Tuesday Afternoon Linebacker

Fantasy football playoffs are a harsh mistress. They’ll make you do weird things. Like watch a game you would normally not give a damn about. That happened to me this weekend as I tuned into the Denver-Kansas City match-up to see how my quarterback was doing. Similarly, in the NFL, a team like the Bucs at 5-9 are still mathematically alive for the playoffs. What the hell is up with that? And then you have Ricky. Ricky “Leave Me Alone” Williams, a man who can’t seem to stay away from the cameras right now. Even though he professes to want to be left to his business. I’m not sure what Ricky Williams has to do with the playoffs…. Uh, let’s get to it.

Really, It’s All Over
Yes. Again, mathematically, the Bucs are still alive in the NFC playoffs. But as TALB noted last week, the loss to the Chargers basically put a stake through the heart of those chances. And if you want to get really technical, the loss to the Panthers a few weeks ago was the real kill-shot for this season. Or, the 0-4 start might be considered the hemlock to the Bucs’ 2004 season.

Sunday was not anything new to me. I had seen my team play well for most of a game and then snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at the end. Of course, those were mostly Gators games I was watching, but that’s not important right now. What is important, and what I’ll get into more deeply in my post-season post-mortem, is that I think the Bucs need to more-or-less stand pat on personnel this off season. There’s a lot of good on the team, and I think with another training camp and another full season to get the system running that they’ll be able to do some good things next year and beyond.

Hopefully the Bucs can win at least eks of their remaining games. But I’m not sure of that anymore. Arizona is looking a lot tougher now than they were just a few weeks ago. This is going to be a tough off-season if the Bucs finish 5-11 or 6-10.

Maybe The NFL Should Use The BCS Too
The field for the Super Bowl tournament is nearly set. Of course, the beloved NFC is doing it’s best to field a sub-par team (or three) this time around. Which is why I am about 95% confident the AFC Champion is very likely going to win the Super Bowl (see below).

In the NFC basically it’s the Eagles and Falcons followed by everyone else. The Packers and Seahawks are schizophrenic at best this season. One week they’ll turn in a championship-worthy game, the next they’re blown out of town. And the wild-card situation is well documented. With many lamenting the possibility of a team at 9-7, 8-8, or even (gasp!) 7-9 making the tournament. On paper of course either the Eagles or Falcons should run all the way to the NFC Championship game. Which means that neither team will make it in this topsy-turvy year. Contrary to what I’ve been putting in the Super Bowl running item, I’m kind of leaning toward either the Seahawks or one of the wild-card teams to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl this year. But once the field is set, I’ll make a stronger prediction.

The AFC is the class of the NFL this year. For much of the 80’s and 90’s the NFC ruled pro football. But since the Broncos won their back-to-back titles, the balance has begun to shift. And now it seems to be fully over to the other side. Which means that the NFC is simply sending a lamb to the slaughter at Jacksonville against probably the Steelers or Patriots. Though you have to give serious consideration to the Chargers in the AFC. But, in my view, the Colts are not going to do so well. Right now they are sporting the league’s 78th ranked defense along with the well documented lofty offense. Such a setup will provide a great regular season when you have 9 games indoors. However, in the cold of open-air Foxboro and Pittsburgh in January that offense will sputter. And since the defense is no longer defending a 20 point lead, they’ll be exposed. And the offense of the other playoff teams aren’t so shabby either.

So basically, we’re going to see some hapless NFC team fed to whatever battle tested team emerges from the AFC. It’s sad to say, but Vince will not be on “our” side of the league.

Lucky Me
Oh boy. I almost screwed the pooch this week. That’s not a good thing to do during the first round of the playoffs. My brain had left me near the end of the Denver-Kansas City game. Actually, it left me a few days earlier when I decided to start the faltering Jake Plummer over the surging Matt Hasselbeck. Plummer had racked up a mighty 8 fantasy points by this time, so I was looking for something to help me out. So, against what I knew to be true, I attempted to add the Kansas City defense (they had a couple of INT’s and a return TD) to my roster, dropping the Arizona defense in the process. I knew it wouldn’t work, but I tried it anyway. Horror, my defense was empty and I could not move either KC or Detroit into the starting spot since their games were in progress. Which I knew would happen. But like I said, I tried it anyway. Scrambling through the waiver wire (Arizona wouldn’t clear until the 22nd) I had to find a good enough defense that was playing late. Lo and behold, the Jacksonville defense was still there.

I had toyed with the idea of adding them earlier in the week, but opted for Arizona instead as they faced Chris “Interception Machine” Chandler and the Rams. Jacksonville had been on the radar because they were facing the Packers. Normally, one wouldn’t want to have anything to do with a team facing the Packers late in the season at the Frozen Tundra. But having watched The Great(ed) One many times over the years I knew that he liked to force things. So with no oththe hoice I took Jacksonville on-board and hoped for the best. In the end, Jacksonville turned in a pretty good game; giving up 19 points (6 more were “against” the offense) and recording 2 sacks, 3 interceptions, and recovering 2 fumbles (for 13 fantasy points). Arizona managed 15 fantasy points.

In fact, with about 12 minutes to go in the DEN-KC game I sent an email to Prof Savage congratulating him on moving to the next round. With the remaining players, he should have killed me and I was not optimistic about my chances. I guess that’s why we play the games.

But it was Jerry Porter who saved my bacon this week. 148 yards and three touchdowns (25 points) is a pretty good day. Next week he faces the sieve that is the Kansas City pass defense.

As for next week, I am still alive in the playoffs. Having defeated Prof Savage’s Ass Clowns 96-65 to move into the semi-finals against the Gunslingers. The big line-up question for me will be Rudi Johnson of the Bengals (vs. the Giants) or Mike Pittman (vs. the Panthers). The Prof and I have played three times this season, coming to a very even 1-1-1 mark in the three games. It’s just too bad that the Prof had to lose to me this week. He has a good team. If only he had started Billy Volek and Joey Galloway.

Wow. The fantasy section is huge this week. But then again, it was a huge week. One final note. Over the last eight weeks, the Thunderers have won 6 games. All thanks to a little help from CNNSI. Check the “Start Em or Sit Em” section on Fridays. I can reveal this little secret because none of the teams left read this site. In fact, the only time in the last few weeks that I went against SE/SE’s advice I tossed out 31 points at the QB spot (Plummer [started] -3, Hasselbeck [bench] 28) in a game I lost by 7.

All Quiet
Not too much going on with the college game this week. There was a bowl game in D-1A and playoffs in the lower divisions. TTNHBC brought on some more coaches this week. Bringing some of his offensive staff, officially, to Gainesville.

The bowl season kicks into gear today with the Champs Sports Bowl in Orlando.

Running Items
WTF?
The score of the Rams-Cardinals collision, 31-7. And the Cardinals are the ones who put up 31.

Oh Ricky
Ricky now says that the Dolphins’ dismal season is not his fault. Okay, it’s not 100% his fault. But having your star running back quit football on the eve of training camp is sure hard to overcome.

Then he goes on to say that he quit mostly because he was scared that people would find out he smokes the sticky icky. Guess what Smokey? We all know. We knew within days of your retirement. Heck, the Bucs website was making fun of him for it by the second pre-season game.

Hopefully this man can get the mental help that it seems he so desperately needs. But he’s not likely to find it while studying holistic medicine.

Reverse Watch
During this past weekends’ games I found two instances of announcers properly calling ends-around. Bravo to the crews working Denver-KC and Tampa-New Orleans.

Grated Cheese
It seems the Lambeau Mystique is gone. The Packers have lost at home 4 times this season. It might have been that playoff loss to the Falcons a couple years back that broke the legend. A dome team comes into Lambeau in January and beats the Packers? Before that no one would have thought any team from anywhere could win in those conditions. But the Falcons did it and so began, in my opinion, the end of the Lambeau Mystique.

Worst. Call. Ever.
This week, WCU is not about anything in particular, but about one NFL rule that annoys me. It is known as the “5-15 Rule”. It happened in both the KC-Denver and TB-NO games (can you tell which ones I watched…). Basically, if there are two fouls on a play, one on each side, and one is a minor 5 yarder and the other a major 15 yarder, then 5 is thrown out and the 15 enforced.

I think that’s just dumb. It’s in response to back in the day when in this situation a personal foul was offset by illegal formation. Here’s the thing though. The illegal formation (or other such mundane, pre-snap 5-yard penalties) happens before the play starts. The offense is already breaking the rules before anyone gets a chance to do anything. It should be offsetting penalties, replay the down at anytime where both teams commit a foul on the play.

This might just be the foundation for another off-season TALB. My changes to the NFL…

Super Bowl XXXIX
Steelers vs. Eagles
Made it back around to the NFC East this week…

Next Week: Fantasy Playoffs, Bowling For Dollars, and much more…