You know what we need? Fantasy pro-bending. Have you seen that shit in “The Legend of Korra”? It’s sweet, and even though it’s not a real sport, it would be pretty awesome to have a fantasy baseball-like game based on it. However, until that becomes a reality, we’ll have to content ourselves with continuing to discuss the mundane sports that don’t involve the players bending elements to their wills. This week in fantasy baseball: a bunch of really stupid ideas.
Stupid idea No. 1: Trading to trade back
Believe it or not, this is actually something some people think will work. The idea is that you trade a player to another owner in your league with the intention of getting that player back further along in the season. This is done for a few reasons, such as avoiding slumps or temporarily obtaining help at another position, but it rarely works. The problem is that unless it is prearranged, there is no way to guarantee that the other owner will be willing to trade back. If they can fill the spot of the player they gave you, there is no reason for them to take back the player they lost. And if the player you gave them is doing well, why would they choose to lose that production? Plus, people simply don’t like undoing their own actions. It’s like admitting that they made mistakes, and people generally don’t like to admit mistakes.
Stupid idea No. 2: Not waiting out rough patches
Every player will fall into a slump at some point. Every. Player. It doesn’t matter who they are or how good they think they are. Now, this can be scary, especially for fantasy owners and especially for owners who start to slip in their league’s standings when their players slump. The instinct is to dump off the slumping player, either by trade or by dropping them from the roster. In most cases, this is a mistake. Any player you find on the waiver wire or get in trade for a slumping player will most likely not be able to equal the production of the slumping player at his peak, and players in a funk almost always come out of it eventually. Wait out slumping stars. In most cases they won’t hurt you as much as you think, and you’ll be glad of their production once they recover.
Stupid idea No. 3: Fighting the Hulk
SPOILER ALERT! Skip this paragraph if you have not yet seen “The Avengers,” although if you haven’t then shame on you. It’s fantastic. In any case, comic fans have always known that angering the Hulk was never a good idea, but “The Avengers” simply served to reinforce that. The big green dude punched a giant armored space worm in the face and killed it with that single hit! And if there is still anyone out there who doubts the Hulk’s strength, I have two words for you: puny god.
Stupid idea No. 4: Being Ron Artest
Even though he’s calling himself Metta World Peace these days, which is quite frankly the stupidest and most annoying name of all time, he doesn’t really seem that much more peaceful. True, elbowing James Harden in the head doesn’t quite stack up to the Pacers-Pistons brawl of a few years back, but it’s still not very nice. The dude really needs to learn to stay out of the news, unless he just rescued a kitten from a tree. Unless he put it there in the first place, which is really something I could see him doing.
I’ll leave it at that for now. There are far too many stupid things that people are doing these days that people need to stop doing (I’m looking at you, cast of “Jersey Shore”). Several books would have to be written to mention them all.
