One of my favorite websites out there is Indexed. It features a fair bit of geek humor as author Jessica Hagy breaks down concepts into simple terms featuring venn diagrams, x-y axis, and other commonly seen diagrams. Today, she diverted from mathematical designs to display her concept of a fantasy league:

Aside from the fact that there is no way a ghost would beat a yeti, this does bring up a good point. While we in the industry like to bring up the fact that 30 million Americans play fantasy sports, that also means over 270 million Americans do not play fantasy sports. Thats 90% of the country. While this edition of indexed is a joke, it may not be too far from the impression that many people in the country share about fantasy sports.

It’s Wednesday and, at least in DC, kind of dreary. Since we can all use a pick me up, I have an amusing little story to get your blood going this afternoon.

In my oldest fantasy baseball league (the league that recently folded), the league had an entry fee of $350 per team. Since we all knew each other, owners did not have to pay the league fee until the end of the season. That was if they did not win anything.

One season a league member (John) had a terrible season and had to pay about $300. My brother Jorge was responsible for collecting the funds. One day, he gets a FedEx envelope in the mail from John with the $300. When Jorge opened the envelope, it starts to rain as about 15 twenty dollar bills fall out of it. This is a little odd, since most people pay league dues with a check. Jorge calls John to find out what the deal was with all the twenties.

Well, sometime around June, John realized his team was going to have a bad season and he was going to owe a bunch of money. In order to not anger his wife in October with a large check against their joint checking account, John put twenty dollars into his desk each week through out the rest of the season, since she would be less likely to notice that amount on a regular basis.

Morale of the story, pay your league dues a little at a time, and your wife will never know how bad of a fantasy player you are.

Have a funny fantasy sports story of your own? Email it to me at derrick@fantasyethos.com, and I would love to read it.

Photo by Darren Hester