Hopefully by now, your Omnifantasy drafts are coming to a close, as we’re about to hit a busy month for early results. The 128-person Omnifantasy Cup is finalizing, with about half the drafts in the books and all likely to finish up today. The more exclusive Ship Chasing Cup, if you’re in that contest, still has a ways to go.
As of yesterday, we have our first Omnifantasy points of the new year! Two Champions League Round of 16 contests were decided as the second legs of those matchups began yesterday with Benfica coasting over Club Brugge, as expected, and Chelsea turning the tide on Borussia Dortmund, which was more in question. Dortmund held a 1-0 advantage after the first leg, but Chelsea won the second leg 2-0 — thanks in part to a controversial penalty retake — to advance 2-1 on aggregate. Chelsea was the higher drafted of the two sides, but certainly Dortmund had a shot to earn points as a later-round pick.
Instead, it’s Chelsea and Benfica as the first two picks to earn 20 points for advancing to the quarterfinals in their sport, and Dortmund and Club Brugge as the first two to officially be eliminated with zero points. There are two more matches today, and then a little break before the other half of the Round of 16 second legs are played next Tuesday and Wednesday. But today features a doozy of a pair of matches.
First, we have Tottenham in the same position Chelsea found themselves in yesterday, as the favored side by futures odds but nonetheless down 1-0 after a road loss in the first leg. AC Milan won 1-0 when those two sides met in Milan last month, but Tottenham will look to match Chelsea’s feat yesterday in overcoming that deficit today in London.
The other matchup is even bigger. Bayern Munich is one of the top favorites overall, and won 1-0 in their first leg match with Paris Saint-Germain in Paris. Returning home today against a PSG side that will be without Neymar, Bayern are poised to advance, but it’s far from written in stone when the opposing side still features Messi and Mbappe. Keep in mind the away goals rule was scrapped a few years ago, so this is simply a one-goal lead regardless of how things play out in the second leg. If tied in the aggregate after 90 minutes, there will be extra time (and then possibly penalties).
Elsewhere in the Omnifantasy landscape — and halfway around the world — the World Baseball Classic group stages started up last night (for American time zones) in Taiwan, and continue there today and in Tokyo, Japan. Netherlands knocked off the higher-drafted Cuba in the opening match last night, and Panama — one of the lowest-ranked in futures odds in the whole content — currently leads Taiwan 12-4 in the 8th inning of the second game of the tournament as I write this.
Both of those games come from what looks like the most wide open group, with two of those four teams plus Italy set to advance to the quarterfinals after all five teams have played each other in a four-game round robin. The other group starting up soon features Japan and South Korea as overwhelming favorites to advance, but baseball is a high-variance game in such limited samples, so it feels like anything could happen in the WBC.
Events to watch out for
The best part about being able to include the World Baseball Classic this year is how it gets the Omnifantasy season going quicker than ever. Because baseball can be played essentially everyday, the round robin of the group stages will take place in five days at each location, with the Asian groups starting sooner to allow for travel time before the semifinals and finals, which will be played in Miami.
After the top two in each of Groups A and B are decided on March 13 and 14, quarterfinal games will be played in the Tokyo Dome on March 15 and 16, before the two advancing nations from those groups will take off for Miami.
Meanwhile, Groups C and D will begin in Arizona and Miami on March 11 and run through March 15, with those other quarterfinals matchups taking place on March 17 and 18 in Miami. The semifinals will then take place on March 19 and 20, with the final following on March 21, wrapping this whole tournament up two weeks from yesterday. In no time, we’ll have awarded our first 80 of the year to the champions.
Meanwhile, the Champions League quarterfinals will be set by next Wednesday, March 15. One of my favorite elements of the Champions League is that each round is redrawn, with no seeds or anything, so anyone can match up with anyone. The draw for the quarterfinal matchups will take place Friday, March 17, and could feature the top two favorites being forced to face off at that stage, or two longshots matching up and guaranteeing one of them passage to the semifinals (where another random draw will occur to determine those two matchups). The quarterfinals for the UCL begin April 11 and 12, and the final isn’t until June 10, as the various stages are mixed in with each of the participating clubs’ normal league schedules.
The other big event to keep an eye out for this month is of course March Madness, the NCAA Tournament. The first round starts up a week from tomorrow, and it fires off over the course of three weekends, first cutting down to the Sweet 16 in a matter of four days, and then going from 16 to the Final 4 from Thursday-Sunday the following week, March 23-26. That sport will be decided with a semifinal on April 1 and a final on April 3, and will be the second 80-point winner we declare.
Then obviously both the NBA and NHL playoffs will start up in April, though those are marathons that won’t be decided until June. The next sport to finalize will actually be the XFL (for those leagues small enough to include it), as a champion will be crowned there on May 13.
So over the next few months we have a World Baseball Classic champion coming here in March, a college basketball champion coming in the early part of April, an XFL champion coming in May, and then three more champions crowned in June — the Champions League and both the NBA and NHL.
Meanwhile, sports like NASCAR, MLB, WNBA, and MLS will be getting deep into their regular seasons, and we’ll have majors coming in golf and tennis, with the Masters kicking off the Omnifantasy golf schedule in early April, and tennis picking up with the French Open in late May. Oh, and then we get the women’s World Cup in July and August, which should really liven up the summer Omni schedule.
This time of year is really my favorite part of Omnifantasy, when the drafts are just finalized, and there is so much on the calendar to get us going. Thanks again to everyone who participated this year, and good luck this Omnifantasy season!