Not a good Week Six for the People's Champ Renal Failure, but good enough to pull out a slim 94-87 victory over HBFFL veteran Joe O. and his Bourbon Blasters. Our victory came mainly from the arm of Jay Cutler (31pts), the hands of Demaryius Thomas (23pts) and from Joe's lineup choking at the most inopportune time.
The only person who had a worse week than the Blasters
The Blasters were down 8 points going into the Monday night game. All of Renal Failure's squad had played and Joe had Frank Gore and Brian Quick (traded to Joe by us) left to play. The People won't lie, they pretty much believed their Champion was fucked six ways to next Thursday night's game. However, Quick got smothered and put up a goose-egg and Gore was barely able to muster a single point in the Niners victory over the Rams. Andre Williams, Joe's big waiver wire addition this week, did not come through as expected with only 5pts in that debacle vs. the Eagles. Percy Harvin probably was better off not even playing this week (0pts). Andre Johnson languished on the Blaster's bench with 14-we-would-have-won points.
This covered up a horrendous day from the Renal Failure starters. Jeremy Maclin was about the only Eagles to not have a good game against the Giants on Sunday night (1pt). Beast Mode and Alfred Morris put up backup RB numbers (6 and 5 respectively) and were outscored by Fred Jackson and God's placekicker Cody Parkey (9pts a piece).
Half your lineup not scoring can come out of nowhere and push your losing streak to four straight games too...
The People improve to 3-3 on the season, hanging on to 4th place just above our opponent for Week 7, the 3-3 Future Ex-Cons. The two-time defending HBFFL champs kept pace with a victory of Cranberry Sauce, sending the Sauce into a 5-team pileup of 2-4 teams. Troi's looking to springboard into the 4th all by himself with a victory over Renal Failure, but that may be trickier than he thinks.
The Eagles are on a bye week, so no Maclin, no Zach Ertz, and even more important no Cody Parkey. Luckily, that trade with Troi earlier in the season brought us Larry Fitzgerald who is starting to get his motor running (and it helps that he's playing against the Raiders this week). Jason Witten's getting back to being a regular target for Tony Romo, so we're cool on the TE side. That leaves the kicker position, and we're bringing the man, the myth, the legend... BILLY CUNDIFF!
You can't handle Billy Cundiff's sweet moves!
The People think it's actually a pretty sweet move considering the Cleveland Browns offense has been humming with Brian Hoyer at the helm. They put up 31 against the Steelers and they're playing the Jaguars this week. A lot of points could be hitting the board in that game for Cleveland.
Troi still has Peyton Manning slinging the pigskin, but if he's throwing mostly to Demaryius Thomas it's not going to Troi much good. The converse could be said regarding our Drew Brees and his Marques Colston until you remember that Brees throws to the ball to every eligible receiver for the Saints. Better look to Golden Tate going big in the absence of a healthy Megatron, and for DeSean Jackson to get a 60-yard TD. And are you going to take Justin Forsett and Ahmad Bradshaw over the Marshawn Lynch and Alfred Morris, especially with Beast Mode and Morris coming off bad performances the week before?
Brees has a tough matchup vs. Detroit, but he throws the ball all day so he'll get his points. Beast Mode is going to be a beast vs. the Rams. Alfred Morris can certainly run against the JV team called the Tennessee Titans. Even Fred Jackson has a very favorable matchup against the Vikings (are they even trying anymore?)
We're bringing hot fire to Week 7, and random nudity too!
Yahoo!'s giving the early projected edge to Renal Failure 113 to 99. Much of our score is coming from 21 projected points to Demaryius Thomas, which seems a bit high until you realize Peyton Manning is projected for 33 on Troi's side. The People like their chances of Renal Failure hitting the 113 mark and higher in Week Seven.
Standing at 4-3 in either 4th or 3rd place (if Mile High Club loses to The DreamCrushers!) at the halfway point in the season would be an excellent position for Renal Failure to be in. Most of our main talent would be done with their bye weeks and we like our depth if the injury bug bites us. But we have to win Week 7 first. Being 3-4 at the halfway point isn't a death sentence — we've certainly come back from worse predicaments — but it won't be easy.
Renal Failure is the People's Champion and the 2010 HBFFL and FTWL champion. Joe got his vengeance by beating us in the FTWL by a score of 138-113. Yahoo! enjoyed our effort and gave us a B+ in the recap, which is better than the C we got for our HBFFL win, which tells us that winning your game has no effect on your Yahoo! computerized recap grade.
Dear People's Champion of Fantasy Football Renal Failure,
Please accept our apologize for Demaryius Thomas not scoring for shit in his first games of the season. To make up for this, he will score ALL THE POINTS in Week Five for you. Sorry for the miscommunication.
Signed,
Peyton Manning.
P.S. - Please buy a Papa John's Pizza.
When you get 41 points from your WR, things are usually going swimmingly for you. And that indeed was the case in Week 5 as Renal Failure scored a ultra-sweet 129-71 victory over Predator Press. Why "ultra-sweet?" Because Renal Failure hadn't beaten Predator Press since the 2010 Humor Bowl. Three full years of losses to Predator Press - regular season and playoffs. No more of that noise. REGULATORS, MOUNT UP!!!
We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese... and Marshawn Lynch crushing people to be the 2nd highest scoring RB in the league...
There were other bright spots for the People other than Demaryius Thomas's 41-point Bear Leaving the Solar System. Beast Mode went for 17 points. Jeremy Maclin continues catching TD's (13pts), and the San Diego D blanked the Jets for a 16-point day. Cody Parkey told LOBO's Mason Crosby to know his role and shut his mouth with a 10-point day (he's the #2 scoring kicker in the HBFFL). Drew Brees managed 25 points, as did Jay Cutler, so that makes us feel a little better about Brees being on a bye in Week Six.
Cody Parkey drinks your milkshake, LOBO
Unfortunately there were underachievers in the lineup. Alfred Morris and Bishop Sankey only managed 2pts a piece, which greatly disappointed us because we thought this was finally Sankey's time to shine in the Titan's backfield. Morris was running against the Seahawks so we're more charitable with him. Zach Ertz is not living up to the TE of the future label we gave him so he's going to take a backseat to Jason Witten, especially now that Dallas has figured out how to play football again.
LOBO can take solace that nothing he would have done in Week Five would have mattered, but Yahoo! gave him a D-grade in the recap. And he's not in good shape going forward with Jimmy Graham's bum shoulder and Rashard Jennings getting banged up vs Atlanta. At least you've got last place Bald Spots to kick around this week.
We consulted the Torah for our Week Six lineup, but all we got was a recipe for Gifilte Fish...
This is one of the rare seasons that our Week Six opponent Bourbon Blaster do not have Drew Brees in their lineup. Unfortunately we don't have him in our lineup either for Week Six because of the Saints bye week. But Jay Cutler's been putting up Brees-like numbers so we're okay there. The problem comes in the form of some former members of the Renal Roster. We traded Brian Quick for Chris Ivory (who we parlayed for Brees) and Quick has proven to be a golden WR in garbage time for the Rams. Also we had released Ben Tate when he was injured and the Blasters snatched him up when he got healthy, and he's showing to be the main RB we thought he'd be when we originally drafted him.
Joe went to the waiver wire to get Andre Williams with Rashard Jennings down and the Giants playing the Eagles this week (who while having the highest scoring DEF/Special Teams in the HBFFL also give up an obscene amount of yards and points to the opposition). Frank Gore's running on the hapless Rams so that looks problematic for the People. Percy Harvin kept having touchdowns called back this past Monday so he should get the chance to wild against the Cowboys.
41 points later, he's the 8th ranked WR in the league
Despite all that, Yahoo! is giving the early edge to Renal Failure. Demaryius Thomas should have another big day, this time vs. the Jets. Fred Jackson is starting to catch fire and is playing a weak Patriots squad. Maclin's going to get his, as usual, and especially in a game against a divisional rival. And Beast Mode is Beast Mode.
Winning this week would not only give us the pleasure of extending the Blasters' losing streak to four games, it would help us begin to break away from the logjam of six 2-3 teams. Renal Failure's currently atop this morass in fourth because we've got more 6 more points than the Blasters. We'll see whether Week Six marks the point where we rise up toward the playoffs or sink deeper into the uncertain muck.
Renal Failure is the People's Champion and Wild Card (bitches!) of Fantasy Football. We also beat LOBO in the FTWL but not as savagely. We're also playing the Blasters in the FTWL, but Yahoo! likes their chances of winning way more there, but that's mainly because Peyton Manning is projected to put up 33 points vs. the Jets, which is somewhat reasonable.
After a lot of bootstrapping, the Preds detonated Bourbon Blasters in Week 3 -sadly, our first victory of the season. I figured Aaron Rogers and the entire Bourbon Blaster WR corps were expected to get at least thirty points collectively, but as a consequence, our beloved Preds squeaked though by scarcely doubling their score.
*!whew!*
Now I'm beset with a mediocre draft, a cascade of injuries, arrests, and bye weeks. Thank God for Mason Crosby! My roster is so full of waiver wire handcuffs that the most seasoned dominatrix I know uttered my 'safe word' [harder] on sight.*
And with this motley crew, I get the Championship rematch with the Future Ex-Cons:
Artist's Rendering
My strategy will be straight out of the first three Rocky movies. Just like Apollo Creed, I'm gonna dazzle the HBFFL with some trash talk, flashy antics, fancy footwork, and inexplicable reckless underestimation of all my opponents.
I might even celebrate my victories by finally watching Rocky IV this weekend.
*Whatever you do, don't tell her Kirk Cousins is not really my cousin. Holy crap would she be pissed.
"Hello, Mister Goodell? Goddamn it that bitch keeps sending me to voicemail. Sir, I realize this is a bad time with the Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson situation and all, but I really need Aaron Hernandez to be activated this week to defeat the scourge known as Joe Ohlstein. No, not the coolJoel Osteen, but the godless Joe Ohlstein that dresses like a woman in pagan ceremonies to win fantasy championships. I think activating Aaron Hernandez can repair your perceived lack of commitment to football. [*clinky*] Hey man, I just found seventy-five cents in this payphone -now I can call you back later this morning if I need to! Anyways, about that 'Redskins' controversy ... would it kill you to spot Kirk Cousins three hundred yards and two touchdowns and settle the whole thing? And hey ... why don't any players in the NFL know karate? I think the NKFL would be a-"
This is what we do when you draft a player we want right before it's our turn...
The end of August means the start of fantasy football (and actual NFL football), and that means the HBFFL is gearing up for its 7th season. There are some new faces in the crowd as we've moved away from the Humor Blogger requisite of our league, much how like everyone forgot Richie Cunningham on Happy Days had an older brother.
The 2014 HBFFL draft was held this past Tuesday and the grades from Yahoo! are in. Let's see what the algorithm bots have to say about who will dominate the season.
"Is this who's left on the draft board???"
The Patriots - Grade: A - Projected Record: 10-4 (3rd place)
One of our newbies in the HBFFL, Yahoo! liked them the best with their draft, though strangely projects them to finish 3rd. They went with the tried and true Renal Failure strategy of loading up on RB's, taking Eddie Lacy, DeMarco Murray, and Giovani Bernard with their first three picks. They grabbed Matty Ice as their QB, a solid choice. They'll be leaning on Randall Cobb for WR production, but may be relying too much on Vernon Davis at TE. Your People's Champ wouldn't have given them an A rating just because they chose two kickers and one of them is the suspended Matt Prater.
Cranberry Sauce - Grade: B+ - Projected Record: 11-3 (2nd place)
The newcomers know their stuff according to the Yahoo! bots. Jamaal Charles with the 2nd pick will be their focus at RB because the other RB's (Shane Vereen, DeAngelo Williams, James Starks) don't scare anyone. They loaded up at WR with Jordy Nelson and Alshon Jeffrey, and they got the best value of the 5th round by taking the Seattle Defense, which is about the only defense you can unequivocally count on in 2014. Cranberry won't have to worry much if Matt Stafford goes down with Philip Rivers behind him. But in Renal Failure's opinion, Cranberry should be knocked down to a D in this draft for ruining our plan to take Johnny Manziel with the final pick of the draft to make a very clever Mr. Irrelevance joke. To be fair, we did tell people we were going to do it, but that's because it was too good not to share.
And now "Deep Thoughts by Eli Manning"
Bald Spots - Grade: B+ - Projected Record 9-5 (4th place)
The HBFFL vet went WR heavy with Megatron, Brandon Marshall, and Victor Cruz in the first four rounds, which Yahoo! says is the best WR trio in the HBFFL. He'll be hoping RB Andre Ellington comes through, despite playing for Arizona. Speaking of Arizona, their D should be solid again this year. We're not sold on his taking Cam Newton as his QB considering he has no one to throw to in Carolina, and if he spends all his time running that ups his chance of getting injured. Backup QB Eli Manning doesn't scare anyone. And Rob Gronkowski's injury issues may bite Bald Spots when he can least afford to be bitten. Still, you can't rule out a team with Megatron on the roster.
Bourbon Blasters - Grade: B - Projected Record 6-8 (7th place)
This is the rare year that the Blasters do not have Drew Brees as their QB, but Aaron Rodgers ain't a bad replacement. The Blasters will be leaning on Adrian Peterson and Frank Gore for running points, but they're not getting any younger. Andre Johnson might be the only receiving threat for the Texans, but do you want to put your faith in Ryan Fitzpatrick getting the ball to him (why do you think no one won with Bills receivers the past couple seasons)? He'll get more production from Julius Thomas and Julian Edelman, but Joe has no Drew Brees so he gets no playoffs. But Yahoo! thinks you draft handsomely. Also we're not sold on Percy Harvin, but Dennis Pitta is a nice TE option.
Hey LOBO, resolve to fix your autodraft rankings
Predator Press - Grade: B - Projected Record 7-7 (5th place)
Your runner-up in last year's Humor Bowl will have to scrap a bit to get back there according to the Yahoo! bots. though there's a lot to disagree with. Jimmy Graham in the first round was the 2nd best receiving threat in the Top 10 behind Megatron but LOBO was right to feel weird about drafting a TE with their first pick. A.J. Green is another solid WR to build the team around. But the RB situation is a bit dicey. Le'Veon Bell is in drug trouble and Toby Gerhart is Toby Gerhart. Colin Kaepernick will probably be able to bail out PredPress in some tight games, but if he goes down we're not sold on him being able to rely on RGIII. Also, LOBO's autodrafter took Wes Welker way too high for someone with who just got his 3rd concussion in the past two years. But like us LOBO lives for waiver wire pickups so he's got a puncher's chance of sneaking into the playoffs.
Future Ex-Cons (Defending HBFFL champion) - Grade: B - Projected Record 12-2 (1st place)
Troi's chances of winning a third consecutive Humor Bowl are looking good according to the Yahoo! bots, a lot of it due to having the weakest projected schedule (something RF rode hard on last year to get into the playoffs). But they may have stumbled out of the gate by taking Drew Brees AND Peyton Manning with their first two picks. This sort of trade bait scenario rarely works (we know, because we've tried it in the past, e.g. the Tom Brady/RGIII 5-8-1 season of 2012). We like Troi's choice of Zac Stacy in the 3rd round, seeing how we had Zac Stacy last season and he racked up mad points for us in our push to the playoffs. Larry Fitzgerald in the 4th round is a steal. DeSean Jackson in the 5th? Eh... RGIII is not Nick Foles. San Francisco's D in the 6th seemed a bit of a reach as did taking K Stephen Gostkowski in the 8th. Troi will roll the dice with Marques Colston because Brees can't throw to Jimmy Graham all the time. We're going to make an outlandish prediction here: Troi does not win his 3rd championship without trading Brees or Manning, and we don't think anyone's going to make that deal. We may be biased because teams have learned over the years to be wary of trades with Renal Failure (we are the devil!), but the HBFFL has never been a trade-heavy league.
You sleep on Renal Failure, you get snapped in half.
Renal Failure (aka the People's Champion) - Grade B- - Projected Record 7-7 (6th place)
Yahoo! never understands or appreciates how we operate. That's why we're the Wild Card (bitches)! Renal Failure ended up picking last in the draft order for the 2nd straight year, but that's okay because we were 10-4 in 2013. Your People's Champ went with our tried and true method of loading up on RB's - going with Marshawn Lynch, Alfred Morris, and C.J. Spiller. Then we loaded up with a deep trio of WR's Demaryius Thomas, Jeremy Maclin, and Michael Crabtree. Yahoo! says we took Tom Brady too early in the 5th round, but we couldn't count on quality QB's to be available around picks 70 and 71. Yahoo! says we stole TE Jason Witten in the 10th round but we like getting Jay Cutler as our backup QB in the 8th round even more. We rounded out our draft with some handcuff picks (Riley Cooper, Fred Jackson) and decided to gamble in the later rounds with some adventurous picks with Sammy Watkins, Zach Ertz, and (to make up for not getting Johnny Manziel with the last pick) Blake Bortles. If these youngsters blossom like they're expected to, Renal Failure could rocket themselves into the playoffs yet again. And if they don't, well that's why we pound that waiver wire like it owes us money (that's how over the past 6 years we were into CJ2K, DeSean Jackson, LeSean McCoy, Brandon Lloyd, Zac Stacy, and Arcade Fire before everyone else was - just kidding about Arcade Fire, we don't see what the big deal is about them).
Manley's Book Club - Grade: C+ - Projected Record 4-10 (8th place)
This newbie to the HBFFL didn't get the Yahoo! draft love, but he did get Nick Foles who had a red hot 2013 and should continue throwing bears into outer space in 2014 (throwing bears into outer space being our term for ridiculously high fantasy football point performances). We personally think he took Dez Bryant way too high, but we don't much care for Cowboys not named Jason Witten (Yahoo! thinks Bryant's going to lead all WR in points this year because of reasons too smart for us to understand). Cordarelle Patterson is slated to have a breakout year at WR, which we agree with more seeing as someone has to catch the ball in Minnesota. Doug Martin will grind out a lot of yards running for the Bucs, and if Montee Ball can stay competent he could get close to those inexplicable Knowshow Moreno numbers from last year (and just to be sure, Manley drafted Moreno too). We're not keen on him wasting a high pick on Roddy White, considering the shit season he had when he was on the Renal Roster last year. Probably could have gotten him much later.
Sometimes you just get spittin' mad at your draft.
Purple Drank - Grade C - Projected Record 2-12 (9th place)
The commish of the HBFFL never gets any love from the Yahoo! draft bots. Things started off good with grabbing Matt Forte and Julio Jones. Then things went wonky with taking WR Keenan Allen with the 3rd round pick. Reggie Bush in the 4th round was pretty money, as was getting Andrew Luck in the 5th. After that, the rest of his draft decisions don't inspire much emotion other than "Well, you're here, come along." Joique Bell is Reggie Bush's handcuff, so that's something, but the Drank is rolling with two Saints RB's on the bench (Pierre Thomas and Mark Ingram) Who do you know in fantasy football who's gone anywhere in the last few year by relying on the Saints running game? At least Tampa Bay's Defense is supposed to be good.
For when you don't make the consolation playoffs.
Mile High Club - Grade: D - Projected Record 2-12 (10th place)
Yahoo! loves and hates the HBFFL rookies. Mile High was granted the 1st pick overall and took Renal Failure mainstay Shady McCoy (Your People's Champ are McCoy hipsters, we were starting him before it was cool). WR Antonio Brown was a solid 2nd round pick. Yahoo! especially liked his 3rd round selection of Arian Foster (hey, we had McCoy and Foster last year too - Mile High knows who to emulate for success). TE Jordan Cameron is projected to be the only person on the Browns catching anything so take that as you will, and WR Vincent Jackson is slated to be the man in Tampa Bay. Rounding out the lineup are QB Tony Romo and a nice pickup in Round 8 of WR Emmanuel Sanders. But the problem is with the rest of Mile High's RB choices. Trent Richardson and Maurice Jones-Drew (a former Renal Failure favorite) aren't going to make teams lose sleep. And Dwayne Bowe? Sure, Renal Failure won a championship with him in 2010 but that was the last time he was ever useful. Better hope Anquan Boldin still has some life left in those legs, or that RB Devonta Freeman breaks out in Atlanta.
We'll see in 16 weeks who the 2014 champ is, and who are the teams that really wanted to forget the 2014 season. Maybe we'll check with the teams who were ambivalent about their season, but they're less fun.
Renal Failure is the People's Champion and original member of the HBFFL. We are the fantasy football team your league deserves, but not the one it needs right now.
Yeah, that's me, in case you didn't recognize me. Biggest Blowout? Sure, on the losing end. Purple Drank skunked the nowins 131-67 for our seventh loss in a row. I think there's an award for the most losses in the league, isn't there?
I think my problem is I've been so busy following Toronto Mayor Rob Ford's antics I've not paid enough attention to fantasy football. Yeah, that's it, me and the Mayor were in a drunken stupor last week.
Clearly there's a crack in my fantasy football strategy.
Nowins' QB Manning's (Eli's not coming folks) 15 fantasy points, WR Victor Cruz's 10 and RB Reggie Bush's 10 were no match for Drank's QB Stafford's 33 fantasy points, WR Antonio Brown's 33 and RB Ray Rice's 25 respectively.
The nowins are now in 9th spot, recently vacated by Purple Drank who slips into 8th.
Way to go Drank. Is that Purple stuff some kind of energy drink? Can you pass some over here, huh?
Still with the drinking theme, next week nowins takes on 4th place Bourbon Blasters.
Woe to thee, Joe! Behold my secret surprise strategy that will destroy you tomorrow:
Team Predator Press will be divided in half. The first half, Seal Team L, will be in charge of getting the football into a rectangular scoring area in the grass also known as the "End Zone." Meanwhile Walrus Squad 17 will simultaneously try to get the football into a completely different spot in this same "End Zone."
Ha! Sporting platitudes like "May the Best Player Win" are pretty patronizing when my superior football acumen is so obvious; as long as squads 'L' and '17' are both facing the correct direction, Predator Press can't lose. We will crush the bones of the hapless and helpless Bourbon Blasters into
a chalky paste. And then we will pour that hapless and helpless paste into a zinc smelter. And then Peyton Manning will throw that zinc smelter into the Sun!
Soon, the 'Best Fantasy Football Player' will have won, just as Destiny has already foreseen in the past future recently.
Welcome to Tuesday Morning Quarterback, where I take a look back at what I (and sometimes others) would have (could have/should have) done differently with my (their) fantasy football teams for that previous week's games.
Well, this week again I'm not going to look back at what I could have done differently, because to put it quite bluntly, I STILL FUCKING ROCK!
Instead, I'm going to turn my attention to Joe O. of the Bourbon Blasters who lost 56-74 to the Future Ex-Cons.
Joe picked up two running backs off the waiver wire last week: the Steelers' Isaac Redman and the Texans' Justin Forsett, all well and good. They both were nice waiver wire picks, considering that the Steelers' Rashard Mendenhall and Jonathan Dwyer were on the bench and that the Texans' Ben Tate also was on the bench.
In Joe's defense, he does a great job at making picks off the waiver wire week in and week out. Lesson for all of us: Watch the waiver wire!
However, when it came to putting the right one into the lineup, Joe failed. Why? He placed Forsett, a backup to Arian Foster, in the running back slot instead of Redman, who was a backup to no one. Redman naturally rocked with 25 points; Forsett didn't, with ZERO points. If only Joe had played Redman, Joe would have won 81-74.
Lesson for all of us: Play the right guy off the waiver wire and, in the process,...
Every Fantasy Football owner does this hundreds of times a season...
Joe needs to send us a thank you card and a gift certificate to the Olive Garden because we served him his 81-76 victory and some endless salad this past week. We panicked on Sunday morning about Trent Richardson's condition and, not wanting another 1-point day from our RB, we pulled him for Jonathan Stewart. Instead T-Rich decided he could actually play through his rib injury and put up 24-points vs. Stewart's 7pts. But that wouldn't have mattered if we had gone with Tom Brady instead of RGIII at QB (36pts vs. 12pts), which we didn't because RGIII has been throwing bears into outer space regularly and Tom Brady was facing a team with a good pass defense on a neutral site field.
At least Jason Witten had a great day (21pts), however Shaun Suisham again outscored our wide receivers individually (Josh Gordon 4pts, DJax 5pts, Dwayne Bowe 6pts). Joe escaped with quality performances from Jonathan Dwyer (15pts), Percy Harvin (15pts) and Matt Bryant (12pts) to offset the crap games from Drew Brees (16pts - projected for 30pts), Jeremy Maclin (3pts), and Frank Gore (6pts). These are sorts of games teams need to win to make the playoffs, and again Renal Failure is just not getting it done and it's driving your People's Champion absolutely batshit mad.
Only the King of the Potato People can save our season now...
Okay, so we're not going to go 7-0 in the 2nd half of the season, but we can still try to go 6-1 with a victory over Unfinished Person, who scored a blowout victory over front-running Delusions of Inadequacy. But UP is vulnerable this week. Rob Gronkowski and Stephen Jackson are on their bye weeks, Tony Romo's throwing so many INT's lately that Jay Cutler feels bad for him, and aside from Julio Jones no one else on his roster gives us any cause for pause.
Your People's Champ doesn't have to worry about the RGIII/Tom Brady decision this week because Brady is on a bye. Fred Jackson's back from the bye and should put up some good numbers even while sharing time with CJ Spiller, and T-Rich is good to go against a Baltimore defense that isn't so scary anymore.
Yahoo! gives Renal Failure a slight initial edge, but only because Yahoo! is way overvaluing Tony Romo and Dez Bryant in their matchup vs. undefeated Atlanta. But even in 9th place at 3-5, Renal Failure is still only two games behind the first-place trio of Unfinished Person, Delusions of Inadequacy, and Predator Press. If Renal Failure wins six straight, that brings us to 9-5 and gives us the best chance of making the playoffs. 8-6 is a trickier proposition because unless we start throwing bears into orbit every week we're not going to win any tie-breakers.
There hasn't been a Renal Failure-less championship game in three years, and we'd hate to break the streak of last year's runner-up not winning the championship the next year, even though we did break the streak of the previous year's winner not making the playoffs the next year. It's a wicked web of trendsetting and trend-breaking that we've created.
Renal Failure is the People's Champion and The Wild Card (bitches!) of Fantasy Football. Renal Failure is doing better in his other leagues, except the FTWL where we're 2-6. We're doing slightly better in our 12-team and 8-team leagues though, and that's some small solace to us.
Welcome to Tuesday Morning Quarterback, where I take a look back at what I (and sometimes others) would have (could have/should have) done differently with my (their) fantasy football teams for that previous week's games.
All it takes is one mistake.
Sometimes it comes on the front end; sometimes on the back end. For me, my error happened on the front end, but just as easily could have been on the back end.
It all began Thursday night. I had just gotten out of work. It was 8:15 p.m. and I wasn't thinking. I had a cold.
If ONLY paramedics had come to my house, maybe they could have saved me from my fate.
But alas they didn't and by 8:20, I already had lost this week's HBFFL game to Joe O's Bourbon Blasters; only the score had to be determined. That score would be 119 to 117. I left Seattle wide receiver Sidney Rice in at flex when I should have switched him out for one of three players: St. Louis running back Steven Jackson, New Orleans running back Darren Sproles or Oakland wide receiver Denarius Moore.
Rice only scored three fantasy points while Jackson and Sproles each scored 11, and Moore, 9.
I had forgotten a cardinal rule of fantasy football: recheck your lineup before Thursday night's game to see if there are any changes that need to be made. With Rice going up against the San Francisco defense, that is a change that definitely should have been made. To be honest, I probably would have gone with Moore, because I haven't been getting much from Jackson or Sproles and Moore has been on a roll.
But I didn't and for my transgression I paid heavily.
In the other league in which I play I made my crucial switch on the back end, only an hour and half before the start of Sunday afternoon's games, as I dropped San Francisco quarterback Alex Smith for Tampa Bay QB Josh Freeman and then put Freeman in over Detroit QB Matthew Stafford. It paid off with Freeman rolling with 38 points; Stafford had 17.
I won there 100 to 69. I just as easily could have lost as I did here in the HBFFL.
I looked yesterday to see if Freeman was available in the HBFFL. He was.
Welcome to Tuesday Morning Quarterback, where I take a look back at what I (and sometimes others) would have (could have/should have) done differently with my (their) fantasy football teams for that previous week's games.
The fantasy football pundits have been praising Miami Dolphins wide receiver Brian Hartline over the last few weeks and when Indianapolis Colt running back Donald Brown underwent knee surgery, the pundits hyped Vick Ballard who was scheduled to step into Brown's spot.
Two owners in the HBFFL can tell you that neither lived up to their hype this past weekend.
Joe O. relied on Hartline, who had 0 points. He didn't play either Green Bay's Jordy Nelson, with 37 points, or Philadelphia's Jeremy Maclin, with 26 points.
With Maclin alone, Joe's Bourbon Blasters would have at least come close 103-110 against Delusion of Adequacy. However, I would have chosen Nelson over Maclin this past weekend since Maclin hasn't been doing that great so far this season. That would have given Joe the win too.
Renal Failure, meanwhile, put Ballard, 3 fantasy points, in over either Fred Jackson, 13 points, or C.J. Spiller, 16 points, both from the Buffalo Bills. In RF's defense, if you were going to play Ballard, you might as well gamble now with neither Jackson or Spiller being particularly spectacular this year and playing against each other. However, I still probably would have flipped a coin and gone with either one of them over the unproven Ballard.
Here we are, 2012. The fifth season of the HBFFL. Apparently the proper gift for a five year anniversary is wood. Really? Lame. Gift cards to Applebee's would seem more in order. Anyways...
So what can we expect from some of the owners of the league in 2012?
~Renal Failure will regal us with many 1v1 fighting videogame finishing move videos.
~Unfinished Person will use technology from a by-gone era to "watch" football games.
~What the Canuck will be using his Twittens to make lineup changes on his cell phone because in Canada it gets really cold by week two of the NFL season.
~NoNames also lives in Canada, but will have his access to Twittens restricted after beating up on What The Canuck in Week Six.
~Predator Press will set his lineup, re-set, re-set again, and then re-set again his lineup based on fantasy projections, as they change day by day.
~Bourbon Blasters will go rogue, return to cross dressing, and let his wife take over the team.
It takes a team effort to win in this league... and nice legs...
Out of the HBFFL members who have been with the league since its inception, the one with the best record against Renal Failure is Joe O. who has gone 4-1 against your People's Champion going back to when he was masquerading as his wife.
Make that 4-2 as Renal Failure scored a critical 97-93 victory in Week 11 over Joe's Bourbon Blasters. CJ2K woke up from his season-long slumber for a 28-point day. Tony Romo got most of his 27 points in the first half vs. Buffalo, unfortunately not throwing much to Jason Witten (3pts). And Brandon Lloyd put up 10 points, continuing his steady scoring ways since going to the Rams.
Note: Marshawn Lynch put up a huge 26 points on our bench. Is Beast Mode getting activated just before the trade deadline? Who wants to make us a deal for a hot RB?
You gotta be hungry to win in this league... and a nice rack don't hurt either...
But Week 11 had disappointing performances all over the damn place. LeSean McCoy's 15 points was way under his projected 26 (and we blame Andy Reid for abandoning the run for that). The Jets D took the night off, as did Billy Fucking Cundiff. Even Megatron disappointed us with a 7-point night, although he did outscore both of Joe's receivers combined (Dwayne Bowe and Wes Welker, 5 total points between them, total disappointments there).
Joe's team had some good performances, just not enough of them to pull out the victory. Joe listened to our advice from last week and pulled Beanie Wells for Reggie Bush. Bush responded with 15 points to Wells' 6. But Joe didn't listen to our notion that Stephen Jackson would have a hard game against the Browns, keeping SJax in the lineup and watching him rumble for a big 18 point day. And Drew Brees did indeed score more points than Shady McCoy, the complete opposite of what we hypothesized in last week's column, putting up 29. Even Joe's kicker Jon Kasay had a big 15-point day, aided by the Saints and Falcons going into overtime. It just wasn't enough for the Blasters to overcome Renal Failure's balanced attack, or our tendency of getting 90 percent of our prognostications wrong.
We wish our mistakes could look this cool...
Week 11 brings a return encounter with Multiple Scorgasms, who recorded their first win of the year over What the Canuck? to get to 1-9 (and ensure that they can only tie the worst record in HBFFL history, held by Bex's Battling Butterflies in 2010). Now that Mark's team finally has a taste of victory, it's all they crave. Unfortunately Multiple Scorgasms doesn't seem to have enough firepower to make it two-in-a-row at Renal Failure's expense. Phillip Rivers is playing a tough Chicago defense. Rashard Mendenhall is on a bye week, so is Ben Tate, meaning Mark needs to hit the waiver wire or make a quick trade for RB for this week's game because he's got no one else on his barren bench. No one else strikes us as particularly dangerous. Maybe Santonio Holmes cranks it up vs. the Broncos, or perhaps Victor Cruz gets the lion's share of targets vs. the Eagles instead of the other Giants receivers, but Aaron Hernandez is getting pushed aside for Rob Gronkowski and the Eagles D doesn't scare anyone.
As of this posting. Renal Failure is projected to win 87-59 but we expect the People's Champ to score more than that. Tony Romo and Jason Witten have favorable matchups against the Redskins. Megatron will be pulling down balls all day against the Panthers. Shady McCoy will bring it against the Giants. CJ2K wants to show everyone last week was no fluke. Brandon Lloyd is finding his old productive form again. Plus, as always, Billy Fucking Cundiff.
A seventh win will put the People in a great position as the playoff race congeals for the final weeks of the regular season. Predator Press (8-2) and Purple Drank (7-3) have prime seating for this stretch run. What the Canuck? and Unfinished Person (4-6) are fading from contention with their two-game losing streaks. This leaves NoNames, Bourbon Blasters, and Renal Failure at 6-4 as the main combatants for those final two playoff spots. It's a good thing Renal Failure is a second-half team because we're going to need every last victory to defeat the trend of HBFFL champions failing to make the playoffs the following year.
Renal Failure is the defending 2010 HBFFL champion, the defending 2010 FTWL champion, and The People's Champion. We always schedule our team meetings for 4 in the afternoon so we never oversleep. Also, our team meetings are at a bar, so it's happy hour too. Half-off draft beers and 5-dollar margaritas...
Fantasy Football is hard... why's it gotta be so hard?
LOBO got his revenge for losing to us in last year's championship game with the biggest blow out of Week 9, 142-89. Julio Jones threw a 35-point bear into orbit, Ben Roethlisberger took 24 points and a frightened co-ed into a night club restroom, and Arian Foster blew up for 25 points. Renal Failure was missing Megatron on a bye week, but it wouldn't have mattered. CJ2K is slowly improving, getting a 10-point day. Jason Witten over-performed with 13 points. Shady McCoy underperformed with 17 points. Tony Romo and Brandon Lloyd got exactly what they were projected for with 22 and 8 respectively.
Note: Our experiment of picking whatever defense was playing against Tim Tebow failed, as Oakland didn't do shit against
This shoves Renal Failure into sole possession of 5th place in the HBFFL at 5-4, two games behind 1st place Predator Press and one game behind the 6-3 logjam of Purple Drank, NoNames, and Bourbon Blasters. So your People's Champ is on the outside looking in, but is still poised to make a run for the playoffs.
Do not try to run game on Renal Failure...
So Bourbon Blasters is back on the Renal Failure docket. Week One saw Joe's squad beat us 122-106, most of those points coming from Wes Welker throwing a 35-point bear into space, but that was before we had Megatron on the Renal Roster. True, Joe's now coming at us with Antonio Gates rather than Jermichael Finley at TE, but that's a slighter upgrade than our switching out Mario Manningham for Mighty Megatron.
Both squads are clear of any bye week absences, so it's going to be a pure battle of lineup strength. Yahoo! says Renal Failure wins 103-96, the bulk of Renal Failure's score from Shady McCoy's 27-projected points against a weak Arizona Cardinals team. Much of Joe's score is predicated on Drew Brees' 28-projected points vs. Atlanta. We're thinking McCoy has a better chance of hitting 27pts than Brees as the Eagles are going to be looking to slap around someone after their embarrassing loss to Chicago last Monday.
The Nozzle is calibrating our team to beat Joe's Bourbon Blasters... please remain still...
Joe's RB corps is facing an uphill battle. SJax is going against a tough Cleveland run defense, and if Arizona falls behind early to Philly Beanie Wells won't be seeing a lot of runs. They may do worse than the slowly improving CJ2K. Dwayne Bowe will probably get his 11 and more against Denver, but Welker is likely to be put on Reavis Island in Week 10. For Renal Failure Tony Romo has been a steady performer, Jason Witten overperforms, and Billy Cundiff is still Billy Fucking Cundiff. This might not be a good week for Joe.
Another Renal Failure loss puts the playoffs in jeopardy. The way things are going, 8 wins are not going to be enough to get in, and 9 might not cut it either.
Renal Failure is the defending 2010 HBFFL champion, the defending 2010 FTWL champion, and The People's Champion. We were going to watch Sunday's games over at Joe Paterno's house, but we get the feeling he's not going to be in the mood for taco dip.
With Michael Vick on his bye week and Maurice Jones-Drew playing the highly-touted Ravens D, that's who I was this week: The Gambler.
I swallowed the fantasy football hype on Tim Tebow and DeMarco Murray hook, line and sinker, and I'm glad I did. I counted 125 points to Bourbon Blaster's 106 points, with a large portion of his points coming from Drew "The No-Gamble" Brees.
My only error: I jumped on the Torain Train (perhaps a little too early, now with Tim Hightower out), who scored a whopping 0 points. MJD actually had 14 fantasy points and would have been the better play in the flex position.
So what's funny about this post? So far, nothing...
...except maybe for the name DeMarco.
Or how about Tebow?
Tea Bow? Tea Bough? Tee Bo, like Tae Bo? Which brings me in a roundabout way (thanks to a Google image search for Tae Bo) to something Mr. Tebow, being the über-Christian he is, probably has used in his workout routines since his homeschooling days:
original photo courtesy of Open Sports via Flickr, with a little adaptation by me
I know. I know. The NFL bans such promotion underneath the eyes, but I'm imagining what this would be like in a perfect world where there didn't need to be a Christian alternative to yoga, because there would be no yoga.
Personally (at least for this week), I'm just glad there's a Tim Tebow.
Every week it seems like any player that joins the Bourbon Blaster squad either goes down with an injury, an undisclosed illness, or has a pre-existing injury that gets worse. And he isn't even Canadian.
Weird.
And yet, Joe's team keeps racking up the points and the wins. When a cross-dressing fantasy football owner is involved prepare to expect the unexpected.
But something has to give. That something is Week Six. Bourbon Blasters vs Purple Drank. 4-1 vs 4-1. Bye week/injury hell vs a full strength roster.
Facing me this week is like facing the honey badger...
It is relentless. It does what it wants. Of course we know what this means for Bourbon Blasters...
Bad news!
(I thought I had hit publish when I scheduled this for 10:30am this morning. So if you came here and wondered why the hell it showed up at 11:30 pm that's why.)
Play this video twice to get the full brutality of Unfinished Rambler's weekend in Fantasy Football...
Your People's Champion is heading back to the HBFFL Championship by way of a 104-81 victory over The Ramblers. And doubly upsetting for the Ramblers is that they also lost against us in LOBO's FTWL league as well, leaving not even a quantum of solace for the Unfinished One and his impressive fantasy season (10-4, with a league-leading 1407 points, 7 more than Renal Failure) after missing last year's playoffs. But Rambler thought he could harness the power of Ines Sainz but cutting it with a little Jenn Sterger, and Our Lady of Victory smote him with great vengeance and furious anger... and tight pants.
Rambler's end can be traced to his team catching the injury bug late in the season, losing Frank Gore for the year in Week 12 and Aaron Rodgers for at least Week 15. Other teams had been bitten by injuries earlier in the season (like Renal Failure) and had made the proper adjustments to their lineup come playoff time. Rambler, whose lack of depth had already been exploited by Renal Failure earlier this year during RF's season-saving five-game win streak, was left to depend on Jon Kitna for his playoff life, as well as Deion Branch, Rob Gronkowski, and BenJarvus Green-Ellis in an attempt to mitigate Tom Brady's potential bear-tossing damage.
Now, the Kitna plan would have worked out just peachy keen for Rambler (33pts) except for the fact that Kitna was throwing a lot to Renal Failure's Jason Witten (25pts), thus negating all of Kitna's hard work (which we totally foresaw in last week's preview) . Also, Rambler's multiple Patriot gamble backfired because he didn't play the one Patriot that Tom Brady threw his scores to against Green Bay, Aaron Hernandez (16pts on the Rambler bench, compared to the 2pts Gronkowski got from Brady; we suspect Rambler was scared off from starting Hernandez because he was coming off an injury). Also Brady had a mediocre 20-point day vs. the Packers, translating into worse days for Branch and Green-Ellis (though Ramblers choice of New England for his defense was really good, 15pts). And with Rodgers out, Rambler put his boundless faith into Arian Foster, who hadn't had a bad week all season... until now. Five points for the Number One Running Back in Fantasy Football. Yeah, Rambler's season was pretty much over once the final gun sounded on that Tennessee/Houston game with Foster laying an egg at the worst possible time. Underperformance by your stud players is a pain Renal Failure knows all too well... and would like other teams to share...
Revenge is a dish best served busty and scantily clad...
Chris Johnson was back on his game for The People with a 24-point day against the Texans. Even with Tim Tebow under center, Brandon Lloyd got 13 points (and pretty much accounted for all of Tebow's passing yards too). But the People were disappointed with Peyton Hillis's weak 7-point game, as well as with Dwayne Bowe's 5-point blah game with Matt Cassel returning as Chiefs QB. Weaker than that was the Tampa Bay defense getting a big fat zero against Detroit. But at least Matt Bryant kicked himself a 1o-spot vs. Seattle.
So who will be Renal Failure's opponent this year in Humor Bowl III? It's LOBO and Predator Press, pulling off the 4th seed upset over the first place 12-2 regular season champ Bourbon Blasters 134-69. Michael Vick threw a 54-point bear through the wormhole and into Peacekeeper territory, along with Vincent Jackson's 33-point mauling of San Francisco. Joe lost Knowshon Moreno early in the Broncos game, though it would have made little difference if he had played the whole day considering the margin of victory LOBO racked up on the Blasters.
Funny thing is, Joe beat LOBO last week, which actually gave LOBO the 4-seed and the playoff rematch. But Joe's not wishing he would have tanked that last game, for then Renal Failure would have been the 4-seed and still would have beaten the Blasters. So Joe, you were damned if you did, damned if you didn't, and now you're playing for 3rd place against the Ramblers.
The only HBFFL team to have a worse two week span than Joe is Bryan and his Bald Spots team. Not only did their loss to absentee Team Krapsody knock them out of the playoffs in Week 14, but in Week 15 as the 5-seed in the consolation playoffs they got beat by 8-seed What the Canuck? after Adrian Petersen was deactivated for the Monday Night Vikings/Bears game. Such a rough way to end a good season for the Bald Spots.... going 7-2 and then losing the last four of five to miss the playoffs... then falling victim to the 8th-seed Canuck. At least if he lost to an American he could salvage some bit of pride. That should make him hungry for next year for sure.
Ninja Vicki and Samurai Cathy would like to point out that La Machine beat Team Krapsody to move on to see who finishes fifth. They would also like to point out that, for the good of keeping his intestines on the inside, LOBO should seriously consider starting Ben Roethlisberger instead of Michael Vick.
Anyway, back to Predator Press... LOBO has been found guilty in the People's Court of trying dick-ride our Ines Sainz devotion to fantasy football success, and next week Renal Failure has the chance to carry out the sentence on him in not just the HBFFL but his own FTWL as well, considering he won his playoff game there too. Can the People's Champion become an actual champion? Can Renal Failure be a multiple league champion? Or will the HBFFL be cursed to suffer the reign of a manager who averaged over four roster changes a week in 2010? Plus, keep in mind this is a revenge game as LOBO squeaked out a win against your People's Champion in Week 7. And you know how much Renal Failure loves revenge games because NO ONE CIRCLES THE WAGONS LIKE THE WILD CARD, BITCHES!
And we look good in black leather too...
Our preview of HUMOR BOWL III and the grand finale of the 2010 HBFFL season will be later this week. Until then, keep waving those Renal Failure towels high in the air.
___________________________________________________________ Renal Failure is in the championship game in three out of the four leagues they are in, and is a firm believer that Farscape is the far superior science-fiction show than the overrated crap known as Firefly.
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