Week 4 Preview: Renal Failure vs. La Machine

by Renal Failure


Zorro Cat looks forward to a Renal Failure victory this week...

It's a rematch from last year's championship game, though both teams are far from championship form this year. The Failure and The Machine are 1-2 and have had their issues in the early stages of the 2010 season, with La Machine having trouble with the autodraft and Renal Failure losing Ryan Grant after the first game and having the Bald Spots throw four bears into orbit on us last week.

The Yahoo! projections show Renal Failure dominating La Machine 103-79, and as pleasing as it is for us to see the People's Champion winning our revenge game by such a large margin, we find the numbers a bit inflated.

Chris Johnson is projected for 28 points against Denver, but high projections like that are never to be trusted. And while we're fine with Tom Brady's 24 projected points vs. Miami, we're not so sure of New Orleans DEF's 11 point projection. Even Pierre Thomas's 13 projected points seem highly optimistic, even against a bad team like Carolina.


Ninja Vicki and Samurai Cathy suggest La Machine start Alex Smith this week...

La Machine is going to depend on Matt Schaub and Cedric Benson to have big days because Ray Rice has knee troubles and will probably see a bunch of his carries given to Willis McGahee. There's the newly-acquired Peyton Hillis sitting on Chris's bench, but really, does the defending champion want to put his trust in a member of the Cleveland Browns?

Roddy White's been paying dividends at WR, but Terrell Owens hasn't been setting the world on fire. La Machine could start Braylon Edwards in TO's place, but then that would put Chris on the shit-list of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and those women are relentless. (Side Note: The Westminster Dog Show people have been burning a dog house on Rambler's lawn for having Michael Vick on his roster. And you don't even want to know what the Lifetime Network has been doing to LOBO for having Ben Roethlisberger on his team.)

One edge La Machine might have is that he has New England's Stephen Gostkowski kicking for him, and if Renal Failure's bear-chucking machine Tom Brady stalls out against Miami, Gostkowski could get some field goals.


Gostkowski blesses you, my child...

Without a doubt, this is the most important game on the Week 4 schedule. The winner goes to 2-2 and gets back into the playoff hunt; the loser goes to 1-3 and sees their road to the post-season become that much more difficult. Still, La Machine started the 2009 season 1-3 and won the championship, so it's not an impossible position. So since it's a familiar place for Chris, he should drop to 1-3 and try to recreate his magical run of '09 while Renal Failure tastes Week 4 victory. And just to bring balance back to the universe, Renal Failure should run win the rest of their games and duplicate their magical 12-2 regular season from '09 as well.

The People have waited a long time for vengeance against La Machine, the team that ruined our perfect '09 season and then took the championship from us. Revenge is a soup best served hot and steaming and poured in your lap, and we've got a cauldron of chicken noodle heating up for Sunday.


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Renal Failure also likes lobster bisque, but finds its too thick for proper vengeance-filled crotch scaldings. You want a thinner broth that will seep through the fabric and the zipper.

Threat Level Bear Force One Has Been Declared!

by Renal Failure


It was that kind of week for the People's Champ...

We're starting to get the feeling the 2010 HBFFL season is just so all the other teams from 2009 can get revenge on us. Apparently our total collapse in the Championship game wasn't enough to satiate everyone's thirst for vengeance.

Last season when we played the Bald Spots, their QB Tom Brady put up 60 points just by himself, yet Renal Failure was able to survive and win the game. This time around the Bald Spots said "All right, you can survive one player putting a bear into space, but how about FOUR?"


My God... it's full of bears...

Your Bald Spot bear-throwers for Week 3...

• Philip Rivers: 41 points
• Anquan Boldin: 37 points
• Adrian Petersen: 36 points
• Brandon Marshall: 27 points

Any combination of these three starters for the Bald Spots beat our whole starting Renal Roster (the final score being 156-86). And all four of them handily beat our optimal roster as well.

So when your opponent puts up just as many points in one week than you had scored the previous two combined, you don't need to spend much time staring at your team and lamenting that this wasn't the week to bench Hines Ward (9pts) and Dwayne Bowe (12pts) in a fit of pique, or that your prediction of David Akers outscoring Jay Feely was wrong, or that your idea that Clinton Portis would run all day on the Rams was outlandishly wrong as well. You just thank Tom Brady (30pts) and Chris Johnson (29pts) for keeping the score relatively close for a little while and look forward to Week Four, or more specifically to Week 12 where Renal Failure gets another shot at the Bald Spots. Because as regular readers to the HBFFL will know, Renal Failure is all about revenge games.


I shall leave you as you left me, as you left her. Marooned for all eternity, at the bottom of the HBFFL standings. Buried alive.

The People have known pain this season, what with losing vaunted starting flex-option Ryan Grant for the season after the first game and having the 2nd-most points ever scored on us in the HBFFL (Joe O. under the Fantasy Virgin moniker put up 168 on The Ramblers in '08). But the People are confident there are brighter days for the People's Champion because the Bear Apocalypse hit us early in the season, giving us plenty of time to circle the wagons like no other team does.

The defending champion La Machine comes into the People's House for Week Four. Nothing like a little revenge game to get our Fantasy Football mojo working again. We'll preview that match-up later in the week, but before we sign off on this post the People's Champion would like to ask the other HBFFL teams this question: Our apocalypse came in Week Three, when will yours come?


When kitten videos aren't enough to ease your suffering, you have to go metal. And Angela Gossow can scream the flesh off a bison.


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Renal Failure sort of has its own awareness ribbon color. Green is for kidney disease, which can cause renal failure. Green is also for glaucoma, but those people won't know if you're wearing their ribbon or not.

Walk Like an Egyptian, Bitch

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Oh wait. That was the Bangles -an American all-female band that originated in the early 1980s. They were cute an all, but this other band ‘The Go-Go’s” has probably had them all killed by now.

The Bengals are a bit more germane to the HBFFL juggernaut of titanic, hard-hitting sports journalism you’ve come to expect here. So if you don‘t mind I would prefer to skip your weird preoccupation with 80s trivia and get down to the number-crunching scientific football insights. Don’t get me wrong. I could go on and on about 80s crap forever -I might have to someday for historic purposes: in the wake of an oasis of cocaine, dense concentrations of hairspray, and highly combustible automobiles, there‘s only like six of us left.

Watching Sunday’s game against the Panthers … well, I don’t want to single anyone out, but I immediately wanted Carson Palmer dead. There should be a 54th place on the roster for a guy who does that: the coach should signal for him, and he comes out onto the field; cradling the wayward quarterback's head in his lap, rocking softly, he soothingly instructs the guy think about happy thoughts like his first kiss or something, then pow, puts a 45-caliber slug right through his fucking noggin.  I‘ll bet you would see those interceptions and fumbles dry up real fast, too: nothing is better for Predator Press morale than the Predator Press Halftime Show.

The weird thing is Bengals won. One so-called editorialist went as far as to say that the Bengals won in spite of Carson Palmer. Then I discovered a lot of news people are ripping off our idea to do sports commentary! ESPN, Fox … O holy Christ there’s like a dozen of them already.

So yeah -now I am furious with Carson Palmer again.

But it‘s been 24 hours now, and I‘ve ‘cooled off‘ a bit. It occurs Carson Palmer being dead will make him virtually impossible to trade. Another thing? He’s playin freakin Cleveland next week … who wants to see the Browns get beat by a team with a dead quarterback?

How much worse can it get, really?

Really.

Tuesday Morning QB: Where the North wins again

Last week I didn't play the race card after losing 102-90 to Static's Team Krapsody even though he is black or at least his avatar is, but the previous week I did play the misogynist card after winning 72-51 over Bex's Butterflies since Bex ostensibly is a woman or at least plays one online.

So by virtue of that logic, that means this week I can play the North vs. South card after winning 117-102 over Red Raider's Eunuchs since Red Raider claims to be from Mississippi, and so I will.


To wit:

• Exhibit A: Five of my eight players, including my defense, this week were from teams from the North, meanwhile, only four of Red Raider's eight players, were from the South, meaning he was split half and half between North and South.
  
• Exhibit B: Ten of the 16 players on his roster are from teams from the North. Twelve of the 16 players on my roster, meanwhile, are from teams from the South, and I'm thinking of kicking two of those no good Johnny Rebs back to the swamp.

Bottom line: I didn't, and obviously don't, doubt my northern roots whereas he did, and obviously does, doubt his southern roots.


Maybe in the future, Red Raider will learn to keep his head...



For next week's Tuesday Morning QB, I'll go back to being politically correct and not mock anyone based on ethnicity, gender or region as I face Bald Spots. I'm pretty confident I'll still be able to mock, though, as his stud running back, Adrian Peterson, will be on the bench. I just haven't picked the angle from which I'm going to mock yet.

I'm sooooo screwed!

You know it's going to be a bad day when the guy you picked is running in reverse.

Author's Note: Luckily, this was in my other league. In this league, I played Marques Colston who so far has 2 receiving yards. Lance Moore, are you kidding me?

But I Didn’t Exhale

 Predator Press

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Prompted by the recent Felix Jones Fire Sale and a baking criticism of NFL media accuracy, I’m going to revisit the 'Pre-Draft Rankings' issue for hopefully the last time in 2010. It‘s Week 3, and the flaws of the autodraft logic are starting to become increasingly visible on the teams that trustingly employed it. Besides … as most of you already know I like lecturing extensively on things I don‘t know anything about. It‘s good practice for when I run for Congress.

I didn’t have Felix Jones in my “Exclude” list, but I vaguely remember bumping him waaaaaay down in my rankings because he is virtually interchangeable with Marion Barber. I bumped them both in fact: as I learned from Seattle last year, teams that are “balanced” like that are a pain in the ass to second-guess at gametime. If you look at Seattle’s depth chart and cross your eyes, they will have changed their lineup entirely.

We know that a player that is fantastic in “real” life can be virtually worthless in fantasy football, right?  In theory, Yahoo operates off of the same media -or lack thereof- we do, and previous to Week 1 we had only incomplete preseason team performances, last year’s statistics, and wild speculation to work with.  2010 fantasy football scoring had no “frame of reference” yet; in fact at that point, Yahoo couldn’t devalue two fine running backs like MB and FJ properly.

Nonetheless, a simple intuitive call can be made with a little research.

No, I didn’t “score” either one of them. Let’s say I didn’t like the price of what was likely going to be a fifth round draft pick. I can live with that.

-And there’s Jones on the waiver wires already.

Week 3 Preview: Renal Failure vs. Bald Spots

by Renal Failure (aka the People's Champion)


Look upon your fantasy football schedule... and despair!

Week 3 in the HBFFL... where teams stop fucking around and get down to business. Where 0-2 teams try to get back into the season, 1-1 teams look to jump over the .500 mark, and 2-0 teams look to maintain the momentum of their awesome starts. Whatever your situation, this is the week to circle the wagons, and if you were paying attention last season you'd know that no one circles the wagons like Renal Failure.

Yahoo! Projections have the Bald Spots beating the People's Champion 91-86, mainly on the projection of Adrian Petersen putting up 23 big points on Detroit. And perhaps that's a fair assessment, but Yahoo! is discounting Tom Brady yet again, only projecting him for 22pts against a horrid Buffalo Bills team after coming off a frustrating game against the NY Jets. Bill Bellichek is a bitter man, so we see him telling Brady to launch multiple bears into space this game.

The People's Champ is also being discounted at the WR position, as we're starting Mark Clayton and Nate Washington instead of Dwayne Bowe and Hines Ward. It may seem like a fit of pique to bench our usual starters - and, to some extent, that's true - but it's also a relatively smart play as Clayton and Washington have the hot hand, Bowe's not getting anything from Matt "2008 was a fluke year" Cassell, and Pittsburgh is starting Charlie Batch at QB this week who is merely a step up from starting someone who lost their throwing arm in a fight with the Yakuza.


My mistake, she's way better than Charlie Batch.

Not to say the Bald Spots are undeserving of their high projected score. Philip Rivers is playing against a very non-special Seattle defense and doesn't have young RB Ryan Mathews in his backfield this week, so we're going to issue an Orbital Bear Watch for Rivers, unless Mike Tolbert bashes in all the TD's from the goal line.

Brandon Marshall doesn't have to deal with Daryl Revis when the Dolphins play the Jets, Anquan Boldin will get better than average chances to put up big numbers against the Browns, and Matt Forte is likely to have an average day against the Packers, which is fine because AP will pick up the slack against Detroit in what we'll designate as an Orbital Bear Warning.


The highest level on the Bear Threat Level Chart is, of course, BEAR FORCE ONE. Once Threat Level Bear Force One has been declared, go to your local gay bar and stay there until Tuesday because you don't want to see what happened to your Fantasy Team on Sunday and Monday.

But unless you've got the memory of the guy from Memento, you'll remember that no one circles the wagons like Renal Failure. Tom Brady is an Orbital Bear Warning against the Bills, Chris Johnson will be looking to rebound from a horrid performance against Pittsburgh to get himself back on track for the 2,500 yards he plans on having by season's end, Clinton Portis is going to see a lot of time with the ball vs. the porous St. Louis Rams, and Jason Witten and the Cowboys look to reestablish themselves this week against a Houston Texans team that gives up big numbers to tight ends according to Yahoo!.

So the tie breaker for this game will come down, in true Wild Card (bitches!) fashion, to the kickers. Renal Failure has perennial Top Two kicker David Akers who is always busy. Bald Spots have Jay Feely who is one step above someone who lost their kicking leg to a zombie outbreak.


Our mistake again... she's much better than Jay Feely.

It won't be a blow-out, but it won't be a low-scoring affair either. Renal Failure didn't lose consecutive games last season and doesn't look to start either because no one circles the wagons like the People's Champion.


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Renal Failure might be into amputee chicks, but only if those limbs have been replaced with deadly weapons.

Cash-Strapped 2010 Preds Pressed to Barely Tolerate Additional Sponsors

Predator Press



"We will make coffee metal.
-We will make everything metal."
*footthingy: Soooooo jazzed we have another team manager that is a Metalocalypse fan, I wanted to add one for the Holidays.

And no, the Islameter isnt going off .... hell I don't think this guy is even Jewish.

So Merry Future Christmas HBFFL,

Haha! And fucks you.




*another 'footthingy.' like a sub-foot Thanksgiving/Christmas fungus you don't have to spray for:

We Threw a Week Two and Nobody on My Team Showed Up

by Renal Failure


This is how Week 2 went for the People's Champion...

The cold, hard fact of Fantasy Football life is that during the course of the season you are going to have a bad week. And by bad fantasy week, we don't mean when your wet dream about Inez Sainz suddenly morphs into a wet dream about Jessica Tandy. No, we're talking about when most of your stud starters fail to perform while your opponent has everyone clicking on all cylinders, leaving you to wonder "Where is my team and why aren't they scoring?"


"What I want from each and every one of you is a hard-target search of every gas station, residence, warehouse, farmhouse, henhouse, outhouse and doghouse in this area. Your missing fugitive is the Renal Failure starting lineup."

A lot of the blame for our 105-61 drubbing goes to the Pittsburgh Steelers. For one thing, their defense put up 24 big points for Don and his Eunuchs while keeping the cornerstone of the Renal Roster Chris Johnson to only 4 points (breaking his streak of consecutive 100-yard rushing games). Then Pittsburgh's offense sucked so bad that our top receiver Hines Ward didn't get a single point.

The Renal Bench outperformed the starters with Mark Clayton and Nate Washington individually outscoring both Ward and Bowe combined, and with Clinton Portis outscoring both Chris Johnson and Pierre Thomas combined as well. So the People can take solace that the Renal Bench looks to be rather deep, especially once our trade of Drunk Driver Braylon Edwards for Sydney Rice goes through. Yeah, Rice is out until after the halfway part of the season, but Renal Failure is investing in the future.


Are you on the right track toward retirement? What about college for your children? What if you have to play Renal Failure again in Week 11? Or if Braylon Edwards has to drive you to the doctors?

We did get two things right from our preview last week: one was that Tom Brady would exceed his projected total, but 24 points is far from throwing a bear into orbit. The second was that Dwayne Bowe's performance could only go up, and it did. He quadrupled his point output from last week from 1 to 4 points. But the Philly offense was clicking under Michael Vick, only allowing David Akers to kick 5 extra points instead of the plethora of field goals we thought he'd be booting. Hell, we didn't even get the predictions on our opponents right, as Rashard Mendenhall had a poor showing for the Steelers, Michael Turner left the Atlanta game early, and Tony Romo outscored Tom Brady.

Fact: Don's squad showed up this week ready to rumble and ours didn't. Watch out for the Eunuchs. They may not have balls, but they've got some strong bear-chucking arms.

Now, getting back to our original point about bad fantasy weeks. Last season, we didn't have our bad week until the Championship Game (losing 127-62 to La Machine, the only time that year we scored under 80 points), so we're hoping now that we've got this bad week out of our system we'll be able to run the table and win the league championship.

Fact: Both previous HBFFL champions La Machine and Fantasy Virgin (aka Joe O. faking being his wife Leigh) started their seasons 1-1. See, the trends are still with Renal Failure, so if the rest of the league thinks they can jump on top of the People's Champion, you'd best be backin' up off us.


We never met our daddy...

Week Three sees the Bald Spots coming into the People's House to test Renal Failure's resolve. The last time these two teams met was the infamous Tom Brady 60-point game of '09 that gave birth to the best fantasy football catch phrase ever: throwing a bear into outer space. What new saying will be conceived this time around? Perhaps our preview later this week will have some clues. Until then, go read some books before irony takes that ability away from you.


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Renal Failure is not a dimension of sight or sound but of mind. A really sick mind.

Braylon Edwards Arrested: Unfinished Rambler Validated In Not Accepting Trade

Braylon Edwards
Photo courtesy of Benjamin Chodroff on Flickr

This post earlier this afternoon from Lobo reminded me of how I could have almost got played last week.

After I picked up Brandon Jackson, I received a couple of trade offers from the Ryan Grant owner, Renal Failure. The first was for that playa pictured above and mentioned in Lobo's post.

I'm not sure what my exact thoughts were in rejecting the trade, but I think it was something along these lines:

Get that shit out of here. Are you kidding me?

Now with Edwards' arrest and what should be a suspension, I am validated in my initial decision.

Now I just have to hope that one of the playas on the defense RF tried to trade me (a defense for Jackson? why didn't you just try to trade me a tight end? I mean, come on) can get arrested so I can feel doubly validated.

Photo courtesy of Keith Allison on Flickr

I know. Good luck with that, huh?

Braylon Edwards Learns Traded to La Machine, Gets Shit-Hammered

Predator Press

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Jets' Wide Receiver Busted for DWI

Tuesday Morning QB: Where I didn't get to play the race card against Static's Team Krapsody since I lost

After attacking the gender of my opponent, Bex, in last week's Tuesday Morning QB post, I said I wouldn't go after the ethnicity of this week's opponent, Static, in today's Tuesday Morning QB post. That doesn't mean that before the outcome, I didn't think long and hard about playing the race card in this week's post, because I did. How could I not think about playing the race card when my opponent's avatar is this:

The possibilities were endless.

However, after comparing our rosters, I counted six individual white players on his team to four individual white players on my team, so I quickly dropped that idea. And when it came down to whom we each played, we actually were even steven in the race department: two white guys in Aaron Rodgers and Brent Celek for me to two white guys in Joe Flacco and Garrett Hartley for Static.

So so much for playing the race card...

...plus it would have worked only if I had won, which by virtue of losing 102-90, I didn't...well...win. There's no fun in making fun of a black guy who wins, unless you're a member of the Tea Party.

In the end, the game between Static and me came down to a pure numbers game.

Even if I had played Austin Collie instead of Steve Breaston and Arian Foster instead of Brandon Jackson, I only would have gained 10 points and still lost.

Hey, I'm just calling a spade a spade. You know what I'm saying?

It would seem like each week's of Tuesday Morning QB just gets riper and riper for the comic possibilities. First, I faced Bex's Battling Butterflies, a too-cute name for a team and a woman team owner to boot, then this week Static's Team Krapsody, which seemed too good a name to be true in terms of mockery and a black team owner to boot. Unfortunately, not everything as it seems. Next week I face Red Raider's Eunuchs. However, it might be more difficult than it seems since I'm not sure how to kick an opponent in the balls when he doesn't have any. I might just have to kick his ass.

Fans of Bad Teams Use Yahoo Search

"One is an accident, two is a coincidence, three is a trend."

I have no idea where that saying came from, or who said it but we are clearly at the coincidence stage when it comes to Yahoo Trends on Sundays and crappy football teams.

Last Sunday the Lions/Bears game was in the top-ten of Yahoo's Trends list:

Ironically enough, that game featured the infamous Calvin Johnson non-touchdown reception. You know, the one that was ruled an incomplete pass because he did not hold onto the ball for ten minutes. And there was a lack of a "second act", whatever the hell that means.

Has the NFL suddenly gone Shakespeare?

 True to form for 2010, another crappy game ended up in the top-ten of the Yahoo Trends list yesterday:

Rams vs. the Raiders? Really?

And like last week, there was a reality check when you looked into the trend results...

The hundreds of people that are Raiders fans did not get to see their team win the game. They also did not see Jason Campbell get benched. Or see Darren McFadden rush for 145 yards.

Still, despite that bittersweet outcome, we are just one week away from establishing a trend.

Okay, we aren't. The fans of crappy teams are.

Now if you will excuse me, I need to watch for next week's bad game trend.

I also need to make a waiver claim for the Asian Unicorn. My team needs all the luck it can get.

Ines Sainz Story Could Have Been Worse

In all the talk about the Ines Sainz story, and the weighing-in of fellow HBFFL writers Bex, and LOBO not just once but twice, there was one angle that thankfully did not come to fruition...

What if Joe Namath was around on that fateful night?



Things could have been much worse.

The Bottom Feed

Predator Press

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I suppose I’m inherently obligated to at least one “serious” post where I wax and wane boringly on my overall battle plan.

So here it is.

-For posterity.

Rather than white-knuckling games based on a highly-coveted QB this year, I didn’t even select one until the autodraft forced me to. And even then I removed some -I didn’t want Favre, Kolb, et cetera.

In both leagues, however, I "botched" my desired backup QB and got Ben Roethlisberger. This was not necessarily a bad thing -just wholly unanticipated: while Big Ben wasn't very high in my draft priorities, he wasn't in my "Exclude" list as I thought he would be long gone at that point. So when that late pick rolled around he was still available, pow, the AutoDraft picked him.

Oops.

Matters complicated quickly, and in both leagues I lead in transactions: each currently has fifteen recorded waiver-wire moves by me, I've done some trades as well. (The second highest number of waiver-wire moves for both leagues is half or less ... I’m surprised you guys haven’t accused me of tying up the waiver wires as a strategy!) Worse -with my bye week coverage slots opening up and my Michael Vick-esque QB rotations- I see myself as having another six moves or so before mid-October as I refine the mid-to-late season.

Minimum.

Why? My original plan -to “double-dip” in easy-to-aquire QB/WR/RB pairings and triples- now must accommodate what I promised I wouldn’t do in 2010: nurse another potential 2009 Westbrook, aka Ben Roethlisberger. Cripes, this is even worse than the Westbrook debacle if you think about it: Westbrook was a running back. Roethlisberger is a freakin quarterback. It's like having negative points on your bench. A lot of negative points.

Nonetheless, I’m kinda excited to see how it all pans out because my “disposable QB” tactic seems to work exactly as planned -in fact, all this draft strangeness seems to underline the success. In my other league I had Stafford and Roethlisberger ... and Stafford -in an eerily Westbrook-like move- inconsiderately got his arm ripped off in the very first game. If I had squandered early round picks on Brees or Rodgers and that happened, I would have been completely screwed already. But by virtue of this deliberately-sought flexibility, I can still make a good run with unwanted "QB leftovers.” True a Michael Vick may only be good for a game or so ... but I can get a Hasselbeck, a Bradford, perhaps even a cast-away Favre down the road. Rothlisberger's Week Six "event horizon" is worth another notation here -I may be enjoying a huge shift in gears once that suspension is complete, no matter who I have assembled in the meantime.

And statistics be damned, there’s just a handful of guys I’ve wanted for no good reason whatsoever. Like 99% of the time I see Malcom Floyd play I think he is incredibly promising; this year I got him, but Legedu Naanee is challenging Floyd for the role of the Chargers’ favorite recieving target. I acquired Naanee -who was soup dujour at the time- and waivered Floyd ... but I knew I could get Floyd back because he was less-than-mediocre last week, and everyone is still salivating over their superstar draft goodies. Three maneuvers that seemed circular on the face actually gave me a solid backup defense and almost the entire pass-happy SD receiving corps; a few weeks should be enough time to shake out who Phillip Rivers deigns his new wide-receiving pet to be, and I’ll have another roster option -handy when you’re going week-to-week with quarterbacks in the short term.

(Admittedly, Vincent Jackson returning to the Chargers’ lineup would really screw me here -in fact, the Chargers‘ seemingly-rattled debut got me a bit worried. But luckily they seem to be "staying the course," no matter how stupid and insane that course seems to be.)

Lastly, I succeeded at something else a bit more on the subtle side -I even mentioned it earlier in this post. Predator Press will have a significant percentage of bye weeks out of the way by Week Five, with particular regard to kickers and defenses. Yes I need a backup TE for Vernon Davis, but that isn’t until Week Nine … and at that point, a lot of you other managers will have slimmed down rosters and dropped a few good ones (and heck ... at that point a few Free Agents my be developing).

I’m not sayin I got it all figured out -in fact on the contrary there’s a handful of you guys I’m not likely to beat under any circumstances as things stand. But win or lose, I’m looking forward to watching some of my fave players and actually rooting for them this year.

-And through due diligence, build this season inch by inch by inch by inch ...

Sainz Goes Marching In, Flees Screaming

Predator Press

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The more I think about this Ines Sainz thing, the more annoyed I get. It really illustrates the difference between “Journalists” and “Entertainers” nicely: "Journalists" don’t become The Story.

And stripped of the trappings of “Journalism,” I’m almost offended at her being offended. They didn’t sneak into her bedroom, build a locker room around it, and then stuff it with crude naked guys while she was sleeping.

Saintz went in under her own power.

-disguised as a "Journalist."

Now I, conversely, am a pulp schlock-slinging football fan … and I cannot imagine anything that would get me into a team locker room post-game. I don’t care if it’s the Superbowl, an Jesus played Mohamed.

Besides … Jesus would kick the crap out of Mohamed, and Mohamed gets cranky.

Week 2 Preview: Renal Failure vs. Eunuchs

See you all in 2011...

Ryan Grant may be out for the season, but Renal Failure is far from finished as we gear up for a Week Two slugfest with Week One's highest-scoring losing team The Eunuchs. Grant's loss hurts but is not a fatal blow to our season because The People's Champion drafted well and will be starting Pierre Thomas in Grant's place (and because Rambler snatched up Brandon Jackson off the free agent list mere seconds after the story of Ryan Grant's season being over hit the ESPN ticker, selfish bastard), ensuring that our ground attack will keep putting up points for us.

As of Thursday, the Yahoo! Match-up has the Eunuchs up 84-83 on the People's Champ, but this supposedly low scoring affair is deceiving. Both Tom Brady and Chris Johnson have tough match-ups against the Jets and Steelers, and their projected scores of 19 and 16 reflect that, but you also have to remember that they are Tom Brady and Chris Johnson. They exceed expectations habitually. We call this duo Bear NASA because they are always tossing bears into outer space.


Throwing a bear into outer space = awesome fantasy day (except for the bear, who dies cold and alone in the vacuum of space thanks to Lou Ferrigno)

Also, Yahoo! projects Tony Romo to have a slightly better day than Tom Brady (21-19), which we're not buying, mainly out of our hatred for Dallas. But we've got one of Romo's favorite targets Jason Witten on the Renal Roster to cut into those Romo points, and word from Yahoo! is that Romo's opponents this week, the Chicago Bears, are soft against tight ends.

Hakeem Nicks threw a bear up for the Eunuchs in Week One, and while the Giants/Colts game looks to be a pass-happy affair I wouldn't count on another 25 point day from Nicks. On the People's side, however, Hines Ward could easily have another 1oo yard receiving day for 15 points, and maybe even add a touchdown as well. And Dwayne Bowe's production can only go up from Week One's single point.

Mendenhall and Turner for the Eunuchs will likely have big days, so what Week Two will come down to is the kicker and the Defense/Special Teams, and traditionally that is where Renal Failure dominates. The Eagles tend to stall in the red zone so that means more field goals for David Akers, and the Saints are playing a struggling 49ers squad. The Eunuchs have Mason Crosby of the Saints doing the kicking, and the Saints know how to punch it into the end zone on a regular basis. Plus the Pittsburgh D is not going to have its way with Vince Young, Chris Johnson, and a surging Tennessee Titans offense.


Renal Failure's in-house consultants Ninja Vicki and Samurai Cathy suggest that Don should pick up Ryan Grant and start him this week, as well as trade Chris for Sidney Rice and start him too. Be bold, Don. Be bold!

Neither team will likely breach the century mark in points, but they'll likely get to the 90's and the Wild Card (bitches!) likely will get to 2-0 because the trends state that when Renal Failure starts the season 1-0 they won't lose again until November.


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---Renal Failure got to be the People's Champion by winning the People's Primary.

Elephants have BIG trunks (and other things I learned in Kindergarten)

I am a pretty big deal. I didn’t know if you knew that or not. I am Bex and (once in a blue moon) I write the Blog of Bex. But that’s not why I’m a big deal. No, I’m a big deal because I have boobs. Boobs are awesome. Ask anybody. Another person with boobs is Ines Sainz. Do y’all know her? She’s a television reporter with TV Azteca. She’s been in the news lately because of some shenanigans that went on during and after the Monday night NFL game.

I read in the news that she was embarrassed. When I first heard this I wondered if maybe she wasn’t embarrassed by the ridiculous programming on TV Azteca. I mean seriously…have you ever seen one of their insane talk shows? Schmaltzy host? Check! Mostly naked ladies jiggling around the set to sudden bursts of funky music? Check!! Designated buffoon who overacts every scene as if his very life depends upon it? Oh yeah, they’ve got that, too. And don’t even get me started about the soap operas.

But no, she’s embarrassed because she went purposefully into a professional football teams’ locker room and, apparently, got an eyeful. Wha…?!! For chrissakes. What kind of moron goes into a locker room and then “dies of embarrassment” when she sees what she sees?!

Let’s roll down the facts, shall we??

• The Jets are a football team.
• The team is made up of male players.
• Men have penises.
• Judging by the tightness of their pants, some of them are probably quite large.

She should probably write them a thank you note.

But, in this crazy era when some douche bag pours a cup of hot coffee into her own lap and is successful in suing the company that sold her that cruel java weapon, the Jets are probably fuqued. I love how she stated that she tried not to look anywhere. As my homie Yoda once said, “Do or do not. There is no try.” But Sister, for real. It is in poor taste to take a gander at some dudes wedding tackle and then later complain that you were embarrassed by what you looked at.

PS Unlike you guys, I had no idea who she is. So I googled her. Now I know what I'm going to wear the next time I want to really be taken seriously at work:

UPDATE: Everything is Cool Now

Predator Press

[LOBO]

According to Yahoo, the NFL is condemning remarks made by Clinton Portis concerning female reporters in the locker room -a room where maybe 30 violent quarter-ton testosterone-addled glandular freaks, often in extreme states of undress, answer questions and offer commentary about their recent bone-crushing confrontations.

Greg Aiello, League Spokesperson, says Portis’ comments are “clearly inappropriate, offensive, and have no place in the NFL.”

In response, Portis -the running back for the Washington Redskins- issued a contrite statement, acknowledging among other things “[Reporters] have a tough job.”

I feel better now .. Don’t you?

Tuesday Morning QB: Where I gambled against Battling Butterflies and still miraculously (snicker) won

As Kenny sings: "You got to know when to hold 'em. Know when to fold 'em. Know when to walk away and know when to run."

This week in fantasy football, I didn't know any of the above as I gambled, but somehow still managed to pull off the win 72-51 over Bex's Battling Butterflies.

Aside: Battling Butterflies: What the hell kind of name is that? I swat you away, killer butterflies, with my butterfly-swatter named Aaron Rodgers.

The score should have been 138-72, if we both had played our "optimal lineup" according to Yahoo GameChannel/StatTracker.

This is where the gambling entered the picture, at least for me. For Bex, I think since she's a woman, it was just throwing darts at pictures on a wall to see who she played.

Photo courtesy of Quixado on Flickr:
I'm thinking the monkey would have fared better than Bex in this contest.

However, for me, I took a gamble on an old Cadillac:

photo courtesy of rocketvox on Flickr

And like the one pictured above, the Cadillac I played, Carnell "Cadillac" Williams was parked, with nine fantasy points. I'm in two leagues and have Arian Foster in both, so I thought I'd test to see how Williams did here in this league and Foster in the other. That was my gamble.

While I did win the game, I did lose the gamble. Arian Foster put up a monster 46 fantasy points as he and the Texans went off on the Colts.

The only two other players which I have in common on both teams now are Aaron Rodgers and Austin Collie. I think next week I'll play someone else instead of Collie, but I'm thinking I'll do it in that other league which shall not be named. Maybe it will be Dez Bryant. As for Rodgers, I don't think I'll gamble him with much, except in week 10.

Tune in for next week's Tuesday Morning QB after I play Static's Team Krapsody...and I thought Battling Butterflies was a team name of which I could make fun. Oh, I can't wait for this. Don't worry I won't go after Static's ethnicity like I did with Bex's gender. After all, most of my squad is made up of African-Americans, whereas I have no women on my team and so can feel free to make fun of them all I want. Plus whereas misogyny is considered funny, racism is not unless you're a member of the Tea Party.

The People's Week 1: It's happening again

Ever been in a Turkish prison, Static?

With their dominant95-59 victory over Team Krapsody in Week One, Renal Failure begins its inevitable march toward the top of Turkish Oil Wrestling League - uh, we mean the Humor Bloggers Fantasy Football League. Sorry, we took up a new hobby recently...

Tom Brady (30pts) and Chris Johnson (31pts) outscored Static's whole starting roster, and Hines Ward had himself a good day as well (15pts). Unfortunately Ryan Grant left the Green Bay/Philly game early on with an injury and was unable to buttress our already high score.

But Jason Witten and Dwayne Bowe disappointed the People for the full games they played, scoring less points combined (2 and 1 respectively) than our backup TE Heath Miller (4pts), who LOBO is always keen to tell us never scored a single point for him last season. Possibly out of spite.


Heath Miller has suggestions for where LOBO can put this football... none of them involves shelves or closets or lubrication...

Bench scoring is usually our biggest source of regret, but we're not feeling the sting too much this week. Hard to believe that Eli Manning outscored Tom Brady this week (31pts for the younger Manning) but we're absolutely cool with that because we had to wait last year until after the trade deadline for Eli to prove himself as valuable trade bait. This year's he's doing it in Week One. So bravo, Eli, for giving us something to wave in front of desperate teams later this season. And Pierre Thomas's 14-point day against the Vikings made us feel better about the prospect of losing Ryan Grant for a week or two, especially since Clinton Portis had a poor day and C.J. Spiller pulled an anti-Arian Foster by being completely irrelevant in Week One.


A C.J. Spiller sighting...

On the other side, Static's squad did what the People's Champion did in last years HBFFL Championship Game and just plain failed to show up. His big guns Andre Johnson and Randy Moss put up paltry numbers, Joe Flacco had a rough match-up against the Jets Defense, and Joseph Addai had an anemic day on the ground. At least Antonio Gates showed why he's money at the TE position and Jeremy Maclin had a decent day once Michael Vick started slinging him the ball. But at least it's not like Static's bench did any better (Danny Woodhead was credited with no points). It's not like he had left Arian Foster and his Throwing-Bears-Through-A-Wormhole 46-point day wasting away on the sidelines, because that's what Rambler did and he still won his match over Bex and her Battlin' Butterflies, as if to rub it in Static's face that he could leave the biggest bear-tosser in Fantasy Football that week on the bench and still have a better day than Team Krapsody. Are you going to take that, Static? Are you going to let Rambler smack you in the face with such an insult? No? Then do something about it in Week Two!

Anyway, Renal Failure is 1-0 to the start the season, which is a favorable sign because that's how we started last season, which was then followed by eight more victories before losing our first game in November to the eventual champions La Machine in Week 10. So the trends are on the side of the People's Champion once again, as well as the Bear NASA duo of Tom Brady and Chris Johnson.

Next week, The Eunuchs get their first taste of the Wild Card (bitches!). Don gave LOBO a run for his money in Week One, losing 108-103, but can he put up those numbers again when facing the infamous Renal Failure? We'll have a preview of this match-up later in the week. In the meantime, we have to go oil ourselves up.


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---Renal Failure is in three other leagues because statistically speaking we can't suck in all of them.

2010 Week One Results and Standings

Results

Standings

2010 Week One Fantasy MVP

There are a lot of the usual suspects on the MVP list for the opening week of the 2010 HBFFL fantasy football season. Ocho Cinco is a rare winner though...

QB: Peyton Manning 44
What the Canuck?

RB: Chris Johnson 31
Renal Failure

WR: Chad Ocho Cinco 26
Bald Spots

TE: Dallas Clark 14
Bourbon Blasters

K: Mason Crosby 10
Eunuchs

Def: New England 17
Predator Press

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(Points are based on the following system: Passing-1 pt/20 yds, 6 pt TD, 5 point 300+ yds; Receiving/Rushing- 1pt/10 yds, 6pt TD, 5 point bonus 100+ yds; 2Pt Conversion 2 pts; Sacks 1pt, Int/Fumb 2 pts; Def/ST TD 6 pts; Safety 2 pts; Block Kick 2 pts; FG 3 pts, 1 point bonus 50+ yds; PAT 1 pt)

Roethlisberger Cleared by Authorities in Huntsville Assault

Predator Press

Dez Bryant No Longer Suppering Ankle Sprain

I think WFAA in Dallas created a new verb.

And now that Dez is fully healed he is available for errands or to babysit the kids.

With the exception of Sundays, a few Mondays, and Thanksgiving of course.

And for some reason that has nothing to do with Dez Bryant or the Dallas Cowboys there is something unexpected trending big-time on Yahoo:

That's right, the game between the Lions and the Bears is the talk of the internet today. Bigger than Tony Romo and Eminem.

(I still do not understand why someone would name themselves after candy but it seems to be working for the rapper.)

Sadly, reality gave a slap to the face in the trend results:

Everyone knows that lions can't beat bears. Duh.