The NFL season comes with more than just regular games, as many football fans are deep into coaching their imaginary football teams.
Fantasy football, an industry that has doubled its users in the last 15 years is expected to continue its rapid increase in users, according to the Fantasy Sports & Gaming Association. This industry brings together groups of eight to 12 people who draft their teams of 16 players, with nine of them being starters. These rosters change as members make trades, release players, and add free agents.The goal is to draft a team that will score the most possible points. Points are scored based on the statistics made by the players each week and points vary based on the players positions.
Each week, different fantasy teams play each other throughout the NFL season until week 15, when the top four teams with the best records compete in the playoffs. The teams who failed to make the playoffs will compete in a loser’s bracket to try and improve their record. At the end of the season, teams are ranked from first place to last place. The champion usually receives an award and the loser has to deal with a punishment.
The severity of these punishments vary depending on the league’s decisions. One of the most common fantasy punishments is when the loser spends 24 hours in a local Waffle House, but for every waffle they eat, one hour is removed. Although eating waffles may seem fun, eating eight waffles still means they have 16 hours left.
With leagues run by high school students, the punishments often focus on embarrassing the loser. The most common punishment is wearing a humiliating outfit to school. The outfits worn usually require the loser to wear a dress or skirt or some sort of costume.
As someone who has been the loser of a fantasy league, and wearing an “I suck at fantasy” shirt, it is not as embarrassing as anticipated. There is an embarrassing factor, but it is seen more as comedic and it is better to go along with it.
Many social media accounts have been posting videos with lists of punishment ideas. The videos have reached extremely high view counts, which have inspired many fantasy groups on their punishment deliberations.
Being someone who has played fantasy for years, most ideas that have been brought up were either taken from social media, or heavily inspired by it. Most ideas were not harmful, and any that were harmful were quickly turned down.
Many of these videos are unserious, and the suggestions are completely unrealistic ideas. One example is aTikTok that posted a list of ideas, and one consisted of the loser committing a felony of the winner’s choice and the winner getting the chance to hit the loser with their car. This video is not supposed to be taken seriously, and the goal is to get the attention of fantasy fans, for good entertainment and laughs.
These punishments add extra motivation to lose as little as possible. It keeps members actively trying to improve their team.This benefits the fantasy industry greatly, as many leagues without punishments tend to have members give up or forget about their team. Although some punishments are risky and dangerous, they are the reason people stay invested in their leagues, making them more competitive.
