ESPN Fantasy Basketball sucks so I decided to make my own. Ask me anything!

Ever think of making one for football?

If enough people like it for the NBA, then NFL isn't too far away :)

For the love of all that is holy, please. If the devs actually had to use their own app they'd realize how fucking awful it really is

ESPN Dev downloads ESPN's app: Who tf made this ?? Oh wait.

Am I the only person who actually likes ESPN's fantasy football app, a lot?

It's the best one available and it's still terrible.

Yahoo Master Race (sucks slightly less)

I think Yahoo's layout/UI is a nightmare. It's so cluttered.

Agreed, especially after this year's update. It also drives me nuts that the app has some stuff unavailable on the site and the site has stuff that's unavailable on the app.

Woot! Agreed.

If you ever decide to shoot for Fantasy Football, I would strongly encourage you to find a way to port league history into your new system. My leagues have considered moving to a new system, but don't want to because ESPN saves the results for prior years. I don't know if it is possible, but it is worth looking into.

Yeah...I think a lot of people are getting tired of Yahoo/ESPN. I'll see if there's a way to make this work. Thanks!

Nice rhyme

Pssh.. I can make a rhyme anytime

I'm not a big fantasy person but that scoreboard/schedule/standings UI is gorgeous. Do you think you could make an app that's just a "scores" app for NBA/NFL/NHL etc.? I know nothing about programming so I could be completely wrong, but it seems like it wouldn't be too much extra work since you've already designed the scoreboard separately.

Good question! Roshi was originally only scores and people really wanted Fantasy so I added it in this summer :)

A lot of people seem to be asking for NBA + NHL so stay on the lookout...

Are there legal issues to creating your own fantasy site? e.g. using player and team names

And how are you getting stats to update points?

I'm a developer myself and have always wondered about these two things!

Can't copyright facts. Getting real time numbers is another issue though so he's probably only updating with delays or maybe once a night or something.

Correct.

Addressed this below - But to reiterate, scores are updated live and are paid for :)

What's the revenue model then since it's in the store for free?

And why the minimum age?

The minimum age is because Apple makes me...why? I really don't know.

And monetization will come later. :)

Get people hooked, then put the ads everywhere. Good idea.

Nooooo...no ads ever.

you've probably thought of this, but if you integrated payment for the league into the app then it would be a useful feature AND you could take a tiny %.

Now there's an idea :P

What about an android version?

Coming soon! :)

How about a windows universal version?

If your comment gets enough upvotes, then it's definitely a possibility!

I mean he already has 37 upvotes on his post, I'm pretty sure every Windows Phone user in the world upvoted it. Better get on this.

^{Just so this post is more than just a shitty joke I guess I'll say your app is really cool and I appreciate what you did with it}

On it. :)

Man that's awesome. You're like us, always saying 'one of these days I'll show them how this should look like'. Except you glorious bastard actually did it. Make sure surely to notice the reddit family once android gods live!

thank you for the encouragement!! Hope you like it :D

awesome looking app cant wait to try the android version

Awesome - I'll keep you posted! :)

btw will the ios and android versions be able to play with one another?

Of course!

When do you expect it to be released? I can't wait to give it a try!

A) Next season hopefully - a lot of people are requesting this B) Or, get an iPhone. Not a 7 tho, you need an aux port :D

What if I have self respect?

Whoa :O

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/03/29/ap_090911089838_sq-3271237f28995f6530d9634ff27228cae88e3440-s900-c85.jpg

Out of curiosity why go apple before Android when 90% of smartphones on the market are Android. It just seems like entering the densest market first would be the more logical and profitable.

True - tbh the only reason is because I have an iPhone :)

But it looks like a lot of people are requesting Android so maybe it's time to buy one....

How does ESPN's daily stuff compare to Yahoo's? Are you planning on getting into that aspect of it at some point in the future or is it just too much?

If you mean daily fantasy: I really don't like the idea of gambling since it takes away the fun of following the game (and desensitizes you from it to tbh)

Fantasy basketball should be something that you play against your friends so whatever features I roll out in the future will help improve that! :)

Why did you remove the post? I was just reading it then.....boom gone.

Sorry, situation with the mods - we sorted things out though

How many users currently use your fantasy basketball? And how many do you think it could support? I'm an avid player and was thinking of switching over because this looks good

Looks like this post did surprisingly well to say the least haha...

Currently it's at 20k leagues made!! :)

One thing I hate about all of the current fantasy sites is the lack of customization when setting up a league, such as scoring options, player positions, and bench size. Do you plan on giving commissioners more options to customize their league?

Yeah I definitely agree...I changed the way scoring works on Roshi. Basically you're given a $100 Million salary to buy the players that you think will score the most points. You're ranked amongst your friends based on the cumulative points you score that week and the winner gets $5 Million every Sunday and is crowned. It makes the system a lot easier to understand for newbies, a hell of a lot easier to play with when buying players

So if you can invite players after the initial draft, how does drafting work? Are the late players kind of shafted? Or is there a weekly draft?

Edit: Or, since you can draft right when you sign up, are you allowing people to have overlapping players within leagues?

So you start off with a $100M salary cap and use it to buy the players that you think are going to score the most points. Your players that you bought carry over to the next day where you can return them and buy someone else.

The marketplace that you buy from closes when the first game starts and reopens at midnight. You can see the players that your friends drafted once the marketplace closes.

This is super cool!! I’ve always wanted to play fantasy basketball but was averse to it because of how long it takes...how does setting a league up work on Roshi?

Super quick!!! Takes less than <1 minute to set up a league and draft your players once you download the app. I optimized the inviting process so it's super easy to do :D

"Takes less than a minute" That's impressive :)

Yep!!! It had to fast, that was my #1 priority....ESPN takes AT LEAST 4 hours (if you account the time it takes to set up an account on your computer, email your friends, sit through the draft, etc.). Who has time for that smh...

How does the draft work for the league?

You start off with a $100M salary and buy players that you think are going to score the most points that day. Each subsequent day you return them if they're not playing since your goal is to maximize the number of points you make. When you're friends join, they do the same, and you're ranked based on the cumulative points you make that week. Every Sunday a winner is crowned, $5M and earns a trophy :)

Any plans to add baseball, hockey or football?

Which one would you want to see first?

Hockey!

It's a possibility!

Football!

SOON! :D

Baseball please! I can't tell you how many times the apps that Yahoo and espn use blow. Then halfway through the season they change the interfaces and completely ruin how the app work. I just want some consistency with my fantasy teams.

I totally understand - in fact, that is one of the reasons why I built this thing in the first place!

I'll add MLB to the list of requested features :)

As a UX Designer you managed to solve a lot of issues fantasy owners face when using yahoo and espns apps. How much research went into this before you began design and development?

Oh man..at least a month was spent in designing the UI. I mentioned this below but a lot of the stuff you see like the hovering score pages had to be written from scratch.

Other things like loading scores/fantasy quickly was more of a technical ting.

Someone asked something similar, but to be direct. How do you get the stats? Is there an open API I'm unaware of?

Currently paying a pretty penny for it. Luckily my school provides grant money!

Edit: re-approved

messaged!

Proof: https://postimg.org/image/lfc4xz6zz/

Great app man. Can't wait to use it on Android, how soon will that be?

Triton Pride.

Next season - I think... Triton pride.

Can we do one for college basketball?

Now there's an idea...

How long did it take you to develope the App? Just curious because I've just started learning programming (:

Some 1000+ hours. The UI had to be perfect. Most of the stuff that's default on iOS wasn't quite what I wanted so some things you see in the app like hovering pages had to be written from scratch.

But I think most of my time was spent on the backend...I wanted this thing to be lightening fast. I made a gif for a reddit user below that I'll repost here for comparison :)

gfycat.com/CommonZanyEsok

Is LeBron the best in the game?

To refrain from the curry/davis/etc. fans, I probably shouldn't answer that

But....congrats on the 20,000 points for all LeBron fans!!!

Are you planning on adding blocks and steals to the Matchup scores?

Literally working on it as we speak....new update coming this week (with 3pt %, FT%, etc.) :D

Is there an option to input info from previous years so that a league can keep track of wins from previous years when switching to your app?

Roshi will keep track of your wins on the app year to year :)

What's the name of the song in the demo video?

20syl ongoing thing

So...my friend and I have had an idea for a fantasy add-on that is needed in the market but nobody has. Everyone we've talked to (non-programers) loves the idea but we can't find programers who are fantasy minded! It's become really frustrating looking for someone who can code a simple app that has the potential for a large user base. So my question is how can I find other like minded programers that have a fantasy focus? It's been a struggle. Any tips? Thanks!

Thanks! Would love to hear your ideas: [email protected]

[deleted]

If you click the league name, you can invite your friends right to that league!

Fellow CSE triton here! I have been on and off with trying to learn how to develop iOS but never really get over that learning curve. Any tips on iOS programming? Any good resources that you used? Thanks. I don't really have problems with Obj-C or Swift but xCode itself.

LOL YOUR USERNAME (pines does suck)

I learned off Youtube...add me on fb if you want help!

I'm a mobile/web dev based in Seattle. I use react and react-native. Working on something similar but for football. Need some help?

Sure, can you shoot me an email: [email protected]

how many people are on your team? or did you do the entire product yourself?

Yep built it myself!

Is playing fantasy sports a declining hobby? I had a great time in like the 08-10 seasons in both the nba and nfl, but personally it just felt like I grew out of it. I make my march brackets every year for ncaa basketbal, but that's about it nowadays.

I think the app itself has a lot to do with how addicting it is. If it's hard to do something, then people won't do it - and that's the case with current fantasy apps. They basically take a webpage and embed it inside an app....and that's NOT how apps should be made. It should be native. So the goal of Roshi was to make setting your lineup/ inviting your friends absolutely effortless, and therefore more fun too :)

How long did it take you to finish the app since you first started working on it?

It was actually broken into a lot of pieces, with scores debuting first. I worked on fantasy during my summer break :)

So why are your tweets not public? Seems kinda shady to me.

Request and shall accept :)

As someone from Europe who has no Idea what Fantasy Football or basketball is,what is it ?

Fantasy basketball is basically something where you compete against your friends to see who knows the most about basketball (in short). Roshi challenges you to draft the players that you think are going to score the most points and you're ranked amongst your friends weekly based on how well you do!

Hey OP, this looks really cool even though I don't usually do fantasy basketball. I have a few questions, if you see this.

1. How easy is it to add other sports now that you have an app built? I would assume it's much easier.

2. Would you consider adding support for MLS as well? I know it's not very popular but a lot of other fantasy apps don't support it (as far as I know the only place to do so is the official website) so it would be super cool if there was an app for it.

3. Is this a salary-cap based format, or a draft-based? Can you do either? If it's draft based, how does it work for someone to join an existing league like you mentioned? Wouldn't they be at a huge disadvantage as all the best players would be gone.

4. Monetization: how are you planning to do this? A suggestion I have is making an option to put a buy-in price on leagues. So if I set up a league and want to, I could make it cost $2 to enter. My friends and I would pay $2 each and the winner would get his back, and you would get the rest. (Minus Apple's cut of course)

1. I think a lot of people are asking for NFL so I'm looking into that rn
2. MLS is really interesting..I don't follow soccer too much but if it's demand exceeds that of NFL, then I'm down to do that!
3. Each user can buy any player they want from the "marketplace". You can see your friends lineup when the marketplace closes (this happens when the first game starts).
4. Maybe down the road :)

If someone from one of the big fantasy sports companies stumbles into to this thread and want to buy your app, what's the smallest you would sell it for?

Selling is the last thing I'll ever do to Roshi. I put a lot of effort into making this something remarkable, and I def won't see it become another yahoo.

The biggest flaw of yahoo fantasy basketball is that a deceptive player (like for example, my asshole beother) can have a player get his points for the day then drop him before midnight directly after his game and pick up someone playing the next day. If you do that everyday, you are basically gaining 60+ points on everyone daily if they aren't as "dedicated" of autisticly compulsively checking the site (again, my brother) have you done anything to make free agency more of a even playing field?

Yeah that's a huge problem!

To solve that I implemented something called a marketplace. This is where you buy and return your players. It closes when the first game starts and reopens at midnight. This is great because you can draft in the morning and see how well your players do in the evening (and it takes care of people who try to cheat the system) :]

Are you planning on opening a business?

So a lot of people seem to be downloading the app right now...

What's you favourite team? No judgement from me! (unless it's the sixers)

Seattle supersonics :P

Can you verse people as a general leaderboard, not just scoring against your league? Everyone join my league Coz I'm lonely, league name: reddit

If you click the league name, you can invite your friends right to that league!

As for a general league, a couple people are asking for it so I'm going to roll one out on Monday when the new week starts

Ok cool, Coz I'm in Australia and it's to hard to find 6 friends who follow the nba.

Gotchu. I'll add everyone in a general league right now.