Head-to-head, nine categories, on ESPN

Box Out

Category-league fantasy basketball, judged in the currency your league counts: category wins. It reads your ESPN league — this week's matchups, the table, the draft and what it was worth, every season the league has kept — and for your own team it works out the moves worth a look, with what each one is worth in categories a week.

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What it is for

Measured, and written down

Every claim here was measured on eight seasons of one real league and published before it was built into anything. The numbers are categories a week, because that is what a nine-category head-to-head league is won in.

The moves worth a look

+0.16

Categories a week the pickup recommender added over doing nothing, at its 0.20 bar. It names a move on about one decision in eight and says nothing clears the bar the rest of the time, which is most of the time.

Backtest over 616 team-decision points, 2026 season · docs/pickups_backtest.md

The open place

0.38 vs 0.00

Categories a week a streamed place returns, against what the thirteenth man a roster holds all year returns. Holding a man for a rainy day is the expensive habit; the place itself is the asset.

1,536 team-periods, 2019–2026 · docs/streaming_lane.md

What it will not pretend

25 of 55

Past trades whose better side the evaluator picked — a coin. So a trade page leads with what a deal does to each side's nine categories, one line at a time, and prints that record under the number rather than beside it.

55 deals over 6 seasons · docs/trades.md

A tool, not gospel. Every number comes with what it rests on and what it does not know. Nothing here fills in a lineup, makes a claim or sends a trade: it lays out the reasons and you decide.

What it needs, and what it will not do

From you

An ESPN fantasy basketball league played head-to-head in the nine categories, and an email address to sign in with. No password, ever: the link is the sign-in. One member of the league connects it with his own ESPN login and sends everyone else an invite.

Not on your behalf

Nothing here touches ESPN on your behalf. No add, no drop, no claim, no trade, no lineup is ever submitted for you. It reads your league with a member's login and writes back nothing at all.

Box Out · boxoutfantasy.com · built on ESPN's own data, read with a member's login; nothing is written back to ESPN.