How to Fail at Fantasy Baseball

Fantasy sports are a way for us sports fans to live out a very specific sports-related dream: have a team of superstars that will dominate every opponent.

At least, that's what we wish of our favorite teams.  But most of us can't have that. 

So baseball fans turn to - you guessed it - fantasy baseball.  These are situations every fantasy baseball owner wants to avoid and I've narrowed them down to the type of owner who would most likely get caught in them. 

The First-Time Owner: All the players he drafted peaked ten years ago and are in their last couple years in baseball.  But he drafts them anyway because he doesn't know any better due to his casual fan status.  All his players end the year with a .250 average, 15 homers, and 50 RBI.  He has no idea what he's doing and sucks at fantasy baseball so he quits and doesn't try again until ten years later.  With the same result.     

The Get-With-The-Times Owner: The Get-With-The-Times Owner scours the free agent pool for new pickups who are swinging a hot bat, even if he knows a potential pickup will be hitting .200 again in another two weeks.  The only proven star he has is his first-round pick.  The rest of his draft picks were guys who had good springs even if they had sucked for their whole careers prior to it.  But, hey, it's no big deal; he plans to overload his roster with temporary replacements by the second week.  (Me)

The Seasoned Owner: He knows how things work and all the strategies.  He does his best to pick the best and healthiest team possible, but disaster strikes.  Five of his starting position players get injured, forcing him to play all of his bench players.  Plus three of his rotation's five pitchers suddenly can't do anything right.  As a result his pitching staff loses game after game.  But he's forced to leave them in because his backup staff is the laughing stock of the majors.  If you're a real "seasoned owner" reading this, you're thinking, "Man, it would be horrible if that happened to me."

The Sleeper-Team Owner (The Wannabe Spoiler / Downer): The name of the Sleeper-Team Owner's game is drafting all potential sleeper picks so he can can have the satisfaction of knowing he unexpectedly screwed up another fantasy owner's season because all his sleepers had breakouts.  Or he is left to wallow in his own stupidity and humiliation because all of his sleepers went to sleep (resulting in a record with no wins).  (Also sort of me).

Just hope none of these things ever happens to you.  Especially not a successful Sleeper-Team owner.