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Fantasy, SI used
to mean swimsuits

NOW we know it for sure. We are in the last days.

Up is down. Down is up. Something is seriously wrong.

Dogs and cats, living together. Mass hysteria!

This week, Sports Illustrated came out with its "NFL Fantasy Football Preview."

This was not some newsstand special issue. This was not some other trade "magazine" sprung up just for this purpose.

This was Sports Illustrated.

It was not the NFL preview with a few fantasy stats thrown in. It was the NFL Fantasy Football Preview issue!

We've crossed a line now. It was OK for Sports Illustrated to write occasional feature stories about fantasy sports. That, the universe could handle. A bad sign? Yes. Mildly annoying? True. A guilty pleasure? OK, OK, the article I read was not that bad. I'll admit it.

But now here we are -- America's most prominent sports magazine treating fantasy sports as if it was a sport. As if that was the point.

This fantasy business has gone too far. That and poker. These things must be stopped.

Except, no. Sports Illustrated is in on it now (I would expect this from ESPN). No doubt the New York Times is next. Soon Ted Koppel will be telling us his "sleeper" fantasy quarterback picks.

It's over. It's too late. We've been overrun. This is our culture now. I'm the last voice in the wilderness.

Except I'm not. That's the worst part. I'm a hypocrite.

Even I have a fantasy sports team. This is how deep it goes.

I put it off as long as I could, but you can't work in a newspaper sports department and not have a fantasy team. I know. I tried. But you can't not have one. It's in the union contract or something.

So I rebel against this trend the only way I can: I refuse to care. I make no trades. Indulge in no trash talk. The computer picks my team ("the Centipedes") and I let it sit.

OK -- I occasionally check the computer and shuffle the lineup according to injuries and bye weeks. Yes, I'm starting to slip. But that's it.

OK, last season I even peeked at the point totals sometimes. I caught myself scanning box scores to see if Alge Crumpler had scored a TD.

But now this Sports Illustrated preview clinches it. It's official -- we've hit the day where real sports is just there to serve as a backdrop for fantasy sports (the way, at some places, it's there to serve as a backdrop for cheerleading and marching band).

A guy in our office, Jerry Campany, is in about 47 fantasy leagues and he's always asking me who he should start.

Maybe that's why I'm against this stuff.

I just can't handle that kind of pressure.