Finding the Best Website for Your Fantasy Football League

There are a myriad of options for running your fantasy football league. But the old days of searching through newspaper box scores with pen and paper are long since gone. Providers big and small offer software platforms through which you can manage your league and your owners can manage their teams for a relatively low cost.

Larger companies such as Yahoo!, CBS Sportsline, and the Sporting News offer their own systems, often for free, while upstart, fantasy-focused sites have developed proprietary software that offer more information and more options for more sophisticated, and more obsessive, fantasy football players.

Here’s a look at some of the leading fantasy football management platforms and their advantages and disadvantages.

Yahoo! Sports
Website: football.fantasysports.yahoo.com
Price: Free / $124.99 for premium Football PLUS! platform

Advertised as the #1 free fantasy league, Yahoo! offers free and paid versions of their commissioner software. Football PLUS! sports a fee of $124.99 for up to 20 teams. This paid version allows the commissioner to create custom specifications for the league – but the only upgrades relative to the free program are the allowance of divisions within the league and a few specific waiver rules. Even when split 20 ways, the $125 is better spent toward prize money to make your league more interesting.

The free Yahoo! management program runs through their free site – simply select “Create a League” within their free fantasy football program and you can set up a password-protected league. The free version allows for a number of customizations, including roster size and composition and varying scoring systems. For most leagues, the free Yahoo! version is more than sufficient.

CBS Sportsline.com/NFL.com
Website: www.sportsline.com/fantasy or www.nfl.com
Price: Free / $129.99 (limited time) - $149.99 for premium Fantasy Football Commissioner