Welcome to the 2021 HFFL season!
Believe it or not, this year marks our 15th season of the HFFL! What an incredible accomplishment! To give you some perspective, here’s a snapshot of the roster for our first-ever Super Bowl winning team way back in 2007:
I mean, how did Jim manage to lose 5 regular season games with a team that included Randy Moss (with 23 TDs!!) AND LaDainian Tomlinson (18 total TDs!!)??!?! Plus Clinton Portis apparently…
And here we are in 2021! Who would have thunk it?
Anyway, we emerge once again from our pandemic-soured 2020 season and soldier on into a … pandemic-tainted 2021 season!?!! Oh great. Well, if it’s any consolation, we’re getting an EXTRA game this year! That’s right, the HFFL is adopting the extra game, meaning we’ll get 14 regular season games before a standard playoff format.
We have some 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!
This year, the leagues and draft orders look like this:
| League of Champions | Elite League | Premier League | |
| 1 | Tom Mc | Chris T | Nate E |
| 2 | Nick L | Hyatt H | Eli B |
| 3 | Greg K | Bob D | Eli T++ |
| 4 | Ron R | Seth R | Kevin vdS |
| 5 | Liam E | Matt R | Chris A |
| 6 | Eric H | Wayne T | Noah B++ |
| 7 | Dan E | Zack T | Eric M |
| 8 | Stephen G | Peter T ++ | Jonah T |
| 9 | Luke A | Jake L | Tyler L |
| 10 | Peter C | Joe D | Taylor L |
| 11 | Mike M | Caleb Z | Spencer P |
| 12 | Jim R | Aaron W | Eamonn M++ |
++ 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
In-person drafts are back on the menu this year! Very exciting! However, we’re still dealing with Covid-19 as you all know. So with that in mind, all leagues will use the standard Yahoo online draft tools this year. That means if you’re not comfortable coming to the church building and drafting together, you can easily draft remotely via your Yahoo league page or via the Yahoo Fantasy Sports app on your mobile device.
If you’re coming in person, feel free to bring a drink or snack FOR YOURSELF. We’re not going to do a community snack table this year.
The LOC conducts an auction (salary cap) draft. If you’re in the LOC and are new to auction drafting, check out the Auction Draft FAQ post here.
The Premier League and the Elite League conduct standard snake drafts to select players. That means you draft 1-12 in round one and then 12-1 in round two and so on.
A Word About Draft Orders
The actual snake draft orders are reflected in the league assignments grid above. The orders were determined using the final standings from last year for the returning teams and the rookies were randomly assigned a draft number and inserted into the order. In cases where two teams had the same draft stock number, a coin flip determined the order. In cases where three teams had the same draft stock number, a random draw determined the order. In the interests of openness, here’s how that broke down for each league.
Note: League of Champions draft order is mostly irrelevant due to the nature of salary cap auction drafts.
The League of Champions
| League of Champions | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Tom Mc | 6 |
| 2 | Nick L | 6 |
| 3 | Greg K | 6 |
| 4 | Ron R | 10 |
| 5 | Liam E | 10 |
| 6 | Eric H | 10 |
| 7 | Dan E | 11 |
| 8 | Stephen G | 11 |
| 9 | Luke A | 11 |
| 10 | Peter C | 12 |
| 11 | Mike M | 12 |
| 12 | Jim R | 12 |
The League of Champions auction will be held Monday, August 30th, at the church building OR online via the Yahoo site/app. Show up around 7pm to get situated. Auction begins promptly at 7:15pm.
The Elite League
| Elite League | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Chris T | 1 |
| 2 | Hyatt H | 2 |
| 3 | Bob D | 3 (coin flip) |
| 4 | Seth R | 3 (coin flip) |
| 5 | Matt R | 3 (coin flip) |
| 6 | Wayne T | 4 |
| 7 | Zack T | 5 |
| 8 | Peter T++ | 6 (random draw) |
| 9 | Jake L | 7 |
| 10 | Joe D | 8 |
| 11 | Caleb Z | 9 (coin flip) |
| 12 | Aaron W | 9 (coin flip) |
The Elite League draft will be Wednesday, August 25th, at the church building OR online via the Yahoo site/app. Be there at 7pm, snake draft beginning at 7:15pm sharp!
The Premier League
| Premier League | Draft Stock | |
| 1 | Nate E | 1 |
| 2 | Eli B | 2 |
| 3 | Eli T++ | 3 (random draw) |
| 4 | Kevin vdS | 4 (coin flip) |
| 5 | Chris A | 4 (coin flip) |
| 6 | Noah B++ | 5 (random draw and coin flip) |
| 7 | Eric M | 5 (coin flip) |
| 8 | Jonah T | 5 (coin flip) |
| 9 | Tyler L | 7 |
| 10 | Taylor L | 8 |
| 11 | Spencer P | 9 |
| 12 | Eamonn M++ | 11 (random draw) |
The Premier League draft will be Sunday, August 29th, at the church building OR online via the Yahoo site/app. Be there at 7pm, snake draft beginning at 7:15pm sharp!
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 participate in your draft at that time, Yahoo will auto-draft for you. This is less than ideal, but it works okay. However, it definitely works WAY WORSE for the Salary Cap Auction draft. Rank your players early on Yahoo if you can’t draft yourself.
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
In Season Stuff
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 4622 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 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!!
Hiawatha Fantasy Football League 