FANTASY BASKETBALL IS NOT F'N GAMBLING!!!

What the hell, man?

It’s 2AM, Philippine time. I’m busy finishing work so I can enjoy my personal leave. Yes, I still need to do other things, but at least writing wouldn’t be one of them.

Anyway, I checked my ESPN Fantasy Basketball account, and for some reason, my browser deemed it unsafe. I tried again, and then I got a different result. So I turned off Norton, restarted my computer, and clicked on a YouTube tutorial.

And then I got this.

What the fuck, man!!!

Look, I think gambling is bad, and I really want the government to regulate it. Whenever I watch PBA, NCAA, or MPBL livestreams, all I see are “fans” watching games because of the odds—telling players they’re idiots because they messed up their bets—and just making the comment section hell on earth. Yes, I understand that these things need to go. But to regulate fantasy basketball???

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, sometimes it involves money, but it’s more of a friendly wager between peers. When you’re over 40, with brittle knees and a dad bod, the only way to emulate basketball is by getting into the mindset of a general manager. I’ve been playing fantasy basketball since the mid-2000s via a PBA fantasy game called PBFantasy. It’s been more than a decade since our ESPN Fantasy League started, and in it comes a whole lot of research, mind games, cursing, trolling, and everything friends do whenever they hang out.

Fantasy basketball may have luck involved, but you also have to use your brain to make your schemes work. And yes, at least the Yahoo Fantasy Basketball game still works, but its game modes are limited to rotisserie and head-to-head. The one cool thing about ESPN Fantasy Basketball is that you can modify the points to maximize your fun. And because most of the players in my league are former PBFantasy players, we customized our points league, and we’ve been enjoying it ever since.

Again, fantasy basketball is what friends do, especially if they can’t see each other often. Hopefully, this is just a temporary thing, because I doubt I’d adore the idea of using a VPN to fool my browser into accessing something that should be legal in the first place!

I don’t give a rat’s ass if they ban online betting—but spare fantasy basketball!