Disputers, Jurors & FSC fans,

First off, we just wanted to give you guys a huge shout out for supporting the launch of www.fantasysportcourt.com over the past two weeks. We could not be more excited with the initial success and buzz we are receiving. In our first two weeks, we have resolved some amazing disputes in a timely and unbiased manner, which is exactly what we set out to do. As well, we partnered with MLSE’s Team Up Foundation for the next year (Are you interested in donating your time? If so, send us an email). Finally, one of the most exciting turn of events during our launch week, was when our CEO was asked to participate on a radio show, called “The Program” to discuss how we are changing the game for dispute resolution.

The feature dispute that garnered the most voting and commenting was Will Carroll (SI.com Contributor) vs. Jeff Kinch (NFLFanFreeAgent Contributor) as they went head-2-head on which sport is the best fantasy sport? Baseball and all of its complexity edged out Football and all of its simplicity by a count of 15 to 14. Who ever said men were simple? Check out the closed case here: http://fantasysportcourt.com/dispute/fbbf308cf6a55ecfd4bc8811dea75508

The most popular dispute, which is still active, is the dispute where Tim McMenamin brought Robert Crnkovic to court to settle the score on an expired bet. At the time this communication was written, the count was a dead-lock 20 to 20 (57 comments). VOTE here, if you haven’t already: http://fantasysportcourt.com/dispute/f545b613bdaf88d92c99045b713a8680 

Interestingly but not surprisingly, as witnessed by the latter dispute we are seeing http://www.fantasysportcourt.com being used to resolve disputes outside of fantasy sports. We will continue to support this assuming that is the direction YOU (our community of jurors) would like to take it. Ultimately, we just set out to provide our community with a platform to resolve disputes in an unbiased and timely fashion….looks like we are succeeding and that is all THANKS TO YOU!

We announced on September 22nd, 2011 that we will be donating $1.00 CDN to the MLSE Team Up Foundation (mlseteamupfoundation.org/) for the first 500 disputes entered into http://www.fantasysportcourt.com. So far, we are at 36 and counting. Please pass this on to your friends so we can get to 500 as soon as possible.

Please continue to provide us with your candid feedback either through our website or by emailing us directly. We want to make resolving your disputes the best experience possible.

Cheers,

FSC Team

“Hey Bill O’Reilly, you’re mean! Common’s a cool guy! You’re the man behind the curtain of the selective outrage machine”

…BOOOOOORRRRING….

BBBBBB ooooooring…..  You serious with that crap? 

 All people care about now is 1 thing - Fantasy Football 

 Want ratings?  Want to leave a social footprint?  Talk to me about the right or wrong of a trade Colbert made with the “Pow! Pow!” guy from Step-Brothers that used to work for you.  By the way, if you turned that Pow! Thing down for your show…burn.  Listen to me well Stewart. That sort of fast and loose team management is happening most hours of the day in offices all across the country.  Who is our moral compass?  Are you really naive enough not to see the connection between this and the state of the economy?

 Who doesn’t see why the education system is questioned? Think Sally has a snowballs chance in hell when her Pop’s last writing project was the “Nutted! Need a QB, Plz help” trade message he sent to the Chinese supplier in his Roto League.  By the way, think they aren’t noticing. 

 I am pretty sure all our problems started when Maurice Jones-Drew went down on the one yard line in order to “ice” the game for his team.  Are you familiar with the Butterfly Effect?

 USA is built on people having the opportunity to achieve based on skill and effort.  Millions lost their match-ups that afternoon even though they had the best team!  People didn’t just miss the playoffs - the entire world was flipped on its head.  Where is the justice if you can not count on your first rounder to punch it in untouched for 6 points.

 America is in fact in crisis but O’Reilly isn’t the issue.  We need leaders like McShay, Cross, Schefter and Lombardi to step up! 

 First clean-up Fantasy and the Country will follow!! 

 You may be only down by 2 points on the scoreboard but its 4th and Goal from the 1 and America’s fantasy team is down by 5…

 Mr. Stewart, ARE YOU KICKING OR GOING FOR 6??

Im ready to tackle this issue Robert@fantasysportcourt.com

We are thrilled to have another guest blogger today. Jeff Kinch, sports writer for NFL Fan Free Agent has written a piece on the latest debacle in Boxing. Jeff will also be our feature dispute on Monday Night as he gets set to roll up his sleeves against SI.com heavy weight, Will Carroll.

************************************

By Jeff Kinch

I count myself among the very few Mayweather “apologists” in North America right now (Note: I even once got into a bit of a fight with my wife when after an episode of 24/7-Mayweather/Mosley showcased Mayweather’s arrogance she innocently asked “how can anyone cheer for Mayweather?”. My shortsighted response of “you’re absolutely right, only people who know something about boxing would cheer for Mayweather” was dripping with condescension and resulted in a very awkward breakfast the next morning) but I feel confident waving his flag again today.

 
A few declarations:
 
1)      There is zero question that the left hook-right cross knockout combo after the final warning was legal

2)      Zero question

3)      It may not have been the most sportsmanlike thing for Mayweather to do

4)      The headbutt from Ortiz was without question the most blatant and ill-intentioned headbutt I’ve seen in 30 years of watching boxing

5)      A fighter that was giving up 15 pounds and 10 years to his opponent - an opponent that was touted as being the tougher, harder fighter – reacted to a vicious headbutt delivered out of frustration completely within the rules.

The most important factor in forming my opinion though is one final declaration: Victor Ortiz wanted out.  

Please know that I like and respect Victor Ortiz as a boxer and as a person (his back story is as uplifting as any in boxing) but he was in no way outfitted to challenge in this fight.  Much like Tyson in his oft discussed ear-ingesting bout against Holyfield, Ortiz resorted to non-boxing tactics to get back at his opponent.  He fought gamely and with a plan, he came forward the first three rounds and tried to slug it out with Floyd.  When Mayweather continued to land his right hand lead at will and weather Ortiz’s best flurries Victor knew it was over.  
 
It’s very odd that a prize fighter like Ortiz would leave a clinch when the ref said “box” and keep his hands down – he had to know that Floyd had tasted blood (both figuratively and literally) and would want to exact revenge.  The most telling part, though, was Ortiz’s reaction after the knockout.  No matter how nice this guy is there’s no way a prideful boxer would be smiling and telling his corner “it’s okay” after a supposed sucker-punch knockout if he felt it was unfair.
 
Ortiz was going to lose that fight regardless – the fact that he did so in such a sympathetic manner only serves to help his legend.  But in no way, should it hurt Floyd Mayweather’s.

At Fantasy Sport Court, Inc (FSC) giving back to the communities in which we work, play, & live is important to us personally. In fact, it was woven into our fabric even before Fantasy Sport Court was an idea at the bottom of a glass of cold Canadian beer. To that point, we are thrilled to announce that we have chosen to support the MLSE Team Up Foundation for the upcoming year. 

We will be donating $1.00 CDN for the first 500 disputes entered into www.fantasysportcourt.com! So far, we are at 35 disputes, so please suport the cause and get your disputes resolved at the same time. We believe this is a positive spin on the phrase “charity case.”

We had 3 pillars we used to evaluate the foundations we were considering;

1. We wanted the foundation to be local.

2. We wanted to combine Youth & Sport.

3. We wanted a cause we could support with our hard earned money but also our time.

MLSE Team Up Foundation aligned perfectly with all three, they have;

1. Invested over a half a million dollars in 4 GTA rinks (local)

2. Disbursed over $1,369,000 to charities that provide children and youth, of all abilities, access to sports and recreation. (youth & sport)

3. Refurbished 4 rinks, 2 courts and 1 pitch through their legacy program in the last 12 months, and has 9 projects planned over the next 12 months. (time)

If you are interested in learning more about MLSE Team Up Foundation click here: http://mlseteamupfoundation.org

“A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor’s.” ~Richard Whatley

Best,

The FSC Team

“AHHAA, Court is now in session.” Never truer words than those spoken by Pauley Shore!  Now that court is in session, any and all disputes can finally be settled once and for all by a jury of your peers. With that accomplished, most is right in the fantasy world or at least can be if you write a solid case, rocking the vote and maybe throwing down a couple tweets for support like Johnny Cochrane did in the early 90’s, right?  Wrong!  In addition to all the commenting, voting, crying, laughing, debating, tweeting and resolving going on - FSC wants to help make you smarter.  Every once in a while, we plan on offering all the degenerate fantasy hooligans like yourselves, some legal advice for the rock bottom price of free ninety nine.  

We are no experts - but some of our friends are pretty smart.  In addition to helping establish precedents on high profile topics though featured disputes - some of these beauties are guest blogging some thoughts on making you a better player.

Todays Lesson Comes from Ryan Lester of www.Lesterslegends.com Ryan is giving us the low -down on his Bye Week Strategy! 

“You spend countless hours preparing for your fantasy draft. You may rank your players by position. You may separate them into several tiers. You probably participate in a mock draft or twelve. You study websites, fantasy books, and sports talk radio to the point where you can almost blindly participate in a fantasy draft without the aid of any sort of cheatsheet.

You’re cruising along in your draft as the players you were targeting fall into your lap. Suddenly you’re faced with your first dilemma. You drafted Shady McCoy in the first round, Hakeem Nicks in the second round, and now you have the opportunity to take Tom Brady in the third round? Do you pull the trigger?

All of your research suggests that if you don’t take him now you’ll likely be forced to drop a tier when you get around to taking a quarterback. You have to take Brady. What good reason do you have notto take him?

As your turn is coming up you glance at the bye weeks and notice that Shady, Nicks, and Brady all share the same bye week. If you pair that trio up you’re setting yourself to have no chance to win in Week 7. You might as well start your team off with a big L in the loss column before the season even begins.

I say go for it. Heck, take Stevie Johnson in the fourth, Fred Jackson in the fifth, and Vernon Davis in the sixth as well.

You’re not the 1972 Dolphins. You’re not playing for perfection. I know you don’t ever want to concede defeat, but the most important game of the year comes in Week 16 in most leagues. Last time I checked there are no bye weeks that late in the year.

Don’t give away value just because you put yourself in a bind one week.

In actuality, you may be better off loading up for one bye week. Sure, you will be the laughing stock of your league one week, but you’ll basically be at full strength (barring injury) the rest of the season. While everyone is scrambling week-to-week to fill their bye week holes, you can simply play your best guys every week.

Plus, if you do win you throw away week you can forever hold that over the head of your opponent.

I say don’t be afraid of pairing up players with the same bye week. I say embrace it and put yourself in a position to dominate on any given Sunday.”

Ryan Lester from www.Lesterslegends.com .  LestersLegends.com is a fantasy sports site dedicated to helping you win your Fantasy Baseball, Football or Basketball league. Its a go-to for all things fantasy but we pay special attention to his waiver wire suggestions - shout out to LestersLegends for our 2009 Derek Anderson pick-up that helped us win the title boo- yah baby!!! He’s good Sh$t!!