Tales of Bad Luck

I'm going to pull a Bill Simmons/Michael Silver here and, instead of writing in a sorta-academic fashion about sports, tell a story about someone's fantasy football team. In this case, it's my own.

I'm a girl, and this is my first foray into fantasy sports of any kind. It's not a fancy league, and it's not for money or anything, so I figured it'd be a good first-timer experience. I managed to screw up huge at the very beginning by falling asleep on the afternoon of our live draft. When I woke up 40 minutes after the start time, Yahoo had auto-drafted me Larry Johnson, Michael Turner, Donovan McNabb, Randy Moss, Roddy White, and Javon Walker. I spent the rest of the draft grabbing random tight ends, including Kellen Winslow and several dudes whom I've since switched out. I also realized on the fly how little I knew about NFL defenses; I took a flyer on Pacman Jones in the 14th round, and ended up with the Baltimore D when every other team I thought might work got drafted immediately before my pick.

I find it sad that the only two players that are getting me any points at all out of that list are those who are part of the Atlanta Falcons offense. The remainder of my roster is the flippin' NFL All-Suspension Team, with the exceptions of McNabb (whom I replaced with Philip Rivers because he THROWS for TDs instead of handing off to Brian Westbrook) and Randy Moss (who vanished when Tom Brady's knee caved in). I cut Walker as soon as I figured out how to cut players; I can't cut Johnson or Moss, so they're dead weight in their respective spots (Johnson on the bench, Moss in my 2nd starting WR spot because the best alternative I've had access to in 8 weeks has been Patrick Crayton pre-Romo injury). I have McNabb taking up another bench spot because I keep thinking I can trade him for a viable TE, but never actually get around to it.

My one stroke of luck after Week 1 (I actually won big in my first 2 matchups, but my only win since is over the team that's been in dead last since the beginning) was when that Baltimore/Houston game got hurricaned out. At that point, no one had caught on to the Tennessee D yet, and I dropped a nameless RB to start them in place of Baltimore.

If this tells us anything, it's that past performance is not necessarily predictive of future results. Unless, of course, we're talking about Pacman Jones.