What is a good fantasy football score?

You scored 118 points on Sunday and want to know if that is good. The honest answer is that no number is good or bad on its own. A score only means something next to the other scores in your league that week, and a league's scoring rules, size and roster settings change what a typical score looks like. A 118 can win your week by thirty points in one league and finish in the bottom half in another.

This guide gives three ways to judge a score fairly, from a thirty-second check to a comparison that works across leagues.

Why a raw score is not enough

Four things move the points on the board without changing how well you actually managed your team:

• Scoring format. Full PPR, half PPR and standard scoring award different points for the same catches. The same lineup can score noticeably more in a full PPR league. The PPR versus standard guide shows the arithmetic.
• Roster and starting slots. A league that starts a second quarterback, a flex or two, or a tight end premium has more scoring slots and different values at each position.
• League size. In a 14-team league you are competing against more managers, and the best players are spread thinner than in a 10-team league.
• The week itself. Weeks with several high-scoring games lift every team. A score that wins one week is average the next.

Check 1: where does it rank in your league this week?

The quickest fair test is your place among the scores in your own league that week. Count how many teams you outscored. Beating 8 of 11 opponents in a 12-team league means you had a better week than about three quarters of the league, whatever the total was. Do this every week and you have your all-play record. A season-long all-play win rate above 50% means you usually beat most of your league.

Check 2: how far above or below the league average?

Rank tells you how many teams you beat but not by how much. Compare your score with the league's average score for the week, then ask whether the gap is large compared with how spread out the scores were. If most teams scored between 95 and 125 and you scored 118, you were well above average. If scores ranged from 70 to 160, the same 118 is a good week but not a dominant one. Statisticians call this gap measured in spreads a standard score. It is the idea behind the next check.

Example (illustrative numbers): Your league averaged 104 points this week and a typical team landed within about 15 points of that. You scored 118. You were 14 above average, close to one standard step. Another manager in a different league scored 97 in a league that averaged 83 with a similar spread. That is also 14 above average. Their 97 is as good a week as your 118.

Check 3: compare against a team built for your league

The first two checks only compare you with your own league, which may be unusually strong or weak. To compare across leagues you need a reference that matches your exact scoring, roster and size. FantasyMatrix builds one for each league each NFL week and reports the result as Matrix Score: 100 is a typical team in an equivalent league that week, and 15 points is one standard step above or below. A 115 is about one step above a typical team, whether it came from a 10-team PPR league or a 14-team standard league.

What a good score looks like over a season

Single weeks are noisy. Injuries, bye weeks and one lucky touchdown can swing a week by 20 points. For a season, look at three numbers together: your all-play win rate, your points for rank in the league, and your expected wins compared with your actual wins. A team that is top three in points, above 60% in all-play and at or below its expected wins is good, even if its record is mediocre. The reverse pattern is a warning, as the luck guide explains.

What not to compare

• Your score with a friend's score from a league with different scoring.
• Your score from a heavy-scoring week with one from a low-scoring week.
• A single week with a season-long result.

See your own numbers

A free FantasyMatrix account shows your Matrix Score, your rank on the global Leaderboard and your all-play record once you connect a league. Sleeper connects with a username only.