The GOI Football Draft Wrap-Up Special, Part II

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are tonight's entertainment!

On the last Saturday of August, I spent six hours drafting. I spent the day at my buddy Bennett’s place (whom I have a few board bets with) because he was in both of the leagues that had drafts on this Saturday. During our first draft, we popped in The Dark Knight to help pass the time. There’s a scene in the movie in which Harvey Dent is lying in his hospital bed when The Joker comes to visit him. The Joker tells Dent:

I just did what I do best. I took your little plan and I turned it on itself. Look what I did to this city with a few drums of gas and a couple of bullets. Hmmm? You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan." But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!

Besides the obvious, what The Joker is talking about is expectations. When we expect things to go one way, and they don’t, we get upset. But if we expect things to go a certain way, even if what you expect is bad, and it does go the way you planned- well then we don’t get upset. If you’re waiting for a table at a restaurant and the hostess tells you the wait will be an hour, you get a bit upset but you love this restaurant and you go sit down and sulk. However, to your amazement, the wait was only a half hour so you’re pleasantly surprised to wait only 30 minutes. Now let’s say the waitress tells you the wait will only be five minutes. You go and sit down and smile because you’re not going to be sitting down for very long. But then 15 minutes rolls around and you’re table isn’t ready. 20 minutes roll around and you’re table isn’t ready. 25 minutes roll around and you’re table isn’t ready. Finally after 30 long minutes you’re table is ready. In both these scenarios it took you 30 minutes to get a table, yet you’re happier in the end when the hostess told you it would be an hour wait as opposed to the five minute wait. And that’s because of the expectations that were set up from the get-go.

And that’s why I felt upset during this 14 team Game Of Inches auction draft. (My second of the night).

And here… we… go!

Actually before we begin, go to http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/league/goi to see who drafted who and vote on who you think the preseason favorites are.

Like all good fantasy players, I made sure to do my research before the draft. Admittedly I could have done more, looking extensively at all 32 teams and analyzing their offense like I did the Baltimore Ravens. But alas I did not. But what I did do is enter plenty of mock drafts to see how I should rank and pay for the players I wanted. I made a list of every position and assigned a dollar amount to these positions of how much I wanted and was willing to spend based upon my mock drafts.

Unfortunately how the computers spent money in mocks seemed to be drastically different than how my fellow drafters spent their money in my league. And because my expectations changed, I was very upset at the end of the draft.

Look at you! What do you believe in, huh? WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE IN!?

I believed in the stars and scrubs approach in this draft. I spent most of money on three players: Frank Gore ($61), Tony Romo ($26), and Andre Johnson ($49). In a .5 PPR league, I’m a big fan of Gore and Johnson. I had allocated $62 to spent on a top tier running back and I put in bids of Rice, Johnson, MJD, AD, and Michael Turner (the man I actually wanted). Unfortunately all those backs went for more than $62 so I was “stuck” with Gore. I don’t like the fact that he’s really injury prone but he’s very good at catching the ball and I expect about 50-60 receptions for him this year. I love Andre Johnson. Normally WR don’t perform as well as RB and QB, but I trust that Johnson will. And especially considering he’ll be AT LEAST top 3 in receptions this year, I didn’t mind that I had to pay a lot for Johnson. Especially considering I was willing to pay $50 for him.

The only sensible way to live in this world is without rules. And tonight you're gonna break your one rule.

Now my Tony Romo pick I like and I don’t like. I had only allocated $21 to the QB position, but I wanted and needed a top tier QB. My plan was to put in $21 bids for Rodgers, Brady, Manning, Brees, and Romo and if I missed all of them then I’d wait on Joe Flacco. Unfortunately Bennett spit out Joe Flacco while Manning, Brees, and Romo were still on the board and got him for $16. I couldn’t in good faith risk paying for Flacco at that point in the draft (although now I wish I had). But when Manning and Brees both left the pool, I knew I had to get Tony Romo at whatever cost. This meant paying five more bucks than I actually wanted.

I know the truth: there's no going back. You've changed things... forever.

I also only allocated $9 to my TE position and even though TE don’t nearly produce the same fantasy results as RBs and QBs and many WRs, I wasn’t going to get stuck with Greg Olson (as I did in my ten team draft a few hours earlier) and with Clark, Gates, Witten, Celek, Davis, Finley and Daniels already off the board I needed to get Tony Gonzalez- which cost me $11. But now that I had overspent an extra $7, I couldn’t pay for many of the sleepers I had wanted to get. While $7 doesn’t seem like a lot of money, when my sleepers Mike Wallace and Reggie Bush went for $10 each and my max budget was $6 at the time both went off the board, that extra seven dollars really could have come in handy.

After my boy Mike Wallace went to my hated rival TBO and Malcolm Floyd went for $8, I loaded up on cheap WR sleepers I liked- like Steve Breaston, Julian Edelman, and Anthony Gonzalez hoping that at least one pan out. I even tried spending $6 on Johnny Knox but he went for $9. I also have what I believe to be the #1 wide receiver and this is a 14 team league- which means the 28th best wide out will still work out well for me.

Now If I could go back I probably would have spent money on Reggie Wayne ($33), Randy Moss ($34), or even Brandon Marshall ($30) so I could pair them with better sleepers and wide outs. But c’est la vie. There’s no going back.

I am very good with calculations.

I did think I allocated some money appropriately. I wanted to spend $24 on a second RB and I spent that much on Felix Jones. (Ideally I wanted Matt Forte but he was still out there and I didn’t want to risk of losing out on both Jones and Forte- who ended up going for $25). I also wanted to spent $14 on my flex RB position and I ended up getting Ahmad Bradshaw for $12. Last year I LOVED Brandon Jacobs and I wasted my first round draft pick on him. So you’d think I’d hate him but when training camp and pre-season started, I still liked Jacobs and thought he would be a post hype sleeper and I could get top tier talent for cheap. But as training camp went on and pre-season games went underway and reports of the New York running back situation came out, logic just told me that Bradshaw would perform better than Jacobs. But my heart’s still for B.J.

And I thought my jokes were bad.

See, I'm a man of simple tastes. I like dynamite, and gunpowder and gasoline! Do you know what all of these things have in common? They're cheap!

You know what else came cheap, the rest of my team. I like Chad Henne a lot so as my back up QB I got him for $2, I also got a back up TE (Kevin Boss, $1) and a back up RB (Bernard Scott, $1) and as well as the best K (Jeff Reed, $1) and D/ST (Washington, $1) left on the board. I also got L.T. for three bucks. The guy can't run anymore but I expect Shonn Greene to be out for an extended period of time, that Jets O-line is amazing, and they LOVE to run the ball. Also part of the reason I couldn't spend money on Bush or Wallace but his value was too good for me to pass up

-Did she believe you?
-Yes
-Of course she did. Because she trusts you!

Cubsfan and I have a board bet Arian Foster vs. Steve Slaton. I took Foster. Cubsfan took Slaton. I love the talent of Slaton more than I do of Foster, but this bet is about fantasy football and I think the Texans like Foster more than Slaton and thus will get more carries (a lot actually) and be more fantasy relevant. Apparently Cubsfan agrees with this sentiment because him and I were duking it out for Foster when his name got spit out. The $14 allocation that I used on Ahmad Bradshaw was meant for Foster. But apparently Cubsfan liked Foster more because he paid $16 for him.

Now, for obvious reasons, no one except me can know the location for now. But rest assured, your money is safe.

For one member of this GOI league, his money was safe, because he still had $109 left at the end of the draft. The reason for this was because he autodrafted. At one point we got lucky and only had 2 out of the 14 members autodraft. But towards the end we had about 4-5 that weren’t picking for themselves. The computer loved to drive up the value on some crappy players (like Vincent Jackson and Sidney Rice) and made drafting for us real humans annoying sometimes. But we got the last laugh because not only did the computer spend more than a dollar for these teams kickers, they made sure these teams had two.

Why so serious?

At the end of the draft when my expectations weren’t met and a lot of players I wanted and were targeting did not fall to me and when the players I ended up getting costs too much for me- I was upset. I was in a bad mood. I walked back to my place cranky.

The night is darkest just before the dawn. And believe me, the dawn is coming

But after I’ve had a night to sleep on it and briefly trying to work out a trade with TBO to get either/or Mike Wallace and Reggie Bush, I like my team. While I didn’t get the top sleepers on my list, I did get ones that I have full faith in. While I don’t believe with full 100% confidence that Felix Jones will emerge as Dallas’ #1 back, I do love the man’s talent and do think the price I paid for him is reasonable. I do like Ahmad Bradshaw in my flex, I still like the top of my team. I also think I have a legitimate chance of making the playoffs after looking at everyone else’s team. So when my last pick was in the books and I sat at my seat a bit ticked off, I was in the dark. But the night is darkest just before the dawn.

If you're good at something, never do it for free.

On a final note, good friend of GOI FFSpin (who was in our draft) told me during the draft that he started up a new website called fantasyfootballcrystalball.com. For only a $15 subscription, you can get more and great fantasy football advice. I know I’m signing up for it. And when he probably defeats me and wins this league, you’ll see why paying for his service will be worth it.

So here's how my team turned out

QB- Tony Romo ($26)
QB- Chad Henne ($2)
RB- Frank Gore ($62)
RB- Felix Jones ($24)
RB- Ahmad Bradshaw ($12)
RB- LaDanian Tomlinson ($3)
RB- Bernard Scott ($1)
WR- Andre Johnson ($49)
WR- Steve Breaston ($4)
WR- Anthony Gonzalez ($2)
WR- Julian Edelman ($1)
TE- Tony Gonzalez ($11)
TE- Kevin Boss ($1)
K- Jeff Reed ($1)
D/ST- Washington ($1)

So what do you guys think of my team? Take a look at the rest of the league and how do you think I'll fair?

Part Three, with at least Cubsfans thoughts of the draft, to come shortly.

LAST EDITOR'S NOTE: If you couldn't tell, all quotes are from The Dark Knight