Look On The Bright Side

There are few things in life more soul crushing than waking up today to the hard reality that your fantasy football team will not be in the playoffs. You patiently waited for Chad Ochocinco, Shonn Greene, and Ryan Matthews to have their breakout games. You diligently scoured the waiver wire, adding Kenny Britt, Mike Goodson, and Ryan Fitzpatrick to your team. Your team played with dignity and honor, but alas, it was not enough. For those of you who were just eliminated from your fantasy football playoffs, I have good news. There are some benefits to missing the postseason. Here you go…

1) Pretending You are Not a Nerd: I will reluctantly admit that fantasy footballers are the Lord of the Rings of the Football fan world. We speak a special language replete with words and phrases like “PPG,” “PPR,” “pick-ups,” “waiver wire,” and “flex positions.” We have somehow found a way to introduce a computer algorithm to the NFL. To the outside world, we are a strange breed of freaks. We are often forced to hide our secret fantasy identities in public. Seriously, how often have you been struck with a sudden “illness” in order to miss a Sunday event, pretended to check your email, or left work for an “early Monday night dinner”? For the next nine months, you can pretend that you are a normal person… a person who dreams of creating a better life for him or herself (as opposed to a person who dreams of Jason Witten fully recovering from his ankle injury).


2) Saving Your Job: According to USA Today, 37 million people spend an average of 50 minutes a week managing their fantasy football teams. Employers are losing approximately $1.1 billion per week in lost productivity. Before you shed a tear for the productivity dollars lost by your employer, keep in mind that your employer most likely can track your internet usage. Take a moment to reflect on how many hours you spend per week at work on fantasy football. It’s pretty scary, isn’t it? Imagine sitting in a meeting with your supervisor trying to explain why you spent 16 hours reading internet articles about Reggie Bush’s right fibula. Now that your fantasy season is over, you will have to find something else to do with your time at work. How about actually working? Perhaps. But in any event, your internet usage will decrease dramatically. And your job will be safe… at least for the next nine months.


3) Enjoying a Football Game: For the fantasy football player, watching an NFL football game is stressful. Your perspective is totally skewed compared to that of the average NFL fan. You are not rooting for the dramatic 4th quarter comeback. You are not excited when the special teams player makes an astonishing acrobatic hit on a return man. In fact, you are not even rooting for any particular team. Instead you are rooting for particular players to do specific things. Last weekend, Reggie Bush had three receptions for zero yards. While this hurt his NFL team, he actually scored 3 points for my PPR-fantasy team. I don’t care if my receiver made the nice 13 yard catch-and-run to keep a desperate drive alive. I would much rather have the running back who punched in the easy half yard touchdown, scoring 6 arbitrary fantasy points. Now that you are out of the playoffs, you can sit back, enjoy the game, and root for a team.


4) Playing NFL Postseason Fantasy Football Games: So if your thirst for football nerdiness still needs quenching, you can set up an NFL Post-Season Fantasy Football Game. Scoring works like standard fantasy football scoring. However, the scores accumulate over the course of the entire playoffs. When you pick your players, you want to keep an eye toward which teams are likely to win. This way, you are actually rooting for specific teams. You are rewarded for your player’s fantasy production but also for his team’s real-life success. Depending upon the number of people playing, consider allowing everyone to pick up the same player more than once. Perhaps you also allocate a point value to correctly picking playoff victories. The possibilities are endless!


5) Enjoying the Holidays: “Damn you, Derek Anderson” I shouted at the top of my lungs on Christmas Eve 2006. Imagine an overhead camera dramatically capturing my clenched fists and unbridled frustration. I reluctantly started Derek Anderson in the fantasy football championship one week after Anderson posted two touchdowns against a formidable Baltimore Ravens defense. Surely, Anderson would have similar if not more success against a reeling Tampa Bay defense in sunny Florida on Christmas Eve. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Anderson threw four interceptions and zero touchdowns. While the rest of my family was enjoying egg nog, baking Christmas cookies, and singing carols, I was in the other room swearing like a sailor and fuming like Wile E. Coyote. If you are out of the playoffs, you can focus on enjoying time with family, Christmas trees, menorahs, dreidels, stockings, carols, and presents. You no longer need to agonize over Derek “The Grinch” Anderson ruining Christmas for you and your fantasy football team.

-By Kevin Hammon