Hello, kind stranger. You both seem lost and perfectly on your destined path. Yes, it is a large boat, some may even call it a yacht. We’ve got plenty of space, climb aboard, I want you, and everyone you know to live your best life. 

*Michael McDonald Intensifies, but only enough to set a 33% level of Michael McDonald Mood, it’s really quite pleasant actually and thoughts admonishing your younger, outwardly cool self for its performatively avant-garde taste in music linger longer than usual*

How I got this sloop you ask? Oh ho ho gawah hai, most people usually ask me about the hat but you’re the first to want to know how something like this came to a simple seafarer like me? 

Fantasy baseball.

5 cat, 7 cat, 9 cat, 3 dog night, Custodian Rules, protoball, rotisserie, diamond mine, emerald nine, mastered em’ all. 

Fishing for pixels of performance, a sweet treat of judo and Vulcan belief, and one that they’ll give you a refund for if they don’t serve it upside down.

*Breezy brass and breezy breeze meld perfectly into a syrupy daze of uniquely nautical relaxation, the place in your head where expectations and pressures of terrestrial life is shrinking, your posture improves slightly and you swear that you can see Tim Kurkjian across the deck*

Quinn, fix our friend a drink, just make exactly what you think they look like. 

*That is absolutely Tim Kurkjian, and it’s Golden Hour. the mood shifts to a strange nostalgia for baseball-themed oddities, summers of yore, and a craving for aqua fresca*

Nobody on this boat, nay, no one on this earth has ever run the cats. The great wide web is littered with those who’ve tried. Bradley Rotisserie himself challenged me to double or nothing blue slips, ho ho hoh, that is what we call ’em’ on the water, Bonifacio did what Bonifacio does, and here we are. 

When I used to take this badboi out into the big salt drink, I met everyone who’s worth meeting, peas, some of em are here now. If I could distill the words of the world it would be this, traveler, They got a name for the winners in the world, mon chou, and it’s Fantasy Baseball Work League Champ.

*Quinn taps you on the shoulder, slightly chilled hibiscus tea is yours. 15 years have gone by since you and your friends thought you were a vodka soda. As you bring your lips to the ice cubes, a realization overcomes your mind. You were just really drunk at the time.*

Thanks for letting me pontificate, comrade. Most are here to network and at times I feel as if I’m simply a fan man, and they, Drederick Tatum. Come with me, my Homer, let’s talk Family and Friends Leagues.

Enjoy Fruits of the Region

Be they pizza, be they soda, be they what they may, your draft is to be celebrated for the event that it is. By some minor miracle, you’ve found eight to twenty folks bent of mind enough to take the largely hypertext journey through 75% of our earthly quarters. The mere coincidence of factors that led you to multiple townships missing their hatter is unique in human history.

Yell at the Void

That being said, there should be many, many more Beautiful Boaters. An earlier me jumped in, delved deep, saw no bottom in sight, and upon my return to terra firma, got a degree in accounting. After decades of beancountery, a realization overcame me, no one has seen the bottom, and no one ever will. Your self-admittedly flimsy view of the number production is not many degrees different than that of the fantasy intelligentsia. You wanna ship Mike Clevenger, ship the Clevenger. You wanna ride the projected stats riptide, jump on in. Spend 69% of your auction dollars on pitching and call it “The Straily Shuffle”, inspired. Though there is no net, everyone but one ends up in the foam pit. Ignore the birds of paradise, you belong.

*Wow, Kurkjian can work a room. Stories you can plainly see are macarena adjacent, multiple strangers met, he really shouldn’t be a Timothy. The man embodies Marco, doesn’t he, Marco Kurkjian…*

Be the Character You Want to See in Your Realm

If we’re honest with ourselves, we know we aren’t our perfect story. The slings and arrows of life leave you more hobbled, timid, and subservient than your 100th percentile self. However, here, there are no backaches, no titles, no masters, possibly gods but there are convincing arguments on both sides. We are only governed by the express written consent of Major League Baseball, its affiliates, and the statistical categories chosen by your compatriots. If you want trade offers, send those kites. If you want to liven up the room, channel your inner Giamatti. Baseball on the internet will leave you confused on the whole, but with a firm grasp that attracts like.

You Bought Yourself a Bonsai Tree

So did your friends. Some may be larger, some may be smaller, you could call it pine, you could call it fern, you could call it celadon, you could call it Shawn, Sean, Chad, Dallas, whatever comes to mind. It’s a green tree within a deviation from your friends’ trees. Everyone leaves the draft with some variation of a similar shrub. The cruelest trick the devil ever played was convincing us that Fantasy Baseball is a closer relative to baseball than it is to gardening. Results are never there from initial watering, there is a certain joy in the constant maintenance. Streaming starters, pruning closers, enabling the sensual ballet that is Chirinos Versus Lefties, things of that nature. Much like those who keep the grounds, the science exists, but daily tending and watering separate the lubbers from the saltdogs. I find diminishing returns after 15 minutes or so but your mileage may vary.

You’ve probably been wondering who captains the biggest rig here….

*Though you haven’t spoken in what could quite have been hours nothing has been lost by your quietude. The smaller ice cubes to match the falling temperature by Quinn were an inspired touch. Out of your peripherals you can see Kurkjian and what you can ascertain to be a dentist working out something that took decades to bubble to the mantle . The sun has set yet spirits are still rising. Conversations around you have incorporated playful shoulder punches, stealing away is being discussed at great volume by the NPCian guests. Though it somehow faded into the background during this monologue, that is the largest boat you’ve ever seen…*

It’s Ciscoe.

..

….

……

“Whether or not George Fant should get more targets, tomorrow on Brock and Sa….”

You awaken to the familiar Huardian schpiel and are shocked at the time. The sunset, grammable, the day, exhausting. Somewhat beyond your expected return home, but not to an exaggerated sense of neglect, there is panic in the air, yet you feel a casserole of being strangely at one with the world and blissfully adrift on the waves of the lake. After allowing yourself one last look at the line of boats below you, a figure who you feel more in tune with than many childhood friends waves to you. Out of pure human instinct you sheepishly wave back. Feeling recharged, you head home with the strange hope and near certainty that Adam Eaton is available on the waiver wire.