I GOT AN EMAIL FROM my friend Mike Luke last week. His real name is Mike Lukaszewicz and, though he lives in Los Angeles, we stay in touch throughout the year. We correspond almost daily during football season, when the two of us, along with a handful of other friends from Wisconsin, email back and forth to assess the Green Bay Packers. (Or, in the case of my brother Andy, to chastise the coaching staff for failing to call a fake punt or field goal attempt on every fourth down.)
Recently Mike Luke informed the group that he had joined a fantasy football league. Fantasy football works like this: “Owners” choose real NFL players from all 32 squads to create a “team.” This usually happens at a beer-drenched draft before the season. The resulting teams then use individual player statistics to compete weekly against one another for stakes that usually amount to little more than pocket change. It’s like Dungeons and Dragons for sports nuts. A Harris poll commissioned by the Fantasy Sports Trade Association–yes, there is one–found that nearly 30 million Americans participate in fantasy sports, mostly football.
As he ended one recent email, Mike Luke wrote: “I ended up with a starting squad of Favre, P. Holmes, Tiki Barber, Michael Bennett/Warrick Dunn, Joe Horn, Laveranues Coles, Doug Jolley, Matt Stover, and the colts d. We can start 3 running backs or 3 WRs. Anyway, I’m not sure why you’d care about who’s on my team, but now you know.”
Mike Luke doesn’t know it yet, but needless disclosure of such information is the first sign of Fantasy Football Addiction.
It starts slowly. You tell friends about the fantasy draft or your siblings about who you’re starting and who you’re keeping on the bench. It picks up speed. You tell your parents about your great match-ups this weekend or explain to your wife that Trent Green won’t produce the numbers you had anticipated because Kansas City has switched to a run-first offense. Eventually, it careens out of control. You tell the grocery checkout lady that Mewelde Moore is going to be a 1,500-yard stud, and you let your boss know how you snookered league-leading “Bridesmaids No Longer” into a trade.
Seriously. Here at the office, Vic Matus and Fred Barnes were discussing Fred’s upcoming trip to Lambeau Field. When Fred mentioned that he and his son are big fans of Cadillac Williams, I saw my opening.
“Just acquired Cadillac in a blockbuster deal this week,” I said, giving them the slow nod that says, “I’m so sweet.” Then I paused to heighten the drama. “Traded Jamal Lewis and Donald Driver for Cadillac Williams and Stephen Davis.”
No reaction. Maybe it wasn’t the steal I had thought. So I threw in this nugget. “Got Steve Smith in the sixth round. The man is a beast.”
Nothing. I retreated, head down, to my office. The slow walk was punctuated by sudden, Tourettes-like outbursts. “Stephen Davis–touchdown machine!”
Soon you begin to sound like a local newscaster using nonsensical transitions to force fantasy football into everyday conversations. I was having breakfast with friends, including Buzz Fladung, known in Maryland fantasy circles as the guy who finished 23rd in ESPN’s public salary-cap league a few years back. Someone commented, “These eggs are greasy.” I turned to Buzz: “Do you think Brian Griese will have any 300-yard games this year?”
Last week, I found myself sitting across from someone I can describe only as a “senior Bush administration official,” listening to a perspicacious analysis of the changing dynamics in the Muslim world.
“We are witnessing an awakening of the human spirit, an acknowledgment of the natural rights of individuals, an embrace of government by consent” the official said. “And with Isaac Bruce potentially out with Turf toe against the Giants, you’d better pick up Kevin Curtis when the waiver wire opens Tuesday . . . ”
It took me a moment to separate my thoughts from his words. “After the elections in Lebanon,” he continued. But I was gone again. “With Pittsburgh’s defense on a bye, is the best play Seattle or Denver?”
The lines between fantasy and reality have all but disappeared. As I contemplated a trade with a guy in my league known as “The Manchild,” I found myself worried about my team’s chemistry. These players don’t even know each other.
Anyway, I’m starting Brian Griese, Cadillac Williams, C. Dillon, Steve Smith, and Reggie Wayne at WR, Tony Gonzalez at TE, and S. Graham as my kicker. And I decided to pick up the Seahawks for my DST, against a weak Washington Redskins offense.
I’m not sure why you’d care about who’s on my team, but now you know.
-Stephen F. Hayes
