It’s time for another weekend recap. One of the really nice things about football season is that almost all meaningful sports happenings take place on the weekend, so it makes it easy to keep track of it all. You just put in the intense time over the weekend and you have almost a full week to digest and recap. Of course now that we have college football on Thursday, Friday and Saturday and Pro football on Monday and later on Thursday and Saturday, it is becoming harder and harder, but it’s still mostly a weekend sports world right now. When the NBA season starts I may just have to give up sleeping all together.
Anyway, here are my thoughts about the weekend:
1. Friday was a great day for sports because I got to play basketball for the first time in longer than I care to admit. I would play basketball every day for as long as my body could take if I could find a way to make it work, so the fact that I haven’t played regularly in a while really bothers me. But Friday, I got to play some backyard hoops with my buddy Randy in Stockton. I have to start playing basketball again now. My sanity, and certainly my waistline depends on it.
I followed up the afternoon hoops by watching Kansas v. Toledo in the restaurant bar Friday night, a great game that went into overtime. I don’t care about those schools, but overtime is always fun…if it is college that is. I know I’m not the first or even the 5th to say this, but that college OT format is soooo much better than the one we are stuck with in the NFL. Why is this so hard to change? It’s usually money that stops reasonable sports changes (see, e.g., the BCS), but I can’t see how that’s a factor here. The NFL system is something like changing the rules of a classic pistol duel and saying ok, start back to back, take 15 paces away from each other turn and then Bob, you fire first and if you don’t hit and kill Joe, then Joe, you can take a shot and you keep going until one of you hits the other. Doesn’t exactly wreak of fairness.
2. College football is great. I really enjoy it, especially when the Ducks are playing and playing well or when two big time, highly ranked programs are going head to head. That said, Saturday is not just for football. I love being able to sit and watch the games, but not every week all day long. Saturday is primarily for playing with your kids and reconnecting with your family after a long week of work. It is for getting things done and resting and playing and getting outside whenever possible. So, most of the time, I don’t watch more than a few quarters of various games mixed throughout the day on Saturday and frankly, that is just fine with me.
That said, every once in a while it is pretty dang nice to have no obligations and be able to sit and watch as much football as your rear-end and eyes can take. If such a Saturday comes along on the same weekend when 14 of the top 25 teams are playing against each other, then that is no minor blessing and should be cherished and remembered and discussed repeatedly in sports blogs. This last Saturday was such a day. I was traveling on business, but finished my business early and spent the rest of the day “trapped” at my brothers’ places with nothing better to do than watch football. I couldn’t do that every week, or even most weeks, but this week it was pretty nice. So, here are my college football thoughts:
a. Of course, I have to start with the Ducks. What an amazing game. The Ducks looked early like they were going to dominate and then the offense started to fizzle and OU remembered that Fresno State had already conclusively proven that Oregon’s D can not stop the run. OU came back and then went up and then went up some more. OU led by 13 with a little more than 3 minutes remaining in the game. Sitting dejected on the couch next to my brother Enoch, I turned and said, “well, if they can get a quick score they still have time for an onside kick and a couple desperation throws to the endzone.” I knew it was true, but I didn’t believe it would happen.
Then, they took the ball down and Dixon did a Vince Young imitation keeping the ball and running for a TD. I was thinking, “hey that’s great.” But I still didn’t believe they might actually pull off a win. The onside kick comes after a shifting of the line by the kicking team that, as far as I can tell, had no affect on anything but did waste time and look foolish. A good kick. Bodies colliding. A loose ball. OREGON RECOVERS!!!!!
Or did they? Then about an hour and 15 minutes of replay follows. The replay shows a few things relatively clearly and some things just clearly enough. First, the ball was clearly touched by an Oregon player before it went 10 yards. Second, the Oregon players fairly obviously ran into the OU players before the ball went 10 yards (another no no). Finally, it appeared in serious doubt whether Oregon even recovered the ball. All of this was fairly clear to everyone except Dan Fouts who is the biggest homer (for the Ducks) in sports broadcasting, and probably my buddy Whipple who has 15k stashed away to pay for an experimental procedure that would actually change the color of his blood to lime green.
My brother and I watched again and again looking for some way that the refs could find there wasn’t conclusive evidence. The more we watched, the more our spirits sank as it was fairly obvious that the Ducks should not get the football. Little did we know the refs were not watching the replays after all. It turns out that when the refs went to the monitor, they used the time to watch those cool new Nike adds with all the famous football personalities coaching and playing highschool football. Like anyone who likes football, they had a great time watching it over and over saying, “wait, wasn’t that _____?” They admired the production quality and marveled over the money Nike must have spent to bring all those sports personalities together for one commercial. After they had finally seen enough, they realized they were supposed to be reviewing a key play in a game they had not even been watching to begin with. The head ref wheeled around in a panic, but before he could decide what to do next his eyes were caught by the cross-hatch-faux-diamond-plating on the Ducks uniforms and then saw that Nike swoosh. It must have been a sign. He strides confidently to the mic and announces “Nik…err, I mean Oregon retains possession.” 4 people lost their hearing from the cheering Oregon fans at Autzen.
I had that weird feeling I always get when I’m playing sports and someone remembers the score wrong in my favor, or someone doesn’t see my teammate take 4 steps on his way to the basket or something like that. I don’t want to win that way. At the same time I want to win. When I’m playing I can (and do) speak up and correct things. Nothing to do in the Oregon game, but sit back and enjoy the good luck. Then Oregon struck fast to the endzone and I completely forgot the onside kick. It was just pure joy. The commentators started criticizing Oregon for scoring too fast. What? Yes, there was 45 seconds left or something like that, but what should they have done? “Yeah coach, I know he was wide open for the TD, but I thought I’d just throw it away to burn some more clock.” College football commentators are the absolute worst.
Anyway, apparently feeling like the game needed considerably more drama, as if that were possible, the Ducks decide not to tackle the guy returning the kick who runs the ball all the way down to field goal range. After choosing to run instead of taking one shot to the endzone, the Sooners try the field goal and it is blocked!!!! Astounding. What a game. Enoch and I were bouncing around his living room yelling and carrying on like we were one of the thousand drunk Oregon students who rushed the field to make faces at the camera interviewing a frightened Coach Bellotti. Good, good times.
Of course now, every talking head in the country is talking about how the refs jobbed the Sooners and cost them the game. This is one of my least favorite things about sports. How many plays do the refs affect in the course of a game? 3%? 5%? 10%? How many plays do the players affect? 100%, of course. But everyone wants to pull out one or two plays and blame the refs for the outcome of games when they screw up a call. I’m not saying it wasn’t a bad call or that it didn’t affect the game. But refs do not win or lose games. No ref failed to tackle Dixon on his late TD run. No Ref blocked OU’s would be game winning FG. No ref failed to score for OU on various possessions throughout the game. No ref scored any points for Oregon. The refs make a difference, but they do not decide games.
The Ducks deserved that win. They earned it.
One more thing while we’re here. I’m sorry, but the Ducks Unis are the ugliest things I have seen since they added the stripes to the Rockets uniforms back when Chuck was renting Hakeem to get a championship. The mess on the shoulder pads, the strange matted pants, the greens that don’t match each other, the overall busyness. It’s brutal. I love that the Nike design folks work with the players and try to be creative. I love all the different options and really do appreciate the effort. Good idea, bad execution. These things will be remembered and talked about and laughed at for decades. It’s not bad enough that a cartoon duck is the mascot, now they have uniforms that the XFL think are too gaudy.
b. What happened to ND? Did I just get caught up in the hype along with everyone else? Was Michigan really that good? Was it a fluke? Tough to say, but good for Michigan for doing what I gave them no chance to do. The bad part now is that Notre Dame’s season is most likely over after 3 games. What are they playing for now? A non-title determining BCS bowl game? Who cares? Until we get a playoff format, the season will continue to be a season long single elimination tournament where you have to keep playing meaningless games after you lose in week 3. I hate it. It’s why I can’t become a huge college football guy and remain a casual fan. But everyone already knows this is a problem and agrees with it except for the people who actually make decisions about such things, none of whom are likely to read this or have an intelligent thought in the near future, so we’ll move on.
c. When are we going to see the drop off for USC from last year to this year? I mean they lost Leinert and Bush and White and others and they don’t look any worse. I’m beginning to think USC may be the Yankees of college football. It is becoming clear that they likely have the largest payroll for their players and they are so loaded every year it is starting to get unwatchable.
d. Is there a secret agreement among the top programs to let small schools play with them in the first half to get everyone excited about a possible upset only to run away with the game in the second half? Aren’t there about 25 games like that every week? Is it just to torture us? Is there some NCAA official who just sits back laughing to himself every Saturday saying things like, “look, people think Cincinnati is going to beat Ohio State. Hahahahahahahahahahahaha!” I think there is.
3. Now on to Pro football. Unlike, …well…ever, I also got to sit around doing nothing but watching Pro Football this Sunday as I was still staying with my brothers who live for that sort of thing and who am I to do otherwise. NFL Sunday ticket was created for days like yesterday when the game CBS was showing in the morning was the Ravens/Raiders game. Seriously, when are they going to bring the NFL back to Oakland? I really think they could support a pro team if the league would give them a chance. I know this is quite a statement, but in all my years of watching football, I do believe this Raider team may very well be the worst team I have ever seen. They can not even snap the ball without fumbling. They did not have their first play for positive yards until well into the second quarter. After the first several possessions ended in turnovers, the commentators found themselves praising the Raiders for actually getting to punt. I think the league should step in and take over the franchise like MLB did with the Expos. It’s time.
But having to watch that game didn’t upset me at all for two reasons. One, my brother Caleb has Sunday Ticket so we could watch whatever game we want (in HD no less) and two, the Ravens’ D is on my fantasy team and was really giving me a good start to the day.
a. Not to be mean, but I can’t say I’m disappointed in the new TerreBill development. TO breaking his hand means Parcells should start openly criticizing him in about 2 days which will kickstart yet another glorious public fued further distracting their owner/public enemy from the fact that his starting QB is having to fight for his life to hold off Tony Romo. Yikes
b. Did you see that Jerricho Cotchery catch where he got sandwiched with a hit that would have ended my life and then somehow didn’t let his knee touch and got up and scored? If you didn’t, find it and watch it. I watched it like 20 times in slow motion with my tivo this morning and loved it every time. Even my lovely, but non-football liking wife was moved to exclaim, “wow.”
c. When will scouts finally realize that your team is better off with a poised accurate passer than a giant QB with a super strong arm? I think probably never. I mean, if you didn’t learn that from watching Montana and Marino all those years, you are never going to get it. Why do I bring this up? Because Drew Brees and Chad Pennington would probably give your team a better chance to win than whoever they have throwing the rock around…with exception of course, but I’m just saying. Ask Miami fans if they disagree.
d. Apparently, Miami was in the microwave and not just the conventional oven, because they got done in no time. Let’s just say, if they were pasta and you threw them up against a window, they would stick. They’re done. Really. It’s over. …unless they start playing Joey. See subsection c above.
e. The Seachickens are in trouble. After their offense looked bad the first week, you could tell yourself, maybe it was just rust and maybe the Detroit D is pretty good. Well the Detroit D just made Rex Grossman look like Payton Manning and the Seattle O still couldn’t move the ball against Arizona who plays D like the French guard Paris. I’m not counting them out yet and Branch should help, but they’re in trouble and if they don’t get things turned around quick, the Giants will win by 3 scores this weekend. (side note: My brother Caleb purchased Seahawk jerseys for his whole family. They are very cool and the family looks great. His 2 year old daughter, however, refused to wear hers and so he had to go out and buy her a Seahawk cheerleading outfit which she loves. Just a little reminder to Daddy, that she is 100% girl)
f. Steve Smith is good, but he’s not going to save the Panthers. If he isn’t what’s making the difference right now, they are in huge trouble. If he is, then every team in the league is going to triple team him and they’re still in trouble. No team has ever won the superbowl after starting 0-2. That record could be broken, but Carolina’s in trouble.
g. Teams I still really like as Superbowl contenders include: Baltimore, Indy, Philly, Atlanta, Pittsburg and maybe Chicago and that’s pretty much it. Notice a pattern? All those teams play really good D. Even Indy, though they might not be in the same league as those others on defense.
4. Ok, enough with the rest, now lets talk about the Niners. What a glorious afternoon. The home opener, the rival Rams, watching with Enoch in his newly purchased Vernon Davis jersey, Frank Gore on my fantasy team, watching in northern California where the Niners is all anyone talks about on radio. It was the coming together of all those things that made an early season victory a truly sweet event. For no extra charge, here are my thoughts on the game:
a. Frank Gore is a bonafide stud. He gains yards on every play, he can run inside and out and catch the ball. He takes on tacklers and drives them back. He is quick, fast, shifty, patient, has good vision. If he stops coughing it up once a game, he has the potential to be the best RB in SF history. I mean that. He may never get to be part of a great team like Craig and Rathman and Watters and the others, but he may be more talented than any of them. Plus, and I really love this more than I can say, he blocks. He saved Smith’s bacon at least 3 times that I saw with great blitz pickups blocking linebackers and safeties. To be that small and still be able to block in the passing game means he can play every down and open up the offense by being available in the passing game. I’m still worried about his health as he has a bad history and plays very physical, and if he goes down to injury, I may cry, but right now, watching him play is a thing of beauty and gives the Niners a chance against just about anyone. Not saying they are now going to beat everyone, but they will have a chance in every game.
b. The Niners beat a pretty good (though poorly coached if you ask me) Ram team without a bunch of fluke plays, without V. Davis doing anything in the passing game and without the entire left side of their O line who also happen to be their best linemen. I didn’t think that was even possible, but they flat out, outplayed the Rams and earned that win. Very impressive.
c. The D, which looked so bad against Arizona played extremely well. The rookies look good, they had some pass rush (6 sacks) and their DBs were amazing, especially in single coverage. Every time the rams threw deep I expected the camera to pan to an open receiver and instead it showed a Niner DB knocking down another pass. The Niners aren’t ready to join the league’s elite, but they are no longer a bye week for the team playing them.
d. Alex Smith looks good. Not better. Not improved. Not progressing nicely. Good. He stands in in the pocket. He delivers the ball high and quickly and has nice mobility to run or throw on the run. He could be more consistent, but he only made one bad decision in the game yesterday that I saw and that statement alone is amazing. I think he’s going to be for real which is a huge relief.
e. Tough game against the Eagles next week, but the Niners have a punchers chance every week and that is something. Now if we could just get the local fox channel to show the game when the Seahawks aren’t playing, we’ll really have something.
5. Now, for the StumpTown Fantasy report: This week I played the most loaded team in the league (Alexander and Rudi and Driver) and the team with Tomlinson. Tough duty. I had a pretty amazing week though. With one guy left to play, I have already bested last week’s league leading effort with 107 points. That’s a lot. 34 of those came from the Ravens’ D. I love the Raiders. My big dilemma of the week was who to start between Caddilac Williams and Deuce. I went with Duece and it paid off. Caddy stunk again and Deuce went for 2 TDs Gore was great again with 127 and a score and Keyshon went over 100 yards. Hassleback let me down with a very sub par performance and Larry Fitzgerald who is usually great was quite lame.
The good news is that with 107 points only 3 teams have higher totals than me right now with one game to go. The bad news is I’m playing 2 of those teams. Great timing. Now I need 20 yards receiving for Matt Jones tonight to win one matchup and I need Jones to outscore Hines Ward by 4 points to win the other. I’m guessing that’s good enough for a split this week and unless something horrible happens, I should be 3-1 after this week.
Next week I play my dreaded rival Dutt for the first time this season. He was the 3rd team to outscore me this week with a huge week. He starts Dunn and Barber and has good players mixed in all around. It will be a tough matchup, but if there is any justice in the world, I will prevail. Let’s just hope Jones doesn’t pull up lame in the first quarter tonight and send me to 2-2 after going over 100 points two weeks in a row.
Ok, that’s enough for now. Go Matt Jones and Go Niners.
Anyway, here are my thoughts about the weekend:
1. Friday was a great day for sports because I got to play basketball for the first time in longer than I care to admit. I would play basketball every day for as long as my body could take if I could find a way to make it work, so the fact that I haven’t played regularly in a while really bothers me. But Friday, I got to play some backyard hoops with my buddy Randy in Stockton. I have to start playing basketball again now. My sanity, and certainly my waistline depends on it.
I followed up the afternoon hoops by watching Kansas v. Toledo in the restaurant bar Friday night, a great game that went into overtime. I don’t care about those schools, but overtime is always fun…if it is college that is. I know I’m not the first or even the 5th to say this, but that college OT format is soooo much better than the one we are stuck with in the NFL. Why is this so hard to change? It’s usually money that stops reasonable sports changes (see, e.g., the BCS), but I can’t see how that’s a factor here. The NFL system is something like changing the rules of a classic pistol duel and saying ok, start back to back, take 15 paces away from each other turn and then Bob, you fire first and if you don’t hit and kill Joe, then Joe, you can take a shot and you keep going until one of you hits the other. Doesn’t exactly wreak of fairness.
2. College football is great. I really enjoy it, especially when the Ducks are playing and playing well or when two big time, highly ranked programs are going head to head. That said, Saturday is not just for football. I love being able to sit and watch the games, but not every week all day long. Saturday is primarily for playing with your kids and reconnecting with your family after a long week of work. It is for getting things done and resting and playing and getting outside whenever possible. So, most of the time, I don’t watch more than a few quarters of various games mixed throughout the day on Saturday and frankly, that is just fine with me.
That said, every once in a while it is pretty dang nice to have no obligations and be able to sit and watch as much football as your rear-end and eyes can take. If such a Saturday comes along on the same weekend when 14 of the top 25 teams are playing against each other, then that is no minor blessing and should be cherished and remembered and discussed repeatedly in sports blogs. This last Saturday was such a day. I was traveling on business, but finished my business early and spent the rest of the day “trapped” at my brothers’ places with nothing better to do than watch football. I couldn’t do that every week, or even most weeks, but this week it was pretty nice. So, here are my college football thoughts:
a. Of course, I have to start with the Ducks. What an amazing game. The Ducks looked early like they were going to dominate and then the offense started to fizzle and OU remembered that Fresno State had already conclusively proven that Oregon’s D can not stop the run. OU came back and then went up and then went up some more. OU led by 13 with a little more than 3 minutes remaining in the game. Sitting dejected on the couch next to my brother Enoch, I turned and said, “well, if they can get a quick score they still have time for an onside kick and a couple desperation throws to the endzone.” I knew it was true, but I didn’t believe it would happen.
Then, they took the ball down and Dixon did a Vince Young imitation keeping the ball and running for a TD. I was thinking, “hey that’s great.” But I still didn’t believe they might actually pull off a win. The onside kick comes after a shifting of the line by the kicking team that, as far as I can tell, had no affect on anything but did waste time and look foolish. A good kick. Bodies colliding. A loose ball. OREGON RECOVERS!!!!!
Or did they? Then about an hour and 15 minutes of replay follows. The replay shows a few things relatively clearly and some things just clearly enough. First, the ball was clearly touched by an Oregon player before it went 10 yards. Second, the Oregon players fairly obviously ran into the OU players before the ball went 10 yards (another no no). Finally, it appeared in serious doubt whether Oregon even recovered the ball. All of this was fairly clear to everyone except Dan Fouts who is the biggest homer (for the Ducks) in sports broadcasting, and probably my buddy Whipple who has 15k stashed away to pay for an experimental procedure that would actually change the color of his blood to lime green.
My brother and I watched again and again looking for some way that the refs could find there wasn’t conclusive evidence. The more we watched, the more our spirits sank as it was fairly obvious that the Ducks should not get the football. Little did we know the refs were not watching the replays after all. It turns out that when the refs went to the monitor, they used the time to watch those cool new Nike adds with all the famous football personalities coaching and playing highschool football. Like anyone who likes football, they had a great time watching it over and over saying, “wait, wasn’t that _____?” They admired the production quality and marveled over the money Nike must have spent to bring all those sports personalities together for one commercial. After they had finally seen enough, they realized they were supposed to be reviewing a key play in a game they had not even been watching to begin with. The head ref wheeled around in a panic, but before he could decide what to do next his eyes were caught by the cross-hatch-faux-diamond-plating on the Ducks uniforms and then saw that Nike swoosh. It must have been a sign. He strides confidently to the mic and announces “Nik…err, I mean Oregon retains possession.” 4 people lost their hearing from the cheering Oregon fans at Autzen.
I had that weird feeling I always get when I’m playing sports and someone remembers the score wrong in my favor, or someone doesn’t see my teammate take 4 steps on his way to the basket or something like that. I don’t want to win that way. At the same time I want to win. When I’m playing I can (and do) speak up and correct things. Nothing to do in the Oregon game, but sit back and enjoy the good luck. Then Oregon struck fast to the endzone and I completely forgot the onside kick. It was just pure joy. The commentators started criticizing Oregon for scoring too fast. What? Yes, there was 45 seconds left or something like that, but what should they have done? “Yeah coach, I know he was wide open for the TD, but I thought I’d just throw it away to burn some more clock.” College football commentators are the absolute worst.
Anyway, apparently feeling like the game needed considerably more drama, as if that were possible, the Ducks decide not to tackle the guy returning the kick who runs the ball all the way down to field goal range. After choosing to run instead of taking one shot to the endzone, the Sooners try the field goal and it is blocked!!!! Astounding. What a game. Enoch and I were bouncing around his living room yelling and carrying on like we were one of the thousand drunk Oregon students who rushed the field to make faces at the camera interviewing a frightened Coach Bellotti. Good, good times.
Of course now, every talking head in the country is talking about how the refs jobbed the Sooners and cost them the game. This is one of my least favorite things about sports. How many plays do the refs affect in the course of a game? 3%? 5%? 10%? How many plays do the players affect? 100%, of course. But everyone wants to pull out one or two plays and blame the refs for the outcome of games when they screw up a call. I’m not saying it wasn’t a bad call or that it didn’t affect the game. But refs do not win or lose games. No ref failed to tackle Dixon on his late TD run. No Ref blocked OU’s would be game winning FG. No ref failed to score for OU on various possessions throughout the game. No ref scored any points for Oregon. The refs make a difference, but they do not decide games.
The Ducks deserved that win. They earned it.
One more thing while we’re here. I’m sorry, but the Ducks Unis are the ugliest things I have seen since they added the stripes to the Rockets uniforms back when Chuck was renting Hakeem to get a championship. The mess on the shoulder pads, the strange matted pants, the greens that don’t match each other, the overall busyness. It’s brutal. I love that the Nike design folks work with the players and try to be creative. I love all the different options and really do appreciate the effort. Good idea, bad execution. These things will be remembered and talked about and laughed at for decades. It’s not bad enough that a cartoon duck is the mascot, now they have uniforms that the XFL think are too gaudy.
b. What happened to ND? Did I just get caught up in the hype along with everyone else? Was Michigan really that good? Was it a fluke? Tough to say, but good for Michigan for doing what I gave them no chance to do. The bad part now is that Notre Dame’s season is most likely over after 3 games. What are they playing for now? A non-title determining BCS bowl game? Who cares? Until we get a playoff format, the season will continue to be a season long single elimination tournament where you have to keep playing meaningless games after you lose in week 3. I hate it. It’s why I can’t become a huge college football guy and remain a casual fan. But everyone already knows this is a problem and agrees with it except for the people who actually make decisions about such things, none of whom are likely to read this or have an intelligent thought in the near future, so we’ll move on.
c. When are we going to see the drop off for USC from last year to this year? I mean they lost Leinert and Bush and White and others and they don’t look any worse. I’m beginning to think USC may be the Yankees of college football. It is becoming clear that they likely have the largest payroll for their players and they are so loaded every year it is starting to get unwatchable.
d. Is there a secret agreement among the top programs to let small schools play with them in the first half to get everyone excited about a possible upset only to run away with the game in the second half? Aren’t there about 25 games like that every week? Is it just to torture us? Is there some NCAA official who just sits back laughing to himself every Saturday saying things like, “look, people think Cincinnati is going to beat Ohio State. Hahahahahahahahahahahaha!” I think there is.
3. Now on to Pro football. Unlike, …well…ever, I also got to sit around doing nothing but watching Pro Football this Sunday as I was still staying with my brothers who live for that sort of thing and who am I to do otherwise. NFL Sunday ticket was created for days like yesterday when the game CBS was showing in the morning was the Ravens/Raiders game. Seriously, when are they going to bring the NFL back to Oakland? I really think they could support a pro team if the league would give them a chance. I know this is quite a statement, but in all my years of watching football, I do believe this Raider team may very well be the worst team I have ever seen. They can not even snap the ball without fumbling. They did not have their first play for positive yards until well into the second quarter. After the first several possessions ended in turnovers, the commentators found themselves praising the Raiders for actually getting to punt. I think the league should step in and take over the franchise like MLB did with the Expos. It’s time.
But having to watch that game didn’t upset me at all for two reasons. One, my brother Caleb has Sunday Ticket so we could watch whatever game we want (in HD no less) and two, the Ravens’ D is on my fantasy team and was really giving me a good start to the day.
a. Not to be mean, but I can’t say I’m disappointed in the new TerreBill development. TO breaking his hand means Parcells should start openly criticizing him in about 2 days which will kickstart yet another glorious public fued further distracting their owner/public enemy from the fact that his starting QB is having to fight for his life to hold off Tony Romo. Yikes
b. Did you see that Jerricho Cotchery catch where he got sandwiched with a hit that would have ended my life and then somehow didn’t let his knee touch and got up and scored? If you didn’t, find it and watch it. I watched it like 20 times in slow motion with my tivo this morning and loved it every time. Even my lovely, but non-football liking wife was moved to exclaim, “wow.”
c. When will scouts finally realize that your team is better off with a poised accurate passer than a giant QB with a super strong arm? I think probably never. I mean, if you didn’t learn that from watching Montana and Marino all those years, you are never going to get it. Why do I bring this up? Because Drew Brees and Chad Pennington would probably give your team a better chance to win than whoever they have throwing the rock around…with exception of course, but I’m just saying. Ask Miami fans if they disagree.
d. Apparently, Miami was in the microwave and not just the conventional oven, because they got done in no time. Let’s just say, if they were pasta and you threw them up against a window, they would stick. They’re done. Really. It’s over. …unless they start playing Joey. See subsection c above.
e. The Seachickens are in trouble. After their offense looked bad the first week, you could tell yourself, maybe it was just rust and maybe the Detroit D is pretty good. Well the Detroit D just made Rex Grossman look like Payton Manning and the Seattle O still couldn’t move the ball against Arizona who plays D like the French guard Paris. I’m not counting them out yet and Branch should help, but they’re in trouble and if they don’t get things turned around quick, the Giants will win by 3 scores this weekend. (side note: My brother Caleb purchased Seahawk jerseys for his whole family. They are very cool and the family looks great. His 2 year old daughter, however, refused to wear hers and so he had to go out and buy her a Seahawk cheerleading outfit which she loves. Just a little reminder to Daddy, that she is 100% girl)
f. Steve Smith is good, but he’s not going to save the Panthers. If he isn’t what’s making the difference right now, they are in huge trouble. If he is, then every team in the league is going to triple team him and they’re still in trouble. No team has ever won the superbowl after starting 0-2. That record could be broken, but Carolina’s in trouble.
g. Teams I still really like as Superbowl contenders include: Baltimore, Indy, Philly, Atlanta, Pittsburg and maybe Chicago and that’s pretty much it. Notice a pattern? All those teams play really good D. Even Indy, though they might not be in the same league as those others on defense.
4. Ok, enough with the rest, now lets talk about the Niners. What a glorious afternoon. The home opener, the rival Rams, watching with Enoch in his newly purchased Vernon Davis jersey, Frank Gore on my fantasy team, watching in northern California where the Niners is all anyone talks about on radio. It was the coming together of all those things that made an early season victory a truly sweet event. For no extra charge, here are my thoughts on the game:
a. Frank Gore is a bonafide stud. He gains yards on every play, he can run inside and out and catch the ball. He takes on tacklers and drives them back. He is quick, fast, shifty, patient, has good vision. If he stops coughing it up once a game, he has the potential to be the best RB in SF history. I mean that. He may never get to be part of a great team like Craig and Rathman and Watters and the others, but he may be more talented than any of them. Plus, and I really love this more than I can say, he blocks. He saved Smith’s bacon at least 3 times that I saw with great blitz pickups blocking linebackers and safeties. To be that small and still be able to block in the passing game means he can play every down and open up the offense by being available in the passing game. I’m still worried about his health as he has a bad history and plays very physical, and if he goes down to injury, I may cry, but right now, watching him play is a thing of beauty and gives the Niners a chance against just about anyone. Not saying they are now going to beat everyone, but they will have a chance in every game.
b. The Niners beat a pretty good (though poorly coached if you ask me) Ram team without a bunch of fluke plays, without V. Davis doing anything in the passing game and without the entire left side of their O line who also happen to be their best linemen. I didn’t think that was even possible, but they flat out, outplayed the Rams and earned that win. Very impressive.
c. The D, which looked so bad against Arizona played extremely well. The rookies look good, they had some pass rush (6 sacks) and their DBs were amazing, especially in single coverage. Every time the rams threw deep I expected the camera to pan to an open receiver and instead it showed a Niner DB knocking down another pass. The Niners aren’t ready to join the league’s elite, but they are no longer a bye week for the team playing them.
d. Alex Smith looks good. Not better. Not improved. Not progressing nicely. Good. He stands in in the pocket. He delivers the ball high and quickly and has nice mobility to run or throw on the run. He could be more consistent, but he only made one bad decision in the game yesterday that I saw and that statement alone is amazing. I think he’s going to be for real which is a huge relief.
e. Tough game against the Eagles next week, but the Niners have a punchers chance every week and that is something. Now if we could just get the local fox channel to show the game when the Seahawks aren’t playing, we’ll really have something.
5. Now, for the StumpTown Fantasy report: This week I played the most loaded team in the league (Alexander and Rudi and Driver) and the team with Tomlinson. Tough duty. I had a pretty amazing week though. With one guy left to play, I have already bested last week’s league leading effort with 107 points. That’s a lot. 34 of those came from the Ravens’ D. I love the Raiders. My big dilemma of the week was who to start between Caddilac Williams and Deuce. I went with Duece and it paid off. Caddy stunk again and Deuce went for 2 TDs Gore was great again with 127 and a score and Keyshon went over 100 yards. Hassleback let me down with a very sub par performance and Larry Fitzgerald who is usually great was quite lame.
The good news is that with 107 points only 3 teams have higher totals than me right now with one game to go. The bad news is I’m playing 2 of those teams. Great timing. Now I need 20 yards receiving for Matt Jones tonight to win one matchup and I need Jones to outscore Hines Ward by 4 points to win the other. I’m guessing that’s good enough for a split this week and unless something horrible happens, I should be 3-1 after this week.
Next week I play my dreaded rival Dutt for the first time this season. He was the 3rd team to outscore me this week with a huge week. He starts Dunn and Barber and has good players mixed in all around. It will be a tough matchup, but if there is any justice in the world, I will prevail. Let’s just hope Jones doesn’t pull up lame in the first quarter tonight and send me to 2-2 after going over 100 points two weeks in a row.
Ok, that’s enough for now. Go Matt Jones and Go Niners.
Comments
Speaking of "Florida football," how about the "Teal (Jaguars) Curtain?" I guess the Colts are to the Jags as the Bulls were to the Cavs during the Jordan years.
Anybody bored yet?