Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Fantasy Football Week 2 Awards

It was a near perfect weekend for me in the football world. The Steelers won, which makes the wife happy, I won in both of my fantasy leagues, which makes me happy, and the Redskins gave up a 17 point lead to lose in overtime, which makes me wonder why I still watch football at all.

Let's not waste anymore time talking about something you could have read here, and get right to the Week 3 Awards!

As always, we start at the bottom, which inevitably means Team Ralph.

The Cat in the Oven Award- Formerly known as the Huggy Bear Award for Emo Statuses (which I'm hereby retiring until further notice) this new award will serve to ridicule the overreactions and delusions of the players in our fantasy league. Let's be honest, fantasy football wouldn't be fun if we didn't get overly involved in it and upset at the mere idea of our starting the wrong player in our flex position. Pierre Garcon v. Denver, Mike Wallace at Tampa Bay, or Nate Washington v. the Giants?? Who do I pick?? Someone help me!

No, seriously help me. I want to trade players.

Neil takes home the Cat in the Oven award for angrily and awkwardly, albeit correctly, using the word "garner" in his complaint filled status post. As in, "Two weeks in a row I have two players garner me less than two fantasy points". If you're going to use inappropriately complicated words, you might as well make the whole phrase overtly complicated. For example, "Balderdash! That I twice held lads upon mine roster who sequentially garnered unto I a depleted effort of acquisitional know-how. And oh, did he, but twice to me give a number less than three that I, regrettably, took not part so he and me could then become we."

I wasted a lot of time doing that.

Take the cat out of the oven, Neil.

The Cosmo Kramer Award for Hyperactivity- Each year I wait for the time that Ricky's hyperactive add/dropping or incessant trading will bite him in the butt. Usually he's making smart moves so it takes a while for something to go wrong. This week, however, he was a victim of bad timing. You see, Ricky and Tom agreed to a trade where Tom would give up Anquan Boldin and Reggie Bush for Carnell Williams, Darren McFadden and Wes Welker. The trade processed this morning at 7:40am, just a few hours after Reggie Bush fractured his fibula putting him out for at least six weeks.

Do you think Ricky ever would have traded Williams, McFadden and Welker for Boldin straight up? The hyperactive player movement caught up to him like a Kenyan chasing.....well....me.

The Post motherlovers Hangover Award- Goes to Wheels this week, and I'll tell you why. At the end of the post last week I made four predictions, and I nailed two of them. I'm a believer in self-jinxing so I said I'd lose to Creasman and someone on my team would get hurt in an effort to avoid both of those things happening. I ended up winning and everyone on my team is healthy...for now.

The other prediction, that the Texans would the Redskins, was the same type of attempt only it didn't work. However, it did mean I guessed correctly.

Which brings us to the one prediction I made that wasn't a reverse jinx. I predicted that Wheels' team (who, in Week 1, posted 141 fantasy points) would not break the 90 point mark this week. He finished the week with 80 fantasy points. How did I know this would happen?

I'll tell you via an excerpt of an awards post I wrote last year for this same league. My team name was "motherlovers", which should clear up some confusion. I wrote:

" [Sam] is the latest victim of what I’m deeming the Post motherlovers Hangover. What is that, you ask? I’ll explain. I’ve calculated (remember, tons of free time at work) the number of points against me this season and averaged it out over 9 weeks. Teams, when playing me, average 92 points. The following week (the Post motherlovers Hangover) teams are averaging 72 points. That’s a 20 point difference!! To take it a step further, I’ve removed the perennially hopeless teams (kyle, blakely, ralph) and the results are staggering (to me at least). Without those 3 teams, opponents against me average 100 points, and in the week following…68! What is it about my team that causes you all to play so well? And do poorly the following week?"


Hopefully there's one glaring fact that stands out from that. My inability to capitalize people's names. And the fact that in the weeks after teams play me they tend to put up only a fraction of the points they did the week before when we matched up.

Playing me is like dating a Kardashian. Sure it'll make you look good for a little while, but afterwards you are crippled by the experience and no one will ever respect you again. Ever.

These awards are taking much too long, let's move into the Quick Hits section.

The Homerism Prevails Award- Sam gets this for sticking with his guns and starting Donovan McNabb over fantasy stud Matt Schaub. The two quarterbacks faced each other on Sunday and, being a Redskins fan, Sam couldn't start the QB playing against his home team. The fantasy gods smiled upon that decision and granted both field generals with superb fantasy games, and garnered Sam a victory.

The Jabba the Hut Award for Moving at a Standstill- I take pride in my ability to hawk the waiver wire and scoop up little known players on the verge of a breakout. Last year I acquired Miles Austin during his incredible game against Kansas City, a decision that led me to a 3rd place finish. This year, however, I'm moving slower than Kevin James towards a salad bar.

When Ryan Grant, starting RB for the Packers, got hurt, I thought to myself, "I should go pick up Brandon Jackson, his backup." Then I thought, "Meh, I don't really need him that badly." WHAT?!? When could I not use a top-20 running back on my team?? I'm such an idiot. Needless to say a few hours later when I checked back Ricky had already scooped him up. This also happened with Mike Vick, Jason Snelling, the San Francisco Defense and Jeff Reed. All guys I said, "I'll wait a few hours to pick them up" and then were gone.

The Scarecrow Award- Nothing brings me more joy than ridiculing Austin's decision on who to start and who to sit. He often makes the logical decision but has it come back to haunt him like Moaning Myrtle in the second floor bathroom. This week Austin benched Mike Sims-Walker, his 5th round pick, because he posted 0 catches last week. Clearly rattled, Perry stayed away from starting him this week and, of course, MSW has over 100 yards and a TD. Good things come to those... who aren't named Austin!

The Blown Gasket Award- The final award this week goes to Noord. Lets all take a moment to reflect on his laugh.

Noord, stop starting Brandon Jacobs. He lost the starting position, asked for a trade and threw his helmet into the stands. He's one Dennis Rodman haircut away from being Ron Artest. BACK AWAY SLOWLY!

Predictions for Next Week- Jimmy posts his highest point total of the year, one of the currently undefeated teams will lose, and both of the teams with 0 wins will remain that way.

You heard it here first. Which means I was the first person to get it wrong.

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