2010 fantasy recap, week 14

Let me get this straight.

The Philadelphia Phillies, the only professional sports team with 10,000 losses, a team that five years ago had to beg pitcher Adam Eaton to play for them, last year traded away the second-best pitcher in baseball (Cliff Lee) in a controversial and emotional move get the best pitcher in baseball (Roy Halladay), only to see Lee come back one-year later and give the Phils a discount so that he could play here instead of with the New York Yankees, the winningest franchise in all of professional sports.

Oh my gawd, I was killed in some sort of baseball-related accident, wasn't I? And this is heaven? Is Brian Dawkins on the Phillies now too?

QB: Matt Schaub, 32.52 pts -- sitting on Paul's bench
RB: Darren McFadden, 39.03 pts -- started by Jim
WR: Andre Johnson, 30.33 pts -- started by Jim
TE: Jason Whitten, 23.60 pts -- sitting on NewMike's bench
K: Jay Feely, 30.00 pts -- sitting on the waiver wire
DEF: Pittsburgh, 27.00 pts -- started by Jeff
D: LaMarr Woodley, 15.00 pts -- sitting on the wire

Just to cover that amazing Jay Feely line a little closer: He kicked five FGs, four extra points, recorded a tackle and scored on a five-yard TD run on a trick play in the second quarter. And after that TD run? Yeah, he kicked the extra point for that too.

"QBs name Kyle" edition
3rd Place: Kyle Boller, 0.50 pts -- sitting on the wire
2nd Place: Jake Delhomme, -0.56 pts -- sitting on the wire
1st Place: Kyle Orton, -0.86 pts -- started by Heidi

At least Boller has the excuse that he was a temporary fill-in as the Raiders' backup QB -- Both Orton and Delhomme were the starters in their game, and just played dreadful.

Orton, who has 20 TDs and is on pace for a 4,000-yard passing season, has thrown no TDs in his last two games against three picks. And he hasn't passed for 300 yard combined in those two losses. And Tim Tebow is his backup, so it's not like anyone wants to see Orton play in the first place. Rough end of the season for him.

Every so often I like to remind myself how important good coaching is in this league. As an experiment, I recently popped in the very realistic Madden 2003 into my PS2 and played a full regular season with a randomly drafted set of players, insuring that every team is about the same skill level.

So, with coaching as the only real variable in the video game, here's a look at how my team performed under my creative play calling, proper clock management and general excellence:

** Team finished 16-0, averaging 100.3 points scored and 11.1 points allowed a game.
** QB Aaron Brooks passed for 5,721 yards and 80 TDs against 4 INTs.
** Backup QB Rob Johnson passed for 2,473 yards and 35 TDs against no INTs.
** RB Ricky Williams rushed for 3,178 yards and 75 TDs. He also caught 53 passes for 1,004 yards and 15 TDs.
** TE Chad Lewis caught 80 passes for 1,928 yards and 28 TDs, and was the team's-second leading receiver.
** The team was plus-31 in turnovers, with 14 defensive TDs, and allowed under 14 yards rushing a game.
** HB Brian Mitchell had 6 punt returns for TDs and 4 kickoff returns for TDs.
** K David Akers was 1 for 2 on FGs for the year, with 98 extra points converted.

All I'm saying is I'm available any nights or weekends to help Andy Reid figure out how to use timeouts properly.

During the Brett Farve eulogies on ESPN Monday night, two comments stood out above all the other nonsense.

First, Stuart Scott noted that when Farve's consecutive games streak started in 1992, "the number one song in the country was Boyz 2 Men's 'End of the Road.' How appropriate is that?"

Then, Chris Berman noted that Farve's consecutive game streak would end against the New York Giants, "and Orioles SS Cal Ripken ended his consecutive starts streak against the New York Yankees. How ironic is that?"

The answer to both those questions? Not at all. It's barely even interesting.

How the Eagles can miss the playoffs with an 11-5 record:

** The Eagles lose next week to the Giants, but win their final two games.
** New York wins their last three.
** Tampa Bay wins their last three.
** New Orleans wins two of its last three, but loses to the Bucs.

Then, the Giants (12-4) would win the NFC East (better record). The Saints (12-4) would be the top wild card team. The Bucs (11-5) would be the #6 seed, winning the tiebreaker over the Eagles (better NFC record).

An 11-5 team has only missed the playoffs twice in NFL history: the Broncos in 1985, and the Patriots in 2008. During Sunday's Eagles win over the Cowpokes, NBC commentator Chris Collinsworth said Dallas K David Buehler is a great young player with a lot of kicking power. "His only problem is accuracy."

As a football genius, I can tell you that there are only two real phases to kicking in the NFL: getting the ball to go far, and getting the ball to go straight. If you can't do one of the two, you're only doing half of your job. Currently Buehler is ranked 32nd in the league among kickers in FG accuracy, 26th among kickers with at least 10 attempts. That's not good.

But Collinsworth could have just looked at Buehler's name and seen clearly that it spells out failure:

Dallas Cowboys Kicker David Buehler
** Crabby lad: I suck, have eroded skill. Ow.

See? He's not accurate and not a good kicker.

Click on the image below to make it bigger.

Bobert becomes the first person to break the 1900-pts mark, but check out that grouping at the top -- Another big week by me puts my team fewer than 24 points off of first place. It's still anyone's game.

** Dad picked up another game this week, so he trails by just a single tally with three weeks left in the season. It's the closest we've been in the weekly picks in years. One small screw-up and an entire year's bragging rights goes down the drain. Of course, since I'm beating him so handily in the fantasy league standings, I'll probably survive either way.

** So the Eagles beat the Cowboys on Sunday, the Phillies sign Cliff Lee late Monday, the Flyers end the Penguins' win streak on Tuesday. Can the Sixers cure cancer on Wednesday? Can the Philadelphia Union sign Jesus on Thursday? Gotta keep the good week going.

** Best part of the Cliff Lee signing? I can wear my Cliff Lee Phillies T-shirt again without any bad feelings. I knew there was a reason I never returned it.