimes, I believe it’s best to invest in a top-heavy team, because two or three top ten scorers at their position will most likely take you to the playoffs. However, after experiencing injuries to starters and thus having bye-week nightmares, I am moving more towards valuing depth. The waiver wire is extremely thin, so it’s almost impossible to find weekly fill-ins. I mentioned no kickers and defense as ‘non-traditional’, simply because in a 16-teamer where we start nine players, it makes those lineups even deeper. However, eliminating kickers and defense was necessary for my own sanity, and if you are still in leagues that use them, please encourage the league to move on.
Non-traditional settings:
- 24 teams (2 leagues of 12)
- Superflex
- TE Premium
- Devy players and a taxi squad
- Auction drafts
- Contracts
- Extremely flexible lineups
- Double headers
- (Plus many more)
This is my favorite league, and you can’t have success without putting the work in to understand all of the separate rules and bylaws. Ryan McDowell, our commissioner, recently admitted these were his favorite leagues as well, and even outlined some of the crazy settings in a piece for DLF in 2013.
Honestly, I just love mayhem. And from the moment we began, it required more planning, note-taking, budgeting, projecting and spreadsheeting than I’d ever encountered in my time playing fantasy football. Having the previous experience in two quarterback leagues helped with the superflex format, but as I mentioned in my last piece, I think superflex is the perfect in-between. I believe the best success can be achieved by treating it as a 2QB league (have two starting quarterbacks in your lineup every week), otherwise you aren’t taking advantage of the lineup settings. Daily Fantasy Cafe’s Russell Clay invested heavily in Andrew Luck and Aaron Rodgers in last year’s startup auction, and isn’t looking back – he currently leads the ‘Sharks’ division in record and points.
I won’t cover all of the settings, but there are two in particular I absolutely adore – the flexible lineups, and the fact it’s a devy league. Take a look at the lineup settings:
Essentially, you can’t get more flexible. This allows owners to invest in positions any way they want. Some take an extreme ‘Zero RB’ approach because they almost don’t need anyone strong there, some choose to create a balanced squad, and personally I have taken more of a running back-heavy approach because I saw value there in last year’s startup and rookie auctions. Unfortunately, the injuries to Ameer Abdullah and CJ Anderson have hit that group pretty hard.
As for the devy aspect, I just think it’s awesome. I look at it as adding two dimensions – scouting ability, and deeper roster management. The taxi squad is eight deep, can feature both devy players and rookies, and those who are on it do not have a contract. The ability to both utilize the space and identify good talent will be crucial to future success in the league.
And another thing – slow auction drafts are perhaps the best thing in fantasy football. They are agonizing, time-consuming, exhilarating and simply too much fun. I urge everyone to incorporate slow auction drafts into their leagues.
Non-traditional settings:
- 10 teams
- Start 2QBs
This league is a more traditional two quarterback league, with the ten teams creating less of a struggle at the position. In 2QB leagues with 12 teams or more, there are simply not enough quarterbacks to go around, and you can end up with situations where multiple owners are taking a zero during bye weeks and while they deal with injuries. In those cases, quarterback prices go up even further and if an owner is stuck on the outside without more than their two starters, they can find it very hard to get back in.
With ten teams, there isn’t too much of an emphasis on quarterbacks like there can be in deeper leagues. For comparison’s sake, the top three rookies were taken at 1.06, 1.09 and 1.10 in Groundhog’s versus 1.02, 1.05 and 1.08 in the International Dynasty League (12 teams). In this league, there is also a slimmer chance that all backups are already rostered when injury strikes, so there is an opportunity to salvage some points from the waiver wire – something I’ve had to attempt after injuries to Robert Griffin III, Teddy Bridgewater and then Brian Hoyer. Being stuck with only Sam Bradford and Carson Wentz as healthy quarterbacks is tough, but I fancy my chances of fixing it much better in a 10-team league than 12. Do those of you who play 2QB dynasty take part in ten or 12 team leagues? What are the positives and negatives of each of them?
What makes your leagues different? Does it add enjoyment, or make your life more complicated? What are the ‘ideal’ league settings you’d like to see?
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As well as editing for DLF, James writes for Sky Sports and can be found on Twitter at @JS_Football
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