David Sweet • E-mail

On Monday mornings, Damien Price can be found at his office computer. For eight months a year, the vice president for an insurance company will be checking work-related fare. But starting Sept. 8, his gaze will turn in another direction.

“All I do for multiple hours is hit the the waiver wire and look to pick up whatever player was hot the day before,” said Price, who is known as the “Statmaster” in his fantasy football league.

The reality of fantasy football — primarily played by males who are 18-34-years-old, such as Price — has not been pretty to widowed girlfriends over the years, and it’s increasingly drawing the ire of companies.

According to a study released two years ago by outplacement consultants Challenger, Gray and Christmas, fantasy football players in the workplace conservatively cost the U.S. economy about $500 million a week in lost productivity, slightly more than $9 billion during a 17-week season.

The Chicago firm based that on actual fantasy research conducted by players, such as scouring injury reports or making trades, which it estimated to occupy workers for more than an hour a week. It also added that fantasy football aficionados spend more than a half hour a day just thinking about their teams.

Video   $100,000 Fantasy Challenge Tiffany Simons and Gregg Rosenthal explain the game and suggest who to pick in Week 1. NBC Sports

In many ways fantasy football — whose season is set to kick off during Thursday night’s NFL season opener between the Washington Redskins and the New York Giants — is beginning to mimic college basketball’s March Madness. There, during the first round on a Thursday and Friday, games occur during office hours, and workers track scores and watch videos.

The problem is, fantasy football is a 17-week operation, where March Madness hampers work only for a few days.

More than 19 million people play fantasy sports in the U.S. and Canada, according to numbers released in 2007 by the Fantasy Sports Trade Association, and football comprises the majority, exceeding 14 million.

Major Web sites, such as ESPN.com and CBSSports.com, cater to players by offering leagues and fantasy columnists, as do hundreds of lesser-known sites. Yahoo! Sports has even inked Braylon Edwards of the Cleveland Browns as a fantasy football spokesman.

The World Championship of Fantasy Football begins Thursday with drafts in Las Vegas, Dallas, Atlantic City and Orlando. The pot is $1.6 million, with $300,000 going to the overall winner.

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How did this juggernaut happen, so that even a sports league as serious as the NFL is dedicating time on its NFL Network to an entity called fantasy?

Emerging first about a quarter-century ago was fantasy baseball, then known as Rotisserie League Baseball. Both fantasy baseball and fantasy football boasted hard-core participants into the 1990s, but the emergence of the Internet — which led to ease in keeping statistics and a better way to communicate via e-mail and message boards — fueled the boom.

The ability to set rosters and accomplish other fantasy football pursuits from work helps ensure its growth. If there’s one factor working against the popular hobby (aside from confused loyalties when a fan cheers against his favorite team), it’s time. What married man can justify trying to secure Donovan McNabb in a trade while his wife cooks dinner and kids cry for his attention? At work in front of a computer screen, he can see if his running back’s turf toe is truly serious while acting interested during a business phone call.

Of course, one assumes that employees would be working if fantasy football were stripped from them when, in reality they may just find other opportunities to waste time. Price said he would be “doing a little net surfing anyways” if he weren’t in a fantasy league, just like the majority of American chained to an office computer.

And when he heads home from work on Monday nights this fall, he’ll be glued to his machine on his own time.

"I have my computer open the entire time watching games while players’ point totals change,” he said. “I know how I am doing — always".

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