Welcome to the 2020 HFFL season!
This spring/summer has been a trip to the Twilight Zone in a lot of ways and there’s definitely some trepidation about whether the NFL season will even happen in a way that supports fantasy football. Even so, we will press on!
We have a couple of rookies joining us this year, so welcome them! For you newbies, you should read over everything carefully so you understand how the HFFL runs.
Basics
The HFFL exists as 3 separate leagues of 12 teams each, but they are all part of the HFFL universe! There are two lower leagues and one upper league. The lower leagues are the Premier League (PL) and the Elite League (EL) and the upper league is known as The League of Champions (LOC).
Everyone starts out in one of the lower leagues. To get to the League of Champions, you have to earn your way in. Those managers playing in the League of Champions this year won their way in last year. More on advancement later.
Our leagues are hosted on Yahoo Sports. It’s a pretty great platform and, better yet, it’s free! You’ll need a Yahoo account if you don’t have one yet.
This year, the leagues and draft orders look like this:
| League of Champions | Elite League | Premier League | |
| 1 | Zack T | Spencer P | Aaron W |
| 2 | Eric H | Mark E | Jake L |
| 3 | Bob D | Peter C | Taylor L ++ |
| 4 | Brian P | Tom Mc | Liam E |
| 5 | Tyler L | Jonah T | Eric M |
| 6 | Kevin vdS | Joe D | Nate E |
| 7 | Greg K | Chris T | Wayne T |
| 8 | Luke A | Matt R | Nick L |
| 9 | Jim R | Chris A | Stephen G |
| 10 | Hyatt H | Dan E | Mike M |
| 11 | Ben F | Paul R | Eli B |
| 12 | Caleb Z | Ron R | Seth R ++ |
++ Denotes a rookie
Now you can officially scope your competition! And don’t forget to find the rookies and welcome them to the madness!
Drafts
| League of Champions | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Zack T | 7 |
| 2 | Eric H | 7 |
| 3 | Bob D | 7 |
| 4 | Brian P | 3 |
| 5 | Tyler L | 3 |
| 6 | Kevin vdS | 3 |
| 7 | Greg K | 2 |
| 8 | Luke A | 2 |
| 9 | Jim R | 2 |
| 10 | Hyatt H | 1 |
| 11 | Ben F | 1 |
| 12 | Caleb Z | 1 |
| Elite League | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Spencer P | 12 |
| 2 | Mark E | 11 (coin flip) |
| 3 | Peter C | 11 (coin flip) |
| 4 | Tom Mc | 10 (coin flip) |
| 5 | Jonah T | 10 (coin flip) |
| 6 | Joe D | 9 |
| 7 | Chris T | 8 |
| 8 | Matt R | 6 |
| 9 | Chris A | 5 (coin flip) |
| 10 | Dan E | 5 (coin flip) |
| 11 | Paul R | 4 (coin flip) |
| 12 | Ron R | 4 (coin flip) |
| Premier League | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Aaron W | 12 |
| 2 | Jake L | 11 |
| 3 | Taylor L ++ | 10 (random draw) |
| 4 | Liam E | 10 (coin flip) |
| 5 | Eric M | 9 (coin flip) |
| 6 | Nate E | 9 (coin flip) |
| 7 | Wayne | 8 (coin flip) |
| 8 | Nick L | 8 (coin flip) |
| 9 | Stephen G | 6 |
| 10 | Mike M | 5 |
| 11 | Eli B | 4 |
| 12 | Seth R ++ | 3 (random draw) |
These are the dates that worked for the overwhelming majority of the owners. The Yahoo draft tools work well on mobile or in a browser, so you hopefully can join one way or another.
If you simply CAN’T log in for your draft, your team will be autodrafted by Yahoo’s AI. This is not ideal, but it doesn’t have to be terrible. Log in to your team and go to the Draft page. From there, you can Pre-Draft Rankings and customize your player list a bit to “help” the AI. Really all players should do this JUST IN CASE your internet goes down at a critical moment and the AI takes over.
Remember, you can’t win your HFFL Super Bowl on draft night, but you can probably lose it. We want everyone to feel good about their team and that starts at the draft.
Rules
*COVID-19 Stuff*
The HFFL has never utilized an IR spot. Basically, in a 12 team re-draft league, you don’t need that. HOWEVER, this season is going to be weird. We’ve already seen some positive COVID tests during training camp that later turned out to be false-positive. If that had been in-season, that player may have been forced to miss a game and then brougth right back on Monday morning with a negative test. Of course, there will also be real positive tests that will result in a prolonged absence too. It’s going to get dicey.
SO, with that in mind, we’re ADDING 1 IR spot to each roster this year. We’ll use that spot for any IR-flagged absence (by Yahoo’s definition) so you don’t need to drop someone in a pinch that may be back quickly.
The rookies among us will also appreciate a word on Weekly Waivers and Free Agent Blind Bidding.
At the start of the first game of the week, any player that isn’t on a roster is placed on Waivers. These players cannot be picked up immediately by teams. If a team wants one of these players on waivers, they must bid on him from their imaginary waiver budget ($100). The bids are blind, so you don’t know if any other team is bidding on this player or how much they are bidding. Strategy is key here. Then on Tuesday, the team with the highest bid gets the player and the other teams keep their money. This levels the playing field for those guys who aren’t watching every game on Sundays looking for breakout performances and snatching those guys up. If no one picks up a player on waivers, then on Tuesday he’s a free agent again and anyone can pick him up, “for free”, immediately. You’ll get the hang of it.
And just remember, there is no ACTUAL money involved with the HFFL. Just fun!
Playoffs and Advancement
They’re baa-aack! Weekly Pick’em and Survival Groups!
If just picking games is more your thing, join our HFFL Pick’em group or our Survival group.
In Pick’em, just pick the winners of each NFL game every week. Best picker wins!
Join Pick’em here. Group # is 2760 and the password is “river”.
In Survival picks, you pick ONE team to win each week. Once you’ve picked a team, you can’t pick them again for the rest of the year. If your pick loses, you’re eliminated from the game! Scary!
Join the Survival group here… IF YOU DARE!
HFFL Universal Blast
Each week, you can expect a goofy wrap-up post/email to appear in your inbox: The HFFL Universal Blast. There will also be chatter on the NEW Fantasy Sports group on the Church Center App! Get the app as I’ll use that to communicate with everyone and not get lost in email inboxes.
You can also check HiawathaFantasyFootball.com which houses all the back-issues of the Blast and lots of other information – including career statistics for everyone and other geeky numbers.
Okay, that should do it! Check your email for your official invite to your Yahoo league, click through and set up your team! You must be set up with your team to draft! It’s VERY important!
Now… let’s go!!
