Other then the new FOFC Auction draft formed recently, the only other fantasy league I am involved in is a league I run with my buddies. We've done it on the free yahoo service and I was wondering if any of you guys have experience with the pay sites? The only two I know of off the top of my head are CBS Sports and MyFantasyLeague.com. Anybody have experience with either? They worth it?

This will be my 7th season using ESPN. I can't imagine a pay site doing it any better.

NFL.com looks like they have some interesting features.

I don't think it is worth it to pay for it. There are very good free sites out there.

I've been using myfantasyleague for six years, going on seven. Couldn't live without it, at this point, but it certainly ain't cheap ($90 now, since we've passed a couple of their discount deadlines). For me it essentially comes down to your scoring system....if you're comfortable using a standard scoring system, and your league doesn't have any 'special needs', then using a free site is probably a great idea and myfantasyleague would probably just be overkill. If you DO have custom rules, MFL is invaluable, and can adjust for just about anything.

We have been using myfantasyleague for many many years, but our scoring system needs their setup. No other system does a good enough job. Next year i'm even thinking of adding individual OL players and punters. I believe their system could take it...

Are the additional features worth having the league members pay 7.50 for? We use a standard scoring system so if it's just Yahoo! with ultimate scoring customization then I'll pass.

If you're comfortable using standard scoring, you should probably just stick with Yahoo. MFL has tons of bells and whistles that I've become accustomed to, but again the flexible scoring is really what makes it worth the cost, and if you don't need that, MFL is a luxury rather than a necessity.

Other nice stuff:

All your previous league results and pages are kept completely intact. I can get to my league's 2004 draft, and any other manner of stats from any year we've played, in just a couple clicks from this year's homepage. There are tons of customizable reports and analysis tools. All past player stats are kept and tracked using my custom scoring system, so our league has a real history on MFL that is very deep and extremely easy to access.

Everything is customizable, and now that my keeper league has been going for over ten years, just about everything needs to be customized, beyond just scoring rules and extending into draft order, lineups, etc. Beyond the meat and guts, MFL is also highly customizable aesthetically, and all sorts of neat whizzbangs can be added to league/team/owner pages (including free confidence/survival picks pools), well beyond what you would get with a free league....that can be a blessing or a curse, depending on your level of OCD.

Here's our 2009 league, for reference:

http://football23.myfantasyleague.com/2009/home/16178 (may be NSFW due to the usual crapass sophomoric team names/pictures, and note our awesome 8-team lineup...no attempts to expand have made it past our rigorous vetting process)

All your previous league results and pages are kept completely intact. I can get to my league's 2004 draft, and any other manner of stats from any year we've played, in just a couple clicks from this year's homepage.

One league I was in used ESPN, and after a few years of convincing, I finally got my other league to switch from Yahoo to ESPN so that all the history is kept. I think that's pretty awesome for a free site.

I guess there are more people out there willing to pay for a website. ESPN gives us everything we're looking for and free. You guys must need more stuff.

I run one league with CBSSports, and I'm in 2 that use myfantasyleague. I prefer CBSSports a lot more- might be that is what I used first, but I just find it cleaner and easier to use.

A league I was in for about 8 years used CBS, and really, I saw no point in it. Even using the early setup and discounts, it cost everyone around $10-15 extra. We didn't have anything in the way of custom scoring, and could have easily been handled on Yahoo! or ESPN, but by default, every July or so, it would be brought up, and nobody would want to change.

Live scoring was included, but to me, that is a pretty worthless feature-- can't change your lineup now, all it does is frustrate you to see that guy racking up points on the bench.

I guess there are more people out there willing to pay for a website. ESPN gives us everything we're looking for and free. You guys must need more stuff.

Maybe even 3-4 years ago, there wasn't nearly the amount of free, reliable and easily customized sites that there are now, and as such I think a lot of folks (myself included) got 'locked in' to certain pay sites, in terms of scoring oddities that may not completely transfer, history, or just plain ol' resistance to change....we also got used to paying for it many years ago.

If I had to start from scratch today, I'd definitely feel comfortable going with ESPN, or a similarly robust, free option.

A league I was in for about 8 years used CBS, and really, I saw no point in it. Even using the early setup and discounts, it cost everyone around $10-15 extra. We didn't have anything in the way of custom scoring, and could have easily been handled on Yahoo! or ESPN, but by default, every July or so, it would be brought up, and nobody would want to change.

Live scoring was included, but to me, that is a pretty worthless feature-- can't change your lineup now, all it does is frustrate you to see that guy racking up points on the bench.

ESPN also has live scoring for free (even if you place no value in it :p ).

We used fanball.com for several years but we are moving to ESPN this year. Can't say anything bad or great about fanball, so probably not worth the cost.

Seems kind of like paying for pron on the internet

We used to be on Fanball since about 2004 or 2005 but made the switch over to MyFantasyLeague last year and love it. Great customization in everything. If you just need something basic and bare bones go with Yahoo or ESPN. However, if you are looking for something above that, go with MyFantasyLeague.

For instance, we are a ten team league and have in the past ran two-five team divisions and a 13 or 14 week regular season, playing your own division twice and opposite division once.

However, this year we are switching to one conference with 10 teams. The scheduling customization allows us to play 10 one game weeks and 4 double header weeks (which is a pre-selectable option) against two different opponents in the week. This means that we play all opponents twice, including playing everyone at least once in a NFL non-bye week. We are using weeks 11-14 for the double header weeks so it should make things really interesting in those final weeks.

Also, it is very easy to implement graphics. I had no experience with Photoshop or anything like that, but have learned Paint.net this off-season and created some basic graphics like this (http://www21.myfantasyleague.com/fflnetdynamic2010/17189_franchise_icon0008.gif) and this (http://www21.myfantasyleague.com/fflnetdynamic2010/17189_franchise_icon0009.gif) along with team pages. These graphics show up on scheduling, standings, etc. and really add a great immersion factor to it.

As an aside, what is the consensus on the best free site, ESPN or Yahoo?

I use ESPN for the 2 leagues that I commish and I like it. We use Yahoo for the FOOL league and it works fine. If I were to choose, I would pick ESPN. I believe both keep past seasons, too.

The commercials for NFL.com's version has me interested. If I were starting a league I would take a good look at it.

However, this year we are switching to one conference with 10 teams. The scheduling customization allows us to play 10 one game weeks and 4 double header weeks (which is a pre-selectable option) against two different opponents in the week. This means that we play all opponents twice, including playing everyone at least once in a NFL non-bye week. We are using weeks 11-14 for the double header weeks so it should make things really interesting in those final weeks.

I really like this idea. Drama is good in the last 3 weeks. Are your playoff match ups just one week, 15 & 16?

I really like this idea. Drama is good in the last 3 weeks. Are your playoff match ups just one week, 15 & 16?

Yeah, we will go weeks 15 and 16 playoff weeks, with the top 4 teams making the main bracket.

League I posted about it now full.

Going back to this a year later, did any try NFL.com's service last year, and how did it stack up with other free services such as ESPN, Yahoo or Fleaflicker?

I had one league on NFL.com last year, it was meh, it wasn't my most active league so maybe I just didn't get used to it. For some reason I'm not a fan of ESPN leagues, I have a few on yahoo and I like those. I am sticking with CBS again this year for my big pay league.

We use rtsports.com.

This is a league that is 17 years old and I'm guessing this site was one of the first ones on the block when fantasy football hit the web...I don't know. It is pretty dynamic as we do have some unorthodox scoring but I doubt it is any better than any of the free sites. In fact, the site itself is pretty clunky and could definitely use some updating but I'm one of the newer guys in the league so I'm not about to rock the boat by asking the league to switch sites. It has been brought up before but nothing ever came of it.