I am not much of a salesman. If someone doesn’t want something, that’s fine with me. I don’t particularly like being sold things either. This attitude has not served particularly well when it comes to selling fantasy college basketball, and I feel a bit guilty about it. The draft season for fantasy college hoops is at the same time as the middle of fantasy football season (October), so that is a slight problem. However, the season dovetails nicely with fantasy baseball, and I would think that fantasy baseball players would enjoy fantasy college hoops more than the populous fantasy football players.
Fantasy baseball is a grueling challenge. There are a lot of players over 162 games to keep track of. Some dynasty leagues include the dozens of minor league teams as well. This demands a type of research that might allow these people to enjoy fantasy college basketball. Other than what I write on RotoWire (these days), there is almost no fantasy writing being done about college hoops. For me, it makes it my own little niche. It is a hard sport to get a grasp on because the best players only spend a year in college. Some leagues focus on what I call Tier 1 conferences (ACC, Big 10, Big 12, Big East, Pac 12, and SEC), and it can be a challenge to find a productive upperclassman in these leagues. Most players (other than the infrequent exception like Marcus Smart) leave once they have a chance to get drafted.
The research aspect of fantasy college hoops appeals to me. I also like college basketball (as I’ve written about many times, including here). When I started my own fantasy college basketball league, the Big Chief Challenge (yes, I am Big Chief College Basketball), I did all of the stats by hand. Happily, a fellow, who joined the league a few years in, had some web design expertise and now all of the stats are handled automatically. So, here comes my sales pitch:
I think you should try fantasy college basketball. First off, it’s fun. Our league is designed to be fairly casual. You really get to know the players so that you don’t have to cram between Selection Sunday and the beginning of the tournament in March. Players come from all of the Tier 1 leagues and games are played on a weekly basis with three stats: points, rebounds + blocks, and assists + steals. If your team wins all three categories, you get an extra win (the sweep). Rosters are composed of two guards, two forwards, a center, and a utility player – one of the six starters has to be a freshman. There are four bench slots.
The past three years, I have set up a system of relegation and promotion in the Big Chief Challenge leagues. Last year, we had two Challenge leagues of 16 teams. The regular season and tournament champion get promoted to the Big Chief Invitational. The BCI is composed of 20 teams, a few of which have been in the league since I started it in 2006-07 (the year of Durant and Oden). Every year, the bottom four teams in the Invitational are relegated to the Challenge. This creates intense competition toward the end of the regular season as the teams near the bottom of the BCI scratch and claw to stay in the top league.
Would you like to dip your toe in the fantasy college basketball pool before committing to an entire season? You are in luck: we have set up a series of mock drafts over the next three weeks. We’ll start with Tier 1, then go to individual conferences on Wednesday and Sundays. You can sign up here. And, yes, it is free. If you are curious, leave a comment below or shoot me a message.
Perry Missner is a college basketball enthusiast who writes for RotoWire along with several other outlets. He welcomes your comments on Twitter at @PerryMissner or via email at [email protected]
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