Snakes totally ruin snake-style draft

Playoff hockey pool panic

By Sharon Miki, Humour Editor

Jon Cherry was just a regular guy looking to fit in with the bros when things took a biting and serpentine turn for the worse last Saturday—thanks to an unfortunately scaly misunderstanding.

Cherry, 20, recently moved to Vancouver and was looking to make friends. In a totally innocent and reasonable move, Cherry confided his loneliness to a coworker; when the coworker suggested that Cherry host a playoff fantasy pool draft party at his home to prepare for the upcoming NHL playoff season commencing on April 16, he jumped at the opportunity.

“Rich said to me, ‘Yeah, just like get some beer and snacks and I’ll invite everyone. It’ll be fun. Oh, and we’ll do the draft snake-style,’” said Cherry.

Traditionally, a snake-style draft is the term given to a method of picking players in which the draft order is reversed in even rounds. So, in a snake-style draft, if you picked first in the first round, you would go last in the next round and so on.

Not really being what you would call a “sports guy,” Cherry was nervous that he might make a social faux pas by not being totally prepared, so he really took Rich’s words to heart: he bought three kegs of beer, ordered catered hors d’oeuvres, and acquired 10 rattlesnakes—one for each guest.

“I was aware that the snakes were poisonous, but… I figured the guys wanted to show how tough they were, having a snake pick players for them. So I went with it,” explained Cherry.

When guests arrived at Cherry’s condo for the draft at approximately 2:05 p.m., they were not thrilled to walk into a den of poison, danger, and venom.

“AHHHHHHH!” said guest Kyle Chan, when asked to describe his reaction to the event.

Within moments of arriving, four of the guys had been bit, three were sobbing, and the brave remainders had gotten the hell out of there.

“I feel bad,” said Cherry, while changing the dressing on a horrible snake-inflicted wound on his left thigh. “Not just for the guys who got bit—though, of course, I sympathize with them—but also for my party. I put a lot of effort into it, all for nothing. I had even set up little pictures of each of the players for the snakes to slither over to, it would have been a really fun and exciting night.”

Unfortunately, Cherry may have to wait until 2015 for his next chance at a playoff pool: he is currently under investigation for charges of assault from many of his injured party guests.