Laughing Matters: The Fantasy Life

By Ryan G. Van Cleave |  Illustrations by Darcy Kelly-Laviolette

October 2021—

I’ve been visiting my folks up in Chicago for a few weeks, and the only place to work is at the kitchen table, which means people are puttering around me all the time. Moments ago, my mom walked past as I posted this note on Facebook.

Why did I get her correspondence instead of mine? That’s for some future kid’s dissertation in chaos theory to unpuzzle. 

12-team yahoo ff dynasty; .75PPR, 2 IDP, ret yds; no snake; $300/150/50, $35 in; 26 roster, 2 IR; 

She paused, looked at what I’d created, made a chuffing noise, then took off her glasses and wiped them on a towel, as if assuming that they were malfunctioning, one imagines. As a professional writer, I’ve been known to employ actual words and sentences, after all (at least most of the time). For my poor mom, this must’ve been quite the departure.

She finally voiced her concern. “What on earth is that?”

“It’s a fantasy football thing,” I said.

“What’s wrong with regular football?”

“With fantasy football, you can have Tom Brady on your team, throwing to Davante Adams and Julio Jones.”

Mom snorted. “If all those fellows were on the Bears, they’d still lose.”

Point taken. But her confusion over what I’d written on Facebook was valid, with I being about as full of insider geek-jargon as one gets. Yet that’s how we fantasy football people speak sometimes. Well, that way plus lots of overly emphatic conversations about the perils of Thursday night football, the merits of microwave burritos, and the steady increase of women sports reporters (as a rule, we’re quite in favor of this).

Just in case you don’t know what fantasy football is, I’ll explain. It’s where people pretend to be an NFL owner, only with 100% fewer mega-yachts, 200% fewer personal shoppers, and 6,000% less teeth whitener. Okay, I might be overstating the case there. Some NFL owners prefer Gulfstream jets over big boats. 

An added plus to being in a fantasy football league is the punny team names you’re obligated to use, such as Rollin’ with Mahomies, It Takes Tua to Tango, and Bear Force One. Trust me, these names are a scream…at least to the same demographic who can decipher my geek jargon up above and who also spends the entire season fearing a last place finish which necessitates having to dress in their best Sunday duds and jumping into Lake Erie. Or, in some cases, shave their eyebrows and use that photo as their new social media profile picture for the rest of the year. We fantasy footballers like to punish our own.

I fully realize that many people like football but don’t engage with the fantasy aspect of it. Their loss, I think. 

The more I consider things, the more I’m coming to realize that the fantasy aspect is what appeals to me more than actual thundering hits, Hail Mary passes, and kerfuffles in the stands between Philadelphia Eagles fans and, well, pretty much everyone, including Santa Claus (you can look this one up if you want—they pelted him with snowballs back in ‘68). 

As I stroll past the Sears Tower on this breezy Chicago fall day, I realize that my love for Things Fantastic has been part of my life forever. My three favorite books? The Hobbit, The Princess Bride, and the entire Harry Potter series. My three favorite foods? Meatless hamburgers, spray cheese, and I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter. Pretty fantastic, right? Even my three favorite creatures are all (I’m sad to report) make-believe: unicorns, dragons, and punctual doctors.

Alright, alright. I suppose there MIGHT be a real dragon out there in Iceland or somewhere. Probably just down the fjord a bit from where Amelia Earhart, Elvis, and D.B. Cooper are hanging out in some rustic lodge, playing a lot of pinochle.

But here’s the most important question you’ll be asked all week—why don’t we take the idea behind fantasy football (bringing the fantastic into the realm of the real for the sake of fun) and crank it up to 11?

For example, if there was a fantasy dinner party catered by celebrity chefs, I’d be trying to trade Bobby Flay and Gordon Ramsay for Guy Fiere in two flips of a spatula. And can you imagine the fun we’d all have if we could play fantasy filmmaker, pairing up directors and actors off our rosters (“Gimme a Brad Pitt, any two Baldwins, and Angela Bassett, then let Sofia Coppola run with it!”)? Don’t even get me thinking about fantasy parenting! (“You spilled juice on the living room carpet? AGAIN? I’m trading you for Jimmy from down the block, even if I had to toss in two future options on a kid who actually likes soccer.”)

Think about the possibilities for work! For neighbors! For adult bedroom playtime!

Let’s be honest. We ALL already play some version of this in our own lives, ranging from the what-might-have-been to the I-might-one-day-still to the I-never-could-but-boy-howdy-if-I-did stuff. The key difference, I think, is that fantasy football players just fully own it in a silly, public, often juvenile manner. Like the time my kicker lost me three games in the home stretch of the season and sent me to the basement of my league, which meant I had to spend 24 hours in my neighborhood Waffle House while wearing an “I Suck at Fantasy Football” t-shirt. Fortunately I could shave off an hour for each waffle I ate. 

I ended up only spending half the day there, but I must’ve gained eleven pounds, and my stomach still aches—to this day!—at the memory of it.

Waffle-chomping aside, I’ve got to wrap this piece up and return to my own fantasy of being 11 years old again. I’m currently staying in my folks’ basement, you see. All I need is an Atari 2600, a Members Only jacket, a Walkman, and a Rubik’s Cube, and it’s like reliving those golden years of youth all over again. Though this time around, I’ve got Tom Brady on my fantasy team to buoy me through the turbulent days ahead right here in the Windy City.

If you’ve ever owned a fantasy football team entitled Victorious Secret or Hooked on a Thielen, PLEASE contact me immediately. I have a Matt Prater-for-Aaron-Rodgers trade I want to talk to you about. For the rest of you, just flip through the rest of this month’s magazine. I’ll deliver something more palatable than Beyond Meat cracks and football chuckles next time. 

Probably. 

Unless I get all caught up looking at the NFL injury report and rue the day I ever drafted Zeke Elliot. How about them Cowboys?