How did FF leagues work before the internet?

[utambol 2]

I get that weekly scoring calculations had to be done manually. But how did waivers and adds/drops work? Did everything have to be put through the commish? Were there weekly conference calls to talk about who is picking up who? Were updated rosters and starting lineups mailed out to each other? How did this all work?!?!

[Cloaca du jour 2,064]

Commish was alot of work. We had to have our waivers in by wed. Then you found out by friday.

[Cloaca du jour 2,064]

Rosters submitted by phone call. Land line to answering machine

[Cloaca du jour 2,064]

Waivers based on total points...lowest with first priority

[Cloaca du jour 2,064]

My first league...you drafted a single team...one of each position. No waivers or anything. Every 4 weeks you had a supplemental draft to replace injured players. You didnt have 2 qbs...just one. He get hurt and you were out of luck till supp draft. Good times!!!

[huskyhater75 242]

We had one guy that would add everything up and mail results out-we'd get them Wednesday or Thursday. Waivers, we would have a supplemental(?) draft 1/2way through the season, it was like a whole new season and that's the only time we could get new players. Trades had to all be called into our commish and approved. We really didn't know any better but we're 25 years in now and 3 of the original 10 players/teams are still in the league.

[huskyhater75 242]

I get that weekly scoring calculations had to be done manually. But how did waivers and adds/drops work? Did everything have to be put through the commish? Were there weekly conference calls to talk about who is picking up who? Were updated rosters and starting lineups mailed out to each other? How did this all work?!?!

 

And yes, our rosters were submitted by phone. What else was there? We/

've gone from smokin' and drinkin' to Gatorade back to drinkin' at these "drafts" over the years. Great times.

[weepaws 2,450]

Yeah phone calls, leaving lots of messages. The Tuesday morning edition of the news paper is where you knew how everyone scored.

 

It was a great time.

[rotisserieking 34]

Been running my league since 1998 and back then had to scour the newspaper box scores, input into an Excel spreadsheet, and then email out to everyone. The add/drops were actually not bad because no one paid as much attention or had access to a thousand websites/social media updates/etc but if you wanted someone, they would either email me or call me and then i'd send an email to the league. But we also charged $1 (real money) per pickup and at the end of the year the transaction money went to the highest scoring team on the season. Ah, the good old days.

 

You made me take a trip down memory lane. I found an old html file from my 99 season so looks like I created a very basic website to post scores and standings to. Our Super Bowl winning roster in '99:

 

QB - Beuerlein/McNair

RB - Charlie Garner/Robert Smith/Jamaal Anderson/Cecil Collins

WR - Marvin Harrison/Terrance Mathis/Derrick Mayes/Tony Martin

TE - Wesley Walls/Lovett Purnell (???)

K - Elam/Mare

[jrokh 567]

Ahhh those were the days: Back then a dimebag cost a dime...

[huskyhater75 242]

Ahhh those were the days: Back then a dimebag cost a dime...

HAHA the GOOD ol' days! Also back then-here in Oregon (unfortunately had to move to Wa), we had 2 newspapers the Journal and the Oregonian. We had to make the Oregonian the official newspaper. Once in a while there were differences in the stats, and we love disputes!

[Woble Eth 11]

Agreed, good ol' days.. Live drafts - up close and personal shots taken at your fellow owners after EVERY PICK.. LOL

 

The USA Today sports box scores were official and were perused over - remember being one point down?? Feverishly looking and looking and looking for that fumble recovery or fumble lost... and god forbid if the box score was off - and you actually saw the game locally - THAT WASN'T A FUMBLE!!!!! - despite the fact you were privy to an obvious miscue - too bad!!

 

USA Today was LAW.

 

Actually crap like that were few and far between..

 

More? No flex position, people on the help board actually helped and didn't beg incessantly for you to "ANSWER MINE" or "LEAVE A LINK".. (lazy asses)... The toolbags at CBS with their backwards ball caps - now they are "professional" dart-throwers in suits and ties.. Ah the mighty pundits. As clueless today as they were then. With the exception of a few I leaned on then and still lean on today.

 

Scanning the local papers in every NFL (been there, done that..) city for that nugget of information... who remembers "our favorite newspaper sites" from the mastermind?

 

Pay sites - BAH. Silly then - sillier now.

 

The few FF magazines out there were the SHEEEAT. Never mind they were obsolete pretty much the minute you plunked down $7.99 and left the store.. The Fantasy Football Index.. the bible back in the day.

 

FFToday is still going strong - and for good reason.. Mike does yeoman's work. I have been here for well over a decade for a reason. Sadly, Gone are the daily days of ffmastermind, redeyesports, the original pigskin addiction.. so many more.. The hobby sadly got itself into a big damn hurry.

 

I am on a roll..

 

I remember the days when the networks, the leagues, etc all shunned this hobby. Hardly recognized it. Until one day it dawned on some suit in a corner office that crazy peeps like us spend MILLIONS on this hobby yearly.. maybe we ought to pay it some mind.

 

Funny, I felt like they invaded our fraternity tho... but I digress....

 

Now, you can't go anywhere without an update. Fantasy this, fantasy that. Scrolling scores, fantasy shows, podcasts, "experts".. (please.. I wrote for multiple sites over the last 15 years, I know my stuff, but at the end of the day, I was a guy with an opinion and a forum or two to spout off... opinion.. ) And you know how that cliche goes.. LOL

 

Technology.

 

This was fun!

[John Fox 5]

Waivers based on total points...lowest with first priority

 

yup. those were the good old days. Tuesday's were a busy day compiling all of the stats from the games. I would compile a starting lineup and email or hand deliver lineups for that week. Had a hard deadline of Saturday @ noon for rosters to be turned in or they stayed the same.

[TheUsualSuspect 207]

Collusion/Cheating on all kinds of levels.

 

Simplified scoring, ie. TD only leagues

 

Due to lack of resources, or even popularity there was a greater separation from the best teams and worst. Today, anyone can play and win.

[John Fox 5]

Agreed, good ol' days.. Live drafts - up close and personal shots taken at your fellow owners after EVERY PICK.. LOL

 

The USA Today sports box scores were official and were perused over - remember being one point down?? Feverishly looking and looking and looking for that fumble recovery or fumble lost... and god forbid if the box score was off - and you actually saw the game locally - THAT WASN'T A FUMBLE!!!!! - despite the fact you were privy to an obvious miscue - too bad!!

 

USA Today was LAW.

 

Actually crap like that were few and far between..

 

More? No flex position, people on the help board actually helped and didn't beg incessantly for you to "ANSWER MINE" or "LEAVE A LINK".. (lazy asses)... The toolbags at CBS with their backwards ball caps - now they are "professional" dart-throwers in suits and ties.. Ah the mighty pundits. As clueless today as they were then. With the exception of a few I leaned on then and still lean on today.

 

Scanning the local papers in every NFL (been there, done that..) city for that nugget of information... who remembers "our favorite newspaper sites" from the mastermind?

 

Pay sites - BAH. Silly then - sillier now.

 

The few FF magazines out there were the SHEEEAT. Never mind they were obsolete pretty much the minute you plunked down $7.99 and left the store.. The Fantasy Football Index.. the bible back in the day.

 

FFToday is still going strong - and for good reason.. Mike does yeoman's work. I have been here for well over a decade for a reason. Sadly, Gone are the daily days of ffmastermind, redeyesports, the original pigskin addiction.. so many more.. The hobby sadly got itself into a big damn hurry.

 

I am on a roll..

 

I remember the days when the networks, the leagues, etc all shunned this hobby. Hardly recognized it. Until one day it dawned on some suit in a corner office that crazy peeps like us spend MILLIONS on this hobby yearly.. maybe we ought to pay it some mind.

 

Funny, I felt like they invaded our fraternity tho... but I digress....

 

Now, you can't go anywhere without an update. Fantasy this, fantasy that. Scrolling scores, fantasy shows, podcasts, "experts".. (please.. I wrote for multiple sites over the last 15 years, I know my stuff, but at the end of the day, I was a guy with an opinion and a forum or two to spout off... opinion.. ) And you know how that cliche goes.. LOL

 

Technology.

 

This was fun!

 

 

those early FF days were fun! alot more work but alot of fun as well!

[Woble Eth 11]

Rosters submitted by phone call. Land line to answering machine

 

I am getting misty with nostalgia here. Yep, we also cleared the scores with that week's opponent and called it in to the commish..

[rotisserieking 34]

Ah yes - the official USA Today stats and the Fantasy Football Index. I was so excited when I found one at the local bookstore. I bought them every year for 3-4 years and yet they helped me none, but it was cool to actually have "intel".

 

I joined here in Sept 2000 back when there was only 1 message board, only half of the posts were about football, and the other half about women and general BS'ing to get through the day.

[Showboat 142]

 

Had a hard deadline of Saturday @ noon for rosters to be turned in or they stayed the same.

At first I thought this a bit harsh, but thinking back - maybe not such a big deal. Late breaking injury info was almost non-existent. However, I remember a couple of times when I got a good tidbit from the pre-game shows and was able to make a change with a call into the commish with only minutes to spare.

[RoadLizard 73]

Ahhh those were the days: Back then a dimebag cost a dime...

Yep - and I have to be honest, as much as the internet has helped fantasy football its also sort of ruined it too. How so?

 

1) Every single person on Earth has access to every single piece of information about players that you could possibly want. No more being "sneaky" with moves or finding that one source to help you gain an advantage. IMO there was more actual skill involved and effort usually resulted in a better record. Now? Face it, our Mothers could easily join a league and just set it to 'auto" and finish .500.

 

2) Scoring systems have become obnoxiuos. I get that TD-only leagues(I was in one for several years) dont cut it but now you get points if your guy ties his shoes correctly. The final scores are so stupid now.... like 134.89 to 127.47. Yeah, I win. Somewhere in the middle is the right call but Ive seen some goofy scoring systems that only exist because the web makes it so. I dunno.

 

3) Everyone is in like 20 leagues so your league is no longer the most important one. Way back when, we were al in ONE league. Thats the one that got the attention. Thats the one thet people cared about. Thats the league that got discussed. Now? Pfft, it takes people like 3 seconds to start spouting off about "their other league they got XXXX" or whatever and you instantly could not care any less. Also, As soon as people are doing poorly in your league they stop caring and tend to their 19 other leagues. Makes for some dodgy late-season matchup issues/concerns.

 

4) Less reason to get together and watch the games. You used to go to peoples houses and watch the games, the scoring tickers, collect stats together, etc. No reason to now. Just opn your app on your phone and see if your guy scored aTD or not. The end. Yawn.

 

So there, my old, curmudgeony ass just laid it out there for ya.

[makindollaz 40]

First league I played in had such simple scoring. 6 for every TD, 3 for 300 passing yards and 1 for every additional 50. 3 for 100 rushing/receiving yards and 1 for every additional 25. Wasn't uncommon for your kicker to be the leading scorer, and for bad teams to score in the teens each week.

 

Can still remember my 1998 undefeated championship winning starting lineup. Brett Favre, Eddie George, Robert Smith, Randy Moss, Ricky Dudley, Denver D/ST, Ryan Longwell, and either Herman Moore or Rod Smith in my 2nd WR spot depending on the matchup. Favre & Moss won me several games by themselves.

[tanatastic 2,061]

They didnt, people just say they played using the newspaper to seem old school cool. No one played FF til late 90s.

[Cloaca du jour 2,064]

Been running my league since 1998 and back then had to scour the newspaper box scores, input into an Excel spreadsheet, and then email out to everyone. The add/drops were actually not bad because no one paid as much attention or had access to a thousand websites/social media updates/etc but if you wanted someone, they would either email me or call me and then i'd send an email to the league. But we also charged $1 (real money) per pickup and at the end of the year the transaction money went to the highest scoring team on the season. Ah, the good old days.

 

You made me take a trip down memory lane. I found an old html file from my 99 season so looks like I created a very basic website to post scores and standings to. Our Super Bowl winning roster in '99:

 

QB - Beuerlein/McNair

RB - Charlie Garner/Robert Smith/Jamaal Anderson/Cecil Collins

WR - Marvin Harrison/Terrance Mathis/Derrick Mayes/Tony Martin

TE - Wesley Walls/Lovett Purnell (???)

K - Elam/Mare

Before internet lol. No email

[stonewall 647]

They didnt, people just say they played using the newspaper to seem old school cool. No one played FF til late 90s.

 

Incorrect, my friend.....although you are probably being factitious.

 

One live draft 12-man league I am in began in 1985, and has continued non-stop. I joined in 1999, but 5 original members are still playing. Yes, even after I joined in 99, we still did everything manually for 2 or 3 more years, and used USA Today for official scoring each week. Commish was a busy man!

[seafoam1 1,878]

 

Incorrect, my friend.....although you are probably being factitious.

 

One live draft 12-man league I am in began in 1985, and has continued non-stop. I joined in 1999, but 5 original members are still playing. Yes, even after I joined in 99, we still did everything manually for 2 or 3 more years, and used USA Today for official scoring each week. Commish was a busy man!

Hell yeah. I remember people in my league pouring over the newspapers, including myself, when there were like 1-2 point losses looking for and fighting over the stats. In Chicago they had the Sun Times, and the Tribune, and they did not always have matching stats.

 

The cool part is still having about 30% of those guys still in the league today.

[edjr 5,540]

The National

 

 

Greatest paper ever

[dcgangstas 41]

 

Incorrect, my friend.....although you are probably being factitious.

 

One live draft 12-man league I am in began in 1985, and has continued non-stop. I joined in 1999, but 5 original members are still playing. Yes, even after I joined in 99, we still did everything manually for 2 or 3 more years, and used USA Today for official scoring each week. Commish was a busy man!

Same here. Been playing since the mid-80s. Kept track with an EXCEL spreadsheet and scored via the USA Today.

[ralphster 274]

great post roaf lizard.

 

my 2nd year playing Napoleon Kauffman helped me to a ship. Been going mad ever since.

[justforbeer 39]

I was in a league that started in 89'.

 

We used the newspaper for official scoring. No waiver wire. only IR drop/adds once posted. Call in to the bar as the commish was the bartender.

 

It was simplistic and yet effective.

[seafoam1 1,878]

This has to be the #1 topic of the year.

 

At least for those of us who lived it. It was so much harder to follow the league in a fantasy sense when there wasn't an over-abundance of statistics jammed down your throats or daily and weekly rankings sent out from 7000 sources that mostly all agree with each other. That was part of the fun figuring all those weekly rankings yourself vs. your league mates.

 

The drafts kicked ass with the huge paper flip boards we had and going up to them and writing in your player on them when it was your turn. Those drafts took hours but nobody cared because it was a day long event and you didn't have people tuned in to the internet and getting phone messages from family, etc... You just drank, ate, laughed and busted on each other for hours.

 

Did anyone do auctions back then? Can't remember if that was a thing.

 

My league didn't change to auction until about 12 years ago.

[frank 2,143]

I got USA Today every Friday to help set my lineup and pick football games. There was a page with a box for each NFL game. It showed the line, offensive and defensive rankings, team records, etc and a few sentences about each team. I treated that page like top-secret information. I bet I never even mentioned it to anyone in the league.

[bfros 53]

Somebody has got to make a documentary about this!!! Or is there one?

[weepaws 2,450]

Cups and string.

 

Going way back.

[SaintsInDome2006 128]

Ahhh those were the days: Back then a dimebag cost a dime...

And a pork chop was a nickel.

[AintNoStoppinMeNow 68]

Somebody has got to make a documentary about this!!! Or is there one?

 

There actually is a documentary about the early days of fantasy. It was one of the early ESPN 30 for 30's if memory serves me right. It was about baseball and not football but still talked about many of the topics discussed here and was very interesting. It's called "Silly Little Game."

[IN$TANT REPAY 8]

Back in the early 90's, Monday's edition of USA today served as the scoring bible. The layout was better than the local paper's sports section.

 

We had to turn in our starting lineups by slipping them under the Commish's door before Friday. Sometimes you would not find out if you won or not until the following Wednesday. It helped if you got a copy of the lineup from the owner that you played against.

 

Good luck if the Commish was on vacation.

 

I think that it was Sportingnews.com that launched an early online site with a message board. Then three years later after I joined, the paper league went Bobby digital and did not look back.

[Dunger 0]

in 96 or 97, I was made commish of a long standing league, cause I had software and a service that let me download a stats file via modem. Would download the file and import via modem.

 

We had 2 waiver dates in the season, we would all meet up just like a live draft to put in it waiver claims.

 

Otherwise, you had to call me by noon on Sunday to set your lineups

[plasma george 52]

Remember the movie "Old School" scene, when Luke Wilson is making copies of flyers for the Fraternity, and hiding them....

That was exactly me.

"Hey Mitch, what are you doing?"

"Nothing, just making some copies"

[huskyhater75 242]

I got USA Today every Friday to help set my lineup and pick football games. There was a page with a box for each NFL game. It showed the line, offensive and defensive rankings, team records, etc and a few sentences about each team. I treated that page like top-secret information. I bet I never even mentioned it to anyone in the league.

USA Today was the Bible! That and the NFL pregame shows.

[nzoner 936]

I got USA Today every Friday to help set my lineup and pick football games. There was a page with a box for each NFL game. It showed the line, offensive and defensive rankings, team records, etc and a few sentences about each team. I treated that page like top-secret information. I bet I never even mentioned it to anyone in the league.

Same here and watched Edge NFL Match-Up on ESPN with Ron Jaworski.