Fantasy Football Fanatic

I love sports, I really do. A majority of my time is spent playing them, watching them, or following them. Every year, there comes a time where I am following the game almost constantly on the weekend and that is generated by one thing, fantasy football. I am a fantasy football fanatic, it seems strange that pointless statistics of non-popular players could be the thing that makes or breaks your week, but its all for the love of the game and I love the NFL and fantasy football.


Before about 2008, I was always skeptical about fantasy sports. Back then, I was really into NBA basketball, since it has always been my favorite sport. That was the first year I had any experience with fantasy sports. I was invited to a Yahoo fantasy basketball league by my brother and it was a rather lame league and I neglected my team pretty much all that year. When it came to any other sports, basketball always came first, and everything else seem like a distant second.

It was 2009-2010 season where I played fantasy football for the first time. I had a condescending attitude of hesitation when I joined that league, but what I didn't know is that it would change my perspective of sports for a long time to come. I started the league and was in it with a few friends from school, I really didn't know much about the NFL, expect what I needed to know to watch it every Sunday. I knew a few players, I knew that I loved the Chicago Bears, and I knew that basketball would always be my favorite sport to follow no matter what.

I finished that season 2-14, I didn't follow it like most the other people, but something about that year changed my perspective on fantasy sports and sports in general. I became more open and unbiased to my love of sports, I simply loved fantasy football, I loved football, and basketball still was my favorite to watch. Even though my record didn't quite show it that year, I still loved following it every Sunday, watching each player on my team with every chance I got and having my mood depend on pointless statistics that when I got to school Tuesday morning after the football games for the week, meant absolutely nothing.

Last year, I joined two fantasy football leagues, I got a little more serious with fantasy football and quickly put my love of the NBA second to my love of the NFL. I joined one $25 dollar league with a bunch of friends and two of my brothers, which ultimately became the league I was most applicable of having a chance to win. I also joined another league as a co-owner with my sister, which was a keeper auction league, it was a $75 dollar league and now that I joined these leagues there was money on the line.

The keeper auction league quickly became my favorite, there was so much strategy behind it, it just made me want to research more players and keep playing, it distracted me from school and I just kept on searching for more ways to win. I finished that league 4-12, and was not much better than the year before, but it still kept me going. I finished 9-7 in the other league and still wasn't enough to be in the top 3.

This year, I stepped up my fantasy football managing and also became a commissioner of my own league. It's been a pretty decent year for me. The auction keeper league I started out 3-0, but went on a 5 game losing streak due to the fact I lost 4 of my top players (Jamaal Charles, Kenny Britt, Tim Hightower, and Jahvid Best). I'm currently 12/14 in that league with a 3-5 record, but still follow it closely. The league I'm commissioner of I've had better luck I drafted the top running back and top wide receiver (Adrian Peterson and Calvin Johnson). I'm currently 5-3 in that league and in 5th place.

To you, this is pointless statistics, to me this is research and what will be able to make or break my week.

Fantasy football changed my perspective on sports. I feel that because of it I've became more open to other sports. I was incredibly biased towards the NBA and as basketball will remain my favorite sport and the sport that is always there for me, the NFL has become my favorite sport to follow, simply because it is the most interactive experience in football. I never thought before that I'd know who Kregg Lumpkin is, or that Calvin Johnson scored two touchdowns every game in the first four weeks of the league this year. It's those pointless statistics that keep my sane in each coming week, the ones that can make or break my week, and the ones that just occupy some of my time and make my further my love of the game and when the NBA is out of the lockout, I'll be there waiting to participate in fantasy basketball, waiting to watch game one by one, and loving every minute of the playoffs, but for now the NFL has dominated my weekends and changed my perspective of sports. I love sports, and fantasy sports are a great measure of that.

Lesson 4: A little fun in the newsroom never hurts.

"I never did a day's work in my life. It was all fun."- Thomas A. Edison


Sometimes the quote above is how we always feel while we produce the magazine. We work hard, and we play hard as well. While working on the magazine most people outside of class and staff think of it as strictly a class where we write all day, do interviews, take pictures, and quietly obey a teacher like most classes at school. It is the complete opposite of that. We've always said that Torch is a family and as cliche as that sounds, we sometimes act like one big family. By the end of the day, as much work has went into it, how many occasional "damps" and "ships" (No Swear November censorship) directed at the computer, and just any speed bumps in the road, we always find a way to have fun.

I believe that we do a lot of work and really it can be quite stressful sometimes, especially with five/six other classes, it piles up. One thing we've really learned to do though, is make it work, make the best of it and have fun with it. Most of our staff this year is an editor and on top of that a reporter as well. Being a reporter is always a fun part of the job but is quite intimidating at first, especially if you get a story you really want to cover. It's funny to think that three years ago, I was scared to talk to anybody about an interview when I was a beginning journalist, but now I love it. An interview isn't just a way to get a source, it's a productive way to have a conversation with somebody about your topic. I was taught in that beginning journalism class, that an interview isn't an interview, it's a conversation, it's a way to get to know somebody, and meet new people. Simply by making it work, you can take one of the scariest parts of journalism and make it fun.

All the time, I get asked by people... "What exactly do you do?" and I usually reply somewhere along the lines of "stories, pages, hangout, and have fun," because really we aren't tied down to doing stories and pages. Of course, we take them seriously and we try and make them the best we can, but we have fun while doing it. One of the parts of staff that is usually really fun for editors, is work session. Work sessions are where the editors get together and create the pages that will be seen in the final production. Instead of constantly working, we usually play loud music, have raves (strobe light+ a bunch of teenagers cooped up in school long past regular hours= awesome dancing), eat, give back massages, a lot of hugs, and did I mention eat? It's not that we are just focused on it at all times, and I believe that is one common misconception that we get. Of course this probably isn't seen on a wider scale, such as the New York Times or ESPN. I doubt you'll ever see Michael Wilbon of ESPN raving around with Tony Kornheiser (wouldn't we all like to see that?) but still journalism is fun and with a good support cast, we tend to make it work by having fun.

Every time I get the question of what we do, I always feel that people have a perception of just another boring Language Arts class. As a news-magazine, I believe that we are far from a boring Language Arts class, I believe that there is so much to us than just work. Everybody is always so accustomed to each other on our staff and I think sometimes we just have a little too much fun, but is there anything as too much fun if you truly think about it? Journalism is fun, is the one form of work that your today is different from your tomorrow, there is so many twists, turns, and bumps along the road, but once you get the final piece out there it's such an accomplishment. Being apart of the news-magazine staff especially in high school is definitely a great experience and you will run across some problems, but like I've said, make it work and have fun and everything will seem better by the day it's published.

November Preview

I've been stressed, tired, overexerted, and quite frankly unmotivated lately. My theory behind this is school. The fun of October swiftly blows away as the weather changes and November becomes cold and disastrous, especially in school. As a student, I've always loved school, but have always been fed up with the way teachers act when it gets closer and closer to the "f-word"....Finals. In my opinion, we need to just step back and chill, since November is such a festive and great month. Two posts you should see in November are my ones pertaining to how great of a November month is through tradition and festivities as well as how that is ruined (by school and finals). We shouldn't have to stress about teachers laziness (not all teachers, some work very hard and I appreciate that) but really some are just starting to piss me off...Wait a second is piss considered a swear word anymore? I'm also participating in a self-made month where I give up swearing, I'll blog about that as well.

After final test exams, our paper and majority of our staff will be going to the JEA National Convention in Minneapolis. Definitely expect coverage of that on my blog, I'll definitely be putting up a lot of photos (whether or not they are pertaining to journalism and the convention or not), maybe a video, and after the convention a nice little blurb about the experience of it. The convention is one of our favorite times of the year and last year we pretty much left our mark on the Kansas City convention (getting an indirect mention about having a little too much fun in the revolving doors, oops).

This leads us right up to the end of the month and Thanksgiving, one of my favorite Holidays. I expect that I'll blog about Thanksgiving and all the festivities I love. One of the festivities that comes with fall, is football, and with football comes fantasy football, expect to know further into the life of fantasy alter-ego (who is crazy). Last but not least, expect a few lessons in the newsroom as well. I've been kind of slow to churn those out and the ones I did weren't the direction I wanted, but expect to see more in November and in the coming months. It's really hard to blog about one topic, and I chose journalism because there is such a broad spectrum of things to talk about, but once I got down to the lessons I was stumped, and that is why you have seen a lot of different sides of my blog now: music, sports, viral sensations, and anything else.

Thank you to anybody who has read my blog thus far, regardless I've been kind of lacking on them as the requirement for the class, I plan on catching up and using my blog more, especially having the one week break will be a really good time to get some blogs out there. That is what you can expect for November, hopefully you will enjoy!