What a bunch of sports nuts! Yes, I am one of them, one of those guys who updates his fantasy team multiple times per week during the NFL’s regular season. There is so much to look forward to each week for the fantasy football enthusiast. Not only do we play because of our passion for the wonderful sport of football, but also it enables those of us who wish we had the opportunity to be an NFL owner or coach to show off our mad skills.
Fantasy football allows the average Joe to sort of “live the dream” in his own small little world. It does take some smarts to be a successful manager though. It’s one thing to have a hunch that running back LaDanian Tomlinson is going put up decent numbers this year, I mean he only scored 31 TD’s last year to go along with over 2,300 yards, so he is pretty much a sure bet, but it takes an intelligent fan of the game to know which quarterback to start in week 8 when your current starting QB is on a bye. Odds are that all the other teams in your league probably have the highest rated QB’s on their rosters already so you have to choose between a bevy of other players who are less proven. You could pick up Rex Grossman, but he plays like Joe Montana one week and then the next week looks more like Akili Smith (you’re probably trying to remember). You could pick up Dante Culpepper who threw for over 4,700 yards and 39 TDs a few years ago but since then has been hampered by injury and is starting for the lowly Oakland Raiders this year, a team that gave up more sacks last year than Tito the bag boy on double coupon day at Burt’s Market. Anyway, you get my drift, there are loads of decisions to be made in order to successfully lead your team to the top.
One big motivator for most fantasy football buffs is a little something called “bragging rights”. This is usually more important to the player(s) who talk the most smack during the season. For those who don’t know what talking smack entails, here is an example:
Team 1: “__________ should just quit now and save himself some future embarrassment.”
Team 2 response: “Oh yeah! I almost forgot, when I beat you last, I let my girlfriend update my team, I needed a week off.”
Bragging rights are extremely important; they directly correlate to the amount of satisfaction that the fantasy devotee receives. There’s nothing like defeating last years champ who currently has the team name of Repeat ________ (his name or something clever would be in the blank). You would then also receive more satisfaction by talking some smack; maybe say something like “Repeat ________? More like, Repeat my ass!” It just makes everything more fun from week to week. It’s all done in good fun and makes the league more enjoyable. Definitely learn to not take yourself or others too seriously. If you are overly competitive then you will have the opportunity to work on that flaw.
I could go on and on and give you some tips and pointers for your own fantasy team, but hey, I don’t want to give away the shop. I am participating in 3 leagues this year and am the commissioner in 2 of them. They call me DomiNATE, yes that is my team name, but it’s my name for a reason.
So you wanna know what to do about fantasy football… join a league, talk some smack, have some fun. Thanks for reading; if anyone wants to talk some smack with me lets start a fantasy football thread in the forums.
“What a sports nut, huh?” -Mrs. Finkle (Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994))
*this article was featured on September 3, 2007