That’s Kerplookee, as in the sound a golf ball makes when it drops into the cup after a well-executed putt. Kerplookee is also a new fantasy golf site with a fantasy golf game. It’s a simple salary cap game where you get $20 million to spread across as many as ten golfers. Score points based on how well your golfers finish in the money.
Kerplookee has an interesting strategy for the start of its game. It started play in the first weekend of January, but those are practice rounds. The game officially starts on February 11. It allows for fantasy players to get used to the game before the start of the season. The downside is that players may drop-off before the season actually starts. The free game is broken into sessions that gives fantasy players a fresh start every few weeks. In addition, Kerplookee also has a pay fantasy game planned that will kick off with the Masters in April.
According to founder Chuck Fridinger, the site has signed up over 500 members since its launch in December and that over 96% of players are actively playing. With a few more promotion events planned, he expects to have a strong number of sign-ups by the time its season starts.
Congratulations to Kerplookee on its launch, and good luck to it as it navigates the fantasy waters.
You thought it was bad that CBSSports.com had given up on fantasy golf, but the PGA Tour has essentially abandoned fantasy golf by reducing its PGA fantasy golf to a really large Yahoo! Fantasy Golf group. Really? That is the best the PGA can do? While leagues like the NFL and MLB are investing heavily to make their digital departments the destination for news about their sports, it seems the PGA Tour is going in the exact opposite decision.
Fantasy sports are known to boost fan engagement, and the PGA is really missing the boat on this. Although this decision was made before Tiger Woods‘ recent issues, the lack of a truly engaging fantasy option gives them one less weapon to combat what are surely going to be pathetic ratings until Tiger comes back.
While fantasy golf is not the behemoths that fantasy football and fantasy baseball are, the number of players is in the hundreds of thousands of players. That is a large enough audience that PGA really should care just a little bit more. I understand not developing the game yourself, but the fact that it is not even bothering to create a true white label fantasy game, it is just disappointing.
In case you are interested in playing the game, it is broken into winter, spring, and summer segments. Weekly prizes are some Nike ONE Vapor golf balls, segment prizes are Nike VR drivers, and a grand prize of a trip for two to a 2011 PGA Tour event.
In an interesting move, it appears that CBSSports.com is abandoning fantasy golf and fantasy NASCAR for the 2010 season. I heard some rumors about this over the last month and received confirmation from a message board posting by CBSSports.com writer Ross Davenport in a discussion about CBS 2010 Fantasy Golf.
I have an email in to CBSSports.com about this development, and will update once I know more. My guess is that this was a money thing. Fantasy golf and fantasy nascar, despite the hope for these sports, just do not have the numbers to justify the costs of the games. Between statistic costs, software maintenance, marketing, and writers, running a fantasy game on a major site like CBSSports.com could easily get expensive with very little direct return to date. With everyone’s budgets tight these days, it is not surprising to see a reduction in services.
Killing these games is surprising to me for different reasons. Golf and CBS Sports have a long standing relationship, so CBSSports.com dropping fantasy golf is a pretty big indication of how futile its efforts have been in developing the fantasy golf market.
Fantasy NASCAR has had a lot of hype around it as the next big fantasy game. However, it is still exactly that– hype. That market has not quite materialized as everyone had imagined. Perhaps this is CBSSports.com deciding that the market is just not there yet, and it needs to cut bait.
Definitely an interesting development. What do you think?
In the mean time, you can check out my earlier post about where to play fantasy golf if you now find yourself in need of a new fantasy golf league.
While everyone has been talking about Tiger Woods way more than they ever did during the golf off-season, I would like to remind you that the start of the golf season is less than a month away. This also means that the fantasy golf season is just around the corner.
Personal observation: Smaller sites tend to do a better job with fantasy golf. This is a function of the fact that smaller sites dedicated to fantasy golf really care about fantasy golf. Whereas, in the case of a larger fantasy company that has many games, fantasy golf is just a drop in the bucket, and is not nearly as important to the company as other fantasy games. With that being said, when picking a game, do your homework, be careful, email in questions, use message boards, and/or ask around.
I know you must be dying to get your virtual driver going and get onto the fantasy fairway with 2010 fantasy golf. With that in mind, I have compiled the details about a number of fantasy golf sites for your inspection. If you have any thoughts on any of these sites, please feel free to add them in the comments section. Also, I would like to Colin Robertson for contributing on a number of these evaluations:
Format: Pick three golfers each week. Score points based on their earnings for the week.
Substitutes: Switch out one golfer after the second round and/or use one of your six mulligans to switch out another golfer before the final round.
Selection: Set a new lineup each week. Can only use a golfer twice during the season or three times if you use a mulligan.
Good points: Low number of players (capped at 125) so good chance of winning a prize; scores updated quickly; sends multiple line up reminders and (brief) weekly newsletter; able to change line up during tournament; mulligans feature; offers section prizes so always something to play for; Great reputation for customer service and prompt prize payout.
Bad points: Only US tour so not a lot of UK or European interest in the game.
Expected Start Date: Multiple start dates, from January through April
Full disclosure: When I play fantasy golf, this is where I play.
Format: Select a team of twelve golfers each week, with all scoring points based on 72 hole scores.
Substitutes: Able to change two (three for majors) players between weeks.
Selection: No limit.
Good points: Free entry; reasonable prizes for a free league, allows multiple mini leagues.
Bad points: Most weeks will not have a full line up, no opportunity to change during tournament, funny bonus captain system (where you are unable to change from Tiger Woods as you can’t bench him), poor website.
Format: Select a team of twelve golfers each week, with six scoring points based on 72 hole scores.
Substitutes: Able to change three players between weeks.
Selection: 25 changes per season.
Good points: Most popular UK fantasy golf game; scores updated quickly; spin off mini tournaments; sends line up reminders and detailed weekly newsletter.
Bad points: No opportunity to change during tournament; restrictions of number of players per continent; doesn’t start until Masters.
Format: For Major tournaments only, pick four golfer for your team. Score points based on their earnings for the week, and double points for your top pick.
Substitutes: None.
Selection: Set a new lineup for each tournament.
Good points: free to play; top prizes has been a trip for two to a following year’s masters; limiting to Majors ensures selection from top players,
Bad points: May be too infrequent to engage players;
While Tiger is guaranteed $3 million for just showing up to play the Australian Masters, you get the opportunity to compete for some lesser, but awesome prizes. Winning this free fantasy golf will net you a brand new set of Srixon clubs and golf bag. To play, select a roster of twelve golfers within a $6 million salary cap. The fantasy golf game is built around Australia’s summer of golf of November and December, which makes for a quick fantasy season.
If you have an itch for fantasy golf and cannot wait for the Sony Open, the traditional opening of the golf and fantasy golf season, you may want to check out this new fantasy golf game from the PGA. Entries are due Wednesday afternoon (Thursday morning if you are in Australia).
Apparently, the fountain of youth can be found on British golf courses. Last year a then-53-year-old Greg Norman nearly pulled off a miraculous victory at the British Open, before fading in the final round. On today’s opening round of the British Open, 59-year old Tom Watson’s face has been all over the television for firing a 5-under 65 that gave him a share of the lead, until 45-year old Miguel Angel Jimenez shot a 6-under 64. I cannot even fathom the kind of odds that you could have received in Vegas by predicting those two golfers would be on the top of the leaderboard.
While Watson and Jimenez may fade, for fantasy golfers, performances like this just create all sorts of issues, because very few fantasy players, if any, will have selected these guys. Then, if the elder overachievers continue to perform well, fantasy golfers are faced with the question of hopping on the bandwagon and substituting them into their lineups.
Aside from the fact you are behind the curve if you do not have Tiger on your squad, the high level of week-to-week unpredictability is a big issue for fantasy golf. When you see performances like this, it makes you feel like you are just grasping at straws. Feeling like you have no particular insight into a sport tends to make you not want to keep playing it.
Update (6:10pm EDT): I just received this rebuttal from John Hohlen of Pro Tour Fantasy Golf (PTFG), and honestly, he raises some good points. In my own defense, I did not mean to imply that fantasy golf is pure luck. In fact, I am currently in the hunt in a league at PTFG, and maybe this article reflected more of my own current frustration with my picks (That’s right, I am looking right at you Tiger, Sergio, and Furyk. What do you think?
Your latest post about the British Open is based on one round out of four. By Sunday, do you think both of the elder statesmen will still be a top the leaderboard, I don’t. There are plenty of “popular” picks within just a few strokes.
Your article makes it sound like all fantasy golf games suck! Some do, especially the ones which force you to play the same lineup for 4 rounds. Being able to sub is one of the unique selling features PTFG that many other games don’t offer.
Having the old-timers lead after a round or two is great for the game of golf — and fantasy, I believe. Last year, there was a tournament where Greg Norman had a nice lead after 2 rounds (it may have been a major, I can’t remember), but it was still a hard decision on whether to put him in your lineup. A lot of people did, but unfortuantely Norman eventually lost his lead. Fantasy participants had a tough choice to make – go with your heart or play the odds. Either it way, it was great for fantasy and the game of golf. More viewers than usual tuned in because Norman was in the hunt.
If everyone won who was supposed to win, everyone finished in the position they were predicted — that’s what would make me want to quit following or playing a fantasy sport.
I don’t think fantasy golf is as unpredictable as you make it sound. Take a look at the leaders in League 3. Take a look at the Stats page and see how many winners they have picked. Most have picked over 10. That’s out of 23 weeks to date (over 50% of the time). So each week your picking 3 golfers out of 144 on average and you’ve been able to a pick a winner half the time. That’s not random luck or grasping at straws — that’s skill!
From fantasy sports business to its unique culture, from industry news to some lighthearted fantasy humor, and even fantasy sports jobs and videos, Fantasy Ethos covers the world of fantasy sports for fantasy players and the fantasy professional.
You are currently browsing the archives for the Fantasy Golf category.
Subscribe
Keep up with Fantasy Ethos away from our site via:
That’s Kerplookee, as in the sound a golf ball makes when it drops into the cup after a well-executed putt. Kerplookee is also a new fantasy golf site with a fantasy golf game. It’s a simple salary cap game where you get $20 million to spread across as many as ten golfers. Score points based on how well your golfers finish in the money.
While everyone has been talking about 
