Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Yeah, I know nobody cares about my fantasy team (or fantasy league!) but I'm still going to Squawk about it!


The first annual SIAC Fantasy Football League.


Me wearing my commissioner's hat. I'd like to think
I look like an old-school rapper with the hat!
There are three kinds of fantasy football players -- the hardcore, the moderate, and the neophytes. Kind of like the people in my running club. And sometimes, these worlds collide. This is a Squawk about what happens when they do.

I am at the back of the pack when it comes to running (although I do enjoy the heck out of it, and have lost 52.5 pounds so far doing so!) But I am pretty good at fantasy sports.And I wanted to do something with my running club, the Staten Island Athletic Club, that showed I was actually semi-competent at something! (Squawker Jon read this blog entry before it was published and said that his neck was hurting from reading all of this navel-gazing. So sue me!)

Anyhow, I somehow was able to form the first-ever fantasy football league with our running club members.

So we had our fantasy football draft Monday night at the Pepperjack Grill on Staten Island, the same place that hosts our monthly meetings. (Incidentally, my team's name is "My Balls Are Perfect," as per that legendary Daily News back page about Tom Brady.)

As commissioner, I wanted to make sure we got to 10 people, so I talked my compadre and fellow blogger Josh into joining our league. This, even though he knew nothing about fantasy football. Since he was only doing it because we needed 10 teams, his team name is "The 10th Guy." I promised to help make this as easy as possible for him, and explained beforehand how fantasy football worked.

Josh was new to the world of fantasy football,
but he proved to be a quick study -- especially
when it came to trash talking!
One of my selling points in getting people to join the league was that we would have lots of trash talk at the draft. That started right from the beginning, with Rob, who had the first pick in the draft, bringing it, making me want to give him the "most insufferable" award right away!. He may have failed in his first pick (Aaron Rodgers, really?) but he did bring it when it came to throwing shade, as the kids say! He also bought shots for the group (with ulterior motives, perhaps?) so I have to give him credit for that.

There were lots of characters in the draft room. Chris was very entertaining and animated during the draft. Margaret and Jazmine quietly made some good picks. Corey and Stephanie did as well. Josh picked up the game -- and how to trash talk! Mark, our club president, was a real hoot, as usual. (Although going for Gronk for the second pick wouldn't have been my choice! I think Mark is now obligated to name his team something with Gronk's name in it, like Honky Tonk Badonka Gronk or something!)

Charlotte complained that I kept on stealing the players she wanted to choose! Frank had a friend drafting for him remotely, which made us crack jokes about a robot making the picks.

Everybody seemed to have a good time!
As for myself, I brought a fedora to wear to the evening whenever I needed to put my commissioner's hat on. (Get it?) I also wore my burnt orange University of Texas Vince Young #10 football jersey.

It didn't take long before I got in trouble with the crew. Josh had to go out to his car to get his phone charger cord, and he was going to miss his second pick -- 12th overall in the draft, after picking Jamaal Charles with the 9th pick. So I went to his phone and picked Dez Bryant for him, causing the room to erupt in "I call shenanigans" cries. Oh, well!

I had a pretty good draft going -- Adrian Peterson fell into my lap, even though I was the No. 5 team --- with Demaryius Thomas in the second round, Randall Cobb in the third, and Russell Wilson in the fourth -- when my computer froze. I blame Windows 10. I didn't exactly handle it well; I think I screamed "Nooooo!" more than once and cursed a whole lot. So much for that semi-competent thing!

My reaction to my computer freezing up.
In the meantime, the NFL.com autodraft picked me Latavius Murray, Joique Bell, and Dwayne Allen. What a nightmare! I was beside myself over this debacle! It took several rounds for me to get back on track and I ended up having to conduct the rest of the draft from my iPhone app. I also got mocked for this as well, of course!

But I, of course, did some trash talk as well, sassing the Mets fans in the room and saying that at least this fantasy football team would give them something to do when the Mets collapsed again in September. Oh, snap!

At the end of the evening, we posed for a group photo, and everybody thanked me and said they had a great time. So the night was a big success! Now it's on to the season!

And this afternoon, I was bored, so I came up with funny team names, based on the players on the respective teams. Here they are:

Charlotte: Luck Be a Lacy Tonight

Chris: Cruz Control

Corey/Stephanie:  Don't Luck With Me

Frank: Bad, Bad, Antonio Brown

Jazmine: Saved by Le'Veon Bell

Josh: The Walking Dez 

Lisa: Eat, Drink and Demaryius

Margaret: My Favorite Marshawn

Mark: The Big Gronkowski

Rob: Golden Tate Bridge

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