Another Time

[Edwards Kings]

I have been doing fantasy sports pretty much non-stop and pretty much mostly baseball since 1984. A group of guys in Athens, Georgia, lead by a couple of guys who would make their careers in sports news and media, started this fantasy baseball points league and invited me to join. I was a "charter" member there too and was very sad when time, careers, and distance (pre-internet) broke it up. Sad and strange, but while I was looking for something else, I came across my notebook where I tracked my teams progress (done daily out of the boxscores) for all of those early years, including 1987. I finished last in 1986 (12 team mixed) and (13 team mixed) won in 1987, though I was in first place only four days (I guess I pulled a "Clum" before Clum. It was a snake draft format and I won it (those of you who know me don't laugh please) by focusing on pitching early. My team then by round:

Don Mattingly
Lou Whitaker
Gary Gaetti
Dwight Gooden
Todd Worrell
Ron Darling
Bruce Hurst
Jesse Orosco
Tom Henke
Odibe McDowell
Mel Hall
Brett Saberhagen
Benito Santiago
Ozzie Smith
Dan Pasqua
Jose Uribe
Mike Scioscia
Eric King
Andres Galarraga
Eric Show
Ron Oester
Eric Bell
Danny Darwin
Gary Ward

We had funky names like "Gerke Westers", "Steffe N'Wolfs", and "McCallum Berjacks". I was "Edwards Kings".

We had trades and free agents and all and we charged for transactions. It was a points league and I won by only 13 over second place with 4,450. And the pitching was the difference, finishing with 36 points more than my nearest competitor. Best pick of the draft was Robin Yount by the Berjacks. He tied for fifth in total points but wasn't drafted until 10th round, 130th pick. Of the first rounders, Mattingly (I had the first pick of the draft0 was second in most points, George Bell was first and lance Parrish was worst. I won $250 bucks and that made me third all time at that point. The 4,450 points I had that year was a league record. At the time and in the four years since the beginning of the league, only Ripken, Sandberg, Gary Carter and Dave Winfield were picked in the first round each year.

Anyway, just a blast from my past.