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Wager On Football's Fantasy Football experts stop
by every week to give you the lowdown on Fantasy Football.
Their fantasy insight is invaluable when it comes
to gaining knowledge about the one thing that consumes
so many of us die hard football fans for six months
every year.
Some Innovative Suggestions For
Dealing With Deadbeatsby By:
David Bachman Fantasy Football Editor
9/04/04
You deadbeats know who you are; you're the ones who
aren't reading this essay because you don't visit
fantasy websites. You don't know that Jamal Lewis
is injured or what kind of contribution he made to
the Ravens 4 years ago or even what the Ravens did
that was so remarkable. Hint: They won the Super Bowl
with Trent Dilfer as their QB. But of course, you
deadbeats don't even know enough to be astonished
by that Trent Dilfer factoid.
For the sake of clarification, allow me to define
a fantasy deadbeat. I'm not talking about a guy who
refuses to fork over his entry fee. Any of you schmendrick
commissioners who are clueless enough to wait on fee
collection until the end of the season deserve any
headaches you end up with. The kind of deadbeat I'm
talking about is a guy who joins a fantasy league
just for the sake of fitting in around the office.
Maybe the boss likes to play fantasy football, so
the deadbeats line up with their entry fees on draft
day with the intention of scoring a few brownie points.
Deadbeats know how to talk the talk in front of whoever
it is that they're trying to impress with their phony
interest in fantasy football. They show up to the
draft with a copy of the Sporting News that they've
studied for all of fifteen minutes. They tend to play
things safe and stick to obvious draft choices. During
the actual draft, they'll be able to distinguish between
Daunte Culpepper and Peyton Manning because they'll
really know the difference as long as it's spelled
out for them by some sportswriter. But that night
they'll be hit with a case of amnesia. By the time
the season starts, they won't even remember the players
on their own rosters, much less anyone else's.
I usually get suckered into playing in a league with
one or more deadbeats, and they are, in my opinion,
the most important obstacle to overcome in order to
enjoy a season of fantasy football. Deadbeats start
players that are injured or suspended or, in some
cases, dead. They use the same lineup all season long
without paying attention to bye weeks or player performances.
And the worst thing about them, of course, is that
their team loses to every other team in the league-except
yours.
So what's to be done about them?
I talked to the commissioners of a few leagues about
the possibility of instituting a death penalty for
anyone voted a 'deadbeat' by two-thirds of the league
participants, but that's roughly the same thing as
putting a band-aid on a broken leg. While it's true
that a dead deadbeat will be prevented from joining
the league next year, ritual slaughter of football
idiots isn't excused in such hard-nosed states as
Alabama, Iowa, and Oregon unless it occurs at the
end of the season, and that does nothing to solve
the problem of this year's deadbeats.
Of course, there's always the possibility of fining
fantasy owners for failing to pay attention to their
own rosters. Some commissioners have penalties set
up so that if you start a player whose team isn't
playing, you have to contribute a nominal fee to the
pool, but most deadbeats don't mind such penalties.
In leagues with transaction fees, they'll pay less
by ignoring the NFL and not trading players than the
regular league members will by studying the sports
section of the paper and tuning into the pre-game
show for Monday Night Football and constantly tweaking
their rosters through trades and waiver wire acquisitions.
One commissioner told me that his method of keeping
deadbeats under control is to make it clear that any
owner who fails to keep up with his roster will not
be invited back next season. Yeah, that's gotta work.
One league that I was on the verge of withdrawing
from because of rampant deadbeatism, however, has
just instituted a fairly interesting new procedure.
Instead of determining draft order randomly on the
night of the draft, draft order was assigned in early
August. Players have until draft night (September
7th for us) to swap draft positions. It's a traditional
draft in which the player who picks first in the first
round picks last in the second round. Not surprisingly,
the guy who's slated to pick first is trying to trade
with someone who has the 4th-6th pick. I lucked out
with the 6th pick and am already getting all sorts
of offers from other league members. I think I might
want to go 4th, but that depends on who will be ahead
of me and what their drafting strategies have been
in the past. There's a lot of rumor-mongering and
'buzz' about who will be drafted and when. Player
A says he will take Priest first; Player B says he
intends to go with Culpepper; Player C doesn't mind
picking late in Round 1 so long as he ends up with
Kevin Barlow and Marvin Harrison.
Right now, there are 12 people in the league. Come
September 20th, the commissioner will be accepting
deadbeat nominations. Based on conversations and e-mail
exchanges, we'll each have to name the one or two
people that we think are least qualified to participate.
Anyone who gets over 6 votes is out-before we even
make it to draft day. I admire the commissioner for
trying something new, and I hope it works. But the
problem with the deadbeats is that they get to vote-and
deadbeats aren't even attentive enough to spot their
own kind.
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