My inbox has just been flooded with copies of a landmark announcement–the Sporting News has let its players know that it will no longer provide fantasy games to its readers. In an email from the Sporting News’ President and Publisher Jeff Price, he writes:

Dear Valued Fantasy Games Player,

Due to a shift in our core business strategy, SportingNews.com will no longer offer new fantasy games going forward (excluding Strat-O-Matic). The fantasy industry is changing, and we feel it’s best to devote our resources to providing the best fantasy content and advice on the internet, and beyond. We believe SportingNews.com’s fantasy content, tools and advice are already best in class, and over the next few months, we will completely redesign the Fantasy Source section of our site to deliver a new and improved user experience. With this shift in strategy, we will dedicate our entire fantasy staff to building Fantasy Source into the number one destination for fantasy information, accessible via internet, mobile devices, and other new technologies.

…

This is huge news! During the 1990s, the Sporting News was a major source of information, and hosted its own very successful games which were powered by CDM Sports (now Fanball). In recent years, it has fallen off the fantasy radar as fantasy players have flocked to sites offering free fantasy games with lots of bells and whistles. Holding on to its fantasy business for purely nostalgic reasons just does not make good business sense. It does plan to continue producing fantasy content via the Fantasy Source.

The Sporting News has been aggressively changing its business model over the last few years as the need (or demand) for a weekly sports magazine has dissipated over the last few years. Last month the Sporting News announced that its Sporting News Today product would switch to a subscription model starting in April. The Sporting News is focusing on making sure that as the sports information industry evolves, it is ready and profitable.

Also a loser in this announcement is also RotoHog, who just last June announced that RotoHog would be providing the fantasy games for the Sporting News. RotoHog, who is fully focused on white-label games currently, will definitely miss the cachet and doors that running the Sporting News’ fantasy games might open. After all, the Sporting News is still a very recognizable and trusted brand in fantasy sports.

The winner in all of this is CBSSports.com. Later in the email Price recommends that Sporting News users looking for fantasy baseball to sign up for CBSSports.com’s fantasy baseball commissioner at a nearly 50% discount.

It is sad to seem these change in the industry. I applaud Jeff Price on being able to make a decision that was definitely not an easy decision for him to make.

Thanks to everyone who let me know about this in a very timely manner.

Wow! I struggled with how big a move this is initially. The fact that Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball ’10 Named Official Online Fantasy Game for MLB.com indicated that it is much more profitable for MLB Advanced Media (MLBAM) to partner with Yahoo for its fantasy baseball game than produce it themselves.

MLBAM is easily the most technologically advanced of the professional leagues, is easily top five companies for digital sports capabilities, and has a ton of awards to provide it. Running fantasy baseball leagues is something that it can easily do (and has done in the past), yet it is choosing not to do this year.

Yahoo! is by far the most popular site for fantasy baseball, and it also makes the most money. As a partner, MLBAM could not have picked a better partner. The financial nature of the relationship is unclear, but MLBAM is either getting a share of the advertising revenue, a sponsorship fee from Yahoo!, or possibility both of these situations.

From a competition stand point, it is always disappointing to see one fewer company in the mix. While MLBAM has not been known for its leagues, the fact that it was competing in the past was always a good sign. Fewer options always mean less innovation.

The underlying question here is how exactly profitable is free fantasy baseball if Major League Baseball finds it better to outsource its game? If you are operating a free fantasy baseball game, how much scale do you really need to make it profitable, and how achievable is that scale?

What are your thoughts? Am I completely off my rocker?

Draft Analyzer is one of my favorite tools for the fantasy baseball season and it is back for the 2010 fantasy baseball season. Just like it did for the football season, Draft Analyzer is now fully accessible through the web (in the past, it was an application that you had to download).

Since I like to consider myself a numbers guy and what I have always been particularly fond of with Draft Analyzer is how simple it makes the whole drafting process. I tell it all about my league’s scoring, roster requirements, how many teams, draft style, how much risk I would like to assume, and it cranks out pick after pick recommendation. It helps you find the best value that is available at every pick. This becomes particularly useful in leagues where you are drafting deep, and often have to take players you rather not (and in some cases, never even heard of).

Draft Analyzer has two pricing options. You can get it for $29.95 with either Fanball’s or Accuscore’s projections. Or, for $44.95, you can get it with both sets of projections, which helps get a much more well-rounded sound of projections.

Clearly, I am a big fan of the software (I gladly purchase it for myself each year), and it is something that I think you might like too.

Last night I had the opportunity to attend one of Baseball HQ’s First Pitch Forums in Washington, DC. I had never been to a fantasy baseball seminar before, so I was not really sure what to expect. After a few year of trial and error, Ron Shandler has hit on a format that seems to work really well. The whole program was broken into nine innings (or sections), and the information that doled out was broken into manageable and themed chunks (ex: 5 pitchers at workload risk).

Plus, the crowd was kept regularly engaged by answering some Jeopardy-style questions that are part of a competition against other First Pitch Forums. To illustrate a point about high-risk, high-reward pitchers, a mock auction was conducted with volunteers from the audience. The balance of audience participation and expert advice (that is why people are there after all) worked well and kept the crowd engaged for the full three hour session.

While the fantasy baseball advice doled out by Shandler and company was top-notch what struck me as the most interesting was the audience. The majority of the crowd had been to one of these sessions before, so these were definitely your much more serious fantasy baseball players. In fact, after hearing how the crowd asked questions, discussed issues, responded to questions, I can certainly say that if someone picked 12 people at random from that room and put them into a league, that would be a very competitive fantasy baseball league.

Entrance to one of these forums is $39 in advance or $49 at the door. While that price may be a little steep, I would liken this to going to a play for the night. Spending over three hours talking about fantasy baseball is not a terrible way to spend a night (your significant other may differ, but that is another issue).

This one scores high points for just coolness. The Peoria Chiefs (the Cubs A-Ball affiliate) are offering their luxury suites at O’Brien Field for use for fantasy baseball drafts this spring. For $35 per person, each league is provided a suite for four hours to draft, an all-you-can-eat buffet, draft beer, internet, and ticket to a future game. Heck, for that set-up, I could skip the draft all together and just hangout in a luxury suite all day.

Why more stadiums and team do not do this, I do not know. Getting to draft at a stadium just sounds cool to most fantasy players. Stadiums have the space and are equipped to do the catering. Plus, you are bringing in revenue during a time your venue is sitting empty. Some extra revenue is always more than no extra revenue.

If you are one of the few people who has never done an in-person fantasy draft, you are totally missing out. Aside from the headache of trying to find a draft day, it is a blast. The biggest benefit to the in-person draft is that it helps your league get comfortable with each other and usually leads to additional discussion throughout the season. In other words, you will have a much more active fantasy league, which leads to more fun. Remember, fun is the point of fantasy baseball!

If you are in the Peoria area (or looking for an excuse for a road-trip) you can read more details in the announcement detailing how to Hold Your Fantasy Baseball League Draft at O’Brien Field

via Nando Di Fino at the Wall Street Journal

Even though Spring Training games have just started, MLB.com is challenging fantasy players to accurately predict who will win each division, league pennant, World Series, MVP, and Cy Young awards with the Gillette 2010 Season Predictions Sweepstakes. Be the person with the most correct predictions and you will win an all-expenses paid trip for two to the 2011 All-Star Game in Phoenix.

The contest is sponsored Gillette and is another example of the series of simple fantasy games that MLB continues to produce. With the 2010 Season Predictions game, players are able to pick a few of their favorite teams and players, have a little fun, and then forget about it until October. Its Beat the Streak game is a classic example of a simple game done right (so right, ESPN copied it with its Streak for the Cash game).

Not every fantasy game needs to be complex. Sometimes, a really simple game can get you just as much user engagement as a full-fledged fantasy sports game.

It’s Wednesday and, at least in DC, kind of dreary. Since we can all use a pick me up, I have an amusing little story to get your blood going this afternoon.

In my oldest fantasy baseball league (the league that recently folded), the league had an entry fee of $350 per team. Since we all knew each other, owners did not have to pay the league fee until the end of the season. That was if they did not win anything.

One season a league member (John) had a terrible season and had to pay about $300. My brother Jorge was responsible for collecting the funds. One day, he gets a FedEx envelope in the mail from John with the $300. When Jorge opened the envelope, it starts to rain as about 15 twenty dollar bills fall out of it. This is a little odd, since most people pay league dues with a check. Jorge calls John to find out what the deal was with all the twenties.

Well, sometime around June, John realized his team was going to have a bad season and he was going to owe a bunch of money. In order to not anger his wife in October with a large check against their joint checking account, John put twenty dollars into his desk each week through out the rest of the season, since she would be less likely to notice that amount on a regular basis.

Morale of the story, pay your league dues a little at a time, and your wife will never know how bad of a fantasy player you are.

Have a funny fantasy sports story of your own? Email it to me at derrick@fantasyethos.com, and I would love to read it.

Photo by Darren Hester

Remember when someone showed up to your fantasy baseball draft using a laptop? At first, you probably wrote him off as a total dork, but when he left the draft with more talent on his bench than in your starting outfield, you might have reconsidered. At this very moment, we may be at another fantasy technology paradigm shift as it is now possible to use just an iPhone to draft and manage your fantasy baseball team.

I took the liberty of looking at the available iPhone applications that would enable this not-to-distant future:

• 2010 RotoWire Fantasy Baseball Draft Kit ($3.99) This is the mobile version of RotoWire’s fantasy baseball draft kit and is complete with rankings, historical stats, projections, and analysis on the names you will hear on draft day. RotoWire also has a free fantasy news application that you may want to look into.
• Fanball.com Fantasy News and Updates (Free) Another players news application from a completely different source than RotoWire uses. For hot news, I like to check to multiple sources for the latest information, so having two player news applications on your iPhone can be nothing but good for you.
• CBS Sports Mobile (Free) This application is a mini-version of the full-fledged CBS Sports site. In addition to easy up-to-the-minute player news, you can adjust your fantasy baseball roster on the fly.
• Yahoo! Fantasy Baseball (Free) Not officially released yet either, this application will allow fantasy players to manage their teams and get real-time scoring. Conceivable, you could go the entire season without ever having to use one of those antiquated laptops.
• MLB.com At Bat 2010 (TBD $14.99) The pricing for the 2010 edition has not been announced yet, but expect this year’s version to improve on an already stellar product. Just released, MLB.com At Bat 2010 will allow users to watch any game they want (subject to blackout restrictions). In addition, just like last year’s version, fantasy players can listen to audio from every game. We can only hope that the 2010 version will feature video from every MLB game. It has in fact, gotten even better!
• ESPN ScoreCenter (Free) Just think of this application of all of ESPN’s scoreboards tucked into a nice little application. You can check out in game boxscores and even watch the gamecast of a your game of interest. This is a great free alternative to MLB.com At Bat.

Between all of those application, you can prepare for your draft, adjust your rosters, and follow player news. The days of staring at laptop during your fantasy draft just may be over. And if you get an iPad when it is released, your laptop days are definitely over.

One of the things that disturbed me about putting this list was that the fantasy baseball applications worth mentioning were either by the major or mid-major players in the fantasy industry. There is definitely a business opportunity for a killer fantasy baseball application.

There may be additional application releases in the next month, so I plan to adjust this list accordingly.

After a stomach bug kept me from reading anything last week, I am happy to get up back on track with the next installment of our Fantasy Book Review series here on Fantasy Ethos. I am happy announce that today’s review centers around the release of Baseball Prospectus 2010 by the Baseball Prospectus Team of Experts.

The last time I held a book this large, I am pretty sure I was looking a number in the phone book. That so happens to be the book’s exact point. The Baseball Prospectus 2010 is meant to be an exhaustive directory and analysis of every player that will matter for the 2010 baseball season. The team at Baseball Prospectus exhaustively goes team-by-team and breaks down each player’s recent history, provides an analysis, and projects what 2010 will look like for each player. What’s useful about their projections is that they are not just an average of previous seasons. There is real insight behind the projections that will make bold statements about a player’s demise or rise.

And that insight is well-known to many of Baseball Prospectus’ regular readers. The front cover boldly highlights that the book contains “Nate Silver’s Deadly Accurate PECOTA Projections for More Than 1,600 Players.” PECOTA is respected as the most accurate baseball projections tool. Silver cut his teeth developing PECOTA before he created the models that allowed him to correctly predict the 2008 Presidential Election on FiveThirtyEight.

One of the most useful items in the book is not any of the statistics, analysis, or projections. It’s the ten-page Statistical Introduction that makes the book significantly less intimidating for those who may not be as number savvy as the authors. Further, the significance of each statistical topic is framed within “Fantasy Focus” sections, which helps the average fantasy baseball understand why he should care about each of those statistical difference and how to adjust his strategy accordingly.

Baseball Prospectus 2010 very delicately balances between being a heaven for statistical geeks and a practical guide for fantasy baseball players. At the very least, after reading this, you will sound like the smartest guy at your draft.

You may purchase Baseball Prospectus 2010 at amazon. , via our affiliate link (which helps fund this site).

Have you checked it out, what are your thoughts on the Baseball Prospectus 2010 (or previous editions)?

Trades may be the single largest cause of disputes in fantasy leagues leading to the collapse of leagues and even the demise of friendships. A cottage industry to help settling fantasy disputes has developed catering to this market with sites like SportsJudge and Fantasy Dispute. A reader sent me this screen grab from his Yahoo! Fantasy Baseball sign-up, and the lower right corner, you see a new offering:

In the lower right corner it says:

Yahoo! Sports Trade Review: Yahoo! Sports staff members will review all trade protests and veto trades deemed to be unfair to the rest of the league. Just $14.99 per league.

Yahoo! has established themselves as a third-party evaluator of trades for fantasy leagues. By making sign-up part of the sign-up process, Yahoo! has made it very tempting and very easy for fantasy commissioners to remove themselves from what can become a very controversial issue within leagues.

This is good news and bad news for fantasy dispute services like Sports Judge and Fantasy Dispute. Yahoo’s entry into this market will help educate consumers about the availability of third-party fantasy dispute resolution. The bad news is that Yahoo!’s price is much lower and integrates easily seamlessly into its fantasy commissioner product. Those are things that the dispute services will not be able to compete with very easily, if at all.

With Yahoo! charging just $15 for the whole season unlimited trade resolutions, that blows away the $15 per dispute that the other fantasy dispute services charge. There is a difference in service levels as Fantasy Dispute and SportsJudge can evaluate more than trades and provide well-thought responses as to how it reached its ruling, which is above and beyond what Yahoo! appears to be offering. The question then becomes what level of service will fantasy leagues desire?