I will be the first to admit that I am not what one would describe as a sports fan. I know enough to be able to watch a football, baseball, or soccer game and understand which team is winning. I have a favorite football team, and a favorite baseball team, but I am not heartbroken if they lose a game. Of course, having grown up near Chicago, my favorite teams are the Chicago Bears, and the Chicago Cubs. Being a fan of those two teams pretty much means figuring they will lose the game, and being ecstatic with delight when they actually manage to win one or two.
A friend of mine, on the other hand, is a big sports fan, and is someone who frequently creates fantasy teams. From what he has said, it is my understanding that creating a fantasy team is extremely complex. I don’t understand very much, but I do know that it involves selecting players from a bunch of different, existing, teams, and grouping them together into a fantasy, non-existent, team. There is some sort of points system that I do not really understand, except for the main concept. Points are given out when a player that you selected for your fantasy team plays in an actual, real world, game. I think whoever ends up with the most points at the end of the season wins.
Now, my friend said his group plays for fun, and for “bragging rights”. Most fantasy sports leagues, on the other hand, are playing for money. It costs something to join, and the winner takes all the money at the end of the season. This is why people spend so much time trying to create the perfect fantasy team. Once you have made your selections of players, you cannot change them. This means that if one of your players gets injured badly enough that he cannot continue to play this season, you are out of luck.
This is why Fantasy Sports Insurance was created. It is a type of Sports Disability Insurance policy. It protects your investment in a fantasy team from a “season changing” loss due to an injury to a key player, (or players). It is designed to reimburse you for all of the money you spent to join the fantasy league, for access to online stats services, for the magazines your bought to help you create your team….. all of it. The insurance company will make a list of the top 50 pre-season ranked fantasy players. You can take out this insurance policy in that players name. If the player is not on the list, the insurance company may not offer Fantasy Sports Insurance on him.
This type of insurance makes it a little safer for a person to invest in a fantasy team. If tragedy strikes, instead of losing everything, you will get a check from the insurance company after the season is over. There is no insurance to protect you from the loss of “bragging rights”, however.
Image by John Martinez Pavliga on Flickr