It’s that time of the year folks and it doesn’t get any better when my two favorite things in the world are combined into some arbitrary blog post discussion – football and website design.

Yep – today, we’re going to break down the ESPN fantasy football website to demonstrate the how important it is to clearly define UX when considering website design.

So – without further ado, let’s tear apart the ESPN website design.

Here’s my take on what’s working for the page design. It’s clearly an ESPN brand, and for the visual consumer – we have three distinct choices from which to choose a different fantasy football experience. Having said that – I have several question marks – and for a consumer who might actually use this product or service – that’s not good. I’m already having doubts about my level of happiness. Will I be forced to pay for additional services that impact my experience? Will I be forced to pay if or when I reach the playoffs? So many questions prevent me from making a buying decision.

But the big question mark is – how much is it to play? I’m really having a difficult time finding a price point on this site within the first second or two of landing here. In this economy everyone is obsessed with pricing yet – ESPN buried it! The most important selling point appears in the banner copy – then again below the ‘call to action’ in light gray. It’s barely visible when I do a ‘squint test’. I personally would have made that scream off the page in a similar red as the buttons for the purposes of cognitive association. Umm, not good. Secondly – there’s a lot of wasted space in the banner where the video could have been used to sell this experience. But – what we’ve got here is a tiny video that’s buried under the more prominent funnels and I’m a little confused as to whether or not it’s a video. The video ‘play button’ is in a place I would not normally see it – so, again – question marks.

All these question marks add up – and prevent me from being able to make a decision. Not whether or not I’ll be playing fantasy football this year – because I will be, but whether or not I’ll be using ESPN or heading over to the NFL.com site.