Yahoo vs ESPN

[rookies and cream]

i've never tried to do this as i've only played auction leagues on cbs. i would assume importing rankings is possible but i'm not really sure.

Negative - this is one of the biggest drawbacks of CBS in my opinion, especially when switching from Yahoo. While their stats are much more comprehensive (and allow you to generate custom reports), there is no concept of a ranking that you can use to sort players. I'm certainly no fan of Yahoo's O-Rank, but an actual rank is quite useful. I tried to create my own custom "dollar value" stat that would effectively do this and it almost worked, but there were glitches that I never was able to work out.

while it would add a bit of convenience, i actually kinda like that they don't have their own rankings... it actually forces me to look a bit deeper to find a free agent pick up rather than just picking up the highest ranked player. with all the stats they give you and the different time frames you can check, it makes it pretty easy to sort by most ABs to see which players have been getting the most playing time in the last week (or 2 weeks or month) and then go from there.

Actually, CBS does have a ranking system this year. They call it "roto value" and it is "calculated by a proprietary formula that takes into account a player's statistics in the ten standard Rotisserie categories".

[GiantsFan14]

interesting, i'll have to check it out

[BitterDodgerFan]

i was talking about pre-draft rankings btw, not FA pool ranking but i can't imagine playing without FA pool customizable rank sorting.

[rookies and cream]

i was talking about pre-draft rankings btw, not FA pool ranking but i can't imagine playing without FA pool customizable rank sorting.

I can actually rank players according to CBS projections, which I guess is similar to pre-draft rankings.

[fast dogs]

guess I don't really understand the need for rankings, doesn't that stuff change almost every day of the season? can't believe anybody that plays in keepers aren't thrilled with CBS, but I guess if you are used to something else its different & different scares some. Our keeper leagues have been the same page for 6 years, almost w/o a problem anytime with the service. the last time I played in yahoo they were a year or 2 behind cbs copying what cbs was doing.

[ayebatter]

if you're willing to pay, i think cbs sportsline is the best. i've used it for a couple money leagues and love it.

agree

Thrice

[rookies and cream]

x4

[JohnnyBenchBest Ever]

I never considered CBS as an option (having never played there). From what I've heard from the Cafe, I think the choice is clear...I’ll be moving my league to CBS sportsline. Thanks for the help.

[SecretAgentMan]

CBS is far superier to anything out there for the money. Been using it for 9 years now for all my money leagues. Yahoo's private leagues are OK for free leagues, but the interface is very lame imo and the stats are near worthless and they still charge you if you want to add live scoring.

Yahoo rankings are pretty meaningless and in the end every owner uses their own rankings anyway. So that aspect of it is moot imo. CBS's rankings are probably even worse than Yahoo's if you can imagine, but they do offer the Avg draft position ranking, which effectively gives you a fair starting point equivalent to what Yahoo does in that respect with a generaly better client base (less 10 year olds playing for free messing up the stats like on Yahoo).

CBS also offers reports galore, including and most importantly, the ability to bring up a quick list of the most owned free agents and the most added players for the scroring period across CBS. Very useful to see what is really around on your wire and to catch a trend maybe a bit sooner than most of the people in your league.

Where most people usually complain about CBS is that it is traditionally set up to do weekly scoring periods. Yahoo is traditionally is a daily scoring setup (though you cansetup weekly in private leagues). If you get a "thrill" micro-managing rosters on a daily basis, swapping out your Cs on off days,r playing H2h pitching sreaming or the like, then Yahoo is more suited for that. CBS has traditionally catered to the more traditional weekly Roto lineups.

As for ESPN, can't speak to it in recent times,but traditionally they have been horrible and I swore off them years ago and have no intention of ever going back. Service was horrible and the product just plain stunk.

[BitterDodgerFan]

you can still set up cbs leagues as daily, right?