Sullie
Footballguy
1989 - it was my first year. It was an office league and I had the 3rd pick in an 8 team draft and Warren Moon was my first pick. I don't recall that we even had magazines out yet and the only thing available was Cliff Carpenter's 1989 Fantasy Football book and (as I recall) at least 5 or 6 of us had the exact same book. I just looked it up, I think it featured Greg Bell of the Rams on the front of it if I'm not mistaken. God it was so much fun. We drafted at the office, the draft lasted way, way too long. We had one guy that substituted for another guy and he was an absolute RINGER. He was from New York, he had been playing fantasy football for a few years and his draft was amazing. The next year we instituted a "no sub rule" for the draft!
1991- I joined another league, in another city (about 200 miles north of me) drove up for the draft and, to me, that was okay but it was a 12 team league and I was just not ready for it, too many sharks and I was still a guppy. Later on, I got better but that league started a spinoff keeper league a few years later and that was fun for a while until there was an expansion draft, then it turned horrible. I really hated that keeper league, to me it sucked the fun right out of it because there was no in person draft, it went on all year long and you never felt like you ever got a break from it. So, it went from new, unique, fun and interesting to meh, going through the motions, playing along to finally complete and total burnout. The last straw for me was that I got a call on a Saturday morning in February at 7:00 am "Hey Sullie, you wanna trade blah for blah?" And, of course, it was one of those stupid, one sided trades and I just thought "I'm done with this" and I quit. That was 1997.
1994 - I met the girl of my dreams (she still is) but she lived in Indianapolis and I lived in Cincinnati. . . I found a job in Indianapolis and I moved there to be with her so I quit my job and, naturally, the office league I had joined in 1989. We later got married, I hated the job I transferred to (love the hell out of the dream girl and I really like Indianapolis) but I gutted it out for another couple of years at my crummy job until 1997.
1997 - I started a new job at a new company and I did not have a fantasy football team so I thought it was time to start a league. Again, this is a time pre-internet. So I got 8 co-workers plus my brother and I started a 10 person league. We drafted in person, I bought those large tear off sheets of paper, everyone wrote their drafts on the sheets with a marker, we ALL had fantasy football magazines and the FOREVER JOKE of the draft is that one guy drafted Bubby Brister first and his 2nd pick was Bruce Issac. . . always a classic. That guy quit after the first year.
2022 - I dissolved the league. One of our founding members passed away last fall. He was awesome, he became a close friend over the years and I let him pretty much co-run the league with me. He was 79 and he really looked forward to playing fantasy football every year and he was just one of those people you can't replace. So another guy quit to go work at a different company about a month ago and a 3rd founding member e-mailed me the other day to say he was no longer playing. And, if I'm being completely honest, I was so overjoyed he did that because I was completely over it last year after our friend passed away. I'll be more candid and just say I had been going through the motions for a few years now. I had used a 3rd party tool for the last few years to help me draft because I stopped getting excited about fantasy football years and years ago. I really had not been into fantasy football for a few years and I found myself just watching random NFL games with my son just to enjoy the game. I felt like fantasy football made me focus on the players so much, I stopped focusing on the games a long, long time ago. . . which is messed up if you think about it. I think, for me, fantasy football stopped being fun a long time ago and it had become an obligation. I miss the in person drafts the most. The problem was that no-one wanted to host them any longer (can't blame them) and getting 10 people to agree on a draft date is a big enough chore let alone working in an in person draft, setting up the room, etc. Again, it became a source of dread for me in the last few years, especially when it was obvious it became an obligation to, not just me, but I could "feel" the others were over it as well.
So then this will be the first year I have not played fantasy football in 33 years. . . I may cheat and join an online league with a bunch of strangers, we'll see. Right now, I'm enjoying the thought of being FREE from fantasy football for a year.
1991- I joined another league, in another city (about 200 miles north of me) drove up for the draft and, to me, that was okay but it was a 12 team league and I was just not ready for it, too many sharks and I was still a guppy. Later on, I got better but that league started a spinoff keeper league a few years later and that was fun for a while until there was an expansion draft, then it turned horrible. I really hated that keeper league, to me it sucked the fun right out of it because there was no in person draft, it went on all year long and you never felt like you ever got a break from it. So, it went from new, unique, fun and interesting to meh, going through the motions, playing along to finally complete and total burnout. The last straw for me was that I got a call on a Saturday morning in February at 7:00 am "Hey Sullie, you wanna trade blah for blah?" And, of course, it was one of those stupid, one sided trades and I just thought "I'm done with this" and I quit. That was 1997.
1994 - I met the girl of my dreams (she still is) but she lived in Indianapolis and I lived in Cincinnati. . . I found a job in Indianapolis and I moved there to be with her so I quit my job and, naturally, the office league I had joined in 1989. We later got married, I hated the job I transferred to (love the hell out of the dream girl and I really like Indianapolis) but I gutted it out for another couple of years at my crummy job until 1997.
1997 - I started a new job at a new company and I did not have a fantasy football team so I thought it was time to start a league. Again, this is a time pre-internet. So I got 8 co-workers plus my brother and I started a 10 person league. We drafted in person, I bought those large tear off sheets of paper, everyone wrote their drafts on the sheets with a marker, we ALL had fantasy football magazines and the FOREVER JOKE of the draft is that one guy drafted Bubby Brister first and his 2nd pick was Bruce Issac. . . always a classic. That guy quit after the first year.
2022 - I dissolved the league. One of our founding members passed away last fall. He was awesome, he became a close friend over the years and I let him pretty much co-run the league with me. He was 79 and he really looked forward to playing fantasy football every year and he was just one of those people you can't replace. So another guy quit to go work at a different company about a month ago and a 3rd founding member e-mailed me the other day to say he was no longer playing. And, if I'm being completely honest, I was so overjoyed he did that because I was completely over it last year after our friend passed away. I'll be more candid and just say I had been going through the motions for a few years now. I had used a 3rd party tool for the last few years to help me draft because I stopped getting excited about fantasy football years and years ago. I really had not been into fantasy football for a few years and I found myself just watching random NFL games with my son just to enjoy the game. I felt like fantasy football made me focus on the players so much, I stopped focusing on the games a long, long time ago. . . which is messed up if you think about it. I think, for me, fantasy football stopped being fun a long time ago and it had become an obligation. I miss the in person drafts the most. The problem was that no-one wanted to host them any longer (can't blame them) and getting 10 people to agree on a draft date is a big enough chore let alone working in an in person draft, setting up the room, etc. Again, it became a source of dread for me in the last few years, especially when it was obvious it became an obligation to, not just me, but I could "feel" the others were over it as well.
So then this will be the first year I have not played fantasy football in 33 years. . . I may cheat and join an online league with a bunch of strangers, we'll see. Right now, I'm enjoying the thought of being FREE from fantasy football for a year.
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