Tell me again why I do this every year?

I hate fantasy football.

It sucks.  Hard.  With a loud slurping noise.  Actually, that’s not 100% fair to say- it’s not that fantasy football sucks, it’s more that I suck at fantasy football.

Hard.  With a loud slurping noise.

I’ve been my fantasy league’s doormat for years (I unofficially call my team the Bye Week).  The main reason is because I am not one of those FF guys that spend every waking moment poring over sports pages and stats, analyzing trends of how Joe Running Back performs against teams in the western half of the U.S. that have artificial turf surfaces in temperature ranges of 57-73º during the first three weeks of September of a contract year for his left-handed quarterback who is coming off a season-ending jock itch injury.  I have neither the patience nor the time- nor, frankly, the desire- to put THAT much friggin’ time and effort into it.  I suppose if I did, maybe I’d be better at it.  But holy crap, folks- it is getting as stat-obsessed as baseball.  And not just fantasy baseball- regular baseball.  I absolutely love baseball, but there are so many statistics- the pertinent (batting average, ERA, etc.) and the completely and totally obscure and meaningless (pretty much everything else)- that it just takes away from the enjoyment of the game to have to have calculators and slide rules.  Personally, I think they’re making many of them up.

For anyone who doesn’t know, fantasy football and its many brethren are basically Dungeons and Dragons for sports geeks- minus the 29-sided dice and pocket protectors.  Every August we get together at the “commissioner”’s house (the guy that runs the league) and have a draft that, up until this year, lasts about 2 hours longer than it has to, during which we pick from the best of the rest (all the players that are really worth a shit are already on someone’s roster as that person’s “keepers”).  Every year I think I do a decent job of drafting (and some years I actually do- on paper), and then every year my team gets sodomized for 14 straight games.

This year proves to be no different.  I have two pretty good keeper running backs, neither of which did shit in Week 1, and one of whom earned himself a concussion.  I apparently waited far too long to pick a quarterback in the draft, so I am stuck with a low-mid-tier QB in Marc Bulger of the Rams as my “#1″ guy, and I think he must have missed his plane to Philly, because he sure as hell wasn’t on the field this past Sunday.  (If he was, I sure as hell never saw him.)  I have five wide receivers, all of which had very respectable games.  Not great, but I believe all of them had double-digit points.  Only problem is that I can only play three WRs at the most each week.  My “good” defense gave up 34 points, and my “back-up” defense gave up 10 points and had 7 sacks.

We’ve had some debates in our league before about people “putting forth the effort” and what not, and how some of us “want to be spoon-fed all the information” instead of going out and looking for it.  To an extent, yeah, I guess that’s true.  But then, if you had the choice of being GIVEN something and having to go out and get it yourself, what would you do?  Hell, that’s pretty much the whole reason the welfare system exists.  Anyway, as I said before, I have neither the time, patience, nor desire to sit in front of the computer every waking moment going over stats and trends and stuff.  And as I said before, maybe if I did, I would be better at it.  But here’s the thing:  yeah, we “play” for money- a couple hundred clams, depending how many transactions get made during the course of the season- but still, hardly enough to be THAT frickin’ studious and diligent.  Hell, I have a wife and kids and a life full of a hell of a lot more important things to deal with.  Fantasy football is just a fun little diversionary way to spend the football season, nothing more.  If people want it to be this ultra-competitive, high-stakes, cutthroat, ball-busting league, that’s fine and dandy.  Jack the entry fee way the hell up and have a good time, because you won’t see my ass.

I’m a competitive person by nature.  I admit that.  I friggin’ hate losing.  That’s why I don’t gamble, or play much of anything for money.  I could win 40 hands of blackjack in a row.  The second money becomes involved, I will never win again.  That’s just how it is.  But there are a couple guys in our league, holy crap- they make me look tame, competitiveness wise.  It’s like, give it a rest, guys.  They want all these rule tweaks and point system changes that benefit the teams in first place (usually them) that they would wholeheartedly vote shoot down in a heartbeat, were they in my position (usually last).  Again, I realize that until I really, really put forth the effort (studying trends, spending the entire summer researching players, learn how to draft properly, etc.) I will never win a fantasy football title.  But I accept that, as do the couple of other owners in the league that are in my same basic boat.  Hell, I’d figure the rest of the owners would like having people like me in the league, as to insure at least one easy victory a year, two if you’re in my division.

Anyway, I’m still here in my normal place at the bottom of the standings, wondering why I continue to piss money away every year and enjoy doing it.  It is SO wrong that I secretly start hoping for season-ending injuries for certain players just so my fantasy team might not get beaten nearly as badly.  But I will continue to do it- it’s all I’ve got right now.