The affect luck has on the game of fantasy football is an interesting topic. It is very easy to ruffle the feathers of a fantasy GM by saying he just "got lucky" that week or with picking such and such player in the 15th round. Many GMs feel that with hard work, determination, draft prep, good instincts, etc., they make their own luck and their egos get bruised at the mere suggestion that luck played a part in their teams success. Of course, it's these same owners that will not hesitate to attribute bad luck if their team struggles. If you look closely at how any season unfolds and you will see that there are 2 big areas where luck can be a major factor: the schedule and injuries.

Schedule

Last year the schedule was in my favor. I played against many teams the week their best player(s) were off or got injured in the first quarter. Although I had a good team, there was only 1 week that I was the highest scoring team and I finished 11-2. The same season, the highest scoring team in the league lost 6 games and barely made the playoffs. There is no denying that with bye weeks, the schedule can play a major role in your team's success or failure. Luck is a factor. Unless you have the highest scoring team on a given week, the schedule helps determined whether your team won or lost or tied. Here are some suggestions on what your league can do to deal with this luck factor:

1. Schedule divisional games during as many non-bye weeks as possible. In a 12 team league with 3 conferences there are typically 6 divisional games…why not save the last 3 for weeks 11-13 so the impact of the bye-weeks are minimized when it matters most? If you make weeks 1 & 2 divisional weeks, the most important games are least affected by bye-weeks.



2. Have a Total Pts Champion. Have a prize for the team that scores the most pts overall…if this team is different from the League Champ in week 16, you can even have them square off in week 17 for fun, pride, money, etc. Our league fee is $150 and we give the total pts champ $50 so they get a third of their money back (plus any weekly high score prizes they won along the way).



3. Spread the money around more. In our league, we award cash prizes for Division Champ, Wild-Card, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, Total Pts Champ, Weekly High Score. This gives more teams a shot at making back some money and keeps teams interested all year. If you can keep that 2-9 team that got hit hard by the injury bug and played the highest scoring team every other week (i.e., had bad luck) interested by giving them a shot to make some money the last 2 weeks, the integrity of your league will be improved.

Injuries

The timing of injuries cannot be predicted. Sure there are the infamous injury-prone players such as Fred Taylor or coming-off-injury- risks such as Priest Holmes that some owners will avoid because of the risk, but lets face it, there is a injury risk every time your starters are on the field. Some "experts" look at a player's workload and may assign a higher degree of risk to them (the "big back" theory which assigns a higher degree of risk to big smashmouth backs like Bettis) compared to some of the more elusive backs that avoid big hits. Since many of those elusive backs get taken out at the goal line, there is a risk to your team of losing out on TDs in favor of avoiding injuries. A few years ago many an owner suffered some bad luck when the top 2 picks in many drafts, Terrell Davis and Jamal Anderson, suffered season-ending injuries early. Rather than get bogged down in trying to predict injuries, here are some things you and your league can do to help teams deal with the injury luck factor:

1. Have an IR system. Our league allows owners to put a team on IR as long as they are listed as OUT on the NFL injury report. This allows owners to free up rosters spots for depth.



2. Draft and manage for depth. Don't be so quick to trade that #3 RB early in the season, especially if your team is having early success.