Sigh of relief from the battle-tested Flamingoes

Remember back to the scene in Gone With the Wind when Scarlett is on her knees in the dirt hollering that she will never go hungry again.

Now transpose that to an ill-fated and pink-clad bunch of baseball players and insert the words, "I will never play fantasy baseball again!"

For those of you who follow my blog, you've heard me whine about the inevitable fate of the Flamingoes, my ill-fated fantasy baseball league team. I joined in this year and set a goal of coming in ninth place. There are only 10 teams, so I thought that wasn't too lofty a goal.

Unfortunately, the Flamingoes caught the bird flu around late May and suffered through the loss of three pitchers, two outfielders, an infielder and a utility player or two.

All within three weeks.

And that isn't something you can come back from, as my poor pink friends found out. No matter how hard I tried to doctor them, they kept dropping dead.

Soriano. Peavy (he later came back). Some dude who broke his wrist. Another who practically shredded his ankle. One guy missed games as a penalty for brawling. And the list goes on and on.

But even after all that, I received a glimmer of hope today.

Yes, I'm still the loser out of the bunch, but it turns out that my team had the highest batting average in the league. Small consolation, but it just might be the turnip that keeps my proverbial Scarlett in the league next year.

And I already have a goal: Just beat one person.

Not too lofty, right?