Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - 10 Offseason Tips & Tricks

to not change. I wanted to stay with Colin Kaepernick. I wanted that glory prediction. But look, number 10 is stay water, okay? Not stone. Be pliable. Be humble with your opinions because you'll end up in a better place when you're the champion and you don't have to be humble anymore. Ha ha!

Like Jason. But look, we don't want to declare things too early and then just set yourself up for them. We certainly try to avoid that for your sake. We don't want to come on here. And somebody might say, well, you thought that back then. And I said, yeah, but I got new information now. I found something else out. They signed a new running back to share the backfield with him. They got a coach that wants to do this. They drafted a running back. Did you hear when I had to throw myself at the mercy of the court?

with the sad music and I had to apologize to Devante Freeman. I did it. How did that feel? It felt terrible and great at the same time because it takes a big person to admit when they were wrong. And I was wrong. And you're a big person. Just ask Ricky Jervis. Yeah. I'm not the fat guy this episode. This is great. It's, you know, you guys can rotate.

Rotate the title. All right, so quick recap of the tips and tricks. Reflect and react. Make sure that you're paying attention to what you did last year that was good and bad and what the trends were. Mock it up. Make sure you're doing some mock drafts. Get a sense of the ADP. Get your house in order. That means get your league in order. Get your rules in order. Find the right league. Jason mentioned that. We're trying to help you guys out with that on Jointhefoot.com, but find good people to play with. Then you'll enjoy the season.

Mike brought up, stay connected. Get on Twitter, get connected to the experts, get listening to podcasts, pay attention in the offseason, get connected for the regular season. I brought up watching the rookies. Keep your eye on them, literally. Watch some video. That'll help you make a determination if guys are really close in your mind. That led into some dynasty discussion. Number seven, opportunistic trading. Take advantage of potential and get value that you know is there.

Number eight, listen to your league mates. Mike talked about this. Pay attention to league trends and team trends in your league. And that helps you with the draft season. Number nine, take things with a grain of salt. The coaches, they love coach speak. So does the media. The media likes to really ramp up small news, make it big news, take it with a grain of salt. And number 10, stay pliable. And I think that's a great way to end that list. Be subject to new information. Change your opinion. Change your rankings. Be pliable.

If you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup. If you put water in a bottle, it becomes the bottle. Yeah. I was going a little Bruce Lee on you. I apologize. Thanks for another old reference. Bruce Lee is always, always current and awesome. Mailbag. Yeah. All right, we're going to answer some questions. I think there are some good ones in this mailbag here today.

If you want to ask one of your own, you go to the website, the Fantasy Footballers.com, click on the Subcommittee Question button or go to your phone and dial 302-464 TFFB. You can leave us a voicemail question. Got a few of each on today's show, so we're going to dig in, see if we can help out some of the listeners. We're going to start with a voicemail question. Here it is. Hey, guys, this is Flip from Pennsylvania. I wanted to let you know I love the show.

It's my first year of listening. Foot Clan title. Thank you very much. I do have to tell you guys. I don't really have a question. I have to tell you. I recently found an even more funnier. Yes, I said more funnier. Way to listen to your show. That's how Jason would say. That is on half speed. There is nothing more hilarious than hearing the mailbag screamed at half speed. I giggle like a schoolgirl. It's fantastic. I find myself listening to it like that even more and more. Of course, I listen to it first and then re-listen to it at half speed.

uh thanks so much for all the entertainment and uh for getting me my title guys can't wait for next year i've heard the the comment about the half speed before and checked it out and it is extremely funny that's the 11th tip and trick if you want to i haven't i haven't checked out the mailbag drop in half speed so that is i got to put that on my list to do someone someone uh post that on twitter for us i want to see the mailbag drop

on half speed if you're uh if you got the time for someone sent in one last year with me talking about a j green's gonna be a really good player this year you also got the tip uh from that last caller that if you want to win your hashtag foot clan title you listen to us once oh here you listen to us twice on a half speed no no that's it that's it all right here's a uh here's a real question hey footballers

It's Matt from Miami calling in a drawing your collective infinite wisdom. I'm in three leagues that are going on their 10th, 7th, and 6 years, respectively. However, despite these leagues long-storied history, every off-season is the same. During the owner's meeting for these leagues, inevitably they devolve into many sessions of Congress with each owner pushing an agenda and lobbying for support. The bickering is incessant.

So I call them the highest court in the fantasy football lane to make a decree. Footballers. What is the undisputable best league format and rule set? How many teams, 8, 10, 12, auction, or draft, scoring, standard, half, or full PPR. Is a keeper or non-keeper? If it's a keeper, how many? One, two, three. What's the penalty for keeping them? Who can be kept? You know, what happens if free agent claims? What positional slots?

How many of each? Two wide receivers, three right receivers, how many flexes, how many bench spots, IR spots, and how many teams make the playoffs and what's the playoff format? And finally, what should you have a trade deadline? Any clarification on this is much appreciated. Wow. Go fit.

It sounds like the next episode will be filled up. Well, I can tell you this. We actually ironically talked about it, our Foot Clan leagues that we're going to be doing, but we'll have kind of a sheet in there of what we kind of say is, you know, what we think is the best type of league. And while there is no best, because... I think it's fun to pretend. It's fun to pretend. So here... You guys are crazy. There's a best. Yeah, no, that's what I was going to say. There's a best. And here's the best. All right. Here we go.

I'll give as much as I can on the best. You guys correct me or add to it. Okay. Here is the best. For sure, it's half point PPR. I can say, start with the scoring system. Scoring system is half point PPR. Full point is too much. Standard is stupid. Half point PPR for the win. Come on now. No, we're going. Shots have been fired. All right. You got two running backs. You got two wide receivers. New politics. You got a flex and a tight end.

You've got one quarterback, a defense, I would say no kicker, but we'll go ahead and let the kicker be in there. Five bench spots. It's going to be a keeper league so that the offseason matters. You're going to keep three keepers, and you're going to have a penalty based on where you draft them. You give up the draft round of where you got them every year. It's two rounds ahead of that.

If you got a guy off of waivers, you do not get him for the last pick in the draft. I say throw him back in the draft. Let him be drafted. Oh, you can't be kept? Can't be kept. Can't be kept. Let's make this hardcore and value your draft. If nobody drafted him, he doesn't get to be kept. ADP minus a round. I like that as well.

I do like that as well. Six teams make the playoffs. Half your league. Half of the 12 team, that's the sweet number if you can get 12 good teams. Half of your league makes the playoffs. How many IR spots? Two IR spots, five bench spots. Trade deadlines week eight. I agree. Early trade deadline. Because it's a keeper league. You don't want people tanking. Weeks 14 through 16 are your playoffs. Two teams will get a buy.

Yep. One week playoffs. One week playoffs. All right. We nailed it. All right. We'll do it differently. Hopefully. That's cool, too. All right. Ben in Pittsburgh. He's in a 10-team league expanding to 12 teams. It's a PPR league. I have to keep, or I get to keep two players as my 15th and 16th round picks.

My options are Eddie Lacey, Des Bryant, Kelvin, Benjamin, Michael Floyd, and Josh Gordon, with declarations in August. Additionally, after the two new team select keepers, I have the first round pick in the draft. Well, well, well, well, it's, I could have said you could stop reading after the first two names because that's who I would go with. But because you could wait until August. You're going to change? You're not putting Gordon over Des, are you?

No, I would put Gordon possibly above Lacey, would you? Hmm. You'd go with the affirmation strategy of the PPR elite. Correct. A PPR with dual elite. I'll actually distinct Lacey and Bryant. Yeah, I will as well. All of that being said, if I can have Eddie Lacey and Des Bryant, that's your clear keepers. All right, Josh in Harrisburg, I am the second pick in a very deep league to quarterback league, by the way.

Three wide receivers. Yeah. If he falls, I want Antonio Brown, but if he's gone with so many questions at the RB spot, do I pull the trigger on a quarterback like Cam Newton or a wide receiver like Julio Hopkins and Odell? In this league, you can keep any two, or any player for two spots above where he drafted them. I would still, even though it's a two quarterback league, I would still take the elite level wide receiver, Julio Hopkins, O'Dell. I know that a quarterback's go.

A lot earlier in a two-quarterback, and I'm not saying you have to wait forever, but there's a sweet spot of guys that tend to be cast into the fantasy trash pile, like Tony Romo, Philip Rivers, these older guys who think, ah, there's no way they're going to get it done again. They are. They are because they're veterans who know how to play the game.

So you can wait a little bit and then you have the advantage with a Beckham or a Julio Jones. All right. I'm going to say I would absolutely take a quarterback there. A quarterback? A quarterback? In a two quarterback league. Yeah, that makes sense. I think a Newton or an Aaron Rogers is a guy that is just so indispensable for those leagues. Here's what I would recommend, Josh. Go back and look at your last several championships and see who their quarterbacks were. And I promise you they're always going to be, they're always going to have one of the best.

All right, Nick in Michigan says I'm in a keeper league with offseason trading where any players traded in the offseason are required to be kept for the next year. About a week before the Marty suspension news came out, Mr. Bryant was one player dealt in a trade. The commission now wants to retroactively put a ruling that does not count Marty against the new owner's keeper count for 2016.

Neither the commissioner myself are involved in the trade. However, I contest that suspensions and injuries are an inherent risk of offseason trading. What are your thoughts? This is amazing because we had this exact same dilemma in our league with Josh Gordon. We actually lost a team because of it where the keep, and it wasn't even, it was worse than this, where the keeper declaration was in, Josh Gordon.

The next day Josh Gordon was suspended for the entire year. Now, the way our league did it, you kept him, you deal with the consequences. You make the deals in the offseason. You live with it. These are things that happen and suck. Now, it sucks to be that guy. I will say this. Our league was a little bit different because what we had just done in our situation was we had.

bypassed the normal rule to keep guys earlier than normal, and we had done so saying, well, I accept the risk that's involved. Because the risk that we thought was involved was the NFL draft changing who you would keep. We did it before the draft for some players. Well, then the next day Josh Gordon got suspended, and people were like, no, you can't change it now. You literally just said you were going to accept that.

So for me, I go back and forth on this question, but I would say you just vote. Vote. Yeah, that would be the solution that's most amicable in the league. I will say this. If you start giving ways around this, it is a slippery slope. Oh, the slippery slope.