Today's Fantasy Rx

Four different fantasy games are available at both TSN and Yahoo. Both of these links will provide you with essentially the same page, albeit located on the different servers.

The four offerings are:
Ultimate Fantasy Baseball, TSN's version of the Diamond Challenge
SportingNews.com Basic Fantasy Baseball, a free half-season version of the Premium Salary Cap-style Game
Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball Plus, TSN's version of the standard ESPN game
Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball, the free though somewhat limited version of the Premium Fantasy Game

I'll break down the latter two contests in today's article. Since some of my readers have been kind enough to suggest more games, it appears we'll have at least another day or two of these reviews, but I do intend to spend a couple of days covering the LABR drafts immediately following the conclusion of this series.

Internet Fantasy Baseball Contest Review of:

Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball Plus

Cost: $24.95/team, $37.50/2 teams, and $124.95 for a league with up to 20 teams for you and friends.

Prizes: Each league winner receives one MLB team replica jersey ($50 estimated retail value); the winner can select which team.

Draft Options: Live snake draft or an Autopick Draft where you can either rank a Single List or use their default rankings. Invite leagues can also draft off-line and then input the rosters.

Style: They offer a variety of options for league configuration. Rules vary between standard public leagues and leagues that require a password and particular invite to join.

Most Public leagues use standard rotisserie scoring. Fantasy points leagues, only available in the private invite version, accumulate points as specified by the league commissioner.

Rotisserie league descriptions: 12 teams, ML5x5, no maximum roster moves, 162 Games/Position max, 1250 IP max. Roster breakdown: 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, C, 3OF, UT, 2SP, 2RP, 3P, and 5 bench players of any position.

Three types of head-to-head play are available. Standard H2H rotates weekly match-ups using traditional roto scoring. H2H One Win modifies standard play by counting a category win as a "run" instead of a win, and then whomever has the most runs for the week, receives a single "win" for the week. H2H Points tallies the proscribed fantasy points for each week, and the teams with more points also receives a single "win" for the week. All public H2H league use Standard H2H.

H2H league descriptions: 12 teams, ML5x5, no max. roster moves, and 7 IP min/week. Roster breakdown: 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, C, 3OF, UT, 2SP, 2RP, 3P, and 5 bench players of any position. September is reserved for playoffs, wherein 6 teams compete to win the league while the other 6 play in a consolation bracket.

For invite leagues, the commish can set almost any rules he wants, including # of teams(1-20), # of players/team(8-30), AL/NL/ML, and the number and type of categories used for scoring.

Transaction deadline: 11:59PM Pacific for all daily moves.

"Extra Plus Features": Real-Time StatTracker, TSN Draft Kit, Assistant Manager that provides predictions and ratings, and "can't cut" list - their version of the idiotic undroppable players list from ESPN.

I'm not sure if this same feature is available for all leagues with a web-enabled mobile phone, but Yahoo! highlights the ability to make moves via a portable device when you're not near a computer. For those of us not firmly at the lead of the portable revolution, this seems like a very neat feature for some people.

If you still want to play, here's how to win:

There's really little different in this game from those previously discussed like ESPN and the Points-based contests. Your focus, especially in the H2H versions, should be on maximizing match-ups on a weekly basis.

As far as cost-benefit, while the teams are a few bucks more expensive than ESPN, you also gain the much neater reward of a Replica Jersey, infinitely cooler than an ESPN league winner T-shirt, if you manage to win your league. Considering the additional options offered by Yahoo!, if we were to play one of these games this year, we would definitely pick this over ESPN.

Compared to yesterday's two reviews, your decision depends on your preference of play. For any owner desiring more traditional roto play, you should invest in today's Fantasy Baseball Plus. However, if you prefer the opportunity to own any player and have the time to check transactions daily, stay with the Premium Salary Cap game.

Internet Fantasy Baseball Contest Review of:

Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball, the official fantasy games of the MLBPA

While there are no prizes awarded in this standard game, you also have to pay nothing at any point to compete.

As every single option to the best of our knowledge is identical to the above version aside from the "Extra Plus Features", I can confidently conclude today's article with

Today's Fantasy Rx: If you'd like to join a low impact, public league for an apparently relaxed level of competition, join Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball. If you really want a replica jersey, go to your local sports apparel store and simply purchase one. Based on the value of the prize offered in the first contest above, you'll likely pay less for the jersey in a store than you will if you purchase two teams. Using this strategy, you'll be able to actually wear your jersey for an extra six months, and you can focus on managing your other teams while playing the game for fun.