For the first time in its three years of handing out Readers’ Choice Awards, About.com is opening the umbrella. The new coverage area includes a fantasy football category.

About.com, a property of The New York Times, hands out the publicly nominated awards to “showcase the best products, features and services in multiple categories.” Among the new categories this year is football, which occupies its own About.com subdomain, with “Best Fantasy Football Site” among the four subcategories.

The football wing also houses awards for: Best Football Blog, Best NFL Team Blog and Best NFL Draft Site.

The nominating process is open through Feb. 4, with reader voting following from Feb. 11 through March 8. Winners will be announced March 15.

“There’s no prize — just the bragging rights and potential traffic that come with getting recognized by the readers of a leading website owned by The New York Times Company,” football guide James Alder said in a recent e-mail to FSB.com.

With about 45 million unique visitors arriving at About.com a month, that potential traffic is something that many fantasy folks would be happy to win.

Now that I’m finally able to see through the tears that coincidentally arrived after someone else beat me out for fantasy football writer of the year, it’s time to pass along the full list of winners.

We’ll have more about the Fantasy Sports Writers Association awards — including historical data — over the next few days, but here are the folks who grabbed trophies Tuesday night in Las Vegas (in bold):

FOOTBALL WRITER of the YEAR
Ladd Biro, The Sporting News
Dave Richard, CBS Sports
Matt Schauf, RapidDraft.com

BEST FOOTBALL SERIES
Ryan Bonini, KFFL
Michael Fabiano, NFL.com
Mike Gilbert, RotoExperts

BEST WEB FOOTBALL ARTICLE
Andy Behrens, Yahoo! Sports
Christopher Harris, ESPN
Tim McCullough, RotoExperts

BEST PRINT FOOTBALL ARTICLE
Andy Behrens, Yahoo! Sports
Cory Bonini, KFFL
Matt Waldman, Football Guys

BEST FOOTBALL MAGAZINE
Football CheatSheets
Football Diehards
Sports Illustrated

BASEBALL WRITER of the YEAR
Tristan Cockcroft, ESPN
David Regan, RotoWire
Derek VanRiper, RotoWire

BEST BASEBALL SERIES
Matt Lutovsky, The Sporting News
David Regan, RotoWire
Chris Ryan, RotoExperts

BEST WEB BASEBALL ARTICLE
Tristan Cockcroft, ESPN
David Regan, RotoWire
Derek VanRiper, RotoWire

BEST PRINT BASEBALL ARTICLE
Brent Hershey, Baseball HQ
Chris Liss, RotoWire
Jeff Stotts, RotoWire

BEST BASEBALL MAGAZINE
RotoWire
Sporting News
Yahoo! Sports

BASKETBALL WRITER of the YEAR
Carson Cistulli, RotoWire
Shannon McKeown, RotoWire
Brian McKitish, ESPN

HOCKEY WRITER of the YEAR
Evan Berofsky, RotoWire
Jan Levine, RotoWire
Janet Eagleson, RotoWire

RACING WRITER of the YEAR
Adam Ansell, RotoExperts
C.J. Radune, RotoWire
Mark Taylor, RotoWire

COLLEGE SPORTS WRITER of the YEAR
Brad Evans, Yahoo! Sports
Chris Morgan, RotoWire
Jesse Siegel, RotoWire

GOLF WRITER of the YEAR
John McNamara, RotoWorld
Scott Pianowski, Yahoo! Sports
Greg Vara, RotoWire

NEWCOMER of the YEAR
Jake Ciely, RotoExperts
Mario Puig, RotoWire
Lane Rizzardini, Bruno Boys Fantasy Football

BEST HUMOR ARTICLE
Andy Behrens, Yahoo! Sports
John Paulsen, Bulls-Eye
Chris Ryan, RotoExperts

Back home from the latest Fantasy Sports Trade Association winter conference, we’ll have material over the next few days covering some of the stuff learned.

At the end of a Wednesday gobbled up by travel and family time, though, we’ll pass along the winners of the most recent set of FSTA awards (in bold):

MOST INNOVATIVE PRODUCT OR SERVICE
Grid Iron Fantasy Sports — VuFantasyFootball.com
World Fantasy Games — RapidDraft Fantasy Football Weekly app
RotoWorld — Draftmaster software; Season Pass; Online Fantasy Draft Guides
Fantasy Football Crystal Ball
Head2Head Sports — Injury/Bye Protection
RotoExperts.com — Fantasy Grinder
RotoWire.com — Fantasy Football Draft Kit (mobile)
FantasyPros
LeagueSafe
NFL.com — Fantasy Football 2010

MOST INNOVATIVE CONTEST
RotoExperts.com — Upset Challenge
World Fantasy Games — RapidDraft
Athlon — Pro+College Fantasy Football
NFL.com — Fantasy Playoff Challenge

MOST OUTSTANDING AD
NFL.com — TV spot
MyFantasyLeague.com — print ad
RapidDraft.com (World Fantasy Games) — Week 17 Twitter mock draft
ESPN — campaigns for fantasy baseball, Tournament Challenge and fantasy football
FootballDiehards.com — print-Web promotion

MOST OUTSTANDING CONTEST
NFL.com
FanDuel
CBSSports.com — Free Fantasy Football
World Fantasy Games
Fanball.com — Diamond Challenge Fantasy Baseball
WCOFF

MOST UNIQUE/OUTSTANDING LIVE EVENT or CONTEST
Baseball HQ — First Pitch Forums
WCOFF
NFL.com — Fantasy Live webcast
Head2Head — The Draft 2010
FanDuel — Fantasy Football Championship
RapidDraft.com (WFG) — RapidDraft Weekly

UNIQUE AD
NFL.com — “Dots” TV spot
FootballDiehards.com — print-Web promotion
RapidDraft.com (WFG) — Twitter mock draft

MOST VALUABLE CONTENT
Fantasy Sherpa
CBSSports.com
RotoWorld
ESPN
RotoExperts
Baseball HQ
RotoWire
The Huddle
XML Team
RapidDraft News (WFG)
NFL.com
FFSpin.com
FFToolbox.com
GodfatherofFantasySports.com (Charlie Wiegert’s blog)

MOST VALUABLE TOOL
RotoLab
NFL.com — Bloomberg Decision Maker; NFL.com Fantasy Tour
FantasyPros
Competitive Sports Analysis — scoutPRO
Fantasy Football Crystal Ball
RotoExperts.com
RapidDraft.com — Fantasy Football Weekly app
CBSSports.com — Fantasy Football Commissioner
RTSports.com — online draft room
Fantistics — Fantasy Draft Assistance Tool: Baseball; Football
RotoWorld — DraftMaster
MyFantasyLeague.com
Advanced Sports Media — Draft Analyzer

ROOKIE of the YEAR
FFSpin.com
FaGames
NFL.com — Fantasy Football 2010
FantasyPros
Competitive Sports Analysis
Gridiron Fantasy Sports — VuFantasyFootball.com
Joe Namath (World Fantasy Games)

Name: Michael Fabiano
Nickname: Gridiron Guru
Job title(s): NFL.com Fantasy Editor
Full-time in fantasy? October 2000-present
Age: 37
Education: Bachelor’s degree
Family status: Single
Favorite fantasy sport to play: Football
Favorite sport to watch: Football
Favorite team (any sport): Dallas Cowboys
All-time favorite athlete: Troy Aikman
Years playing fantasy: 15

I got my start in the fantasy industry when: I was hired by COMMISSIONER.com/CBS SportsLine.com in October 2000 as a Fantasy writer covering the NFL, MLB and NBA.

Since then, my fantasy résumé includes: I worked for CBS SportsLine.com as a Senior Fantasy Writer from 2000-2006 before taking the position of Fantasy Editor at NFL.com. While at CBS, I also worked with The NFL Today and was the first fantasy writer to ever appear on one of the four major networks on CBS’ Fantasy Football preview show. Now with the NFL, I also appear regularly on the NFL Network as a fantasy football analyst. I have also created two celebrity fantasy football leagues including such participants as Jim Nantz, Dan Marino, Boomer Esiason, Warren Sapp, Rod Woodson and Marshall Faulk.

Three questions

1. You’ve been a fantasy writer for a long time and active in the Fantasy Sports Writers Association for the past few years. Other than the explosion in volume, what has changed about fantasy content over your time in the industry — good and/or bad?

I think the thing that has changed the most IS the explosion in volume. There are tons of websites and talented writers out there covering every fantasy sport from every angle. It is amazing how many fantasy magazines you see on newsstands these days, especially when it’s time for football season. It’s also been very cool to see fantasy sports go from a hobby played by the hardcore fans only to becoming much more mainstream across the board.

2. Can you describe for us how your current setup with the NFL came about?

A lot of hard work and networking! It has always been a dream of mine to be involved with the NFL, especially since I’ve been a fan of pro football since I was eight years old. When I felt like it was time to move on from CBS SportsLine.com, I talked to the NFL about how the league wanted to move forward with fantasy football. Luckily, it was around that time that the owners decided to bring NFL.com in house. I started off with the league in 2006 as a contracted writer and analyst and was hired full time in 2007. The rest is history …

3. Do you gain any edge by working for the media arm of the league we all follow (first-hand news, players stopping by, analysts on hand — particularly the Playbook crew)?

Honestly, I don’t think I have any more of an edge than anyone who works at ESPN, CBS, FOX, etc. Regardless of who breaks news, everyone else in the industry has their version of it soon thereafter. There are some instances where I’ll be talking to one of our analysts and get information that I can use for my own fantasy prognostications, but for the most part I’m all about analyzing the stats. The NFL and fantasy football has become unpredictable in recent seasons, so even if I do get a nice nugget it doesn’t always translate into an “edge.”

Bonus: What, no fantasy baseball?

I actually started out primarily as a fantasy basketball writer at CBSSportsLine.com. I also wrote fantasy baseball columns, but neither of those sports compares to football. It’s always been my favorite sport, and it’s clearly the best fantasy sport. The season doesn’t last forever like baseball, for example, so every single game counts. People do often ask me what I do during the NFL offseason, to which I reply, “what offseason?”

The NFL has now become a 365-day-a-year sport, especially with all of the media coverage of such events as the Scouting Combine and NFL Draft. The NFL has truly become America’s passion, so it only makes sense that fantasy football would become similarly as popular.