Now don't I feel silly

Remember earlier in the year when I was whining about my frustrations in fantasy football? I waxed poetic about how you feel when you have a week or two or three that don't go your way. I lamented the frustration and vexation involved, hinting that I might should just quit playing. Well, I take it all back.

It seems somewhere along the way I received an infusion of luck and yes, skill. I play in the two leagues I noted, an ESPN draft league and a stock market style league at the Sporting News. In the ESPN league I employed smoke, mirrors and bribery to put together a team that won its final 4 in a row and made it all the way to the championship game. Now I met the REAL 'best team' in that game and was soundly trounced but, I got there and was happy about that. I mean I could have been playing for last instead of first on that week, right Steve?

In the Sporting News league I pecked my way back into contention through the end of the season. In fact, starting this week I was two-hundred and twenty-five points out of first place (and a 50 dollar win). Realize at this point that we both were at 40,000 points and the mere 225 was not much. The rest of the field was basically out of it, both of us would have to tank for the guy in third to win, sorry Jeff. In the end we had 4 differences on our 11 man rosters and all my hopes were riding there. The day wore on and I gained and lost ground, finally, at the end of the afternoon games I looked at the score and realized I was still 80 points behind. I had nearly resigned myself to calling my buddy up and congratulating him when I noted that I still had one player left to go in the night game. A quick check showed that ALL of Steve's players were done and all I had to do was get 81 points from Ray Bironas, the kicker. Realize that 80 points is NOT a guarantee, you get 10 for each extra point and 30 for field goals up to 39 yards long. The great thing about this was I had the SAME kicker he did until the night before when I had one trade left and decided to differentiate from Steve. Now, this wonderful guy kicks a short field goal, a 40 yard er for 50 points and then another 60 points for a 54 yard field goal, 150 points later a new champion is born.

I suppose I should take the lesson from all of this and "never say never" but what would be the fun of that?