Fantasy Minyan

How to assemble a fictional team of all-star prayers to help clinch the big 10 at home!

I know, we’ve been stuck in the house a bit too long. And for once, they actually cancelled shul! Come on, last month they were shooting us up in there, and they didn’t even cancel shul! This is big!

And the home minyan thing isn’t going over so big with the establishment Rabbinate. If they all realize we can hack our way to free shul in our living rooms that easily, who is gonna pay the building fund?

And to make matters even worse, then they went and cancelled professional sports. What are we gonna do?!

So, for all of my Israeli friends, who’s main source of entertainment of late has been voting, there is a concept in the USA called ‘Fantasy Football’. Let me explain. Basically, a bunch of schmendricks that can’t throw a ball, but know every statistic about every player that ever lived, choose a bunch of football players and assemble them into a fictional dream team of sorts. Then they use their team against their friends, to see who’s make believe team wins the most games that season.  The winner gets a pile of cash. Not bad. Yes, my friends, we are talking about adult grown men here, playing make believe sports with their peers. And my kids make fun of me for reading every book in The Witcher series.

In any event, while I was watching 10 guys sneak into Mr Rubenstein’s house (name changed to prevent identification) next door last Shabbos to have Schacharit, I thought maybe we all could learn from Fantasy Football, and assemble our own team of minyan going all stars so we could scrimmage a kiddish and run a few galilas.

So here are my 10 picks, in no apparent order.

Oh, but first, a few rules. It’s religion, you always need a few more rules:

1. Any one can be included, as long as they once lived in real life. No fictional characters. Sorry Obi Wan Kenobi. Jewish not Jedish.
2. Women can be included, at least in Fantasy Minyan, so I can eliminate half of the negative talkbacks a priori. Besides, there are no tefillin in Shabbos anyway. Go WOTW!
3. We will accept all conversions in our Fantasy league, since shul going status has gotten very complicated. We got people who walk to shul, the whole eruv thing, that weird key in a belt contraption, and all those little sephardic kids and the occasional Boomer who show up riding these really cool scooters.

And with no further ado, my Fantasy Minyan!

1. Lenny Kravitz. Hands down, Coolest. Jew. Ever. Has to be there.
2. Drake. Maybe even a bit cooler then Lenny. And since Yeezy started that whole prayer thing and is actually making money at it, how could the Drake man resist? By the way my kid has a bar mitzvah this fall. Can you come? You can call me on my..; Oh my God, did I just say that?
3. Bernie. I need my Uncle Sam to explain to the Bern that a trip to the Gulag wasn’t quite the summer in the Catskills. Maybe he’ll finally get a clue. Is he still around?
4. and 5) The chief Ashkenazi and Sephardic rabbis of Israel. Then we can finally find out if my kids who are half Polish and half Iraqi can eat Bamba this year on Passover
5. See above
6. Seinfeld – comic relief. Every minyan has one. Jerry: “I wanted to talk to you about Dr. Whatley. I have a suspicion that he’s converted to Judaism purely for the jokes.” Minister: “And this offends you as a Jewish person?” Jerry: “No, it offends me as a comedian.”
7. Anthony Bourdain. Stealth Jew. So kiddish club will rock.
8. Nigella – Nigellisima! And more food.
9. My attorney – In case any of you bored homebodies steal my stupid idea and find a way to monetize it before I do, so I can sue you. Don’t worry, we’ll settle
10. Moshe Rabeinu – the only guy who ever went one on one with the big guy and lived to tell the tale. Maybe he can save us from this plague and explain to the Jews how to vote in a majority in their own country? You never should have hit the damn rock bra! We need you bad…

So feel free to send in your top 10 Minyonairs, we may be flying solo for quite some time. Obviously, if I’m literally so bored  that I came up with this drek, I’m really missing the loshon hara express in the back row of my shul. At least now all the bad stock tips I get from Morris and Haimy will all actually be worth something – in three more years! Shalom!