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More Power to the Fan. Crowdsourcing Team Selection through Fantasy Sports

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At Fantain, we are all about the fan. Indeed, our name itself is fan and captain together. As we bring together the sports teams and players you love and follow, and you, together, we hope to bring a richer, more intimate experience to you, the fan.

Enough has been written about how fans must be delighted by the sports teams by giving them better facilities, better viewing experiences on the field, on TV and on the Internet, giving them the ability to interact with their favorite players, etc.

But what if a sports team can truly give the ultimate power to its fans – that of selecting which players it wants to put on the field for a specific match. We all know there are team selectors, coaches, managers, the captain, etc., but take any match played in India, and you will inevitably have a section of the fans grumbling about one player selection or the other. The ‘if only’s will be endless, and will be loud and sometimes ugly if their favorite team lost a big or important game.

Fantasy Sports, through which fans select teams, can be a truly unbiased model for selecting the right pick. Because in fantasy sports, the fans have to pick their teams based on who will perform best on a given day – not because they have a favorite, not because a player is from your state or college, not because you like his style better than his average. And as millions of fans pick their teams, and as the winning teams emerge, a clear pattern of which players must be played emerges. Factor in the ground, opposition, current form, weather conditions, etc. and you have a truly crowd-sourced model for team selection.

Today’s data analysis technologies, the ability to track large groups of fantasy teams by millions of players, and the ability to factor for aspects like opponent and conditions using computers will provide a meaningful team selection process, free from the traditional constraints of scouts having to watch for players, players being picked on perceived form, or the omnipresent feeling of partiality based on geography.


Now, if only a team out there will put their hands up and say YES to truly “crowd-source” their team selection by listening to the fans through their fantasy picks … and who knows, we might see that soon in one of the many sports leagues that are around.

Witten by : Aravind Ramachandran, CPO at Fantain
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