Late byes this year

[Henry Muto]

Week 11 Byes: Dallas, St. Louis
Week 12 Byes: Buffalo, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Seattle

Well this won't affect the NFFC as much as other contests since you use a 13 week shedule. Being in the playoffs in other leagues and having your players on bye week 12 1st week of playoffs is going to hurt.

[Tom Kessenich]

It strikes me as being similar to playing Week 17 which most fantasy players abhor. Instead of being able to rely on top options in Week 12 such as Wilson, Spiller, McCoy, Green and Lynch, you have to rely on backups to try and propel you further. That's the same issue which pushes most fantasy players away from counting Week 17. Tough sledding for sure, especially if you own two or more of those players which is quite possible.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Henry, this is HUGE news for the fantasy football industry. This is the 1st time the NFL has ever had byes in Week 12. Prior to 2012, the NFL had bye weeks from Weeks 3 to 10 and last year they extended that to Week 11. Now that they have 4 teams with bye weeks in Week 12, this CONSIDERABLY changes the landscape for fantasy contests.

It's almost impossible now to run fantasy football contests with regular seasons that end after Week 11 and consider it a fair setup. And I'm not knocking any fantasy contest that has it set up that way because nobody saw this coming. But the NFL has changed the regular season for those contests and it sure doesn't seem fair to have playoffs in a key week when four NFL teams are on a bye. How is that fair to fantasy owners?

I'm glad we have our 13-week regular season schedule for 12 and 14 team leagues. And hopefully the NFL doesn't extend bye weeks past Week 13 in future years!! Heck, at this pace it may happen some day. But this is HUGE news today with the release of the NFL schedule.

[Tom Kessenich]

If the NFL extended byes into Weeks 13 and 14 it would force us to revisit our rules. No other way around that. I don't see how we could justify having league titles and prize winnings being directly impacted by those bye weeks. Hopefully we don't have to go down that road because clearly not all bye weeks are created equally. A bye in Week 5, regardless of the teams who won't be playing, is clearly significantly different than a bye in Week 13 or Week 14 when so much is riding on those weeks' outcomes. Regardless of what happens in a Week 5 bye you'd still have several weeks of the season left to play. A bye in Week 13 and losing top players then and your season could be over. The impact of a bye at that time is clearly far more significant.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Week 11 Byes: Dallas, St. Louis
Week 12 Byes: Buffalo, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Seattle

Well this won't affect the NFFC as much as other contests since you use a 13 week shedule. Being in the playoffs in other leagues and having your players on bye week 12 1st week of playoffs is going to hurt.

Henry, it's worth noting that three players locked in as first-round picks (Spiller, Lynch and McCoy) will be out that week and a fourth player who could be a first-round pick in a lot of leagues (A.J. Green) will also be out. Not to mention Russell Wilson, who could be one of the top QBs in fantasy. That's a lot of top talent, but in the NFFC it's just another regular season week where top talent is out for some owners just as it was in Weeks 3-11 before. But there's a HUGE difference between those guys sitting in regular season games and league playoff games where much of the prize money is won.

In the NFFC, you can continue to draft your team to DOMINATE your regular season. And then the best regular season teams advance to the Championship Round having won the most league money and with the best chance to win the most overall prize money. That's the way it should be.

[Tom Kessenich]

Henry, it's worth noting that three players locked in as first-round picks (Spiller, Lynch and McCoy) will be out that week and a fourth player who could be a first-round pick in a lot of leagues (A.J. Green) will also be out. Not to mention Russell Wilson, who could be one of the top QBs in fantasy. That's a lot of top talent

I'll say again that it reminds me of Week 17 and we all know how most fantasy players feel about Week 17.

[Greg Ambrosius]

I'm trying to figure out why the NFL added byes through Week 12 and honestly it doesn't make much sense. You would think that they would do that so that no week has 6 teams off at once, but nope, Weeks 8 and 9 still have 6 teams off each time. And yet Weeks 4, 6, 7 and 11 have only two teams off each week. Why did they need to add a 12th bye week when those four teams could have easily been distributed in any of those four other weeks with just two bye teams? It makes no sense.

Was the NFL just trying to screw up fantasy football leagues?

[Henry Muto]

Henry, this is HUGE news for the fantasy football industry. This is the 1st time the NFL has ever had byes in Week 12. .

Actually from 1999-2001 the NFL had byes in all 17 weeks with at least 1 team because they had 31 teams. I remember back then thinking am I really drafting a guy who will not be there for my Championship game ?

Remember back in 1993 we had to deal with the "double bye" as the league played an 18 week schedule with every team having 2 bye weeks.

[BillyWaz]

Was the NFL just trying to screw up fantasy football leagues?

Nah....the NFL is aware that the majority of fantasy leagues go to AT LEAST Week 13 and playoffs start in Weeks 14 or sometimes 15.

[Team Legacy]

Was the NFL just trying to screw up fantasy football leagues?

Nah....the NFL is aware that the majority of fantasy leagues go to AT LEAST Week 13 and playoffs start in Weeks 14 or sometimes 15.

Exactly. Greg, thank you for pioneering the 13 week format. It makes so much sense. I can't wait to dominate here in the NFFC this year. I am a player first and this IS the contest to win in this year. Where you guys at? I'm DOMINATING the $150 DM #2... bwahahaha... okay, that's half serious... but I like my team. #bringit