What's Your Fantasy?

Most fans know about fantasy (or "rotisserie") leagues in which they can create superstar-laden, imaginary teams and use the real-life player's statistics to see which squad would win in any given week. It's such a big hobby that traffic to Yahoo Sports (with its very popular fantasy system) eclipsed ESPN as the most trafficked sports site on the Internet.

It started with fantasy baseball and a lot of people now enjoy fantasy football. Most of those leagues are based on NFL players, but a newer segment of the fantasy world is emerging: college football.

We got the lowdown on this growing hobby from Steven Lassan, who serves as the College Fantasy Editor for Athlon.

People are a lot more familiar with NFL fantasy football. What's the biggest difference with the college version?

The biggest difference is the large player pool you're looking at. You've got 120 teams (now including Western Kentucky) as opposed to the NFL where you get 32. The thing that really appeals to me about college fantasy football is the passion. In college, they're doing it because they love football whereas in pro they're doing it for money. Every Saturday a lot of people put passion into college football.

Another good thing is that you can use the same scoring system, same waiver wire, same league setup as you use for the NFL -- you're just using different players: from the Big East, Sun Belt and Conference USA. You can take pride as an owner if you pick the new running back at Toledo who could be a superstar. Your friends are drafting Tim Tebows and Sam Bradfords and you can make a team of all small guys that can take on the big boys.

With so many players available, do people generally have larger rosters on their fantasy teams?

It can very from league to league. I've played in a few where we play all 120. You can do BCS-only leagues. You can do a West Coast league with the Pac-10, WAC and Mountain West or an East Coast league with the ACC, Big East and Big 10.

Most 120-leagues are starting your standard quarterback, two running backs, three receivers, flex [where you can pick a skill player from one of several positions], tight end, kicker and a defense. Or you can do more: two quarterbacks, another flex. When you do a 120 league and you have 12 teams, there are so many players out there that you can start each week!

Is there a different strategy to think about when you draft from such a huge pool? Do you look for smaller conference stars?

If you play college fantasy football and you only follow the big schools, sites like Athlon can take care of the New Mexicos and Kent States of the world and show you "these guys are going to be your fantasy stars this year -- be sure to draft them!"

One thing that I always look at when I do a fantasy lineup is the guys stepping into so-called "system" offenses: Texas Tech, SMU, Hawaii and Houston. Even the newer guys stepping into SMU this year may be guys who are going to produce top-30, top-40 fantasy numbers assuming Justin Willis and June Jones work out.

Like I said, small school guys, if you don't follow them, turn to a draft kit. But I also encourage people to go out there and look at the stats and make your own decision.

You mentioned the passion in college football. Is there more of a risk drafting a lot of players from your favorite school? Do you think that happens more often with college fans?

I think it does. As an owner, I try to avoid taking too many guys from one team. If you're taking the quarterback from one school, maybe you don't take the stud receiver, too (unless he's absolutely the best threat on the board). If something happens to that quarterback, you'll lose some value in that receiver. The same thing happens in the pros -- if Peyton Manning goes down, you know that Reggie Wayne and Marvin Harrison's value will go down too.

For somebody new to fantasy sports or fantasy football, what's your biggest piece of advice?

The best site to go play is U-Sports [an Athlon partner]. You can set up your custom league, your scoring, your waiver wire, all that stuff. In your first fantasy league, keep it simple and keep it manageable.

If you're interested in challenging yourself, there are keeper leagues [where you keep your team playing through the following year] that draft guys who are freshmen -- Terrell Pryors, Terrell Scotts, Julio Joneses. Kids like that are higher picks in keeper leagues because of their long-term value.

The history of rotisserie leagues is pretty well known, but was there a point when fantasy college football really started to pick up steam? Or is it still in its infancy?

I think college fantasy is reaching a point where it is relatively well known and starting to pickup steam for fantasy owners or college football fans. I wouldn't say it's in the infancy stages, but probably somewhere in the middle. I think it has really picked up a lot of steam over the last two to three seasons and continues to get more interest each year.