Some people breath a big sigh of relief when the NFL regular season is over. They are actually worn out and tired of fantasy football. They might even decide to watch the NFL playoffs as a fan of a "real" team. Here at Footballguys.com, we don't understand these people.

The NFL playoffs are about rebirth where every team in the league starts out on a level playing field. OK, so they are just another excuse to get together with friends and re-draft. But what's better than a drafting with friends?

Well, beating those friends into a bloody pulp is certainly preferred. Hopefully, this article will get you headed in that direction in only three easy steps.

Step 1 - Predict the outcome of the NFL playoffs through the Super Bowl

This is critical. The key to success is having players on your roster that will play in as many games as possible. Only in the NFL post-season is a guy like Plaxico Burress even considered ahead of Randy Moss.

Why? Burress could easily play three games. If he scores a mere six fantasy points (FPs) each game that is 18 FPs for the entire playoffs. On the other hand, Moss is likely to be one and done. He'll have a hard time accumulating similar stats that single game.

If you do not want to predict the playoffs (or don't feel comfortable doing so), the Footballguys message board has done the work for you. Here is the New England thread. From there, you can find threads for the other playoff teams.

Here are the predicted games played for each of the teams (from the message board threads at the time of this writing):

Example: Atlanta is predicted to play one game by 24 people.
They are predicted to play two games by 9 people.
They are predicted to play three games by 15 people.
The average prediction is for them to play 1.70 games.

Note that the averages above were manipulated slightly
to compensate for lack of consistent participation
from team to team.

Step 2 - Draft good players from teams that will play a lot of games.

Of course there is the corollary to this is to avoid players that will not play a lot of games. From the table above, we want players from Green Bay, Indianapolis, New England, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and San Diego while avoiding players from the other teams. Of course that's a very general view of things. Do we pass on Curtis Martin in order to draft Najeh Davenport? Of course not, but we certainly will take Corey Dillon over the Jet.

If you are serious about your playoff roster, you'll certainly want to utilize Value Based Drafting. Here is a sample VBD board for QBs using their regular season FPs per game and the predicted games played from above:

Key
Reg - Regular season FPs per game
GMs - Predicted games played in the post-season
FPs - Predicted total fantasy points in the post-season
VBD - Overall value which then can be compared across positions

Step 3 - Get lucky on Step 1.

This is the tricky part of playing fantasy football in the post-season You simply must be correct when forecasting. Just for kicks, let's see what happens to our QB rankings if the Seahawks end up taking out St. Louis, Philadelphia, Green Bay, and New England on their way to a Super Bowl title.

Those four game played make Hasselbeck the QB to have by a large margin. Also notice what happened to McNabb if he were to play a single game. Not a pretty picture. Pay close attention to Culpepper. If the Vikings do not win in Green Bay (which would be a surprise), he is merely an average QB at best.

Compensating for luck

The easiest way to get by the luck factor is to compete in multiple leagues (or have multiple entries into a large nationwide contest). And obviously, you don't want to select the same players in each league (or entry). This would work especially in a large contest. Have one entry with San Diego getting hot. Have another entry where the Packers tear through the NFC. Mix things up, and you could end up looking like a genius....once.

Other

Since there are 12 NFL playoff teams, any fantasy league with 12 or fewer teams has the perfect opportunity to hold a post-season draft.

Generic Rules

• Use the same scoring system as the regular season.
• Use a lineup of 1 QB, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE, 1 PK, and 1 DT (only an 8-round draft).
• Each lineup can have no more than two players from the same NFL team (prevents people from loading up from one team).
• Winner is the team with the most fantasy points after the Super Bowl.

Have the draft early Saturday morning (shouldn't take long with only eight roster spots) and then have everyone stick around and watch the first two playoff games.

What does the winner receive? Anything, but something everyone will value would be the top pick in your league's 2005 regular season draft.