This Fantasy Football thing is going to kill me. I’m not even kidding. I get so worked up about it that I can’t sleep and get all stressed out. There is no way, NO WAY, I could manage or run an actual real-life football team. I would be dead by the age of 35. Or, locked up in padded room for the rest of my life.

This week I was both very stressed and very lucky on numerous occasions. Here’s how things shook out.

This week starts the playoffs in FF. Since my team (aptly named Team Trader) has been #1 or tied for #1 all season, we clinched a spot early on and were paired up against the 5th place team for the first round of playoffs. No problem, right? Should be easy to knock off the 5th place team and then continue to steamroll over everyone else.

Eh, not so much.

See, my fantasy team has been plagued by injury recently and the available players are slim pickin’s. Here’s who I had on my roster, as starters, last week:

• QB – Kyle Orton (Broncos)
• WR – Larry Fitzgerald (Cardinals)
• WR – Terrell Owens (Bengals)
• RB – Adrian Petersen (Vikings)
• TE – Aaron Hernandez (Patriots)
• W/R – Danny Woodhead (Patriots)
• K – John Kasey (Panthers)
• DEF – Atlanta Falcons

The ones in red are all those who had an injury or illness. Yeah. Half the team, and some heavy hitters. Soo…I was forced to make some tough decisions.

I traded Orton for Jon Kitna (Cowboys), which proved to be an awesome move and probably saved me this week – lucky break #1 that he was available.

T.O. was set to start so I kept him in. I also left Petersen and Hernandez because they were questionable right up until game time and after what happened a few weeks ago when I mistakenly benched Peterson, I was a little gun-shy about sitting him out just yet.

This is where all the stress starts. In the first quarter, T.O. aggravates his knee injury and is not only out for the rest of the game, but also the rest of the season. This left me with a big fat ZERO in the points column for him. So much for “Batman and Robin”. That’s when I started stressing about Hernandez. If we was out too, then I’d have 2 zero spots unless I could find a decent replacement. I looked and there were no good tight ends available so I was left to take a risk with him. It worked out because not only did he play, but he played well and got me lots of points – lucky break #2.

By this point, it’s Sunday night and all the games have been played except for the Monday night game between the Vikes and the Bears. I only have 1 person left to play – Petersen. I look at the match-up and I’m beating my rival team by 8 points. That’s not a lot and he also has one person left to play on Monday – Johnny Knox of the Bears. I knew this would be a nail biter.

I scour the boards and no one knows if Petersen will play or not. I figured that he will come through for me like he did before so I try not to think about it too much. I go on with my day, enjoy my evening with the family and then decide to turn on the MNF pregame show only to hear that Petersen is not playing. CJ and I look at each other with wide eyes and he says 3 words, “You better hurry!” I dash downstairs and pray to God I can find someone to fill his spot. Turns out, I have Toby Gerhart sitting on my bench, who just happens to be Petersen’s back-up in real-life (lucky break #3). I quickly switch ’em and then start breathing again.  

The game starts and Gerhart gets the ball in the first 2 plays and I’m thinking, “Yes! This is working out awesome!” I relax and head out to meet up with the girls for some cheesecake (Godiva Chocolate at the Cheesecake Factory. So good. I die.). I head home and casually check my phone to see how the match-up is working out. I am behind my rival by 1 point! 1 stickin’ point! But it was the end of the 3rd quarter so there was still time, but not much.

I get ready for bed, kiss CJ and Samson goodnight and climb under the covers. But I can’t sleep. My heart is racing. My mind is racing. I have to know. I won’t be able to sleep until this is all over. No matter how it ends up, I have to know before I go to dreamland or else I’ll be plagued with nightmares (turns out I was anyway. Oh well).

So I check my phone again. I am now ahead by 2 points and there are 6 minutes left in the game. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?! I turn the TV on and anxiously watch. By the time it’s all over, I had won the matchup by 4 points and the hair of my chinny, chin, chin. Turns out Knox either didn’t get much play or was pulled out in the 4th quarter, which saved my butt. Lucky break #4.

I peed my pants a little and then ran out to exclaim my happy news to CJ.

He looked at me like I was crazy and promptly told me I need a support group.

Whatever – you can’t rain on my parade Donnie Downer! I won, I won, I won!

Now, it’s on to the semi-finals. I play a tough team and will probably be knocked out, but not before I have several small heart attacks, a stroke and vomit from all the anxiety.

Maybe I do need help.

Hi, my name is Sarah and I’m overly-competative.

HI SARAH!

P.S. Kudos to team CBBroncos for a great game. You gave me a run for my money J.S.!!