Matt Casazza, Face on Balls

Name:  Matthew V. Casazza
Occupation:  Occasional police officer in my country.
Age: 29
Birthday: November 5
Marital status:  The only ring I have is the one around my ass.  (READ MORE)




Fantasy experience:  This is my second year doing fantasy baseball.  Technically I had two teams last year, but I lost interest in one of them halfway through.  Probably because it sucked.  My other team, Joose Noots, wasn't so bad.  I had a shitty first half and a great second, I ended up missing the playoffs by only a couple points.  I ran a fantasy football league this year, The Nudist Colony.  Brentmeister General, Mr. G, House of Pizza, Balls on Face and Mario Van Peebles all took part and LOVED it.  None of them had any complaints about dues, scoring, roster size, draft day or the totally fair and non-controversial way the season ended.

Balls on Face (Paul), Mario Van Peebles (Day), Monstah of Beantown (John), Bx Bombers (Travis) and I "work" together at the P.D.  The Bloop Chutes (Pete), NY Crop Dusters (Nick), Brentmeister General (Jeremy), Danbury Mets (Steve), Dunder Mifflin (Bryan) and I have known each other since school days;  Jeremy and I went to the same grade school and Steve and I are on the same softball team.  Mr. G and House of Pizza?  Those two should be obvious.

I take exception to my brother's comment that, should my team do well, he won't hear the end of it.  If my team does better than his he won't hear the end of it.  I'm not a gloater, but I will give you a ration of shit if you're beating me, that's for sure.

I'd like to put Jeremy high in the running for the team to beat this year, if for no other reason than his success in the fantasy football endeavor.  He took a team that, on paper, really didn't turn too many heads and took it all the way to the title.  There's a lot to be said about the guts, grit and guile it takes to start Fred Davis and Quintin Ganther in a playoff game.  Good job Jeremy.  I'll get your trophy engraved as soon as those fucks down at the league office put me back to work.

But, I'm also a big fan of the "sleeper."  Webster's defines "sleeper" as:

....a movie, book, play, etc., that achieves sudden unexpected success after initially attracting little attention, typically one that proves popular without much promotion or expenditure...


...which is why I am a little wary of some of the newcomer's potential, those guys who aren't fantasy baseball experts like me.  Guys like Nick and Pete who are, as far as I know, FB virgins.  Sometimes those are the guys to look out for.  They're the ones who don't obsess over every stat and game and are more likely to relax and be more patient with a player who turns out to be an All-Star.


But, at the end of the day, I gotta go with the guy who got me here.  He "tries to remain aloof" and humble about it but my dad is probably one of the most successful fantasy baseball owners that we've got.  Granted, his picks on draft day will certainly give us all a little laugh ("I thought Mo Vaughn was back in the Red Sox organization somewhere?"), but, like all of us Casazzas, he seems to get it in the end.    He's finished in the top half of six out seven Yahoo! FB leagues in which he has participated since 2002.  That includes 5 top-5 finishes and two consecutive championships ('08 and '09).  He has never finished lower than 7th (out of 12).


That makes House of Pizza my pick for the team to beat this year.

Trash talking?  Read my blog and pay me my money.  That's all I ask.  Day didn't do either this past fall.  Go ahead, ask him what happened.