Late-Round Perspectives: Scott Fish

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Scott Fish is the president and founder of Fantasy Cares and the creator of the Scott Fish Pole.

00:00:05
Speaker 2: He's won the Matthew Berry Game Changer Award.

00:00:07
Speaker 1: He's once named the FSGAS Humanitarian of the Year, and he was one of the Athletics Persons of the Year in twenty eighteen.

00:00:13
Speaker 2: He's a pretty decent guy.

00:00:14
Speaker 1: These are his Late Round perspectives. This episode is sponsored by Underdog Fantasy. If you haven't played over an underdog yet, now's the perfect time. There are tons of different best ball leagues that you can join, and there's definitely a league out there that fits what you're looking for, and you can use all the things that I've talked about with guests on becoming a best ball bro to crush those drafts. But like I said, now's the right time to join up because if you go and you sign up and use promo code Late Round, you not only get a nice deposit offer, but you also get a free late Round Draft guide that's a twenty five dollars guide email to your inbox after signing up for absolutely free. So head to Underdog Fantasy dot com, sign up using promo code late Round and make it a posit I can confirm it's a really really fun platform to play on. Now back to the show, I was hoping that you would be sitting in the in the famous white chair that I'm sitting in. Not the same, not that we've like shared the chair, but we have the exact same chair off of your recommendation, I don't know, like five or six years ago.

00:01:25
Speaker 2: Probably at this point.

00:01:27
Speaker 3: Like it's longer. I do have it here, it's right here. I don't know if you couldn't.

00:01:30
Speaker 1: There you go, yeah, yeah there lifting it up for people watching on YouTube.

00:01:35
Speaker 2: I love it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:01:37
Speaker 1: I feel like everyone in the fantasy industry. First off, seemingly everyone needs a computer chair. Yeah, but when they do, somehow you and I get tagged in tweets like just just there's like a conversation and then eventually it leads to to one of us. It should just lead to you, because you're the one who introduced the chair to me when it was like it was really discounted and it's a great chair, but it was from like office depot, and I don't think it exists anymore.

00:02:03
Speaker 3: No. I think this is the Dolly part and Whitney Houston thing, Like I think you know, I think I may have found the chair first, but you're the one who made it famous.

00:02:14
Speaker 2: That's hilarious. Yeah, that's hilarious.

00:02:17
Speaker 3: Yeah.

00:02:17
Speaker 1: I mean like I'm in it literally because you every time I see you on shows and listen to you on shows and stuff, I feel like you're always in a different location. I'm like stapled to this chair, like this is the same spot that I'm in for every spot that I do. Pretty much, you're sometimes like you know, out on your back porch or just just lounging somewhere, which you can do now because the weather there is not frigid cold.

00:02:45
Speaker 3: The weather in Minnesota is great right now. So every time my wife is at work or downtown working instead of at home, I am on that deck out in the gorgeous weather, just enjoying life, working working from outside. Yeah. Have you so?

00:02:58
Speaker 2: Have you? Have you been traveling around and stuff for Scott fish Ball?

00:03:02
Speaker 3: I have? I have. The first weekend I went to Las Vegas for the event at circa kind of kickoff event for the fish Bowl a few weeks here. It was it was awesome. They did an awesome job there. Circa put us up on the big screens and did the drafting from the owners suite. It was one heck of a time drafting from pools and whatnot. And then last weekend I went to Denver where you know, I had had a great time out there. It was well done, well done by Dave Klugi put on a good show there and then football guys, excuse me. And then I stayed in Colorado for a couple of extra days because I don't know if you've been to Colorado, but it's just going.

00:03:40
Speaker 2: It's amazing. Yeah, I've only been out there once, but it's it's it's great. Yeah, love it.

00:03:45
Speaker 3: God, so beautiful, so beautiful. And then this weekend I'm going to be doing the one here in Minnesota. And after that, the final weekend, I am in La on Saturday hanging out doing at that event. And then I read eye to Boston for our first ever attempt at Fantasy Cares Gala in Boston, the final the final drafts of SFB. So it's gonna be it's gonna be a fun next couple of weeks as well.

00:04:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then right after that we have the Fantasy Football Xpo. I'm assuming you're going to the expo this.

00:04:16
Speaker 3: Year, yep, yep. I always go to the Expo. That's that's a heck of a fun time. You got there last year, Yeah, that was awesome. Yeah, great time there.

00:04:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you're just all over the map.

00:04:25
Speaker 1: I mean I wish, I obviously wish you could be at the Charlotte Live this weekend, you know, which is I'm gonna at least show up. I'm doing a slow draft, but I'm gonna a least gonna show up for a little bit before on Saturday. My wife and I are actually going to the Back to the Future Broadway show that's kind of traveling around there in Charlotte this weekend. So that was part of the reason why I couldn't do the live draft.

00:04:45
Speaker 3: But I'll at least, you.

00:04:46
Speaker 1: Know, go stop by, see what's going on, make fun of some picks, you know, all the good stuff.

00:04:52
Speaker 3: I like that. I do the same I do slow draft and then I just hang out at the Lives.

00:04:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:04:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. I encourage people to go to the Lives even if you're not drafting. It's just a fun time with a lot of like minded people, just like the Expo is.

00:05:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly exactly, you know, So we'll get to the Scott fish Bowl.

00:05:07
Speaker 2: We'll talk about that, uh in a lot more detail.

00:05:10
Speaker 1: But I think I only discovered this and realized this over the last like six months to a year.

00:05:15
Speaker 2: But sure, you're basically credited for coming up with the DEBI format. Can you can you just talk about that?

00:05:23
Speaker 1: I know that you're humble. You don't want to be like, oh, this was all that whatever. But uh, but but I want to ask you how did that come to be? Uh?

00:05:32
Speaker 2: What's deb all about? Because I think a lot of people still, you know, it's still not like as well known as even you know, Dynasty and such. What's it all about?

00:05:41
Speaker 3: Uh?

00:05:41
Speaker 2: And and what led you to sort of create it?

00:05:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I'm gonna I'm gonna step back and be a little a little humble a lot on this definitely, because I'm sure there were other people doing this in the nineties, you know, drafting college players and having them like it was probably just home leagues and stuff. The the reason I get credit is because I had the first articles, the first podcast, the only set of rankings on the out there. It's actually how I got into the industry. I started playing fantasy football in nineteen ninety two and then somewhere in the mid nineties, I'm like, I'm watching college football. I want these players on my big roster now. But obviously I didn't do college fantasy football. We just drafted them and we eventually That's how DeBie works. You draft college players, you let him sit, you watch them play on Saturdays, and then when they get to the NFL, they go to your big club. That's basically what DeBie is. But I started doing that in the nineties, and then in the early two thousands after college whatever I was, I was basically on message boards and Aol chat rooms and all these things trying to trying to find anybody else that did this, and I just couldn't find it. So I think with a lot of people, maybe late on kV is one of these receptions in Matt Harmon right, Like I think with a lot of people, when you can't find anything out there about the thing you are passionate about doing in this space, you just start doing it. Yeah and yeah. So yeah, sometime in the mid two thousands, as I'm writing and start sitting Waiver articles first sight, I decide I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna put up Debbie content. I'm just gonna start doing Debbie stuff. Yeah, and that's kind of how I'm here now.

00:07:25
Speaker 2: Are you?

00:07:25
Speaker 1: What would you say your portfolio of leagues, like, what percent of that portfolio is still dedicated to Debbie? I suppose you just yeah, what does that look.

00:07:35
Speaker 3: Like for you? Just one league? Just one league that's still does that. I'm still in that does that. I used to have dozens upon dozens, but about you know, so probably a year I had a heart attack at thirty five. I've talked about this on other shows. I know you know this, but it really shifted the way I saw things that really, you know, shifted how SFB became and Fantasy Cares and all that what it is now. But I decided I can't continue to do thirty five to forty managed leagues.

00:08:05
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:08:05
Speaker 3: So I just started saying no to everybody asking me to be in a league. I just kept saying no for about seven eight, nine years, and now I'm down to under ten leagues and only one of them is Debbie still. Yeah.

00:08:15
Speaker 2: So was that a turning point for you?

00:08:17
Speaker 3: Then?

00:08:17
Speaker 1: The heart attack of you focusing more on the you know, the stuff that you're doing with Fantasy cares and focusing more on Scott fish Ball, maybe kind of pushing away from the obviously playing but even the analysis side of things.

00:08:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's yeah, I think what it did is really made me refocus my time and where my passions lie, you know, wanting to be a role model or a leader for you know, my young child at the time, for the industry, like using any platform I have for good. But you know, just just in general, I realize if I'm going to spend more time on this, I need to spend less time in managed leagues. I'm still in you know, nearly ten, but that's that's just where that came on. But yeah, the heart attack changed the way you see so many things. Yeah, I mean, I like, tomorrow isn't granted. And I see that more clearly than ever now. I went into the hospital with another man with three kids who had a heart attack the same night, actually younger than me, with three kids, and he died that night and I lived the next day and I'm still here today, So I don't know, it kind of shapes the way I kind of put this on a dark twist. I feel like that.

00:09:35
Speaker 1: I think it's important to understand where all of this humanitarian type work comes from and I think that I think it's innate and a part of you as a person. You know, you and I have gotten to know each other well over the years and such, but you know, I think that's definitely a part of who you are. But I also think there's just life events and things that happen to people that sort of pushed them along a certain path. And that path for you, you know, seem to be like like, yes, that was a changing you know, a point, turning point for you to focus more on. You know, let's be honest, like what you do with fantasy cares and you can talk about fantasy cares a little bit too, just just so that people are totally aware, but what you do with fantasy cares and Scott Fishbowl at the end of the day, is far far more important objectively than analysis. Like I'm not saying this because I'm talking to you and I want you to feel good about it. I'm saying that objectively, like like you're doing good for the world. And sure, you know you can say like, oh, you know, and you know, podcasts and entertainment is it allows us to escape and it gives us that escapism and it's great for people to have that, which I don't disagree with, Like that's something that I've had to come to grips with, you know, through the years doing this is that like existential crisis of like what am I doing with this is insane? Like I'm my my livelihood is based on a game about a game. This is crazy. But they need to take a step back and be like, look, this is entertainment at the end of the day, and you know, we're trying to have fun with this. We're trying to create community and bonds, and that's a great thing at the end of the day. But what you're doing is next level to that, and it's it's not cool.

00:11:11
Speaker 2: That's not the right word.

00:11:12
Speaker 1: But I think that it's kind of important to focus on that one life changing aspect that you have and thing that happened to you to say this fed into that to some.

00:11:21
Speaker 3: Degree, you know, Yep, absolutely, you should definitely not undermine what you do. The the the amount of people I've talked to who things like fantasy sports and just connecting with a personality who does analysis feeling like they have a friend in their ear that you know things like them or you know, teaches them or whatever, it's it's very important to people just having entertainment and escape. It's it's actually it's a really really big deal and people need it more than you think they do. And I think you, I think you do know that and you kind of touched on it, but yeah, absolutely that it's I agree with you that my wife and I are the types that we've always given to like over fifty charities. My parents ran a five O one C three charity when I was younger. Uh so, yes, you're right, It's always been part of who I am. But yeah, it gave me a little kick in the butt, I guess too start doing more.

00:12:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, can you can you just explain quickly Fantasy Cares and what you're doing with Fantasy Cares.

00:12:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, so Fantasy Care is also, like my parents is an accredited five on five O one C three charity. What we do each year is we try to inspire the fantasy industry, you know, all fantasy sports really, but mostly fantasy football, but inspire the fantasy community to do good with this hobby of ours. I went on podcasts and shows for years, tagging at the end with my you know, social media handles and saying if you can convince your lead to give one entry feet of charity. You're not gonna miss it. You're gonna like, there're one hundred thousand leagues. We can do a ton of good with this, and I kind of turn that that idea into a into a charity and we take we have we have people donate and when they donate, we take money and we go do toy shopping trips around the country for toys for Tots. We're a national corporate sponsor. We spend over one hundred thousand dollars in twenty plus different cities each of the last couple of years just doing giant toy shopping trips for you know, toys for tots, but also we've done toy shopping trips for like kids, cancer awards and stuff. And we don't just do toys for tots. There are other charities were the way we're structured is we can give to any other charity. So we give to food shelters, we give to dog rescues, things like that, just a whole bunch of things that Fantasy Cares does And that's basically what we are. We inspire the fantasy community to do good with the hobby.

00:13:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's it's really important because there are times, unfortunately where it's very easy for what we're doing to become a little bit toxic and for us to sort of lose sight of you know that this is just a game. At the end of the day, your home league entry fees for ninety five to ninety nine percent of people, it's it's a good beer money for you, you know what I mean, Like, it's it's not like the end of the world for most people, you know, if they win or lose that, so to be able to give back is really really important. Let's let's shift focus a little bit. You've also been a commissioner, Slash helped run leagues for years and years as well, And you know, I feel like that's a topic I know that you've done like podcasts and stuff specifically on the topic, but it's something that I don't you know, I get questions every once in a while for like mail bags and stuff about being a good commissioner. You know, a lot of times it's like, you know, my league is doing X y Z, how can I convince them to do you know A or something like that. But but I think that that I wanted to ask you what to you makes a good commissioner and what do you think commissioners could do to just be better?

00:14:51
Speaker 3: So yeah, this, this, this could go this question could go on for an entire show. So I do do a podcast called commission Impossible with Ryan McDowell that we discuss stuff like this routinely every you know, every two weeks in the off season. And the great thing about commissioner stuff is it's evergreen content, Like three years from now, you're going to be like, oh, this is this is probably how you should deal with this. So many things are case by case and there's so many so much backstory to everything. But I think the main things commissioners need to do is have a decent set of by laws. Always be looking to close loopholes, not exploit them themselves, or you know, if people exploit them, figure out how to close them. But judge fairly, like do things fairly evenly among league mates, including yourself when decisions need to be made. But the number one thing I always tell commissioners that they need to have in their by laws is loopholes are going to exist. You're not going to always always have a rule in place for everything, So you need a best interest clause at the bottom of your bylaws. It says, you know, in case something's not explicitly listed in the rules, the commissioner will make the best decision possible for the league, you know, and you figure it out from there. Yeah. But I think the main thing is you just got to treat everybody fairly and not at quite as reactionary, you know, take a step back and you know what's best for the league, but absolutely do everything fairly and have that best interest clause probably are my main things.

00:16:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, what do you think is like the one of the main topics that gets brought up to you, like, is it vetowing? Is it?

00:16:26
Speaker 1: You know, just like league integrity and people you know, not starting the best lineups because they get pissed off that they got eliminated from the playoffs unfairly or something like that what they deem as unfairly and that kind of thing.

00:16:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, the collusion, vetowing retaliation type stuff doesn't come up as often in the in our questions or questions to me personally. I think the number one thing, number one and number two things are we have X, y Z, you know, one, two, three whatever, totally inactive league members. How do we make them more active. Yeah, and then then the next one is how can I convince my league to shift from this setting to this setting? And a lot of times it's from one QB to super flex or two QB, which almost always takes you need eighteen months, like its off season and a half, or you just need to restart the whole dany thing. Yeah.

00:17:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's tough. It's tough.

00:17:15
Speaker 1: Do you do you just tell people like like like like if if someone were someone were to come to you and say, I want my league to realize that we need superflex instead of the single quarterback league. It's a ten team league, we should go to super flex. Are you answering that, like, oh it mimics the real game more? Or like is there is there a certain answer that you gotta go with that.

00:17:36
Speaker 3: No. I I definitely don't stay stuff like that because I'm I'm team no league. Shame. Yeah, I don't say no matter what your Saturday settings are, if your league likes it, it likes it, yeah, and good for you play what you enjoy. Uh.

00:17:52
Speaker 1: No.

00:17:52
Speaker 3: When someone says I need to convince my league mates, I have a lot of tough time. I have a really tough time with that because because i'm team no League shame, there are people that are so staunched super flex that they can give you a bunch of data points that they're like, this is why you should do this in attend team league. The depth of them there's you know, then there's there's twenty viable quarterbacks. There's that, you know, thirty viable, but there's definitely twenty viable quarterbacks. You can start two every week, et cetera. But I'm not going to try to convince someone, hey, you should do this, this is the right way, because I'm not sure I fully believe certain things are the right way except for two tight ends. I cannot disagree with two tight end enough. I did a study about seven years ago. I did some research on it, No five years ago, something like that, where it was the most detrimental scoring system or lineup system I've ever seen, because I think I looked at thirty three or thirty five leagues and over the course of three seasons of all those leagues, and almost never was a championship team had a non top three tight end. You had to have a top three tight end to win a championship in a two tight end league. It's just so detrimental to do two tight ends. Yeah, unless we start seeing tight ends get deeper, which they really haven't.

00:19:08
Speaker 2: You definitely haven't.

00:19:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, until we see that, it's such a detrimental setting to start two tight ends.

00:19:15
Speaker 1: I think it's I think that the no league shaming is a really good point though, because it's almost like these anyone asking that question is coming from a place kind of arrogance in a way, like like.

00:19:26
Speaker 2: I like it this way.

00:19:27
Speaker 1: We need everyone to go with what I believe is true, even if this is dumb. I always have approached, like my analysis slash that kind of answering that question of like just play to the rules, you know, like like people who want to mimic real football, Number one, it's almost impossible to do that, right And number two though, it's like why do we have to do that? You know, like I don't like we're playing a game, like this is very clearly a game, and you know, if you if you want to mimic real football, then remove the running back position from fantasy football, you know, like like fun is that going to be?

00:20:01
Speaker 3: Then? You know, don't give points for yards?

00:20:04
Speaker 2: Yeah?

00:20:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well the other I got a question actually about this in a Patreon Q and A this week, and I was like, if you wanted to mimic real football, do like an EPA league right where where you're getting points for expected points added, you know, as opposed to to yards, and like, you know, I just think that a lot of that stuff. You know, at the end of the day, just just play Plato what you're given and if if you don't like it, then you know, of course voice your opinion as to why you don't like it, but you know you can you can also join other leagues and there's a lot of them out there, as you've been managing and doing for for years and years now.

00:20:41
Speaker 3: Yep. I like that you said one thing in there, the why part, because uh, my good friend Ryan mcdealell always says, consider the why when when adding or removing a rule or wanting to play. Why are you doing this? Like what what does it add? You know? Sometimes the answer is just fun. But if you're just adding to complicate things, you know, maybe that's not the right way.

00:21:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, totally.

00:21:05
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about Scott fish boll You know, I wanted to have you on during peak scott Fish Bowl season, not only to promote everything, of course, but because it's fresh in everyone's minds and it's a really fun topic to sort of dig into. You have been doing Scott fish Bowl. This is the fourteenth iteration. I don't know how many I've been I've been in. I think I've been in probably half ish maybe like maybe maybe eight or nine.

00:21:29
Speaker 2: At this point.

00:21:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, you've a lot.

00:21:30
Speaker 2: I've been in a lot. I've definitely been in a lot.

00:21:32
Speaker 1: I think I was in it like back when it was, you know, when you were doing the Oasis stuff. But yeah, just give everybody a quick rundown of what Scott Fishbowl is, how it came about, and how it's become the behemoth that it's now become.

00:21:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not even sure how it became the behemoth that it's become, but yeah. It started in twenty ten as kind of a reader slash listener league for ff Oasis, which was my my site that I did all those you know, deVie rankings on for three, four, five years whatever, but just a reader listener league. We went out and we grabbed analysts from other sites because we wanted like analysts that they knew, Guys like Mike Clay who won year one. You know, like guys they knew from other sites to come play with just our regular Joe readers, right, And so we did that for two years. I took a year off when my wife was pregnant with our first kid. It just the timing was not you know, not good for me to try to run a large tournament. And weirdly enough, back in twenty ten, a ninety six team super Flex tournament was quite a rare thing. It was actually hard to find people to play.

00:22:42
Speaker 2: I can, I can imagine.

00:22:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, not only was the industry not what it is today, but also like super Flex wasn't nearly as big as it.

00:22:51
Speaker 3: Is now, No, not even close. Yeah, so we we actually had trouble keeping that thing full and keeping people's attention the first two years. I just I don't know, I didn't feel like it was worth it that third year. But uh, after that f f Oasis had gone, like I'd closed it. I started working you know, more side jobs around the industry instead, and but I wanted to bring it back. Needed a new name. I remember on on the old Twitter they they said it should be called the Fishbowl and Fishbowl dot com, dot org, dot net everything was taken, so I just did Scott Fishbowl. It wasn't going to be called Scott fish Ball. It's just going to be the Fishbowl or Fishbowl Tournament or whatever. But this stuck, you know, Scott fish bull stuck. And I will say it's been it's been a heck of a deal for branding.

00:23:37
Speaker 2: Let me tell you what do you want to hear something crazy?

00:23:39
Speaker 1: Before we started recording this, my wife was leaving for work and I was talking to her. I was like, oh, yeah, I'm gonna be interviewing Scott Fish And she didn't even realize that was your name. It's always been when I've referenced you or it, it's always just been Scott Fishbowl, right like like it was like it was like, oh, this thing called you know, it's not like she's like totally understanding what I'm doing today and stuff, like she knows what I do, of course, but you know, it's not like she's like in the weeds on what's going on on Twitter and stuff like that. And she she literally thought that like fish Bowl was a thing and then your name was Scott. She didn't realize that your name was Scott Fish and that right so speaking of branding, that the branding of the scott Fish Bowl has really come together for you.

00:24:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, it really, it really has. Uh yeah, but yes, that third year we just I we I say we, but it was really me. Years three, four, five, six, whatever was just all me. I realized that there was something there. There was like, there was something there that really could and should work at a large level, and I could keep pulling friends in the industry in And really the reason it became what it is today is because of guys like you, Guys like you know, Matthew Berry of course, and like uh like any of them, Mike Clay, any of these analysts that start, Okay, i'll play, I'll play. Once you guys play your the people who watch your stuff and listen to your stuff they want to play with you. And the people that with every analyst, And the other thing is once analyst A plays, analyst B is like, oh he's playing, Okay, I'll play. So just a giant snowball effect of you know, thirteen, fourteen whatever years of that. I think right around the SFB five or six is when you know, Barry jumped in and a few actors jumped in and a few former athletes jumped in and stuff like that, and that's where it really took on a life of its own. And weirdly enough, also coincided with around the time I had my heart attack and really made charity a huge focus of the fish Bowl, And that's another reason people are cool with supporting charity. Yeah, combining charity and fantasy football and playing with some of your favorite people, every one of those things led to it being what it is today.

00:25:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, how big is this year's tournament?

00:25:57
Speaker 3: When all said and done, It's going to be right around four thousand teams. It's a little under that now, but I'm going to open a couple more leagues, just you know, some some last ditch effort, people that you know, we want to get in and people who have come to the live events to support us but they're not actually in it. Yeah, gonna add a few more. I think it's gonna be about four thy eight teams.

00:26:16
Speaker 1: So what has been the build from that, like in terms of total teams in this tournament?

00:26:22
Speaker 2: In this league?

00:26:24
Speaker 1: I know you said you started at ninety six year one, right, you don't have to say every single year obviously, but like you know, like a few years ago. I remember, wasn't it just a few years ago, like just a little over a thousand, Like I feel like it's been a we've seen a big jump at least over the last couple of years in terms of number of teams in this thing.

00:26:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's it's really jumped. The first year was ninety six, and I told you, like, filling that tournament wasn't easy. The next year was sixty. We actually downgraded it for year two, but then year three and above is like one, twenty two, forty three, sixty. We just kept jumping up and then, yeah, you're right. Last year was thirty three hundred. The year before was twenty four hundred, The year before was two thousand, The year before that was like twelve hundred. Yeah, so like five years ago we were like at twelve hundred teams. This year, over forty four thousand people signed up to play in this thing.

00:27:15
Speaker 1: That is absolutely wild, absolutely wild. Speaking of wild, you like to get wild and crazy with the scoring every year. You know, this year another interesting wrinkle. We'll get to that in a second, but how are you developing the scoring system for scott Fish Bowl. You know, it does feel like you build off of the previous year a little bit and kind of shift things around. But how do you go about making the scoring system what it is?

00:27:42
Speaker 3: Yeah? So I think it always starts with the basic half point PPR half point per first down, like base that I and you're a lot of the sayings are pretty close to basic, and then tweaked. I do that for two reasons. A, Uh, this gets talked about on a lot of shows, and you don't want to for a lot of newer players or casual players or whatever that are listening to those shows or playing an SFP for the first time, I don't want it to be too crazy, you know, But I do want them to think about I want them to have a base and then be like, Okay, these two tweaks, how do I adjust for these? Each year is different. One year I wanted people to, you know, consider what third round reversal could be for their leagues if they wanted to bring that to their leagues. One year, many years ago, I was like, first downs are important. I love having first downs in my league. This is something I can show the industry. Hey, at a large scale, obviously it's been done before, but at a large scale, hey, you can add first downs to your league, and I see them far more often now right obviously even starting in that first year we were super flex in twenty ten. Some years it's just that it's just I want to show this to the industry and like showcase it for people to talk about on shows. Some years it's thematic, like the video game year we had big bonuses, like for like thedeo games have bonuses one year. Some years it's what is being talked about that and to make that important for you know, you know, make that a talking point. Like the year people were talking about our our sacks a quarterback stat or an offensive line stack. I threw them in to make people talk about them. This year, the NFL changed the kick returner rose and I could have done something really basic with kick returners and then people would have been like, I don't know, maybe you know, still draft them at the end, or just not even draft them. I went I went big.

00:29:29
Speaker 2: You went hard, you went hard, you went hard with the kick.

00:29:33
Speaker 3: Returns absurd like we could see a kick returner be the number one player.

00:29:37
Speaker 2: It just happened. Yeah, yeah, not even out.

00:29:40
Speaker 3: Of the question. But because I did that, it's it's getting talked about right. It gets talked about a lot, just furthering that conversation. But all of them, all of the tweaks I always do that they come at they they It's something I also have to balance because what I want is draft chaos. I want you to be able to build your roster however you want and be happy with it, go in with your own any strategy you want. There's no right strategy. You can go with any strategy. And also I want the draft board to be all over the place for all three hundred, four hundred leagues. Yeah, I just want them to be crazy, so you don't know what's happening, you don't know what's coming, and it just creates excitement and energy. So that's kind of what goes into why I score it the way I do, why I change it each year.

00:30:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll say this, Of all years that I've been playing, I think this year in particular is one where you could objectively and like logically and rationally. You know, obviously you can go in any direction any year and end up hitting on the right players and be fine. Right, But just from like a strategy standpoint and the stuff that I was digging into before my slow draft started, it seemed like this year was the one year where I'm like, I could kind of go in any direction here, like like realistically, like I could go heavy tight end, I could go heavy running back. And understand going that direction, I get why people were drafting quarterbacks when they're drafting them. And then obviously, you know wide receivers and the elite wide receivers are the elite wide receivers, and we know that they have a lot of stickiness and that they're they're just good, high upside type players. And so it was a very interesting scoring system I thought this year. One one piece that I thought was most interesting was the quarterback aspect with them getting fifty yard a point for every fifty yards instead of you know, twenty twenty five with a lot of standard leagues that you see. And then on top of that, you know they're getting six points per touchdown pass. But then on the flip side, you know what I thought was really funny is people are sort of like against mobility at this point at quarterback, like a cross like I've seen people argue against it. It's so stupid that you know, this player isn't that good as a quarterback, but he can be so relevant fantasy because of his rushing, and you're basically like, well, screw that, we're gonna make We're gonna make quarterback rushing kind of inherently more important.

00:31:52
Speaker 2: Because the passing is a little bit less important.

00:31:55
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean, I think that the way you brought it together this year, to me at least, was is really fun. I think the one piece that's gonna be most difficult is the return the returner piece, right, and the kick return stuff, because us drafting in July, it's not so much that like those guys are gonna make an impact, like there's no doubt, like there's gonna be there's gonna be some I mean, even if you look at what happened last year, you know, Rashid Shahed was like a top twenty ish kind of player in the format, right, But that's also last year where we probably saw less return yards than we will this year, and a guy like Shahed could even have a bigger role this year, right. And then, so I think that the hardest part for me, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, The hardest part for me with the return stuff is not so much knowing that it's important.

00:32:43
Speaker 2: It's knowing who the heck is going to be that guy, Like who who.

00:32:47
Speaker 1: Are going to be the return because not only like we can sit here and project in July who that guy is gonna be, but I think that we what we could see is week three passes and teams are like, oh man, we're we didn't think about this strategically enough. We got to change things up and get a new returner back there.

00:33:05
Speaker 3: Yep. Absolutely, And it's a full season game with waivers. I think this is so much more a week one, week two, week three waiver pick up thing. I think part of what the kick returners does is this year, you know, you got so many flex spots and they are so flexworthy when Xavier Gibson isn't getting started in any league except for s be at this point, you know, uh, but yeah, it's it's gonna definitely be more of a waiverwarry thing. I have a weirdly hot take on the on the the Saints where I could see Shahid He's gonna be needed more in the offense with Michael Thomas gone and whatnot, and Taysom Hill jumps back there as a style player to just I have a hot take on that where I think Taysom Hill could absolutely do some returns that yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:33:52
Speaker 1: Well that's the thing like I've seen, you know, the takes of people saying, like, oh, Shaheed was a top twenty player, he could realistically be drafted in the top three rounds or whatever, but he's not from an ADP perspective. And I think it's because the market understands that there's still a predictability aspect to that, right, Like there's still that side of, well, is he gonna retain that? Right? He's their number two now, Like this isn't the same type of situation for Shaheed as.

00:34:17
Speaker 2: It was last year.

00:34:19
Speaker 3: Absolutely absolutely, But yeah, we the only thing that's really affecting so far in drafts is people are taking dart throws on Gibbs, Gibson and Mims and Rashid at probably higher than they but maybe not. Maybe it's just risk. Maybe they're just comfortable with the risk and you know guys like Turpin and Gout, you know, all those types of types of guys. Yeah, but this is the exact reason I changed the scoring every year. I don't want analysts to even walk into this on autopilot because we do so many drafts. I want them to think about it and talk about it.

00:34:48
Speaker 2: No, it's true, It's very true.

00:34:49
Speaker 1: Like this is one of the few drafts that I actually have to like prepare for, if you will.

00:34:56
Speaker 2: You know, like most drafts, you're like, okay, what is it?

00:34:58
Speaker 3: All right?

00:34:58
Speaker 1: Full PPR three wide flex, All right, I know exactly what I'm doing, you know, whereas this you got to at least you know, I'm not like the biggest, like vorp kind of drafter because I think there's just a lot more to the game than just looking at a projection and kind of going from there. But I do think it's a good starting point for something like this to at least understand, you know, what position matters a little bit more what we've seen historically, all that kind of stuff.

00:35:22
Speaker 2: This year.

00:35:23
Speaker 1: You what I really like this year too, is that you don't have, from a supply and demand perspective, your positional requirements. You only need one quarterback, one running back, one tight end, one wide receiver, and then there's a super flex spot. So it's you know it pretty much let's just say two quarterback league, but it's super flex obviously, so you can go to a lot of different directions, and then there's all these flex spots. Six flex spots, right, or five flex spots.

00:35:47
Speaker 2: In this in the super six what is it?

00:35:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's eleven total stars. It's one of each position and you know the rest flex. I had hoped that I had nerved some of the you know, you know, some of the lower end passing quarterbacks enough that maybe you'd you'd consider not starting them sometimes, kind of like the years that I did super negative scoring.

00:36:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's fair though. I think that that's that that you accomplished that if you do go heavy enough at the other positions early, right.

00:36:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's that's true. I was wondering if there's too many flex spots for that, that it's still a two quarterback league because you're like you're sixth flex or fifth flex or whatever, probably still should be a good starting quarterback. But you know, part of why I did that, the you know, the settings like that, and added some kick returners, and the tight ends premium is so high that some of those four for forty yard type tight ends are flexworthy. The reason I did all that is we we draft twenty two rounds. We draft in July. There is nothing on waivers. There are a couple by by apocalypses or buy mcgeddon's. I don't know which word you like for all those, but I'm like people year after year like we should have irs, and I'm like, I don't want irs in this. You know how annoying that is as a commission of four thousand team. So I kind of did that. I kind of did that so that you know, there's all these other options to get you through. And that's why you can flex kickers too. I'm you know, throwing just a whole bunch of things you can flex out there.

00:37:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

00:37:14
Speaker 3: Uh.

00:37:14
Speaker 1: You know I mentioned that I sort of look at things from a VORP perspective at first, and then I sort of dig in to think about then, like the predictability of each position and stuff like that. After looking at at VORP and what these projections are saying. When you have these unique scoring leagues, how do you go about seeing what kind of strategy you want to employ?

00:37:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I think you've talked about it before and you kind of touched on it here, like you you have to play to your scoring, you have to you have to you have to really you have to really adjust for your scoring. You know, you always got that base, but you take into effect each each factor of the scoring and see where they should go, where they start to plot out against the other players in a scoring system like this, when you're only starting one of each, I think a lot of a lot of the positions you sit there and go, do I want to grab my one stud and to just not worry about it? Or am I going to take this position? At it as a carousel? Right? And I think we're seeing a lot of that play out with the early Christian McCaffrey players. People that draft Christian McCaffrey are like, that's my running back one and whatever else is just flex at this point. So I think you just I think you just always have to adjust to your scoring and your lineup settings, and and in this one, you know I I have This is the kind of This is the kind of roster construction. This the this lineup that in normal leagues it decreases trading. The data shows it decreases trading because people don't need to trade for those positions that are required. In this there's no trading, So you just you just go after what you what? What you the players? The best value players you think, the players you like, the players you think are actually going to perform because you can flex them anywhere in your lineup.

00:39:04
Speaker 1: Do you think that scoring is the one piece of Scott Fish bull that fantasy managers don't pay enough attention to or do you think there's something else that they're not really paying enough attention to.

00:39:14
Speaker 3: No, it's it's it's it's I wouldn't. I wouldn't, I would, I wouldn't. Almost say it's it's not paying attention to this going. I think it's not fully figuring out the impact the scoring is going to have. It's probably the number one thing I've seen through the years that you can get this this base level. I think this should do this, but it doesn't always work that way. And I think a prime example is the last two years with kickers, I have had kicker scoring a little bit through the roof. For this is the third year now, the first year was the first year. My my number crunching told me you should start one kicker and probably a second on buys or injuries or whatever, flexing like that, but usually just one kicker. So so on sleeper you can only start one on MFL, we planned two different platforms. On MFL, you could start up to four the last couple of years. Last year when I up the kicker scoring, it showed you should be starting two every week. People didn't. Sleeper still had the advantage. The average kicker started was still right around one, and so everybody thought, oh, you can flex four kickers and they you know, they're so safe and you know an extra point is three point three points. They're scoring fifteen points here, and people on MFL just didn't do it. They just didn't do it. And Sleeper had the advantage the last two years. They had more, a higher ratio percentage of playoff teams, they had a higher points per game, everything, and the average amount of kickers started was right and dang near one. People just didn't care. We'll see if that works out again this year where you can flex more even but you can never fully adjust for like a scoring or a setting for what you are going to do. That's the variable you can't control. You can try to, but you can't control it. But yes, I would say that's it's not that they don't understand the scoring, it's they don't understand or the lineup. They don't understand the true impact it can make. They don't really dig deep enough to see what that what it can do.

00:41:18
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, that's a really good point.

00:41:19
Speaker 1: I've also found that it seems like, and this year it's a little bit less relevant because of what you talked about before. You know, there's only one quarterback. You have to start one running back, one wide receiver, one tight end. I think this goes for literally any league format. Is you know something that I An example I use in the draft guide and I have over the last couple of years is when you publish rankings, people are always like, is this for.

00:41:41
Speaker 2: Half PPR or full PPR?

00:41:43
Speaker 3: Right?

00:41:43
Speaker 2: And I'm like, technically your question should be what are the lineup requirements for this league?

00:41:48
Speaker 3: Right?

00:41:49
Speaker 1: Because that's gonna shift your rankings a lot more than half versus full PPR. I've done analysis on my projections to see how big of a shift there is from players from half to full PPR and PPR to half. Obviously there's a decent change with full PPR to standard, but you're really only looking at one or two spots at most per player from a projection standpoint. From half to full PPR which really important is if your league is starting five wide receivers and only one running back, like you better be pounding the wide receiver positions often.

00:42:22
Speaker 3: Even the two wide receivers. The three changes that I what you just stated about the that change is my my constant offseason argument about six point passing versus four point passing. Yes, like, you score twenty more touchdowns, that's forty points difference on the year, and you're trying to project it. I get, yes, I get weekly how that's a thing. Yes, But when you're trying to project it in the preseason, how many touchdowns this person's gonna have and it's totally it's like one point seven points per game more they're gonna score in your projection, right, I mean, come.

00:42:56
Speaker 1: On, exactly exactly. I think that's something that people get wrong often is that they're looking at everything in hindsight. But when you look at things in hindsight, you're looking at the outlier seasons that just occurred, right, Like you're looking at brock Perties seven percent touchdown rate last year, or you're looking at, you know, a player who had a two and a half percent touchdown rate that's likely going to regress when you actually look at projections like you can right now, go look at like Mike Clay's projections, which I think is the gold standard in the industry, and they're published and they're out there. You're not gonna see massive, massive variation in passing touchdowns from the top guys into the middle tier guys.

00:43:36
Speaker 2: And it's gonna be a pretty linear drop and it's not gonna be that dramatic.

00:43:40
Speaker 1: But at the end of the season, there's gonna be some guys who throw forty touchdowns and they're gonna be the ones. Yeah, sure, we're gonna say, oh yeah, six points per touchdown pass mattered for those players. But it is not as projectable as people think. You know, it's not something that's easy to sit in the preseason and be like, see, this is why we got to do it this way.

00:43:59
Speaker 3: Yep. I don't mind it on a week to week basis, where you think this guy is gonna throw a two passing touchdown. You know, you're like looking at extra four points this week or whatever. I don't mind it weekly in season, but before the season, that is, it doesn't seem like a valuable, valuable work.

00:44:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just not as big of a deal as people don't think from a projection standpoint, it might end up being a big deal, but it's not a big deal from a projecting standpoint exactly. I got to ask you, because you architected the whole thing, how are you how are you approaching your like, where are you at right now?

00:44:30
Speaker 2: In your draft? You said you were doing a slow draft. How are you drafting in SFB this year?

00:44:36
Speaker 3: Yeah? So I really wanted to do the the hero running back style where you just I just grab one running back and then we just got pound everything else. But I am on the twelve spot. I'm on the tail end and Richardson and Laporta, Anthony Richardson, who I think has a legit shot to be a top five quarterback if he can get his passing passing right this year, you know it's and stay healthy. But I got Richard sitting Laporta on the back end, so like I kind of walked myself out of the options for stud running backs. Yeah, but yeah, you know, I can tell you my draft so far, it's okay, Richardson and Daniels, Jade and Daniels. I got a lot of running quarterbacks and then Laporta and Kittle at tight end because I'm pounding that really really heavy tight end scoring Uh Taysom Hill as you know, a third height end, I guess, but we hope he does. Returns Nico Collins and Rashad White. That's where I'm sitting right now, about seven in. I guess White is going to be my top running back. Maybe hopefully the volume is there for him, Hopefully the past catching comes back, but I feel like that's going to be more of a rotation probably by the end of it.

00:45:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what I ended up doing.

00:45:46
Speaker 1: What you said that you were looking to Anthony Richardson falling that far though hasn't seemed like it hasn't happened that frequently, and it hasn't. Yeah, I ended up getting Bijon. I was in the eleven spot. I got Bijon with my with my first pick. Just to again my plan, this will go out because we're only in like round five right now.

00:46:03
Speaker 2: This will go out.

00:46:04
Speaker 1: Maybe my league mates will hear, but my plan really is not to like I'm I'm I'm Bijon and I'm just just done.

00:46:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm done. I'm not gonna be drafting a running back for probably you know, eight more rounds. It's just not really worth it at this point.

00:46:17
Speaker 3: Nope, that's that was that was my hope. But now I gotta take some dark throw shots. Yeah, running backs.

00:46:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, but tight end is so valuable that I you know, it's it's understandable that that you wanted to go that direction and lock that in. So before we go, I I need to get at least some more takes from you, you know, some some fantasy takes in twenty twenty four. Just give me a couple of players. Do you think that you're gonna be targeting in re draft leagues this year?

00:46:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it depends on how high middle low. We're talking like high at the top of drafts. I want a Chan on as many rosters as I can. I feel like he's, uh, I know, the hype train's really out there right now, so you're not getting him cheap anymore, but he's at the top. He could to have a Christian McCaffrey type year, and you know, it totally makes sense in that offense. I know most it's still there, but Taja Spears is a guy I just think is better than Pollard at this point. So like, if I'm in the mid rounds. I'm looking at him late rounds if like my last picks. I'm spending on guys like Tyrone Tracy and Dylan Lobby just because I like those First. I know Tyrone Tracy isn't the biggest pass catcher, but those versatile guys that have potential openings into that offense, especially if there's any kind of injury, I like those. Later. Nico Collins is a guy I've always loved. I'm grabbing him everywhere. Same with Anthony Richardson. Clearly I got them both there. Lad mcconney's interesting to me just because of you know, just because of that room and how much I liked him coming out. I think I've listed a bunch of them, but at varying levels of where I like that.

00:47:57
Speaker 1: No, it's a great group. I agree with the majority of those two. I mean the there's there's been a little bit more steam with Tyrone Tracy this week.

00:48:04
Speaker 3: And I know I noticed that, which is actually very frustrating.

00:48:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, yeah, I agree. He's one of my highest rostered best ball players right now. It's it's one of these and you mentioned it with Dylan Lobby too. It's like you want to get players in these backfields who kind of do something a little different than what the other backs in those backfields do, right, And with Tracy, to me, he's way more explosive. This is all hypothetical because he hasn't played you know, an NFL down yet, but more explosive than Singletary and Eric Gray. Eric Gray had an opportunity last year, didn't really do anything with it. Singletary is a solid back, but let's not pretend that he's special, right, and then you like you said, you know he has pass catching chops. I mean he played wide receiver for four years in college.

00:48:46
Speaker 2: I know that he's older. That's definitely a red flag.

00:48:48
Speaker 1: But he just seems like someone who could really, you know, be at least a decent flex you know, is like a change of pace guy. And then it's like, well, what if the Giants are done towards the end of the year and they just want to throw Tyrone Tracy out there often just to see what he's got.

00:49:06
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, And we're talking these are dang near last round packs too. Yeah, that's that's the beauty part of them. I do this show Fantasy Football Weekly with Paul Charci and and it's the longest running terrestrial radio show. Right now, we're in your thirty three or thirty fourty No, I think it's thirty thirty years. I get that confused with my home league, which is now going into year thirty four.

00:49:30
Speaker 2: That's crazy.

00:49:31
Speaker 3: I know. We do it up here. We do. Everybody comes, it's live, We get a mobile pub like.

00:49:36
Speaker 2: Oh, I think I saw pictures of that from last year. Yeah, that's sick.

00:49:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, we do it up every year. We have this slush fund where we all just like chip in money and then we do something big each year. Where was I? Oh? A thing I constantly preach at the end of the preseason and routinely through the first half of the season is pick up the backup running backs. Throw them on the bottom of your roster the like injuries happen and then things happen. And how many backup running backs have we seen, like Zach Moss last year? Even like, how many of those have we seen become RB ones for a week or two or three? And if you haven't come at the bottom of your roster, those are what I like to do my late late round picks on, especially if I've done a bijon Robinson in the first and I can type of move.

00:50:20
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:50:21
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And I think again going back to Scott fish Bowl, I think it's gonna be really interesting to see if any of those types of backs or some of the wide receivers end up getting return rules that we don't anticipate really, because there's some like a Tracy might get some work there and all of a sudden. You know, That's what's gonna be really interesting to me is the players who have somewhat of a role in their offense just automatically, and then on top of that they get the return stuff. That's when you could really sell like a league winner type player.

00:50:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, that's that. It's gonna be weird at the end of the year to see Tyrone Tracy be like RB twenty seven or and then this Slory'd.

00:51:01
Speaker 1: Be Great'd be great. But anyway, Scott, it was so great to talk to you. I'm really glad that, you know, we got to speak to people about the awesome work you're doing with Fantasy Cares and Scott fish Bowl. Can you let everyone know where to find you how to donate all that kind of stuff.

00:51:16
Speaker 3: Yeah, sure, Scott fish twenty four on all the social media's I just have the same thing everywhere. And then Fantasycares dot Org is where you can donate. We we routinely have lots of fun contests. We like to do master's contests. We do mere leagues and satellites. So there's an Underdog satellite going on. If you go find that, that's five dollars. But and that goes straight to straight to our charity. But we have we have lots of campaigns routinely, fun of fun things we do all year round. I know right now it's all s f B, but we do a lot of fun little contests for prizes and stuff. So fantasycares dot org for that, Scottfishbowl dot com you can sign up for next year SFB fifteen already, get on that, get on that list early. Maybe play with JJ. Maybe maybe next year we should we should have someone have you give away a spot to play in the same league with you. I'm down.

00:52:04
Speaker 1: I'm down to do it, like I mean I I you know, I was able to donate some some prospect and draft guides to the live events and stuff. So you guys are, yeah, of course, of course, but anyone at the live events you guys can get into that. But yeah, I'd be down to do a to do a spot if if someone wants to probably beat me.

00:52:20
Speaker 3: Sure yeah yeah, or or you can just give away spots to play playing the fish bowl. Uh. In general, we'll figure that out later, but that that sounds like fun.

00:52:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I really really appreciate it.

00:52:31
Speaker 1: As always, everyone, you can check out everything I'm offering over on lateround dot com.

00:52:35
Speaker 2: The Draft Guide is live.

00:52:36
Speaker 1: Don't forget to check out the underdog promo that I've running and get the Draft Guide for absolutely free. I'll be tweeting out my scott Fishball team once I get a little bit deeper in the draft. Like I said, at the time of this recording, I'm only like four or five rounds in, so uh, you know this, it's just not like as alluring to see that team at this point. But I will tweet it out. But otherwise, everyone, thank you for tuning in the program. Member contacted Cotta