Fantasy Football Finals

Finished 2nd in Skidoo's money league this year, to double up my poker bankroll! I lost in the finals to Memphis Mojo, who steamrolled through the playoffs. I entered the playoffs as the #1 seed, but that one seed was a bit misleading. Mojo led the league in points, was the #6 seed going into the playoffs--good ol' heads up play! I could have scored 21 points higher if I had played everything perfect, including starting both NYG running backs (who both went for +20 points), but who starts two running backs from the same team in the finals of a fantasy league?!

Tequila, Seahawks, Push Ups and Fantasy Finals OH MY!

Man oh man. Saturday night was a rough one. Josh and I rolled into Dare's a little before 9pm, when the party was set to start. I'm used to rolling into parties a little late, but Josh reasoned that the earlier we get to the party, the earlier we get to start drinking--and that made a whole lot of sense to me on Saturday night. Dare and Will were already at the house, but Josh and I made 4.

Dare came up with the brilliant idea of everyone doing shots of tequila when each new group of visitors arrived. I don't do shots, but it just felt right. A.Flew showed up and the five of us took shots. A few minutes later, a car-full of people showed up, which meant another round. I convinced dare to put a shot of tequila on top of the toilet, so whoever broke the seal first had to take a shot.

We played some cards in between rounds of shots, and we had a big game of Asshole going. First rule, made by Will, was President gets to be thumb-master, always a good rule. The second rule, made by Dare, was that if you make eye-contact with the Asshole, you have to take a drink. This rule was new to me, and amazing! I got to give a trivia question (holding a 2 as my only remaining card), and I asked what color the asshole's eyes are, which got plenty of people drinks.

I ended the night on the floor, after hugging the toilet for a while. Josh got us back to his place, and I woke up around 10:30am to the Seahawks leading the Rams, and a nice headache. I looked at my phone and had 3 voice mails from Tyler and Marc, who were supposed to come down to watch the game, but chicken-shitted out because of the snow. Bullshit!

The Seahawks pulled out the last-second field goal to win it in the 4th quarter, for our 3rd win of the season (two against the Rams! Eight in a row against the large beasts). Josh made some red beans and rice, and the meal was finally ready around 3:30pm, which was actually perfect for me, because up until about 3pm I had absolutely no appetite.

Sunday was definitely the hardest day of Push Up Challenge 2.0, but I got in my 117th push up of the day around 11pm. I also recruited Push Up Challenge 2.0's second official member, Will! Welcome aboard! Will got the crazy idea to add sit ups to the challenge, which I'm a fan of. So today I've got 118 push ups and 100 sit ups to do, each increasing by one until I max out at 200 or 300 of each. Will says 300, but I'm leaning towards 200. I like his style. I also got in my 2,000th push up since Thanksgiving in today, so that was a nice milestone on this chilly Monday.

Speaking of chilly, Stevens Pass opens limited operations on Thursday, so that is where I'll be! Gotta take advantage of my first season's pass while I'm on break!

In Fantasy news, if David Akers doesn't kick for 26 points tonight, I'm moving on to the fantasy finals in my money league! The $20 buy in represents a third of my Full Tilt Bankroll, so if I can get 1st or 2nd place money, it'll be a huge boost to the roll! I only made one decision this week that was not the best possible decision in setting my line up. I played the NY Jets defense over the NY Giants defense for the 2nd time all season (1st was bye week), and it paid off huge. My only mistake was not starting Minnesota's back up running back, he scored more than Lendale White or NYG's Ward--but both of those guys started and Minnesota's back up obviously did not, which is why I kept him on the bench.

Lastly, Suvivor Gabon ended...

(slight spoiler ahead)

...and it was a really good season to watch. Sugar was amazing towards the end of the game, giving up her chance for a million bucks so a more deserving person, could claim their rightful prize. I don't think I've ever seen anyone else do that in my years of watching.

Fantasy Football, 2007

The playoffs started last week for my fantasy football league. The league is comprised of some of my good friends here in Seattle, then another group of Scott, his wife, and his wife's mom and sister. The 12 of us got cut down to 8 for the playoffs, and I squeaked in at 7th. Tyler had the 8 seed.

For the first week of playoffs, Tyler was up against the 12-1 Tristan "Milraukee Cow Tippers" who dominated the league. Tristan had Romo, Moss, Adrian Peterson and a few other big-time fantasy studs this year. Tyler didn't change his squad the entire year, hell, he let auto-draft pick his team, and he still somehow managed to make the playoffs.

And he beat Tristan in the 1st round! What??? One of his guy's was out this week, and he still beat the number 1 team in our league. It helped that Adrian Peterson only had 3 yards rushing, but who would have thought? Of course, I picked Tyler to win the game, because I always root for the underdog!

Not to be out-done, I was down 35 points going into the Monday night game in my 7v2 game against Jeremy. But I wasn't scared, Drew Brees and Marques Colston put up huge numbers and carried me to victory!

This week, I have to dispatch the #3 ranked Scott, and Tyler needs to take care of #5 ranked Sam. If we both win, I win the last-longer bet made with Sam, Jeremy, Marc and myself--and win free dinner and booze! Gooo Tyler!

The Onion's Fantasy Football!

As seen on Iron Girl's blog.

Dear Cranky NFL Fan,

Someone close to you has extended an invitation to play Onion Fantasy Football: Shattered Expectations. The Onion Sports editors have created the only fantasy football game that allows discerning fans to earn money by selecting the players most prone to disappointment. Weekly prizes of $500 and an overall season jackpot of $5,000 will motivate you to figure out which top player is going to drop the ball. Put your critical thinking skills and pessimistic nature to work at http://fantasysports.theonion.com/indexmain/signup.

League name: Seattle Loves Vick
Password: seattle

Pessimism? Rooting for good players to do bad? Sounds like it is time for poker bloggers to unite!

Long Day

Today started at 7am for me, which isn't necessarily early for most of you, but I started making a habit of staying up late and waking up around 11am. It is much easier to do than it sounds, given two weeks of nothing to do before 2pm. But that life is over. It was fun while it lasted, but today marked the beginning of three weeks of observation for me.

I started my observation today at Eckstein Middle School, my old stomping grounds. I walked the ten or so blocks to school this morning at 8am. I had on a fleece, but the second I got to school I shed it. Today ended up being a beautiful day, maxing out at around 75 I'd guess. I observed Mr. Howell's 8th grade math class until about noon today. He was one of my favorite math teachers growing up, and I was able to get in contact with him back in July about observing his class when I got back to Seattle.

He remembered me after about a ten-year absence, because I was one of the kids on his first "math team" trip up to Blaine, WA. It is just south of the Canada border, and I was only there because my math-genius friend, DTran, wanted someone there he knew. The most memorable moment of the trip, besides not knowing any of the math questions, was skying Mr. Howell playing ultimate frisbee out on the grass during one of the breaks at the math competition. I think we ended up doing fairly well at the comp., no thanks to me!

We talked a lot during his break period, and it was kind of cool to play connect the dots with old friends and family friends who had taken math from Mr. Howell. I would mention someone, then he would say if they or their siblings were in his class, then I would update him on what they were doing now. One of the craziest crossroads was that his daughter is now at Nathan Hale, and is playing ultimate frisbee. Her coach is Sammy CK, who I played ultimate with growing up and is in my fantasy football league! Again, it is pretty nutty being in a city where I actually know people--still awkward, but I'm sure that'll pass soon enough.

I only observed until lunch, because it was pretty much get-to-know-you day and go over the syllabus. After four runs through the syllabus, I had it down water-tight, and didn't really need to hear it two more times. Another cool thing about observing Mr. Howell's class is that he has homeroom, then he has his prep period until 9:10am. So I don't have to come in until then to observe! I observe three classes, have lunch, observe two classes and the day is over! Well, then I head to Greenlake and coach.

Today, coaching was a lot of fun, and I finally got to run the kids a bit. It wasn't bad really, but got their blood pumping. I hit some really soft balls at them today, which was a change of pace. I noticed at our match yesterday at Issaquah, that they were getting a TON of floaty balls back, due to their really good groundstrokes--but once they got the floaty balls, they couldn't put them away! It was frustrating as a coach, to have a team dominate from the baseline, but not be able to put anything away!

So I pretty much lobbed balls at them, hoping they would smash them for nice shots--sadly they smashed them... into the net, or into the fence behind the court. Not many hit their intended target--so I'll have to work on that. The team is really above average at hitting nice, hard groundstrokes, but realistically, at the JV level, they aren't going to get into that many good rallies--they will more often get into loopy-ball rallies that need to be put away.

We backed it up a bit and hit a little harder, then I got a couple double matches going before calling it a day. Tomorrow should be fun, and I hope to make Friday the fun days to come to--play some fun games like monster king-of-the-court, and graveyard (where once you miss a ball, you sit on the court and stay there, like a zombie--and you get to hit any ball that comes your way).

After practice, Tyler and I tossed the disc for a bit, then watched the first football game of the year. Saints at Colts, and the Colts just whooped em'. For the most part, the game was a push for me. I could have done a lot, lot better, but in my pick'em league I had the Colts winning, and in my fantasy league I had the Colts D. Unfortunately, Tyler, who I'm playing this week, had Peyton Manning, who went off for 230+ yards and 3TDs. Drew Brees and Marques Colston combined for 8 whole points--Brees had 2INTs and zero TDs, and Colston only caught a couple passes for 40 yards or so. I think the Saints duo is going to wreak havoc this year, just not against Indi. The big bright side was the Colts Defense, who I picked on purpose in our fantasy league, because I think they are way underrated. I also have the Saints D, who I knew couldn't really contain Peyton--but they had me second guessing my Defensive choice after the 10-10 halftime score, with the only Saints Touchdown a fumble-recovery touchdown! Both Defenses are looking great, Peyton and the Colts were just too strong at home.

Looking forward to the rest of the NFL games this weekend, observing tomorrow, the UW/Boise State game this weekend, and grilling up at Marc's for the Seahawks game on Sunday!

It's been a month--crazy. Now I know what Brandon feels like.

I've taken a step back from poker, and I dove headlong into Everquest. I'm not sure if it is a good or a bad thing, but it is a lot of fun. I've also been doing alright in the fantasy pickem' league Hoyazo is hosting on yahoo. It feels a lot like March Madness, for six months!

In pretty crappy news, last night Stacey and I decided to break up. No big fight, just mainly her wanting to not be in a relationship anymore. We've had that talk before, and I've always fought really hard to keep the relationship going--but I finally realized that isn't the best for both of us. She's only 22 (I'm only 24), and we don't want to get married anytime soon--but we already live our lives like we've been married for years. We still love each other.

It gives her a great opportunity to focus on School, Work and her new band that is just getting its feet off the ground; and the break also puts me in the enviable position of being 24 years old and having almost no strings attached. I can travel, I can go take a road trip with my cat--I can do anything I want. I'm still just working temp jobs in Portland, so there is no reason for me to stay here.

Most all of my friends are in Seattle, so that will probably be my next location. I'll probably stay there for a few months, then hopefully take flight again.

I'm all cashed-out from Stars, Full Tilt and Neteller--how does the new legislation affect our pushup-challenge, Brandon?!

Time is flying.

Stacey and I just purchased a new digital camera! Can't wait to test both the picture and movie taking out when it arrives next week. Just in time for our week in San Antonio to visit her mom and sister.

I've heard quite a bit of buzz about the San Antonio poker leagues for some reason, it might be nice to check out a game or two while I'm in town. I'll have three lovely ladies to escort me (Stacey, Ellen and their mom), so if anyone wants some nice company and knows where to find a (free?) game in San Antonio, let me know!

In fantasy football news, this season is going to be the best so far. Stacey's bro Scott set up a public/private league for a few of us (started private, then opened it up to others once we were all in). It should be a great mix between inside jokes and shit-talking.

Hoyazo's pro-pickem' league I am hopefully going to crush. I'm 2nd out of about 3,000 players after the first day. I'm tied for second right now, but originally had Pitt as my 3rd highest confidence. Had to bump them down a few notches because no Big Ben. I'm starting to regret that, but oh well.

I really like Carolina this year, but with no Steve Smith, I've got to bump them down against the Falcons too. This first week is a toughie. I've picked 7 games against the odds--we'll see how it works out for me...

I'm back on the mmorpg bandwagon. The original Everquest started up Progression servers in late June, and I started the first day. I only lasted about a week, because I was gone for all of 4th of July weekend and when I got back, all the dragons had been killed! Jeesus, that's some fast progression!

I didn't want to be behind the curve, and Stacey and I had a great summer of hiking and trips planned, so I cancelled the account after the first month. The Sleeper server is starting on Velius today, which is many people's favorite expansion. I know I will never catch up to the people unlocking new servers, but I've decided that I don't want to necessarily be at the cutting edge.

My plan is to create a guild (Maiden Voyage) which goes through all of the content in the game at its own pace. I'm planning to start on the Old World and Kunark raiding at Halloween. If any of you poker players are interested in some old-school everquest fun, give our recruiter Ashana a tell on the Sleeper server.

On the poker front, I can't wait for the DADI in a few weeks, hopefully I can get computer access in San Antonio for that one and show all of you guys how a donkey plays HORSE!