Welcome to the week 4 round up! I think we can all agree this was the best week in the history of human existence. Let's breath in the glory!
Cut Like Lewis (Jesse) vs. Einhorn is Finkle (Kelleye)
What's to-day, my fine fellow?" said Scrooge.
"To-day?" replied the boy. "Why, Christmas Day."
"It's Christmas Day!" said Scrooge to himself. "I haven't missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!"
I've been sitting at my desk staring at the screen for quite some time thinking about how to accurately describe my emotions. All words seem inaccurate or inadequate. Joy? Elation? Thankfulness? Rustled Jimmies? All seem to fall flat when trying to portray what happened in this match up. Biblical? Yeah, that's it; Biblical. This was David vs. Goliath, Jesus, Vishnu, St. Peter, Optimus Prime, and the plastic packaging used for most electronic devices.
going into week 4, I was feeling pretty low; one of my top receivers as well as the Bengals D were on bye week, and while Team Finkle's squad was also heavily affected by bye weeks, the match up looked squarely in her favor. My hope was that Finkle's 3rd string QB Eli Manning would finally show his true derpy colors and completely shit the bed against Washington. I mean, who is he going to throw the ball to? Some 3rd year undrafted free agent tight end? Ha! I'll be....OH MY REPUBLICAN JESUS! While the rest of the world might not have known who Larry Donnell was, it was clear him and Eli Manning both swiped right on Tinder. Donnell hauled in 7 of 8 targets for 54 yards and an astonishing 3 TDs. Derp Derp finished the night with an even 400 passing yards and 4 passing TDs! The pair combined for a soul-crushing 54.50 FAN points. At this point, I was reaching for the Vaseline and trying to purchase an Ottawa Red Blacks jersey on EBay.. I didn't even bother looking for a defense. What was the point?
Fast forward to Sunday. I'm in a car driving home from a wonderful weekend in Maine. the car is full of fantasy football freaks, all eagerly waiting to hit the border and suck some fantasy data out of the 3G ether. What's this? Matty Ice is having a stellar game against the Vikings? Randall Cobb is putting a hurt on the Bears? Desperation TE Coby Fleener is going to hit projection? Of course, my first thought was that the Fantasy gods, who have up until this point chosen me as their Job, were continuing to dangle relief in front of my victory-starved maw. Surely, the rest of my team would tank, leaving my just shy of the win and cement my team in 12th place. But then the clouds parted, the sun shone brightly, Frank Gore racked up a combined 274 yards and 1 TD and Ahmad Bradshaw continued his stellar year with 52 yards and a TD. By the end of Sunday, I was ahead! By a lot! I then realized that if I were to lose due to not starting a defense, I would relinquish the right to ridicule other teams forever and thus render these round ups useless. I picked up KC simply because they were playing Monday and they were facing a Patriots team that could only be described as flaccid. They failed to disappoint, holding the Pats to a pathetic 14 points, while sacking Brady three times and scoring a TD. Their 16 FAN points was icing on the orgasm cake (wow, maybe should have thought that metaphor through....), as it turned out that my original defense, the Bengals, had a far better night on bye week than Team Finkle's Bears, who politely stepped out of Green Bay's way.
I could go on for ever. This feeling is incredible. I won against the best team in the league. It's like sleeping in a bathtub full of kittens, or punching disabled strangers. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
The Mountain Men (Antoine) vs. Concussed Criminals (Gabe)
I haven't seen this much hilarious back and forth since seeing that video of the tentacle horse and the lost school girl (Pornhub has some really interesting sub-channels). The Men pulled out to an early lead after Thursday, but saw a pretty lucklustre performance from backup Washington QB Kirk Cousins. Who throws 4 interceptions to the Giants? I guess the only way the marketing wizards in Washington can stir up a QB controversy between Cousins and the effectively retired RG3 is by having Kirk throw a few games. Guys, if you're going to do stuff like this, at least be subtle. Does it really count as an interception if the ball appears to be thrown directly to a member of the Giants' defense? At the end of the early Sunday games, The Criminals had a slight edge leading 59.74 to 53.18, however by the end of Sunday The Men seemed to have things well in hand. DeMarco Murray was positively saucy against The Saints, rushing for 149 yards and 2 TDs. RB Lamar Miller rightfully realized that anything less than a stellar performance against the damp cloth that is Oakland's defense would be career suicide, and rushed for 64 yards and 2 TDs. The Mountain Men would have completely put the week away if Carolina's defense had a decent game against Baltimore. Hrmm. Baltimore? Why does that team bring back memories? Oh right! It was Baltimore's defense that earned my team a healthy does of humiliation, mostly from Mountain Men manager Antoine, last season by posting a series of negative scores, most notably a -4.00 in the early weeks. Fate certainly is an asshole. However, despite Carolina's comical failure, The Men were up comfortably by Sunday's end, leading the Criminals 106.78 to 83.54. The Criminal's only hope was to see a monster night from KC RB Jamaal Charles, who up until this point had been woefully under performing tallying only 4.6 FAN points in the first 2 weeks of the season and was held out of week 3 due to ankle issues. There certainly could be no way that Jama......OH MAN LOOK AT THAT GUY GO! 92 rushing yards, 1 rushing TD, and 2 receiving TDs! UNSTOPPABLE!
What was that sound? It sounded like someone throwing an iPad against a TV.
Bounty Hunters (Iain) vs. The Toucherdowners (Mounia)
The great thing about being so lazy with these write ups is that, at the time of writing, I know what's happened in the future. In the case of The Toucherdowners, we know that after getting thoroughly reamed in Week 4 by The Hunters, Mounia finally gave up on Tom "Pedophile Smile" Brady replacing him with Joe Flacco and a guy who's thrown more interceptions than the number of steel pins in RG3's knees. At first glace, casual onlookers would be perplexed. Get rid of Tom Brady? Isn't he an elite quarterback? Wouldn't he be a fantasy owner's wet dream? Unfortunately, Brady's star faded drastically after league rules removed "Number of High Fives left Hanging" and "Level of Waterslide Enthusiasm" from the stat categories. In all serious, Brady has had a rough go in the first four weeks of the season, with this week's game against the Chief's acting as the corn nugget cherry topping the shit sundae. Brady completed only 14 of his 23 attempts for 159 yards, 1 TD, and two INT, one of which was a pick-six that hit Husain Abdullah right in the numbers. Despite solid nights from tight end Travis Kelse, who put up a combined 98 yards and one score, and DeAndre Hopkins, The Toucherdowner's fell way behind projection not only due to the poor play of Brady and the Pats, but DeSean Jackson as well, who managed a single reception for 9 yards. It's difficult to place blame on Jackson for such low performance (however he did drop one of the three balls thrown his way), as he was dependent on QB Kirk Cousins, who seemed determined to carry on the proud Washington football tradition of stubbornly making everyone upset by being shitty for no good reason.
The Hunter's had a solid week despite being managed by an insensitive, emotional bully. While the Hunters saw great performances from kicker Adam Vinatieri and the San Fran defense, the star of the show was superstar wide receiver Antonio Brown, who seemed to be able to get open at will catching 7 of 11 passes for 131 yards and 2 TDs.
Troy Polamalu's Hair (Mich and Natasha) vs. Spud and Dud (Zach)
Now, your first reaction when looking at the outcome of this match up is probably something along the lines of "Oh great, here comes another tasteless joke about domestic violence that is not only unfunny but stands to normalize abuse." And normally, you'd have walked into the right door, but I see this outcome rather differently, at least from the perspective of Team Polamalu. Sure, getting steamrolled by a margin of 73.62 points might feel crummy, but wouldn't it have been much, much worse if they had replicated their glorious week 2 performance against Team Cunado only to come 14-odd points shy of the win? Who am I kidding; as someone with plenty of experience, I can assure you losing always sucks.
Team Troy was simply awful across the board; while QB Drew Brees put up good stats by throwing for 340 yards and 2 TDs, their wide receivers, running backs, and tight end combined for a total of 239 yards and a single touchdown, amounting to a laughable 29.9 total FAN points. I'm running out of synonyms for terrible. Horrawful? Incredibad? Dissambarrasment? Polamortifying? If this team is someone's fantasy, their reality must be some special type of hell. It's like asking a kid what he wants for Christmas and getting the response "acknowledgement of my existence".
On the other side of the virtual field was team Spud and Dud, who amassed the league's third highest weekly point total so far this year. As per my earlier argument, maybe Team Spuds is a tad disappointed they wasted such a beating on such a clearly defenseless opponent? Regardless, The Spuds were fucking resplendent in week 4, with QB McCain Superfries throwing for almost 300 yards and 2 TDs, and throwing his Yukon golden body over the line for a rushing TD. WR Jordy Nelson was clearly Aaron Rodgers first choice for prom date, hauling in 10 passes for 109 yards and 2 TDs. Running backs Matt Forte and Trent Richardson combined for 270 and 1 TD, leading to a total of 33 FAN points. This means the Studs could have benched everyone except Nelson, Forte, and Richardson and still come up with the win. Depresshitty?
John's Dazzling Team (John) vs. Halifax Explosions (Ryan)
Please excuse me, as I plan to go on a bit of rant that may verge on the personal, However, I think it would be better to first talk about the performance of The Halifax Explosions, who had an excellent week 4. Is there a defense that can stop QB Phillip Rivers? Okay, the last few weeks have seen the Chargers take on, shall we say, unworthy opponents and asking Jacksonville to prevent Rivers from throwing for 377 yards and 3 TDs is apparently like asking my father to set his lines every week (more on that later). RB Eddie Lacy shared in the spoils of the Pack's drubbing of the Bears, rushing for 48 yards and a TD. San Fran kicker Phil Dawson seemed unable to miss from any distance, even booting one through the uprights from past the 50 yard line and the Texans' defense manhandled The Bills, sacking the QB twice and catching two interceptions, one of them for a TD. Let's compare Team Splody's defense to his opponents. While it's really tough to make a direct comparison between Houston and Seattle's defensive squads, I'm going to use my expert analysis skills and say the key to Houston's 13 FAN point victory was that they actually had a Goddamn game to play.
I've spoken here before of my lifelong admiration of my father. Like most children that look up to their parents, one of my greatest fears in life was to disappoint or fail to live up to their expectations. I tried as best I could to follow their teachings and espouse their values of hard work and determination. I grew up believing that it was always best to finish what you started. Dad, what do you think it says to me when you don't start a WR or defense in week 4? How am I supposed to feel? How do you think it makes Brain Hartline feel? You're effectively telling the guy that you think Larry Fitzgerald can put up more FAN points while binge watching Lost Girl on Netflix than he could against The Raiders?
The Footbalcoholics (Jesse #2) vs. Brolo el Cunado (Andrew)
"Oh God! it's like wiping peanut butter out of a shag carpet!"
Speaking of rough goes, it's been a tough year for Team Raffi. Their weekly point totals have been in the 80's and 90's, but despite their week three victory over John's Dazzling Team, The Cunados always seem to get edged out by just a handful of points. Things were no different in week 4, as The Footbalcoholics took the win by a mere 4.24 points. Even more heart-wrenching was the fact that this week saw Aaron Rodgers hit his season-best fantasy total, passing for 302 yards and 4 TDs! I'm sure Team Raffi is wondering why this couldn't have heppned when they were facing someone who leaves empty roster spots.
Jesse #2's side was certainly no slouch; QB Colin Kaepernick combined for 276 yards and 2 TDs against the Eagles, and Vikings RB Matt Asiata, whose last name sounds like one of those American chain Chinese restaurant where bored, teenage waiters are underpaid to feign respect when you ask to have your fork replaced with chopsticks and laugh when you crack that "cream of sum yung guy" joke that everyone finds delightful, had an incredible game against The Falcons, rushing for 78 yards and 3 TDs, leading to a whopping 28 FAN points.
Manager of the Week: ME!!!! Oh God, I was wonderful, wasn't I? I may never win another match-up, but this week I slayed the Goddamn unkillable dragon in spectacular fashion. I will be sure to regale the members of the CFL with tales of my glory in the years to come.
Manager of the Weak: John's Dazzling Team (John) - Failing to field a full squad of players is like cutting boards without measuring. Nobody likes a sloppy craftsman, pop. However, do feel free to tank it against me in week 5.
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