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"ALL PRO SPORTS FOOTBALL SERIES"

MORNING BRIEFING

Fans Along for the Ride in NFL's Fantasyland
By Jerry Crowe
Times Staff Writer

August 26, 2006

Fantasies he understands.
But fantasy football?
David Whitley of the Orlando Sentinel just doesn't get it.
"More than 15 million supposedly own teams…. ," Whitley wrote. "One study says companies could lose about $20 billion in productivity this year as employees negotiate trades, scan the Internet and ponder whether to start Laveranues Coles or Arnaz Battle at wide receiver.
"And to think I've been wasting all that work time on the Jessica Alba website."

Trivia time: What was the name of the now-defunct New York restaurant where publishing executive and fantasy-league inventor Daniel Okrent gathered with other baseball fans to perfect the rules of so-called Rotisserie leagues?
Texas tops Trojans again: As if it weren't bad enough for USC fans that Texas defeated the Trojans in the Rose Bowl, now the Longhorns are piling on.
According to the Princeton Review, Texas is the nation's No. 1 party school and ranks among the top 10 in "Lots of Hard Liquor," "Lots of Beer" and "Major Frat and Sorority Scene," and is ranked No. 13 on the "Reefer Madness" list.
USC couldn't crack the top 20 on any of those lists.
Not surprisingly, Texas also ranked among the top 10 on another list: "Their Students (Almost) Never Study."
Who has the time?
Raise your glasses, please: In ranking Milwaukee at the top of its list of "America's Drunkest Cities," forbes.com noted, "Even the name of the town's baseball team — the Brewers — alludes to its boozy past." Austin, Texas, home to the nation's No. 1 party school, came in at No. 5.
Unmasked: Cam Ward, who was the playoff most valuable player last spring in leading the Carolina Hurricanes to the Stanley Cup championship, told Canadian Press that he thoroughly enjoyed himself last month while meeting all those recognizable people at the ESPY Awards show in Los Angeles — even though he went virtually unrecognized before introducing himself as the Cup-winning goaltender.
"When you do say that, they know what you're talking about," he said. "But until you say that, they just think you're another fan."
Hollywood story: Writes Nick Canepa of the San Diego Union-Tribune, sympathetic to UCLA's wallowing in USC's long shadow last season: "Only in L.A.: Your college football team goes 10-2, matching the most wins in school history, and it's a silent movie. You're starving, busing tables, or sitting on a stool at Schwab's waiting to be discovered."
And perhaps still smarting from a 66-19 loss to USC.
Low blow: Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times, noting that nflshop.com is offering sofas in the colors of NFL teams, complete with logo: "The Houston Texans model, no doubt, goes well in any basement."
Trivia answer: La Rotisserie Francaise.
And finally: From Jeff Gordon of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: "Now that Pluto has lost its designation as a planet, will scientists declare that Barry Bonds' head is now part of the solar system?"


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