Draft Prep: Keeping up with the keepers

Fantasy Football just keeps evolving. It hasn't been all that long since the internet helped make Fantasy more fun and less of a stat-keeping chore. NFL players are now more knowledgeable and open to the idea of Fantasy Football and understand that their production makes millions of people around the world happy (or unhappy if you're losing because of their performance). Nowadays, people are expanding their rosters to include defensive players.

It was only a matter of time until rabid Fantasy owners got to the point where they're keeping players on a yearly basis. More and more people are turning to keeper leagues to get their Fantasy fix. Not only does it boost the intensity of the game, but it also improves the camaraderie among owners in a league.

True story: I have played in the same league since 1997 (back when having an e-mail address was considered "high-tech"). In 2001, we decided to make it a keeper league for a number of reasons. Everyone in the league was friends and/or relatives with each other, and we loved to bust each other's chops. We had all moved away from each other, and the league helped us all stay in touch. We all wanted to have the satisfaction of knowing that every NFL season, we had a league we would be in no matter what. And, it was a league where we could latch on a player and keep them for a long time. In short, it was, and still is, a reliable Fantasy league I enjoy playing in every year.

So if you know you're going to be in a league with the same friends each season, you might as well make it a keeper league. If you play on CBS SportsLine, you can get more information on setting up and maintaining a keeper league by watching this video hosted by yours truly.

How do you keep up?

If you're just starting a keeper league, you need to think about how you'll hold on to your players from year to year. Will they cost you anything, or is the league designed to let you keep whomever you want at any time? Here are some suggestions for ways to maintain your best Fantasy performers.

Just keep 'em: Pick the players you want to hold over and get them on your roster the following year. This is the easiest way to run a keeper league.

Keep a player, lose a pick: Most keeper leagues will let you keep a certain amount of players, but you'll lose draft picks in exchange. For instance, you can keep a player, but it will cost a first-round pick.

Keeping youngsters like Joseph Addai will help your Fantasy team in the long run. (Getty Images)

Some leagues take it a step further and let you keep a player for the round he was initially picked in, which made owners who took Maurice Jones-Drew with a 14th-round pick very, very happy. In my league, you must forfeit a pick two rounds higher than the round you originally took him in (so in that instance, Jones-Drew would cost a 12th). There are variations of all these systems, so whatever you and your fellow owners can decide is fine.

Pay for play: Other leagues will charge a fee for owners to keep players, be it in the form of actual money, auction dollars or a predetermined salary cap where each player earns a fictional salary in the league. Granted, this is a more complicated way to do business, but it could add to the "reality" of Fantasy Football.

Getting down to business

So we've talked about starting a keeper league and maintaining your guys over the long-term. Now, let's discuss some nuances owners need to consider involving players.

We're often asked keeper-league questions where an opinion is wanted on Player A vs. Player B. Assuming the players are near-equals on our rank list, we will always take the younger guy assuming he can be kept longer. Holding on to running backs who are 29 or older, receivers who are taking on a lesser role in the offense or quarterbacks expected to struggle to keep their job are never a good idea.

For instance: Shaun Alexander or Joseph Addai? If you can keep Addai for several seasons to come, keep him over Alexander. Ahman Green or DeAngelo Williams? Same thing. So long as the dropoff in talent isn't very steep, it's always worth it to take the younger alternative. The only instance we could see doing otherwise is if your other keepers are young and you just need a veteran whose production you can count on.

Another factor to consider when figuring out your keepers is whether or not you'll be able to get a player you let go in your draft (if you draft). For example, if I'm picking between Laveranues Coles and Santonio Holmes, which one would I most likely be able to get with a reasonable draft pick? Does anyone in my league have a man-crush on one of these players and would he/she swipe them before I get a chance? These factors come into play, especially if you covet two players and can only keep one.

Finally, if you can give up a late draft pick for a younger player with upside vs. an early draft pick for a good -- not great -- player with limitations, it's almost always better to take the younger player. Jerious Norwood for a 10th-round pick is better than Edgerrin James with a second-round pick, especially if you know you can get a comparable back to James in a draft or via trade. James may help you more this year, but Norwood is younger, fresher and presumably will be on your roster a lot longer.

Rookie watch

There aren't many of you out there, but several keeper leagues use rookie-only drafts to help fill out rosters from year to year. But even if you're not in a rookie-only draft, you can still benefit from this list of how we rank the 2007 rookie class. This is how we'd expect the first two rounds of a standard-scoring keeper league rookie-only draft without IDPs to look like:

And if that's not enough, here are five more "sleeper" rookies to lean on:

• Tony Hunt, RB, Philadelphia
• Antonio Pittman, RB, New Orleans
• Laurent Robinson, WR, Atlanta
• Mike Walker, WR, Jacksonville
• Garrett Wolfe, RB, Chicago

So there's a look at keeper leagues in a nutshell. As always, you can drop us a line to talk about your specific keeper-league situation at DMFantasyFootball@cbs.com . Be sure to put Attn: Keepers in the subject field, but be aware we do not guarantee personal responses to all questions.

The popularity of keeper leagues is on the rise, but if it ever comes down to Joe Average sending Peyton Manning a check as a signing bonus, then we've officially gone too far.