Is FBG getting too big? (1 Viewer)

[Army Eye]

I tend to agree with many others here. I've been a subscriber for many years and mostly use the boards and the pre-season stuff. Personally, I don't find much value in the in-season data any more. I would love to see more details on the weekly cheatsheets and Top 200 forward even if it means less content thoughout the week. I just don't find the cheatsheets here that helpful because I have no idea what the justification is for rankings. If you take a look at the rotoworld weekly rankings, at least Rosenthal gives a writeup of why guys are ranked where they are. Just my $.02.

While they are not packaged with the cheatsheet, the Passing Matchups and Rushing Matchups articles give very detailed analysis of this nature.

 

[Hipple Long Ware & Peete]

I don't think the site is getting too big but there are things that need to be reviewed by management

While the Weekly content has been excellent and on time (so far) there were articles that were weak (Perfect Draft) and missed (PD - Auction) BECAUSE existing paid customers Expected them - a new subscriber would not have had those expectations.

As far as the Forums go I know that Joe and David have steadfastly maintained that they want one big message board where everyone had access.....that they didn't want as some have said, the delineation of Subscriber Only to strangle the range of discussion that exists in the individual forums. BUT personally I don't think that would be the case. I think the subscriber only forums for people to dissect the weekly rankings/cheatsheets would be a good thing because we can't really do that now without giving away content to other readers. IF the information is a part of the subscription then discussion of said information should also be limited to those who pay. And I don't think that will stifle the other forums - we added a subscriber only forum at Mastersball this year (http://forum.mastersball.com/) just so people could ask for help with their teams or understanding the rankings or otherwise get help without having people who might be in their leagues (especially NFBC and WCOFB) see their questions unless they were also paid subscribers. Take a look and you will see how it looks and there was MORE discussion in all the other forums on the boards (remember there is much less discussion on baseball sites than football sites and we are much smaller than FBG).

I think the "staff" here does a really good job for the most part - and hopefully the new staffers will help this season with even more contributions....BUT remember that most of the staff are part time contributors and many of them are not paid much above and beyond their subscriptions.

The bottom line is that for the price FBG delivers more than any other fantasy site. Period

I disagree with one pt here, that I think is oft misunderstood. 'subscriber info' isn't off limits for posting in the pool. In fact over the years hundreds of times I have copied and posted breakdowns and takes on the players listed by FBG staff (usually a few guys say 'hey that's sub material' etc) but I think you are missing the point. You can't go and ctrl-A all the material and post it here, but taking parts of it and discussing it has been cool forever. In fact moreso than 'hurting' the FBG bottom line, I think it often helps sell it to those nonsubscibers who are like 'whats behind the curtain'. It shows them glimpses into what the subscription contains.

 

[Hipple Long Ware & Peete]

I'm a subscriber and I'd rather have one forum. I get annoyed enough having to jump between two threads with the same topic, I'd hate to have to log out and log in for it. Yes I'm one of those that will complain if you start a duplicate thread.

One thing that would help, is if certain 'trusted posters' were given mini mod powers (the ability to merge threads for e.g). That would clean up most of the hondaing right there.

 

[garosenb]

I'm a subscriber and I'd rather have one forum. I get annoyed enough having to jump between two threads with the same topic, I'd hate to have to log out and log in for it. Yes I'm one of those that will complain if you start a duplicate thread.

One thing that would help, is if certain 'trusted posters' were given mini mod powers (the ability to merge threads for e.g). That would clean up most of the hondaing right there.

As another poster mentioned earlier, this almost needs to happen at this point. Between the duplication, name calling and generally childish behavior exhibited by some, the value of the forums is starting to diminish in a marked way. I still find useful information in the SP, I just have to sort through much more crap to get at it.To FBG credit, when I found cheatsheets.net (which seems like ages ago) I felt like I had uncovered the holy grail of FF. No more Fuad Reveiz picks in the 9th round for me! Value based drafting, the original spreadsheets and more recently the Draft Dominator became indispensable tools.What disheartens me a bit-aside from the SP slipping-is the sense that there isn't accountability for the tools or content. A few examples:1. Regularly produced articles show up late or not at all each year. There are never any explanations why.2. DD really has lost its polish. It works, but one would expect many more feature enhancements for a piece of software that has been around for as long as it has. An example would be the inflexibility in altering custom scoring categories. It's funny when people comment on "X player" and don't provide the context of their league scoring. The scoring makes all the difference in the world. DD has not kept up with this trend. DD also lacks data integration tools with different leagues (Hey, I want DD to login to my Yahoo/CBS/ESPN/MFL account and pull down league settings/historical drafting patterns/my leaguemates favorite thong color.). I know mobile apps are sexy to talk about, but who uses their iPhone as their primary drafting device?3. Many have asked for (and I believe there was a FBG effort) a rating system that evaluated all FBG picks. We know Herman does well with kickers, let's quantify the value of the experts and even break them down by positional accuracy. Isn't the fundamental tenet of FF that this site espouses all about value? Let's quantify the value of certain prognosticators! This somewhat happens on a few third party sites, but not in great depth. We can all use this information as a learning tool.4. Let's deal with criticism in an adult way. This thread has really touched a nerve with me. I used to post more in the forums, but life and my increasing disappointment with FBG has gotten in the way. I would love to see the FBG staff acknowledge this thread and maybe even talk about a roadmap for the site and all of the tools. Focus groups of established, trusted participants (and even n00bs) would be a great step forward!In sum, I owe many league championships and countless hours of entertainment to FBG, their staff and the community. I fear that I and others are starting to frequent and utilize these resources less frequently and that some changes are in order. I ask that FBG and their staff take these suggestions to heart and embrace this topic for what it is...members who want to see FBG flourish.

 

[Daywalker]

Shark pool keeps you up to date on all the injuries, matchups and playing time of everyone of note.

What more do you want? You don't go to espn on Sunday morning an hour before the opening games. You go to the Shark Pool for the most up to date and accurate information.

Page one we are debating whether D. Nelson is a good pickup. Daily info on B. Lloyd's injury status. The mess in St. Louis. Is B. Scott ever going to get a chance?

I spent more time in the SP once preseason started in order to catch up before my draft. Early September I purchased a subscription in order to get the VBD app and spreadsheets. None of the FBG rankings surprised me because the SP is like the pulse of fantasy football. The SP had me completely informed.

Sure back in the day their was much more interesting threads about strategy. But seems like most of those topics have been beat to death. Kind of like religion threads in the Free for All.

Are their improvements to be made? Of course. But the site is golden and their is no substitute. You are not going anywhere.

 

[Sigmund Bloom]

I tend to agree with many others here. I've been a subscriber for many years and mostly use the boards and the pre-season stuff. Personally, I don't find much value in the in-season data any more. I would love to see more details on the weekly cheatsheets and Top 200 forward even if it means less content thoughout the week. I just don't find the cheatsheets here that helpful because I have no idea what the justification is for rankings. If you take a look at the rotoworld weekly rankings, at least Rosenthal gives a writeup of why guys are ranked where they are. Just my $.02.

I publish a companion list of ceiling/floor/bust risk to help with this - http://subscribers.footballguys.com/2011/11bloom_ceilingfloors2.phpalso in my work on the audible, you should have a pretty good idea why i rank the way i do...

i am also always open to questions about specific rankings.

Thanks for subscribing!

 

[millerarm]

Has FBG gotten too big? I think in some way it might be and it would be nice if they would focus a little more on the weekly games and give some analysis for why they have certain players at certain rankings including perhaps a round table discussion on the weekly rankings. i would love to see Sig, Jason, Jeff, Jeff, Matt, Jene, all of them have a little write up on their opinions for that week.

This. This is the first year in a long time that I haven't subscribed, and the primary reason is that there is very little written weekly rankings explanation. I play FF to win my matchup every week. The closest thing resembling weekly analysis is the "matchups to exploit/avoid" section, which is of little value IMO. I can view "informed" numerical rankings anywhere. And while I love the podcast and it's in-depth analysis, I rarely have the time to listen. To be honest, MOP provides the best individual player analysis on here - just wish he'd add QB's and WR's to his breakdowns!

 

[garosenb]

Shark pool keeps you up to date on all the injuries, matchups and playing time of everyone of note.What more do you want? You don't go to espn on Sunday morning an hour before the opening games. You go to the Shark Pool for the most up to date and accurate information.Page one we are debating whether D. Nelson is a good pickup. Daily info on B. Lloyd's injury status. The mess in St. Louis. Is B. Scott ever going to get a chance?I spent more time in the SP once preseason started in order to catch up before my draft. Early September I purchased a subscription in order to get the VBD app and spreadsheets. None of the FBG rankings surprised me because the SP is like the pulse of fantasy football. The SP had me completely informed.Sure back in the day their was much more interesting threads about strategy. But seems like most of those topics have been beat to death. Kind of like religion threads in the Free for All.Are their improvements to be made? Of course. But the site is golden and their is no substitute. You are not going anywhere.

I want to remind everyone of the original intent and question of the OP, "Is FBG getting too big for its britches?" In other words, are they spread so thinly and devoting themselves to varied projects that the core offerings have become degraded or unusable. I would agree with you that the site is still fairly useful and the tools function. It is myopic to think that competitors have not caught up in this race in terms of tools and forums. There are viable alternatives that I have examined. I definitely feel a loyalty to FBG as they were one of the pioneers in the field. I at least considered dropping my membership for the first time this year-and I think I have used FBG or cheatsheets for 11 years now.All that being said, our concerns are that the tools and forums are becoming less useful in light of the competition and focus of the staff. Some of these areas could be relatively easy to fix. For example, there really is not a valid excuse for lacking volunteer forum mods. Most of the forums that I read regularly have them in place and they really won't affect the bottom line.At a higher level, there is the perception amongst some of us that FBG is becoming less responsive to the wants of the users. I want them to succeed and will give them more than the benefit of the doubt. Should they address these in the near future, then I think all will be well. However, if the status quo persists, then I will be going elsewhere.

 

[Ramblin Wreck]

Way too much content. Some of it may actually be good but it's too much read and even worse incredibly hard to find what I'm looking for because the Player and Site search on the main page only works for players.

The staff is unresponsive. I asked at least a half dozen times if the QBBC and Defense by Committee data could be put on a page where you select one team and it shows all committees sorted from good to bad. More than one staff member continued reading and responding in the thread and never even addressed my question. That's poor.

Dodds has ignored why half the perfect draft article contained "suck" from Eliminate the suck. Probably because what can he say other than he half-assed the perfect draft article this year. Which goes back to one of FBG's biggest problems, IMO, that they don't focus on the stuff truly important to their customer base and then delegate accordingly. There's 39 bio's on the staff page.... perfect draft and from the gut articles that people have been asking about for over a year should be able to get done, IMO.

So, yes it has gotten way too big in terms of there's just so much content and it's hard to find.