Does your dynasty league still include kickers? (1 Viewer)

[ChuckLiddell]

Our league had agreed to eliminate kickers and replace them with a second flex, that could include kickers as soon as Justin Tucker retired since the Justin Tucker owner felt he presented a weekly advantage. My personal feeling on kickers is that they suck. I don't like rooting for my kicker's offense to fail inside the 30 so I can get 3 points, and I hate having to constantly turn over the position for byes. There might be 2 kickers worth holding through a bye and I will never own either because I would never want to cut an actual football player to roster a second kicker. But, I can always scoop up one of the 12 best kickers in the world on any given week to fill the roster spot - which to me is stupid. Now that Tucker is likely done, the topic came back up to replace kickers with a flex in 2026 that could include kickers and was hit with a lot of pushback by people who feel that kickers are part of the game, and the owner of Brandon Aubrey. So I am wondering, for established leagues out there that take this game seriously, do you still use the kicker position or have you moved on from the dark ages to use only players that would be worthy of a draft pick in your lineups? And defenses because those are 11 real football players who are on the field for half the game.

 

[BLOCKED_PUNT]

I'm on the side of save the kickers

 

[ChuckLiddell]

To be clear, this proposal was not to eliminate them. They can still be used in the flex. They just are not required. Maybe you can use a player you actually drafted instead of one you grabbed off waivers and will cut as soon as they have a bye week.

 

[efactor]

One has them and one doesn’t. I kind of like the idea of eliminating them.

 

[menobrown]

Why make a post asking for opinions when your mind is already made up?

 

[mashedbananas]

In 7 dynasty leagues. 3 have kickers. And 3 have Team Defenses. In the 3 leagues with K/DEF, there are flex starting slots and you can use a K or DEF in them. During bye weeks with a lot of injuries I have used a DEF in a flex position, but I do not think I have seen anyone use a K in the flex.

 

[ChuckLiddell]

Why make a post asking for opinions when your mind is already made up?

Thats a fair question. I wanted to see if I was the crazy one, or if most good established dynasty leagues have adjusted from what was once the norm.

 

[Catbird]

Most of my leagues are dropping or have dropped kickers. One league uses team kickers, so you draft the team in your kicker slot and have the kicker points for that team that week no matter who scores them. You can change teams on waivers. In a team's bye week that team gets the average fantasy kicker points that team has scored per game to date. That works well, but requires the Commish to divide kicker points scored by team games played for 1 or 2 teams per week and adjust those team's scores accordingly.

I'm pretty indifferent on whether to have kickers. but I think if you have them their scoring per field goal should reflect kick distance.

 

[menobrown]

Why make a post asking for opinions when your mind is already made up?

Thats a fair question. I wanted to see if I was the crazy one, or if most good established dynasty leagues have adjusted from what was once the norm.

Ok, thanks for answering in a calm manner.

I have one league out of 8 that does not use the K. Started in 2015, basically FFPC rules but with no K. It's not a hot button issue to me and I'm ok with it, though there was talk in last few weeks about voting to include it.

Personally, I'd rather have a K. Mainly to try and squeeze out any competitive advantage I can. You might say/think "exactly what competitive advantage"? Not that I'm always going to get it right and but where you referenced how you can just pick up any K any week I make it a bigger priority to obtain a top notch K. The kind you don't cut, the kind you endure their bye weeks. All my leagues are blind bid waivers and in my experience this saves me money as well as a little edge in points.

Aubrey is my K on 5 of the 7 teams that require one and I don't say that to indicate because I have the best K is the reason why I lean having a K, it's to highlight I put priority on getting a good one.

Like I said not a hot button or big issue and I tend to do well building up back end of my roster so that roster space is usually an issue for me and in that sense not having a K helps, but I'd prefer one and find if you commit to finding a top notch one and don't view it as a throw away you can usually carve out a little advantage.

 

[Mitchie]

Don't mind the kicker, there's a lot of luck in fantasy, yes a bit more with kickers but same rules for everyone. There's still some skill in getting a good kicker.

 

[ChuckLiddell]

I hear you and sure, there are a couple kickers worth keeping through the bye weeks, but I will never own one of those because I will not cut a player like Jalen Coker or Jalen McMillan to keep a kicker on my roster when I can just grab one of the top 12 kickers in the world on any given week off waivers and hope their offense stalls out a few times inside the 30. I think there is far more strategy involved with making that a flex spot and making it open to the kicker position. If you want the decent floor, start a kicker. If you want to shoot for the moon, throw in Jalen Coker or the like.

ETA: 24 man rosters so you will be cutting a good player in many cases to keep a kicker on a bye

 

[Mitchie]

I hear you and sure, there are a couple kickers worth keeping through the bye weeks, but I will never own one of those because I will not cut a player like Jalen Coker or Jalen McMillan to keep a kicker on my roster when I can just grab one of the top 12 kickers in the world on any given week off waivers and hope their offense stalls out a few times inside the 30. I think there is far more strategy involved with making that a flex spot and making it open to the kicker position. If you want the decent floor, start a kicker. If you want to shoot for the moon, throw in Jalen Coker or the like.

ETA: 24 man rosters so you will be cutting a good player in many cases to keep a kicker on a bye

Nothing wrong with doing it that way, personally not sure I like it, feel like either keep kickers as a position or get rid of them.

 

[JohnnyU]

While in some of my leagues we got rid of kickers, in one we allow kickers at the flex, but a kicker isn't required. It has come in handy in a pinch sometimes.

 

[ChuckLiddell]

This is exactly what I was hoping to do

 

[BLOCKED_PUNT]

To be clear, this proposal was not to eliminate them. They can still be used in the flex. They just are not required. Maybe you can use a player you actually drafted instead of one you grabbed off waivers and will cut as soon as they have a bye week.

I understand and it's a little neat....I never knew you could do that. I just like kickers for various reasons and I'm not a huge fan of the "let's get rid of swingy kickers!" fad that has been sweeping the FF landscape.

 

[The Future Champs]

Let me speak for the pro kicker side:
In my main league we had a late season weekly hth match that came down to a last second FG attempt in the Monday night game. It was do or die for both real life and fantasy, and both had serious playoff implications. Making the moment even more delicious was that the manager with the kicker had (foolishly?) picked up and started the kicker from a real life division rival, and that rival was playing his homer team. That, my friends, is quality entertainment.

 

[BLOCKED_PUNT]

but I think if you have them their scoring per field goal should reflect kick distance.

I also do not like this. If the intent here is to make kickers less swingy then I think that does the opposite. I think there's an argument to be made that kick distance better reflects game performance and is more inline with how other offensive positions score but I think it's even less fair than than the current 3 for everything under 40, 40+=4, 50+=5. Just make all fgs 3 points, big boot kickers are still going to get more tries without further widening the gap.

but anyways, just my stupid opinions

 

[BINGBING]

I don't play in leagues that still play like it's 2005, so no.

 

[Crippler]

We start PK and allow in flex also. 40 PKs on rosters. Those that do homework are rewarded and this position really shows who pays attention. With 15 teams starting 11 O guys per week, the PK has value but as the lowest scoring Offensive position, their value is usually later 2nd rounder. More value than chasing 4th or 5th WR

I love our rules on PK. Some teams carry 3 and have seen 4 starters on teams. Trades happen with kickers all the time. No blockbusters but adds some extra excitement

 

[joey]

In 4 dynasty leagues. 3 have kickers and 1 doesn’t (FFPC Triflex league with no K or D).

I don’t mind either way. wherever the league rules are, I plan accordingly.

 

[rockaction]

I've played in both types of leagues, so I know how the kicker can be an advantage if you pay attention and get a good one in a good situation, but if you play in a league where everyone is looking for edge in an active fashion, it brings an element of pure luck into the equation that isn't so cool. I prefer no kickers.

 

[InDitkaWeTrust]

In my main league, we just upped the value of kickers. That, with our already high value placed on team DEF, makes this league super interesting and a good change of pace from the vanilla dynasty (QB/RB/WR/WR/FLEX/FLEX) leagues out there. Like has been said before, if I can eke out a small advantage in positions that don't get much hype, I have a better shot at winning a 'ship.

 

[JohnnyU]

In my main league, we just upped the value of kickers. That, with our already high value placed on team DEF, makes this league super interesting and a good change of pace from the vanilla dynasty (QB/RB/WR/WR/FLEX/FLEX) leagues out there. Like has been said before, if I can eke out a small advantage in positions that don't get much hype, I have a better shot at winning a 'ship.

I don't think upping the value of kickers fixes what's wrong with kickers in the first place and that is there isn't much difference between kicker #3 and kicker #12. Yes, there's always a couple that stand out, but is that enough to make the position desirable? When 30 fantasy points separate the #3 and #12 kicker it makes the position mundane IMO.

 

[Birdie048]

Our 12 Team 1QB League TE+ voted to remove PK last off-season and replace it with RB/WR/TE Flex. It failed to meet the 8 votes needed to pass. (close .... 7-5 in favor)
I suggested to add PK to the "Flex" option but it was never included in the final poll.
We start 2 RB/3 WR/1TE and 2 flex. Adding a 3rd Flex is reasonable, but allowing PK is smart strategy for maximizing points.

My Reasoning: Top 10 PK in my league score avg 10 pt / week
This is equivalent to RB 28 / WR 38 range in performance each week.
So why start crap shoot RB like ARZ RB Michel Carter (avg 6.1 / RB52) over PK Det Jake Bates (9.6 pt/PK 10)

 

[JohnnyU]

Our 12 Team 1QB League TE+ voted to remove PK last off-season and replace it with RB/WR/TE Flex. It failed to meet the 8 votes needed to pass. (close .... 7-5 in favor)
I suggested to add PK to the "Flex" option but it was never included in the final poll.
We start 2 RB/3 WR/1TE and 2 flex. Adding a 3rd Flex is reasonable, but allowing PK is smart strategy for maximizing points.

My Reasoning: Top 10 PK in my league score avg 10 pt / week
This is equivalent to RB 28 / WR 38 range in performance each week.
So why start crap shoot RB like ARZ RB Michel Carter (avg 6.1 / RB52) over PK Det Jake Bates (9.6 pt/PK 10)

Precisely why we allow kickers as a flex, not required, in one of my leagues. The kicker in a flex actually saved my hide a couple of times when I was strapped to start a flex.

 

[pinkstapler]

I stopped using them once all my leagues left MFL. The only time I was ok with using kickers was when we had the tools to create a scoring system which I felt minimized the randomness and severity of their scoring. At the time, I looked back over the scoring of kickers from the previous decade or so and found it was much, much more correlated to play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies than the kicker themselves. Obviously some kickers are "better" than others, but in general the turnover for top 10 scorers was very high year over year. So we changed scoring settings to be more based on points per yard of each kick instead of an automatic 3 + distance based on broad ranges, and similarly really upped the penalties for missed kicks based on distance as well. It at least got rid of the guys putting up 25 points from dinging 6 30 yarders just because they have a kick happy coach and an offense that sputters in the red zone.

 

[InDitkaWeTrust]

In my main league, we just upped the value of kickers. That, with our already high value placed on team DEF, makes this league super interesting and a good change of pace from the vanilla dynasty (QB/RB/WR/WR/FLEX/FLEX) leagues out there. Like has been said before, if I can eke out a small advantage in positions that don't get much hype, I have a better shot at winning a 'ship.

I don't think upping the value of kickers fixes what's wrong with kickers in the first place and that is there isn't much difference between kicker #3 and kicker #12. Yes, there's always a couple that stand out, but is that enough to make the position desirable? When 30 fantasy points separate the #3 and #12 kicker it makes the position mundane IMO.

Understandable. Our point system has ~50pts difference between 3rd and 12th. 70 difference between 1st and 12th.

 

[Dacomish]

When I designed my IDP league in 2017, we didn't have Kickers and it has never come up to add them, very glad given the volatility year to year for kickers.

 

[Gally]

My dynasty league uses kickers and punters. Punter's are awesome. We have also made the scoring enough that they matter. Having a good kicker and punter (especially punter) can be a significant advantage. This league is also a full IDP which is why we included punters. So we start 8 Offensive players (7 plus K) and 8 IDP players (7 plus P).

I am also in a different league that is SF but that SF spot can only be used for a QB or K. Many teams start two K's and 1 QB because K's score well and QB scoring is a bit depressed. Essentially a QB that throws for 250 yds, 2 TD, 1 INT would score 11 and a K that has 2 XPT, 35 yd FG, and 55 yd FG scores 12 pts. Kickers matter.

 

[wlwiles]

In 3 dynasty leagues, only 1 uses Kickers. I like them for two reasons. Half the teams in the league roster 2 kickers all season long, so that's one less lotto ticket on their squads, and usually I can dump a late 3rd or early 4th round pick if I have an extra and can pretty much buy any kicker I want. I'd rather have Aubrey or Dicker or a top 5 kicker type all season long, instead of a 10% dart throw with the 4.04.

 

[InDitkaWeTrust]

My dynasty league uses kickers and punters. Punter's are awesome. We have also made the scoring enough that they matter. Having a good kicker and punter (especially punter) can be a significant advantage. This league is also a full IDP which is why we included punters. So we start 8 Offensive players (7 plus K) and 8 IDP players (7 plus P).

I am also in a different league that is SF but that SF spot can only be used for a QB or K. Many teams start two K's and 1 QB because K's score well and QB scoring is a bit depressed. Essentially a QB that throws for 250 yds, 2 TD, 1 INT would score 11 and a K that has 2 XPT, 35 yd FG, and 55 yd FG scores 12 pts. Kickers matter.

Do you mind sharing the scoring system for P's? I am intrigued!

 

[Gally]

Do you mind sharing the scoring system for P's? I am intrigued!

No problem. It's probably not for everyone but we enjoy it a lot. I actually will go to my punters game just to watch him punt. Here are the scoring aspects:

• 4 pts for Punts downed Inside the 20
• 1 pt for every 150 punt yds
• Starting at 40 yd gross average (40-42.49) 1 pt. Then a point for each additional 2.49 yds. So a 55 yd punting average is 7 pts.

So ideally you want a punter from a team that is a decent offense that can get a first down or two but then punt. You want as many downed inside the 20 as possible. So a punter with 4 punts that equals 200 total yds (50 yd average) that downs two inside the 20 gets you 14 pts (8 pts for inside the 20, 1 pt for 200 yds, and 5 pts for 50 yd average)


Our top punter was overall player #24 with 14.3 ppg (Tommy Townsend - Hou)

 

[-OZ-]

Both have them although one proposed removing them this year. In that league I have Reichard and Bates, so I’d prefer to keep them.

 

[InDitkaWeTrust]

Do you mind sharing the scoring system for P's? I am intrigued!

No problem. It's probably not for everyone but we enjoy it a lot. I actually will go to my punters game just to watch him punt. Here are the scoring aspects:

• 4 pts for Punts downed Inside the 20
• 1 pt for every 150 punt yds
• Starting at 40 yd gross average (40-42.49) 1 pt. Then a point for each additional 2.49 yds. So a 55 yd punting average is 7 pts.

So ideally you want a punter from a team that is a decent offense that can get a first down or two but then punt. You want as many downed inside the 20 as possible. So a punter with 4 punts that equals 200 total yds (50 yd average) that downs two inside the 20 gets you 14 pts (8 pts for inside the 20, 1 pt for 200 yds, and 5 pts for 50 yd average)


Our top punter was overall player #24 with 14.3 ppg (Tommy Townsend - Hou)

Dude, I love this! Thank you!

 

[Lehigh98]

Dynasty kickers? Never did, never will. No defenses either.
We make it super flexy though...
QB, SF, RB, WR, TE, 5 Flex

In a for-fun family league with silly rules, we may go to 2 kickers next year to make it more random and fair to the people who don't really know what they're doing.

 

[Gally]

Do you mind sharing the scoring system for P's? I am intrigued!

No problem. It's probably not for everyone but we enjoy it a lot. I actually will go to my punters game just to watch him punt. Here are the scoring aspects:

• 4 pts for Punts downed Inside the 20
• 1 pt for every 150 punt yds
• Starting at 40 yd gross average (40-42.49) 1 pt. Then a point for each additional 2.49 yds. So a 55 yd punting average is 7 pts.

So ideally you want a punter from a team that is a decent offense that can get a first down or two but then punt. You want as many downed inside the 20 as possible. So a punter with 4 punts that equals 200 total yds (50 yd average) that downs two inside the 20 gets you 14 pts (8 pts for inside the 20, 1 pt for 200 yds, and 5 pts for 50 yd average)


Our top punter was overall player #24 with 14.3 ppg (Tommy Townsend - Hou)

Dude, I love this! Thank you!

It's great having a punter on Monday night and their team keeps stalling and you get 4 pts after 4 pts after 4pts as he keeps downing them inside the 20.

The other exciting thing is on the return. As long as the returner gets tackled inside the 20 it counts as a punt downed inside the 20 for 4 pts. I won a game once because my punter kicked the ball to the 22 yd line and the returner ran backwards and got tackled at the 19 yd line counting as a punt downed inside the 20 and I got 4 pts to win by 2. One of the most exciting FF plays I can remember.

There is nothing worse than your punter punting from the 40 and he can't pin them inside the 20 and it dribbles into the endzone. So frustrating. 4 pts out the window.

Like I said, I will go to my punters game every time he punts.

 

[Zow]

We actually did away with them this year.

 

[Lehigh98]

Removing kickers is like good old California Hold'em adding 11's and 12's, removes some variance.
It's up to the league members if they want more or less luck involved.

 

[zed2283]

Of course.

 

[zed2283]

I stopped using them once all my leagues left MFL. The only time I was ok with using kickers was when we had the tools to create a scoring system which I felt minimized the randomness and severity of their scoring. At the time, I looked back over the scoring of kickers from the previous decade or so and found it was much, much more correlated to play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies than the kicker themselves. Obviously some kickers are "better" than others, but in general the turnover for top 10 scorers was very high year over year. So we changed scoring settings to be more based on points per yard of each kick instead of an automatic 3 + distance based on broad ranges, and similarly really upped the penalties for missed kicks based on distance as well. It at least got rid of the guys putting up 25 points from dinging 6 30 yarders just because they have a kick happy coach and an offense that sputters in the red zone.

Sounds to me like a good way for a shark to gain an advantage. Why is taking play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies into account when drafting other positions ok, but not kickers?

I've never seen a good argument as to how kickers are more prone to "variance" than any other position.

 

[joey]

Removing kickers is like good old California Hold'em adding 11's and 12's, removes some variance.
It's up to the league members if they want more or less luck involved.

tangent: I've played poker online with friends every week since the pandemic started (started with hold em but have moved exclusively to Omaha Hi Lo for the crazier roller coaster ride!). This is all to say that this is the first time I've ever heard of California Hold'em. Have you ever actually played it?


un-tangent: kickers are fine with me

 

[pinkstapler]

I stopped using them once all my leagues left MFL. The only time I was ok with using kickers was when we had the tools to create a scoring system which I felt minimized the randomness and severity of their scoring. At the time, I looked back over the scoring of kickers from the previous decade or so and found it was much, much more correlated to play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies than the kicker themselves. Obviously some kickers are "better" than others, but in general the turnover for top 10 scorers was very high year over year. So we changed scoring settings to be more based on points per yard of each kick instead of an automatic 3 + distance based on broad ranges, and similarly really upped the penalties for missed kicks based on distance as well. It at least got rid of the guys putting up 25 points from dinging 6 30 yarders just because they have a kick happy coach and an offense that sputters in the red zone.

Sounds to me like a good way for a shark to gain an advantage. Why is taking play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies into account when drafting other positions ok, but not kickers?

I've never seen a good argument as to how kickers are more prone to "variance" than any other position.

In my subjective experience most high buy in/competitive leagues I know of have phased them out over the past 5 years or so. That speaks for itself IMO. It's similar to how most of those same leagues have shifted to an extra game a week against the median scoring. It's a counterbalance trying to reduce the overwhelming amount of randomness and luck already in fantasy and attempt to make it more "skill" based.

We likely just disagree and I don't really care to argue about it as I don't care what you do in your leagues. I'm rarely dogmatic about anything in life, so I especially wouldn't be about a game played for entertainment. If you enjoy/see benefit to using kickers, go right ahead. I'm glad every league I'm in no longer uses them and I doubt I'll ever join a league in the future that still does. Just my preference.

 

[Lehigh98]

Removing kickers is like good old California Hold'em adding 11's and 12's, removes some variance.
It's up to the league members if they want more or less luck involved.

tangent: I've played poker online with friends every week since the pandemic started (started with hold em but have moved exclusively to Omaha Hi Lo for the crazier roller coaster ride!). This is all to say that this is the first time I've ever heard of California Hold'em. Have you ever actually played it?


un-tangent: kickers are fine with me

That's about a 20-year-old FBG inside joke. I tried to find an old thread but must have been on one of the old boards. This is the best I could find: https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/paging-mr-ham.741734/

Long story short from what's left of my memory... One of our FBG's (Mr. Ham) had an idea for a poker variation to remove some of the variance and bad beats by making it harder to hit draws by adding non-suited 11's and 12's to the deck and called it California Hold'em. I think it got some interest for a while around 2005-6? to the point where Phil Helmuth commented on it or got a little involved. He got it added to a small online poker room called "Let's Poker" that I think another FBG was involved with. They had a tourney to promote it, that I won for about $1k. Unfortunately, I don't think it ever really caught on. I still have a California Hold'em deck somewhere at home with my poker chips though. Don't get me started on the Mission betting site and how I doubled that $1k to $2k with their free bet on the opening NFL game even though Roethlisberger crashed his bike after I placed the bet and moved the line in the wrong direction for me. Thank god for a late pick 6 from Culpepper to cover. Ah, the good old days...

 

[zed2283]

I stopped using them once all my leagues left MFL. The only time I was ok with using kickers was when we had the tools to create a scoring system which I felt minimized the randomness and severity of their scoring. At the time, I looked back over the scoring of kickers from the previous decade or so and found it was much, much more correlated to play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies than the kicker themselves. Obviously some kickers are "better" than others, but in general the turnover for top 10 scorers was very high year over year. So we changed scoring settings to be more based on points per yard of each kick instead of an automatic 3 + distance based on broad ranges, and similarly really upped the penalties for missed kicks based on distance as well. It at least got rid of the guys putting up 25 points from dinging 6 30 yarders just because they have a kick happy coach and an offense that sputters in the red zone.

Sounds to me like a good way for a shark to gain an advantage. Why is taking play calling/coaching/offensive philosophies into account when drafting other positions ok, but not kickers?

I've never seen a good argument as to how kickers are more prone to "variance" than any other position.

In my subjective experience most high buy in/competitive leagues I know of have phased them out over the past 5 years or so. That speaks for itself IMO. It's similar to how most of those same leagues have shifted to an extra game a week against the median scoring. It's a counterbalance trying to reduce the overwhelming amount of randomness and luck already in fantasy and attempt to make it more "skill" based.

We likely just disagree and I don't really care to argue about it as I don't care what you do in your leagues. I'm rarely dogmatic about anything in life, so I especially wouldn't be about a game played for entertainment. If you enjoy/see benefit to using kickers, go right ahead. I'm glad every league I'm in no longer uses them and I doubt I'll ever join a league in the future that still does. Just my preference.

I was replying to your post but not addressing my comments to you specifically, but to the general argument against kickers.