Fantasy Football Spectaculum!

Simply put, that is the name of all my fantasy teams this year. I woke up last Friday morning, and the first thing to pop into my  head was the word "VaGiants." I share a team with Kim and I kept trying to get her to go along with my names. First I had Bulk Hogan, than I turned that into Butt Fumble (in reference to the infamous Mark Sanchez Thanksgiving Butt Fumble). She wanted a name we could both be proud of. She didn't want to go with Jacquizzed In My Pants, so I went to bed on Thursday upset that our shared draft was approaching and we hadn't yet had a solid, agreeable name. I usually wake up and first thing in the morning utter something vulgar to myself as I slowly wake up. I don't know why, but I said "VaGiants." It was set. Suddenly the day was great, and I feel the draft went well also. So, without further aduba, let me present to you my three versions of the VaGiants...

 

 

12 Team, two conference (each conference held a separate draft) Ultimate Fanfool League heavily weighted performance Points Per Reception (PPR).

 



 

I have never participated in a PPR league. I noticed that receivers receive 2 points while other positions get 1 point per reception. We had the second pick. I made my draft cheatsheet courtesy of the Football Guys Value Based Drafting tool. That is a method of seeing how much better a player will do than the median scores/performance. It isn't necessary for the first round, but later rounds it helps you see who should go and could be a steal. I used this in all my leagues. We had the second overall pick. I knew we needed to go big with a homerun pick. I explained the theory to Kim, and she was in agreement with me. Sure enough, they started the draft 15 minutes early and we had just moved into our new house that day. We got a phone call from her coworker who picked at number 1, and Kim said, "We are up? Okay, we both agree, we want Calvin Johnson." Her coworker simply said, "Really? Okay...." We showed up and saw the giant draft board. Saturday was hot as hell also and our conference's table was in the sun. All quarterbacks in the first round, minus Calvin Johnson. Looking at the previous year's stat sheets for this league I saw that QBs had the best performance last year. Well, if Calvin Johnson got tackled in the endzone 9 times as opposed to the 5 yard line, he would've been tops. I felt confident and one step ahead of the game. I had my star receiver and my purpose now was to go with those who could catch the most passes and be the focal points of their offenses. Also, there was limited team space with Minimum/Maximum roster spots: 2 QBs, 3 WRs, 2 RBs, 2 TEs, 1 DST, 1 Kicker. My team is as follows:

 

QB - Russel Wilson, Carson Palmer: Last year's out of nowhere whiz kid who has the same exact core players as last year, and the undervalued Carson Palmer who was born throwing a football.

 

RBs - Darren Sproles, Reggie Bush: Two central pieces to their teams offenses and suited for pass  happy teams that are weekly contributors. Plus, if Reggie Bush is to the Lions what he was to Miami, this league is in the bag.

 

WRs - Calvin Johnson, Demaryius Thomas, Steve Smith: The best receiver of now and working towards being the best of all time, the best receiver for Peyton Manning, and the only receiver for the Panthers.

 

TEs - Jordan Cameron, Zach Miller: Not my favorite spot on my team, Cameron is all the rage this year with two coaches who specialize in tight end weapon offense and Miller came up huge in the last quarter of the season/post-season for the Seahawks.

 

DST - Seattle: Basing a lot of my hopes and dreams on the team I formerly hated the most. I think my degree of hate for the Seahawks was well beyond anything I harbor for the Redskins.

 

K - Stephen Gostkowski: He is guaranteed for at least 4 extra points a week in Tom Brady's offense plus with their depleted/unknown receivers, chances of a struggle and resultant short field goals could bolster him.

 

It should be noted, I have never done anything worse than second place (and that was only once) in a new league.

 

8 Team, 4 Points per Touchdown Voorhees Fantasy Football League

The league we started three years ago when we entered the Voorhees office from work. Expectedly, I won that league in the first year after being in last place in October, changing the name to Bunch of Sissies, and went on a several game winning streak to obliterate the playoffs. No matter how I do from this point on, my team is the first name on the trophy Lisa Sauer created for us. The second year I flat out sucked and last year I did the Bunch of Sissies name switch while in last place and placed second. This year, we are all scattered about Pennsylvania and New Jersey as a bunch of douchebags from my old company basically tore us all apart. Luckily in the internet age, I will still be able to beat all of them and without having to see them, I can become more and more crude and make things more uncomfortable now. We drafted last night at 8 p.m., cutting it close to the wire, and I  had the first overall pick. Nine starting spots and 6 benches on an 8 team league make every team a super team. My first overall was a no-brainer and I went with the best performer in last year's league as I wouldn't pick until 14 other players were off. It was tricky, but I was prepared:

 

QBs - Aaron Rodgers, Russel Wilson: Very happy with my quarterback selections. The league's second best player and the kid who is primed for a big week during the bye.

 

RBs - Adrian Peterson, Reggie Bush, Darren Sproles, Ahmad Bradshaw, Daryl Richardson: The best player in the league, plus two cross-over players from my other team, a potential matchup based lottery ticket, and the unknown, bye week filler.

 

WRs - Demaryius Thomas, Desean Jackson, Steve Smith, Cecil Shorts: Another cross-over player who I have a lot of faith in, an Eagle who I think is severely undervalued, cross-over matchup play, and perhaps the best under-the-radar receiver in the league.

 

TEs - Jared Cook, Zach Sudfeld: Jared Cook can be a consistent weapon for the Rams and gets to play over half his games on turf and should shine, the other may be the no-other-choice-but-to-throw-to-him option for Tom Brady.

 

DST - Cincinnati: I really was hoping for Seattle or Chicago, but with 14 picks between teams once they were picked, I think I did fairly well at this spot. Hopefully the contracts their players have signed don't entice them to sit back and relax but rather let them play all out knowing they are taken care of financially.

 

K - David Akers: Throw the old dog a bone.

 

I was about to write that I had no more than one player per team, until I realized Akers and Bush are on the same team. Otherwise, this should provide constant production. I got an email from Yahoo! stating that I earned a B in the draft, saying that my first half was the best of all teams, but then ranked me third overall. Uh, where do you think the starters come from? So yeah, despite not winning the best draft award, I am very happy with my team. But it is essentially a who's-who league of fantasy football and not many chances for that sleeper player you educated yourself on to bring you the title. This will probably be the toughest league I am in.

 

'13 Duba Invitational - 16 Team league with Performance Bonuses

If there were more hours in a day, I could've reviewed this draft party held at Pounders Irish Pub in northeast Philadelphia three weeks ago. Yes that was a long time ago, but getting 16 ingrates friends together can be tough. Pudding thankfully had us over to the bar to produce a boozy setting. However nice the bar is, it is in a part of Philadelphia where there is a red light every 10 feet and across from a draw bridge. Needless to say we were an hour late starting the draft. I had the 10th overall pick and I had played out several scenarios of how to draft my team. I pretty much always had the same team minus a few players hear and their and analysis of mock drafts showed I had the best team 90 percent of the time. But, there was no scale for drafting with idiots so I knew all this practice and experimentation would be for naught. I have add/dropped some players since the draft, but for the most part my entire team is still together:

 

QBs - Andy Dalton, Jay Cutler: I waited and waited on this position and other than Week 1 with these two teams facing each other I think they could be interchangeable productive pieces.

 

RBs - Lamar Miller, Montee Ball, Ronnie Hillman, Ben Tate: I originally had Bernard Pierce and added Hillman, after dropping Knoshon Moreno. I don't know what to do at this point - I like Miller, but the Ball/Hillman fiasco is worrying me. I think Ball is the redzone back, despite each of these guys supposedly going series for series. I also hope that my years of drafting Ben Tate finally pays off as Arian Foster is hurting after the years of abuse and veganism.

 

WRs - Calvin Johnson, Mike Wallace, Lance Moore, Quinton Patton: I originally drafted Vincent Brown, who I was loving pre-season and especially after Donario Alexander went down, but I think San Diego is just too terrible. Calvin Johnson, well, if I didn't get him the next guy would have. He and the next position top pick make me most confident in my team. Lance Moore is a potential lottery ticket this year and Mike Wallace could thrive in his new division while Quinton Patton will probably have a bigger than anticipated role and also returns kicks (which we are awarded points for).

 

TEs - Jimmy Graham, Zach Sudfeld: The options between Graham and the next 20 picks later were not great, so I had to go with him. I have two great offensive weapons guaranteed (barring injuries) to start my team, but you see how the rest played out. Again, hoping Sudfeld grows into the next major piece of offense I need.

 

K - Garrett Hartley: A guy on maybe the best offense in the league who kicks over half his games in a dome? Uh, yeah.

 

DST - Cleveland Browns: They are supposedly much improved this year, but they are maybe more of a streaming defense. I don't even know if they will stay on my team by this coming Sunday.

 

So I ran this team and my league through the draft analyzer. Sho'nuff, guess who was ranked number one again? The man with his face on his shirt, The Great Jim Duba.