Yahoo apologizes after fantasy site goes down

Ken Fuchs, head of entertainment, sports and games at Yahoo Inc., emailed players early Monday to apologize for problems with the site and its mobile apps.

“I’m disappointed that we failed all of our fans today,” Fuchs wrote in the email. “Our first priority is having the best experience for our users, and today we fell short.”

Fuchs said the outage started about one hour before the first games kicked off, which he called “awful timing.”

Yahoo, along with sites run by ESPN and CBS Sports, is one of the biggest players in the $800 million-per-year fantasy sports industry, hosting leagues where users pick a team of real-life players and compete based on their individual statistics. A study last year found that 32 million people in the United States and Canada were playing fantasy sports, according to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association. Football is by far the most popular fantasy sport.

Many players play casual leagues just for fun, but others gamble money – sometimes big money.

Yahoo said Monday afternoon on its fantasy football Twitter account that the website was back up, but users were unable to make lineup changes on mobile apps.

Bills RB Jackson out: At Orchard Park, N.Y., Bills running back Fred Jackson is out with a concussion, and there’s at least one teammate who’s unhappy with how Patriots linebacker Brandon Spikes celebrated after delivering the blow.

“Yeah, he’ll get his,” backup running back Tashard Choice said Monday. “I don’t like to see nobody get hurt, and then on top of that [Spikes] making fun of him while he’s on the ground.”

Choice was referring to how Spikes flexed his arm and then mouthed off at Jackson and several Bills players while the running back was down late in the fourth quarter of a 37-31 loss at New England.

“You know it’s cool to make a big hit,” Choice said. “But it’s not cool when somebody’s down like that.”