Time for fantasy football already?

I suck at fantasy football. Okay, that's a bit harsh. I think that maybe I just have bad luck. (Why would that be any different from every other aspect of my life?) My team last year seemed to go up against the top scorer of the week. Head to head matchups were killing me. My team actually finished second in total points but I ended up with an 8-7 record. That was good for eighth in the standings because I lost in the consolation playoffs. That's so damn embarrassing. Seriously, what's the point? Even if your league is playing for money, no one finishing fifth or worse is going to get paid anyway. Moving right along... I seem to do pretty well in fantasy baseball because the season is so much longer and there are more day to day management options. Also, injuries in fantasy football have much more of an impact because there are only 16 regular season games. And if you have a certain awesome wide receiver but he has a hobo throwing him the ball (more on that in a sec), he's not going to catch a lot of passes is he? So this may be an exercise in futility, but hopefully you the reader as well as myself can learn from the trainwreck that was my 2007 fantasy football experience. Join me won't you?




So I had the second pick in a 12 team league. We had a live draft with all but one manager not present. (Guess who won the league by the way...) I did a fair amount of research going in but with 16 rounds, I wasn't exactly confident that I'd be making stellar picks towards the end. I find that the "tier" system of ranking players by position is the best way to go. There's the common sense stuff like don't draft defenses (a few exceptions there) and tight ends (again, Gates, Gonzalez and Whitten were the exceptions) until much later and don't draft a kicker until the second to last or last round. You have to watch out for bye weeks and pay attention to who is drafting before you and see what their needs are. Now since I had the second pick, I wasn't drafting again until pick number 23. Better make that first round pick a good one, right?


I picked Steven Jackson.




He only had two 100 yard rushing games and missed four games in a row due to an injury. Now granted, Orlando Pace missing the entire year didn't help matters, but when your first pick is that unproductive, you're probably going to be in for a rough year. I ended up trading him anyway. Oh, and for all you people thinking he'll have a bounce back year or some such nonsense, he's holding out for a huge contract and has stated he's willing to sit out half the year. Good luck with that...



Okay, so a whopping 14 running backs get taken after my pick along with Manning, Brady, Palmer. I had my eyes on Drew Brees but he was taken two picks before me. I decided on a wide receiver as soon as Brees was snatched, and saw that only Chad Johnson and Marvin Harrison had been taken. So when it's my pick, I smile and confidently belt out these immortal words, "I'll take Steve Smith!" Yeah, that turned out great too because Jake Delhomme went down in the third game of the year. Awesome! And who ends up "leading" the Panthers in passing the rest of the year? Vinny Testaverde. Unfreakinbelievable. Matt Moore and David Carr completed the trio of suckitude and Smith only managed 3 more TD's after Delhomme got hurt. I traded Smith too.



Well after picking Smith, I knew I'd be picking again almost immediately. Wayne and Housh get snagged so I went with Antonio Gates, again feeling pretty confident. Right. Gates had a very up and down year but I traded him as well (noticing a pattern?) before things got really bad. He only caught one pass each in three of his last five games. He was battling a toe injury but Phillip Rivers was more inconsistent than a Judd Apatow movie. Twenty more players would be picked before I got another chance. I was panicking a bit because I didn't have a quarterback yet but only McNabb and Vince Young got snatched up before I was on the board. "Great!" I thought. Look who's still available. I couldn't believe my luck. Marc Bulger was sitting there. And I took him with the 47th overall pick. Yeah, he had exactly three good games all year and finished with more interceptions than touchdowns. He was hurt for a good portion of the season and I straight up dropped his ass after about Week 7.

So at this point you may be wondering how the hell I finished second in overall points.





THIS GUY! I only had one running back at this point but had a great feeling about Adrian Peterson aka Purple Jesus. Lucky for me, his college knee injuries scared some people off so I grabbed him. What a rookie season! He had two games where he scored three touchdowns and oh yeah, he broke the single game rushing record dropping a filthy 296 yards in week 9 against the Chargers. Many people are projecting him as a top three pick this year. He did hurt his knee missing two games so his health is still a concern. But damn, he would have rushes where no one was even close to bringing him down. He'll still be sharing some of the carries with Chester Taylor, but that's pretty much the norm these days in the NFL.

Showing some iota of competency, I took Braylon Edwards in the sixth round. These two guys carried my team and Edwards is without a doubt in the top tier of wide receivers. The Browns shocked everyone with their offense last year but I would honestly take B.E. over every other receiver except Randy Moss. Okay, maybe Reggie Wayne too, but Edwards is definitely the third best receiver. I don't see him getting out of the second round in most (12 team) drafts. Rounds 7 and 8 brought about the brilliant picks of Calvin Johnson and Ladell Betts respectively. Johnson didn't have the breakout rookie year I thought he would, but he'll be much more productive this season. I could see him going as early as the sixth round.

My ninth round pick proved to be the most productive one. This pick gave me more points than any other one I drafted. The New England Patriots defense. Some frown on picking defense that soon, but like I said earlier, there are a few exceptions. Minnesota's defense this year is going to be downright scary. Last year they finished with 275 total fantasy points (the Pats had 287) and that was before they traded for Jared Allen. You know, the same Jared Allen that led the NFL in sacks with 15.5 last year? Yeah that guy. San Diego's defense is right up there too. Eighth to Tenth round is where I think these teams will go.

The wheels came FLYING off at the point as I drafted Chris Brown (not the singer, but that probably would have been a better pick in retrospect), Kevin Curtis, Leon Washington and Antwaaaaan Randle-El. Curtis had one game where he caught three touchdown passes and I don't think I even started him that week. That was pretty much it from him. Washington turned out to be an okay return guy but I cut him early in the season. Randle-El didn't score a lot of TD's but got decent receiving and return yardage. But this is what I was talking about as far as who to take in the late rounds. Going back and looking at my league's draft, there are hardly any players that made any kind of impact that were taken after the 10th round. That's where the waiver wire comes in. There are so many damn injuries that backups that looked like they were hardly going to play, turn into great pickups that will get you a ton of points. I snatched up Ernest Graham from the Bucs and he was extremely productive. I have a feeling he'll get drafted this year though...

I guess this just turned into me rambling about how my first four picks were flaming hot garbage. Hmmmm. There is a ton of luck involved once the draft is over but if you want to be successful in your league, you still have to put the time into preparation. Make sure you know what the point scoring system is and how many players start at each position. Again, more common sense stuff but there are definitely certain leagues where a few stragglers get roped into taking a team because there were only 8 or 9 dudes (and ladies...hey ladies) that couldn't field a 10 or 12 team league. So good luck, unless you're playing against me, then in which case, draft Steven Jackson with your first round pick. Oh, and if you're in a keeper league, I guess you can disregard most of this post. Probably should have said that at the beginning...

Hard Knocks, Face Punches, and Favre the Jet: a Football Round-Up!

I thoroughly enjoyed the season premier of Hard Knocks last night. Maybe it's just because I didn't have HBO last year and missed the first season, maybe it's voyeuristic interest in a team I grew up hating... either way, here's what I took away from episode 1:

• Amid all the Adam Jones drama, I failed to realize one of the most compelling points of Cowboys camp: Jones will be covering Terrell Owens in practice. If that much head-casery going 1-on-1 doesn't pique your interest, then you enjoy shitshows way less than I do.
• He can say he's dropped the nickname as much as he wants, but every Cowboys coach refers to him as "Pac" in meetings. Also, Jones hazed a rookie by pouring a bucket of water out of a hotel window on to him. The guy just can't seem to stop making it rain.
  
• Jerry Jones really is as intrusive of an owner as his reputation says. He was sitting in on almost every meeting that involved a coach. Not that his is shocking, but you can expect to see plenty of Jerry's mug if you watch.
• Tank Johnson seems amazingly comfortable in Big-D. For a guy whose home looked like an Iraqi insurgent's base camp two years ago because he was paranoid of people attacking him, he was shockingly relaxed in every appearance he made on-screen and was generally the loudest player leading the team in goofing off and having a good time. It was nice to see, and hopefully he's turned over a new leaf.
• Patrick Crayton can lie to himself all he wants, but the Boys have just about no receiver depth behind T.O.
  
• T.O. is an entrepreneur. He showed up with boxes of t-shirts with slogans based on the premise i(verb), such as "iBlock", "iCatch", "iTackle", "iPlay ... T.O.Win", and of course, "iLove... Me some Me". Not expected on the order form: iDrop, iCry, iWhine, iShare, iLikePorn, iNeedAttention, or iAmCrazy.

Should be a fun season! Other stuff that's going on in camp:

• Steve Smith: Now do you see why I don't listen to fantasy advice given before August? Smith will miss the first two games of the season after being suspended for knocking Ken Lucas the F-out in practice. I was trying to decide whether to hold onto Smith in my keeper league or not... thanks for making that decision easy for me!
• Ryan Grant: Last year's surprise fantasy RB ended his holdout and signed a 4 year deal. Now he's in camp and should be good to go for the start of the season. He probably won't produce like last year, but he should still be a quality #2 RB.
• Jordan Palmer: Apparently Carson Palmer's little brother is his backup. I, did not know that.
  
• Brett Favre: LOL! Seriously, it's never a good sign for the Jets when I get giddy about an acquisition they've made. First it was giving a small rowboat full of cash to Calvin Pace, and now this. I think Favre is going to embarrass himself in East Rutherford this year, so much that he'll make the Patriots secondary look talented (which is not easy to do). There's also now the question of where Chad Pennington will end up. My best guesses are San Fran or Chicago, who both have unsteady young starters and no quality veteran backups. Outside shot at Miami or Oakland getting in the mix as well.
  

You know what? Fine.

fucking FINE.

This is it though. This is the last time I'm letting you in the door, The Jets. I'm going to pretend this sounds like a good idea, but this is the last time. I won't pick a new team, with a flashy uniform and those white cleats everyone else seems to wear, but this is the last time you're going to let me down. I'm electing to believe in you, even though I don't want to. When this blows up in your faces, just like everything else since Namath, don't come crawling back here.

The lights will be off.

A Few Quick Words About a Sack Machine

So I'm a little late on commenting, but I couldn't let this go by without saying a few words. This past weekend, my sister got married. Beautiful ceremony, great guy, drunken renditions of Livin On a Prayer all night long. It was truly a great day.... and I almost missed it. The reason? My father threatened to skip the event to drive to Canton, Ohio and see Andre Tippett get inducted to the NFL Hall of Fame in person. And there's no way I would have let him go without me. I'd like to think we'd still wear our tuxes, since they'd been paid for and all... but alas, we missed the induction and attended the wedding. Considering the potential wrath of the women in our lives, it was probably a smart decision.

This is how much #56 means to diehard, long-term Patriots fan... the kind that grew up wearing big red Starter jackets with a dude squatting over a football on it. Tippett's jersey was the first I remember seeing in my house*. His biggest years came in '84 and '85, where he amassed 35 sacks and was the leader of a defense that helped the surprising Patriots to the Super Bowl. Of course, I was too young to enjoy that time, so my memories come from a darker era.

Over the 5 year span from 1989 to 1993, New England won a total of 19 games. I remember this very clearly, since my family bought season tickets just before the 1991 season. Tipp was one of the few holdovers from the superbowl team, and while at the end of his career still picked up 27.5 sacks in the 4 seasons he played (he missed 1989 with an injury). That brought his career total to an even 100, which I like because I'm lazy and even numbers are easier to remember.

Some people will try to tell you that Tippett was "the LT of the AFC." And I'm talking about the REAL LT here, not the crybaby Tomlinson. But that's really a discredit to Andre, because while Lawrence Taylor was an insane coke-head with a mean streak and always seemed to try to hurt people... Tipp was as professional as they come. He wasn't trying to break your bones, he was simply trying to DOMINATE the other team in the most efficient way possible. He worked hard and kept to himself, and it's great to see the Hall recognize a player who wasn't always just trying to get recognized.

Now if we can just get Bruce Armstrong (6 Pro Bowls) and Ben Coates (499 catches, 50 TDs) to the hall, my childhood heroes will be properly represented**.



*Other jerseys we have: Ben Coates, Drew Bledsoe, Curtis Martin, Chris Slade, Willie McGinnest, Andy Katzenmoyer (oof), Tedy Bruschi (dad), Richard Seymour (mine for the past 7 years), Adam Vinatieri (mom), Troy Brown (sister), Stephen Gostkowski (mom... I shit you not)

**Note: I accept at this point that Drew Bledsoe will probably not be getting the call to the Hall despite being 5th in completions and attempts, 7th in yards, and 13th in TD's all time... but that dude was my idol growing up. Also, C-Mart is getting to the Hall, but he played way longer for the Jets than the Pats, so I can't take claim to him. Ask Billy about him some time.

Yankees are F'd in the A and other baseball musings.

Joba Chamberlain is seeing Dr. James Andrews today to get his shoulder evaluated. Yankees fans are collectively pooping all up in their pants. With Chien-Ming Wang probably out the rest of the year and Phil Hughes (who has only started 6 games this year anyway) still rehabbing in Triple-A, the New York Yankees desperately needed Joba to be an ace for the rest of the year. Who would have thought that on August 6th, the only two Yankee pitchers who have started more than 20 games are Pettite and Mussina? Yikes. Darrell Rasner has flaked out, Ian Kennedy is mayor of Bust City and Sidney Ponson is actually on the mound every fifth day. (The other four days, that dude is rockin' the buffett in an ongoing eating competition with Andruw Jones.) In his games as a starter, Chamberlain has a 2.23 ERA and 69 K's in 60.2 IP. He will definitely miss his next start, but anytime an athlete is down in Birmingham visiting the Doc, things probably aren't good. Of course, I haven't even mentioned Posada and Matsui being out for the year. The Yankees are 3-7 in their last ten and are 6.5 games back behind the Rays in the East and 3.5 games back in the Wild Card race. If Chamberlain has to shut it down, the Yankees can start booking vacations for October.

Could the White Sox and the Twins both make the playoffs? After taking the above paragraph into account and with Boston only having an 8-9 record since the All Star break, it's perfectly conceivable that both Central teams could sneak into postseason play. I know you should never count Boston out and they do play Toronto and Baltimore in six more series combined, but Big Papi's health continues to be a concern and Jacoby Ellsbury still hasn't snapped out of his slump. They will need him back permanently in the leadoff spot to get the lineup going. Ortiz's wrist is bothering him again and he's not seeing the same pitches since the Manny trade.

Chicago had a HUGE comeback win last night in the 14th inning against the Tigers. They are still scoring all their runs by hitting the ball out of the park but Carlos Quentin shows no signs of slowing down. (Please, please don't make me regret typing that.) Granted, the pitching still looks pretty haggard but if the starters can right the ship, the bullpen looks to be a bit more solid especially when Linebrink comes back. The Twins finally called up Francisco Liriano and get better by subtraction with Livan Hernandez hitting the bricks. Liriano looked fantastic in his win the other day against the Indians. They've had to deal with some injuries as well but to be playing this well without Johan Santana and Torii Hunter is pretty amazing. Plus they have one of the best closers in baseball.


If the Arizona Diamondbacks make the playoffs, it will be a mirror image of their great 2001 run. I could legitimately see Webb and Haren start just about every game. Webb won his 16th game last night which accounts for more than a quarter of the teams total wins. They also resigned Haren through 2012 which is monumental. He is making my Cy Young prediction look good so far going 4-0 since the break. Arizona's only tough spots on the rest of their schedule are St. Louis, Florida and the Dodgers. They'll be fed a steady diet of San Fran, San Diego (man I feel sorry for Adrian Gonzalez being stuck on that team) and Colorado with a bit of the Reds and Astros thrown in for flavor. Their offense still blows but I sure as hell woudn't want to face them in the first round or any round for that matter.



How much of an impact will David Price have? Tampa Bay is on the verge of calling him up but some are saying that he'll be in the bullpen. Huh? I know he's only 22 but he's 6-0 with a 2.08 ERA in eight starts in Double-A, with 48 strikeouts and 12 walks in 52 innings. And for a team that didn't make any moves at the trade deadline, Price could be just the thing to put the Rays over the edge and win the AL East. He can bump Edwin Jackson or Andy Sonnanstine out of the rotation and get some big league experience in preparation for next year. Oh you mean when Scott Kazmir, James Shields, Matt Garza and David Price will all be pitching on the same team for the whole season? Holy Crap! The Rays have the fourth best ERA in MLB right now. Oh yeah, he can throw almost 100 mph. Just like to mention that...





And finally, what year is it? Nope, you weren't seeing things if you looked at the box scores from last night. Mike Hampton actually pitched seven innings for the Atlanta Braves and won his first game since 2005. For a guy who only had one really dominant year (1999 22-4 record) he's certainly mad an ass ton of money. Here's his combined salary from 2006 and 2007 when he didn't pitch a single inning of major league ball: $29,950,370. How depressing is that? Almost as depressing as the fact that he'll make $20,000,000 in 2009. He's 35. John Smoltz and Tom Glavine are also still on the Braves. Tim Hudson is having season ending elbow surgery. Folks down in Atlanta better hope Jair Jurrjens and Jorge Campillo stick around for a while.

All divisions except the AL West are still up for grabs and the Wild Card in both leagues are going to come down to the final week of the season. Good times. Makes me wish I had spent the scrilla for the MLB Extra Innings package on cable...

Insert Wizard of Oz pun here:

Disclaimer: This will be an subjective and biased look at the current manager of the Chicago White Sox, Ozzie Guillen. Enjoy.

For the first time since May 16th, the Chicago White Sox are not in first place in the American League Central. The collapse continued last night in a blowout loss to the Kansas City Royals in which three players and and both managers were ejected. With the bases loaded in the fifth inning, Sox pitcher D.J. Carrasco hit Miguel Olivo on the hand with the fourth pitch of the at bat. Olivo charged the mound. KC was already up 6-0. And while Mark Teahan tried bunting his way on earlier in the inning, Guillen says that he didn't order Carrasco to hit Olivo. On the previous three pitches, Carrasco was going inside to try and get a double play. After Olivo charged the mound, he and Carrasco were both tossed, then Ozzie was tossed after arguing the situation. However, crew chief Gary Cedarstrom, later apologized to the White Sox for Carrasco's ejection because a review of video from the game showed that the sequences of pitches were not thrown in an attempt to hit Olivo.

Now predictably, Ozzie had one of his many lengthy post game diatribes. But this one lacked the name calling and sometimes childish antics that normally punctuate his statements. The dude was cogently making points, even though it was something the MLB probably didn't want to hear. He admitted, out loud, that he has his pitchers hit opposing players. All teams obviously do it, but it's something the league wants to minimize and ultimately eliminate. But the Carrasco/Olivo situation was not one of those instances. You see, D.J. Carrasco isn't exactly a fireballer. When Ozzie wants guys to get plunked, he'll send in pitchers like Octavio Dotel and Matt Thornton who throw in the mid 90s. Plus...the bases were loaded. Now maybe, if Olivo took out someone in a double play with his spikes up earlier in the game, I could see there being a chance that Guillen would order the hit even if the bases were juiced. Ozzie is a firm believer in protecting his players and said out loud what all the 29 other managers practice silently.

I know that Ozzie is a bit more vocal than most skippers and on multiple occasions has really gotten into some serious shouting matches with umpires. He has said some things that most people don't agree with and some are even offended by. At the end of the day however, I think he is one of the best managers in baseball. In only his second year as manager, he won a World Series with a team that absolutely demolished the competition in the playoffs. This made him the first Latin born manager to win one. Last year's team was a complete disappointment especially considering the team's payroll. But the 2008 squad has pleasantly surprised most people who picked the Tigers and the Indians to finished atop the Central standings. When it looked as if the White Sox had a chance to really succeed earlier in the year but stumbled a bit, Ozzie lashed out claiming his offense was hot garbage and that GM Kenny Williams needed to make some changes. Guillen was particularly unhappy with the play of Nick Swisher and Orlando Cabrera, two new additions to the club made by Williams. (And of course there's the ongoing embarrasment that is Paul Konerko's .212 batting average and .665 OPS. Damn yo.) The team responded however by piling up the runs scored in the subsequent games and began to create some space between them and the other teams in the division. He seems to skillfully balance on that fine line between riling your players up and having them tune you out. Plus, he hates Jay Mariotti!

Happier times?

But now the pitching is really starting to falter. John Danks and Gavin Floyd have been the only remotely consistent guys in the rotation as veterans Javier Vazquez and Mark Buehrle continue to give up runs at an alarming rate. The team has given up 6.6 runs a game since the All-Star Break. That is NOT good. With Scott Linebrink on the DL the bullpen hasn't been great either. However, Guillen recently admitted after a loss that he didn't manage the bullpen well. He's always quick to jump on someone else who has made a mistake, but he'll also own up to his faults as well. It will interesting to see if he is able to manage the rotating CF/1B/DH nightmare between the newly arrived Ken Griffey Jr., Nick Swisher, Jim Thome and Konerko. He is also dealing with a void at third base with Joe Crede finally landing on the DL because of his back. Josh Fields and Juan Uribe have been splitting time there so far but if Crede stays out for an extended period (which as of today looks like it might be a possibility), Ozzie will have to make a choice. Carlos Quentin and Jermaine Dye continue to put the offense on their backs with terrific numbers, but when you're already down six runs in the sixth inning there's only so much they can do. These last two months will really show what Guillen is made of. He's been to the promised land before and he's been in the doldrums too. I think if the White Sox end up making the playoffs, Ozzie is going to have to pick his spots when lashing out or criticizing.

He's definitely not perfect, but hopefully people won't just brush these latest quotes aside because for all his eccentric outbursts, this one has validity. But he couldn't resist a parting shot. Later in the game last night, Zack Grienke hit Nick Swisher with a pitch and denied he did it intentionally. When asked about any future dust ups with the Royals, Guillen coyly said, "I signed a five-year deal with this organization, and we play Kansas City a lot." And you can bet D.J. Carrasco and his 82 mile an hour sinker won't be the one asked to get his hands dirty.