Many activities in life require an update to keep things feeling fresh. The same needs to be done in fantasy football. A league, especially a dynasty league that shuts down in January and stays stagnant till August will often fold after a few seasons. Of course, it is up to each individual owner to keep active and always look for trades and offseason information to make the league active year round. However, the commissioner of a league cannot leave this to chance and needs to look for ways to keep up the excitement.
Below is a list of ideas that I have seen implemented in other leagues that add creative flare to making fantasy football as exciting as possible.
Spread Out the Offseason
I have a friend and owner in the league that I commission who has branched out to other leagues in the last year. The one major annoyance that he has noticed is that the rookie draft and auction draft are lumped together the same day; or over a weekend in the middle of August. 
While there’s nothing wrong with waiting to collect all the necessary information to conduct a draft waiting till the preseason starts leaves 7 months of dead air for conversation. Especially in newer RSO leagues that only have between 8 and 12 players moving with each team into the new year, this doesn’t leave a lot of options for offseason trades as most players are sitting locked in free agency. Ideally, you want to conduct your rookie draft sometime between May and June. The free agency auction should be conducted between June and before week 1 preseason in August. This benefits the league by allocating players earlier in the offseason which allows for values to fluctuate over several months as depth charts are shaken up. It also creates more offseason trading due to these changes as well as with injuries.
Triple Crown Rebirth
The goal of dynasty football is to not only win a championship but to win multiple championships to create a dynasty team. However, unlike real NFL owners who have billions of dollars invested in their teams, fantasy owners are rarely bound to their team year over year. 
A league that becomes unbalanced faces a high turnover rate which can damage the league’s playability. To offset this possibility leagues can have the option to have a total reset of rosters should any team win the league three straight years. This means throwing all the players back into free agency and starting from scratch the next offseason. The likelihood of this, especially with how the contract and salary cap structure of RSO helps creates greater parity, is very slim. However, this could be an ultimate prize for owners to strive for. It would create a very strong buzz should any team repeat as champion as owners need to be aware that their team could be blown up should the owner win a third time. This would also alter the trading strategy of the league as a whole as well as the auction values for an owner looking to complete the sweep.
*Bonus* For those of you who have season-ending payouts for standing finishes you can take a couple of dollars each year and put it towards repeat and triple crown winners. Think of it as the Jackpot in Wheel of Fortune where if nobody wins then it just keeps growing until it is paid out. This helps keep owners in the league since they are paying for future riches while also offering a bonus incentive for people to strive for.
Offseason Roster Expansions
This is one that my co-commissioner and I discussed this offseason. In the NFL offseason the roster size of each team balloons to 90 players and then shrinks back down to the 53 man active roster by week 1. If we play on RSO to create the closest experience to being an NFL GM then one should have the roster flexibility that they have during the offseason. Therefore, from the rookie draft through to the 3rd (or 4th) week of the preseason the roster size would be greater than that of the regular season. Depending on your current roster limits and league size a sufficient amount of added roster slots would be somewhere between 10-20% to still allow there to be adequate free agent acquisitions available. The point here is to accomplish three things:
- To simulate the necessary roster selections that GM’s face closer to the regular season whereby one must choose to hold onto a preseason darling or drop them and allow the possibility of another owner scooping them up.
- To allow for owners to have flexibility when making uneven offseason trades that would otherwise put them over roster limits (i.e. 2 for 1 trades or player for picks trades).
- To generate low-cost trades for conditional picks and players. If one isn’t able to hold all of their players or favors one over another, they may be able to move them during the “cut week” for conditional 3rd and 4th round future picks.
Preseason Cut Discounts
The second suggestion specifically for RSO leagues would be to offer a second cut “discount” period closer to the start of the regular season. Each offseason in the NFL there are usually a few veteran players during OTAs and training camp that don’t fit with the current roster and are subsequently released.
The RSO platform already offers a discount before the start of the free agent auction whereby an owner can opt out of an existing contract by paying only 50% of future years’ salaries. However, if you want to implement or already implement an early draft date like I suggested above there are often changes to a player’s value before the start of meaningful games in September. Players who you thought might have major roles on your team can be overshadowed by incoming free agents. Also, injuries and preseason sleepers can usurp roles that you wouldn’t have otherwise foreseen when bidding in July.
Therefore, before the final week of the preseason owner can have the option to release players once again without having to pay their full contract. To reduce the cap charge to between 75-85% (equal to cutting a player of $10M but being charged $7.5M while freeing up $2.5M) could offer the opportunity for owners to open up some much-needed room to add players during the season or to accommodate trades. When implemented with the aforementioned roster expansion this would also be a great way to hold potential project players over team veterans. Finally, this can also help with restocking the free agency cupboard, and keep everyone on their toes by having unforeseen cuts right before week one.
The most important thing to having a healthy league is to keep up the activity as well as to inject new ideas and themes each year. Make suggestions to your commissioner on activities or policies that you would like to see added to your league. If you are a commissioner, make sure to keep an open communication with all your league mates to ensure that you are creating a league that is enjoyable for everyone and stays fresh year after year. If you like any of the suggestions above or have a unique idea that you have or would want to implement in your leagues share your ideas with us on Twitter @RealitySportsOn or @naandrews19.
