Without making this article a dictionary corner edition, here is the official definition of schadenfreude: Satisfaction or pleasure felt at another’s misfortune, derived from the German schaden (harm) and freude (joy). Nowhere is this excitement more evident than in Fantasy Football!
There’s nothing more satisfying than watching a game you’d traditionally never care about, with players who aren’t even on your own team, just hoping that hapless defender your friend has in his lineup can let twelve in or score a own goal. . Maybe your striker only plays five meaningless minutes at the end of the game, or maybe even hits the jackpot with a red card in the first half – it’s a negative point bonanza!
Of course, the flip side of this holds true in Fantasy Football as well: rampant jealousy over your friend’s uncanny ability to switch his Captain to that hopeless player who suddenly scores a hatrick or his decision to play with five defenders, all which keep the goal to zero. Suddenly, scoring takes a backseat to feelings of despair and revenge, in true British sporting tradition. It’s not losing that I hate, it’s the other guy winning that really bothers me!
Of course, as the season progresses and your team gradually slides down the league table, the strong emotions that plagued every waking minute give way to apathy, depression, and a grim sense of inevitability. The team begins to take a back seat, Friday nights and Saturday mornings spent not poring over the latest stats but visiting friends or maybe even bringing his wife breakfast in bed. In short, life just doesn’t seem worth living.
Eventually, the only thing keeping you from swinging on the end of a rope is the hope that maybe your Nemesis, who has won the last five titles, will slip, make a mistake, forget his Captain has been suspended. You don’t obsess over the fortunes of your own team (every member of which you now despise and blame for all the pain in the world), but instead descend into a nightmarish, voyeuristic world of Fantasy Football Schadenfreude.
Until next season, of course! Next season everything will be different. Next season I will be Fantasy Football Champion!
