In this week's P.O. Box:

It’s been a week now since my trip out to L.A. to help YouTube with their pregame broadcast for the Friday Night Football game in Brazil, which drew a global audience of over 17.3 million viewers.

I’ve received lots of questions about the experience (and also selfishly would like to document some more of it so I don’t forget), so here’s a combo FAQ/diary…

Alex Piper, who is YouTube’s Executive Producer of Sports and Creator Content, reached out to me through Steph Miller in June (they play in some dynasty leagues together!). I initially thought I was getting catfished (he didn’t have his official Google email yet) and I nearly brushed him off when asked if I would hop on a call to learn more about an “opportunity.” Because I thought I was getting catfished, I asked if he could give me more details over email first (whoops). We eventually got on a call and he explained what was happening and that he wanted me to be the fantasy analyst for the pregame show. He then asked me to pitch him a bunch of ideas for segments, so I sent him like 10 different ideas. I got the gig.

Initially the plan was for me to monitor the live chat during the pregame show and flag a few questions to toss to Derek Carr, Brandon Marshall, and Tyrann Mathieu in real time. That plan later got scrapped, but we were still looking for questions that we could use on the Friday show. Alex suggested that I host a stream on my channel on Thursday that we could mine for questions. Once again, it sounded way too good to be true…and yet that is exactly what happened.

ICYMI, here’s the roundtable podcast I got to host from the NFL studios on my channel with those guys. I thought it went really well. I wish we could have gone another 45 minutes as everyone got more and more comfortable as we went, but we were on a time crunch. My favorite part was this very funny “fantasy” story from Derek:

YouTube used the NFL studios in Inglewood, Calif. (right next to SoFi stadium) for the broadcast. We were in the same studio that they shoot “NFL Total Access” and “NFL GameDay” in. It is a massive space and looked very cool decked out in the YouTube red:

The coolest thing from the whole experience was just getting to hang with Derek, Brandon, and Tyrann in the green room in between rehearsals, tech, makeup, etc.

I got to be a fly on the wall while they talked about their former coaches and teammates (Brandon and Derek shared a lot in common with Josh McDaniels!). I also got to pick their brain about random players. Derek gave me a nice rundown on Kendre Miller’s potential in the Saints offense and showed me his fantasy teams (100% exposure to Jayden Higgins!). Brandon told the story of his 21-catch game and how he had called his shot before it even happened. Tyrann dished on Marvin Harrison Jr.’s game and told some funny stories from Cardinals practice.

Yes, multiple times. They had a team of like 7-8 makeup artists who would get us all ready before rehearsals and then “touch us up” right before we went live. Honestly? As a backwards hat bro, it was pretty nice to have someone making sure your hair looks respectable at all times:

I was pacing like a mad man in the 5-10 minutes right before we went live on Friday. Those guys all had their chairs, but I was standing at my spot near the screen with nowhere to put my nervous energy. It was one of the more surreal moments of my life to be watching Kay Adams live on the monitor from Brazil—in the same way I would at home—and then having her “toss” it to me 90 seconds later. It almost felt like I was in a cartoon or something stepping into the live production.

For the most part, though, I felt pretty comfortable. I had fortunately been able to rehearse my segment multiple times. All of the producers and stage managers there were total pros, which helped put me at ease.

Even though I had basically zero broadcasting experience, the biggest saving grace for me was having a ton of reps with my teleprompter at home. I had purchased one for my studio set-up and I’ve used it regularly for the past two years (Deposit Kingdom videos, Swolecast overviews, social clips, etc.).

When they told me that my main segment was 2.5 minutes long, I knew I’d want a teleprompter—that’s a really long time to solo riff on global television.. If you’ve never used one before, a prompter can be very tricky to execute without sounding stiff, so I was incredibly grateful that I had unknowingly been preparing for that moment over the past couple years.

I’m still working on tracking down an HD version somewhere since the broadcast isn’t archived, but here’s a version that Fantasy Life’s Eliot Crist grabbed on his phone…

As far as the picks, I nailed the RB usage on both sides, whiffed on Justin Herbert, mushed Xavier Worthy, and bricked a half-court shot on KeAndre Lambert Smith almost solely so I could sneak the word “slappy” onto the broadcast. That said: no regrets.

I did exchange numbers with both Brandon and Derek and they both said they’d be down to do a show in the future so I’ll definitely be cashing that in at some point.

I still can’t believe this happened and can’t give enough thanks to everyone who made it a reality…

Alex and YouTube for the opportunity and taking a risk on a nobody, all of the great producers at NFL like Chris Weertz and Dean Christensen, the team at Synergy for the world class hospitality (someone was waiting for me at my gate when I landed lol), Brandon/Derek/Tyrann for being so welcoming to a fantasy nerd, Matthew Berry and Fantasy Life for all of the support, and everyone who tuned in (especially April in her pajamas) and sent me messages.

I don’t know what’s next—YouTube doesn’t have any more NFL games this year—but it is an experience I’ll never forget.

🤯 BLOCK PARTY & BULLY THE SIMS: Week 2 DFS Strategy, GPP Picks, & Sims Process. JMToWin breaks down the Week 2 slate before Youdacao and Bric75 walk me through the sims.

⏰ OFF & ON THE CLOCK: Week 2 Underdog DFS (Top Plays & Scrolls). Fun slate breakdown with Nez. Here are the pick ‘ems if you’d like to tail:

🔮 Week 2 NFL DFS Strategy for Underdog and DraftKings: Sleepers, Vomit Stacks, and More. Here’s my DFS column for Fantasy Life. I also hosted a “Week 2 DFS Jam” on the FL YouTube channel where I drafted teams, talked strategy, and answered questions from the chat.

🤓 FANTASY LIFE: Weekly Roundup. This week we recapped the rookie hits from Week 1, reacted to the Tank Bigsby trade, shared a sneaky sleeper WR to stash, and nervously explained why I’m willing to buy low on the Dolphins.

I regularly write the Fantasy Life Newsletter. Get it in your inbox free every morning:

🥃 AFTER DARK: Crossover Show w/ Nose Strip Nez. We drafted some Dawg Bowl teams for our YouTube members.

💪 THE SWOLECAST: Week 2 NFL DFS Picks. The one where Davis reached his tipping point.

🎉 BATTLE ROYALE BASH: A Pool Guy With A Sneaky Week 2 Stack. A very fun debut to the in-season version of the Bash where we got to meet some new faces and say hello to some old friends.

☣ LOLZ: DFS Sweat Etiquette & Companion Streams. Also, updates on the gambling tax provision.

📈 STAT CHASING: Week 1 Usage, Buy Lows, & DFS Plays. So stoked to have these shows back in our lives. Sack and Drico are top-tier analysts who share a ton of alpha. YouTube members can watch live on Tuesday nights.

We’ve got the Week 2 DFS Cram at 10:30 am ET on Sunday:

For After Dark shows, you can become a YT member for access or subscribe on Spotify for a private RSS feed (I post the video/audio there directly after the show).

And then we’ll have the ShipCast at 4pm ET:

🚶 Book #6 for August (60%): Playworld: A Novel by Adam Ross.

I’m still slacking. These past few weeks have been crazy, but I’ll wrap this up in the next week or so and pick something out for September.

🚶 Book #6 for July (COMPLETED): Things Become Other Things: A Walking Memoir by Craig Mod.
☁ Book #5 for June (COMPLETED): Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
🐊 Book #4 for May (COMPLETED): Gator Country: Deception, Danger, and Alligators in the Everglades by Rebecca Renner
🍌 Book #3 for April (COMPLETED): The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America’s Banana King by Rich Cohen
💉 Book #2 for March (FINISHED): Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe.
🐃 Book #1 for February (FINISHED): The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry

Got a question for me? Reply to this e-mail and I’ll get back to you…