Fantasy Football

Every year, I host an online game during the NFL regular season. I invite a group of friends to participate, and we always have a great time.

Here's how it works. There are 17 weeks to the regular season. On any given week, there can be anywhere from 13 to 16 games. During the season, each team gets one week off, called a bye week. That is why the number of games varies. The object of the game is to pick the winners of each game. Your picks must be made before the first game of the week. For the past few weeks, there have been games on Thursdays, so that means you have to have all your picks, including the Sunday games, set before the first game of the week on Thursday. Once that game starts, everything is locked. You can't make changes.

Here's where it gets tricky. You have to assign confidence points to each game. If there are 16 games that week, you assign a point value, from 1-16, to each game. You cannot use the same value twice. So here's an example of how you would do it. The Raiders stink. So, if they were playing a very strong team, say the New York Giants, you would be very confident the Giants would win. So you might put 16 points on that game. If the Giants win, the 16 points you put on it are added to your tally. For each game you lose, you simply don't get the points. At the end of the season, the player with the most points wins.

Each year, I have three goals.

1. Make sure everyone has fun
2. Win
3. Beat (best buddy and Crossing Paths reader) Troy

Goal number one is most important. I don't think we've ever lost anyone because they didn't have fun. We have men and women in the group, college students, moms, dads, sons, brothers, sisters and grandfathers. It's a fun group of people, and it's growing each year.

Goal number 2 is a real challenge. This year we have twelve players, so coming in first is never easy. Counting this week, which kicked off with last night's game between Chicago and New Orleans, there are only three weeks remaining.

Goal number 3 is pretty much a lock.