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I understand that I am the only girl in my pool. I understand that I’m the only virgin fantasy baseball player. I understand that I’m not the most athletic person who knows a little about sports. I understand these things. Do you?
Okay, I love my guy friends, but I think they underestimate my baseball intelligence. I might not have the right mindset for fantasy baseball (I only half-cheered at Matsuzaka’s five-inning gem yesterday, when I should’ve been ecstatic -- the whole Red Sox thing still gets in my way), but I’m getting there. I keep receiving the most bogus trade requests ever. EVER EVER. They’re trying to play to my emotional, girly side.
I’ve received the following two trade proposals in the past week (but I won’t name the offending parties):
1) I get Jonathan Papelbon, Andy Pettitte and Todd Helton for Joe Nathan and Manny Ramirez.
2) I get Robinson Cano and Kelvim Escobar for Daisuke Matsuzaka and Ian Kinsler.
Now, the first guy knew I like Papelbon and wanted him from the beginning. He threw Pettitte in because he knew I was a Yankees fan -- not because he thought I’d want him on my fantasy team, but because he’s a Yankee. Okay, fair enough. To sweeten it, he threw in Todd Helton. Now, I already have two first basemen in Ryan Howard and Kevin Youkilis (who plays everyday, so I plan on using him at my utility position). I’m not sure how or where I would use Todd Helton, so there’s that. And my outfield is crap without Manny. Why would I trade him? So, I ask my guy friend how he managed to pull that proposal out of his ass and I get the following reply: “Well, I figured I might as well give it a shot. I mean, you could’ve been the GIRL that accepted it, right?”
Now the second guy is a Red Sox fan. He knows that I loathe having Matsuzaka and was trying to help me with this problem. That is until I mentioned how pissed I was that he picked up Cano seconds before I was about to draft him. Now I would have considered a trade of Kinsler (because for second base it would have to position for position) and Matsuzaka for Cano and Brandon Webb. Or Kinsler and Chris Capuano for Cano and Dontrelle Willis, but this guy was literally giving me crap for a really great pitcher. Okay, maybe my trade proposals aren’t great for him, but maybe we just shouldn’t make a trade. We don’t have fair players. He played on the whole “Cano’s a Yankee” aspect of it as well. And he did a 180 with the Matsuzaka/Red Sox part, too. He went from “he’ll-be-your-fantasy-stud” to “he’s-unproven-in-the-MLB.” Wow.
(For my girlfriends who read this just because I asked them to, it’s okay that you didn’t understand that Kinsler/Cano/Matsuzaka part. Statistics -- you know.)
Now, given the aforementioned skill set I have for FANTASY baseball, these might be fair assessments -- if I were a complete idiot. Now I love these kids and they had good intentions, but I am seriously questioning the amount of faith they have in me. Did I mention I’m No. 2 in the basketball tournament pool? I have some kind of sports knowledge. I’m not pulling this out of nowhere. Yeah, it is my first time though -- go slow, but not THAT slow.
And I’m not ranting. I’m not pissed at all that they think they can get away with these trades. I actually think it’s really funny. And when I called them both on it, they knew that I knew they were trying to fuck with my team. It just makes me want to beat them even more. Oh, and I was invited to another fantasy baseball league, one that was also previously "No Girls Allowed." Nice.
Opening Day is in five days and fantasy baseball season kicks of for me on Monday. I’m nervously excited.
Photo Source: Bodog Beat
I know this is supposed to be a fantasy baseball diary, but it’s March Madness and it would be sports sacrilege not to even mention the tournament. Did I forget to mention that I’m in a tournament pool as well? I’m not the ONLY girl -- my sister is in it, too. Last week, the first and second rounds, were really painful. Not because most of my upset picks failed to go through, although that was a part of it, but because I worked Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I had to resort to phone calls, text messages and catching parts of games on this hair salon’s tiny TV while on my break. I think they caught on to my creepster routine of hanging around outside their doors, because I did it for the end of the World Series as well as the second round of NFL playoffs games. So, I made sure to schedule myself off early enough to catch all of tonight’s games. Sometimes it’s good to be in charge of all the scheduling.
(It’s pretty bad working in a mostly female environment when you’re a sports fan, even as a girl myself. I feel like I’m the only son in a family with five girls. I can’t talk about sports to ANYONE. I constantly have to explain things to my girls and I just don’t know how much longer I can take the blank stares. I didn’t have the guys the whole weekend and I wanted to just die.)
Recap of my picks: I hate Duke with a passion. I’m not a North Carolina fan, just a fan of every single other team that deserves to be seeded higher than Duke, but gets shafted because of the “legend” that Duke isn’t (Laettner’s miracle shot, Krzyzewski, etc.) And I’m not going to lie: I had to look up how to spell his name. Anyway, I had Duke losing in the first round. Basically, I had both the Duke and the Wisconsin upsets, but everything else went chalk, so I missed a couple of games. And thank you Texas, for losing to USC. Thanks for screwing my bracket. At least it was just a little, not like everyone else’s.
Okay I’m watching the Southern Illinois-Kansas game. What is a Saluki? Wikipedia says it’s a dog. Okay, that’s cool. In Hawaii, we were a meteorological phenomenon for a long time, so I guess I can’t hate. I think it was last year that one of their cheerleaders, I think she was Asian, fell on her back during the halftime and cracked her vertebrae. These are the things I think of when I think of Southern Illinois. That and their point guard, Tatum, kind of looks like a girl when they’re on the wide-angle shot. He has thick, pretty cornrows, and he keeps them out of his face with a headband. It’s one of those Nike ones, but he doesn’t wear it on his forehead like most guys do. He actually wears it like a girl would wear a headband. He’s killing, so it’s okay. Anyway, I have Kansas going to the championship game, so I’m needing them to win it.
Ten minutes later, it was kind of a sellout ending. Save for the missed free throws, the buzzer beater could have only tied the game. That’s no fun, because you know the better team always wins in overtime. Hah. Whatever, I got points! Whoo! It’s too bad that everyone else in my pool got points too. Except one random guy, who picked the Salukis.
What I love about watching games in Canada is they have all the games on satellite on Score54, so they do your channel surfing for you. Whenever one game goes to commercial, if the other one is in action, you get to see that. It’s pretty cool during the first round when there are eighteen million games going on at a given moment. This is laziness at its best. I don’t even have to use my energy to hit LAST.
Okay, here we go with Texas A&M and Memphis. Some guy is hurt for Memphis, but they’ve won something like seven billion straight because they play in a weak conference. What a game. It’s in San Antonio, so everybody’s an Aggie today. Pretty close game, but I have A&M going to the Final Four, so it’d be nice if they didn’t bracket bust me.
Five minutes later, it’s A&M up by 1. Acie Law IV just misses a fucking breakaway lay-up! Ouch! This sucks. Okay, here we go. HELLO DEFENSIVE REBOUNDS! Three chances to get a defensive rebound and not a chance. Instead they foul. The Aggies are supposed to have a great coach. Well, I guess there’s nothing he can do from the bench. And what was that? Fucking bracket busters.
Before the second set of games really get going here are a few things I really dislike about college ball. I despise the two half set. I don’t understand why they do halves in college basketball. In football, it’s the same in college and the pros. Why don’t they prepare their players for the pros by going with quarters? It’s especially important now that high school players have to play at least one year of college ball. If it’s because of the length of the pro game versus college, then just make it ten-minute quarters. Also, I don’t like how the three-point line is closer to the basket. I also don’t like the bonus/double bonus foul shot concept. I guess it makes sense with a five foul format, but I don’t understand it. I guess it rewards better foul shooters, but how many times do you see good free throw shooters still make the second shot after missing the first. It comes back to KILL some teams. It’s not fair because the rebounders are in movement, which can distract some shooters. Actually, who am I to comment on any mechanical element of any sport? I suck at sports -- clumsiest dancer you’ll ever meet. Except, I’m really good at wiffle ball. Hah.
There’s a Canadian on Pitt. Shit, I have to go to my second job soon (which entails pressing Play/Pause on a CD player and looking cute giving out bonus points -- more on this later). Last week, during the first round of games, I was at the bar I work at, and they had one teeny-tiny TV with the basketball games. Of course, all the plasmas and projection TVs had the hockey game on. I wish Canadians cared more about March Madness.
And of course they had two little TVs with the games on. But don’t worry! They had the Anaheim-Phoenix hockey game and the Sacramento-Phoenix basketball game on. Normally I wouldn’t mind that a Sacto game was on, but come on, it was against the Suns. Might as well not play and just give Nash & Co. the win (which is exactly what happened).
How did Ohio State come back from a twenty-point deficit? Sooner or later, and I’m thinking it’s sooner, their strategy of sending the Columbus High JV team in for the first half is going to backfire. You heard it here first. Four more games tomorrow. Somebody text message me updates. Please?
Photo Source: Georgetown Hoyas
Have you ever read Sports Guy's book? You really should. Unless you're a Yankees fan, in which case you should only read the first 200 or so pages. In fact, you should probably just burn the last hundred something pages. Just pretend they don't even exist. (In case you don't have ESPN as one of your bookmarks, a quick rundown on the book: Sports Guy aka Bill Simmons is a HUGE Red Sox fan. After the 2004 World Series, he compiled his columns from ESPN into a book. Basically, he's a funny guy -- but damn he loves those Sox. I can respect that.)
I started and finished the book during my last visit to Boston. I didn't have the luxury of a working fireplace. Well, actually I'm pretty sure the fireplace worked. It wasn't mine and I just didn't know how to work it -- give me a break, I grew up in Hawaii. Anyway, the reason I'm bringing this up is because I've been thinking about my Matsuzaka pickle.
Some background here: I love almost everything about Boston and New England except the Red Sox. I dislike most things about New York, especially the pollution, traffic and angry people. Consider the fact that I lived about three hours from New York and an hour and a half from Boston for four years and only made it down to NYC about three times (versus countless visits to Boston). I don't know why, but I just feel like New England has a lot more history than New York does. I also hate the Knicks - a lot. Not really sure why that is.
If/when I move to Boston, I could handle being a Celtics fan. I'm a Sacramento Kings fan, and they only play each other twice. And seriously, it's not very likely that both teams will make the NBA Finals in the next millennium, which would force me to choose between the two, so that's fine. I could also handle being a Patriots fan, partially because I already kind of got into the whole Pats thing. I watched the heartbreaking Pats loss to the Colts earlier this year while I was in Boston. I actually felt upset. Anyway, two out of three ain't bad right?
But, I absolutely love my Yankees. Love them. And in my defense, it's not just because they were good when I was growing up. Anyone remember the early 1990s? Before the 1994 player strike? I'm talking about when the just SUCKED. Poor Donnie Baseball, he never made it to the World Series. And right after he retired, they win it all. Anyway, growing up in Hawaii, we just didn't have a local team (duh) so I guess you could say I picked a team.
My dad, sister and I were watching some night game in 1991 or 1992. The Bombers were playing in Anaheim and the Yankees were just getting killed. I mean just slaughtered. I think it was about 5-0 or 6-0 for the (California) Angels, when my dad turned to my sister and I and told us to pick teams. My sister, three years older, picked the Angels because they were winning (and she's such a bandwagon jumper like that). So I was left with the losing Yankees. I had hope, yes I did. And Christ, did they just crush my little seven year-old heart. I might have even cried. Then I probably played with my Barbies. I think if you go to BaseballAlmanac.com, you can find the actual game. I asked my dad if he remembered the night. It was kind of a waste, because my dad, bless his heart, can't even remember how old I am now or my birthday, let alone some random night fifteen summers ago. He's a Cubs fan. Maybe it's better that he can't remember the past.
Now, I'm a loyal person. I stayed with my team. It's not my fault they became winners. I could have become a Braves fan after 1995, like my sister did. (In her defense, she did go to Atlanta that summer and saw a few games. At least, I think it was that summer. I was eleven. Forgive me if my memory's a little fuzzy. Her bandwagon jumping did make for a great 1996 World Series competition between us, though. Guess who won.) One thing I really didn't realize living in Hawaii: the intensity of the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry. In Hawaii all we had when I was growing up were the women's volleyball UH-Stanford, men's volleyball UH-UCLA and football UH-BYU rivalries. As big as those were (and believe me, they were huge), there's no way they could have prepared me for the magnitude of Red Sox-Yankees.
I think my first taste of the rivalry came my freshman year of college. If you didn't know, I went to school (go Mt. Holyoke!) in western Massachusetts. It's safe to say that I was surrounded by Massholes, being near the center of Red Sox Nation. (Don't forget, New England is quite a large region.) I was settling into my free life as a college student and decided to take an October trip to Boston to visit some friends. PLAYOFFS! Yeah, it was 2002 and the Yankees were in it, but the BoSox weren't. (Tear.)
We were at some club or bar or something when the Yankees lost to the Angels. My friend's roommate was from the Bronx or Harlem or something like that and he was crushed. I couldn't believe Sox fans were actually taunting him. They didn't even make it into the playoffs! I guess that's when I realized Sox fans were just sad, sad people who (sometimes, at least) would rather see the Yankees lose than the Sox win. Of course, I was still in Massachusetts for 2003 (man, did those Red Sox fans love it when the Marlins won). I think the cries of pain after Aaron Fucking Boone hit that homer soothed my little heart. But, I was also there for 2004. Let's just say I might have gotten what I deserved.
Okay, back to Sports Guy and Matsuzaka. He says it's not okay to root for your fantasy guys if they're playing against your team. What makes the Matsuzaka pickle (and how good is that word, thank you The Sandlot) even worse is that he plays for my most hated team. Should I bench him if he's playing the Yankees? Plus, I have Manny. Do I bench him, so I can be happy in both fantasy and real baseball if/when he goes 0-5? Furthermore, what if it's Matsuzaka vs. Mussina? Do I bench both of them so I can just watch the game in peace? The game I'm watching in Boston is the 17th for the Red Sox and the 16th for the Yankees. Depending on who the Opening Day starters are for both teams, there's a very good chance it could be Matsuzaka vs. Mussina.
Maybe I'll just get so drunk that night I'll just forget I even play fantasy baseball. For that night, and that night only. And you can bet your ass I'll be cheering for the Yankees.
Photo Source: NNDB
This is my first season participating in fantasy baseball. The season's promising to be a good one, so I figure I'll keep this "running diary" of my experiences.
Quick rundown of my league:
1) Thirteen teams in the league -- I'm the only girl.
2) All of the guys have played against each other in this league before. I'm the only virgin.
3) We live in Canada. All of us. I don't know if that means anything, but I thought I'd throw it in there.
4) There should be some sort of man law against a guy playing in the same league a girl he's dating, right? Check, not doing that.
5) Did I mention I'm the only girl?
Let me just remind everyone that I am a YANKEES fan. That's right. I am. I'm not sure if or how this will change your opinion of me, but I'm sure it's for the better.
Okay, on with it. Last night was the draft. I can't even begin to tell you how much my head was hurting and my heart was pounding at about 8:40pm. The amount of (vulgar) smack talk floating about the message board was ridiculous. I wish I could have saved it. Actually, I should have kept a live diary of the events, but oh well.
I end up getting the fourth pick -- RYAN HOWARD. Unbelievable. I was on pins and needles trying to figure out who everyone was drafting. And to make matters worse, the guy who was drafting before me is probably the SLOWEST person in the world. You know how Bengie Molina runs like his father slashed his Achilles when he was kid? Well this guy drafts at about the same speed. Somewhere between a turtle and a snail. Even worse is the guy drafting after me was in the hospital, so he was auto-drafting for the first few rounds. But I digress -- on with the draft.
I remember helping manage a team last year. He had Papelbon -- absolutely sick pickup. So I think, "I should definitely get on with it and draft my closer before they're all gone." So in the second round I take Joe Nathan. I'm pumped because he's still there and I got him. And I just get SLAMMED by the boys. "Holy hell, what is this girl doing?" comments are running through the message board. Apparently, there's some rule about 2043249 pages into the "How to Play Fantasy Baseball" handbook that NOBODY gave me. Why shouldn't you draft a relief pitcher early? Maybe you're laughing at me, but I just don't get it.
I guess my biggest problem is changing my mindset from REAL baseball to fantasy baseball. I have to realize that "Derek Jeter intangibles" don't really translate to fantasy baseball. For example, I love Michael Young, but do I trade my life for him? He is just so cute. Whoops, there's the whole girl-thing running back into it.
Back to my team -- quick rundown. Howard at first, Ian Kinsler of Texas at second (I was thisclose to drafting Robby Cano, but the turtle in front of me drafted him with about six seconds left -- I was snapping), Edgar Renteria of ATL at short and Ryan Zimmerman of the Nationals (almost ROY) at third. Quick note: I like how Yahoo keeps the Latino feeling alive by putting the accents on player names. It's kinda nice. Makes me feel all warm.
Anyway, I've got Manny (do you need a last name?), Willy Taveras of the Rockies and Mike Cameron of the Pads in my outfield. Remember that crazy collision Cameron had with Carlos Beltran a couple of seasons ago? Everytime I see his name, I still shiver. I've got Brad Wilkerson, Nick Johnson and Mark DeRosa on my bench. If you're not a big fan of baseball, there's a chance you're thinking "Who the hell?" Yeah, I would too. I was literally grabbing at straws by the 12th round. With 13 teams and 20 rounds, we're drafting 260 players total! I felt like I might as well draft that girl who played left field for the JV softball team in middle school. Instead, I got Mark DeRosa. Not sure who I'm better off with.
My one Yankee: Mike Mussina. Moosie -- I love that little hop he does after every pitch, and what a looker. Whoops, there it is again. Anyway, I've got Chris Capuano, Jered Weaver (do you think Jeff Weaver has a big brother complex?) and Daisuke Matsuzaka. Okay I'm a huge, huge Yankees fan, as you may know. I feel almost as weird as I did when Johnny Damon came over to the good side. I've been waiting for Matsuzaka to have some freak pitching accident, like a comebacker right to the elbow (graphic, I know). Now what do I do? And what do I do if he's pitching against the Red Sox? I'm watching the Sox play the Yankees in Boston in a few weeks and it's the 17th game of the season -- meaning it might be Matsuzaka. My heart is hurting.
Now we're doing post-draft nervous trades and pickups. I'm not sure how to handle all this. On one hand, I want to play the league by myself to prove to the boys that I'm not just some stupid girl. (Did I mention there are bets on what place i'm going to finish in? I'd like to thank Jeffrey for having faith in me and I'm sending out a big fuck you to Mikey for the lack of faith.) On the other hand, I want to win. I'm very tempted to run every move I make by a second and third (and fourth and fifth) party.
Anyway, my eyes are starting to burn, because I'm watching Deal or No Deal as well right now. It's ladies' night and they have a bunch of macho firefighters holding the suitcases. My mom is convinced that the twins who are playing accidentally listened to her and said No Deal (!!!!!!) when she really meant Deal (!!!!!!). I'm sure they did, momma. I'm sure they did.
Photo Source: SignOnSanDiego
