2013 NFL Gridiron League Open

[Shilo]

Well, the mini camps are open and the first preseason game is set to play tomorrow... so it must be time to fire everything up for another season of Fantasy Football.

 

I've set up this years' ESPN Gridiron League. It looks like they have made a few changes so I am having a problem finding the new code for the Pattaya Wannabes League. I'm guessing that it might be the same as last year's because I just "renewed" the league rather then set up a new league. If I am right then you should be able to use this link:

 

http://games.espn.go...oup?groupID=811

 

Along with:

 

Group: Pattaya Wannabes  and Password: Pattaya

 

Or this link which I pulled from an invite:

 

http://games.espn.go...-email-gridiron

 

Feel free to post any questions or let me know if you have any problems getting set up in the league. Also, on a side note... I'm interested to know if anyone has any interest in joining a separate PPR draft league with an online draft. So far it is just me and a friend so we are looking for 8 other guys to make a league of 10. Let me know with a PM if you're interested...

[Shilo]

Why I like the Gridiron League:

 

It's no surprise to anyone who knows me that I love Fantasy Football. Hell, just check out my avatar to see my two favorite past times in life. But I have to say that this Gridiron has a special hold on me. This is something like the 6-7th year that I've set this league up on the Pattaya boards and it's kind of surprising how consistent it has proven. We always seem to have about 20-25 players, generally the league as a whole does well against the ESPN competition, we seem to always have about half a dozen guys who beat 95% or more of the site competitors, and to win our league you pretty much have to be one of the best of the best. For example: last year footypjman won our league but only after beating 99.3% of over 250,000 players across the site... and the year before that I won but it was a race to the end and I ranked in the top 100 over the site.

 

Bottom line: anyone can play in our league but you need to bring your game if you plan to compete or win.

 

The rules are simple. You get a $50 million budget to buy a team made up of 2 QB, 2RB, 2 WR, 1 TE, 1 K, and 1 DEF. Everyone on your team plays each week. You can have ANYONE you want as long as you stay under the cap so we can all have a Rogers/Brees/Peterson mix of players. And the starting budget is pretty liberal... but as the season goes on it gets harder... much harder. The player prices will go up or down depending on the players performance. You might get Peterson at 6.0 mill to start the season but if he has a Peterson like season then his price could rise to 7.2 mill by the time his team comes to their BYE week. And then what do you do? You put 6.0 into that position and you still have 6.0 to work with... you could let him sit on the bench and take a -0- for that week or you could trade him for someone worth 6.0 mill who is a lot lower in quality by that point in the season. And that is an easy choice... it only effects one week and then your back on track. What if it's a sore toe or bruised hip... will he play or maybe share reps with his backup.

 

And then when you get to the end of what has been a great season and it comes down to the last week or two... your stud player has lead his team into the playoffs in real life... what happens to your game plan when the real team decides to rest players for the last game or two. Errrr.

 

The league is open to one and all, it's free, and as a fantasy football junkie I can assure you that it's a hell of a lot of fun with a different twist to the classic draft league.

 

Check it out guys

[Shilo]

2 more weeks of the Preseason and then it's on to the real thing... personally, I'm getting by with watching EPL games on my computer... but my Bengals are getting me excited about the new season.

 

We've got 13 teams so far in this year's Gridiron... still plenty of time for anyone who is interested in joining our merry little band of fantasy managers.

[Wolf Cat]

huh?

[Luv2Phuket]

Took me a while to remember how to log in, but I'm finally back to "defend" my title....though I'm likely due for a sophomore jinx!  

 

It was a lot of fun last year.  

 

Thanks for putting it together again, Shilo!

[Shilo]

We're up to 20 teams with less then a week to go before the start of the season... still time to join if interested.

 

You need to pick 2 QB's, 2 RB's and 2 WR's. I think it is pretty much a no-brainer to pick the top in each position: Brees/Peterson/Cal. Johnson.

 

The winner this year will be determined by the guy who makes the best picks for the #2's and manages the BYE weeks.

 

Good Luck

[Shilo]

Last call before the season starts...

[Shilo]

Time for the first update on the 2013 season of the Gridiron League.

 

For those who have played before, it's clear that the Gridiron Season can be broken down into 3 parts with a possible bonus round. We just finished what I would call Part 1, where each team took the same budget to create a line-up out of the same pool of players. In short, we all started even on a level playing field. And at the end of each game week the value of the players were adjusted up, even, or down based on performance. Naturally, we all wanted to get out to a fast start with as many points as possible. But there has been a new twist added this year with the new Floating Cap pricing structure. In the past, you would add a player at say 5.5 mill and if he did well then you could see his value go up to say 6.0 mill. But then he gets hit with a small injury or has a bad matchup and you would have to decide: do I keep him and cross my fingers or trade him for someone else knowing that I'm limited to the original 5.5 mill cap ie: settle for a lesser player. This year that 5.5 mill investment that moves up to 6 mill allows you to fully benefit from the new 6 mill valuation. So you can drop a stud player and pick up another equally valuable player or maybe even use the added money to improve other positions in your team. But where there are added rewards there has to be added risk... This year you also get burned when a players' value goes down. So that 5.5 investment that drops to 5.0 mill you're still trading value for value and will be stuck kicking the tires of the 5.0 mill options.

 

So where do we stand after the end of the first 3 games? Once again, we have several guys in our league that are ranked amoung the best on the ESPN site. We have 5 teams that are beating 90% or better of all the teams on the ESPN site. I'm happy to claim the top spot with my Prowlers' with a total of 450 points and beating 98.6% of the site. Belem is running a VERY close second with 449 points. Nohoihoewa and Footypjman are in a dead heat with 416 points each. After that another 6 teams are above 400 points so as expected it's still any ones race.

 

Now we go into what I think of as Part 2 of the season... the dreaded BYE weeks. And this is where the new Floating Cap rules are going have have a MAJOR impact. I have Peyton Manning on my team. The old guy is having the best year of his career and maybe is on pace to have the best year of any QB in the history of the game. Needless to say his value has gone up since I added him in week one. And last year I would have happily held on to him through the BYE week and settled for a -0- rather then drop him for a lesser player and lose the chance to have him for the back half of the season. But this year I can drop him and add Brees/Rogers/anyone and if they cost less then I bank the extra money and get Manning back after the BYE week. BUT, that only works if the guy I choose stays even or goes up in value that week. If the new guy drops in value I may not have the money I need to get Manning back on my team. And I can't afford to just let him sit on my team and except the -0-... not with Noho and Footypjman nipping at my heals...

 

So congrats to those who managed a quick start to the season, good luck to those who are just off the pace, and have heart to those who seem to be lagging far behind. It's a new season with a new scoring system and I've got a feeling that we'[re going to see a lot of rotation in our league table as we progress through the BYE weeks.

[Shilo]

Another update and an invite...

 

Well, we are in the last week of the BYE weeks and our little league is still going strong. Out of the 28 teams playing in our group we have 8 that are in the top 90% of the site. As expected there has been some shifting within our table but at this point my Prowlers are still in the lead and have even breached the rarefied air of the Top 100. At this posting I am sitting at 67th out of the roughly 250K players across the site. Woo Woo.

 

Footypjman has fallen a little off the pace but is still crushing the competition across the site beating 99.1% of the site players and needs just one break to shoot up the ranks and or flip over my bandwagon. Strangely, this year his biggest threat is coming from the same source but from 2 different directions... Me. This year we were able to field 2 teams so I just happen to be in front of him with the top team and I find myself nipping at the heals of his second place team with my other team that is sitting in third. It'll be fun to see how this part of the game plays out because I have been forced into taking on extra risks to catch him.

 

Special mention goes out to Belem (95.6%), 49ersinCrisis (95.0%), and gforney (93.6%) who are also having great years and could easily make a solid run to the finish with 6 games left to be played.

 

Now for that invite:

 

For those that are interested I will be setting up a Post Season Gridiron League this year. It'll  start with the beginning of the playoffs and run through the Superbowl. Naturally, everyone in our current league is welcome to play and I'll send out an email to all players once the new game comes on line in late December.

 

But to ANYONE else that missed out on the start of the current league but might be interested in joining the fun... let me suggest that you go back to the beginning of this thread and use the signup info to join our league. Obviously, you won't have any chance of catching the players who started in week 1 but you will be able to set up a team, transfer in and out players each week, get a feel for how the values rise and fall, basically get a dry run and overall understanding of the game to prepare for the Post Season version and or next year's league.

 

Anyway, it goes without saying that being at the top of the hill I'm having a blast this year. And I hope everyone else is enjoying the ride. Good luck to those playing with the back half of the season and WELCOME to any new players that decide to join us...

 

Shilo (proud mangers of the Prowlers)