August 20th, 2005

I can still remember this league's first live draft like it was last year…and maybe that’s because it was. Many hours went into my preparation last season. Day after day, night after night I toiled, ranking and sorting all my potential $h!t Kickers. I spent many a Burger King meal (sometimes two) contemplating what type of strategy I wanted to employ. Finally, after settling on what I hoped would not only be a unique, but also “full proof” plan, I was ready to draft.

The draft went rather well for my $h!t Kickers. I took the players I had targeted and followed the strategy to a “T”. I felt good about my team and decided to start looking to my contemporaries’ drafts for some humor. Sure enough I found what I was looking for in what is now an infamous draft.

Da Bears had never been much to write home about. Matt First, notorious for drafting any Chicago Bear you could think of, had wallowed in fantasy football depravity for three straight seasons. With a career record of 21-30 it was clear this owner new exactly how to underachieve and was making a career of it. Sure we all knew he had a tendency to start out strong, mainly because we would all play down to his team’s level. But we also knew his runs would not last. Matt had a nose fof finding his way to the bottom of the league.

Matt First made his first pick in the inaugural AQ League live draft by taking QB Peyton Manning. This was a solid pick at the time; however, taking him at 5 may have caused some to argue. It was after this that things got questionable. Da Bears followed their first round selection by taking a disgruntled veteran RB by the name of Corey Dillon, a 30 year old with a new address somewhere in Boston. There would be more veterans to follow. Da Bears soon had acquired Isaac Bruce, Garrison Hearst, Rod Smith, and other top fantasy prospects of decades past. Throw in 5th and 9th round selections of token Chicago players mixed with some guy named Javon Walker and a 16th round selection of Warrick Dunn and you have yourself quite the interesting draft.

Well, we all know what happened some 20 weeks later. Despite a second half push by my own $h!t Kickers, Da Bears were left standing on the podium with their fists clenched exclaiming ”Bear Power!” to the free world. Turns out Matt’s little draft had landed him a record breaking QB, one of the leagues top WRs and another top RB along with some solid role players and what turned out to be one of the more consistent teams in league history.

Fast-forward to August 18th, 2005. One look at Da Bears bumper crop from draft day and you may do a double take. “Is that the starting roster for the Shady Acres Retirement Home?” No my friends, that is just Curtis Martin, Jerome Bettis, Muhsin Muhammad, Jimmy Smith, John Lynch, Marcus Robinson, and Joey Galloway all playing shuffleboard for Da Bears. Top that off with the first round selection of Donovan McNabb, a QB with more question marks at the WR spot than there are in a game of twenty questions, and the Champ's draft leaves you reeling. With two late round selections of backup RBs and a flyer on David Boston, there is no telling if Matt will have enough syringes to make anything of this team.

Matt’s team is in an ominous place right now. If there aren’t some quality changes made to this roster, Matt will soon be introducing himself to Mike and Justin as he moves into the basement of the league. You would expect better from a defending champion, and maybe this draft will be another for the ages, but as of now I am pretty confident that we can all be expecting First to worst.

Adam LaBarre
President of Fantasy Football Operations