It’s possible I was mistaken.
A couple weeks ago, I accused the members of my fantasy football league of being responsible for a dog biting my neighbor, which resulted in me spending an afternoon in the emergency room while they stitched her up rather than me spending that same afternoon in my bunker preparing for the league’s draft.
But now I’m beginning to think something larger is at play.
You see, Sunday night I had another draft. Last night? Yet another. Yes, I’m in three leagues this year. Go ahead. Be impressed. But when you’re past the impression to the point where you can stomach this next bit, get this:
Someone seems to have attacked three cell towers in my general neighborhood in an effort to disrupt my draft prep.
Yes, on Saturday night, I started noticing problems with my cell reception. I didn’t think much of it, and in the morning it was fine. But shortly before draft time Sunday, the problem again reared its head. I couldn’t receive a number of texts from the green bubble group text (iMessages worked fine, because I use WiFi that my roommate pays for). I couldn’t issue witty barbs and retorts. I made it through the draft, but I was rattled. Rattled enough that I took three tight ends (Jordan Reed and Greg Olsen were late-round steals, guys).
Then, yesterday afternoon, I was unable to receive rideshare ride requests due to the same issue. Draft time was approaching, and rather than soothing my nerves by telling my passengers how I was going to try to grab Patrick Mahomes in the third round (he ended up going in the second), I had to amplify my rage and go tell two employees at the AT&T store that my phone wasn’t working.
Which is how I learned about the towers.
Yes, in addition to giving me a new SIM card, the employees were kind enough to show me a map of all the cell towers in Austin. Which, I’ll admit, made me feel like Nicolas Cage pretending to have a malfunctioning iPhone so he could figure out how the cell tower grid compared to a map on the back of the Articles of Confederation.
But conspiracy aside, three towers were in the midst of repairs. Three crucial towers. It seems unlikely AT&T would choose to do this on Labor Day Weekend, among the littest Austin weekends of the year. Which can only mean one of two things:
1. Someone in one of these other two leagues has been reading my blog posts and got the idea to disrupt my draft prep.
2. There is an organization out there trying to weaken my fantasy football performance through whatever illicit means are necessary.
Could it be the latter? Such an organization would need to be well-funded. Such an organization would need some sort of motivation to cut off one of my income streams (yes, I’ve done well in my leagues in recent years—fight me). Such an organization would have to be nefarious enough to corrupt both a dog and a cell tower network.
I’m watching. I’m waiting. And when they slip up, they’ll be caught like a “monster” in Scooby Doo: With their head ripped off.
