Tuesday, November 03, 2015

Fantasy league 2015 -- week 8 recap

 
ESPN’s College Gameday show traveled to Philadelphia this week for Temple’s Saturday night contest in what has to be the first time in decades anyone discussed NCAA football seriously in the city of Brotherly Love. Naturally, the Philly faithful were up to the task of showing off solid jabs in their crowd signs. Some of the best:

** Jesus rebuilt Temple in three years (everyone likes Bible humor)
** Notre Dame rooted for Drago (with a picture of Rocky underneath)
** The Pope and Gameday chose Philly (Catholics insults hit hard)
** Coaches named Kelly don’t win in this town (ouch)
** Ray Lewis killed a guy (off topic, but hilarious)
** Play like a champion Today (with the Temple T, of course)
** Santa threw the first snowball (because)

Temple lost to Notre Dame on a TD with less than two minutes to play, which was still the best football display at Lincoln Financial Field this season.

QB: Drew Brees, 60.54 pts -- on Mike’s bench
WR: Odell Beckham Jr., 30.67 pts -- started by Dad
RB: Todd Gurley, 21.67 pts -- started by Sam
TE: Ben Watson, 20.30 pts -- started by Paul
K: Justin Tucker, 20.00 pts -- started by Sam
DEF: Houston, 23.00 pts -- on the wire
D: Whitney Mercilus, 10.00 pts -- on the wire

Not only did Drew Brees become the 8th QB in NFL history to throw 7 TD passes in a game, not only did he post the 10th-highest passing yards total in a single game with 511, not only did he defeat the Giants Sunday and propel his team to a 4-4 record, but he also set a record single-player fantasy points total for our league, besting Peyton Manning’s 7 TD performance in early 2013 by 0.26 pts.

And he did it all on Mike’s bench. And Mike still had a ton of pts this week, so whatever. Who likes fantasy football anyway?

"Skill players" edition

3rd place: Juwan Thompson, -0.10 pts
2nd place: Will Tye, -0.53 pts -- on the wire
1st place: Bishop Sankey, -1.28 pts -- on the wire

In the “statistics lie” category, the New York Giants’ defense was slightly better than the New Orleans defense in terms of fantasy points (4.00 pts vs -1.00 pts) even though the Giants gave up 52 pts to the Saints’ 42.

Meanwhile, Sankey was a sleeper RB2 pick last year. And this week he scored fewer fantasy pts than any single player in the league. Go figure.


** Cowboys WR Dez Bryant (who is pure evil) snapped at reporters’ Sunday after one posted a video online (without sound) showing the temperamental wideout cursing at an opposing Seahawk, possibly saying that another one of the Seattle team deserved the serious injury he received in the game.

Possibly. Or he may have been yelling out a cake recipe. Lip reading videos are a joke. And it was a ludicrous leap to assume that Bryant said something like that, and that his teammate would have zero reaction to such a statement. But, hey, whatever gives you something to write about some weeks...

** The Phillies hired former infielder Mickey Morandini to be their new first base coach next season. That’s stupid. They should just have him play second base, since he’s probably as good as anyone they’re got.


** Only four teams ever have won their division and made the playoffs at 7-9. This year, we could have two -- the Giants lead the NFC East at 4-4 and the Colts lead the AFC South at 3-5.

** Eight weeks into the season, four teams are still undefeated. And if the Broncos lose to the Patriots and Bengals, three teams could finish the season without a loss (since the Panthers don’t play any of them).

** The Ravens have played eight games so far this season, all decided by eight points or less (2-6). Both of their wins came by a field goal.

** Despite all the wackiness so far, if the season ended today, seven of the 12 post-season teams from 2014 would qualify for the playoffs again. Two last place teams from 2014 (The Jets and Raiders) would also qualify.

** At least the Titans still stink.


Philadelphia had the week off, and Dallas had another close loss to drop their record to 2-5. What does this mean for their prime-time matchup next week? I think you already know the answer:

Reeling Cowboys face Monday game against another hated division rival

** Oh me, birds: Eagles dominate early for a change, avoid vanity, win coasting.

Honestly, that one is so long it’s just one step away from anagramming the entire Eagles fight song. FYI, if you do that, you come up with “Dallas is evil” twice.


** Went 2-1 against Dad in our picks this week, which puts me improbably up three with nine weeks to go. I’d be up more if I’d stop picking the Titans, who have gone 3-20 since the start of last season. But now that they fired their head coach, they look awfully good for next week ...

** Oklahoma State player Texas Tech in basketball last February and lost 65-61. On Saturday, they played them in football and won 70-52.

** The Phillies are 300-1 odds to win the World Series next year. Only two other teams are at triple-digit odds -- The Braves (100-1) and the Rockies (150-1). But those odds mean that if you put $10 down on the Phils next year … you’ll lose $10.

Week 8 standings

1 -- Lake Weed Monsters (Dad) -- 1104.68 pts
2 -- Cosby's Sleepers (Mike) -- 1002.76 pts
3 -- Gettin' Chippy (Jo) -- 984.57 pts
4 -- hippo fantasy (Sam) -- 933.93 pts
5 -- Yelp for help (Mom Doyle) -- 922.93 pts
6 -- 1.21 Chip-a-watts (Ant) -- 910.43 pts
7 -- Eat Drink and D Murray (Capt Awesome) -- 871.02 pts
8 -- Clinton's Email (Jim) -- 856.46 pts
9 -- Blue Collar Killers (Jeff) -- 852.75 pts
10 -- Bethlehem Moravians (Bob) -- 845.34 pts
11 -- Heap Big Chief Reid (Joel) -- 783.44 pts
12 -- May Pay Attention (Paul) -- 724.77 pts

A big week for New York QB Eli “Dopey” Manning sneaks Mom back into shouting distance of the top, and a miserable performance by New York Ryan “Injured” Fitzpatrick moves me back into the bottom half of the standings. Other than that, nobody else moved more than a spot.

Dad’s once insurmountable lead continues to slowly dwindle, so slowly that it may take 40 more weeks to catch him. But more than 60 percent of his points this week came from four of his 12 starters, so maybe there’s a chance his team’s balance is suspect. Or maybe this whole fantasy season is just a mess.

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