beavers
Footballguy
A nice blog from the NYT that pretty much explains week 17 and beyond...
http://fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12...y/index.html?hp
http://fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12...y/index.html?hp
Fantasy Cold Turkey
By Mark St. Amant
So it’s Sunday afternoon around halftime of the early games, and this — writing this entry — is the first time I’ve even looked at the laptop today. Seriously.
It’s pretty unsettling, to be honest. For the past sixteen straight Sunday mornings (or more, counting preseason), I’d be surgically attached to the Mac keyboard from the time I woke up — usually around 6:30 a.m. with Baby Saint’s first “Ma-ma!…Da-da!” yelps from her crib — all the way through the Sunday late game more than fourteen hours later. Sunday after Sunday, fantasy football was all I knew. All I did. All I wanted to do. All I wrote/cared/obsessed about. (Yes, Mrs. Saint has a divorce lawyer and D.S.S. on speed dial.)
Now? I don’t know what to do with myself and all this free “real guy in real life” time. I feel as if I’ve woken up in someone else’s body — someone more mentally well adjusted. I ate a leisurely breakfast without caring one iota what Eric Karabell had to say on his fantasy radio show about Brett Favre’s likely playing time. I showered – yes, actually bathed . . . on a Sunday . . . with soap and everything — without fearing that I’d miss a key update on such life or death matters as the Ron Dayne vs. Darius Walker backfield situation in Houston. I watched “Baby Van Gogh” with my daughter without worrying that I should be watching “Sunday NFL Countdown.” I even left the house for a while –- yes, call me Jon Krakauer, but I actually ventured outside into the harsh, unforgiving wilds of downtown Boston! — to take the aforementioned Baby Saintette to the Boston Children’s Museum. And I got back home after 1 p.m. . . . without leading a police chase and/or causing a C*H*I*P*S-style 37-car pileup in my rush to get back to the computer and set my lineup/check inactives before game time. In short, I was a functioning member of society again. At least for a day.
Speaking of the museum, the place was chock full of unshaven, zombified fantasy dads just like me trudging around after their young’uns in a semi-stupor, holding cups of Au Bon Pain coffee, squinting into the sunlight, wondering just what the heck we were supposed to do out here in the real world. If, while pulling half-chewed crayons out of my daughter’s mouth in the toddler arts & crafts room, I’d suddenly yelled, “O.K., who’s up for a one-day-only fantasy draft?! I’ll take Carson Palmer!” I’d have had an impromptu snake draft on my hands, with 11 other bug-eyed, quivering, cold turkey dads chiming in with “Pierre Thomas!” “DeAngelo Williams!” and other potential Week 17 studs. Hell, the guy picking 12th might have even yelled out “Gimme Matt Jones and Quinn Gray at the turn, dammit…I want the Matt Jones-Quinn Gray double-dip!” (And, amazingly, he’d probably have won.)
But I resisted the urge. Because, even weirder, I’ve found that as the day goes on, I don’t miss fantasy. At all. No stress. No worries or shredded nerves. No short, snippy responses to questions from Mrs. Saint about where her maroon scarf is or how much laundry detergent I’m using in each load. No gritting of teeth and biting of nails over every Ben Utecht yard and catch vultured from Dallas Clark. I’m just a regular old football fan again, watching the N.F.L. for pure enjoyment, and it feels pretty cool to take a day off. Hey, even I can get tired of fantasy sports. I love my job and what I get to write about, but I’m kinda like the official taster in the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream plant –- after 364 straight days of eating delicious, creamy ice cream, even he probably thinks to himself, “You know what just might make me want to gouge my eyes out today? Another spoonful of #%$@ ice cream!”
And it helps that most games look like preseason matchups. Charlie Batch taking on Troy Smith. Seneca Wallace hooking up with Nate Burleson. Someone named Mustard (not sure if he’s related to the Colonel) catching passes from Jay Cutler. And Dave Grohl . . . er, I mean, Kyle Orton . . . quarterbacking for Chicago.
No, there’s just not that much football excitement to go around until maybe tonight, when Vince Young tries to pull off another national TV upset against Indy’s third-stringers (and some gentleman named Marvin Harrison, whoever he is) and vault his Titans into the playoffs. Still, Heath Bar Crunch or no Heath Bar Crunch, I can’t help watch each game with a twitchy fantasy eye. Case in point, I wanted to kick in the TV when Ron Dayne lugged his husky hindquarters into the end zone. His goose-egg no-show last week in Indy hurt us in WCOFF, where, sadly, we ultimately finished 10th overall — not bad out of almost 900 teams, but certainly no $300,000. Whoops, there goes Dayne for his second TD of the day. Thanks a lot, tons o’ fun . . . I hope they don’t serve milkshakes down in Fantasy Hell.
Anyway, if you don’t want to/can’t shut off the fantasy valve just yet, I highly recommend playing playoff fantasy football. Here’s my piece on playoff fantasy from last year’s Fifth Down, explaining rules, strategy and the like (obviously, the player names and playoff teams are a year out of date, but you knew that):
So are you automatically going to win your playoff fantasy pool if you snag all Pats or Cowboys? Maybe. If your league mates are dumb enough to let you draft all Pats, then go for it. Brady, Moss & Co. should give you three solid games of production. But you never know –- the sneaky guy who snags David Garrard, Earnest Graham, Fred Taylor, Joey Galloway, Ernest Wilford and the Bucs D might end up storming past all of you if Tampa and Jacksonville catch lightning in a bottle, play three games on their way to the big one in Arizona. Or what if Seattle and San Diego make it? The guy with Hasselbeck, LT, Branch, Engram, Gates and Chambers could be sitting pretty.
So, happy playoff drafting. It’s a great way to keep that fantasy jones going for another month.
Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s time for more “Baby Einstein” with my little gal. What else am I going to watch, Brad Johnson vs. Todd Collins?
(Mark St. Amant is the author of Committed: Confessions of a Fantasy Football Junkie and Just Kick It: Tales of an Underdog, Over-Age, Out-of-Place Semi-Pro Football Player.)
maybe david or joe can confirm, but didn't st. amant write for FBG back in the day? i registered in 2005, so he was before my time, but i think i remember reading that somewhere here??i'll second the above re: the book. i bought the "committed" hardcover when it first came out, read the paperback which had some new stuff in it, and re-read it before this season and it hasn't lost its luster. the players have changed (book was about the 03-04 season) but the sick obsession and fantasy themes are universal, and still ring true. i also read his second book "just kick it" which was about him, a suburban white dude who never played football before, joining an all-black inner-city semi-pro football team...also very funny, but w/ more of a deeper "friday night lights" kinda story to it. highly recommend it.re: the WCOFF post, i followed the league on their message boards (i'm definitely joining next year) and st.amant was first for the $300,000k as late as week 14 or something so he knows his stuff...and his NYT blog is entertaining too. i posted a couple weeks ago about it, which i discovered late in the year, and a lot of his start bench advice helped me win my league. like the writers here, he doesn't give the obvious "start brady and LT this weekend" advice -- always digs deep to find those weekly sleepers that put you over the top, the info that blows guppies out of the water. e.g. roddy white was one guy he was urging people to pick up long before he went off, i snagged roddy, and he helped me win my main league and almost $2k. also told everyone to get maroney off their benches down the stretch and that paid off for me bigtime too. i'm obviously a fan, but it's good to see the "paper of record" has finally jumped on the fantasy bandwagon with some credible, funny writing. a good hire if you ask me.great line above about the "matt jones-quinn gray double-dip" 
