One of the best parts of playing in fantasy sports is the smack talk, and fantasy football smack talk is not exception.  With weekly head to head match-ups and the limited number of producing players, makes for a competitive and exciting battle each week.  The competitive nature of fantasy sports can be heightened by the presence of good, relevant smack talk.  Yes, this can be productive and motivating at the same time.

Case in point, I run a league where I’ve got my top two backs on a bye this week. Yeah, that was a bone-headed move to draft to RBs with the same bye, but they were the two best available at the time.  Now, I’m playing a team that is currently in first place and has the most points in the league, by about 30 overall total points.  I currently have the third most points and playing with my top two backs on byes this week. I was going to let this week go and not even try to play given the fact that I really didn’t need a win, and was figuring on taking a loss any way.  However, the opponent decided to post some really serious smack talk about me and my team, as well as how great his team was.  This was the the wake up call I needed to get my team in order this week to kick some tail.

I used the smack talk as motivation to try to put together a team that will be able to rival for him. The first thing I did was be able to see if I could make a trade with another team in the hopes and gaining another top running back.  In looking around, I found a team that also doesn’t care for my opponent and was happy to make a trade with me.  I gave up one of my WRs, one that I wasn’t playing of course but had good numbers for trade bait, for a first round draft pick running back that is coming off an injury and ready to assume his starting role.  The second move I made was check the waiver wire to see if there was a good play and ended up finding two starting RBs on the wire.  I was able to fill in with another starter that will hopefully be able to produce close one of my regulars given the waivers good match-up.  These two key moves should be able to shore up most of the points that I’m missing this week with the byes.

The smack talk was enough motivation for me to really want to win even if it seems like it may not be worth the effort.  If I do get the win, it will make the victory all the more sweeter as I throw the fantasy football smack talk right back in my opponent’s face.  I personally don’t think much of starting smack talk, as it usually leads to tough times if losses happen, but if you are on the other side of it you will be able to use it to your advantage as long as you don’t let it get to you.  It’s only a game, and a fantasy game at that so the best advice for fantasy sports smack talk is to just make it about the game.