Since its inception a few years ago, the fantasy football IR spot has been a point of contention in many fantasy leagues. Then, in 2020, the complications wrought by COVID-19 only intensified disputes about how commissioners and leagues should handle IR spots.
For those relatively new to fantasy football, or fantasy sports, in general, here is everything you need to know about leagues’ IR spots.
What Does the IR Spot Mean in Fantasy Football?
For the longest time, fantasy football didn’t even have the option for IR spots. When it was first introduced, unless you had previously played fantasy baseball, it might have been a completely novel concept.
If you have played fantasy baseball, then you’re already familiar with the concept of an IR spot. In baseball, it’s called the IL spot (formerly the DL spot). If an MLB team places a player on the injured list, you can put him on the IL in your fantasy league.
I don’t know for sure when it started, but I’ve been playing fantasy baseball since 2003, and it was there back then.
Functionally, the IR spot in fantasy football is identical to the IL spot. However, the NFL doesn’t actually have anything like an injured list in MLB. For leagues and commissioners that view fantasy sports as an extension of the real sport, this can create some debate in leagues as to how the IR spot should be handled.
The NFL Treats Injured Players Differently Than MLB
Injuries are a major part of any sport. The NFL is certainly more conducive to players getting hurt than any of the other sports, but they all have rules in place that govern how teams handle injured players.
In baseball, there is no daily or weekly injury report required. In football, teams have to submit daily practice reports four, three, and two days before game day. The final injury report is what contains the official injury designations: questionable, doubtful, or out.
If a player is either listed as out or has no injury designation, you know his status in advance. If he’s listed as questionable or doubtful, although we will have reports leaning one way or the other ahead of time, we won’t know for certain until inactives are set an hour and a half prior to kickoff.
The MLB injured list enables teams to replace players on the active roster. In the NFL, if a player is out, the team isn’t suddenly short one player — they just activate someone else to the game-day roster.
Where Does Injured Reserve Come In?
Historically, the injured reserve was, well, “reserved” for players who were out for the season. In 2012, the NFL modified their injured reserve rules to allow teams to designate one player who would be eligible to return after eight games. In 2017, they bumped that number up to two, then again to three in 2020.
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Ahead of the 2022 season, the NFL and NFLPA once again revised the rules for injured reserve. Players on IR are required to miss a minimum of four games, but now up to eight can potentially return.
The NFL has gradually, but heavily moved toward the side of not penalizing teams for injuries. After all, they’re already short the player that got hurt. Do they really need to get hit harder beyond that?
How Does the IR Spot Work in Fantasy Football?
The biggest problem I’ve encountered in fantasy football when it comes to IR spots is the reluctance of commissioners — as well as some managers — to want to mimic the NFL. To them, the IR spot should be for players on IR, and that’s it.
All too often, there is a sense of “Well, that’s how the NFL does it” when it comes to fantasy football rules. Our game may be designed based on the real thing, but fantasy football is not real football. We can and should do things differently when it creates a fairer and more enjoyable experience for managers.
Fortunately, fantasy platforms understand this. If a problem does arise, it’s not because of how the IR spot operates on fantasy sites but rather in how commissioners and league members think it should operate.
The default rules for an IR spot are the same across just about every fantasy football platform. Some allow for more customization than others, but if your commissioner changes nothing, here’s how it will work.
If a player is on the NFL’s injured reserve, he can go in your IR spot. That’s the easy part.
There are never any arguments as to whether players actually on injured reserve should be eligible for the IR spot. The contention arises when a player is merely out for the upcoming week but not on IR.
In Yahoo and ESPN leagues, commissioners have no discretion on the matter. That’s not to say they can’t manually enforce any rule they deem appropriate, but if a player is listed as out, each platform will allow fantasy managers to place him in their IR spot.
On Sleeper, commissioners have a wide array of options regarding how to customize the IR spot. In addition to the above, commissioners can choose whether to allow suspended players, N/A players, holdouts, those in COVID protocols, and doubtful players on IR.
Since ESPN and Yahoo allow players listed as out to be placed on IR, managers have the freedom to do so once a player is officially ruled out. However, some commissioners opt to impose the additional restriction of adhering strictly to the phrase “injured reserve.”
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I find this to be an antiquated way of thinking and too beholden to the term rather than the spirit of what an IR spot is designed to do. In leagues with this limitation, there’s no way to police it automatically. Commissioners have to check each team to ensure compliance manually. It’s tedious and unnecessary.
I am a proponent of the liberal use of IR spots. If the platform lets you put the player on IR, then you should be able to. I even support doubtful players being IR eligible, as 99% of players listed as doubtful do not play. In the unlikely event they do play, managers will have to drop a player to activate the doubtful player from IR anyway.
What Does It Mean When a Player Is in Your Fantasy Team’s IR Spot?
It’s probably fair to say the most frustrating aspect of fantasy football is injuries (well, that, and losing with the second-highest point total).
We know injuries are unavoidable. You will be hard-pressed to find a single manager in any league that hasn’t dealt with injuries at some point in the season. It’s something we all have to navigate.
If you play this game long enough, there will be a season every so often where your teams are completely derailed due to injuries. It happens.
The purpose of the IR spot is to soften the blow. That’s not to say IR spots can salvage your season. There’s nothing you can do if you lose too many players — the replacement-level options just aren’t good enough.
However, throughout the season, we’re all going to deal with some players missing at least a couple of games. The IR spot makes it a little bit easier to fill in your lineup when it happens.
When your team loses a starter, you have to replace him by picking up another player. If you can put your injured player in an IR spot, that player no longer counts toward your total number of rostered players. It frees up a roster spot to add a replacement without having to drop another player.
I find IR spots to be extremely beneficial. Of course, you’d rather have the guy who got hurt, but there’s nothing we can do about that. What we can do is help you replace him without hitting you double by either making you drop the injured player or drop another healthy player so ensure you have a full lineup.
It’s a true double whammy and one that we can and should easily prevent. If your commissioner has liberal IR rules, at least you’ll only lose the injured player when he gets hurt.
Should Your Fantasy Football League Utilize IR Spots?
As you may have gathered, it’s a resounding yes from me. At its core, fantasy football is supposed to be fun. Do you know what’s not fun? Losing players to injuries.
Do you know what’s even less fun? Being forced to drop useful players because someone else on your team got hurt. There’s nothing fun about injuries, and it’s only compounded when having to decide which of your healthy players you’re dropping to pick up a replacement starter who probably isn’t going to do much anyway.
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Fantasy football platforms have equipped commissioners with the ability to help mitigate the damages injuries cause fantasy teams. The goal should always be to maximize fun and fairness. IR spots help, even if just a little bit. If your league isn’t utilizing IR, you should propose their addition immediately.
With the fantasy football season behind us, why not start preparing for your rookie drafts with our dynasty rookie rankings? Additionally, as you look to improve your team heading into 2024, our dynasty trade calculator can help you find the perfect deal to boost your championship chances.