This one can go in the category of “I used to walk uphill (both ways) 3 miles in the driving snow every day to school” category of rants. My son hasn’t started playing fantasy sports yet. And he probably won’t for several years. But when he does, I have a filing cabinet full of old USA Today sports sections with pages and pages of YTD stats for every NBA player. I have notebook after notebook of hand-compiled tallies of 8 statistical categories for every active player in our fantasy basketball league… for every week for an 82-game season…. for several seasons in a row. How could one possibly consider these to be the glory days of fantasy sports when there are now thousands of web sites devoted to crunching these numbers for you? Primarily, I miss the in-person draft nights. There were no online drafts when you could haul your laptop around the house trying to draft a good player while simultaneously doing the dishes, putting your kid to bed, and arguing with your spouse. (Not that I ever argue with my spouse or have ever argued with her while doing the dishes, putting our son to bed, and hauling my macbook around waiting for the loud bell sound that signified my turn in the draft – that was purely hypothetical for storytelling purposes). No, you had to show up at someone’s house, sans kid and dishes and wife, with beer and fantasy draft magazines in hand, and be ready to focus 100% of your attention over the next 3 hours on nothing but players and insults. Then there were the countless hours sifting through pages and pages and pages of the USA Today Sports Section, compiling stats, and writing them all down on pieces of paper with a pencil. (I don’t think my forearm has ever been as strong since). Finally, there were the awesomely archaic methods of distributing the results. (You’ll notice that Yours Truly placed first in 1994’s competition). There were the sophisticated vehicles for up-to-the-minute news updates (and pictures of awesome NBA hairpieces), awkwardly-formatted online insults, and pre-digital camera photos of your future wife and Charles Barkley in the same frame. Honest, they are both in that picture.
In short, I have always loved participating in fantasy sports leagues. The modern-day tools available to see up-to-the-second statistics and league standings play into the ever-increasing need for instant gratification. But they also make me wax reminiscent for the days when fantasy sports leagues were really little more than a good excuse to get together with friends.
Tags: fantasy sports, internet