I know it's late. Very late. The Seahawks rolled over the 49ers last night, I honestly thought it was going to be a blowout, but what is three points really?
We actually had a lot of close games last week, and two matchups changed leaders during MNF.
I honestly thought this week was the week. The week Hwood's streak would come to an end. However, like JD did with Dez Bryant last week, I was pissed off with Jimmy Graham and left him on the bench. Turns out I should have done that with Eddie Lacy instead. I also managed to leave my two highest scoring receivers on the bench in Alshon Jeffries and Steve Smith Snr. Devonta Freeman didn't have a particularly fantastic game against the Saints (by his standards anyway) and I though I had a chance until I ended up at the end of Sunday 50 points down, and realized I only had the Eagles D and Zach Ertz to rely on. Even with those three turnovers (one for six) and three sacks (thanks Eli), I had no chance in catching up to yet another 100< score posted by the Free Men.
Week 10. The Falcons have their bye week ten. Boost, the fate of the world rests in your hands in three weeks time.
Moving swiftly on, Hoff and Trees had one of the closest matches of the week, with just 5.14 points separating them by the time the teams walked off the pitch on Sunday night. Both sides had solid performances by their kickers, and pretty bad performances from their defences that faced each other in week six. I have absolutely no idea how the defensive scoring works. Trees skill positions generally did pretty well, with only Arizona's David Johnson posting a poor score of 1.7. Hoff had multiple below average performances from Andre Ellington (5.4) and Antonio Brown (2.4!) and Charles Clay's rollercoaster continues with 6.2 points. However, decent double digit scores from Jeremy Hill and Donte Moncrief (who?) and 2TDs and 140 yards from DeAndre Hopkins made it very hard for Trees to reply. Colin Kaepernick racked up a very respectable 22.6 points and didn't thrown an INT against the Ravens, and the 38 points from Giovanni Bernard, Julian Edelman and Allen Robinson weren't enough. If only the Colts had given Frank Gore the ball more often...
Fortunately for pr0ximity, him leaving Jason Witten in his lineup was cancelled out by TJ leaving Desean Jackson in his lineup. Although Heath Miller wouldn't have made the result any more comfortable for Pr0ximity as he only scored 0.5 points... Tom Brady and Blake Bortles were on a par with each other (never thought I would type that) because somehow 37 rushing yards cancels out two INTs o.O. The RB cores from both sides scored within 0.1 points of each other, and the remaining skill positions scored within 2.4 points of each other, with TJ coming out on top. So without kickers and defences, TJ was actually three points ahead. Steve Hauschka just shows how important kickers can be, nailing three FGs, one from 54 yards, where Kansas City's Cairo Santos had one FG blocked, and one from 66 yards just wasn't going to happen. Although that UCLA kicker probably could have nailed it... As the dust settled, the gap was 8.24 points, and TJ slipped to his fifth loss in a row.
Our first MNF decider was between Boost and JD. Boost had a truly explosive early Sunday afternoon. Phillip Rivers threw for a whopping 503 yards, (400+ passing yards nets you an extra 5 points it would seem) although the Chargers only managed 20 points and they lost to Green Bay. Matt Forte had a great game, as did Megatron, of course. Hell, even with a bad ankle, Sammy Watkins managed double digits. It almost looked like JD was going to stumble again, even with the gaping holes that seem to grace Boost's lineup, now with a permanently bye-week'd kicker, a very holey Cardinals defence and a TE who surprises you with a TD once every six weeks. To make matters worse, Marcus Mariota had his worst week to date, with just 219 passing yards, as well as four turnovers. The Lions defence also coughed up 34 points and only managed to sack Jay Cutler once. ONCE. I COULD SACK JAY CUTLER MORE THAN ONCE. With only four points coming from his QB, the rest of the pack had to step up. Fortunately for JD, his RB pair did good this week, with a very respectable 44.2 points, his faith in DeMarco Murray finally paying off with a great performance on Monday Night against the Giants. The smooth mover Robbie Gould also managed a decent 14 points, and even Emmanuel Sanders turned up this week. The final score betrays how close JD came to another loss, but I'm sure a score of 105.56 is nothing for JD to sniff at. That streak tho.
The Unluckiest Team and
The Hottest Benchwarmers are on opposite sides of the same matchup this week. R1N3 left Matt Stafford on the bench this week in favour of Sam Bradford (I always get the two mixed up tbh) but Matt managed a cool 405 yards, four TDs and only one INT, earning him those extra 5 fantasy points as well. With Sam Bradford having a pretty hellish game against the Giants (god that game was SO awful) it looked like Bueller had a chance to extend his winning streak. Unfortunately, the poor run of form by Peyton Manning, and only Brandon Marshall managing double digits meant that a sorry 65 points was all Bueller managed. R1N3 really didn't fare any better, with only two positions managing double digits. And when the Vikings defence are your second highest scoring team member, you know you've had a bad week. The whole matchup is just quite painful to look at. I would say that Bueller gets the unluckiest team, because he had AD, James Jones AND Randall Cobb, scoring just 13.5 points between them. That and the face that he couldn't capitalize on the loss of Matthew Bradford. I mean Sam Stafford. Uhhh...
If absyrd can take one good thing away from MNF this week, it's that the points his Giants didn't score on the pitch were turned into Fantasy points and earned him the win this week against Demik. The award for
Luckiest Team goes to absyrd this week, because he managed the win with four positions scoring one point or less. ONE POINT. The faith in the Giants is real, with five of his positions filled with the men from Metlife, only two of them scored more than one point. The defence (like I said, how the **** does the defensive scoring system work?) and the ever humble OBJ. Martavis Bryant came off his suspension to have the game Antonio Brown should have had, with 2TDs and 145 combined yards, while Andy Dalton (who thought the Bengals would be undefeated six weeks in?) continued his good run of form with 243 yards and 3TDs. On the other side of the board, Demik had an equally disappointing weekend, with three of his skill positions scoring less than five points, not counting his kicker on a bye week. Gronk looks like he is starting to come out of his slump, with a double digit score for the first time since week three, LeGarrette Blount managed 100 combined yards and 2 combined TDs, but Larry Fitzgerald is still in a bit of a hole with another below average performance for a man of his stature and expertise. The gap ended up being only 11 points, but it shows that even the big names struggle from time to time.
If there is one thing to take away from this, it's that Kickers are a seriously big part of a fantasy lineup. The good ones score more than TEs, routinely every week. Well. We are already a game into week one, and hwood is already 15 points up and the Legion of Boom seem to be back...
