Running of the Horde (Updated)

Yes indeed, it’s game day! Well, technically, THURSDAY was the first gameday, but that doesn’t count, because that wasn’t so much a game as it was a fetid heap of ass.

I was feeling pretty good about the game this week. My roster looks solid, and my opponent has made some…interesting moves. The most recent example…dropping starting wideout Joey Galloway from Tampa in exchange for…Kevin Faulk, a third down back from New England who wasn’t even an active player this week. I’m sure there’s a strategy there, but only Rainman can see it. He also is starting a Patriots defensive back named Terrence Wheatley. He scored a zero. This is a league where one tackle is worth 5 points, and this guy produced literally nothing. He may, in fact, have created a void in the middle of the field, and vanished in to another dimension for the length of the game, as I see no other way how a guy who apparently PLAYED in the game could register NOTHING. Still, it looked like a pretty close matchup going in to the day.

After the Thursday nighter, I was going in to today down by 11. Clinton Portis has run okay for me, although he didn’t get in the endzone, and Santana Moss managed to salvage something with his score. Meanwhile, Brandon Jacobs and Eli Manning played better for my opponent. And, as is the way of my teams, my running back situation ain’t lookin’ pretty.

Steven Jackson’s stat line…12 carries, 33 yards. Wow. A corpse just sort of lying there, being tossed to and fro by the linemen could probably match those totals. He and Portis were destroyed by the tandem of Jacobs and Thomas Jones, who I now despise. Of course, Tommy couldn’t do shit all LAST year when it would have helped me…now that he’s elsewhere, it’s clear he’s carried a grudge. Two can play THAT petty game, bastard. Luckily, my opponent elected to play Chris Perry of the Bengals in the wideout/running back spot. Not a great play, considering he’s still adjusting to starting (and not being injured for once), and Baltimore’s defence is always good early, before all their injury prone veterans start falling like dominoes. My choice for that spot was Huggy Bear Jr., who doesn’t go until tomorrow, against a Denver defence that stopped the run last year as well as warm brie would. I like his chances of surpassing Perry’s ‘performance’, for lack of a better term.

At the receiver position, Anquan Boldin of the Cardinals had a good game. Of course, I am now dealing with the Cardinals jinx. They have two top notch wideouts, and it’s pretty much a fucking guarantee that, whichever one you have on your club, the OTHER guy will score the touchdown. I choose to blame ancient Cards quarterback Kurt Warner. Actually, check that, I blame his bull dyke of a wife, who I can only assume is still an annoying, loud mouthed twit with the spiked hair of a troll doll. Still, he produced. A late touchdown by Charger Vincent Jackson, filling in this week for Brandon Marshall during his suspension, helped round out a nice day for the receivers (my tight end, Denver’s Tony Scheffler, goes tomorrow. With luck, his team’s gooey cheese defence will lead to them trailing, and they’ll have to throw a ton, most of those passes coming to him). My opponent’s receivers scared the shit out of me. I wasn’t too worried about Buffalo’s Lee Evans in his matchup against Seattle…and, he turned out to be the one Bills players who DIDN’T have an epic day against the Seahawks. However, New England’s Randy Moss and Detroit’s Roy Williams matched up against pass secondaries in Kansas City and Atlanta with less experience playing football than Dubya has at being told he’s brilliant…THAT scared me. Williams was decent…Moss was epic. I wasn’t worried about KC’s Tony Gonzalez at tight end, and New England’s D made sure he didn’t do a lot.

My kicker, Pittsburgh’s Jeff Reed, and my QB, Pittsburgh’s Ben Roethlisberger, had big days, thanks to their facing Liam’s favourite sons, the Houston WeSucks. Also exploding was Pitt defender James Harrison, who, thus far, has the biggest score of any defensive player this week. Thanks, imaginary offensive line of the Texans! His kicker is Indy’s Adam Vinatieri, go goes against Chicago tonight. The Bears stink, so he likely will get to kick for a substantial number of points. On the defensive side of the ball, Kerry Rhodes of the Jets was a major let down. Tough, hard nosed contest, and he registered 4 tackles. No assists, no big plays, nothing. Actually, Reggie Nelson of the Jags was equally disappointing. Somebody’s quite possibly losing their spot to LaRon Landry next week. It all looks pretty even on average, though, thanks to his ‘stud’, Philly cornerback Asante Samuel, appearing to be just the overrated bum I thought he might be this year. I have one defender to go, Denver linebacker DJ Williams, and he has 2, both from the Packers in the other Monday nighter, safety Atari Bigby (whose game has high potential to match his name for awesomeness) and linebacker AJ Hawk.

Several of my backups looked good. My other quarterback, El Douche himself, actually surpassed Big Ben this week, so I feel good about my depth there. And, with Tom Brady suffering a knee injury that may be season ending, I dumped Drew ‘Roster Chaff’ Bennett and picked up Brady’s backup, Matt Cassel. I have no intention of keeping 3 QBs, I’m just cornering the market on whatever sap is stuck with Brady. You want one of my backups? Pay up, motherfucker! Actually, Vince Young also got hurt, so I may have more leverage, rat brain. LenDale White put up better numbers than both my starting backs, even though he split the workload since, as anticipated, his immense ass was put in to the backfield on the goal line. And Jonathan Stewart looked good splitting the gig in Carolina. Marshall is back next week, and I think I may put him in for Santana Moss, since Washington’s offence looked putrid. As for James Hardy, he doesn’t appear to have actually played, and I can only assume he slept in and missed the game. Either that, or he’s a guy who needs to be dropped ASAP from someone else, not that there’s much else available right now. Thus, I have done so, unloading him for Dominic Rhodes of the Colts, who may become valuable, depending on the extent of Joseph Addai’s injury there.

Anyway, the Sunday nighter put him up by 14. So it all comes down to the 2 Monday night games. DJ Williams, Justin Fargas and Tony Scheffler for me, Atari Bigby and AJ Hawk for my rival.

Okay, the Monday nighters are over. Wow, is that second crew of Mike Greenberg, Mike Golic and Mike Ditka a steaming mound of crap. Awful. And is if they weren’t bad enough, Dennis Green was the sputtering twit chosen to do color for the radio side of it. It was a night for the damn mute button, that’s for sure. Anyway, it looks good. Of course, the ‘Real Time Stats Tracker’ ended Sunday night (unless you feel like paying extra…I don’t), so I’m doing thias by hand, and it involves fractions at a quarter past midnight. Anyway, it looks like a solid win by about 30 or so points. It turned out that, as of today, going in to the games, things had switched and I was UP 19 to begin with, and it went from there. Interesting…both of us finished with at least 530 points (only one other team had more points than my opponent, and I look like I’ll finish #1 for the week), and yet it was only a 30 point game. High scoring leagues are nuts, baby! Good week overall…I won in 4 out of my 5 leagues, one of my Fantasy Baseball teams is going strong, and made the second round, and the other had a bye in to the second round. I am such a fucking geek, it’s ridiculous.

One little roster note…it turns out Addai isn’t that messed up, and even with Marshall available next week, I want more receiver depth, so I’m trying to drop Rhodes for Joey Galloway on a waiver claim. We’ll see how that goes in a couple of days.

Anyway, 1-0, and things are good!