Millions of you will play fantasy football with ESPN this season, and while only one person can technically win a fantasy league, everyone can be a winner at what's truly the most important part of playing fantasy football: picking a great team name.
Whether we want to admit it or not, finishing atop the standings in a fantasy league involves plenty of luck. Even the most star-studded roster can fall victim to underperformance, injury, benching, coaching changes, contract holdouts, touchdown vultures, the rise of a running back-by-committee ... the list sadly goes on and on and on. You can't control what happens on the field. You can only control one thing: the mind-shattering cleverness of your fantasy team's name.
So how to pick a great fantasy team name? A few paragraphs down are some suggestions for 2019 team names. Feel free to scroll right to those (if you haven't done so already). But if you're still here: a) hey, thanks!; and b) here are some guidelines on coming up with an original team name that just might go down as the greatest in your league's history, inevitably lavishing you with fame and riches.
At least try
Upon creating a team, you will automatically be assigned a team name placeholder. It will feature the word "Team" and then your last name. "Team Jones," for example. Again, this is a placeholder. It is to hold a place. Briefly. Replace it with something. Anything. Keeping your placeholder name all season is as bad as autodrafting your whole team. Actually, that's not true. It's worse.
Lean into puns
Puns have a bad reputation. They get groans. And eye rolls. They are slandered as "dad jokes." But here's the truth about puns: They rule. That is: Puns rule if you think of them. If other people drop a pun? Eh. Kind of lame. Your puns, though? Great. Inspired, even.
But even if you hate puns (including your own, for some reason), there's no better option when naming a fantasy team. There's limited space. It's 15 characters per field on ESPN's platform. I mean, if you can lay out a nuanced joke format with a setup and punchline about a fantasy-relevant NFL player that is pun-free in 30 characters or less, congrats to you. You are a comedy-writing legend. I just don't know how you'll find time to manage your fantasy team while churning out all of your blockbuster screenplays.
Use an active player on your roster
"Over the Dwayne Bowe" is an all-time classic, right? But he hasn't been in the NFL since 2015. You need to let it go.
"Rolling with Mahomes" is a good current team name. But if Patrick Mahomes is not on your 2019 team? Sorry. You shouldn't use it. (Also: Sorry that he isn't on your fantasy team. He's awesome.)
This also means you shouldn't name your team after defensive players (tough break, "You're Not the Bosa Me") or coaches (farewell, "Belichick Yourself"). Although, if you really want to do that, you can always lobby your commish to include defensive players and head coaches on rosters. And if he's a tyrant who just doesn't get fun, you can always become a league manager yourself and set the rules as you see fit. (Head coach, how does that work, you ask? Kind of like a defense, but you get points based on margin of victory only.)
Don't draft for a team name
OK, I know I just told you that you could alter your league in pursuit of a team name, but let's get real for a second. Don't draft a player just because he can produce a good team name. Does Kalen Ballage have some upside? Yes. Should you draft him in the second round so you can name your team "I Kalen Like a Wrecking Ballage"? No.
Well, maybe.
OK, no. You shouldn't.
Get bonus points with structure
Real football team names have a set structure: City, Plural Noun. Denver Broncos. Buffalo Bills. Chicago Bears. Boom, bang. If you can find that rhythm with your fantasy team name -- Davante's Inferno, Landry Service, Inglorious Staffords -- you're going next level. You have achieved fantasy team name enlightenment.
Keep timeliness in mind
The Brady Bunch is a classic TV show. But it hasn't been on the air since 1974 ... and Tom Brady has been in the NFL since about then. "The Brady Bunch" team name is dated. You can do better. (By the way, you can also do better than Brady at quarterback this year.)
While Saquon Barkley is young, fresh and the top-rated player in all of fantasy, referencing a 1986 song by Lionel Richie with "Say You, Saquon" isn't exactly, as the kids of that era said, "hip to the scene."
But you can also go too far the other way and be too timely. That current meme you love? It's not going to age well. No one is going to get why you named your fantasy team "The Feral Hogs" come September, let alone December. Try to find a balance between timeless and timely. Good luck.
OK, without further ado -- by the way, Further Adu was a great name for an MLS fantasy team a decade ago -- here's a big list o' 2019 fantasy football team names, almost none of which meet all the guidelines above. (Shrugs.) Some of the names are new, some you may have heard before, some you'll wish you had never read.
Good luck this fantasy season and happy pun-ning!
Running back-themed fantasy football team names
For Goodness Saquon
Say You, Saquon
Oh Saquon You See
King 'Quon
A Scanner Barkley
Kamara Borealis
Instant Kamara
Michelangelo's David Johnson
Zeke Squad
Zeke and Destroy
Zeke and Ye Shall Find
This Gurley's On Fire
Le'Veon Let Die
Le'Veon a Prayer
Le'Veon on a Jet Plane
Not Your Average Joe Mixon
Mixon Match
Mixontape Feat. Joe
Dalvin and the Chip Hunks
Is this tortured word play? Oh, yeah, 100%. Is it a way to make a pun, predict your team will win the championship and compliment all of your players for being handsome in just five words and six syllables? Also, yes.
Conner Among Thieves
Hot Chubb Time Machine
Kerryon My Wayward Son
Stow Your Kerryon
Forgive and Fournette
Little Len Fournette
Sony Side Up
Cold as Guice
Guice Infestation
I Kalen Like a Wrecking Ballage
Kalen Me Smalls
Big Ballage Brand
Wide receiver-themed fantasy football team names
Davante's Inferno
Forgot About DeAndre
Ob-La-Di, OBJ, Life Goes On
Me and Julio Down by the End Zone
jujulemon
Turbo-Schuster
It Tyreeks When Eifert
A combo name if you have both Tyreek Hill and Tyler Eifert on your team. And let's be honest here: getting Tyler Eifert healthy and productive again is as important for fantasy team naming purposes as it is for the Bengals.
Hooked on a Thielen
You've Got That Loving Thielen
7th Evans
Stairway to Evans
That's Amari
Amari 2600
Is It Too Late to Say Amari?
Godwin Bless America
Godwin Or Go Home
You Play to Godwin the Game
Golladay Inn Express
My Kupp Runneth Over
Keke, Do You Love Me?
Feeling Coutee Might Delete Later
T.D. Metcalf
Radioactive D.K.
How I Metcalf Your Mother
N'Keal Before Zod
N'Kealin Me Softly
Captain and N'Keal
Andy Isabella the Ball
DJ Chark Doodoodoodoodoo
You probably shouldn't draft Jaguars wide receiver DJ Chark. He had only 174 receiving yards last year and no touchdowns and he's not expected to be more than a WR3 on a run-heavy team. But the main reason you shouldn't draft him is so you don't get this song stuck in your head.
Quarterback-themed fantasy football team names
Rolling with Mahomes
Country Roads, Take Mahomes
Sherlock Mahomes
Luck Be a Brady
Deshaun of the Dead
It's Always Darkest Before Deshaun
Aaron on the Side of Caution
Carson Investigator
Attempted Carson
White Picket Wentz
Barbed Wire Wentz
Baker's Mark
Wake and Baker
Mayfield of Dreams
Peaceful, Brees-y Thielen
This is the perfect team name for all the people out there who play fantasy football, have both Drew Brees AND Adam Thielen on their teams AND enjoy 1970s soft rock. All 13 of you.
Green Eggs and Cam
Goff and Running
I'm About to Go Goff
Dak to the Future
Dak in Black
Return of the Dak
Baby Got Dak
Hit Me with Your Prescott
Kyler the Creator
Kyler Soze
Natural Born Kylers
Thrill Murray
There's Something About Murray
Tight end-themed fantasy football team names
Kelce Handler
Ertz So Good
Love Ertz
Kittle League
Kittle Corn
Kittle Big Town
Vance Like No One is Watching
Vance in My Pants
Mary Kate and Greg Olsen
Fant-asy Team
You Fant Touch This
Don't Talk to Me or My Hockenson Ever Again
Hockenson Loogies
Kicker-themed fantasy football team names
Zuerlein'd Coat
Bad Mother Tucker
Yippee Ki-Yay Justin Tucker
Livin' On A Prater
If you're going to name your fantasy team after a kicker, lean toward the Justin Tucker names. You're going to want to sound as intimidating as possible. Because you just named your fantasy team after a kicker.