Fantasy football is the toast of American society. It's a billion dollar industry. Every major sports website has a fantasy section. There are magazines and TV shows completely dedicated to this totally trivial fall activity. It is an organism all its own. I started playing several years ago and I've been engrossed in it ever since. Most people I know participate. We all come back every season for the fun, for the trash-talk, and for the fanfare. And also to inevitably have our hearts ripped out and crushed under the massive boots of the football gods week in and week out.
There is nothing more frustrating or more painstakingly agonizing than participating in fantasy football. I'd like to think that I know a little something about the sport and the professional players that play it. I'd like to believe that my unwavering attention to all the games every Sunday pays off on draft day the following season. I read up and listen to what the pundits say. I try and blend that information with what I already know to build the ultimate fantasy football empire. I swear I look at my team and think that I am putting out a pretty dominating squad. I feel good going into each season. Then the games are played, and I shake my baffled head as the scores reveal themselves.
Case in point for the 2012 season:
-In one league I am far and away the points leader. The next closest player is like 60 points behind me. Yet I am managing a .500 team. For whatever reason, I am getting multiple "best weeks" from my opponents. I'm putting up a ton of points and somehow that's not good enough. It's like a high-octane offense that's stuck with watching the Redskins defense try and defend the lead.
-In another league I have had several games where I lose by 2 or 3 points. That's it. All you need is one player on Monday night to catch like 5 passes. He'll catch one. Or I'll be up 20 going into Monday. The opponent has a player that goes off as MVP of the game. C'mon. What the hell? If roles were reversed and I needed that player to go off on Monday night, he would have been totally neglected in the offensive game plan. Oh and of course when I annihilate everybody in scoring that week, the one player in the league that scores more points than me is the one I happen to be matched up with. Jesus Christ.
-In another league (in which I actually admittedly have an bad team) I hate my players. I hate them all. So I bench them. Then they have awesome days when their points don't matter anymore. Sigh. Nothing ever breaks right.
Look, I know every single fantasy owner goes through this same dialogue. Everybody thinks they are snake-bitten. For some reason in 2012 that sentiment has come to the forefront for me. Apparently, I love going against a Doug Martin owner every time he does something historic for rookies, for the NFL, and for fantasy points. It's halfway through the season and I'm sweating out some playoff spots. It is agonizing. My heart palpitates when I think that I played the wrong guy in my flex spot. My knees are shaking that the night games don't yield any high scorers that I'm playing against. Maybe I should Tweet an expert and ask a question about two players I'm mulling over. Is there anyone I can pick up that can strengthen my team? As soon as I pick him up, will he no longer produce? DOES ANYONE OUT THERE WANT ME TO WIN??
The range of emotions one finds during a fantasy football season is seldom found anywhere else. It is a 17-week euphoric hell. All you end up doing is second-guessing yourself or boasting to anyone who will listen depending on your results. It really is unsatisfying unless you win your league (or at least win some money). Yet millions of people put themselves through this every year. More than once, too. I like to be in more than one league. I am in three this year. I need more action. I need my fix. Maybe I just like getting my soul bloodied and beaten by once-in-a-lifetime performances that are arbitrarily scored by some website. The punishment is just too glorious to stay away.
I've had my share of the weeks where I put up 140 points, but got matched up against the one team that scored more than me. It annoyed me so much that I came up with an idea for a new scoring system:
ReplyDeleteEvery week each team should get points based on how many points they scored relative to the other teams in their league. In a ten team league, the highest scoring team in a given week should receive 10 points, and the lowest scoring team should receive 1. At the end of the season add up all of the points for all of the weeks and determine playoffs from that.