go west and water the trees, my son

Sequoias may not be the tallest trees in the world, as their Redwood cousins edge them out by a few meters, but man, are they the chunkiest. To share a few stats with you, Sequoias are:

• up to 2,000 years old
• reach 375 feet tall
• can be 25 feet in diameter
• volume of over 52,000 cubic feet

Putting that in context of house and home, if you consider the average good sized bathroom, about ten feet wide by fifteen feet long and ten feet high (okay, that's twice as big as MY bathroom, but...) that would be 1500 cubic feet. That means that you could fit more than 34 bathrooms in this tree.

Why would anyone put a bathroom in a tree, much less 34 of them?

Well that's the thing. When I'm out in the woods and have to relieve myself, I prefer to do it on the great big trunk of a great big tree. I like to think that I'm doing my part in the life cycle and ecosystems of the wild.....providing for one of these magnificent giants with the excess water and overflow nutrients that my kidneys have sent the way of my bladder. Call me sentimental, but I guess this act of fellow comrade nourishment just makes me feel as if I'm playing a small but significant role in the greater movings of the universe. In the end, it's about giving back.

The particular tree shown above is located in Mariposa Grove in Yosemite Park, where some of the largest of these grand mamas live. Yes, you can drive a car through it. Yes it is still alive. Pretty damn incredible.

If there were a Fantasy game based on vegetation, I do believe the Giant Sequoia would be a first round pick. Not only do they get HUGE, they are basically fireproof. When walking among them you can see at various intervals up and along their reddish trunks the scorch marks from forest fires. Sometimes a particularly bad fire will get rid of all the underbrush and even hollow out parts of some trees, but the biggest are hardly touched......some theories are that they have so much water in them and have some sort of fire proofing in their bark, that they just won't catch on fire.

So while they are playing for your team they will not likely go on the Disabled List, and they will happily just continue to grow big and tall to pad your team's stats. True, this game might take a lifetime to complete, but what the heck else you got to do, anyways? Smell the roses, draft a tree, life is short, play long.

Why the coniferous ruminations, you might be wondering? Well I'm going with some friends and some family out to a remote mansion in the woods of Sequoia National Park for the next five days. This place is called Kaweah Han and it's pure heaven. It's like a 6,000 square foot (I know, enough with the volume stats!) house perched on the cutback of a pristine alpine creek, with a power generating water wheel, no neighbors for miles and (wait for it) a HORSESHOE pit.

Man, I love horseshoes. It's such a cool game. Throwing things is fun. Ringers are fun. Leaners. I mean, you know all the times you've come SO CLOSE to something that you could almost taste the joy of achievement, but it just slipped past you? Well in horseshoes, so the saying goes, close is GOOD ENOUGH. You actually score points for being "close." Ahhhhh, the shrill sound of a ringer in the crisp woodsy morning.......doesn't get much better than that. Okay, it does get a little better, as in when you make the shoe sing on stake in the afternoon with a cold beer in hand, but I digress.......

Point is, I'll be missing you for the next several days. Will be back to help you all make your Realities more Fantastic next next Monday.......ahhhhh Labor Day.

Until then, Fantasize well, and think of me in the woods, walking on pine duff, feeding trees, and ringin' it up!

burn rubber Sunday, cut rug Monday, drop pounds Tuesday, stab backs Thursday

Oh man, this Fall, starting in mid-late September, is going to KICK ASS in the world of Fantasy Reality TV.

Sundays we will race around the world with our favorite pairs of inventive budget travelers. It's a little bit of torture watching them go places I really want to go and not stopping for a second to enjoy the view, sample the wine, or sun in the sand.(Side note: these two on the left are dead money.....I'm just saying....not only are they silver hairs, they are clearly not the competitive types. Smart money has them preferring the "path" to the "goal." But hey, there will be points awarded for drama and smack talking too, so maybe they'll be good scorers even if they aren't good racers.)



Mondays we will shake it with some favorite celebrities as they learn new dance routines, partnered with professional dancers, and the more they fall, the more they are judged, the more they cry, bitch and moan about how hard it is, the more I will score. (Side note: Penn Jillette? can he dance?)


Tuesday we will cheer the biggest of the bigs as they sweat it out, trying to shed pounds and ounces, literally and figuratively staying alive, and the more they shed, the more they cry, the more they curse their trainer, the more I score. (Side note: this show must have been created with Fantasy in mind....I mean there are stats just waiting to be had.....how many pounds lost, what percentage.....secret twinkies eaten caught on camera.......In the immortal words of Eddie Murphy, "I'll just have a salad.")

Thursday we will watch as a bunch of you's and me's attempt to survive in the wilds of western Africa, eating what they can, sleeping where they will, and weaving webs of illusion and deceit for our pleasure and points. (Side note: I must admit, my personal Survivor dream is to see Jeff Probst attempting to do the things and live the ways he challenges his adoring castaways to do. He looks all tough with that shark's tooth necklace, but I'm betting that's a salon tan, an airbrushed physique, and if truth be told, he couldn't survive a night in the wild, without his troupe of interns and local handlers.)

1,000 Fantasy points to the first castaway that tears off Probst's hairpiece.

The only better thing than watching these shows alone with a bacon cheeseburger and half liter of Ben and Jerry's is also having a team of Fantasy racers, stars, chubies, and castaways to be your very own.

Fantasy ON!

Fantasy is a multilayered cake

Let us all agree that cake is fantastically delicious. Doesn't matter what kind of cake. Chocolate, lemon poppy, vanilla with strawberry filling, ice cream cake......you might have an opinion about which is best, but really these are just varying degrees of bestness.

It occurred to me last night after I got home from Pac Bell Park (or whatever corporation is now monikering the SF Giants pretty little ballground now), having watched the Florida Marlins smoke the gracious hosts to the tune of 6-0, that Fantasy is like a good, tasty, multi-layered cake.

=

I don't mean to insinuate with the above collage that Hanley Ramirez is somehow the equal physically or mentally to a gawdy pinstriped one year old named Christopher's birthday cake, although I must admit the pinstriped similarity is worthy of mention. Also it's notable that Hanley is the #1 bestest baseball player on the #1 team in my league (mine) and that he has a son named Hanley Jr. so he is technically Hanley the first. Eat your heart out, numerologists. I'll eat cake, instead, thank you very much.

The actual point of the Hanley = Cake exercise is to elucidate my point about Fantasy being an extremely deep, many layered, multi faceted, you could even say corrugated, affair. I'll give you a simple taste of what I mean.

Before the game last night I was in high anticipation of Hanley tearing up the Giants shoddy pitching by whipping up a few RBI's, tossing in a handful of runs, and just for icing, a few pinches of stolen bases. (here ends pathetic cake cooking analogy, feel free to proceed) Hanley, however, just didn't have it. He went 1-5 with none of the above, and was happy to watch his Marlin team mates do all the heavy lifting.

Arriving home I was tempted to not check my stats for the day, worried that my other players would have had similar bad results, and I didn't really want to face that music. But who was I kidding? I live for checking my Fantasy stats. It's just how I roll.

I should have had more faith. (Enter now second level of Fantasy) I should have known that on a night when the team captain of my league leading squad has not faired well, that his mates would rise to the occasion and carry him on their shoulders for a bit. That is just what great teams do. Even the best players have down days, but a sign of a true team is that the lesser talents are there to pick up the slack and carry the day. I won't bore you with specific player heroics, but I will tell you that my boys racked up 13 runs, 3 homers, 15 RBI and a .467 on base percentage, each of which were tops for the day in league. Now, if you know anything about Fantasy, then you know that these players are not connected at all (most likely) in the real sense of a team. That should not stop us, however, from fantasizing (lower case f) that they are one big happy gang of merry comrades.

Slicing deeper into my Fantasy Cake I imagine the pep talk that one of my over achieving-for-the-day players had for Hanley. He would also try and cheer up Ervin Santana, one of my pitchers who turned in a great 7 inning, 1 run performance, and having left with the lead against the Eastern Division leading Devil Rays, had to watch his win evaporate due to the donkey pitching of a reliever who doesn't have the skills or good luck to wear OUR uniform. No cake for you, Scot Shields. Face the wall and think about what you've done.

As my Fantasy fantasy continues I pull all my players together to give them a home stretch inspirational locker room talk, a closed to media type of thing that's not over the top, but maybe a few of them cried just a little, being so moved. What can I say, I'm an inspirational fantasizer. Nothing like a little man on man weeping to bond a team in the dog days of a pennant race, when all you really have in the end is your imaginary clubhouse relationships to carry you through.

And then I sent each of them on their way, from the third degree of Fantasy, back to Reality, full of fantastical we're #1 cake.

Bob Dylan, Fantasy visionary

Bob Dylan, paraphrasing Honest Abe, said:

Half of the people can be part right all of the time,
Some of the people can be all right part of the time,
But all of the people can't be all right all of the time.

If that aint the most genius Fantasy thing to say, well I'll be a goat's GrandDaddy.

He nailed it right on the head, and it's our lesson for today on quality Fantasy play. Since all the people cannot be all right all the time and since we are each a member of "all the people," we must each assume that we cannot be all right all the time.

Sure, we would each love to be part of "Some of the people," those who are all right part of the time, but odds are just against that.

So what do we hope for in Fantasy? Well to paraphrase the turtle, "slow and steady wins the race." Or maybe that's a direct quote. Whatev.

Anyways, my point is that there is the tendency to want to gamble when making predictions. We each want to be the first to call a great upset, the first to know who was going to have the most touchdowns this year, and the genius who throws a pitcher out there who just got back from Cancer rehab and throws a no hitter.

But Fantasy just laughs.

HAHAHAHAHA.

Not at the cancer guy who threw the no-no. At you and me, who seeing said mound remission brilliance thinks he'll do it again, and then takes it hard when that guy gets ripped his next time out. So sad.

Nice try genius. More often than not, that which is unlikely will not happen. Bugger.

So where lies the boring road to Fantasy durability and trophy hording? Right down the middle. Or I guess right down the just above middle. True, you still gotta be better than average to win. But shooting for the perfect 10 is dangerous. Especially when you have multiple categories of points to score in. Let me paint you a picture, seen not just this year but also last year in my Fantasy baseball league.

One dude thought it would make sense to get all the best pitchers. So he did. Not hard to do because most people wait a bit to draft pitchers, due to both their fragility and to the fact that a lot of pitchers who didn't do greet last year will do great this year, so they'll be available after the draft on "the wire." So he gets all the best and he gets them EARLY. But in order to do this, he must sacrifice hitting. As in, no hitters taken for 8 rounds or so until he had all the best pitchers.

He is essentially gambling that by scoring the highest in all the pitching categories he will not need to score much in the hitting ones, and he'll take the cake.

Not so fast.

The problem with this strategy is that we are using Rotiserrie scoring, which basically means that if you win a category you get the amount of points corresponding to the amount of teams in the league. So with 10 teams, the winner of each point category gets 10 points. Second place, however, gets 9. So our pitching enamored friend can do as well as he wants in every pitching category, but he can only get one more point in each category than second place, even if he beats second place by 100 wins or saves or strikeouts. He can get 50 points for winning every pitching category, but somebody in second or third or fourth in those categories can get 45, 40, 35, etc.....you see where I'm going. If that other person has not sacrificed their hitting for those 35 or 40 points, and they also get 35 or 40 points from hitting, well they will absolutely DOMINATE that pitcher-slut who will most likely only get 1 or 2 points in five hitting categories, giving him 5-10 points to add to his 50.

Even if he is correct in assuming he got the BEST pitchers, which is quite an assumption, he will still have to make up 25-35 points in hitting in order to be there in the 75 point region where you need to be to win this league. That means he needs an average of 5-7 points in each hitting category, and I can tell you that from his crappy hitters who he had to get in the end of the draft, that just ain't gonna happen, or I'll be a hippo's hooker.

I don't want to bore you with more stat talk, so you'll just have to trust me on that. And I am speaking from experience, for this year I went for the high side of mediocrity with all my picks, figuring I wouldn't likely win any categories, but wanted to be in the hunt in all of them, and I have 72.5 points right now, good for a 9.5 point first place lead going into the last 5 weeks of the season. (knock on wood)

And by the way, the quote from Honest Abe that Dylan was parasinging was:

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people
some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.

So there you go......Fantasy words to live by, brought to you by Bob, Abe, and the turtle.

Keep on Fantasizing. You know I will.

Better Lucky than Good

May I introduce to you, hailing from the 9th selection seat of the 2008 XXFL Draft, the team that will not only not win this years championship, but will most likely not even make the playoffs:

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you "3rd and LONG" (you might want to cover your eyes)

A VERY CRAPPY TEAM

Yesterday I spent the better part of a beautiful Sunday sitting on a friend's patio under the merciful shade of an umbrella, eating snackies, drinking beer, with a dozen other friends, staring intently into magazines and laptops as we called out in turn nearly 200 names of players for the upcoming season of Fantasy Football. I must admit, while I can play the part of the knowledgeable stat-nerd, the reality is that in this sport I am a frickin' idiot.

It's not that I don't get it, I just don't know it. Last year was my first try at Fantasy Football, and although I didn't lose every week of the season, I came pretty close. And last year the league I was in used an auto draft, so I didn't have to think too much. Flip side of that is that had I wanted to "think too much," it would not have helped me. Yesterday's draft was in person. The computer would not be making my picks for me. You see in order to do well in the bigger Fantasy Sports: Football, Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, etc....you need to have a great knowledge of a majority of the players in the sport. All I know about Pro Football I have gleaned as a half-way interested 49ers fan, mostly paying attention when they are good, which hasn't been for a long, long, VERY long time.

This year is my fourth year of Fantasy Baseball, so I have had some time to acquaint myself with the 25 or so Pros on each of the two dozen Major League Baseball teams. That's why I have a fighting chance in my league this year. Experience and luck.

I admit it, my FFootball IQ is pathetic. I know most of the ten players who went in the first round of the draft and a handful of the rest of the 180 or so taken thereafter. Everything else is just random names, some telling stats, and a bunch of guessing. Guessing in this situation is fine if everyone else is guessing, or at least it's not the perfect recipe for getting spanked. But after just a couple rounds of the draft it was pretty clear that I was one of only a few guessers. We of the "I hope I get lucky" gang were surrounded by people who actually know the names of a majority of Offensive and Defensive Lines on a majority of the teams in the NFL.

NOT FAIR. Needless to say, as I'm low on experience, I'm praying to be high on luck.

That said, Fantasy Drafts, even when entering as an ill equipped fool, are totally AWESOME. Snacks. Beer. Friends. That's enough right there to make for a great Sunday. Add a handful of sunshine, two helpings of BBQ, a whole hearty side of smack talking (educated and not) and what you've got is a great time had by all.

Given that it cost each of us $100 to play in this league, and there are 10 entrants, this long Sunday of work will pay off pretty nicely for whomever actually drafted all the good players who slipped unseen through my porous grasp.

One pick I must say I am particularly proud of was in the 14th round (of 18). I took a man named Lofa Tatupu. I don't know where he's from or what his name means...it kinda sounds like a savory bread...but since he is a Linebacker (on of the big guys on defense that tries to attack the other team's quarterback) I hope his name translates to something like "CRAZY VICIOUS SACK DADDY." That's one thing I love about draft day - you can play whatever game you want. Some people go for the high risk high payoff players, some go for the well seasoned reliable strong players, and some go for the best SOUNDING players.

You play your game, I'll play mine, enjoy my 100 bucks, pass the 7 layer dip.

Another thing I really love about Fantasy drafts is the boundless hope. Everyone gathering together on that blessed day has a spring in their step. Some may have the shakes from too much coffee, but they are also hyper alert so as to catch any special value picks that might come their way. Most are smiling in the face of the approaching event which they have been anticipating for weeks, if not months. I was excited but numb in a way, knowing I was most likely about to have my ass handed to me. And for this I am paying?

But hey, I'm an optimistic guy, so I'll chew on hope. We'll see if that hope is still there a week from tomorrow, when our first head to head, team on team, test is done. First up I am going against a guy I've known since Jr. High. He's been in this league since it started five years ago. His name is not yet engraved on the trophy, but looking at his team I fear that I may just be a speed-bump as he accelerates in that direction.

Or maybe he will be the one sulking away with his tail between his legs after a tasting the wrath of my LOFA TATUPU!!

Be good, cross your fingers for me, and keep Fantasizing.

you are AUF

There is something both sexy and scary about the way Heidi Klum says "As you know in the fashion world, one day you are IN, and they next you are OUT!"

Is it the German accent? More likely it's the fierce semi-glazed-over supermodel stare that says simultaneously "take off your pants" and "give me that cheeseburger or I'll kill you!"

MEOWCH!

This week's Project Runway auf Wiedersehen moment came as quite a shocker to yours truly. The designer sent packing was one who I had in my Fantasy Seam Team every week, thinking she was bound to come up with another winning design like she did in Week 1.

Alas, no. Instead, she sent a slutty leopard print bikini shirt top down the runway when she was supposed to be designing something Brooke Shields could wear both in the board room and out to dinner. "Slutty, slutty, slutty!" slandered Michael Kors, one of the Project Runway judges. While slutty might make you popular in high school, it's not going to win you any design competitions.

Add "manipulative" to slutty, however, and you could be the perfect kind of player to win in the upcoming season of Survivor. It never fails to amaze me that certain of the castaways on that show think that they are forming real and lasting relationships. It's a game, some play to win, others want to be liked. Being liked doesn't get you $1million. A strong combination of slutty and manipulative seems to be what gets you that thousand$squared.

Case in point, last season's winner, Parvati Shallow (below). Her bio reads thus: "Parvati Shallow grew up the eldest of three siblings on a commune in Vero Beach, Florida. She and her family moved to Atlanta when she was 11 years old. Shallow put herself through college, attending the University of Georgia where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism with minors in French and Italian. While in college, she was an active member of the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority and is a huge Bulldog fan!"

Well if that doesn't prove my point right there! If I must elucidate further, we know she is smart because she put herself through college. Not only that, but she was raised in a commune. If there's one thing I know about being raised in a commune (trust me), it's that you learn to be around and deal with a lot of different and sometimes CRAZY people. If you can navigate that atmosphere with grace and escape to excel in a world of normalcy, you probably learned at least a few skills of group manipulation.

She was a born Survivor contestant........sorority slutty, with a brain, hippie manipulator extraordinaire, and if I might be so bold, not terrible to look at. Top it off with her skills in the romance languages French and Italian. Nobody stood a chance!

I'm not sure how the "huge Bulldog fan!" thing played into her road to Sole Survivor glory, but my guess is the sporty-spice attitude wouldn't hurt when you have to keep your eyes on the prize and not get intimidated by other back-stabbing maggot eating no teeth brushing beach hobos.

Speaking of maggot eating beach hobos, in the interest of full disclosure I must admit that not five hours after I claimed that my fantasy baseball team was turning things around and possibly sailing to a smashing last month and a half of the season victory party, my star closer decided to try pitching with his head up his ass. He got one out on this occasion also, but then proceeded to give up 3 runs and get ejected for arguing with the home plate umpire. 3 runs, one out. That's an Earned Run Average of 81. Not good.

Good thing I'm not a superstitious person, or I'd think I had jinxed my own team. No. That's not how it works. Trying to pitch at the major league level with your nose smashed where the sun don't shine, that might jinx things a bit, but talk is cheap and blog talk cheaper. So pick your head up, KRod, and smell the sunshine. Throw strikes. Preferably strikes that miss bats.

If only I could slutty manipulate him into another 15 or 20 more saves this year.That would be my Fantasy becoming Reality for the sake of my Fantasy.

Equal Opportunity Ethical Stats Analysis - not just a good idea, it's the LAW

A reader of mine wondered if there are different standards by which we treat our players in the Fantasy realm. Her exact words were "isn't there some kind of special exception rule in fantasy where certain, more awesome, less ridiculous famous people are entitled to some form of fantasy respect or fantasy death mourning?"

To this question I must answer an emphatic and unequivocal NO! and YES!

This is one part of a question as deep as the ages are........well........aged. It is the question of the looking glass, the spot-light, the talk show top-10 moment, the tabloid cover, and the funniest home video. Is it fair to highlight the less-than-heroic times of our fellow human? What relationship do we, the looker, play in the creation of that which is shown?

On this week's cover of Us Magazine, for instance, besides the obviously annoying weight loss pitch from Jennifer Love Hewitt, the other cover stories are about a celebrity break-up and a scandalous would be leader of the free world adultery (on his wife who has cancer) story.

Now, if truth be told, I really did like John Edwards. He seemed to me to be one of the most genuine and compassionate presidential candidates out there. $450 haircuts aside, I loved how he brought the issue of poverty in America to the fore, and if Barack and Hillary hadn't wiped the debate floor with his ambulance chasing ass, he would have had more time to spotlight this issue which is so overlooked by those other candidates (wealthy people) who pander to those who vote (also relatively wealthy people). But cheating on his wife, especially while she is in a life or death struggle, now that is lower than low. The question is, do we cut him slack because we liked him before? Do we treat him all the harsher because we held him to a higher standard and therefore feel more betrayed than if we had known him for the sleazy, nasty, cruel hearted man that he has revealed himself to be?

Luckily, these are much easier questions to answer here than they are in the wishy-washy-feel-good-gotta-be-a-right-or-wrong-answer realm of ethics class. You see, Fantasy is the ultimate Democracy. We treat everyone as if they are exactly the same person but with varying proven or at least somewhat predictable levels of future statistical return. We do not care what they look like, what language they speak, to which deity they pray, how rich, how poor, or with which gender of lover they care to shnooker. We are 100% equal opportunity here in Fantasyland.

How do we vote in Fantasyland? By utilizing our powers of drop/add. There are only so many spots on any given Fantasy team. Whenever you see somebody making news as we have with the aforementioned John (dirty birdy) Edwards, we have a difficult decision to make. Do I pick him up, or not? If I do, then I must make room for him on my squad by dropping another player. If I feel in the end that every player on my team is going to perform better than JE in the short or long run, then I can't in all good conscience go and grab him.

Now, I believe that I have shown why I would answer NO to my reader's important question. To recap: we do not treat any player differently than another because of some personal taste or distaste for that player.

The reason, however, that I believe that question requires both a NO and a YES answer, is this: in the theater of Fantasy Celebrity there is no greater sign of both respect AND disrespect than a thousand Fantasy managers rushing to the team page of their Fantasy league and attempting to pick that player up before anyone else does. Since taste/distaste is a highly personal thing, we must assume that every potential Fantasy player, aka "every person," is both loved and hated by some percentage of the population. Therefore, if a player is owned in every league, we must assume that this player is owned by at least some fraction of people who both love and dislove them. And since the adding of a player in Fantasy Celebrity is not at all a personal comment on the reason for which they are being covered by Us Magazine, but only a prediction that they will be covered, for good or evil deed, this Fantasy "add" is really only a magnifying lense placed upon the coverage itself.

A great example from the world of Fantasy Sports is The Barry Bonds Show. Barry Bonds is one of the greatest offensive baseball players of all time. I mean "offensive" both in that he could hit like hell and he could offend like hell. Outside of San Francisco he is pretty much universally hated, perceived not only a cheater but also a smug, arrogant, generally not nice dude. But when it comes to Fantasy Baseball, in the last few years of his career when he was most potent with the bat and most hated by non-steroid-embracing fans, he was owned in 99.9% of Fantasy leagues. That's basically all of them, for the mathematically uninclined out there.

Love him or hate him if you must, just don't forget to draft him if he's available.

There is one more side of this that I feel must be acknowledged. That is the Fantasy smack board. Any Fantasy website worth it's salt has some sort of message or chat board where people in league together can tell their competition to go step on a stingray. These forums are not only used for the good natured smack talking that so many of us live for, but are also great for sharing recipes, discussing politics, catching each other up on family happenings, and having stimulating discussions about statistical analysis, especially as it pertains to morality and ethics.

These message forums are a great place also for people to give voice to their misgivings about scoring points for such things as an actor dying, politician cheating, or depressed young musician having her children taken from her for preferring to spend time with her bottle of JD than reading them bedtime stories. Let me assure you, there is no shortage of banter regarding the good, bad, and Fugly character of people's favorite Fantasy heroes.

It is indeed possible to have your cake (Barry Bonds' Home Runs) and eat it too ("what an ass he is!")

Be good, and happy Fantasizing.

Why I Love Fantasy, act 2

Right when I thought it was getting kinda boring and tedious to be still winning my Fantasy Baseball league, the bottom started falling out.

All my pitchers decided to get more walks than K's, to throw at least one passed ball with a runner on third, per game, and all my hitters decided going Oh Fer was the life lived in high morality because they didn't want to be seen as "running up my score" in said Fantasy league.

And my stomach began to hurt. My neck and the back of my head, too. Dry or oily patches on my skin, which once upon a time would have disappeared without raising a flag were turning into torturous runaway magic 8 ball sized tumors in that awful place in the inner nose where you can't get at them without the deft helping hand of a surgeon.

The greatest pain of this slippage of my league lead is also the fact that those teams that are catching up with me are not really racking up the stats either. Sure, they are out performing me, but that's not saying much. The only thing holding them back from over taking me is that they are all doing only slightly better than I am and they are bunching up together for a 6 team battle for second place. Really, there are 6 teams within two points of eachother, barely five points behind me. This will end one of two ways. Either my team will wake up and sail to victory, or I will fall back into the pack and be devoured by these second rate pretenders, as a pack of hungry starving dogs would tear apart the carrot they've been chasing for so many months once they finally nip at its little orange haired heels long enough to tire it out.

What about this do I love?

Well, just as I finally began to consider the very real possibility of ending up anywhere from second to seventh place in this league that I've been leading almost all year, a dude named Ryan from somewhere in the Midwest, I think, created a Fantasy game on Flooza.com based on the Olympics. You see, we had thought about creating an Olympics Fantasy game, but had decided against it for many reasons, not the least of which is that it could be a whole lot of effort for a two week payoff. Other reasons included the problem of the entire shabang, medal wise, typically being dominated by the US, China and Russia, so the great unfairness of not having those countries on your team, well........that could just lead to a lot of people beating their computers with their wireless keypads as they get destroyed by their rivals.

Enter Midwest Ryan. He doesn't care about these problems, he just wants to play a game about the Olympics. And he has devised a way that the US, China, and Russia can be less dominant. He puts them each into an A group of countries and cuts them in half each, down the gender line. Adding Germany and Australia to the A group, we then have 8 teams who score about the same in any given historical account of the Summer Oly's.

Then he creates B, C, and D groups of countries based on typical medal counts and gives each team in a league 2A, 3B, 5C and 5Dcountries, for a total of 15 countries per team. He is a genius and he is my hero.

I wrote him to congratulate him on his ingenuity and he graciously invited me to join his league. Which I did. And now I care about 10,000 times more about these two weeks of games played half way around the world than I did a week ago with no Fantasy prospects and nothing to look forward to, seemingly, but all the hype about China's awful human rights violations and internet censorship of journalists, etc....



On the above page you'll see my team, with the medals scored so far in the last 3 days of medaling. I am pretty much kicking ass in Bronze, but points being alloted as they are, 5 for G, 3 for S, and 1 for B, I am just chillin' in second place. But then, as you can see, Canada, Greece and Poland have yet to fulfill their great promise of utter world GOLD domination, so I do not think that I have even begun to peak.

For the record, I picked Australia and Germany to be my Agroup countries just so that I could stay out of all the USA vs China vs Russia drama.......I like to keep my Fantasy and politics separate, thank you very much. Unless it is Fantasy BASED on politics......but that's a subject for future posts.

The greatest thing about what Ryan did for me and my current enjoyment of Fantasy, is that no sooner had I joined his FantOly league, than my Fantasy Baseball team came back alive. My pitchers started striking people out and shutting people down again, Xavier Nady put my team on his back, and I'm getting Saves every day in new and interesting ways I thought not possible. Like last night when KRod came into a game with two outs in the ninth, two men on base and a four run lead. He struck one guy out. Got the save. Three pitches for a Save. Does that seem right to you?

Well he's on my team, so it seems right to me.

Fantasy Olympics rescues Fantasy Baseball, who'd a thunk?
Who rescues Fantasy every day? Flooza.com of course!

Smack vs. Skills - Fantasy Strategy 101

Yes, I love Fantasy Baseball. But I gotta say, sometimes I just wish I knew what the pitcher was saying to the catcher and manager and pitching coach during their little top'o'the mound pep talk sessions.

Are they talking smack about the batter? About the visiting team? Discussing what dinner spot they want to hit up later? Who they should each take in their upcoming Fantasy Football drafts I am beginning to feel as though there is SO much more than just the stats of the game.

Enter the NEXT generation of Fantasy.

Sure the objective stats are important.....the wins, losses, and in the case of Reality TV shows, the judge compliments or disses and the challenge victories/defeats. But oh there is so much more going on than just those must have, bare bones, "why we are here" kinds of things.

Ther is DRAMA!

Which brings me to todays Fantasy Strategy topic: Smack vs. Skills

When selecting the perfect Fantasy Reality TV team, there are really two categories of points scoring. There are, of course, the kinds of points that the really skilled people on the show will be scoring.

So for shows like American Idol, you know, it's the best singers. For So You Think You Can Dance, obviously, the best dancers will get lots of points.

But then there are the best Smack talkers. Smack and drama are really what many of us watch Reality TV for. There are a few shows where that is not totally the case, and where the singing and dancing and scenery are a big draw also. But then there are shows where the modeling or designing or whatever the "skills" are that people are fronting with are really just an empty canvas onto which they sling a highly entertaining stain of interpersonal smackdown.

Enter Stella from the current season (5) of Project Runway


We all know she is not the most skilled designer of the group. But man is she NUTTER BUTTERS. In order to score points you HAVE to get camera time. Better yet, make the most of that camera time and be crazy, dramatic, in-your-face, and whatever other entertaining things you can do to set yourself apart.

Producers love drama, audiences love drama, Fantasy points statisticians LOVE drama.

Smack and Skills are kind of the two extremes around which you must balance your team if you are to be truly successful in Fantasy reality TV. If you take only the "good designers," for instance, then when they have an off week, you will plummet. If you take only the "crazy smack talkers," then you'll miss out on great design points. It's about keeping some points rolling in with the consistent smack talkers and guessing right with the talented contestants in order to go big.

Good luck, may the SMACK be with you, and Happy Fantasizing.
Great smack and many skills to be had at Flooza.com!

All's Fair in Love and War (and especially Fantasy)

Rest in peace, Isaac Hayes. I will always remember you for your deep love makin' songs, especially that classic "Chocolate Salty Balls."



Yes, Chef has left us. Yes, it's a sad day for all Chocolate Salty Balls fans out there. And yes, he is on my Fantasy Celebrity team and will hopefully be helping me dominated my league(s) this coming week with a cover and centerfold story.

Shame on me, you say? Does it seem callous to be capitalizing on a great man's death, trying to score a few Fantasy points?

Shame on YOU, I say, for not getting to him sooner. And besides, I had to drop Miley Cyrus to make room on my roster, so don't think this whole interaction doesn't come with more than a little fear and trepidation on my side.

And to offend you further, it's not just Chef making news over the weekend with his departure from the planet:

http://www.usmagazine.com/Comedian-Bernie-Mac-Dies-at-50

We could run in circles debating the morality of adding a celebrity to my roster because they just died, but I think a friend of mine in another Celebrity league put it best, just after the tragic death of one of America's great acting talents, "I feel so bad about him dying, leaving his little girl without her papa, and maybe, just maybe, if some of us can score some points through the coverage of his untimely departure, it will go a small way to casting some positive light on the lost legacy of Heath Ledger."

Sensitive words co-mingling with strong Fantasy strategy almost always brings a tear to my eye.

Of course, this same friend did follow that quiet prayer with this "And to all you SUCKAS who were caught sleeping, eat dead celebrity cover dirt!!"



And we did. The Ledger bump kicked her into first place where she stayed until Angie catapulted a rival owner into first with the news of twins (but that's another story).

I'm not saying it's exactly morally defensible to opportunistically prey on the death and misery of our stars and heroes (okay I am). What I am arguing more particularly is that it is not the death, divorce or other specific drama that is being used for Fantastical gain. It is the COVERAGE of said death, divorce, and drama.

Very very different.

My case in point: Reality is only really real for those to whom it is directly happening. To the rest of us, it is Fantasy. And Fantasy is about scoring, regardless of the whys and hows.

And to me, this week at least, Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes kick Fantasy ASS!!

Be good, happy Fantasies.
Flooza.com for the Fantasy Challenged

Fantasizing about Joshua Allen

A hearty CONGRATULATIONS to America's Favorite Dancer, Joshua.

http://www.usmagazine.com/sytycd-season-four-winner-joshua-allen

Yes, I read Us Magazine on-line regularly. What of it? WHAT?!

Anyhoo.......what I'm really saying is that by now you should all know who this man is. He is not only the first break dancer to win this popular and AWESOME Reality TV show contest, he is not only the highest jumper and best smack talker the show has ever seen, he has also been, yes, you guessed it, the strongest male Fantasy So You Think You Can Dance impact player this year.

http://www.flooza.com/leagues/67/players?status=ALL

If you can't view that page, that means you need to register for a Flooza account (lagger) and then you'll see what I'm talking about.

Sure, Katee "little miss perfect" Shean was the greatest Fantasy Dancer this season, but c'mon, Joshua has had NO formal dance training. She practically still has a ballet teacher hanging out her ass when she dances. He is raw, fast, hard hitting and just downright CUTE, both on and off the stage.

Yeah, I said it. He HELLA cute. I WAS staring at his head gear before he got the tinsel teef removed. My wife would practically eat her shirt when he was bare necked chested dancing, and his off stage camera quips were by far the most adorable.....but that's a topic for another blog....

What I'm really talking about is how to turn a great dancer into some great Fantasy stats.

One man who knows way too much about objectifying every artist out there is Erik "swede" Svenson. He recently won our SYTYCD experts league. Not only won it, but dominated it, start to finish. Sure he had a lucky draft, but whatever, kudos to him for having not only Joshua, but also Katee and Chelsie "crazy legs" Hightower on his squad.......can someone say Dynasty?

Final standings for this league http://www.flooza.com/leagues/67/standings ......but it really wasn't as close as it looks. Erik you are FantaDanceAlicious, don't ever forget it.

Okay, gonna go watch that Dance finale again. I wonder if any of the upcoming Survivor contestants are break dancers.....might make me put them high on my Fantasy roster!

Be Good
Fantasize Well
Fantasize BETTER at Flooza.com

why I love Fantasy (capital F)

First of all, what the heck do people mean when they say "capital F?"

I've always thought that was kinda funny. Do they mean to simply devote greater gravity to whatever they are saying, as in "She is DRAMA, capital D!" or is it about equating some higher virtue to that which is Capitalized.

So you may be wondering, if I don't know what it means, then why capitalize the 'f' in Fantasy?

Great question.

I guess because I want to make difference between me sitting around fantasizing about, say, laying in a hammock sipping on a margarita on a hot tropical island (mmmmmmm) and the blossoming world of fantasy gaming. And no, I don't mean World of Warcraft. Not that kind of fantasy gaming.

I mean Fantasy Gaming (capitals F and G, boyeeeeee), as in Fantasy Sports. Fantasy Politics. Fantasy Celebrity. Fantasy Reality TV. You get it.

The truth is, anything can be turned into Fantasy. For so long Fantasy Gaming has been just about nerdy older one time jock dudes reclaiming some sort of glory days by drafting a team full of today's super athletes and then psychic mind melding themselves (at least their identities) with those players so as to refer to them as "we."

I like to call this Fantastic Identity Fusion. We all do it in a non-Fantasy way. Some cast their identity with their children. Some with the politician of the day. Some with sports stars, Hollywood celebrities, church leaders, cartoon characters, etc....

But when you own a player on a team of your own, especially when that player is doing well, OH MY GOD, they are your Best Friend Forever (capital BFF). You would text them after every great play, call them to wish them happy birthday, wash their car if you could without being jailed for stalking. But then, god forbid, they stop producing for your team. This love and adoration will turn to scorn so fast, all they will hear is your mouse clicking as you drop them from your squad like last week's garbage.

The Fantasy manager is a fickle friend indeed. This is not about team loyalty as it was known in the past. It's nothing personal. In fact it's not personal at all, for I've never met any of the players I've "owned." But oh man, my love affair with Yunel Escobar, utility infielder for the Atlanta Braves, as he carried my team for the first two weeks of this season, was a sweet time for us both, to be sure. We were VERY close. A month later? Cut from the team. Under performing. Period. Bu-bye.

Besides the easy come easy go love affairs with random athletes and celebrities of your choice, what I really dig about Fantasy Gaming is that it gets you that much closer to your passions. You love baseball? Fantasy Baseball will make you crazy about baseball. You love the world of celebrities? Fantasy Celebrity will bring you a depth of knowledge and investment in that scene that you could never have previously imagined.

Anything that brings us closer to what we love is fine by me. Dominating your friends in a league based around that thing you love, well that's an added bonus. Talking SMACK on the league message board about how you're dominating said friends in said league, total icing on the cake.

Maybe the best reason to love Fantasy, even better than grooving in more depth on one of your favorite hobbies, is getting to know entire new genres of hobby that you didn't know you would love. I, por exemplo, never cared particularly for those trashy celebrity tabloid mags. But now having played in a couple Us Weekly leagues, well I just cherish the relationships I've made SO MUCH!

Speaking of which, right now I own Jessica Alba, Lindsay Lohan, and Jennifer Garner on my Fantasy Us Celebrity team, and I have to run because we are all going to get our nails did.

Be good, and keep Fantasizing!
Find yourself on Flooza.com