The year was 1999. It was my 1^st week of High School. I had spent most of the summer meeting new friends during Football Training Camp so I was a bit ahead of the game in terms of meeting new people. A bunch of my teammates had 5^th period lunch, including five of my closest friends from the team, so I knew we’d have at least one exciting and entertaining 45 minute session to break up the school day.
 
We gathered around a table in the lunchroom and plopped all of our stuff down in one big sigh of relief. Finally it was Lunchtime. After taking a few bites of his sandwich, our friend, Dave, started telling everyone about his idea to form a fantasy football league. In between swallowing his half chewed food and sucking down soda, Dave finally made his point. A Fantasy Football League would not only be fun this year, but if done right, can forge friendships that last a long long time. None of us had played Fantasy Football but have all heard about it. Naturally as football players we loved following the NFL and rooting for our favorite teams, but starting a Fantasy league would take our fan experience to a whole new level. Everyone loved the idea. Since there was only six of us at the table, we needed to find four more people to join our league. Something like Visa’s YOU + TEN Draft app on Facebook, which analyzes your social graph to find the ten best people you interact with, would have been a big help. But hey this was 1999. Mark Zuckerberg was probably a freshman in High School himself, so Facebook didn’t even exist.
 
We set a few parameters for joining:
1.     Only guys from the football team were eligible
2.     Only guys who were graduating with us were eligible
3.     We had to sign a contract that we would at least stay in the league through all four years of High School.
 
Three simple rules but very powerful. It really put a limit on who we could invite to the league but we all stood by our “constitution.” By the time lunch was over, we finalized the four people we would ask and had one backup incase any of them declined our invitation (which none of them did).
 
By 7^th Period, we formed our league. We called it the: HBHS Class of 2003 Fantasy League. HBHS was the name of our school and 2003 was the year we were all scheduled to graduate.
 
Now looking back, nearly 12 years later, it was amazing what happened that day. In a matter of three periods during the school day, we assembled a Fantasy Football League that would last not only through High School, but College, and four years after College.  And we are still growing strong after just wrapping up our 12^th year.
 
The ten of us are so loyal and dedicated to the league and each other, that we have NEVER missed a season of drafting, trading, trash-talking, assembling our fantasy team, and watching the games with each other. The same ten guys every season. The same ten from Freshman year of High School. We are so proud of that accomplishment because we really think it says a lot about our friendship as a group.
 
The Draft is one of the best parts of the fantasy season. Not only does it kick-off the year, but it brings all of us together for about 5 hours where nothing, and I truly mean nothing, else matters. No Work. No Stress. No Girlfriends or Wives. Just Football and Friends.
 
Over the years it has gotten somewhat difficult trying to get ten people all on the same schedule to complete our Fantasy Draft. But we all make sacrifices, change our plans, and ensure everyone is “present” for the draft. Now I put “present” in quotations because there have been a few times when one of our league members wasn’t physically in the room with us.
 
Back in 2008 I had to draft my team from a hotel room in Australia. I was there on a business trip and couldn’t change around my flight. I was devastated for missing the draft in person but fought through the time difference to draft my team over skype and a webcam. It was actually a pretty cool experience and now I can say I built a championship team when I wasn’t even in the Northern Hemisphere, which really irks the heck out of my friends.  Another one of our league members now lives in California. He hasn’t drafted his team “in person” in three years. But every year we connect our webcam to the big screen TV and it’s almost as if he’s sitting with us even though he’s 3,000 miles away. 
 
This past year, all of us were nervous about not having a league because of the NFL Lockout. But once it was lifted, we all celebrated over drinks. The HBHS Class of 2003 Fantasy Football League cannot and will not be stopped.
 
After the Draft we sit back, analyze our teams, discuss who looks “good” on paper, trash talk a lot, and talk about how excited we are for the upcoming NFL Season.
 
The next 16-17 weeks is intense. We check injury reports more than our email. Secret txt messages fly back and forth throughout the deal regarding possible trades. Lies are told to each other just to throw someone off their strategy. We may be best friends but during the fantasy season we are opponents and rivals.
 
But it is during those 16 weeks that we have the most fun. Whether it’s watching a game on a Sunday afternoon, night, Monday Night, occasional Thursday or Saturday, there is usually 3-5 of us watching the games together. And the people who couldn’t make it out to watch the game are sending a fury of txt messages asking for updates, talking more trash, or praying for a victory. This is probably the best part of our league. It is a great reason for all of us to get together, watch some football, and have fun with friends. Since we are all such big fans, there is truly nothing else we’d rather be doing. It’s such a great time and I can’t believe it all started with an idea during 5^th period lunch, freshman year of high school. Just crazy how it all works out.
 
If it weren’t for Fantasy Football, my NFL experience as a fan would be much different. Sure I would follow my hometown team that I grew up loving, rooting, and crying for. But with Fantasy Football I can root for a bunch of players from all across the league. It certainly made all of us more informed and more supportive of the NFL.
 
 
 
Disclosure: We received compensation from Visa for sharing our views in this post, but the views expressed here are solely ours, not Visa or the NFL’s. For more information about Visa’s YOU+TEN Draft app, please visit: http://www.facebook.com/VisaNFL?sk=app_259824094080710
 

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