The only real drawback to Sundays in Autumn is that another week at work looms near, or at least for those with "traditional" work schedules. The prospect of watching NFL football all afternoon while obsessing over fantasy football stats is a pleasant one. The only disappointment comes from looking out the window to see the sun shining brilliantly and a breeze supplementing the brisk temperature in the mid-60s. If there were a way to watch all NFL games with live stat tracking while outside doing something active, the market on happiness would be cornered.

The attention to detail that results from participating in fantasy sports is definitely easy to mock, but there could be something valuable to it. Fantasy football encourages full participation in a weekend's full slate of games, something that would otherwise be almost unheard of. It generates interest in all team's games, thus making the overall experience more enjoyable. There are no bye weeks, there are no road games, there are no bad matchups. It becomes the great equalizer.

Imagine if the same type of arrangement existed for other professions. If there were a measurable and contestable line of statistics that accompanied everything you did at work/school/whatever, how might that affect performance? You could get points for every menial task you perform at the office, but if you do enough of them, those menial points will add up to something significant. You could also save up all your time and energy to do something truly significant, but only get the payoff in one big lump sum.

Consistency would also be key. Everyone would be less inclined to choose the guy that might pull of a great bid proposal or close a deal every once in a while, only to spend the next few weeks playing solitaire. It's better to have a steady performer that comes to work everyday ready to be productive in some form.

There probably is already a good bit of this mindset present in work environments. Everyone knows a LenDale White that puts up pretty good numbers most of the time, but only because he is the fortunate beneficiary of goalline carries set up by Chris Johnson running down the other 90-something yards of the field. White may score more points some weeks, but it doesn't mean he had a better game than Johnson. There is always someone there to claim the glory, even if they weren't responsible for it in the first place. All it means is that Johnson likely did enough to have a good game himself, while putting White in position to have a good game also. Double duty of sorts.

Even in this new form of fantasy sports, trash talking is encouraged. Without trash-talkers, there wouldn't be anyone for everyone to hate. So feel free to do it, but just know that all your coworkers hate you.

Update: Ok, so LenDale White had a big run of his own yesterday. He's still fat and steals Chris Johnson's touchdowns.