Fantasy Football League Scoring Recommendations and Advice

In my opinion, PPR should be the fantasy football norm.  The added points evens out the RB/WR fields, create higher scores and more scoring, and contributes to an overall more exciting fantasy experience.  Big dogs like Yahoo and ESPN do not agree, though.  Their standard leagues do not include PPR scoring.  They go with the standard 1 point for ten rushing/receiving yards, 6 points per rushing/receiving TD, 1 point per 25 passing yards, and 4 points per passing TD.  No partial points, no return yardage points – sooooo boring.  This is a shame because newer players are more likely to use the standard options.  I’d like for new players to be exposed do the most exciting game possible to increase the chances that they fall in love with fantasy football and come back for more each year.

Choosing Point Per Reception scoring makes an enormous difference in fantasy football player rankings.  Take Reggie Bush, for example.  He is the player most affected by adding a point per reception.  If he could stay healthy for a full season he could catch 80-90 passes, almost all of them under ten yards.  If he rushes for 800 yards and scores 5 TDs, then PPR scoring increases Bush’s score by over 25%.  He could be ranked as many as ten spots lower when comparing PPR and NonPPR RB rankings lists.

PPR rankings among WRs are also jostled.  Possession guys that catch a lot of short passes get a big boost.  Wes Welker is the best example of this.  He is a borderline top 10 fantasy WR in PPR leagues.  TE, perhaps the most boring position is fantasy football, is much more fun with PPR scoring.  When Chris Cooley, who you probably drafted in the 8th round, catches 5 passes for 30 yards you actually get some decent points in PPR leagues.  Believe me, eight points feels a hell of a lot better than three.

PPR leagues have a significant affect on draft orders.  Larry Fitgerald and Andre Johnson are going to get 100 extra points out of PPR.  Top receivers usually come into play at the end of the first round, beginning of the second round.  Guys like Clinton Portis, Brandon Jacobs, and Frank Gore will be in that same area in 2009.  Those guys are going to catch 50 passes or (in Jacob’s case) much less.  That gives an extra 50 points or more to the elite WR’s scores, which makes a HUGE difference when making that late round 1, early round 2 draft decision.  You see RB/WR and even WR/WR first two round combos much more often in PPR leagues, and rightly so.

If you’re trying to decide between PPR and standard scoring, take a chance on PPR.  Keep in mind that the PPR impact is significant.  If you want to slowly adjust to it try adding only .5 points per reception.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 18th, 2009 at 1:31 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.