Show Them The Money! San Diego Fans Play Fantasy Football

You're listening toMidday Edition on KPBS. I am Tom Fudge. It's a game that you either love or know nothing about. Were talking about fantasy football and this weeklies are gearing up for a new NFL season. Fantasy football is not just a matter of creating your own dream team trying from the ranks of all rosters, it's a chance to make money. During this part of made a will break down the popular game and look at the business behind it and in order to do that I'm joined by Scott Minto and Cyndi Darlington. Scott is the director of San Diego's date MBA program, Scott things are coming in. Thank you. And Cyndi Darlington is part of an all woman fantasy football league that and runs a blog for female fans called hailmaryblog.com. Cindy, thanks a lot. Hi. They both play fantasy football. Cindy, tell us your story of getting into fantasy football. When did you meet and fall in love? I've been a football fan for years and years. Even with that said, I was intimidated to play fantasy football. I was looking over my husband's shoulders for years watching him play and finally about three years ago I got up the nerve to join a league online and loved it and now I'm in three legs this year and I feel like I could play and 10. Your league is all women? One of the legs is all women. Part of it is educate women on how to play and what to do. How does fantasy football work? Let's say you know the game of football but know nothing about fantasy football. How would you explain it? Fantasy football is like drafting an All-Star roster that you then play games every week against other teams in your league. You want to start with a draft, first of all you want to start with forming a team. You can do that in a few different ways. You can look online for websites like ESPN or NFL.com and find like-minded people that way. You can get together your friends and family or you can just join a randomly gameplay gets you don't know. Your league held a draft yesterday. How many players adipic? Most standard leagues will have 15 players. You have nine starters and sixpence players. It's mostly offense of players that you draft. Leaks can vary but most legs just have one team's defense that you will play. We draft 15 players. You can also use an auto draft and I recommend that if it's your first time playing. The computer will draft the best available players for you and it takes away the intimidating part of the draft. You talk about the draft I was going to ask you what prevents all of the fantasy football players playing the game getting all the best NFL players? Everyone is going to want Tom Brady. Right? Maybe not. There is a draft order. There is a number of ways to pick a draft order. You randomize it. You have an order you draft in an and people can pick their players and different people come into the draft different strategies. Some people like a lot of running backs. Others will pick their quarterback first of a can get someone good on that position. Scott, what your story of getting involved in fantasy football? It started back when I was graduate in college in 2002. I started a league with some classmates than enough kept that one going and a number of others in various lifestages. For me it's a way to keep in touch. It's on the fairly about any kind of prizes that I can win or any kind of bragging rights. It's the best way for me to keep in touch in this hectic time a year with good friends from various stages in my life in the past. Have you had your draft with your fantasy league. One was yesterday. To get anyone good? I'm not raving about my team. It was nice to catch up with everybody. Fantasy football has been called a multimillion dollar industry. Why do you talk about the money and event. It's a multibillion-dollar industry if you really look at all of the money that's changing hands and people that are investing all over. There's an estimated 33 million folks in the United States playing fantasy football and spending upwards of 11 billion in work for the draft. I'm sure Cindy has done some of that. Their website you can pay into to get expert analysis draft fees and that. There are a lot of leaks that cost hundred or $200 to enter with a prize of 1000 or so going to the winner depending on the number of folks. Everyone who plays put in a little bit of money and at the end the most successful teams may be winner takes all, maybe its first play, second, third, but you get some money Not necessarily. You can play that way millions of people do. If your first timer dome of that scare you because you can play in lots of links for free. Tom, is this gambling? It is in some way it is gambling. It's a modest form of sports gambling and I think one of the ways in which we are realizing a society that hour shift in attitude towards sports gambling is going to change. It is considered a game of skill and therefore not covered as sports gaming websites like Yahoo and his other competitors draft kings and they handle have sports fantasy the payer each day where you can pay an entry fee, selected T -- team and can get paid if you're the highest score of the day. You say it's a game and is considered a game of skill, not a chance or smart it's not illegal gallon Chris rock That's what the lawyers say and is a lot of money being investigated -- invested into the company spent tens of millions of dollars in investment going into this big league fantasy leagues. If the party line there sticking to. You listening to Midday Edition and we're talking about fantasy football which might be a favorite subject of your guests Scott Minto and Cyndi Darlington. Scott is director of sports management MBA program and Cyndi Darlington is a member of all female fantasy league and runs a blog for football fans called hailmaryblog.com . Staying with you for a little bit longer, Scott, sports networks are very involved in fantasy football. I think he spoke about a little bit. For the leagues and networks to pay the rights fees to broadcast the games these are billion-dollar investments over course of a contract of Fox, CBS, East -- bill of millions of dollars to broadcast the games. If fans appetite for content is driven by fantasy, they are going to want to be a part of it. To the major players in fantasy online are Fox and CBS. Both broadcast the game. ESPN as well. More interest and fantasy means more eyeballs on Sunday night games played I was thinking about this, the Baltimore Ravens I have no interest in that team, I've no personal connection to that team, but Cindy, if my quarterback is from the ravens or I've got a running back that's important to my team, I might watch that game. Exactly. There's nothing in the world that can make me watch a Jacksonville Jaguars game, but I distracted her tight and yesterday so I will be tuning in. That's why it's good for the NFL. Right, Scott # Another you mention the Jaguars October to fit the Jaguars will be playing the bills in London at 6:30 AM San Diego time and that game will be broadcast on Yahoo live streaming for free. Ill be the first NFL game broadcast on the Internet. You will be able to just go online and watch the game where you have never been able to do that before. You can see, Yahoo's stake in fantasy is giving them a leg up with the league and will represent this change in viewing habits as a result. Cindy, how closely do you watch your players and how is it determined if your team is winning? That is one question I didn't ask you. How do you know your team one question The beauty of fantasy football is you can put in as little or as much you want into it. There's a scoring system that each league has. Generally for example if you are running back you get for every 10 yards or six through every touchdown you score. The computer does all of the attacking nations for you. You want to do every week is going and set your liner. You have to choose your nine starters, they might be somebody who is injured. The computer how you all of that. There might be a team that is on a biweekly Mayor not playing. You have to switch outs. You might want to make some trades or claim some players for free agencies. Depending on how much time you want to put into it, you can make a lot of moves with your team in a course of your. So, it looks like if you get a lot of you when and the number to get depends on how many touchdowns you are back through that particular Sunday, how many yards you're running back., right? Right. The cop located, nation great Anything you want to add, Scott question mark It interesting they go down to the 10th of a point in a lot of times you can see people go into the evening game meeting five points or four for victory which will equal to 54 yards for a wide receiver. You can really agonize to see if he falls short by a yard or makes it by the yard. That will determine whether you win or lose. I wanted to ask both of you to tell I story of some Sunday where your team just really did well, what happened that caused the question Mark Cindy? I think the most exciting thing for me and fantasy is when you find a young running back and you them in as a backup and Bishop thank you for the tight ends comes in mind. He got me a ton of points one season and when you them in the first game it's a great feeling. It feels like it's your game in your winning even on this the player you could care less about. Scott, what about you question mark is there a player that really saved the day for you on some fantasy football weekend? A few weeks back I won a leak on the back of Aaron Rodgers so I will forever be in his death for making that happen for me. I appreciate him very much. I little bit -- I take extreme having six legs. My alumni friends, my family, for me any weekend player scoring a touchdown will hurt me and it will help me at the same time. I'm hedging my bets a little bit across the league. It sounds like you have a diversified folio. That's what you can call. Scott, I want to ask you about draft Kings. What does that mean with regard to fantasy football? Draft Kings and fan dual are the leading companies in daily fantasy which are really taking off right now. They are getting heavy investments in from the key members. Fan dual is a leader and they told out one 5 billion in winnings over the past 12 months. They anticipate over 1,000,000,000 1/2 dollars in payouts. They have an investment from the MBA and Comcast NBC sports to some of the leagues and broadcasters are realizing that this is the business and I want to be involved. Draft Kings on the other hand his relationship with major league baseball and for them, daily fantasy is huge because they -- excuse younger and baseball's audience tends the older. Any to revitalize their product to begin for folks interested. Daily fantasy is we can pick a lineup in the morning and by that night you know whether you've one a set amount of money and you can in a team and invest more weight or two dollars on your team or you can go up and up and get into the tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands. Cindy, I think you said that the stake is not that important to you. You try not to think about the money. We're just in a for fun, we like the draft party and get together during the year. My eight-year-old son plays and he's learning math. It's not about the price, it's about the competition and the fun. Scott, football isn't the only fantasy game out there, right question Mark Not at all. Some of the daily fantasy leagues are really buoyed by basketball and baseball where the playoffs draw the attention. Those long regular seasons need interest see get basketball, baseball there are certainly fantasy hot tea the play everything from fantasy golf to fantasy bass fishing. It's all uncovered. I love it. Cindy, when you have a player who is injured, in real life that affects your team. How'd you regroup after that # It's a complicated regimen of trying to trade and trying to talk your league made into maybe trading or trying to get a player off of waivers which the worst your team is the higher your waiver priority so you have to do some maneuvering and stay on top of that. Scott, the people who play this game, getting back to the subject of who this really appeals to, are these hard-core fans, are these people who have way too much free time, what is the question Mark I think it's a way started out. Obviously fantasy sports older origins to rotisserie football and a stat geeks watching football. I think Cindy cents a new era in fantasy where it's not just the college educated male demographic that has been dominating historically, it's really shifting into casual fans are people who are just fans of the sport. They using it as a way to be more involved and stay in touch with friends or the come robbery of the draft. I you see it shift and who is playing these is not the hard-core fans anymore. Cindy what about people who are intimidated by fantasy football there must be a lot of people who say I just don't know that much about the game. There definitely are and I would say gather your friends together or go online. The computer makes it so easy to do in our address. To go into a freely and check it out. Spend a few weeks playing with your lineup if you find it's too much that you don't have to continue doing it. I think you'll find it's really a lot of fun. Scott I think it's a great way -- I got my family on board, I be my mom in the playoffs last year. I had to explain to her that team Lorraine season had ended in the semi finals. I felt bad doing that. It's a great way to get anybody involved and just keep in touch over the course of the season. It's getting bigger and bigger. Scott I assume fantasy footballs here to stay question asked back it's not going anywhere. It's on the cusp of really exploding in terms of these fantasy games on a daily basis and we're going to see more and more legs steering you toward your computer while you're watching on TV and vice versa. PS said, I think already, this is not considered gambling, but is there anyone who is trying to officially legalize it question Mark The biggest voice in the conversation now is Adam Sandler the basketball Association, he posted in the New York Times calling for fate roll regulations much like you see in the UK. Of all sports gambling question Mark In various forms in the way it is commonplace in social etc. in Europe. He's looking for it to be recognized. There's a lot of revenue to be made. The partnerships that they can have if you look at European sports clubs the majority of the shirt sponsors and his legs are sports online gaming websites. Will we'll have to see what happens here. I've been talking about fantasy football with two guest Scott Minto is director of SDS you sports this is management MBA program and Scott things are coming in. And also Cyndi Darlington she's part of an all women fantasy football league and runs a blog for female football fans called hailmaryblog.com. Cindy, thanks. Thank you, Tom.