How to Take Advantage of Bye Weeks in Fantasy Football

One of the advanced tactics when playing fantasy football is learning how to use bye weeks to your advantage. A bye week is the week in the season in which an NFL team doesn’t play. The NFL regular season is 17 weeks long, however teams only play 16 weeks. That one week of inactivity can be harmful to your fantasy team, especially if it is a player you typically start. However, you can learn how to take advantage of bye weeks in fantasy football.

Instructions

    • 1

      Research the schedules of each team in the NFL before your fantasy football draft. As you draft multiple players at the same position, avoid any two of the players having the same bye week.

    • 2

      Draft players who have bye weeks late in the season. This is especially true for shallow positions such as tight end and kicker. For example, if your kicker has a bye week in the tenth week of the season, that allows you to not worry about carrying a backup kicker for the first 2 1/2 months of the fantasy football season.

    • 3

      Trade for players who have already had their bye week. In return, send out players who still have yet to reach their bye week. By using this maneuver, you get an extra week of action out of the players you get in trades.

    • 4

      Send out your trade offers for players about to enter a bye week. This tactic is especially effective when dealing with a desperate fantasy football team owner. Many times, an owner will trade a player for lower than their regular value solely for the reason that the player won’t be available in the upcoming week. If you can get a player for 75% of his regular value, waiting out the bye week is almost always worth it in the end.