Venture Capital and Fantasy Football Lessons

With the 2008 Fantasy Football season coming to an end, I thought I’d make a quick analogy between entrepreneurship and Fantasy Sports. When VCs look for startup investments, it often comes down to whether they see that certain spark in the entrepreneur. And if that entrepreneur happens to previously have had a successful startup, then that spark seems all the more appealing. If you’ve played fantasy football this past season you probably noticed that previous success had little to do with performance this year.

Photo credit: badrkhan via Flickr

Where do we even start? Tom Brady, the fantasy smash-hit last year ended his season on week two with an injury, also taking down with him the stats of his star receiver Randy Moss who now had to work with a new quarterback. LeDamian Tomlinson, fantasy beast last year, never fully recovered from a toe injury hurting his stats and his team. And the list goes on and on. I would say almost every team owner in my fantasy league had at least one disappointing player from the top picks this year. And even a fairly healthy player like Plaxico Burress ended up with suspensions for missing practice or shooting himself in the leg. Meanwhile some understudies like Brandon Jacobs or Le’Ron McClain, who in recent years were in the shadows of bigger names, have been great, and some big stars like Reggie Bush, who last year didn’t do very well, came back with a vengeance (at least in personal stats).

So what does this have to do with entrepreneurs? I mean ‘common, anyone will agree that health risks for tech entrepreneurs (other than stress) are not nearly as bad as those of football players. Also, startup folks rarely ever accidentally shoot themselves or get shot by others in night clubs. However, one thing any NFL player will tell you is that winning games is not just physical, it’s mental. You need to really want it more than the other guy. The 2007-2008 NY Giants proved this when they defeated the previously undefeated Patriots in the Super Bowl.

So between a first-time entrepreneur with lots of spark but no big exits, or the experienced one who’s already done it once or twice before, which one wants it more and can deliver? Will the experienced one, having tasted success be more motivated to go at it again, or will the first timer be hungrier than the rest of the pack? Feel free to comment.