Fully Operational

August 8, 2012

Don’t Call It a Comeback 12: Notes From a Last Place (Fantasy) Team

By Dre Rivas

I used to never have nightmares. In the past year or so, that’s changed. I get them. Weird ones too. I guess all dreams are weird though. You’d have to be pretty boring to dream about normal things.

This past Sunday I had a nightmare. Only I wasn’t sleeping. Los Pollos Hermanos was having a great week, poised to go 3 and 0. It wasn’t just good to be Los Pollos Hermanos, it was great to be an American. Gabby Douglas was golden in the All-Around after the Fab Five won the team gold. Phelps bounced back for history. And NASA was about to pull off a Mission: Impossible-styled assignment with its Curiosity rover hours away from landing on the surface of Mars.

July 19, 2012

MLB Midway Report: Part One

By J. Goodman

If you click on the Sports link at the top of the page, you’ll be privy to a heaping helping of basketball articles - most recently an onslaught of words and emotions about Jeremy Lin - one on boxing, and a couple on baseball. Football season is soon approaching, so we’ll be jumping ship from the NBA to hit you full blast with some NFL action, but we have been in the midst of baseball season for three months now and all we have are a couple of articles, that’s it? Sure, Dre has his Don’t Call it a Comeback series, which follows his last place fantasy baseball team, but baseball deserves better. Don’t you know? It’s the national pastime.

July 11, 2012

Don’t Call It a Comeback 8: Notes From a Last Place (Fantasy) Team

By Dre Rivas

One of my favorite movies is Tim Burton’s Ed Wood, about the famously awful, B-movie filmmaker. Johnny Depp’s performance as Wood is among his most astute. He pushes all the right buttons, there is just the right amount of abasement to go along with the mirth. And there is nothing mean-spirited about the way Depp and Burton handle this character. On the contrary, it’s clear they are as in love with him as Wood was of his movies; they make the filmmaker’s enthusiasm for cinema irresistibly endearing and – dare I say it - inspiring. You laugh at him, you love with them.

June 12, 2012

Don’t Call It a Comeback 4: Notes From a Last Place (Fantasy) Team

By Dre Rivas

For those of you that are unaware, my fantasy baseball team, Los Pollos Hermanos, gets its name from the television show Breaking Bad. If you didn’t realize this, it means you don’t watch the show. And if you don’t watch the show, you are poison to me. Just kidding. If you read the Breaking Bad piece Goodman and I did last week, you may have noticed I have a rather unhealthy obsession with the show. Some people will eat your face because they sniffed “bath salts”. I might eat your face if you talk shit about Breaking Bad.

June 4, 2012

Don’t Call It a Comeback 3: Notes From a Last Place (Fantasy) Team

By Dre Rivas

Being in last place comes with a lot of luggage. It’s the deepest hole to crawl out from because of all the weight of all the other teams ahead of you: the weight in points, the weight in wins, the weight a jump start in the standings gives them, the weight of injuries, the weight of slumps, the weight of losses. It’s so very heavy: the lack of scoring, the lack of confidence. The weight of every decision you make feels heavier than the one before. Do you start Jarrod Parker this week with two starts against Texas and Arizona? Beachy against Toronto? Something weighing on you there. You feel it all collapsing onto you. Everyone else’s baggage succumbing to gravity, while you struggle with your own.

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