Not so fasta. In what figured to be a week where at least a few teams heard "Hasta," in fact, no one saw their season terminated. OK, technically the Wombats did, but they had already announced the firesale, so I'm not sure that counts. And yes, I/T is on life support, but we'll get to that directly. Is it possible that either Gump or the Camel Jockeys can make the playoffs? Is it possible that Dale's Doormats can lead the league in points and miss? Just like in T1, T2, T3, TS and the TV show, no one ever really dies, they just keep crawling back for more!
Well, the old Watchdog double-jinx finally tripped up Semi-P as going into the Monday Night game, all they needed was 12 points with Gore and Gould going. Gore did his part with 7, but no Cutler does not equal no problem for the Bears and the dream of the undefeated season dies for Semi-P. The point is moot, as I mentioned last week - SP already has the division sewn up. If you're looking for trouble, Gronkowski's broken wrist on the Pat's PAT to get New England up to 59 on the day will keep him out of the next two fantasy games and probably SP's first playoff game (in week 14). Gronk accounted for 25 of SP's 50 points scored on Sunday. Though the Camel Jockeys are 4-7 now, they had Ben Roofiesberger, McFadden and Jennings injured, Marshawn Lynch and Victor Cruz on a bye this week. Oh, and the Eagles D quit. That's a pretty good team on the bench and the Jockeys still won without them. Oh by the way, Matty Ice was looking more like Vanilla Ice with his 5 INTs. And yet if he'd thrown just one TD... And while Semi-P may be full of holes for one week, as Robert Patrick says here - his sister shot him full of holes once. Once.
"Your clothes. Give them to me." In this week's Battle of the Century, the Hundering Turd held on to defeat Dale's Doormats 105-104, despite DD taking a commanding lead in the Chamberlain Scoring race. As usual, these were two of the three teams to score over 86 points this week facing off. So far this season, 8 times in 11 weeks two of the top 5 scoring teams for the week playing each other. As a result, Dale's Doormats are now in 5th place with two to play (against the aforementioned Camel Jockeys this week and the occasionally dangerous Red Bandits next week). It appears winning both games will be crucial as they need at least two teams ahead of them to lose at least once. Dale could become the first team in league history to lead the league in scoring and make the Toilet Bowl (otherwise, he would be one of four other teams since 2002 to lead the league in scoring and finish 3rd in his division).
The Turd, meanwhile, locked up their division, opening up a 3-game lead with 2 to play. Presumably the debate over whether or not to rest their starters is already in full force in Hunderingville, with Cutler riding the pines last night with a widdle headache. Awwww.... (now that's a concussion!)
"Did you call moi a dips***?" Pep 'n' Cheez, desperate for a win, came up with their first high points week of the season, putting up 108 on the suddenly lethargic Red Bandits. 527 yards passing and 5 TD will help get that total up there. That ties Schaub with Warren Moon for the second-most passing yards in a game in NFL history, but 27 yards behind the mortal Norm Van Brocklin. Van Brocklin and Schaub had 5 TD passes, Moon a mere 3. By the way, Elroy "Crazy Legs" Hirsch had 9 catches for 176 yards and 4 TD receptions in the Van Brocklin game in 1951. Their victim? The New York Yankees. Well, that explains everything, does it not? The Yankees were never known for their pass defense, even when ARod was in his prime or back in the day when Mickey Mantle was patrolling center. This is Schaub's second career game with 490 or more yards passing. The only other player to do that was Boomer Esiason (522 and 490). So how is it that Schaub and the Texans QBs are currently 16th in fantasy points? And coming into this week (that is, not including the 51), he was averaging 17.2 PPG, just behind Arizona, Cutler, Eli, and just ahead of Seattle, St. Louis, Minnesota and the Jets.
"Hasta la vista baby." Meanwhile, what has happened to the Red Bandits? They were 6-2 a few short weeks ago and still have a magic number of just 1 to make the playoffs, but the last 3 weeks, they've scored 66, 66 and 49. And when you look at their roster, LeSean McCoy and Eli were the only guys capable of putting up 30 in a given game and now McCoy is out for week 12 and Eli hasn't topped 20 since week 5 against Cleveland. OK, Reggie Bush has 31 in week 2 against Oakland, but doesn't everyone put up 30+ against Oakland? Against everyone else, his high for the season is 12.
The Fatties won a must-win game against Team Brokerage with just enough (73-72). Both teams left big games on their benches from back-up QBs (Freeman had 31 for Brokerage, Chad Henne had 39 for the Fatties). The Fatties got further good news with Willis McGahee going down for the rest of the regular season, making Ronnie Hillman the #1 RB in Denver. As long as MJD is out, that will be key for the Corpulent Ones. Brokerage still has Percy Harvin coming back from his bye week and DeMarco Murray coming back from injury, though probably not until at least week 13. Their magic number remains 1 also to make the Enchilada, though with the tie-breaker of points scored, they'd have to fall apart completely to miss even at 6-7. Brokerage has to still figure out what to do with Harvard Fitzgerald, who has averaged 28 points per game in 6 of his starts and 7 PPG in his other four starts. The Fatties slide into a playoff spot if the season ended today, despite having the 6th most points in the Quakes Division.
The Dundies continue their late-season surge, with their second straight win, this time dealing a big blow to I/T's playoff hopes. By points per game, the Dundies are the 3rd best scoring team in the Canes Division but have been eliminated from Enchilada contention due to having 107 more points per game scored against them than the league average (or 24 points per game more than Semi-P). For I/T, their game and perhaps their season came down to the inexcusable decision to start Tampa Bay D (4 points) over New England (21 points). Or was it inexcusable? Going into the week, TB had scored 80 points and was facing an anemic and troubled Carolina team. New England had scored 79 and was facing a hot Indy team. The only two points in New England's favor - newly acquired Aqib Talib made his first start for them (and had a pick-6) and they were playing at home. Still, a defensible decision for the defense, I think. And now I/T is 2 back with 2 to play.
"It's definitely you." Is that the Justin Blackmon the Jags thought they were drafting? That is a weapon! Team Gump also managed to stay alive (barely) with a convincing 92-79 win over the Wombats, breaking that pesky 5-game losing streak. The Gumpsters are 17 points behind the Red Bandits in total points but if first round NFL draft pick Justin Blackmon can come anywhere close to his 29-point outburst as opposed to the 29 points he'd accumulated in his previous 9 games total, Gump might just do their part and win out against the Fatties and I/T. Alertly picking up Kyle Rudolph when Natural Disaster inexplicably dropped him could also pay off big.
"The future's not set. There's no fate but what we make for ourselves." ND moved into second place in the Quakes division behind recently acquired Drew Brees and even more recently-acquired Calvin Johnson and the 49ers D demolishing the Bears. Just because their draft stunk, doesn't mean they have to settle for "also-ran". No one else did much of anything as they edged the now 1-10 Sprockets. Not sure what the picture here has to do with the theme of the day, but Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
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