Mastersball Fantasy Forum

I was in a league where the average age was much older than me. I grew frustrated with that league because there would be teams that would do dump trades in April! April! I would put my hair out. How can you quit the season in April?!?

To make matters worse, there were factions so even if I tried to buy some of this talent, there was a premium I had to pay.

The bottom line is that each league has its own unique features based upon the character of the individuals involved.

Or the individual characters depending on your league .

I was in this league for the full year and than walked due to complete inactivity on the part of other owners, lack of any potential trading partners and just a general distaste for it.



I'm most definitely considered one of those "younger folk" as I'm 28 and have been in the league with my dad since I was 14 (He's George Steinbrenner and I'm Cashman). We've been a ten team local league now for about the last five years because we can't find anymore people willing to join in. To be fair its very close to a dynasty league with a monster constitution and probably at least a one year learning curve to be competitive. Yet being our 15th year of the league we still have five original owners from fifteen years ago.

I think the issue is baseball is a harder game to follow, harder to get stats from around the league's on tv and a much bigger commitment than NFL is. I love NFL fantasy as its more or less Thursday's and Sunday's and than you can ignore it. Baseball is every night. A lot longer season and you got to be committed to watch Toronto versus KC in late August during BBQ season. Oddly, the arrival of MLB H2H will be good for standard roto in the long run. NFL fantasy leagues continue to get more diverse and deep, as will the baseball fantasy players in time.

It may well be the influence of fantasy football and the familiarity of the H2H style that draws in new, " younger " participants to baseball, but I think it's all good. Anything that attracts someone to our game is a good thing.

I think part of the problem is also the rise of the video game age.

Many of the older (50 +) fantasy players grew up when baseball was the #1 sport in this country. They also likely collected baseball trading cards for the fun of it and played Strat-O-Matic. Oh yeah - they also played sandlot ball and/or stick ball. So baseball was much more ingrained in the culture. For players from my era (35-50) - we still had a connection to the game as the 70's had some great teams (Yanks/Reds/A's/Royals). We still played wiffle ball and collected baseball cards. I was addicted to the game Superstar Baseball (anyone else remember that one) and spent many winter days rolling the dice to see if Lou Gehrig could whack a home run off Juan Marichial. I played this game so much and kept asking my dad questions like "Who was Arky Vaughn?", that he finally bought me The Baseball Encyclopedia. I kept it by my bedside and used to read it before bedtime.

Anyone my age likely remembers when video games arrived. I remember that every kid in the neighborhood had an Atari or Intellivision or Sega system. We went to the 7-Eleven to spends HOURS playing PacMan, Defender or Donkey Kong. We played less baseball and instead of rolling the dice and keeping stats - we played video game baseball. The players decided to go on strike - football gave us Joe Montana. Basketball surged with Bird and Magic then later Jordan. And baseball in the 80's - well I think that strike in '81 really hurt the game. It took that '86 Mets/Red Sox series to kind of give baseball the charge it needed. But the damage was done - kids no longer only dreamed of being baseball stars.

I have a brother-in-law in his late 20's and I think he's a pretty good example of why it's harder to draw younger people into fantasy baseball. It's a thinking man's game. It also is meant to serve the goal of actually (well hopefully) making us actually enjoy WATCHING the real games more. My brother in law has an X-BOX and a Playstation 3. He is like many his age who love to play HALO or World of Warcraft or other online games globally on the internet. They plugin, put on the headphones and go. Yes they have the baseball simulators but they don't even begin to approach the popularity of football's Madden series.

I don't think things are likely to change - Fantasy baseball is really kind of like "Jazz Music" to me. You'll get to a certain age and suddenly realize that jazz is great and you finally have the time and inclination to sit down and really explore why it is the true American art form.

If you study the demographics of consumer spending you'll find that spending changes over the lifecycle, no surprise, but I think that is the key you're looking for here.

As ultra-competitive sports fans get older and no longer can flash their skills on the playing field they need an outlet that ties in with their love of the game and acquired knowledge. At the same time, their disposable income is going up and their general activity level is going down. Overall consumer spending peaks around age 46-67 when most already have acquired a home, furnishings, cars, etc, but income keeps rising. That is the wheelhouse for serious fantasy baseball.

Check back with those young players who play cheap leagues and don't take FB too seriously 10 years from now.

I agree KJ - and that's why I have no problem with what ESPN does with fantasy baseball over there.

They make it easy to play (10 team league) and it's FREE. So they are kind of trying to be the Strat-O-Matic for today's young players as the Gateway game.

Damn...my wallet missed that memo.

Well, Ryan pretty well described me.

Baseball cards. Pick up baseball every chance we had. Played Cadaco, then BLM, then APBA, then Strat (still do) and then moved onto roto/fantasy. Though in truth I went back to Strat. And, I also collected football cards and loved football, but it was not the same. Don't know why, but just not.

I think there are a couple of factors.

First, like it or not, the nature of anything is change. And, well, human beings are odd creatures with these things called egos, and, well, we like to leave an individual stamp on things. So, I think it is normal to expect the variations and tweaks over the years. For better or worse, but, like music (and, I love the Radiohead avatar and the Warren Zevon tag guys) and books and everything, we all have our preferences.

So, the best you can do is find people who are neurotic like you, and like to play like you (and, believe me, I got JP into that hair pulling league, as it was my first league, and well, it was very frustrating in so many ways. and, i won it more than a few times, as did Pasko).

But, also, change is tough, but, it is usually the way of the future, for better or worse. So, I try to roll with it.

I also think things go in cycles. Football is hot now, but, and I hope this happens in my lifetime, I would expect baseball to have a renaisance (did i spell that correctly).

Although, again, the game has changed. Even the Bob Eucker players are now millionaires. When I was a kid, I had the Cubs backup catcher (Cuno Berrigan) as my substitute math teacher in seventh grade cos well, players did not make that much and they had to supplement their incomes unless they were Willie Mays.

I personally try to divorce myself from the owners and the industrial complex of the game as much as I can, and remember the game--as in hitting and fielding and throwing and running--belong to all of us, not them. They might own the players at the highest level, but no one owns us playing pickup or stickball.

And, that said, you can watch a little league game amongst some six year olds and see a play just as jaw dropping as ozzie smith, and you can similarly see bonehead plays at any level.

To me, that is the beauty of the game, and nothing can ever take that away from any of us.