it's only fantasy if you aren't winning


my pointing out that i've now won five fantasy football titles in ten years isn't really bragging. it's just stating the fact of the matter.

however trivial you may think the world of fantasy sports is, let's face it. that just means you haven't played them. for years now, i have championed fantasy football as my true gateway into my love for the nfl. it really is kind of astounding to me that more of my friends won't follow along. everyone and their mother roots for a college football team, most of the folks i know being either alabama or auburn fans. and don't get me wrong. if you are going to have a rooting interest, you might as well pick one that has a legitimate shot at winning their championship, which both of those schools do. unless your rooting interest is, in fact, your alma mater, why one would torture themselves by rooting for a little sister of the poor is beyond me, but that probably only further indicts me as a fairweather fan, which i totally am. that being said, if you are going to pay attention to college football played at high levels, i don't understand neglecting the natural next step of watching professional football on sundays. every nfl team has 20-30 equivalents of your favorite college player. the game is faster, more efficient, more athletic and more powerful. and if you ever get a taste of it and like the flavor, there is nothing that would solidify your nfl fandom more than owning a fantasy team. on an average roster, you have 14-16 players representing almost as many teams, which means you'll be invested in more than 75 percent of every game that's played on a given nfl sunday. rooting for your players. rooting against the players on your opponent's teams. reconciling which you'd rather happen first. your fantasy team winning? or your real team (sorry falcons)?

fantasy football has given me a greater appreciation of the just-less-than gods that entertain me every nfl sunday. fantasy football has also given me a greater appreciation of how good i am at fantasy football.

two years ago, i did this.

this year, i won again.

while i ended up with two marks in the loss column in 2010, i don't know that i enjoyed a nfl season any more than i did this year, the main reason being one of my favorite football players of all time, mike vick, not only lead his real team to a division title, but he anchored the alabama asianmen all year, too. there is no sweeter feeling for this fan than when real life rooting interest also pays dividends on your fantasy roster. for having played as long as i have, it's really kind of a surprise it hasn't happened more often. i had rowdy roddy white for a couple years. i traded for michael turner last year. that's really the list. maybe subconsciously, during the draft, i avoid falcons because i know my heart would want to start them every week even if it wasn't the most sapient fantasy move (god help me when julio is on an nfl roster next year). probably an enlightened strategy. like most of my strategies.

let's break down the season. for the first time in the history of our league, we used the auction draft format, which means, in theory, every nfl player is available to each team in the league. the only factor is how much you want to pay for him. each team starts with a $200 budget with 16 players to draft. my first and most expensive pick ended up being the fourth best player on my team. not great, but not the worst money i could have spent. ray rice only single-handedly led me to one victory all year. it just so happened to be my playoff semifinal. i'll take it. my next three picks also ended up as major contributors to my cause and top four players at their respective positions (tom brady, greg jennings, jason witten). it may be just a coincidence that not one of the other nine teams in my league could make that claim. it's probably not. with the 84th (EIGHTY-FOUR) pick in the draft and my 8th selection, i stole the number one running back in fantasy and my mvp, arian foster. don't try to remember anything substantial he did at tennessee. he was a bust. don't worry about what round he was drafted in the real nfl draft. he wasn't. i paid $16 for him. including my own ray rice, 20 running backs were more expensive in our draft. it may be just a coincidence that i ended up with him. it's probably not. those five picks (out of 16) were the only five that started more than 8 games for my team. the other starters in my championship game came via our waiver wire, which means they had either been cast aside by one of the other nine teams after their draft or they were not taken among the 160 picks in our auction. of those types of players that ended up on my team (coincidence? probably not.), dwayne bowe ended the year as the 3rd best fantasy wide receiver. darren mcfadden was the sixth best running back. another player ended up as the 6th best player at his position, too.

mike vick.

mike vick was my first true waiver claim of the year. i claimed him before week 2 after kevin kolb went down with a head injury in week 1. vick led the alabama asianmen to the first of his 8 (out of 14 team total) victories that week. asianmen went 8-1 in vick's 9 (brady went 6-0. brett favre went 0-1) starts this year, the only loss (one of only two during the entire campaign, remember) coming in week four when the redskins knocked him out during the first quarter. thanksgiving weekend, mike vick enacted his revenge on the redskins on a monday night when he turned in the third best performance in the history of fantasy football. after scoring 74 points for me that night, i blindly and unconditionally started and rode to victory vick the next four weeks even while tom brady outscored him sitting on my bench in the last three of those four. i benched vick in my playoff semifinal, going against my gut, and almost lost as he outscored brady by 30 points while sitting. i scraped by, started vick in the title game and ended up not needing him as my opponent's players were either hurt or didn't show up for the most important game of the fantasy season.

the most interesting part of the vick story, relative to my league, is this. vick got hurt week four and was out for a few games. brady had his bye week five. i needed a quarterback for week five, and i had three options. drop vick, pick up replacement. drop brady, pick up replacement. concede the loss and keep both. well, i don't really do "concede the loss", so i hedged my bet by dropping vick, knowing that if i did so with brady, some team in the league would swallow him up and away from me. i lost week five anyway (stupid favre!), but still sat at 3-2, nowhere near the bottom of the standings and nowhere near the top of the waiver wire. i dropped favre immediately and claimed vick. i opened up my league wednesday morning melancholy at the thought that someone would have gotten him ahead of me. but they didn't. i got him back. it may be just a coincidence that i didn't lose another game the rest of the way. it's probably not.

as cocky as this post sounds (and is), fantasy football is a fickle game. barring injury, you're likely (not promised) to get good production from your top three picks. everyone is. and so, a fantasy draft and season has nothing to do with the first three rounds. it's the middle 4-11. what rookies are going to get playing time? who will be the dark horses (foster, vick) in the age of fantasy sports where all the dark horses have already been identified by some fantasy "expert". how closely can you man the waiver wire in the first couple of months (mcfadden, then bowe) to find a producer on a bad team that might be turning into a good team where he'll produce even more? it's fickle. and it's trivial. but 50 million(-ish) people can't be totally wrong. and if i am going to do it, i might as well do it right, right?

so, i do.

war asianmen.

again.