You Sneaky Little Readers

Yesterday, I learned a few lessons about my readers and the people I'm around on a daily basis.  After writing my previous post about Fantasy Football and reading the responses as well as several email (never sure if the plural of email is email or emails) that I received, something because VERY clear.  The question of why do a lot of men play Fantasy Football is not really a question at all.  It's really a sneaky rhetorical inquiry designed to see if we, men who play a lot of Fantasy Football, will try to explain the unexplainable to people who couldn't care less.  And you know what... I fell for it!

But that wasn't the most disturbing thing I realized after yesterday's post.  I also realized that my readers and my friends are pretty sick and twisted.  I received WAY more interest in my wife being in the league.  And more to the sickening point... They wanted to know about her BEATING me!  Again... couldn't care less about the question asked... couldn't care MORE about finding out the finer details of my wife playing in the MEN'S league and beating the crap out of her husband.  That's just wrong people!

First of all, that has NEVER happened and WILL never happen.  What self-respecting man would let his wife beat him in Fantasy Football? (Ha!  That's my rhetorical for you! :-P)  It hasn't even been close.  My wife only wishes she had the Fantasy Football skills that I display.  Sorry to disappoint all of you who were interested in Mrs. Que's story.  You really thought my wife was hanging with the big boys???  Whatever.  The only reason she is the last remaining female in this MAN'S league is because I run the league.  I have a soft spot for all of the begging, pleading and the eventual waterworks that come from me putting my foot down on the issue.  For that reason, I usually pick it back up and allow Mrs. Que to play.

(That last paragraph is completely not true.  I'm pretty much stepping in to save Mr. Que's life on this one.  I'm his conscience.  And if he goes, I go.  And I'm not ready to go.  He sometimes says things he doesn't mean.  He doesn't like being backed into a corner by other people.  So, I'm going to force him to tell the true on this one.  I will set him free.)

Since my parenthetical EGO (which oddly sounds like my wife at this moment) has felt the need to sell me out and backstab me I am forced to tell the truth.  Yeah, my wife has beaten me once in Fantasy Football. (ahem) Ok. Twice. (EXCUSE ME)  Fine!  She has beaten me several times.  There, I said it!

The first season my wife (then girlfriend) was in the league was interesting to say the least.  There were actually a few ladies in the group and they ALL played very well.  I can't remember if I invited Mrs. Que to the group or if she asked if she could be in the group.  Either way, I didn't think much about it at the time.  I asked everyone else in the group and they OK'd the new additions to the league.  I'm sure the rest of the fellas were thinking the same thing I was... no big deal.  Well, that changed in a hurry.  I think she started the league in first place and ended the season in first place.  She took home the league trophy in her first season.

That in itself was bad.  None of my friends wanted to talk to me after that.  Honestly, I didn't want to talk to myself.  Was I hustled?  Was she a FF (Fantasy Football) guru?  Did she sucker me in with that beautiful smile and irresistible pouty face?  I mean... I knew she knew her stuff but to win the whole thing.  Must have been a fluke.

Well...  next season must have been a fluke too.  She played and won the 2nd place trophy.  What made this worse is that I hadn't won the league since we started buying trophies.  So the last trophy I had won was an old Tecmo Bowl (Nintendo Fooball Game) tournament in college (many years before this).  I got a cute little trophy.  One of her favorite past times was to place her rather LARGE first place trophy next to my little Tecmo trophy that I used to display around my apartment. (That's not funny, folks.  I don't even know where my Tecmo Bowl trophy is now.)  She would even comment on the size of my little trophy.  (Talk about an ego buster.  I'm surprised we even got married after all of that.)  But I'm a big boy so I could take a little ribbing.  It was when she took out the newspaper ad and bought the TV spot during the Super Bowl that I really began to have a problem.  OK, that part didn't happen.  But it did in my mind.  And that's what REALLY counts.

Since then, she has generally ranked higher than me by the end of the season (including last season where she won our division and was literally 1 play away from winning 3rd place overall). (I didn't even make the playoffs.) I blame my friends for this because they laugh at her picks every year.  For some reason, this makes her team better.  So I don't laugh.  I don't even smile.  I just move on knowing that by the end of the season, odds are she will be ahead of me.  I'm not proud of it but it is what it is (she hates when I say that).

So that was more of what my readers wanted me to say.  Fantasy Football is mostly played by men but that doesn't necessarily mean we are better at it.  My readers every year ask me why I play but that's not REALLY what they want to know.  I have been married for a few years.  So I should have seen that one coming.  I will say this, though... The season I finally win again, you better believe I'm buying a MUCH bigger trophy than that little one my wife has from winning the league a few years back.  And that's my answer to the question... rhetorical or not.