The internet has made the sports world much easier to watch, follow, and understand. And along with it has come the growth of fantasy sports. What started out as something the NFL frowned down upon has turned into a cash cow that the league will now showcase every Sunday with commercials. The fantasy football brand has helped the NFL become more popular as a whole.
No longer are fans just following their favorite team; now they are following any player who plays for their fantasy team. Some of the more intense gamers like yours truly, also checks his opponents players and how they are doing, expanding my knowledge well beyond my own team. I currently have three fantasy football teams and while it is not shocking that younger people are catching onto to the phenomenon I found out that my father (50), step mom (48), and even my grandfather (76) are fielding teams this year!
Fantasy Football is still growing. Portfolio.com (http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/playbook/2007/11/14/fantasy-football-growth-continues-at-rapid-pace/ ) reports that, “As of August 2006, about 12.8 million adults were playing fantasy football making up 80% of the $4 Billion fantasy sports market according to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association.” In addition, Yahoo! Sports reports at least a 40% growth each year (Real). The industry is only growing and with new games being added each year the popularity and money will also continue to grow. This is good for not just the fantasy sports websites but also for the respective sports leagues.
People play for various reasons. Some play because they love to follow football. There are the casual players, trash talkers, skilled players, isolationist thrill seekers, and the formatives (Farquhar and Meeds, 1215-22). Whether playing just to stay in touch with old friends and family or dropping hundreds of dollars to play for high stakes and everywhere in between, fantasy football is common place.
The biggest winner is the NFL. The growth of fantasy football has helped contribute to the growth of the NFL as a whole. The knowledge of fans has grown beyond just their favorite teams and has spread throughout the league. This is why the NFL now promotes fantasy football and will continue to do so in hopes that the interest in the league will continue to grow (along with the money).
-Nate Porter
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I think that this topic is really interesting. For as long as I can remember, my dad did fantasy football, and every year he comments on how many more people join his league. Fantasy sports, not just football, are growing at a rapid rate. I agree that this is a good thing for the NFL or the MLB because it has so many more people watching more games than just their favorite team. It has people putting more money back into that sport.
ReplyDeletePeople play for reasons such as social interaction, arousal, escape, surveillance and entertainment (Farquhar and Meeds 1210) However, this article concluded that "The most surprising of this
study’s motivations was social interaction, which was ranked quite low by most of the participants." (Farquhar and Meeds, 1224). I found this very interesting because I would have thought that many people did this for the ability to interact with others and talk about the fantasy league. A lot of research has shown that people watch sports for this reason, but I found it surprising that people didn't play fantasy sports for this reason as well.
Research has also shown that "Like sports on the web, gambling online has grown rapidly, most of it centered on sports. Between 1997 and 2003 the number of gambling websites grew from 25 to 1,800." (Real, 177) Fantasy sports has become a way for people to put money on the game and spend huge amounts of money. I think that this is one of the biggest reasons that people have fantasy teams, because they are able to put money on it and make some of it back.
The other part that was mentioned that I agree with is that not only are people watching their favorite team but they are now following other teams that they normally wouldn't watch. For example, my Dad hates the Jets yet he has players on his fantasy team. I'm not sure where you cross the line between your favorite team or players you choose for your team. For some people, its a way to learn about other teams.
I think that fantasy football is great, whether its an escape, or learning, or the gambling. No matter what your reason is, the fact is that it is helping the NFL and many people are watching more and more football.
Watching my fantasy team come to a 2-3 record after week five, I realized that fantasy football has become a major part of watching the NFL. Who should I start? Who should I sit? Who is doing hot? Who is on a cold streak? There are many questions when it comes to fantasy football. The growth of fantasy football amazes me, watching one of my friends put $150 in to one of his teams was remarkable. Even I have to draw the line somewhere.
ReplyDeletePreparing for the fantasy week is as much important as, the results. Now on ESPN and ESPN.com they have designated fantasy sections. Mattew Berry is known as the fantasy guru. Each Saturday and early Sunday mornings he comes on television and gives his pickups for the week. Each week he also writes an article about his thought of the upcoming week, some people use this information as the building blocks for their team.
In the article, “Types of Fantasy Sports Users and Their Motivations,” the author Farquhar says, “Fantasy sports leagues are one way fans can enjoy their favorite sports away from the stadium or arena.” I think that the key words here are “favorite sports” because it doesn’t say favorite team. Being a big Patriots fan I despise the Giants and Eli. By the luck of the draw Eli ending up being my back up QB, and when my starting QB was out with a bye I had to play him. Then while watching him on television that Sunday I found myself rooting for him. I was shocked to see this from myself.
The use of the web is huge in fantasy football. With all of the research that some people do week in and week out is pretty ridiculous. In the article, “Sports Online: The Newest Player in Mediasport,” Real states that, “The world wide web has become an ideal medium for the dedicated sports fanatic and a useful resource for even the casual fan.” The players in my league range from first time fantasy team owners and veteran owners. They funny thing is that they all do the same thing to see who to play and not to play. They use popular websites like ESPN and others to help them win.
Fantasy Sports are becoming the next big business.
Fantasy sports have continued to grow ever since they were first introduced so many years ago. I have personally been involved in fantasy sports since high school, and every year it seems like there is some new aspect that certain websites are promoting. Websites are finding ways to charge people to join leagues or for extras such as a Yahoo’s stat tracker. However, most websites still offer free leagues which allow for more and more people to sign up every year. By offering money leagues, websites are able to make money off of the hardcore fan, while retaining the casual fan with free leagues. As stated in the Real article, “When other web sites go from free use to a fee charge, subscriptions dry up. But fantasy-league websites have performed impressively by achieving better than a 20% successful conversion rate…” (178). By offering both types of leagues, websites are able to get the best of both worlds and maximize their profits.
ReplyDeleteFantasy leagues are branching out now, with some leagues that aren’t sports at all. According to Lee Farquhar and Robert Meeds, “The motivations most frequently found in uses and gratifications research…are social interaction, surveillance, escape, arousal, and entertainment” (1210). Websites outside of sports are figuring out ways to incorporate these motivations into their selective fields. For instance, fantasy moguls leagues pick upcoming movies that are judged based on box office numbers, and fantasy Congress (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_121/2572-Fantasy-Congress) based on how often members of Congress are in the news and legislations among other things. It’s amazing to see how far fantasy leagues have come since the first leagues that required hours and hours of research. Now a casual fan is able to keep up with in any league with only a few clicks of the mouse.
I think that the growth of fantasy sports can only be viewed as a positive for major league sports. There is no doubt that there is a large portion of fans that simply sit in front of their computers on a Sunday, and watch their fantasy teams as much as they watch the game in front of them. As Farquhar and Meeds pointed out, the Fantasy Football players specifically will generally fall into the categories of the junkie who just loves the numbers, or the casual player who is in it for the bragging rights (Farquhar and Meeds 17). The NFL really doesn't care either way, because the bottom line is that it generates more interest in their product.
ReplyDeleteOnline sites have capitalized on this in a big way. Yahoo!, ESPN.com, and recent growth has been due in no small part because of fantasy sports. Yahoo! reported a growth rate in its fantasy football leagues of 40% back in 2003. And that's up from the 10 million they already had!
For the big media conglomerates and leagues, it appears that everyone wins in this situation. Fantasy sports are just another way to draw attention to their products. Whether you like it or not, it appears that they will be here to stay for the forseeable future.
Posted on behalf of Mike Mancuso:
ReplyDeleteFantasy football, or all fantasy sports for that matter, have seem to really taken off since the turn of the new century. However, even in the past five years or so it is evident to see it's growth. Today we see commercials all the time on television advertising their league whether it be ESPN all week, or CBS and FOX getting their plugs in on Sundays, everyone now at least knows of the existence of fantasy sports whether a fan of the game or not. Many of these networks are beginning to have shows on TV like ESPN's Fantasy Football NOW which airs @ 1130 and goes right up unitl 1 o'çlock kickoff. These other networks are running similar shows online that fans can interact with on their computer.
So why the rise of fantasy sports now, these leagues have been around for over 30 years now (my baseball league i'm currently in was started in 1979). The simple answer is the internet; "The world wide web has become an ideal medium for the dedicated sports fanatic and a useful resource for even the casual fan.” (Real) Gambling and fantasy has taken off not only because of the money involved from a gambling saspect, but because now it is so easy to follow all sports because we can look everything up on our favorite sites online. Real also explains, "Like sports on the web, gambling online has grown rapidly, most of it centered on sports. Between 1997 and 2003 the number of gambling websites grew from 25 to 1,800."
It attracts all types of fans as research has been discovering over the years. There are the casual players, trash talkers, skilled players, isolationist thrill seekers, and the formatives all with different reasons but yet all still play. (Farquhar and Meeds) Some of those reasons include social interaction, arousal, escape, surveillance and entertainment which is also talked about in the Farquhar and Meeds article.
The bottom line is that fantasy sports have opened up a new window for the fan and sports. We are just starting to see this window explored, especially with fantasy football. But once all the sports realize their success, we will soon se all the sports advertising and I would expect fantasy baseball, fantasy basketball, maybe even the smaller fantasy sports like hockey and NASCAR all switch over their marketing efforts and join in on our fantasy world.