Paying the FAAB Tab

[DOUGHBOYS]

FAAB is so tough.
I fulfilled Mothers Day 'stuff' early and jumped into faab for today. There's a reason we cannot really do faab justice by doing it any other day leading up to Sunday.
Things change.
Important things.
Things like Jarrod Dyson starting two of the last three three days.
Heath Bell blowing......a lead....again....
Leaving a wide open door for Hernandez...
Junichi Tazawa being a possible Closer.

In the Diamond League, about a hundred e-mails a week are exchanged between partners. Most have to do with faab.
FAAB is a first chance at new players. A second chance at others.
We have figured out that talking about FAAB early in the week is fruitless.
Too many things change.

For all of us, it is a painstaking task we endure.
For me, off and on, five hours today.
At least.
There's nobody to blame but myself. I signed up for it. I have to own it.
And I don't know what's tougher, having a team that needs a lot of help or a good team that just needs a little fine tuning.
With a team that needs a lot of help, we want to get better, quicker. We may make more moves than needed.
With a good team, we start questioing whether a decent player on our team can become better with a switch of the FAAB.
Or, 'Over-fine tuning' a team.

It's agony either way.
We change bids umpteen times and usually arrive at our first bid as being good.
A player we think nobody will covet will have a terrific Sunday, and we're left doubling or tripling our bids.

And all of it leads up to the longest 35 minutes in fantasy baseball.
The time we have to wait to see how our bids turned out.
I hate that 35 minutes.
During this time, we're cursing ourselves for not bidding enough on some.
Bidding too much on others.
And all the while cursing the NFBC for putting us through this 35 minutes of Hell.
I hate that 35 minutes.

The worst part is not getting or even getting our players. The finality that they are rostered.
It never seems like the combination we bargained for.
And in winning a guy like David Hernandez for $72 in the Diamond League to beat out a $71 bid by another, we are left to question, are we the winner of David Hernandez?
Or are we the loser of $72, while saving the runnerup $71?
It never ends.

As for Mothers Day, for most reading this, it was spent the same way we'll spend Fathers Day.
With FAAB.
It's part of the game.
Not a part we're fond of, but a must every Sunday for the money and time invested.
In a small way, this is an apology to those that would like to see more of us on Sunday....
Whether it's Mothers Day, Fathers Day, or just....Sunday.
We understand the time involved with this hobby better and more than our loved ones.
It's tough on them.
Tougher than on us.
And we know how tough THAT is.

[Quahogs]

Spoken like a true hardcorehighstakes guy. However Dan I enjoy those 35 minutes. It's the only time I have to get any yard work done that day With that I'll leave you with a little comic strip.