So, football season is here again. Which means that it's also time for fantasy football! I started to get into pro football a couple of years ago when I started watching Inside the NFL on HBO. It was a great show: it was hosted by Bob Costas and former players Dan Marino, Cris Carter, and Cris Collingsworth. The show had great highlight footage from NFL films set to dramatic Mr. Voice-type narration and the chemistry between all of the hosts was very entertaining.
Watching the show for a couple of years taught me quite a bit about football. I learned more about the rules of the game and started to follow certain players and coaches that I liked: Hines Ward (half-Koreans have to stick together!), T.J. Houshmanzada, Maurice Jones-Drew, Mike Tomlin, etc... Sadly HBO dropped Inside the NFL but it got picked up by Showtime. N. and I talked about it and we're contemplating subscribing to Showtime so we can watch the show.
So last year when some people at work said they were putting together a fantasy football league, I asked if I could join. If you don't know, fantasy football is a game you play by picking real individual players from different teams to form your own fantasy team (i.e. your quarterback is from one team but your kicker is from another team). So before football season starts, you get together with the other people in your fantasy league and each of you 'drafts' the players you want from different teams. Then every week you earn points depending on how your players did in their respective games. Every week you're matched up against someone else in your fantasy league and who ever gets the most points wins.
Hmm...it sounds like I know what I'm talking about, doesn't it? Well, last year was a DISASTER! First off, it turned out that a date I had made with my sister to go shopping fell on the same day as the draft. So I skipped the draft and let the computer pick for me. Big mistake! And even though I had decent knowledge about football, there were things about fantasy football that I didn't know and that no one had explained to me: like for instance, having to manually switch out the players you have on your bench. I didn't figure it out until half way through the season. I had players active on my team that weren't even playing games that week! I was trying to be all sassy and "I'm a girl but I know about football" but I just ended up embarrassing myself because I didn't know about the mechanics of fantasy football. I came in second-to-last, only beating out our marketing intern.
Fast forward to this year: I thought it would be fun to be in the league again and that it would be a good way to keep in touch with people in the office. So I ask around. And I'm told that there are a 'limited number of slots available in the league.' (sad!) I send back another email pleading my case ("I promise I will actually attend the draft! I bought a magazine to study up!") and a couple of days later they tell me that a slot opened up. (Yay!) I used E. as my mascot and named my team "The Binky Blitz."
So E. and I went to the draft. I followed some of the advice from the magazine, but went with my own gut feelings on some choices. And I ended up with a pretty good team. And last week, (drumroll please) I won my match AND had more points than anyone!
I was pretty excited as I watched my points rack up over the weekend. But then I found out that due to a technical glitch when the league was set up, Week 1 didn't count in our overall scores. (!) Scoring begins this week. LAME! I am just hoping that my team continues to do well so I can at least come in someplace before 6th place--you know, have a respectable showing.
Labels: fantasy football