Friendships were the best part of it, and I certainly do miss them

Today is the day that for about 15 years was one of the happiest days of the year for me.

From 1993 through 2008, I spent the last Saturday in March -- with a couple of exceptions -- getting together with nine other baseball fans to do a Rotisserie Baseball draft. Our league was called the Golden State League, and several of the members had founded it in 1984.

GSL, 2006

They grew up together, and those of us who came along later became part of the family. In the early years, they made a weekend of it -- golf, bowling, whiffle ball in addition to the draft itself.

Owners came and owners went, and after a spring of controversy in 1995, I became the commissioner. For the next 14 years, it was one of the happiest non-family parts of my life.

In 1999, we began going to Las Vegas for our draft weekend. For the next eight years, we did our draft at different Las Vegas sites. For the last four years of that time, we drafted at the home of one of our newer members who lived in a Del Webb retirement community just outside the city.

As the league grew older, some of the tensions between owners began getting worse and worse. Some owners held grudges toward others and one of the more successful owners seemed to be suffering more and more from mental illness.

It all came to a head in 2008, when we didn't even bother going to Las Vegas. We did the draft at one owner's home in the San Fernando Valley, and there wasn't much in the way of small talk or friendly conversation.

After that season -- the league's 25th year -- everything sort of fell apart and couldn't be put back together. Two of the best owners -- great guys, but not successful -- had decided to quit, and the owner who was sort of slipping into darkness had alienated so many people that there was no way to go forward.

As much as I tried to mediate things, my own efforts were so inept that I hurt someone who had become a very good friend and in fact, lost one of the most significant friendships in my life.

I never found another league like the GSL, and in recent years I have mostly just played in Internet leagues where no one knows anyone else. I won two leagues in 2012 and one last year. It isn't the same, though. The three times I won the Golden State League, I felt like I had really accomplished something.

I miss Bryce, Mike, John, Chad, Burt, Matt and Wayne. I'm still in a league with Joel, and I don't miss Jerome at all.

I sure do miss those weekends, though, and I probably always will.