Living in a Fantasy

Anyone that knows me realizes my love for football. I grew up watching it with my dad, playing streetball with the neighbor kids and finally got on an actual team in 6th grade. (League Champs in '94 and '95)

When that shitty realization that summer is almost over hits you right in your grill, I bask in the fact that I will soon get to watch my Dawgs, Hawks and Colts compete for another chance at a Championship appearance (regardless how feasible it is- my passion is blinding). From August to February, I’m generally unavailable if football is on. On Saturday, Sunday and Monday, there is a chance I will be foregoing all responsibilities and sitting on my ass on the couch. [disclaimer: also the occasional Thursday] 70% of my internet use is on ESPN, NFL.com, Profootballtalk.com or the like. In fact, when I first started dating my wife I told her when it came to football, either she was in or she was out. I’m still not sure if she was just a casual fan at that point or not, but either way, she’s soldiered every football game I've ever wanted to see. In fact, for my birthday she flew us to Indy for the Hawks/Colts game a few years back. She remains interested, continues to learn and impresses me all of the time. There was a point where I had to justify the money I spend on the NFL Ticket on DirecTV and just the other day she was out of town and complained of her lack of NFL exposure… I think it’s safe to say, those discussions will be short and painless in the future.

As an avid but slowly aging fan, you find the opportunity to go out and be physically competitive to be difficult when you’re trying to juggle the responsibilities of life. Especially in this lovely Seattle weather. Sure you can get on a soccer team that plays every Wednesday or you can find a flag football team, but unless you find a solid group, you often find yourself driving 30 minutes to a field for a game only to find that half the other team is too hungover to show up. But a man has this instinct in him that requires him to compete. And whether you’re finding time to hit the gym or just sitting down to play Xbox Live against someone, most men have a need to compete.

In 1963 some evil genius that was an affiliate of the Oakland Raiders created the first Fantasy Football League. It was called the “GOPPPL” (Greater Oakland Professional Pigskin Prognosticators League). It was very basic and was a TD-only league; 50 years later it might be one of the largest sports betting options in the country. In fact according to these here interwebs, the oldest running league started in Spokane, Washington in 1981. It started as a TD-only league and maintains that archaic format to this day, but it’s OG none the less.

For those that don’t know, Fantasy Football is a league in which people draft NFL players to form a pseudo-team, scoring points according to each players statistics each week. For us football nerds, it gives us a chance to endulge in passer ratings, weekly matchups and injury reports every week while maintaining a legitimate excuse for doing so…. “I’m studying for my fantasy team.” At first my wife was concerned at the amount of time I spent reading about football but when I told her how much money 1st place gets in the league, she quickly became involved. Little did she know it’s like doing research on your favorite bourbon.

Over the years I played fantasy football with random groups of friends and each year was a little different and each year I found flaws in the system. I remember when we played on pen and paper only! We had to look up stats in the newspaper to figure out our score, then we’d call the person we were playing to discuss the score. Long story short is that maybe I’m a control freak or I truly have legitimate gripes, but most of the leagues I played in were bullshit.

There were leagues where I didn’t know everyone and while some players would dish the trash talk, they couldn’t take it. Yes, I know, I can be a bit of a dickface with my button pushing, but stop being such a baby. If you’re going to insult me, the idea isn’t to have a comeback that is nicer, the idea is to make you understand that I will assault your brainwaves with my words. It’s the least I could since Tom Brady scored 50 points on me. Those high strung dung slingers make the league less enjoyable.

There was a year where a friend asked if I had anyone to fill the last few spots in the league so I invited some other buddies. Those guys ended up taking 1st and 2nd place and never even got paid in full.

Basically--- I wanted a league that was fun and dependable. Part of the trouble was that from year to year you could never count on a league to be there for sure; You never were assured that all players paid on time. So what did I do? I did what any liberal Occupy ass-hat that has a problem with the system does, I started my own league… Oh wait no, those Occupy people just complain about the system. In any case, football is what I do on the lords day, so I aptly (and rather blasphemously) named our league “The Church”.

This league was semi-carefully chosen and was built by the people (me) for the people. A league built so that each player has a place to spend their hard earned money every season. I got 10 dudes together as best as I could for my first year as League Manager and after the first year we were left with seven. One of my best friends, we’ll call him “Gargamel” won the whole enchilada in our inaugural year and just as I would expect, he hasn’t let us forget it. Even worse than him winning was the fact that out of 10 people I got 9th… And the 10th place dude, barely set his lineup towards the end of the season…

This year was about redemption. Not only did I want to whoop Gargamel’s ass, but I wanted to remember what it was like to win. Being from Seattle, it’s not exactly the feeling I’ve come to be familiar with. Gargamel started the season 3-0 so he had momentum on his side. We met in week four and wouldn’t you know it, Papa Smurf put Gargamel in his place. As usual Gargamel continued to win after that and stayed in first place ALL SEASON LONG!!!! Until last week.

Last week I pulled out a win while he got his 3rd loss in a month and that landed our league in a 5-way tie for 1st place with a 7-4 record. As I have the most points in the season, I technically stood at 1st place finally! This time last season I was 3-8. With two weeks left in the season we approached Thanksgiving week. Three glorious football games on Turkey Day starts the week off right. My two best running backs happened to be playing eachother during the night game on Thanksgiving and as I should have, I played them both and they both pretty much shit the bed.

Nervous that I would fall out of first place after only 48 hours, I almost just accepted defeat Thursday night. The weekend played out, my Huskies won their annual rivalry game against the ******* (we dare not type their name) and the Seahawks got their ass handed to them by the struggling Redskins.

Monday night approached and this was the landscape…

I’m down by 10 points with two wide receivers to go, both on the pass-heavy New York Giants. My opponent had posted his final numbers for the week, so a win was on the horizon, but nerves are still there. Gargamel was tied in his game with a mediocre running back going against two wide receivers, a loss was iminent. A fellow 7-4’er, we’ll call him Captain Sneak Attack or CSA as he’s come to be known in the last 10 seconds… was leading by 75 points but still had to face Drew Brees and stud tight end, Jimmy Graham.

Without going too deep into the details, I needed both of them to lose. My game ended up being a blowout, I won by 33 points. Gargamel won by just under 5 points and Captain Sneak Attack got lucky as all hell and won by just 3.6 points after watching Drew Brees slowly chip away at his lead.

So here it stands, final week of our regular season and it’s bout to get grimy. I remain in the top spot at 8-4 and the highest point total. CSA is also 8-4, but is trailing by atleast 50 points. Gargamel also holding an 8-4 record trails me by a meager 8 points. There is a fourth Musketeer at 8-4 but he holds a significantly lower overall point total. Which puts me at 1, Gargamel at 2, CSA at 3 and Musketeer #4 appropiately at #4.

My matchup for this final week? GARGAMEL!!!! If I win, I lock a 1st round bye in the playoffs. If I lose, I need CSA to lose as well to maintain that 1st round bye. Forget the point totals, whoever wins my match this week is the #1 seed for the playoffs! The defending league chump who loved rubbing my face in it all off-season is between me and my #1 spot. I beat him once this season but will need to sweep him to retain my dominance. I’m nervous, but god damn am I excited! COMPETING. It’s a special thing. I wish I was on a field screaming in excitement over a win, but as I finished up my TPS reports, logged off of my computer, found my way home through a horrific commute, I was greeted by a delicious dinner and a football game between two teams I could give a shit about, yet the games outcome meant the world to me!

Anxious for the website that hosts our league to post the updated records and points, I sit here thinking of all the ways this week might play out. My matchup is semi-favorable, I’m interested to see the line; And although CSA and the 4th Musketeer are playing opponents with a combined record of 9-15, I’m ready to dictate my own fantasy fate. I’m pumped. It sounds absurd to some of you. It sounds downright nerdy to a lot of you. But for all of you neigh-sayers out their calling fantasy football stupid… When was the last time you were this excited for something?