Sports Fan Paradise

You want to know my true fantasy? A world in which I don't care whether or not Brian Westbrook's ankle injury will prevent him from starting. A world in which it doesn't matter to me which receiver Tom Brady chooses to throw a touchdown pass to. A world in which leaving DeSean Jackson on the bench as he racks up 136 yards and 2 touchdowns wouldn't completely ruin my week.

I fantasize about a world without fantasy football.

Sounds crazy, doesn't it? Especially coming from such a sports-obsessed blogger who enters every fantasy league he can get his hands on. The resume speaks for itself. I have been doing fantasy baseball since 7th grade, when my buddy Klinky added up the scores by hand. I am in 2nd place in my fantasy Real World/Road Rules Challenge league thanks to a huge performance by Sarah in The Ruins last night and don't get me started on my 2008 ESPN.com golf fantasy team 2 Girls 1 Couples.

But yet, at the end of the day, fantasy football makes me miserable. And it's not because I lose all the time, because I know that's what you're thinking. While I have had a very disappointing run in my current keeper league with my best friends from home, I still manage to stay competitive and finish in the middle of the pack, and I completely dominated a league with my college buddies last year. (I still don't know how you guys let me draft Westbrook, Chris Johnson, Matt Forte, Larry Fitzgerald, Andre Johnson AND Steve (CAR) Smith, but you still owe me the prize money. No, I didn't forget. Quit ducking me).

After winning that championship was when it hit me: This shit just isn't worth it. Week to week I stress over what lineup I'm going to start on Sunday. I spend hours upon hours at work on our Yahoo! league homepage, scour the free agent wire like a cure for cancer is about to pop up, and negotiate trades like I'm freeing hostages from North Korea. And for what? For the minor tinge of joy that I feel when I win? After a victory my emotions rank at about a 2 or 3 on the happiness scale. After a loss it's about a 40 on the depression scale.

Is there any other area of life where the positive result of an event is so disproportionate to the negative? The only thing I can think of is when a plane lands safely. As my plane pulls up to a stop at the gate I quickly reflect on the fact that I didn't die, but I don't dwell on it for more than 3 seconds. If it were to crash, well, it would be a much bigger deal, like when my opponent's kicker drills 3 field goals on Monday night to beat me by 1 point.

Now that I have finally come to terms with how miserable fantasy football makes me, does that mean I'll stop? Probably not. When you're hooked you're hooked, and I'm hooked bad. Is there a 12-step program for quitting fantasy sports? Today I finally began to accept my problem, tomorrow I will come to believe that a power greater than myself can restore me to sanity.

But first I need to finalize a trade for Kurt Warner.

Read more of Mike Stiriti at the original "Sports Fan Paradise" blog.