Move The Chains Fantasy Overview

Move The Chains is a free, season-long, salary-cap fantasy football tournament. Managers get one entry and a $100 salary cap to build a competitive team with. There are no head-to-head matchups, everybody is competing for the top spot on the same leaderboard, most points at the end of week 17 of the NFL season wins. No bad beats, no early playoff exits, every move you make adds up to your final total.

Before toe meets leather on September 9, you'll draft your 12 player roster, and that roster is yours to manage all season.

The Roster
Your 12 player roster includes:

Every player has a price and your whole roster must fit under the $100 hard cap (sorry NBA cap nerds, no aprons here). Prices are set 2 weeks before the start of the season, which will be August 26 for the 2026 season, and fluctuate throughout the season based on how many other managers are adding/dropping them, which means your effective salary cap can fluctuate as well. Add players when their price is down and drop them when it's high to grow your salary cap and get more studs.

Each week you'll set your lineup and choose a captain whose score is doubled. Choose your captain wisely every week, this is where you flex your muscles and chase spike weeks to pull away from the pack.

Scoring
Scoring is mostly pretty standard with a few small tweaks. It's full PPR with TE premium (1.5 per reception for TEs), QBs get 4 points per passing touchdown.

Check out a full scoring breakdown here.

The call sheet is your main weekly huddle all on one page, you can set your line-up, your captain. Call your audibles and even see a recommended move. Don't lose sight of bye weeks. They're going to be a huge obstacle throughout the year to make sure every spot in your lineup is scoring points every week.

Best ball is great for its simplicity, managed leagues are great for their hands-on-ness, but if you're a tinkerer, there's nothing like this format. You get 1 free move each week, every subsequent move costs 10 points against your total for the season. That doesn't mean don't take the hit, it means be smart about it and take it strategically. If you don't use your free move in given a week, you can bank it for next week to use on top of your normal free move. You can never bank more than 2 free moves.

The best part of The Wire is it's a legit market; player prices are dynamic and they change based on how many other managers are adding and dropping them. If you see a player with an easy upcoming schedule, add him onto your team before everybody else does, and then move them off your team at a higher price to increase your salary cap.

Player moves a lock at their individual kickoff time, so you can make moves all the way up to Monday night.

You get 3 audibles and can use each one once throughout the season.

Call them when the defense least expects it, and make sure you get your execution right.

This is a different format, but I think it's just different enough that it'll be really fun. It borrows some of the best parts of managed and some of the best parts of best ball. There's no head-to-head luck. There's no playoff bracket. It's built for people who really know ball and can see an upcoming bye-pocalypse before it happens.

The NFL season starts on September 9th, but MTC starts two weeks before that, when player prices are dropped. On August 26, all player prices will be calculated and released publicly. And the game will open up for you to be able to draft. Managers will have 2 weeks to draft their team before kickoff and lock it in to play MTC Season 1.