Steve Sabol's Future

When NFL Films finally runs out of crappy games to turn into the Miracle on Ice Part 2, I think they should branch out into narrating fantasy football contests, starting with my win last weekend:

[Opening shot: the sun rises over my house, and you see me through my bedroom window, sprawled out in an unflattering position.]

La Escopeta del Desierto was in the midst a season of crushing losses and bruised egos. Despite opening the season with two wins, and riding the breakout performances of late-round pickups Michael Turner and Jay Cutler to the league’s second best aggregate point total, a series of bad breaks and hot opponents left La Escopeta a lowly 2-6 going into week 9. The imperative was as simple as it was obvious: win, at all costs.

It wouldn’t be easy. La Escopeta was fated to face off against Who’s your Daddy, a high-flying circus act of a team that was in the driver’s seat in total points and win-loss record. With a resurgent Kurt Warner and Marion Barber leading Daddy’s attack, La Escopeta would have to dig deep to stave off early elimination.

But while the “experts” of fantasy football had written off La Escopeta, the team still had abundant faith in the one entity that mattered: itself!

After a Sunday of trading body blows—La Escopeta opens with 21 points from Antonio Bryant, Daddy responds with 24 from Chris Johnson—the two squads go into Monday night with only four points separating them: La Escopeta 116.5, Daddy 112.5. La Escopeta’s only remaining player was the Skins’ defense, while kicker Scott Swisham looked to vault Daddy to a victory.

Five minutes in, the Redskins led 6-0 on a pair of 40-yard field goals. Daddy 120.5, Esocpeta, 118.5. With the Steelers cutting through the Skins defense like wet tissue, the situation looked bleak for La Escopeta. But just as had been the case all year long, everyone else may have given up, the team itself never wavered. One sack. Another. Three more down the stretch, to give Escopeta a 123.5 to 120.5 lead. With minutes remaining in a 23-6 game, Jim Zorn eschews the tying field goal for Daddy, instead inexplicably trying to win the actual game. He failed; La Escopeta not only stayed alive for another week, it grew stronger than ever before.

[Closing shot: me in my underwear refreshing the yahoo fantasy football page as I watch the clock wind down.]