It's Friday. You've got a job. You've got stuff to do. But one thing you won't be doing is watching college football. It's a poor substitute, nevertheless we present Free Form Friday. As any member of the Auburn basketball team could tell you, it's a sure bet.
Now is the time of year for March Madness, and our comrades around SB Nation are all over it. And hey, technically, as I write this the Georgia Bulldogs are still in the running for a trip to the Big Dance. Stranger things have happened, right? This is your unofficial pregame thread for tonight's 10 p.m. tip-off against Vandy. If the Fox Hounds pull that one off, you may safely get just a little excited. Until then let's just expect the worst, shall we?
It's also that time of year for colleagues and friends to try to enlist me in fantasy baseball leagues. I don't do fantasy sports. I'm not opposed to them, they just don't really pique my interest. Because strictly speaking fantasy sports are not sports at all. Even in a fantasy sense. Madden NFL Football is a fantasy sport. "Fantasy Sports" is low-risk data set analysis for people with an interest in sports. If I want to crunch numbers in my spare time, I'll try to figure out what Coca-Cola's dividend is likely to be in 2020 given its historic pace of growth. Fantasy sports take a serious commitment of time to be successful. And the college football offseason is the time of year when I commit serious time to family and work responsibilities and little else.
It's sort of a tradeoff I've engineered with the outside world for the single-minded focus that occurs around here from August to January and which sometimes ends up in very strange places. Some use fantasy sports as a reason to follow sporting events they might not otherwise follow. I require no such artificial incentives. If a good MLB game is on television I'll watch it. If a watchable NBA game is on I'll watch that too. At least when I'm not looking out the window to see if pigs are flying by, or if Satan is tobogganing through my neighbor's yard.
Speaking of Faustian juxtapositions, Orson Charles would probably make a deal with whatever demons may be to have last night back. He may well have cost himself some cash, but the NFL draft is a funny thing. A DUI during the months-long job interview process leading up to the draft is far less of an issue than running a slow 40 time at the combine or dropping a couple of balls at your Pro Day. That's a little discouraging as social commentary, but it should be encouraging to young Mr. Charles. I'm guessing that some team that was going to be on the horns of a dilemma regarding whether to take him in the 2nd or 3rd round is now going to gleefully wait around and get him in the 4th. Good for them, bad for Orson.
* Totally not true. Except as the statement relates to Cornelius Vanderbilt. And Anderson Cooper.