The 'Lard Butts' Are Champions

Hey, guess what? I won my pretend football championship game this week. I started playing fantasy football in 1994, and for the past five years have been playing in a league that was made up mostly of people from work but now there's just two of us (out of 14) that work together.

I'm the commissioner of this league, but I'm probably most famous for the fake news articles I write about my team. I always write myself into the reports as team owner. My favorite stories were from a few years ago when I wrote about my fake feud with my quarterback Brett Favre, and then there were those "creative/investigative" pieces about my opponents.

I have posted my championship-winning news release for you here--the names of other owners have been changed, and the comment about one needing Rich Little refers to a guy whose father and wife are in the league and the persistent rumor among us that he secretly runs their teams for them--a certain conflict of interest (hee-hee).
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(AP) Miami--Sitting on a curb amidst soda cups, pretzel wrappers, and cigarette butts is Lard Butts' owner, John Vano, staring ahead and thinking about the team that could.

"Everyone said it couldn't be done," Vano marvels. "But I just kept telling Carson, Maurice, and Tiki--'let's do this', Butts before Beauty, you know?"

Indeed, "Butts Before Beauty" became the hallmark of the playoff campaign for this 6-6 team. After 10 games they were mired at 4-6, but a pre-game speech by Tiki Barber, in his final season as a Butt, channeled an improbable winning streak that took them through both the season and the Down and Out Bowl.

"Our guys were stout this year," says Vano, "Quarterback, my runners, ... well the receivers all sucked. Do you know how hard I tried to get a tight end this year? I called all the teams--talked to Tom Walker three times, I couldn't believe his impersonations of his father and wife. Was I supposed to believer that? He shoulda hired Rich Little!"

"Anyway, it all turned around in that 11th game--with Tiki's speech and then the defense. It seemed like Pacman Jones scored a touchdown on defense every week, and those Vikings and Patriots teams scored 20 points for us consistently."

The Lard Butts, once the crown-jewel of the Busted Chinstrap League, left following their first championship for Down and Out, the highest professional league in football. After reaching the championship game in year one and finishing with strong finishes their other years, the Butts wiped out the past two seasons--just missing the playoffs last year after turning it on late, and then reaching the playoffs as the eighth seed this year.

But Jamal Lewis said it best when he passed out t-shirts with "Butts Before Beauty" printed on them before their first-round game against the one-seed Coletrain. A nod to their ugly season, facing the best team in the league, the shirts were worn under their uniforms for practice and game play.

"They haven't been washed yet," crowed Carson Palmer after the championship game to a throng of reporters maintaining their distance.

VandenOever greeted fans and signed caps, shirts, and programs until the wee hours of the morning Tuesday--delirious with excitement and thanksgiving for all the support from the many fans of the D&O. In fact, the Butts have long been in the top three for apparel sales by all professional teams ("Got Butts?" is the top-seller).

The owner was appropriately congratulatory to his opponent in the championship, Trick Ronald of The Humble Televangelists. "Rick put together a great team. They saw a lot of miracles this season. But like I was telling him last week, 'your guys put up their best numbers on Sunday--you ain't never going to win this game with Thursday, Saturday, and Monday in play'," VandenOever remembered, "People want their church only on Sunday, I'm afraid."

As this iconic symbol of old-school sports sat in celebratory chaos, reflecting on a season that finally went right, he remarked, "You know, as much as I hoped for this--it's not as thrilling as I thought. In fact, you can tell this to the other guys--the other owners. Losing one regular season game bothers me more than my enjoyment over winning this big one. That's the truth."

And with that, we leave this hard and exacting leader--who released long-time but underperforming Lard Butt Chris Chambers today--to think about next year.

Comments

[Barry]

Sounds like a league I would love to join... I found a league this year, but all they did was swear at each other. Merry Christmas!!!

[Darnell Lamb]

In related league news, the Mayberry FifenFurleys have hired Darnell Lamb as their new head coach.

Division leading Fife fired their coach Andy Taylor two weeks ago after the former sheriff failed to lead his team to victory in the first round of the play-offs.

Ask what he would do to make the team better, Lamb stated, "Win more games."

[johnvano]

Barry--we sometimes do have openings. I'll keep you in mind should a franchise be relocating.

Darnell--why do you issue press releases of yourself in the 3rd-person?

[J Andree]

Have you considered the possibility that FF is entirely random? Last year I signed up for a team to stop getting harassed by Jim Rearick. After ignoring the draft and the first 12 weeks of the season, Jim suggested I login to replace my injured players, as I had made the playoffs. This year I took a more active role and benched players when on a bye week, but made no trades or pickups. With the birth of my daughter in mid-season, my logins have declined again. I have just logged in after a 3 week absence to find I lost the super bowl in a sqweeker, losing during the Monday night game. But hey, enough about me - enjoy the championship.