Playoff Edition 1 - 2011

(WatchBlog McGee is a fictionalized blogger but reports on actual, flesh and bone, real-life fantasy football leagues.  This year, he is embedded deep in the CFFFL, and will be periodically blogging on league matters.)

I know you have all been clamoring for WatchBlog to cover the exciting CFFFL playoffs, so here I am. Let’s get to it.

He had a dream

When Commissioner Gary “If I win this thing, I’m buying myself a trophy” Cook stood in his Highland Village home this summer, and gathered members of his family together, he knew what he was going to propose, but he did not know how it would be received.  He had to get 10 family members to commit to being football geeks for at least 5 minutes a week for 16 weeks in order to move forward with his vision of the CFFFL.  Getting this kind of commitment was not going to be easy.  His brothers weren’t going to be trouble, but he only had two, and he would need 7 more managers to make a league.  His wife and children were not football fans, but he was confident his control of the family money could persuade them to play along, but that, along with himself and his brothers, only gave him a league of 6.  The 4 remaining managers would have to come from his parents, his nieces, and his sisters-in-law.  This would be a tough sale, but he felt up for the challenge.  He had been playing fantasy football for years, and all the embarrassing teams he had fielded, and all the hours he had wasted on his various leagues, seemed to prepare him for this very moment - the birth of a new league.  And then the unthinkable happened.  After an impassioned sales pitch to the uncommited Cook family members, he was only able to secure one parent, one niece, and one sister-in-law for the league.  9 managers were as good as 0, and he knew it.  His dream of a Cook only league was not going to be possible, and he started to believe that all the years he had devoted to what could best be described as “pretend time” was actually not worth the sacrifice of a truly meaningful connection with his wife and children.  But if Gary was going to be the Commissioner of a pretend football league, he was gonna have to start thinking outside the box.  The all-Cook league included wives who were not Cooks by birth, so anyone marrying into the family should be eligible.  In a strike of sheer luck, his eldest niece had just tied the knot earlier in the year, and her husband, a Johnson, would be the perfect candidate to round out the league, and make the CFFFL possible.  As you know, Johnson agreed, and the league was born.  Now with the regular season over, and the first round of playoffs in the books, it could be said that Commissioner Cook’s dream that took hold earlier this summer, is winding down.  But he would tell you that, rather than winding down, the dream is actually building in intensity to the ultimate conclusion, the first ever CFFFL Championship Game.  While 10 teams began the journey those many weeks ago, only 4 remain, and the Commish’s team is one of them.  The Commish may not be winning that Championship game, and, he may not even be playing in it, but regardless, in his mind his victory was sealed months ago, when he saw his fantasy dream become a fantasy reality.



WatchBlog out.