How important is fantasy football ownership ?

Ownership is one of the key factors to keep in mind when selecting a daily fantasy football team.

The most famous star players available in a contest are always going to be extremely popular picks among a lot of daily fantasy football players, but while there is a lot of logic in sticking with the wisdom of crowds, selecting players who have a high level of ownership can be damaging to your chances of competing for the big cash prizes.

For example, any time Cristiano Ronaldo is available for selection in a fantasy football game, a large number of people are going to shell out a chunk of their budget to pick the Real Madrid star. But spending so much cash on Ronaldo reduces your options in other areas of the pitch and he has such a high ownership factor that he is not always the best option for your team either.

Depending on the type of fantasy football contest you are entering, having a few key differentials in your team could make the difference between sailing up the leaderboard and languishing in the bottom places.

Any player you pick who the majority of players are going to ignore has the potential to deliver a major differential boost to your side. However, there is a lot of sense in selecting the big name players who are expected to provide a lot of points to their users too, of course.

In some daily fantasy football contests, some players will have an ownership rating of well over 50%, meaning they are in the majority of teams involved in that particular tournament.

By selecting them you can only keep pace with the other teams that have that player, whereas picking stars with a lower ownership rating gives you more opportunity to finish higher.