Much like the Louvres Mona Lisa or Deja Vus Lisa Mona, your fantasy football league rulebook likely has a strict hands-off policy. Theres nothing wrong with traditional six points for a touchdown, you vs. me, winner of the Fantasy Bowl takes home all the spoils especially if youre one of the shrinking number of owners who try to do their weekly fantasy homework in under two hours. But for the geeks that are in deep, traditional is trash, and its time to tune up that rulebook. We asked readers to send us examples of how their league puts a twist on fantasy football, and we were inspired by all the creativity (and shocked by the coin you all are laying down every year to play this game sheesh, nothing like a third mortgage to pay the fantasy bills!). Here are some ideas for those owners or league commissioners looking to give their league a new spin:
1. FANTASY PLAYOFFS (PLAYOFFS?!)
We hope it doesnt take a case of Red Bull and NoDoz to keep you awake on the couch on Sundays after the NFLs regular season, but if you need a postseason fantasy fix heres how to get it. After Week 17, get your owners together and draft players from the 12 playoff teams. Its a total playoff points game, not week-to-week, so youll have to decide between a stud who might only play one game (LaDainian Tomlinson, Tiki Barber) and a ham `n egger who could play three or four games (Muhsin Muhammad, Reggie Wayne). Waynes three so-so games might top LTs one big game once the Lombardi Trophy is handed out.
2. NOT JUST THE FANTASY BOWL
Speaking of the playoffs, dont have all your prize money or prize cattle or whatever it is you play for hanging on your final game. The Fantasy Bowl can be the big payoff, but your top regular-season finishers deserve some of the loot after 13 or 14 weeks of above-average coaching. And find a way to introduce a week-to-week prize game, too. E-mailer Tom Duncan has set up a fantasy skins game that sounds like a winner. If an owner outscores the rest of the league in a week by 10 points, he wins the skins money. If nobody is 10 points better, the skin carries over to the following week. A less-complicated version is to just pay the highest scorer each week a certain amount. Week-to-week games help keep everyone, even the last-place owners, involved all season. They also make every Monday night game a must-watch, and thats hard to do when you get a doozy like that Baltimore-Green Bay debacle.
3. TWO BETTER SCORING IDEAS
Your team defenses should not be outscoring your running backs, quarterbacks or receivers. If you want to have more defensive scoring, pick individual players. Otherwise keep defensive points to return touchdowns and turnovers. When a sack is worth as much as 50 rushing yards, you have a scoring flaw.
If you hate watching T.J. Duckett or Brandon Jacobs steal victories in your league, add bonuses for longer touchdowns. So when Tiki Barber takes a screen pass to the house from 40 yards out itll be worth more than Jacobs stumble from just across the goal line.
4. WINTER MEETINGS
Take a page out of Major League Baseballs book and schedule a league gathering that is billed as a meeting of team officials but is really a saucy social event aimed at getting trades done. A hefty bar tab might get the trade winds a blowin in your favor.
5. DOUBLING YOUR BETS
Two wrongs dont make a right, but well be the first to tell you that being right all the time is overrated. Youre likely already gambling in your fantasy league, so what is a second strike against you gonna hurt? Up the ante in your league by having a different owner each week set their spread on the coming weekends fantasy games (Jims Junkies -4 over Freds Freaks, for example). They look at each owners players, predict the winner and set the line, just like Vegas. That owner then acts as the house, taking bets and adjusting lines, and then collects or pays out accordingly. Each owner takes a turn being the house, and make sure to set a manageable betting limit.
6. GET PROVINCIAL
E-mailer Jack Sivilay from Texas is in a just-for-fun league that involves only players who have a Texas background (grew up there or played college ball there) or play for the Texans or Cowboys a Lone Star League. Steal his idea and start a Big Ten Alums only league. Id suggest an NFC North league, but kickers would be outscoring QBs in that one.
7. THE BYE WEEK GAMBLE
If bye weeks arent your thing - and whose thing are they, really? - institute the Bye Week Gamble. Heres how it works, according to reader Jason Duncan. You can carry over a players points from the week before his bye and automatically earn them again in his bye week. The trick: You have to declare your intention to carry over the points before the players pre-bye-week game. So LT owners would have had to decide before Week 9 whether to carry his Week 9 points over into Week 10 and reuse them. It could pay off big (LT scored four TDs in Week 9 heading into his Week 10 bye this season) but a bad week or turned ankle could be a two-week killer.
8. WHAT TO DO ABOUT WEEK 17
Week 17 is about as much fun as a bloody nose, but heres a solution from Woodburys Burke Hegrenes: The Fantasy Pro Bowl. In Burkes league, the two division winners pick players from any team in their division and form a fantasy Pro Bowl team. The two divisions square off in Week 17, and the winning division splits up the prize money. And with players like Peyton Manning and Shaun Alexander likely just jogging through only a few plays that week, itll mirror the real Pro Bowl.