Bonafide or Bonifacio?

If you play fantasy baseball or even if you just love baseball, be sure to check out the ESPN Fantasy Focus Baseball Podcast. Nate Ravitz (@nateravitz) and Matthew Berry (@MatthewBerryTMR) pride themselves on hosting a show with an equal measure of nonsense as baseball and fantasy.

Most ESPN podcasts like to talk about American Idol at some point by way of indulgence, but Berry and Ravitz’s tangential ramblings usually always have baseball at their heart somewhere. Maybe with the exception of the odd left-fielder that comes out of the mailbox that gets dipped in to every day. They have many regular features, sound drops and name games (where they compare the value of one fantasy player to another), and just recently they have been asking whether a player is ‘La Roche or Latrocious’. i.e. are they a slow starter (as La Roche is notorious for), or just damn awful?

Berry is a bit of a Podulterer (courtesy of Nate Ravitz), and flaunts his fantasy knowledge at whoever will have him. But a big reason why this podcast works is that they are both equally great presenters and fantasy experts. So if Berry, or Nate for that matter goes AWOL for the day, the show does go on. Often a mystery guest is invited in to talk fantasy baseball. This mystery guest is usually whoever is walking past the photocopier at ESPN’s Bristol offices when they need a stand-in.

The show runs its own fantasy baseball league through ESPN.com called the ‘Man’s League’. Each pre-season, listeners compete to get a place on the Man’s League by selling their souls to the podcast. It gives mere mortals a chance of fantasy baseball glory, and to drive Pod Vader’s (the show’s producer) team in to the ground. It is not for the faint hearted though, and if you should lose to Pod in a weekly head to head in the Man’s League, prepare yourself for the abuse that follows from hosts Berry and Ravitz. Though to be fair, if you lose to Pod in the head to head, you should really think about taking up fantasy crochet instead.

It is obviously easier to relate to the guys if you play in one of ESPN.com’s leagues, but even if you play in a different league or a UK league, their discussions on who’s hot and who’s shot are nearly always valuable. From my experience of the podcast so far, I’d tip you the wink to listen carefully to their advice. Matthew knows his onions that’s for sure, and Nate has pulled out some blinders in recent weeks, including suggesting you pick-up Ben Zobrist just before his one game RBI frenzy.

You can e-mail the team (which includes ESPN injury expert @stephania_espn and Pod Vader) at fantasyfocus@espnradio.com. And if you are interested, yes, Pod Vader does have a twitter address too, but as a Fantasy Focus regular I’m not going to get behind any cause of the Dark Lord’s.

As Matthew and Nate often say, if you haven’t got time to listen to the podcast, they don’t care, just download it. The show is certainly Bonafide, and by no means Bonafacio. One word of caution however; you will never get the theme tune out of your head.*

*The guys will also be hosting the Fantasy Focus Football Podcast, with mock drafts coming soon on ESPN. You can catch a recent episode of the football podcast on their page, where they talk to The Law Firm, BenJarvus Green-Ellis (@TheLawFirmBJGE).