Hi, everyone, it’s your pal Jon. As we approach the NFL season opener, the police are out in force. They are the “Sorry, folks. Nobody cares about your fantasy football team.” police. I don’t think it’s very nice to tell people that the things they’re enthusiastic about don’t matter, and I, as a matter of fact, enjoy hearing about other peoples’ fantasy teams. It is interesting to get a peek into their strategy, and to predict which will be fantasy studs and fantasy duds.
A 1,000-word essay about a person’s fantasy football team
There are no jokes or anything, it’s just a guy writing about the fantasy football team he has.
In accordance with this, I made an announcement this morning:
i will paypal $1 to the first person to send me a 1000-word piece about their fantasy football team. jonbois at gmail.
— Jon Bois (@jon_bois) September 4, 2014 A mere 21 minutes later, a reader named Ben submitted an essay that was exactly 1,000 words long. Incredibly, that’s an average of nearly a word per second. Even more incredibly, I copy-edited only three minor errors.
As promised, I have sent him $1 via PayPal. Congratulations to Ben, who can be found on Twitter at @BoomMcSplode. Now let’s read about his wonderful fantasy football team!
★★★
Last night, on the evening of September 3rd, I drafted perhaps the greatest fantasy football team of all time. Adrian Peterson fell off the board quickly with my first rounder, the fourth pick overall, and I waited patiently until my second rounder came along through the snake style draft. Was it too early to take Jay Cutler? Probably. I’ll play it safe with Julio Jones, then scooping up DeMarco Murray in the third. Already I had probably the best one-two punch for fantasy running backs in the league. This may be an archaic approach for the reigning league champion, if the recent move to wide receivers being more valuable is to be believed. In the fourth round, having solidified my running backs, I moved to grab a quarterback in Jay Cutler. Jay Cutler will likely be this year’s Matt Stafford, in that he’ll just hurl the ball in the air and see which one of his receivers will come down with it. He’ll also be able to drop quick passes to Matt Forte, who may be the best receiving back in the league. Next, in the 5th round, I moved on to Zac Stacy, who will likely get a lot of carries with Sam Bradford being out for the year. In the 6th round I moved back to wide receivers with the risky acquisition of Cordarrelle Patterson. In round 7, as my league is a two quarterback league, I took Phillip Rivers. I’m fairly certain this will end up being a steal, and that my two quarterbacks will be bargains by the end of the season. In round 8, I took Tobinbo Gunnar “Toby” Gerhart, who was projected to go in the 3rd round, considerably earlier. I now have four top 30 overall ranked running backs, at least one of which I’m expecting to serve as trade bait. After Gerhart, I selected Eric Decker, who I’m hoping can prove to be a good pick as the only great receiving option in New York. I continued with pass catchers in selecting Kyle Rudolph in the 10th round, who I think will come back, be healthy, and have a great season. In the 11th, I took Rueben Randle. My team is looking like a lottery ticket, with lots of players whose tag line reads “he could be pretty great!” I’m okay with this, as I think I’ll have lots of pieces to move if they don’t pan out. In the 12th, I went with the St. Louis defense, who I only ranked below Seattle, New England, and San Francisco, who were all off the board. In the 13th, another running back and boom or bust player with Jeremy Hill. I believe he’ll take the starting job in Cincinnati, going on to have a pretty good season. In the 14th, I grabbed a kicker in Justin Tucker, one of the best in the league who was on my championship team last year. In the 15th and last round of the draft, I took another player who I think will surprise people in Derek Carr. He looked great in the preseason and won the starting job, but his play looked much more promising than the headline of him having beaten out Matt Schaub for the starting job.
My first week matchup is looking really great, as I’m projected to win the game by about 20 points. Some major concerns for the team include bye weeks. Week 9 has Jay Cutler and Julio Jones, two of my best players, hitting the bench. I’m planning, for now, to have Derek Carr replace Cutler, and Cordarelle Patterson fill in for Julio Jones. Week 10 will be another brutal test, with Phillip Rivers, Adrian Peterson, and Kyle Rudolph having the week off with byes. I have plenty of running backs and another quarterback in the wings, but I’ll have to figure out a new approach at tight end with no other on my roster. Week 11 will be tough. I’ll see Eric Decker, DeMarco Murray, Toby Gerhart, and Justin Tucker take a seat. I’ll likely drop whatever defense I picked up for the previous week in favor of a new, fill in kicker. After these two tough weeks, the team will be back and firing with hopefully no injuries and no more missed time. We can have the A1 lineup out there, with lots of potential for my bench players to become elite players to challenge starters for a roster spot. I always held the believe that you should have a mix of stable players and boom or bust players on your bench. I have a good mix of the two, and I’m looking forward to seeing which of the players will be heroes or duds.
At quarterback, I think that Jay Cutler and Phillip Rivers are going to surprise a lot of people. Rivers had a great year last year, and his developing receivers should be even better this year. I was surprised to see him on the board as late as I did, and it was an easy decision to grab him. He has one of the best pass catching backs in the league with Woodhead, who will continue to only really catch passes. I wasn’t as thrilled about spending an early pick on Cutler, but I think that he’ll end up being a great value with his receiving corps and the elite offense that the team hasn’t had any consistency with in the past. If Cutler can stay healthy, I think he’ll thrive.
My backs are the best in the league, with Zac Stacy and Toby Gerhart currently on the bench or flex spot while others are on the bench trying to crack the roster. They all have a real shot, as they have top-end talent and we’ll just have to see if they can make it. I think Hill will end up being a top 15 back, and will show real promise and threat to crack into the flex spot by week 6.
★★★
But that’s not all! Several other folks also submitted wonderful essays about their teams. They did not win the $1 prize, but since they worked so dang hard and barely missed the deadline, here are three more fantasy football stories.
★★★
From valued Internet subscriber Gavin:
“Where are my pants!?!” screamed Adrian Peterson from the bedroom. “How am I supposed to go out looking like this?”
Peyton Manning chortled to Vernon Davis from their hiding place in the linen closet. “Haha, what a goofus! He’ll never suspect that we put his pants in the freezer!”
“Eric, have you seen my pants?” Adrian called. “No, dude! But I made three ham sandwiches, do you want one?”
“I don’t have time for a damn ham sandwich, Decker, I lost my freaking pants! Boy I’m madder than I would be if I was in a timeshare for the Colts!”
“Hey, it’s not so bad, isn’t it Trent?” said Ahmad Bradshaw, suddenly appearing behind the bedroom curtain. Trent Richardson, lounging on a chair, continued to silently eat Doritos and mutter to himself. “Trent?”
“Give me some peace and quiet, Ahmad, you piglet! I’m trying to get in the zone for the game! And you kids stop running around out there! Get off my damn lawn!”
Tavon Austin and Sammy Watkins heard Richardson from outside, but they just giggled and kept playing tag. They knew Richardson wasn’t nearly fast enough to catch them.
“Hey Eric, I’ll take a sandwich!” said DeSean Jackson.
Eric handed DeSean a sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
Eric handed DeSean the sandwich. “Whoops! I dropped it. Can you grab that for me?”
”Oh my god, FORGET IT DESEAN YOU’RE USELESS!’
Suddenly, a chorus of angels sang out as the front door opened. “Aaaaaaaaaallllleeeelluuuiiiiiiaaaaaa!”
“Damn it, Russell, do you have to do that every time you enter a room?” said Rashad Jennings exasperatedly. “Also, keep it down! DeAngelo just laid down for his nap, and you know he doesn’t like to be woken up before it’s time for his canasta game at 5.”
“O yes, Rashad of House Jennings, I am so deeply terribly sorry. Please accept this hand-whittled dove as my penance,” said Russell beatifically as he simultaneously played Pokemon on a Nintendo DS and Ken Griffey Jr. Slugfest on an old GameBoy. “Behold, my level 80 Zapdos. Behold, for he is the Prince Who Was Promised.”
“LALALALA I can’t hear you!” yelped Brandon McManus, coming out of the bathroom with A Clash Of Kings in his hand. “I’m not that far in the books yet!”
“Brandon?! What are you doing here? Where’s Matt?” asked Rashad.
“I’m subletting for him while he goes on that month-long cocaine bender, remember?”
“Guys! Where the flip are my pants?! If somebody doesn’t give me my damn pants soon, I’m going to be hopping mad!” Adrian called from the bedroom.
“Wouldst that not make thee a bunny rabbit, one who hoppeth to and fro about the land?” said Russell Wilson in a deep baritone. “I declare that would indeed be droll.”
Just then, the front door burst open, and Sammy Watkins and Tavon Austin burst through the door, laughing and gasping for breath. “We’re hungry! We want lunch!”
“Ok calm down you two! I made sandwiches!” said Eric Decker, smiling at the young ones. “Oh wait, DeSean dropped them all on the floor. I’ll just make a few more. Tomato and mayonnaise good?”
“NO! I WANT PEANUT BUTTER AND JELLY!” screamed Tavon.
“I WANT ROAST BEEF!” yelped Sammy.
“I’M ALL ABOUT THAT BASS, ‘BOUT THAT BASS, ‘BOUT THAT BASS!” DeSean roared.
“Shut up, DeSean, you’re not getting any food until you can prove that you won’t drop it,” retorted Eric.
The door opened again. “Boy guys, that was a long walk! I feel like I’ve been walking for...MILES! Hahahahaha! Get it? Get it? Get it?”
“Damn it, Miles!” said Ahmad, who had wandered into the kitchen. That joke wasn’t funny ANY OF THE FIRST FIVE THOUSAND TIMES YOU TOLD IT.” Miles Austin frowned, curled up on the floor, and started bawling.
“Oh damn it, Ahmad, you know how sensitive he is!” said Eric. “Now you’re going to wake up DeAngelo!”
As if on cue, there was a stirring from one of the bedrooms. “WHO DARES DISTURB MY SLUMBER! YOU KNOW I DO NOT RISE IN THE AFTERNOONS BEFORE FIVE!”
“Ahmad, this is your fault,” said Eric. “You go bring him some tea now.” Bradshaw got out the industrial strength tea maker and the two-pound bag of sugar and trudged off to DeAngelo’s room.
“By the way, guys, has anybody seen Peyton?” asked DeSean. Peyton and Vernon giggled from their position in Adrian’s closet. “Shhhhh!” Adrian was still stomping around the room looking for his pants.
“Ericcccccccc! Tavon drank all the orange juice!” whined Sammy Watkins from his perch atop a phonebook on his chair. “I wanted some orange juice, and TAVON DRANK IT ALL!”
“Ok, ok!” said Decker. “The St. Louis Rams’ defense will be by soon to play with Tavon, and I’ll ask them to bring by some more orange juice.”
“Oh yes, the defenders of old St. Louis,” smiled Russell. “I do believe it will soon be time for me to defeat them in battle once more.”
“NOT SO FAST!” came a voice at the door. Robert Quinn sauntered in, followed by the rest of the Rams’ defense. “Got any ice pops?” He walked over to the freezer, and opened it. “Hey, what the heck? There’s a pair of pants in here?! Adrian, are these your pants?”
“PEYTONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
★★★
From valued Internet subscriber Vince:
Vince’s fantastic fantasy team
Hey Mr. Bois,
Well let’s start with I’m the commissioner of my league and have never won, but this is my year my friend. I drafted Eddie Lacy 4th because he is a good player and will be good at scoring points I believe. 2nd round I went with Alshon Jeffery because as I said about Lacy, he is also a good player who will certainly score points. 3rd round? Oh well of course I drafted Arian Foster. You know he is on Twitter and also follows me? This is my greatest and only claim to fame. He is also a good player who scores points and does whatever shit these guys do for fantasy purposes. 4th round I went with Cordarrelle Patterson or Andre Johnson I honestly forget but I realized about this point in the draft that the Texans are very good and they will for sure win some games, I actually guaranteed that. Then as all drafts go, I had to draft a quarterback so I went with Cam Newton since he was there and as far as I can tell he will be a good quarterback for fantasy purposes but probably not because he’s on my team and all my quarterbacks ever are salt of the earth (see RG3 last year, Brady the year he tore his ACL, Culpepper tearing his ACL, and so on). Anyway this team seems pretty good but oh shit I forgot a TE so I drafted Delanie Walker. Delanie Walker is who you get when you say “oh shit I forgot to draft a TE” and that’s exactly what happened. Anyway I cut him for Travis Kelce today because shit I don’t know he reminds me of Brent Celek and I’m an Eagles fan and also he’s Jason Kelce’s brother and the one thing they say about brothers of centers is that they are definitely football players. Joique Bell is on my team and is highly regarded mostly because Reggie Bush is made of paper mache. I drafted the Eagles new kicker Cody Parkey because I am an eagles fan and also his name is freaking adorable. Cody Parkey? Aww it sounds like that kid you have to babysit who is absolutely perfectly well behaved and is totally fine with you going out to your car to rip the bowl so you two can watch spongebob together and laugh and laugh. My defense is currently the Bears because they play EJ Manuel and the Bills week one. I would start a rotting deer carcass dressed as a clown versus the Bills offense and probably still score 10 points. Then I got Lamar Miller because I hate myself and I love owning guys that will definitely be colossal disappointments and get me zero points because Knowshon Moreno somehow eats his way to a starting job where he can gain 40 yards but be praised for his “pass protection” I agree with Lesean McCoy, Knowshon sucks. I also drafted Danny Amendola on the basis it was the 11th round and I no longer gave a shit and just wanted to snack on an edible marijuana treat I possessed. He is good and he plays with fuck boy Tom Brady who is the devil and allows the Giants to win superbowls so my dumbass friend Mike keeps getting to rub that shit in my face. He will play 3 snaps and then his collarbone will shatter into 90 different pieces and that shit stain Edelman will catch 140 passes. I drafted James Starks for the simple fact I own Eddie Lacy and when he inevitably breaks all his bones I will need his shitty backup to replace him so I can go 5-8 and miss the playoffs just like last year when I inexplicably traded Calvin Johnson for Brandon Marshall. That did not work out because I am a moron. Last round pick (aside from kickers and defense which I always draft in the last two rounds because those positions are ultimately meaningless) was Deandre Hopkins. If Andre Johnson happens to die or become horrible this season on the count that he plays for the Texans and will never ever play in a meaningful game again in his career probably, I’ll take his sidekick for Ryan Fitzpatrick to throw over his head. Oh and how could I forget I drafted newly divorced smiling sack of shit Russell Wilson. He never gets drafted high because he doesn’t post gaudy numbers but I can see clearly that if he fails it will be because of me. Side note: I drafted him last year and started RG3 over him almost every week because as I said before I am really bad at this shit for someone who knows every single player in the league pretty much. So that’s essentially my entire team, which is currently named “Danny AmendEbola” because I am as clever as a NASCAR fan with an FUBO bumper sticker. I will most likely not win and all of the players on my team will likely suck besides Arian Foster who is a twitter superstar and Twitter superstars are always very successful in my opinion because they are the most fun people to talk to in the whole world. I’ve been typing this out a while and 1000 words really does take a lot longer than I thought it would but also I’m at work and this totally looks like I’m doing a bang up job, in fact, I’ll probably get a kudos from my boss for typing away like a moron because that’s all that is valued in office jobs. Don’t think, just type, that’s my motto. Anyway, I’m pretty sure someone has beat me to the punch and I don’t much care about the dollar anymore but if you actually read this that would be quite funny and appreciated. If you laugh at any of this I would be so damn honored like whoa. Five more words well okay.
★★★
From valued Internet subscriber Blake (@GreatSaltBlake):
When I draft a fantasy football team, immediately I consider my options for a team name. My league insists on creating puns on each player to title each team (as commissioner, I do most of the insisting).
In years past, I have won titles on the back of Alfred Morris (Fettuccine Alfred), and seen the varied highs and lows of owning Kenny Britt (Britt-ney Spears), Julio Jones (Me and Julio Jones), Miles Austin (Aust in Translation) and others. At times, perhaps the pursuit of a top player pun team name has overcome the pursuit of a top team.
The crux of this, however, is how well a team name translates into a poorly-photoshopped (or in most cases, MS Paint-created) team logo. While the smiling face of Julio Jones looked at home upon Art Garfunkel’s turtlenecked body next to Paul Simon for Me and Julio Jones, there was certainly some difficulty to be had in shoehorning Ryan Mathews’ visage onto Albert Einstein’s neck for Mathewmatics.
This year, however, I did something I didn’t intend to do - I drafted Eagles quarterback Nick Foles. Drafting quarterbacks is something of an inexact science in fantasy football, and while I enter my drafts with some premise of who I’d like, I almost never end up with the quarterback I thought I would.
Foles lasted until the middle rounds, and while the concerns of his previous season being an outlier weighed heavy on my heart, I can appreciate the moxie it had to have taken to throw 27 touchdowns against two interceptions last season. Those numbers would look at home in some sort of Madden 2008 season in which you trade David Garrard to the Rams and win the Super Bowl just to see if you can, something I may or may not have done (I have. As an aside, the Rams defeated Marc Bulger and the Jacksonville Jaguars in the Super Bowl, in what was certainly the least-watched Super Bowl of all time, despite all the storylines. If not for Jacksonville winning the expansion race, St. Louis would have been home to the Stallions!).
Owning Foles presented me with an excellent opportunity, however. The man has a compelling face. Some have compared him to movie character Napoleon Dynamite, which seems harsh as Foles is a professional athlete (arguably an elite professional athlete, but we won’t get into that) and Dynamite surely is not.
All the same, Foles possesses a few strikingly similar facial features to the actor who portrayed Dynamite, Jon Heder. He’s not strictly bad-looking, but he’s at least memorable. The shaggy hairstyle he wore last year contributes.
Knowing I had Foles in the chamber as a possible fantasy team name and logo model, I scanned the rest of my roster. When determining the top team name, consideration has to be given to ease of pun, and popularity of pun, as well as how effectively a tiny logo can convey the team’s pun.
Immediately, the name of my third wide receiver, Marques Colston, popped out at me. “Colston Creamery,” I thought, imagining a triple-decker ice cream cone, each scoop of which could be (poorly) digitally replaced by Colston’s head. His prominent ears would be a nice touch of humor (again, I do not consider him to be a bad-looking man, but his ears are prominent).
I did a cursory Google image search for a good setting for Mr. Colston’s creamery, determining Blake Lively and Leighton Meester’s (perhaps vaguely) iconic Rolling Stone cover in which the two provocatively share a rapidly melting ice cream cone to be a proper backdrop.
However, it seemed that photoshoot was presided over by famed photographer Terry Richardson, who many consider to be sexist, exploitative and otherwise problematic. I didn’t think I wanted Uncle Terry getting involved with my team, so I moved on. By the same token, another quick Google search showed me that Colston Creamery was already a pretty popular team name, so I didn’t want to be late to the party, either.
My backup quarterback is Tony Romo, and it would seem a player so polarizing and public as Romo would make for an excellent team name muse. After all, I still firmly recall that Romolicious was one of the teams portrayed as an unsuccessful fantasy football team in that one commercial a few years ago. I believe Romolicious was owned by a crying blonde woman in a pink Tony Romo jersey, and I believe her team went 1-11, or maybe 2-10. While the homage to a slightly dated commercial might have been fun, I felt shackling my group to what the NFL Network, or whoever else made that commercial, considered to be a failed team would mean setting them up for failure.
That brought me back to Foles. Foles’ name is versatile, and with a little tweaking, it can become “Fole,” which sounds like “Full” as well as “Foal.” I settled on the name Fole Moon, knowing the moon to be of great interest to creative types throughout recorded history, and considering full moons to be even more intriguing.
I set to work to find a picture of a big, round, bright full moon to start. Upon locating that, I downloaded Nick Foles’ shaggy-headed mugshot, turning it to grayscale and setting its opacity to a low level. Then, I superimposed Foles’ smiling, shaggy-haired face upon the moon, and added royalty-free clipart of a silhouette of a howling wolf in front of the Fole Moon.
What satisfaction this caused! At a glance, Foles makes for the perfect man in the moon. His grin is welcoming, inviting of any star-gazer, so as to say “Please, enjoy the night sky! Simply do not intercept my passes, as I only had two last year.” The howling wolf tells me that this is no ordinary moon, but that the beasts of the earth must pay tribute to the Fole Moon whenever it shines its mop-top countenance upon the fields and forests.
I have to face Tom Brady against the Dolphins in week one though, and it seems like Tom Brady always scores like six touchdowns against the Dolphins. At least I have the Fole Moon to help me through.
★★★
Thanks for your wonderful fantasy football stories, everyone!
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