Fantasy Football

Perhaps the most normal 'game' I play is fantasy football. All around North America you'll find business people wasting away hours of potentially productive working hours trying to build optimal teams of players and then they'll be glued to the television every Sunday cheering on their adopted players. I don't care at all how the St Louis Rams fare each week, but I really cared when their top running back went down with an injury as he is on my team. In previous years I've had Aaron Rodgers as my fantasy quarterback so I've taken a liking to the Green Bay Packers. This week, however, my opponent had Rodgers on his team. And thus I was in a situation where I wanted the Packers to do well since I've started liking them but I really needed Rodgers to have a bad game... (He had a good game and my starting quarterback broke his hand. Unlucky for me!)

It gets me wondering though, is this good for the game? Without fantasy football I'm not sure I'd care enough to watch the games. I read an online Detroit newspaper (because I'm a Red Wings hockey fan) and through that have learned a lot about the Lions. Without fantasy football I would probably just end up cheering for the Lions since they're the team I know the most about but the reason for liking them is very arbitrary. (Bob Probert was a Red Wing in NHLPA '93 and I needed a team with a good fighter to beat my friend Matt after school...) Is fantasy football actually any worse of a reason to arbitrarily care about games?

At any rate, now that Vick has a broken hand I'm almost certainly going to have to start Stafford going forward. So I'll be cheering for the Lions for two arbitrary reasons now! (Three actually, since I have a little wager going with Randrew saying the Lions will make the play-offs...) Go Lions!