Turns out that “giant sucking sound” is not NAFTA afterall, but rather the sound my fantasy team is most likely to make. After weeks of anticipation, we had my fantasy football draft last night for the Boyz Near the Hood fantasy league that I run with a college buddy of mine. I’m sure you are all busting to find out what happened and so for that reason and for the therapeutic benefit that it might have I’m going to purge my inner doubts and fears and tell you what happened last night and why I did what I did. Enjoy.
After having spent most of the day at the office getting absolutely nothing work related accomplished, I decided to leave early. It’s not that I didn’t have work to do or that I didn’t want to do it, it is just that I couldn’t really think of anything not related to football and that just doesn’t allow one the sort of concentration one needs to do legal work. I got home about 5 and spent the next hour rearranging my man room, hooking up the computer to my projector, checking in with the 3 teams that are out of state and thus drafting on line and eating about 45 Redvines and then I waited.
John and Rob arrived first and with it came the news that Jeff, who had the first overall pick would be late, but had given his pick to Rob to make for him. The first pick: Tomlinson. This meant that we were going to start the draft with a trade. Earlier in the day, John and Adam had worked out a deal contingent on Tomlinson going first, where John sent his number 2 overall pick to Adam and then John and Adam picked each others picks at random for the rest of the night based on some secret complicated formula designed to distract me as I tried to enter the picks on the website we use. The plan worked and I immediately started drafting players from other sports. With my first pick I chose Cadillac Anderson, former NBA journeyman. Not making that up.
Soon after, my friend Tony called. Tony is a former owner who still comes to the draft to run the computer (no small task), but couldn’t make it. That meant trouble for me because now I was going to have to run the computer and try to draft a team. In the best of years, just drafting a team is a task that takes every ounce of my limited powers of concentration (yes my concentration comes in ounces, if you must know). To try to do two things at once (and I mean any two things) is just too much to ask. Before it even started my draft was in trouble.
Actually, that last sentence is true for a couple reasons. First, I started with WR Larry Fitzgerald and QB Matt Hassleback as my keepers for this league. They are fine players and all, but they don’t play running back. That is a problem because in fantasy football, your season depends largely on having two good running backs and there are only about 8 out there. Bad, bad start.
Everyone else arrived. In this case, everyone else included league veterans: Mike, Jeff, Patrick, Steve, Johnny, and John L, with Clint, Adam and my brother Enoch on line. There was Pizza, the aforementioned Redvines, about 45,000 ounces of soda and enough chips to elevate everyone’s sodium level to about twice the recommended yearly allowance. We were set.
I had the 5th pick in the draft and was hoping to get one of the following RBs in this order:
Ronnie Brown, Rudi Johnson, Stephen Jackson, Carnell Williams. I knew Tomlinson would be gone, so I’m not even counting him. Adam traded for the number 2 spot so he could get Brown, so I was really hoping to get Rudi. Then Johnny took Jackson….there was still hope. Then John L paused….he wasn’t sure…maybe he would jump on Reggie Bush or the best WR available Chad Johnson since he already had the mighty Shawn Alexander as his keeper….alas, no…he selected Rudi. That left me with Carnell Williams. Not a bad running back, and showed flashes of brilliance last year as a rookie, but also proved to be an injury risk. Deuce McAlister, my first round choice last year, killed me with an early injury, so I’m already getting nauseous at this point.
The expected run of running backs and top WRs followed in our snaking draft format, which would mean that I wouldn’t pick again until the 20th pick. I was hoping Kevin Jones would fall to me as I see him being a potential force under Martz in Detroit. Clint spoiled that by taking him with the 14th pick early in the second round of this 12 team draft. That left me hoping Westbrook would fall. He’s chronically injured, but I think he’s become a bit underrated after missing the whole preseason. People seem to have forgotten about him. People, that is, other than my brother who nabbed him 2 picks in front of me. Now the pressure was on to find a serviceable second RB from what was left.
I narrowed it down to Frank Gore, Deuce McAlister, and De’shaun Foster. Then Steve took Thomas Jones so all three were left. Really, this was a no brainer. Gore is a Niner which means I would have one of my home team guys (always a huge fun factor in fantasy) and he’s also set to explode if he can stay healthy. A great athlete, the sure starter and only decent RB on the team and a guy having a very good camp who now gets to run behind Larry Allen’s enormous caboose. Of course, with SF his TD chances might not be that much, but given what was left, he was the obvious choice. I din’t need a QB and there was no WR left on the board that made it worth gambling on passing up an RB when I still only had one on my roster. Gore it was.
I had gone through a couple mock drafts in preparing for this one and the thing I noticed again and again, was that once the top 5 or so WRs were gone, the rest were really difficult to differentiate. Plus, there were tons of WRs, compared to other positions, that could blossom into good players and almost none that were a sure thing. Compare that with the pool of RBs which was more shallow than a relationship with Paris Hilton and my strategy was coming together. I decided that my draft slot was not going to allow me to get another top WR, so I needed to draft RBs until there were absolutely no good ones left and only then start looking at WRs unless a great one fell in my lap.
So, I hoped Foster or Deuce would fall to me with my next pick (29th). Foster went with the next pick. Then it started to look like a very good WR might be there and I thought about shifting my strategy. TO, Driver and Hines Ward were still on the board and any of them would have made a really nice 3rd pick in a keeper draft. However, I couldn’t draft TO because of my strict “no Cowboys” policy when drafting. If I can’t win without drafting someone who plays for my sworn enemy, then I don’t want to win.
Driver and Ward got picked as did Mike Bell who would have entered into the mix, as much as I wanted to avoid the whole Denver mess, so Deuce was waiting for me when it came back to me. But that was a dilemma. First, Deuce ruined my season last year when he went down with a knee injury and I hate him for it. My team made trades, but never recovered. Second, Deuce ruined this season for me by leaving me without a good RB keeper, which was my plan when I drafted him last year and I hate him for it. Third, he wasn’t a good keeper option because he is still recovering from surgery and the Saints drafted Reggie Bush, the most talked about and exciting college runner I can remember.
That said, Deuce has looked recovered in pre season and I think the Saints know that Bush is not ready to be a regular runner. That means, Deuce should still get his carries, especially around the goal line because he’s bigger than Bush, and that means, he could actually end up being a top 10-15 RB. In fact, I think he will. I think he’s going to redeem himself from last year and give my team a boost this year. So, I took him again. That meant 2 of my first 3 picks were players from my team last year that was the worst I had ever had in fantasy. Good start. Thank you very much.
I still didn’t have a second WR, but I wasn’t worried. I figured there would still be lots at the same (albeit lower) level to choose from when things came back to me. Turns out I was right. The problem was, they were all so mediocre and similar that I couldn’t get excited about picking one. I looked back at my list of RBs and decided to take another one. With the injury prone backs I have, I could use the insurance and maybe I could get someone who would be good trade bait later. I decided to go with Chris Brown, the starting RB for the Titans.
Starting RBs are so rare really and Brown has been decent in the past when healthy, so this seemed like a solid pick with the WRs I really wanted (Walker, Jackson, Williams, Plaxico and Housh) taken ahead of me. However, before I entered Brown into the computer, my buddy and fellow Niner fan Mike, came to the rescue. “You know, Henry was just named the starter today right? Brown’s not starting.” What? There was chaos in the draft room with others swearing that was false and me reeling at how I could have missed something like that. John L., who had a laptop, confirmed that Brown was being called “starter in name only” and that Henry would get the nod. No one else had picked yet, so I changed my pick. With the guys good enough to let me do that, I knew I couldn’t take long deciding. I quickly looked at the WRs and froze. I didn’t like any of them. Panic was setting in. Find someone. Someone on a decent offense. Ummmm….ummmm…..”Nate Burleson.” An audible groan went out from the room as everyone knew I had choked.
Burleson relies on catching from my QB which isn’t good in fantasy and plus he’s the number two guy and really fell on his face last year. Bad pick. Darick Mason (the next pick…your welcome), Joey Galloway, Matt Jones and even Antonio Bryant would have been better picks. Ugh.
Now I was nervous about my WRs. Looking at the remaining guys I saw nothing but stiffs on bad teams and number 3 guys on good teams. Uh oh. Had I waited too long? Should I have taken and better WR over Deuce? Then I got a little gift. Matt Jones, who I probably should have taken over Burleson fell to me with the next pick. And then I remembered why I took the strategy that I did. WRs at this point are a crap shoot so I had just as much chance at getting a decent one now as I did the last round or the next round or 3 rounds from now.
A bunch of guys I wanted went off the board before my next pick like Galloway, Bryant and Williamson. When it came time to make the 68th overall pick, I thought about taking Kevan Barlow because we have to carry 4 RBs and he was a potential starter still out there. The thing is, I just don’t think he’s for real and don’t see him producing for the Jets. So, I went with the best guy available on an offense that might be productive. Eddie Kennison. Truth be told I don’t trust Kennison at all, but I liked him slightly better than Coles who was the only other WR I considered.
After that I got Keyshon (a steal I think), the Baltimore D (I really wanted Carolina), Shawn Graham (I really wanted Feeley), TJ Ducket in case Portis stays hurt and Mewelde Moore because I wanted Chester Taylor who went much earlier than I thought because I believe that Minny’s new O line is going to produce a good runner there. So, I took Moor in case Taylor goes down.
In the end, I hated my team. I had just missed on the guys I really wanted, most of whom got taken right before I would have taken them and left me with guys I felt like I had to take. My RBs are brittle, my WRs are thin and inconsistent and neither my QB, D nor Kicker is anything special. I think it will take some weird goings on for me to make it to the playoffs this year, but it is football, so there’s a chance.
And that’s why I keep coming back.
Go Niners!!!
After having spent most of the day at the office getting absolutely nothing work related accomplished, I decided to leave early. It’s not that I didn’t have work to do or that I didn’t want to do it, it is just that I couldn’t really think of anything not related to football and that just doesn’t allow one the sort of concentration one needs to do legal work. I got home about 5 and spent the next hour rearranging my man room, hooking up the computer to my projector, checking in with the 3 teams that are out of state and thus drafting on line and eating about 45 Redvines and then I waited.
John and Rob arrived first and with it came the news that Jeff, who had the first overall pick would be late, but had given his pick to Rob to make for him. The first pick: Tomlinson. This meant that we were going to start the draft with a trade. Earlier in the day, John and Adam had worked out a deal contingent on Tomlinson going first, where John sent his number 2 overall pick to Adam and then John and Adam picked each others picks at random for the rest of the night based on some secret complicated formula designed to distract me as I tried to enter the picks on the website we use. The plan worked and I immediately started drafting players from other sports. With my first pick I chose Cadillac Anderson, former NBA journeyman. Not making that up.
Soon after, my friend Tony called. Tony is a former owner who still comes to the draft to run the computer (no small task), but couldn’t make it. That meant trouble for me because now I was going to have to run the computer and try to draft a team. In the best of years, just drafting a team is a task that takes every ounce of my limited powers of concentration (yes my concentration comes in ounces, if you must know). To try to do two things at once (and I mean any two things) is just too much to ask. Before it even started my draft was in trouble.
Actually, that last sentence is true for a couple reasons. First, I started with WR Larry Fitzgerald and QB Matt Hassleback as my keepers for this league. They are fine players and all, but they don’t play running back. That is a problem because in fantasy football, your season depends largely on having two good running backs and there are only about 8 out there. Bad, bad start.
Everyone else arrived. In this case, everyone else included league veterans: Mike, Jeff, Patrick, Steve, Johnny, and John L, with Clint, Adam and my brother Enoch on line. There was Pizza, the aforementioned Redvines, about 45,000 ounces of soda and enough chips to elevate everyone’s sodium level to about twice the recommended yearly allowance. We were set.
I had the 5th pick in the draft and was hoping to get one of the following RBs in this order:
Ronnie Brown, Rudi Johnson, Stephen Jackson, Carnell Williams. I knew Tomlinson would be gone, so I’m not even counting him. Adam traded for the number 2 spot so he could get Brown, so I was really hoping to get Rudi. Then Johnny took Jackson….there was still hope. Then John L paused….he wasn’t sure…maybe he would jump on Reggie Bush or the best WR available Chad Johnson since he already had the mighty Shawn Alexander as his keeper….alas, no…he selected Rudi. That left me with Carnell Williams. Not a bad running back, and showed flashes of brilliance last year as a rookie, but also proved to be an injury risk. Deuce McAlister, my first round choice last year, killed me with an early injury, so I’m already getting nauseous at this point.
The expected run of running backs and top WRs followed in our snaking draft format, which would mean that I wouldn’t pick again until the 20th pick. I was hoping Kevin Jones would fall to me as I see him being a potential force under Martz in Detroit. Clint spoiled that by taking him with the 14th pick early in the second round of this 12 team draft. That left me hoping Westbrook would fall. He’s chronically injured, but I think he’s become a bit underrated after missing the whole preseason. People seem to have forgotten about him. People, that is, other than my brother who nabbed him 2 picks in front of me. Now the pressure was on to find a serviceable second RB from what was left.
I narrowed it down to Frank Gore, Deuce McAlister, and De’shaun Foster. Then Steve took Thomas Jones so all three were left. Really, this was a no brainer. Gore is a Niner which means I would have one of my home team guys (always a huge fun factor in fantasy) and he’s also set to explode if he can stay healthy. A great athlete, the sure starter and only decent RB on the team and a guy having a very good camp who now gets to run behind Larry Allen’s enormous caboose. Of course, with SF his TD chances might not be that much, but given what was left, he was the obvious choice. I din’t need a QB and there was no WR left on the board that made it worth gambling on passing up an RB when I still only had one on my roster. Gore it was.
I had gone through a couple mock drafts in preparing for this one and the thing I noticed again and again, was that once the top 5 or so WRs were gone, the rest were really difficult to differentiate. Plus, there were tons of WRs, compared to other positions, that could blossom into good players and almost none that were a sure thing. Compare that with the pool of RBs which was more shallow than a relationship with Paris Hilton and my strategy was coming together. I decided that my draft slot was not going to allow me to get another top WR, so I needed to draft RBs until there were absolutely no good ones left and only then start looking at WRs unless a great one fell in my lap.
So, I hoped Foster or Deuce would fall to me with my next pick (29th). Foster went with the next pick. Then it started to look like a very good WR might be there and I thought about shifting my strategy. TO, Driver and Hines Ward were still on the board and any of them would have made a really nice 3rd pick in a keeper draft. However, I couldn’t draft TO because of my strict “no Cowboys” policy when drafting. If I can’t win without drafting someone who plays for my sworn enemy, then I don’t want to win.
Driver and Ward got picked as did Mike Bell who would have entered into the mix, as much as I wanted to avoid the whole Denver mess, so Deuce was waiting for me when it came back to me. But that was a dilemma. First, Deuce ruined my season last year when he went down with a knee injury and I hate him for it. My team made trades, but never recovered. Second, Deuce ruined this season for me by leaving me without a good RB keeper, which was my plan when I drafted him last year and I hate him for it. Third, he wasn’t a good keeper option because he is still recovering from surgery and the Saints drafted Reggie Bush, the most talked about and exciting college runner I can remember.
That said, Deuce has looked recovered in pre season and I think the Saints know that Bush is not ready to be a regular runner. That means, Deuce should still get his carries, especially around the goal line because he’s bigger than Bush, and that means, he could actually end up being a top 10-15 RB. In fact, I think he will. I think he’s going to redeem himself from last year and give my team a boost this year. So, I took him again. That meant 2 of my first 3 picks were players from my team last year that was the worst I had ever had in fantasy. Good start. Thank you very much.
I still didn’t have a second WR, but I wasn’t worried. I figured there would still be lots at the same (albeit lower) level to choose from when things came back to me. Turns out I was right. The problem was, they were all so mediocre and similar that I couldn’t get excited about picking one. I looked back at my list of RBs and decided to take another one. With the injury prone backs I have, I could use the insurance and maybe I could get someone who would be good trade bait later. I decided to go with Chris Brown, the starting RB for the Titans.
Starting RBs are so rare really and Brown has been decent in the past when healthy, so this seemed like a solid pick with the WRs I really wanted (Walker, Jackson, Williams, Plaxico and Housh) taken ahead of me. However, before I entered Brown into the computer, my buddy and fellow Niner fan Mike, came to the rescue. “You know, Henry was just named the starter today right? Brown’s not starting.” What? There was chaos in the draft room with others swearing that was false and me reeling at how I could have missed something like that. John L., who had a laptop, confirmed that Brown was being called “starter in name only” and that Henry would get the nod. No one else had picked yet, so I changed my pick. With the guys good enough to let me do that, I knew I couldn’t take long deciding. I quickly looked at the WRs and froze. I didn’t like any of them. Panic was setting in. Find someone. Someone on a decent offense. Ummmm….ummmm…..”Nate Burleson.” An audible groan went out from the room as everyone knew I had choked.
Burleson relies on catching from my QB which isn’t good in fantasy and plus he’s the number two guy and really fell on his face last year. Bad pick. Darick Mason (the next pick…your welcome), Joey Galloway, Matt Jones and even Antonio Bryant would have been better picks. Ugh.
Now I was nervous about my WRs. Looking at the remaining guys I saw nothing but stiffs on bad teams and number 3 guys on good teams. Uh oh. Had I waited too long? Should I have taken and better WR over Deuce? Then I got a little gift. Matt Jones, who I probably should have taken over Burleson fell to me with the next pick. And then I remembered why I took the strategy that I did. WRs at this point are a crap shoot so I had just as much chance at getting a decent one now as I did the last round or the next round or 3 rounds from now.
A bunch of guys I wanted went off the board before my next pick like Galloway, Bryant and Williamson. When it came time to make the 68th overall pick, I thought about taking Kevan Barlow because we have to carry 4 RBs and he was a potential starter still out there. The thing is, I just don’t think he’s for real and don’t see him producing for the Jets. So, I went with the best guy available on an offense that might be productive. Eddie Kennison. Truth be told I don’t trust Kennison at all, but I liked him slightly better than Coles who was the only other WR I considered.
After that I got Keyshon (a steal I think), the Baltimore D (I really wanted Carolina), Shawn Graham (I really wanted Feeley), TJ Ducket in case Portis stays hurt and Mewelde Moore because I wanted Chester Taylor who went much earlier than I thought because I believe that Minny’s new O line is going to produce a good runner there. So, I took Moor in case Taylor goes down.
In the end, I hated my team. I had just missed on the guys I really wanted, most of whom got taken right before I would have taken them and left me with guys I felt like I had to take. My RBs are brittle, my WRs are thin and inconsistent and neither my QB, D nor Kicker is anything special. I think it will take some weird goings on for me to make it to the playoffs this year, but it is football, so there’s a chance.
And that’s why I keep coming back.
Go Niners!!!
Comments
Like I said, you always speak the truth, Mr. Stump!
Why say something wishy washy like, "I was somewhat disappointed."