Fantasy sports are virtual games which are also known by the name of rotisserie or roto. Within these sports players behave as the owners of the teams which they build. They compete against other such payers based on statistical information which is generated from real games that these virtual sports are inspired from. All fantasy teams have a manager that is in charge of compiling the points as per the roster that has been selected.
The Fantasy Sports Trading Association is responsible for hosting conferences of these sports and is also responsible for ensuring their continuous growth. This association includes almost 120 members ranging from the newer and smaller start-ups to the more established larger media corporations. The estimated age of fantasy sports players was twelve and above and extended to 29.9 million people in 2007.
Fantasy sports experienced a boom in the dot-com era with a number of companies committing to this domain. However when this dot-com bubble burst, most of these companies went bankrupt. Some of the more established and long standing companies did find a way to survive these turbulent times and remerged, some with new names like RotoWire.com and a few with new marketing strategies and business models like Yahoo. Over time, in spite of the unstable economy, it was noted that the average American fantasy players spent almost 8.4 hours of surveying the NFL per week compared to watching the NFL on television. NFL was able to recognize the opportunity that lay in fantasy sports and started to run ads for fantasy football featuring existing players. These people were probably the first to identify that it was fantasy play that drives T.V. viewing.
Some of the most popular fantasy sport are fantasy baseball, fantasy basketball and fantasy football. The other games that have gained prominence with time are fantasy golf, fantasy cricket, fantasy auto racing, fantasy hockey and wrestling.
Fantasy baseball is considered as among the oldest fantasy sports and is also among the hardest and time-consuming sports. It follows the Major League Baseball season of 162 games. Fantasy basketball is said to generally be inspired from fantasy baseball. Since the 1990s fantasy basketball has been increasing in its popularity particularly with the internet exposure which it seems to have. NBA has taken benefit of its immense popularity by launching a global competition called the Premier Fantasy Championships. This competition is considered to be one of the largest and most exclusive fantasy sports competitions. NBA has also launched a program called Fantasy Hoops that gives fantasy sports players all the news and information which they need on the happenings on the world of fantasy basketball.
Fantasy football on the other hand has grown to be more popular then ever and has taken over the mantle of popularity from fantasy baseball. This is mostly attributed to the complexities associated with fantasy baseball with regards to the players involvement for the length of time as well as the many number of matches that are played. Fantasy football, on the other hand, gives its players and managers considerably more flexibility especially in time since the games take place only once a week when compared with daily in fantasy baseball.
Probably the most popular fantasy sports players and games news providers are Yahoo.com and ESPN Fantasy Sports. They gather all of the news, reviews, statistics and players performance and provide it on the table for fantasy sports enthusiasts..