While gun control is not normally a topic you would see on this site, nor will I express my opinion on the subject, it was what naturally came to mind upon seeing this video. If there ever was an argument for it, this would be it. The details, A hardcore Redskins fan bet his Facebook fans that if the Saints won the game, his friends could shoot at his big screen television. Well, the Saints won, and the guy’s television was toast.

via FamousDC

Did Robert Meachem’s fantasy touchdown cause you to miss the playoffs? With your fantasy football team officially done for the season and you might want to keep playing fantasy football, you can check out Fanball‘s SnapDraft.

If you go to any of the SnapDraft sites and sign up now, you receive a $5 sign-up bonus. With some leagues starting at just a $0.20 registration fee, you can get a lot of legs out of it. You can currently play SnapDraft on Comcast, Facebook, SB Nation, Yardbarker, and RotoWire. In other words, just about anywhere you probably are already spending a little bit (or a lot) of time.

Last week we gave you a free coupon code for RapidDraft, so I thought it only fair to balance it out by letting you know that you had another option for a free trial of an instant fantasy sports game. In fact,

SnapDraft is simple to play. All you have to do is pick which league you want to join (there are countless you can). Then, when once enough people sign-up to join a particular league, you draft a team. Then, you compete for just that night. Once the league’s games are over, your league is over. It is that simple.

If you have a hankering for some fantasy, snap to it! (pun fully and completely intended)

It comes just one time a year, and it is here now–Bowl season! That special season when you spend countless hours and days watching games involving teams that you have not even spoken of all season long. Just to make it a little bit interesting, why not enter a bowl contest? What, were you expecting to watch the game with zero fantasy interest? Fantasy college football is all the rage these days, and you need to get with it.

One way to go is with the 2009 College Fantasy Football Insider Bowl Challenge. Playing the Bowl Challenge is simple. All you have to do is select one player from each position tier. The team with the most fantasy points. This game has an advantage over traditional Bowl pick’ems which require you to make predictions of games in which you do not have the slightest clue. By focusing on the players, the Bowl Challenge narrows the amount of information you need to go through to make good selections (or at least ones in which you are confident).

The game is free to play and comes with a pretty cool top prize. Fantasy Trophies is offering its famed The Throwback as the top prize, in addition to a $250 Best Buy gift certificate. You could win a hundred other fantasy leagues, but I doubt your league trophy would be that cool as The Throwback. Not bad for zero investment on your part.

Sign-ups should start by tomorrow, if it is not already active now. Good luck to everyone who enters.

I received a lot of great feedback about yesterday’s article Robert Meachem’s Touchdown Causes Fantasy Controversy. The general consensus was that Meachem should get credit for the touchdown. Of course, it could just be that the Saints defense owners were content with credit for the touchdown and the Meachem owners were outraged and much more vocal.

In an interesting turn, Yahoo! reversed its decision overnight and awarded the touchdown to Robert Meachem and not the Saints defense. Honestly, this probably makes the most sense because while Meachem at that point was considered a defensive player, he is considered an offense player in the system. As one reader pointed out to me in an email:

An offensive team is an offensive team and a defensive team is a defensive team. A change in possession does not change that or by definition, we could never have defensive touchdowns. As soon as the defensive team came into possession of the ball, they would become the offensive team. To think that designation changes at the time of a change of possession simply defies logic the way we play the game.

Whether he scores a touchdown as a member of the offense or defense, he should get credit for the touchdown.

But, it all makes for a little fun controversy at the last minute, eh? Like I said yesterday, no matter what the final resolution is in your league, there will be fantasy owners in some leagues who will feel cheated out of a playoff spot, or even, a fantasy football title. That’s just how it goes. Just like real football.

Currently as of 10:00am this morning, on Yahoo! Fantasy Football (and possibly other scoring systems), no one is being credited for Robert Meachem’s crazy touchdown.

In yesterday’s Saints-Redskin’s game, Drew Brees threw an interception. On the interception return, Saints wide receiver Robert Meachem stripped the ball, recovered the fumble, and took the ball 44 yards for a touchdown. In fantasy football land, who gets the touchdown?

According to the football rulebook, once an interception is thrown, the offense (the Saints in this case) is now considered the defense. When Meachem stripped the ball, the defense is then credited with a fumble and the defense is the one who scored the touchdown.

Now, from a fantasy perspective, does Meachem get credit for the touchdown? It depends. If your league credits the defense and special teams with the touchdown and not the individual player, then the New Orleans defense should get credit for the touchdown. If your league credits individual players on defense and special teams with the touchdown, then Meachem should get credit for the touchdown. Right now, no one is getting credit for it, and that is a problem.

Update: Yahoo! has updated its scoring, and the New Orleans defense is now being credited with the touchdown, since with the change in possession, Meachem was considered a defense player. This is probably the most fair scoring and is also what other fantasy sites are adopting (CBSSports.com has already done it as well). Well done by Yahoo! for getting it fixed relatively quickly. However, there will still be some upset fantasy players over this one.

According to its rules, Yahoo! can make scoring corrections through Wednesday, so do not be surprised if this matter is eventually settled out and either the Saints’ defense or Robert Meachem ends up with credit for it. In the mean time, players are wondering where their points for Robert Meachem are.

Either way, this play will impact countless fantasy leagues and playoff implications, particularly since this was the last week of the fantasy football regular season for many teams. It reminds me of the Brian Westbrook kneel down two years ago or when Donovan McNabb scored a touchdown on a Wednesday three years ago.

Because I love my Fantasy Ethos readers so much, I was able to procure a coupon for Rapid Draft for you for a free trial. Well, Rapid Draft’s Jeff Thomas posted it in the comments section of an earlier post (Get Your Own Fantasy Shuts Down). However, I am reposting it here for you so that you can get yourself into a free fantasy football league this weekend, so that has to count for something? I did not have to repost this Rapid Draft coupon, and you may have missed it. How do you feel about that now? Good, glad we are seeing eye-to-eye on this.

For a free trial of Rapid Draft, use the coupon code Go4It. Then, when you are done, let me know what you thought of the game.

Enjoy!

Update: After saying on Friday morning that Get Your Own Fantasy was just on hiatus while it was being retooled, it looks like Jeff Thomas has reactivated the site, and GYOF is now live again…for now.

At least that is what it looks like. If you attempt to visit GetYourOwnFantasy.com (GYOF) now, you are redirected to Sports Buff. Both sites are owned by Jeff Thomas’ World Fantasy Games which explains the redirect. In addition, the World Fantasy Games footer that is present on its sites is now missing GYOF in it.

The concept behind GYOF was pretty simple: anyone can sign-up and through the miracle of automation, syndication, and the internet, have his very own fantasy site. The site was a repackaging of the fantasy games and content found on Sports Buff, but was a decent start to get a foot in the fantasy industry. For Sports Buff, it was provided an additional opportunity to distribute its content, get new sign-ups for its games, and make additional money in advertising.

Unfortunately, most people looking to get into the fantasy industry want to share their own thoughts or software concepts and are not concerned with distributing someone else’s content. In fact, it is often a frustration with the existing options that leads someone to start their own fantasy sports site. While GYOF provided a platform for aspiring fantasy experts, common content platforms like WordPress are simpler and much more wide-spread.

What do you think? Do you think GYOF died an early death?