Fantasy Football surges in national popularity

BY HOGAN LEPORE

Imagine an irrational interface that spurs rational relationships between users and has generated revenue close to $70 billion. That is what fantasy football is, an online league that allow users to indulge themselves in the NFL in more ways than just watching.

According to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association, over 30 million Americans played fantasy football last year alone. That is equivalent to the entire state populous of Virginia multiplied by four.

Throughout the years, fantasy football has been an place where NFL fans can channel their inner general manager by both drafting players and adding or dropping free agents, or players not drafted.

Fantasy football is great for users because the risky type can play for money, while the more mild fantasy player can play for bragging rights among friends. The fantasy football industry also developed daily games or leagues in order for users to have the same experience as a season long fantasy league, with less time commitment.

Although most participants have full time employment commitments, many figure out a way to handle time constraints due to the fact that most of them are avid NFL fans and mobile apps make it accecible to play while on the run.

Now, with the fantasy football interface prevalent, NFL fans can follow players on their team in order to see the performance of their team as a whole.  Other participants also play in ‘league fee’ leagues, or betting leagues. If you are involved with that, you usually are more concerned with your fantasy team than your favorite franchise. All this really does is advocate and promote fandom throughout the NFL. Living in this football paradise on Sundays was not always the case.

Before the use of computers, the fantasy football industry was only for committed, die hard fantasy fans. Back then, drafts and free agent acquisitions were done on paper, making every league needing a phenomenal historian. Some old timers still use this concept today for fantasy football, however, technological advances are beneficial to us for a reason.

Today, leagues can be setup as easy as filling out a registration form online. The draft is done for you by the website hosting your league such as ESPN or Yahoo, as is free agents and other team transactions.

Overall, technological advances in our American culture have given fantasy football the opportunity to boom in the last decade, both in revenue generated and popularity in our society. Today, fantasy football is slowly becoming more popular than the game itself.