My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (Football Team)!

What's that, Steve Winwood?

You want me to talk about how your Caucasian-psych-swirly-bass band reminded me to do Fantasy Football again this year? WELL OK THEN.

Jimmy Miller, production god who never really got his propers, made some real walking-down-the-street bangers. "Can't You Hear Me Knockin" immediately comes to mind, a shining example of pure hot-weather-in-a-sundress magic. That song's 41 years old and still sexual as all hell (especially those first 45 seconds, mmm).  "Gimme Shelter," with the way it builds and builds? I'M SWEATIN. Be a lamb and put an ice cube down my back, would you.

When fall comes along, his stuff is employed for colder-weather activities - "Tumblin' Dice" for walking down the street in jeans ("cold-weather activity" in my city means doing the same thing as during summer, except in jeans because it's 5 degrees cooler.) Mick's platform in the song is that women are terrible and sexy and not to be trusted, and playing into that is rather fun, so what better way to be a jezebel than to paint on some stretchy denim that shows off your lady-shape. "Gimme Some Lovin," a personal favorite because of the holy trifecta of kick drum, tambourine, and copious church-y HEY!s like a pre-pre-pre-cursor to "Power," is perfect to have on when it's a frigid 65 degrees out and I'm making some baked chicken. You should see my kitchen moves, guys. I shake it like a combination of the girls in that 2 Chainz video and 2 Chainz.

Mr. Fantasy isn't in the same category. It's dreamy and filled with sitars and tambura, too dreamy and slow for a walk. It's got that classic Miller style, though - driving bass, vocal build-ups and cascades, loud, clear drum punches. "Being a drummer," he said, "I was very rhythm minded." Being a Fantasy Football manager for the 2012-13 season, I too am rhythm minded. Everything must flow. The guys on the squad don't have to be best friends, but they have to respect each other as men and support each other to get the job done. (I know how to wrangle some big personalities, just like Miller had to. He worked with The Rolling Stones, you see). My guys execute driving routes, clear punches; tight and right, balanced, nothing sloppy. The pieces of my offense all fit and complement each other, a powerful machine that runs on VitaCoco and maybe a little HGH. I was rifling through my records and came across Mr. Fantasy; a couple hours later, I had my team for this season, drafted and ready. I'm giving Jimmy Miller co-manager credit this year.

The rules were the same this year as every other: 1. do minimal research on who’s really hot - meaning projected to possibly be hot, provided everyone's knees and psyches hold up - for the 2012 season. Check Rotoworld and CBS Fantasy ONLY, in other words - not Rotoworld, CBS Fantasy, SBNation, FantasySharks, "Fantasy" by Guy, The xx, and Earth Wind & Fire, or Final Fantasy 4, big big shout to Danny Brown and DeShay that I should just get out of the way right at the beginning of the post. 2. GET RODGERS; failing that, GET STAFFORD. 3. Draft no Raiders, as I cannot have my real life allegiances and my Fantasy allegiances getting crisscrossed and tied into knots. Drafting dudes from the RVIDXR KLVN, however, is acceptable.

Fall is the finest of all the seasons. My apologies for being truly unpleasant to be around between now and December, but LEH', as my 17-year-old cousin Kevin and all his lame friends said circa summer/fall 2011, GO:



Starting QB:









Nickname(s): None to my knowledge, but I like thinking about dudes walking around Michigan with STAF written above the dark blue oval of the Ford logo on their shirts. IT'S DETROIT; they definitely do this.

Pros: • 63% completion last year. • Poised and in control at all times, much like myself. • Thinking of him gets me all revved up to yell "KITTY PRIDE" at the TV 2-3 times this season after a really big Lions play.

Cons: • The Goonies was on the other night. Stafford looks like Chunk from The Goonies, mixed with a little Temple Grandin.

Do-Gooder Twitter Score (1 - 10 scale): 6. Lots of support for the Wounded Warriors Project, but this is offset by boring self-promo ("Check out my exclusive video with SWAG, a new digital magazine"). The rest of his feed is all Republican-sounding notes on golfing with dad, NASCAR, and the on-the-couch-with-a-bag-of-Doritos-NFL-fan-favorite "leading a healthy lifestyle." Then he demands to see Obama's birth certificate and lays out his plan to keep troops in Afghanistan for the next 200 years.



Backup QB:

Nickname: "Pretty Flacco." Drafted because it was the 12th round and neither Ryan Leaf nor Tim Tebow were looking appealing. Plus I'm always on the prowl for a big goofy white guy to recruit for QB, as they all seem to be great at throwing a football with speed and accuracy. (Ryan Lochte!, I've got my eye on you, buddy.)

Flacco's ability to throw the ball with accuracy lessens every year; honestly, his appeal as a player is purely emotional for me, because of his rad name, his do-gooder qualities (see below), and the fact that his team's been in the news alongside the name of THE GOD Chris Kluwe, soldier for equality. Flacco will do for now. I'm just biding my time until Andrew Luck has one awful week and someone in my league drops him because nobody has loyalty.

Do-Gooder Twitter Score: 9. Being a dad, Joe says, is amazing. He also pushes the Special Olympics and something called Boys Hope Girls Hope Baltimore. Get 'em, Joe.





Starting WRs:










Nicknames: Dez "Dickerson" Bryant; "Trouble Man*," "The Modernaire."


*Invoking the Toddler Clause in his contract, Jerry Jones has decided that, just like my 2-year-old niece, Bryant cannot stay out too late or drink anything bad for him. Dez Bryant is 24 years old. 

Desmond had his barrow in the marketplace, and by "barrow" I mean "bands" and by "marketplace" I mean "Magic City." I fail to see what any of this has to do with him catching a ball and running while avoiding defenders, but the impact Dez's off-season behavior has on his teammates is just the latest in a whole mess of things that Jerry Jones and I don't see eye to eye about.

"Pacman Jones might be a rich man today," a Deadspin commenter noted re: athletes needing to be treated like children, "if there was someone hanging around him all the time trying to keep him out of trouble." Ridiculous. Incorrect. In the immortal words of Nathan Arizona, "And if a frog had wings he wouldn't bump his ass a-hoppin'." Listen, the physical feats of human males are completely separable from their psychological workings and their feelings about their mothers and whether they like their strippers with tattoos or without. Dez Bryant is a grown-up, as was Pacman Jones when he was a part of the esteemed Cowboys organization. The plot of Get Him to the Greek as a real-life scenario with a professional athlete in the Russell Brand role is just not meant to be, guys.

Pros: • Pimp C being a Cowboys fan decreases some of the symptoms of acid reflux in my trachea due to my searing IRL hatred of the Cowboys. • It's kind of cool that Dez is now an NFL Cowboy after being a Cowboy at Oklahoma State, which reminds me: that Mike Gundy video never gets old!

Cons: • Psychological trauma from an elderly man making him kiss the ring will mess with his head on game days. • Tendinitis. (Really though, who in the NFL doesn't have tendinitis.)

Twitter do-gooder score: 4. Mostly he just talks about beating his bros in Madden and tweets Bible verses. Love the bio/location up top, though: the lovely and understated "Cowboys Stadium."

Decker? I hardly know her! Now that that's out of the way:

Drafted on the strength of his head-to-neck-thickness ratio and the fact that he will be catching balls thrown by Peyton W. Manning (goofy white guy!). Decker went to Minnesota, just like Manning's beloved Tony Dungy. The fuzzy feelings this stirs up in Manning due to this association will no doubt make Decker a favorite target. I mean, I already have fuzzy feelings about all things Minnesotan due to Prince connotations.  

Nickname(s): None so far, but if he starts to do real well I'm prepared to introduce the name "Eric Wrecker" to the world.

Pros: • Tall, lanky • Good route runner • Manning.

Cons: • CORNBALL. He and Demaryius Thomas "have been trying to get the nickname 'Salt & Pepper' to stick since 2010 when they were rookie roommates."  • Is a Bronco. This is inherently offensive to me, because RAIDERS ALL DAY AND SOME OF THE NIGHT AS WELL; the Chiefs, Chargers, and especially those fucking Broncos can all go to HELL (a Drake concert in Mitt Romney's backyard) but that doesn't mean I can't use them to get points in Fantasy. I want their players to fail; I want their players to kill it. On Sundays, therefore, catch me at the bar/on my couch in apt. 680/on Mom's couch, practicing some meannnnn cognitive dissonance.

Do-gooder Twitter score: 6. His shoutout to a kid with cancer is offset by relentless pushing of the VitaCoco brand, thanking a dude who said, "Just took you in my Fantasy draft," and saying, "LEZZZZZGO" in response to somebody yelling for the Golden Gophers to start the season off right. 

Nickname(s): Moore Rhymin'? I don't know. I tossed around "Faith No Moore" for a hot sec but then I realized it's a negative phrase. I don't need any of that on the field.

Pros: • Plays for the RAIDAHS, the greatest team in professional sports according to my dad, Bishop's chest, every Los Angeles MC in 1985, and the ghost of Al Davis. • Elicits mega underdog soft girly feelings in my heart - he's from Tatum, Texas, where the backyards are filled with flowers, the median household income is less than $30,000/year, and people are fond of voting against their own self-interests based on the fact that this guy is their representative in Congress. I will obviously be pulling for Denarius Moore with some fiery enthusiasm this season.

Cons: • Plays for the RAIDAHS, a terrible omen. I broke my rule about drafting no members of the team I like in my actual life, but because it's the Raiders, he'll probably rupture or tear something in his soft parts and then spend the rest of the season tweeting about it ("Coming back strong! Trainer says I'm recovering so fast it's a miracle!"). Every time I picture him while rearranging my roster in my head, he's got a raincloud over his head like Schleprock and his leg in a jacuzzi full of ice. Al's gone, though, so maybe the dark days are over? Maybe the coaches will be allowed to coach? Greg Knapp, let's get it.

Twitter Do-Gooder Score: 3. He's got the occasional shout to a kid with cancer, but his feed is identical to your cousin's at Arizona State whose current favorite song is that Tyga joint. "What's up kinfolk," "Whad up," "dm me your gamer tag," "preciate it brah," and the especially powerful "2 chainz!"

Backup WRs:

Nickname: Titus Andronicus. "Young Titus" is pretty good, though.

Drafted because I saw that aw, he just had a baby! and we ladies have all kinds of chemicals running through us that make us draft guys to our Fantasy team if we can picture them holding a newborn. He's also Poised for a Breakout Season, says the completely impartial DetroitLions.com, and it's rad that he went to Uni High, yet another thing he has in common with Darby Crash and Kim Gordon. 

Pro: • Not Greg Little, whom I almost took. Unless of course Greg Little develops some kind of magical symmetry with QB Brandon Weeden (big goofy white guy!), which will turn "not selecting Greg Little" into a Con.

Cons: • Not Calvin Johnson. • Not Nate Burleson. • Comes in at 5'11", according to the Lions' PR team. So, he's 5'9¾". • I will probably drop him for Nate Washington, at which point Titus will have a string of 2-touchdown, 100-yard games because the gods don't want me to be happy.

Twitter Do-Gooder Score: N/A. He appears to have an account, but it's unverified.

Nickname: Killer Mike? Pirate Mike? Pirate Mike!

Not USC's Mike Williams, who, fun fact, is the proud possessor of the terribly appropriate middle name "Troy." This Mike Williams will probably not be the flashiest guy on my roster, as he is competing with IRL teammate Vincent Jackson for receptions.

Pros: • Will give me ample opportunity to share my "How much does a pirate pay for corn? A BUCK AN EAR" joke after too much Ciroc • Vincent Jacskon can't catch every single pass, right?

Cons: • Double-talker, according to a quick scan of his Twitter feed: 


"I'm never cutting the beard!" - 07/15/12.  
"OK everybody I'm CUTTING THE BEARD!!!!" - 08/28/12.

Ha, I kid. This is just a pretend Con. I still need this confirmed, but I heard once that sometimes people say things that shouldn't be taken literally (?). The beard saga was probably for preseason press, just to get his name out there and distract us from his fragile, glasslike body. Actual Con, however: his public back-and-forth with a grown lady who has chosen to call herself "Mulatto Mami." 

Starting RBs:

Nickname(s): Stevie J, of course! Yall are ridin his bus!!

Pros: • Quick legs and a bountiful head of hair. The longer the locks, the wiser the Rasta. • Playing for new coach Jeff "Fischer," who's introduced the disgusting/sexy sounding "ground and pound" offense, according to Bleacher Report. I guess I'll believe this, even though the site doesn't know the correct spelling of Jeff Fisher. • Alum of Oregon State, just like my beautiful mother who is contractually obligated to bring up "the radness of Houshmandzadeh during the '08-'09 season" every September, getting all wistful when we're in line at Target. 

Cons: • Maybe assaulted his girlfriend a few years ago, allegedly? Various articles note that she was his pregnant girlfriend, which on the Lady Crime Ranking Scale is up there with "not being there when you said you would" and "hanging out with Benzino all the time." • His blog and Twitter feed are dull collections of inspirational cliches. "Desire, dedication & being 6'2"  & having genes that have made it easy for me to build muscle determination is what's required to live a dream."

Twitter Do-Gooder Score: 1. There's of course a pic of him at a military base, but this was with several of his teammates and a camera crew, so I'm assuming terrible things about his motivation for showing up. I see zero pleas for helping fellow humans, unless of course you've entered the Rawlings Football Sweepstakes, an event in which Steven wishes you much good fortune. Mostly Steven wants you to know that Steven is ready for a great season and Steven Steven Steven. "Everyone please join me in telling my beautiful mother happy birthday!," "It's official my fighting weight .. Haha 234.8 LBS and 5.1% body fat." I gave him 2 additional points for a kid-with-cancer tweet, then realized #cancers was referring to his son's astrological sign and had to take 'em back.

Nickname: None necessary; baddest name in the NFL. I just hope he'll come out from behind his big desk in his office in downtown Gotham in time to take the field on Sundays this season. Should I decide one day that he needs a nickname, it will certainly not be the tired old "Frank the Tank" that everyone else is going with; I shall call him The Captain, for he inhabits that role on the 49ers. (He's one of four total captains, but that doesn't make him LESS of a captain, youfeelme, also yadadamean since we're talking about the Bay here.)

Drafted because of his numbers, simple as that. He's little, but he's got the numbers. Physical stats in the NFL are just like those in modeling. The numbers get padded, because nobody cares enough to take the time to check. The NFL says Frank is 5'9", which means Frank is 5'7½" like most jockeys and rappers. 

Pro: Same height as me!; i.e., destined for greatness. 

Con: Mentioned in a Wayne song, which means that multiple times this season I will throw a Dorito at Stuart Scott's face on my TV when he's doing postgame 49er highlights.

Twitter Do-Gooder Score: N/A. No Twitter.

Backup RB:

His nickname's "The Engine," he's so young that he was born around the time Ice-T donned that floppy beanie to film scenes for New Jack City, and he's yet another longhair on my squad. He's also yet another guy with a hurt knee on my squad, causing much chair-gripping and teeth-gritting by this little lady while watching him run a sweep and get shoved out of bounds and fall and roll. I have a trick knee, too. 

Pros: • 21 years old. His team's awful but there's nowhere to go but up. • Trent has no Twitter account. He also plays in the city of Cleveland, where there's nothing to do - which proves he has an active inner world and a healthy imagination and probably just goes to the gym and the bookstore during training camp, leading to increased strength and focus when he suits up. These are what we refer to as "intangibles" in the sports world.

Con: He might not be starting against Philly in the opener. I'm not a Fantasy expert but this seems like an inefficient way to get me points during Week 1.

Starting TE:

The Falcons aren't playing any away games against New York teams this season, so my dream of chanting "T-O-N-Y invade NY, beef somethingsomething BEEF" will have to die. Anyway, I love to hate Tony. He's durable and probably underrated so he might not get covered like, say, Gronkowski definitely will. But having this guy on my team is unpleasant because I have numerous memories of his receptions when he was on the Chiefs, playing against my beloved Raiders and then "dunking" the ball over the goalpost crossbar in a giant display of HEY I USED TO PLAY BASKETBALL, I'M 6'5"! What a goddamn showoff jerk. Fuck him. I mean, outside of him getting me Fantasy points.

Backup:

Nicknames: "Greg Nice"; And because he's HUGE and spends a lot of time in Miami, "Blond 2 Chainz."

Pros: • Olsen is the very definition of my beautiful mother's favorite thing in football, a "Big white tight end who doesn't try to be too flashy." That's not racist because a white woman making a joke about white men of a certain physical type is not racist. • I now have "Radiation Vibe" in my head (Greg's from Wayne, NJ).

"So now it's time to sayyyyy/WhatIforGOT to say, ba-byyyy, ba-by ba-byyyyy." 

Hi there, 1996! Missed you!

Con: He's not the Gronk. I really wanted the Gronk. 

Twitter Do-Gooder Score: 10. See but he sneaks up on you though. His feed itself is littered with birthday wishes and pics of his baby and gratitude toward fans; then you look up and under his avatar it says Founder of Receptions For Research Foundation ("established in 2009 to provide hospitals, doctors, and researchers the necessary resources to save those affected with various types of cancers"). Greg's mom is a cancer survivor and he started the foundation in her honor and do you think Greg likes record dorks who make really good baked chicken? I know a gal who might be available. She needs a baller for the purposes of these but other than that her love don't cost a thing.

Defense:

Chicago!

eXquire's from New York but he swears there's good somethingsomething in Chicago and I'm pretty sure it's DEFENSE. The Bears need to defend better against the pass rush and have old dog Brian Urlacher only for the next 5 minutes before his knee gives out and his body crumples like a Jenga tower. But they’re still ranked high because of Lance Briggs and Charles Tillman, both of whom have the names of drill sergeants, and Julius Peppers, a towering hulk of a man whose name makes me hungry. Plus Devin Hester will be returning punts again this year, I think? Everybody pray he has a great season for me, please, as this will help me forget the pain of not getting Chicago’s Matt "Rappin" Forte on my offensive squad.

Pro: JULIUS PEPPERS - man of strength, gentleman, lover, friend, pass rusher, scholarship fairy godfather.

Cons: • The Bears' corners and safeties are TINY - 5'8", 5'9", 5'10". Good look covering guys like the SIX FOOT FOUR A.J. Green, dummies. • The mother of one of Lance Briggs' children is named "Brittini." This isn't his fault but it's still so terrible that it belongs on the Cons list. • Lance Briggs no longer owns a sweeeeet Continental, affectionate hello to Danny Brown for the second time in the post; coincidentally, I no longer have any interest in DMing Lance Briggs naked pics of myself.

I apologize in advance once again for being truly insufferable for the next few months. Steve Winwood!: take me out.