Imagine that it is 12:45 p.m. on a Sunday afternoon and you completely forgot to set your fantasy football lineup for the week. As we all know, every week in a fantasy football season is equally important. Whether the league is free or $100 per team, winning is always of the utmost importance for both bragging rights and potentially a big pay day at season’s end.
In order to stay competitive today in a fantasy football league one must stay up to date with the top fantasy football twitter pages and the top smartphone applications. These Twitter accounts and applications are the answer when you only have 15 minutes until the 1 o’clock games kick-off and you need to set your lineup. There are plenty of them out there, some better than others, and I am here to help you learn which ones are the most useful so when next season rolls around you are as up to date as possible.
The Twitter accounts dedicated to fantasy football are very diverse: ranging from telling owners who to start and sit to injury updates. To make the fantasy owner’s job easier, here is a list of the top five fantasy football Twitter accounts to follow.
1. Matthew Berry (@MatthewBerryTMR)
Berry is paid by ESPN for one main reason—to analyze fantasy football and to be the network’s fantasy expert. He is a regular on the set of SportsCenter during the football season, as he gives his brief breakdown of the sleepers of the week, who to start, and who to sit. He is also great at helping owners prepare for drafts and responds to a decent amount of fan questions via email and Twitter.
2. Stephania Bell (@Stephania_ESPN)
There is nothing worse than being a fantasy owner and seeing your team at a disadvantage because you didn’t realize that one of your players was hurt. Following Stephania would solve these problems, as she is a great account to follow to see what players are injured. It is just as important to know who NOT to start as to know who to play, and Bell is very useful for this information.
3. Jake Ciely (@allinkid)
RotoExperts.com is a great source of information for fantasy football, so following one of its top tweeters is a smart idea to stay in the know. Ciely responds to many of his followers and helps them with their specific fantasy questions, which makes him popular. He is very knowledgeable about fantasy football, and even though he might not tweet on his own as much as many of the other fantasy football tweeters, Jake’s responses to his individual fans makes this a great account to follow.
4. Brad Evans (@YahooNoise)
Yahoo.com is one of the major websites for online fantasy football, so it only makes sense that one of its writers makes this list. Evans is Yahoo’s version of Matthew Berry, as he is one of its most knowledgeable experts. Brad is also very reliable with regards to injury updates, just as Stephania Bell is for ESPN.
5. Nathan Zegura (@NathanZegura)
Zegura writes for CBS on its Fantasy Football Today section. He specializes in ranking players, which makes him a great resource to have when taking part in a draft, and also when deciding who to start and sit for each week.
Smartphone Apps
On a Sunday afternoon, it seems that almost every fantasy football owner is constantly on his smartphone checking how his team is doing. Owners use a variety of apps to track the status of their teams. The three major websites for fantasy football (ESPN.com, Yahoo.com, and CBS.com) all have their own apps that allow a fantasy owner to see how his team is doing. These are not the only apps necessary for one to track his team. Here is a list of the top three smartphone apps that are designed to help fantasy football owners.
1. Fantasy Football Buzzer (By: Winito)
This is a free app that allows a fantasy football owner to link his team from ESPN, Yahoo, CBS, and NFL to the app. Owners then can get injury alerts, lineup notifications, and any news that they want catered to themselves. This app provides users with tweets related to their players.
2. Team Stream (By: Bleacher Report)
This is another free app, but it is less specific for specific fantasy rosters. It allows those who download it to pick the teams they want to follow (particularly those that they have players on) and get alerts on updates on those teams’ games. Team Stream also permits people to brag about their players having great games by breaking news via Facebook, Twitter, email, and text messaging.
3. RotoWire Fantasy Football Draft Kit (By: Roto Sports, Inc.)
This is the only app of the three listed that is not free. It is $4.99 and can be purchased in the app store. The RotoWire Fantasy Football Draft Kit is completely worth every penny. The most important part of a fantasy football season is the draft, and this app essentially provides people with a “cheat sheet” to help them during the draft. The app allows users to enter the league scoring rules and roster setting and helps people draft the best team possible.
By following the five people listed above on Twitter and downloading the three smartphone apps described, any fantasy football owner will truly have an upper hand on their competition.