So, you’re in an IDP (Individual Defensive Player) League. You want to win and want a roadmap to ensure your success. This is the second of two articles I am writing dedicated to dominating your IDP league. The first installment dealt with your pre-draft and draft approach while this piece focuses on how to manage your team after the draft and what to watch for during the season.

Below I outline eight steps to help you continue on the path to IDP domination.

1. Draft Well - Organize Your Roster – Think Trades
Every league has roster limits that detail the number of players that can be carried on a team, the numbers allowed at each position or both. Hopefully during your draft you paid attention to the positions you were drafting and how many players you had at each position. The idea being, you want to avoid a lineup with a major weakness in one or more positional areas - see pcDrafter if you have yet to draft.

See: http://www.4for4.com/pre06/goldcoming.php

pcDrafter and the GOLD algorithm build on Value Based Drafting principles. These ideas have been in the public domain for years. However, GOLD goes far beyond as it tightens up the process and dynamically delivers more robust player recommendations. This results in you drafting a vastly improved team and it works in both IDP and non-IDP leagues. After your draft is also a great time to start looking at the rosters of other owners in your league and think about perspective trades.

By identifying areas where you are strong or weak it will allow you to formulate possible trade scenarios and look for the players on other teams that could help your cause. You must have this information straight and concise, the last thing you want to do is make a fellow league participant think you are “winging it”, you want to show the other owners you have a complete understanding of your roster and a good feel for theirs as well.

2. Bye Weeks
This seems like such a trivial topic but it is more important than most people realize. It could be an instance where you have an abundance of players from the same team or you have multiple players at the same position who happen to have the same bye week.

However, don’t outthink yourself with Bye Week over-management!

See Greg Alan’s analysis that shows point blank, having a “bye-week problem” one week in the season is actually much better than trying to space out your entire roster so its almost never at 100% any given week just to make sure you cover all your byes “properly.”

As Greg said, “drafting players to spread out your BYE weeks is not the way to go! It’s much better to get your BYE weeks out of the way all in one week and then run on all cylinders the rest of the season.”

It all comes down to the math.

Must Read: http://www.4for4.com/pre06/notesf06/byemgmt.php

3. Looking Ahead
Watching the waiver wire is an act that cannot be stressed enough if you want to ensure success in your IDP league. The first thing to do is familiarize yourself with the rules for your league in regards to picking up free agents. There are a number of rules concerning how to pick up players (point weighed system, official waiver order etc).

Sometimes a team releases a player due to limited space on their roster and they have every intention of trying to add that player back on their roster down the road. If this happens you need to make sure when you can reacquire the player, in some leagues there is a set number of weeks you need to wait until the player can be added once again.

Another important factor is learning if there is a limit to the number of transactions you can make during a week. I can’t tell you the number of times I have seen owners try to make moves and realize they have used their allotted number of picks for the week or the season.

In most leagues you see a cap on the number of transactions per week and three seems to be the standard number that is used.

If you see areas on your roster where you have a limited number of backups (example kicker) be sure to note ahead of time the week in which their bye occurs. This way you know going into that week that you need a transaction for that purpose. It could save you the embarrassment of realizing this too late or having to play with a smaller lineup because you lack the number of eligible players during a given week.

Also, be sure to keep an eye in the preseason and during the season on all the 4for4.com Hot Spot Charts. They’re a great tool for seeing who’s schedule gets easier and harder.

SEE: http://www.4for4.com/members/reports/hotsp.php

Also, see 4for4.com’s weekly Wavier Wire Reports including:
http://www.4for4.com/members/reports/WWPICKS.PHP

4. Tracking Player Movement and Injuries
Injuries are important to track for obvious reasons as they impact the hurting playing. However, don’t overlook the depth charts - injuries can have a huge impact on them. Any time you hear a player is hurt – think who’s moving up/down as a result.

If a starting receiver goes down to injury you want to make sure you know who will fill in for that player. You could be talking about a player who has seen the bench or very little time all season and suddenly he is thrust into a starting role. By knowing the depth charts of the various NFL teams you know who to bid on or try to acquire via the waiver wire. This is even more important if the transactions in your league are based on a first-come first-serve basis, this way you can beat other owners who could be trying to make the same move.

In season, among others, be sure to see the 4for4.com weekly Moving Forward Cheat Sheet.

See Trade Values: http://www.4for4.com/members/rostvs.php
and the 4for4.com Rest of Season Cheat Sheet.

Also be sure to leverage the 4for4.com weekly injury report charts and cumulative injury charts.

See Injury Upgrade-Downgrade Movements :
http://www.4for4.com/members/reports/IRUFRI.PHP

See Practice Report - All Positions - includes IDP:
http://www.4for4.com/members/reports/IRAFRI.PHP

See Cumulative Injury Report:
http://www.4for4.com/members/reports/rpt10.php

5. Weather Reports
Imagine knowing a team is playing in a torrential downpour, or if it is later in the year, a snowstorm. These types of conditions usually affect quarterbacks and wide receivers more than any other skill position on your fantasy squad. Rain and snow aren’t the only things to pay attention to when looking at the schedules of the various NFL teams. You could be talking about the differences between playing outside and playing in a domed stadium. There are a number of running backs that perform quite differently on artificial surfaces as compared to natural grass. It can be little things like this that can be the determining factor when you are trying to make a decision between two players that look to have similar matchups or have the same amount of success.

See: http://www.4for4.com/members/weather/weather.php

6. Stay on Top of Issues, Rule Changes
It is rare that you will go through an entire season without some sort of scoring controversy or rule change. In most cases the commissioner asks for your opinion as he weighs his decision as to what to do. Rule changes can be very important, sometimes very beneficial and sometimes crippling to a team’s success. If a rule change is adopted that changes an aspect of the scoring system you need to know about it because it affects you and every other team participating in the league. Be sure that you are not silent on these issues even when it doesn’t directly involve you. The rule change will not only impact the current year in which you are playing but more than likely carry over to following years down the road.

7. Trading and Transaction Deadline Moves
Almost every league in existence has a trading and transaction deadline much like all of the major sports in North America. League owners want to ensure that a team doesn’t stack itself with quality players from teams that have no shot at the playoffs at the end of the season. This is why you need to keep an eye on all teams in your league and talk to as many of them as possible before the trading deadline. Make sure you know when your leagues trading deadline occurs and starting planning for it weeks in advance.

8. Carefully Scout Players for Future Use
Look at the last eight games from the prior year. I believe this applies for IDP. 2005 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Shawne Merriman is a perfect example. Merriman had 57 tackles and 10 sacks during his rookie campaign but he had twice as many tackles (38-19) and more sacks (6-4) over the last eight weeks of the season. This would indicate a player getting more comfortable in his role with the team or with the added responsibility given to him.

As you can see there are a number of things you need to consider when planning your course of action for your IDP league. Domination and your success go far beyond just picking the right players in your draft. The players may be there but if not utilized correctly they won’t bring you the success you are looking for or deserve.