by Mitchell Lookner
graphic by Denise Chan
Having a raw egg dumped on your head or running a mile after drinking a gallon of milk may seem like something to avoid at all costs, but those are just a few consequences Fantasy Football players risk facing each season.
The game is called Fantasy Football, but the league’s format is akin to the NFL, and the game’s realism is what enraptures many.
But for some dedicated (or masochistic) team managers, Fantasy Football is not just a game; there are inventive and intense punishments if you lose, subjecting you to shame and humiliation in front of — or at the hands of — your friends.
While some Fantasy Football leagues consist of randomly-connected strangers, the leagues with the most dramatic punishments often consist of groups of friends or family members. For the participants, having fun is the most important aspect, but to spice up the game, leagues not only create an incentive to win but also impetus not to lose.
In recent years, Fantasy Football punishments have skyrocketed in popularity, sparking more innovative ways to torture the losers of the league.
Some of the printable punishments include: waxing particularly hairy body parts, getting an embarrassing tattoo, being locked inside a cage or running around a track after eating copious amounts of food.
Nauseated running is more common than you may think, even outside of football season — the boy’s cross country team has a yearly tradition of running a mile on the track, drinking 16 ounces of chocolate milk after each of the four laps.
Extreme punishments happen at South too. An anonymous student revealed that as a consequence of their Fantasy Football loss, they were forced to spend 24 hours inside an IHOP, with an hour being shaved off their time for every pancake they ate.
They were trapped between a rock and a hard place: either suffer through 24 hours of mind-numbing boredom at a dingy IHOP or brave the bloating, nausea or other pancake-related-ailments that come with stuffing oneself with a ginormous portion of the International House Of Pancakes’ premiere breakfast food.
As Fantasy Football season progresses and the possibility of being a recipient of a creatively cruel punishment inches closer, players tend to take the season more seriously.
While it is unlikely that you will be the loser who must accept their fate with a stiff upper lip, there is always a possibility, so you must be on your A-game to solidify yourself as a real competitor, and not a chump on the bottom. Otherwise, you could be the one eating endless amounts of pancakes.
