The Monday Mommy: A Step Back in Time at an Actual Live Fantasy Football Draft.
“It was a much simpler existence then, and fantasy football is certainly no exception. We didn’t have such modern day luxuries as the internet or smart phones. We barely had cell phones that weren’t physically attached to a bag or mounted in the car.”
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My first fantasy football draft was in 1996, and I was forced to walk barefoot uphill in the snow both ways to get there. That second part is not exactly true, but I’m trying to set the tone here.
I have no idea why, but I can recall the exact player who popped my fantasy football cherry. The inaugural member of what has turned into a long list of my fake football teams was former running back Ricky Watters.
It was a much simpler existence then, and fantasy football is certainly no exception. We didn’t have such modern day luxuries as the internet or smart phones. We barely had cell phones that weren’t physically attached to a bag or mounted in the car.
The league’s weekly lineups had to be phoned in to the commissioner before game time and we actually had to wait until the next day to scour the newspaper to find out a player’s stats from the previous Sunday. To top it all off, we had to do arithmetic. That’s right, actual math to figure out what our score for the week was.
There were no fantasy experts ranking and listing position players, providing cheat sheets for those to just stroll on in to the draft without doing any of the work. Any research done was on your own accord by actually reading the sports section, and it was still pretty slim.
Being as there were no online fantasy sports sites yet, all drafts were done live and in person. It was just the way it was. We didn’t know any differently and it was kind of awesome.
I believe that my last off-line draft took place in 1998: Until this past Sunday afternoon.
Since I have started writing and podcasting for this very site, I decided to join in on their fantasy league for this season. Colin runs a tight ship when it comes to live drafting, either you are there in attendance or you’re out of the league; no exceptions.
At first I wasn’t really down with this as I have been drafting online for so long now. My main league that has been the same core group of members for over 10 years is spread across the country at this point and I have gotten very used to picking my squad while sitting on my couch braless in pajamas.
I’m never one to turn down a chance to kick some ass, being born with a wee bit of a competitive gene and all. So I printed out my cheat sheets, grabbed my laptop and headed to the draft.
To my surprise, I forgot how fun it is to razz folks in person on their awful picks, as opposed to typing it in that little chat box in the corner of a computer screen. As a society we are so turned on by the convenience that technology has to offer that we forget about the human aspect of it all.
When someone selects running back free agent Michael Turner in the second round, and no this is not a random example-it actually happened, the amount of crap handed to him is so much more fun to witness live.
While I know it is not always possible to do live in-person drafts, there is certainly something to be said for them. The smack talk, collusion accusations and the like make it so worth the effort.
The SSDFFL draft made me pine for a simpler time in fantasy football land. When information was scarce, technology was nonexistent and we all did it for the love of the game and competition. Smack talk was king when it came to draft night and was a huge part of the whole experience. Now people have the ability to sit in their mom’s basement, sign up for a league in total obscurity and have zero interaction with the people participating.
While it is not always possible to have all members of a league present on draft day, it makes for a pretty unique experience.
My main takeaway from Sunday’s draft, besides my soon to be dominant team, is that we all need to take a step back, remember the roots of fantasy football and the reasons we were drawn to it to begin with.
Now get off my lawn.
