!Viva la adiccion! A hardcore player visits fantasy baseball's Mecca: Las Vegas, site of the world championship.(Sins And Losses)

My name is Brendan Roberts, and I am a fantasy sportsaholic. It started about 14 years ago, when my buddy Jon got me into an A.L.-only league. Before I knew it, I was in too deep, taking on six or seven leagues at once, sneaking around to see how John Smiley did in that night's start. Now I keep Baseball Tonight on picture-in-picture while the kids watch a Disney movie.

My addiction has brought me to, appropriately enough, Las Vegas--Sin City--where I am surrounded by others like me. But we are here to feed our jones, not to suppress it. Under the guise of SPORTING NEWS fantasy baseball expert, I am spending three days in the Mecca of the fantasy baseball world one at the Fantasy Sports Trade Conference with fellow industry folks, one at the high-stakes National Fantasy Baseball Championship and one at the even higher-stakes World Championship of Fantasy Baseball.

The competition, the trash talk, the chance to win someone else's money ... it's everything that drives this nation. But, man, can all that ever lead to some anxious times. I lost an 18-team expert league last year by one stolen base--I benched Alex Sanchez in September for what turned out to be a four-steal week--and it took me months to get over it. (Actually, after writing that sentence, I realize I'm still not over it. Sigh.) It's nice to know I am not alone.

In the 2003 World Championship league, Gerard Venezia of Staten Island, N.Y., had a 38-point Roto lead in July and a cool $30,000 halfway down his pocket. Corey Patterson's blown knee and a few otherwise minor injuries later, and Venezia was looking up at the team built by San Diegoans Hojin Kyung and Aram Penaranda for the title. Venezia nevertheless won $6,500 for his effort, but it felt like a loss. He cringes as he recaps it.

"It got to the point where I would isolate myself from my wife and son" says Venezia. "I would come home from work, kiss my son and then run to the computer:'

I'm told a mill worker from Wisconsin who won the 2002 World Championship of Fantasy Football actually had to take out a loan to participate in the event. And here I had the guts to ask someone else (God bless the fine people at SPORTING NEWS) to pay for my trip.

These people have flown into town to throw down the $1,250 NFBC league ...