• 
• 
• 
• 

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Andy Richardson

A quick whirl around the league at the highlights and lowlights of the games I paid the most attention to on Sunday…

Random Thought #1: If you watched the end of the Eagles-Cowboys game, you had to be shocked – shocked – to see Brian Westbrook, about to go in for any easy touchdown to put his team up 11 points with 2 minutes left, stop in his tracks just short of the goal line. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred the player scores the touchdown, and we get to spend 20 minutes watching the other team get some additional fantasy stats, score a late touchdown, try to recover an onside kick, so on and so forth. Instead Westbrook did the right thing … but the thing you almost never see. When you consider how that one decision affected countless fantasy matchups across the country – owners who started or were facing Westbrook, Tony Romo, Jason Witten, and other top players likely to have put up additional fantasy points if Westbrook scores there – well, it’s a pretty significant play, and proof that just when you think you’ve seen it all in football (or fantasy), something comes along to remind you that you haven’t.

Random Thought #2: Has weather ever affected so many NFL games – and fantasy football semifinals – in one week? Browns-Bills, Jets-Patriots, and Jaguars-Steelers were all a snowy, rainy mess, and many owners were certainly in the playoffs in the first place while riding the passing offenses of half of those teams’ offensive stars. Unrelated to the weather, you had big names from the Cowboys and Colts also putting up below-average numbers – altogether, Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Tony Romo, and Derek Anderson combined for 1 touchdown pass. Which makes them even with Cleo Lemon. A lot of angry fantasy owners this morning, and as someone who started Tom Brady and lost as a No. 1 seed, I can relate.

Moving on: Why do “a day” of football when I can do three days? Especially when so many unfortunate souls don’t have the NFL Network and consequently were unable to see either the Thursday night or Saturday night games. Granted these were two games featuring four sub-.500 teams, and not one of them is going to make the playoffs, but there were still some fantasy implications worth discussing….

Broncos-Texans: When this game showed up on the schedule, you wouldn’t think the team that would dominate the other one would be Texans. But here’s Houston with their backup quarterback and backup running back thoroughly outplaying Denver on both sides of the ball. The Texans have an offense – imagine if they hadn’t been without Andre Johnson for half of the season – and they’ve got a defense, too, despite losing a couple of top players in their secondary earlier in the season. The sad thing for the Texans is that two of the AFC’s five best teams, plus another pretty good one in the Titans, are in their own division. Tough to make the playoffs that way, but in Johnson and tight end Owen Daniels, they’ve got a pair of top-quality fantasy options for years to come. I like undrafted rookie Darius Walker, too, who’s faster with much better moves than Ron Dayne. It looks, however, like he’ll always be in some sort of committee, and probably with Dayne next year (rather than Ahman Green).

Then there are the Broncos, who might not be better than very many teams in the league right now. They’ve got a solid, if somewhat mistake-prone young quarterback in Jay Cutler, that’s one thing. Then they’ve got talent at running back, wide receiver, and tight end – what’s funny is that in each case the top talent comes from homegrown players (and projected No. 2 types) rather than free agents or veteran acquisitions. Selvin Young, not Travis Henry, looks like the most talented running back. Brandon Marshall, not gimpy Javon Walker, is the best wideout, while Tony Scheffler (not big-ticket item Daniel Graham) is a good young tight end. Do we give the Broncos credit for finding young talent, or criticism for paying big bucks for players who for one reason or another aren’t as good? In either case, there’s some talent here at the skill positions, but the team’s entire defensive front seven is a total mess. It might be a couple of years before they’re a serious threat in the AFC again.

Bengals-49ers: Where to start with this one? First of all, the schedule-makers seemed to be indulging in a little wishful thinking when they thought this game would be a compelling one. Yes, the 49ers finished strong last year, and the Bengals have some offensive talent, but it was still a reasonable guess that both teams would be the third- or fourth-best teams in their own divisions at this point, and so they are. For San Francisco, even in victory they did some odd things, like trying to convert a late fourth-and-2 with a 7-point lead, rather than attempting a 40ish-yard field goal that would have put them up by 10. Um, huh? Then there’s the fact that based on the way Alex Smith has played, the depth chart at quarterback appears to be topsy-turvy in San Francisco. At least they’ve got one legit star in Frank Gore, who looked better than he has at any other point this season, and – based on this game – maybe Darrell Jackson will be worth a flier next year. Vernon Davis is a trickier case, seemingly capable of a big game one week followed by being totally left out of the offense the next. Tough to advocate gambling on his inconsistency next season.

If the Bengals aren’t the league’s most confounding team, I’m not sure who is. Start with the fact that Carson Palmer threw 1 TD, total, in the last two weeks against the Rams and 49ers. T.J. Houshmandzadeh hasn’t scored in four straight, and appeared to drop catchable touchdowns in two of those. Rudi Johnson and Kenny Watson are in a committee that doesn’t seem to have much rhyme or reason to it – even third-stringer DeDe Dorsey is getting carries lately. It’s just a mess, and while you’d THINK this offense would put up good numbers against a statistically horrible Browns defense next week – of course, they did play that wild 51-45 shootout in week 2 – the guess right now is the rematch will be a lot different. The Bengals just don’t look like they’re going to score even 30 points on anyone right now.

Bills-Browns: I watched more of this game than I saw, if that makes sense. It was definitely one of the worst snow games I’ve ever seen. Not as bad as the Patriots-Dolphins snowplow game, which I saw in its entirety as a kid growing up in Vermont, but pretty bad. At one point the officials spent 3-4 minutes trying to figure out where to spot the ball – they couldn’t find the yard line. Officials and players just stood there in confusion, pointing in random directions, like me looking for my car outside Stop and Shop. I saw a kicker fall flat on his back like Charlie Brown; I saw Derek Anderson wearing an oven mitt; I saw Phil Dawson make two pretty amazing field goals; and I saw Marshawn Lynch bust a huge run across a snow-covered field that made it look like he was running in slow motion. About the only other thing that needs to be said is, check the weather reports before starting any players in the Northeast, Midwest, or any other region likely to be affected by winter weather next week. Clearly it could make the difference between a win and a loss.

Packers-Rams: I was smart enough to start Brett Favre over Palmer in one league, but not smart enough to start him over Brady in another. It’s a dilemma: Do you really bench a guy going for the TD record just because of weather concerns? The answer, I guess, is yes you do, yes I should have, and yes I lost a playoff game because I didn’t. Anyway, it’s nutty to watch the Packers offense, which is playing better than anyone short of New England right now. They’ve scored at least 27 points in seven straight games; 31-plus in six of those. The only time they seem to get stopped is when Favre throws a bad interception, which he still does every now and again. Green Bay could end up with the NFC’s top seed, so they probably won’t be able to rest any starters the last two weeks of the season (only if they lose and Dallas wins next week, which is possible). Unless there’s poor weather in Chicago next week – again, check those weather reports – Favre, Greg Jennings, and Donald Lee are going to help some teams win fantasy championships. (And if there IS poor weather, Ryan Grant will.) The bad news is that Donald Driver still isn’t scoring, but Favre barely missed him for a 33-yard TD on Sunday. Maybe this week.

For the Rams, was the reason they let London Fletcher go a few years back an issue of cap room – too much tied up on the offensive side of the ball? Talk about a team that’s just desperately in need of a defensive presence. You never get the sense that a player is going to step up and make a key stop, any kind of stop. They played with the Packers for a half and then were just a punching bag after that. On offense, what is it with top draft picks like Steven Jackson and Frank Gore finally looking like top picks? It was nice for their owners, but then again, a lot of people who drafted those players probably weren’t still playing meaningful games in week 15 anyway.

Eagles-Cowboys: See, this is why I thought the Eagles had a shot to upset the Patriots. They can play defense, their blitzes give a lot of teams trouble, and they certainly did to the Cowboys today. OK, Romo hurt his thumb, and he was probably distracted by Jessica Simpson/Carrie Underwood/whoever sitting up there in a luxury box – and who wouldn’t be, we understand, Tony. Nevertheless, the Eagles went in and knocked Romo around, harassed Terrell Owens into a few drops, and won convincingly, capped by the Westbrook play described earlier. It can be done; the NFC isn’t over yet.

Are the Eagles really going to dump Donovan McNabb after the season? Maybe the fans want them to, but I just can’t see it. They’re not going to get proper value for him. They don’t really have any idea whether Kevin Kolb can be an NFL starter, and this is not a rebuilding team. Certainly McNabb plays poorly at times, and has this year, but doesn’t this team have a few other problems, too? I’m going to guess McNabb stays put in Philadelphia for one more season. We’ll see.

Washington-Giants: For much of the season I’ve had three of the NFL’s best tight ends in all of my leagues: Chris Cooley, Jeremy Shockey, and Dallas Clark. In a couple of leagues I have two of them, and I usually struggle determining which one to bench. I mention this because for the last two weeks it’s been a no-win situation – Cooley had a 93-yard day against the Bears, but apart from that these guys just aren’t catching any passes. Clark has 1 catch each of the past two weeks. Shockey caught 1 pass at Philadelphia, and then he and Cooley combined for just 2 catches, total, in the first half of this game. I have no answers, beyond saying that tight ends get beat up a lot in the NFL. Maybe by week 15, these guys just aren’t as nimble as they were earlier in the year. As if to prove the point, Shockey proceeded to break his leg in the second half.

Along those same lines, a really ugly game. Santana Moss drops a long pass. His brother, Sinorice Moss, costs the Giants a first down -- twice -- by trying to make a move. Chris Cooley gets underthrown, Brandon Jacobs drops several passes, Eli Manning shakes his head, LaRon Landry follows up a great play by committing a dimwitted taunting penalty that gives the Giants a first down, etc. No team with a winning record has as many just plain ugly defeats as the Giants. Washington manages to win and lose ugly, sometimes (it seems) in the very same game.

But at least it wasn’t snowing.

• Comments [1]

Readers' Comments

Add a Comment

Already a registered user? Please sign in to add comments.

To add comments, you must become a registered user of our site. To register, please click here.