So if you are not a huge football fan, but enjoy watching a game here and there, you have still no doubt heard people talking about Fantasy Football. Until this season I thought FF was for nerds and geeks who have finally outgrown Dungeons and Dragons and needed a new outlet for their brainiac intellect.
If you are not familiar with how FF works, each person who has a team has to pick 15 players for their team from all the football players in the NFL. You choose the player you want, but have to go in order and wait your turn. The order is called the draft order and if you are one of the first picks in your league you can get one superstar player but by the time the the draft gets back to you for your second pick, the top picks will be claimed already (once the last person picks once, you go backwards towards the first pick again, it is called a 'snake'). Once you have drafted your team, each individual player's personal accomplishments in the regular season gets you points. Such accomplishments include a 10 yard run, a 50 yard catch, a touchdown run, a 40 yard field goal, etc. Just like if your team was an actual NFL team, you play another team in your league each weekend. The team with most points wins that game.
As I have mentioned, my 10 year old son joined the youth football league in town this year, so I have found myself hanging out with other football parents. A bunch of us got together and decided to create a free Fantasy Football league on ESPN.com. Each parent and each kid got their own team, and we had a little party at one of the parent's houses to do the draft.
Draft night was a blast, a regular old party... the kids in one corner of the house drinking pop and the adults in the other corner drinking beer. The draft itself was fun for the first 8-9 rounds but once we got to the 10th round it got boring and we just wanted it to be over. My advice is to fight for your first 8-9 people, after that, let the computer pick for you.
I was thinking that the draft was going to be the fun part and I would just log into ESPN once a week on Tuesdays and see how I did that weekend on points. I couldn't be more wrong. My hometown NFL team is the Buffalo Bills who are, as I type, 0-5 for the 2010-11 season. If you have ever watched a Bills game, you will understand when I tell you that it is more exciting to watch my 10 year old's league play. The Bills have so many awesome talents on the roster, but the team dynamic isn't there. Until Ryan Fitzpatrick took over the QB role 2 weeks ago, I was certain my son's league threw further than the Bills QB did on any given Sunday. When this is what you have to look forward to every Sunday (Thanks Mr. Ralph Wilson) you do one of 2 things: stop watching football or watch other games. It is hard to watch other games and get into it when you have no personal ties to either team. Fantasy Football gives you that personal connection. After a week or two, you start to remember your players, what teams they are on, and what their positions are. Now you have at least one favorite player on many NFL teams and seeing that you need 2 teams to have a game, you are almost guaranteed that any game you watch on TV has one of your players on it. Now, the entire NFL is your hometown team!
This game of points and strategies is highly addictive. I log into my ESPN account every day, even during the week, to see who is hurt that I should bench and who the team I am playing is playing so I know how I match up. In addition, I read the blogs by the experts to see who they are predicting to have breakout games. Then come the weekend, I watch the NFL games with my laptop open so I watch my players rack up the points. When my son and I played each other, the entire family came together that week and chose sides in the rivalry that ensued (funny how a rivalry brings us together). I have not faced off against my husband yet, but all I have to say is that I better win... beating my husband is the only strategy that motivates me.
So take this post as an invitation if you have a mediocre to crappy hometown team or no hometown team and you like football. Fantasty Football is a fun way to learn more about the NFL players today and a great motivator to get in the game and watch all the games that Sunday has to offer.
No comments:
Post a Comment