We are two weeks into the full-blown season (I refuse to count the BoSox-A’s debacle in Japan as the beginning) and
everyone is slowly ramping themselves up for the long haul. It’s funny how everyone gets all giddy when pitchers and
catchers report in February, gets pumped as Draft Day approaches and really loses it when Opening Day can be counted
down in hours instead of days.
And then the season starts… and so does the hangover.
You have to remember that like the Major Leagues, fantasy baseball is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s a six-month season of
twists and turns, peaks and valleys, highs and lows. This is a cardinal sin I’ve seen many a roto player make when it comes
to the discussion boards, a sin whose penance often is a sentence of 5.5 months of ineffectiveness. Avoid this
transgression at all costs.
Rule #26: Blowing your wad early will leave you verbally limp for the rest of the season.
I committed this sin early in my “career” playing fantasy baseball via the Internet. I watched the other owners, who had been
playing together for 3-4 years, take pot shots at each other over the first 2-3 weeks, and decided to let loose. I spent an
hour crafting an intricate post, chock full of put-downs for nearly every owner in the league, a seven-paragraph
masterpiece that said everything I could ever hope to say.
And then I was promptly ridiculed.
The post was so damn long that most players stopped reading about one-quarter of the way in. It wasn’t terribly funny and
it lost its effectiveness the moment you started reading. It was like one of those long story-like jokes someone tells at a
party that drags on an on and on with no end seemingly in sight, and then the punchline sneaks up and jabs you out of
nowhere… and you forget to laugh. I was knocked off my game and it took me a solid two months to come back with
another good post, having used all my “A” material in one shot.
I was quickly educated that you need to employ more of a hit-and-run strategy when it comes to the average post. Don’t try
for a knockout blow on each owner in one post. Take a few swipes at one or two (or more if you’re feeling daring), but make
them short and sweet. You can have some fun with it, but don’t feel like you have to write a novel with various layers of
subtext. An easy angle to play up is attacking a team that has several injuries early on, comparing a team with Moises Alou
and Pedro Martinez to a M*A*S*H unit. Propose to send a care package of Band-Aids and Icy Hot to the team owner. It’s
cheap heat, but most times, you take what you can get. Not every post can be a home run.
Rule #9: A good poster is like a great boxer – jab, jab, duck, jab, uppercut!
If you think it’s all haymakers in the world of trash-talking, you’re probably a wannabe hack. I have never found someone
who hits it out of the park every time. Sure, there are guys (and gals, I’m sure) who can put down anyone seemingly at any
time, but even they will back off a little and pepper the discussion board at times, trying to entice someone to enter the fray
so they can pounce. Those little potshots are what keeps a board active and alive during a six-month season. If you relied
on the knockout blow, you’d end up with a boring board that sits dormant for weeks at a time.
One question you might be asking yourself if you are sitting atop the standings: Is it too early to gloat? This is a tough one
to answer because it depends on your resolve. If you are bold and feel confident that you can ride the aftermath, then go
for it. But be warned, odds are that you won’t be in 1st place from wire to wire, and the farther you fall, the harder you’ll get
lambasted. I topped my league for the first six weeks of the season one year and wouldn’t open my mouth – partly for fear
of jinxing myself – until the first month was over. Sure enough, I wound up sliding into the second division, finishing 8th in a
10-team league. Not a pretty sight, and I was given the milk carton treatment (“Have you seen this team?”) throughout the
summer.
On the other hand, if you let comments roll off your back and don’t pay any mind to them, then by all means fire away. Just
remember to duck.
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