Five hour games, fights all over the place and delays for officials’ conferences were the theme of Week 2.
I was watching the Eagles-Ravens game and then saw my fantasy defense get its obligatory 13 points to start the matchup, which made me say, “Wait? How’s my defense have points already?”
Then I looked at the clock and saw it read “4:10.”
Then I looked at the game clock on the Eagles game and there were nearly nine minutes left.
Nine freaking minutes and it was 4:10?
That’s absurd. Just as what the real referees are asking for is absurd.
I hope things get resolved soon, but at the same time, I hope the NFL doesn’t give in to their crazy demands.
The replacements aren’t making it easy, especially after Week 2, but hopefully we get this fixed.
Now that I’m done ranting, let’s talk about how the Thieves, Toasters and Ville all moved to 2-0 while six teams, including myself, moved to 1-1.
And of course, RG3 is the No. 1 QB in fantasy...
T-Money..........................85.4
Hurry up. This may be your last chance. I jumped onboard on Thursday, and the RG3 bandwagon train is departing.
And would you look at that, the Toasters are wearing the conductors hat.
"All aboard!" he shouts. "The train's next stop is JFL Super Bowl VII."
That may not be a joke.
Griffin scored 37.2 fantasy points, showing us that he is in fact the second coming of Cam Newton after two weeks.
The Toasters road RG3’s performance to a victory over T-Money, who struggled mightily with only four double-digit performances. As predicted by yours truly, Tony Romo struggled in a loss to the Seahawks, scoring 17.4 points. Frank Gore, Reggie Wayne and Steve Johnson all did their jobs, scoring double-digits, but Ahmad Bradshaw (1.6), James Jones (0.3) and the Jets defense (6.5) all came up short, causing T-Money to score just 85.4 points — his lowest point total since Week 1 of the 2010 season.
But enough of the T-Money’s woes.
Let’s talk about the No. 3 pick in the JFL Draft, RG3.
Is this unbelievable? We know he was extremely talented after an amazing Heisman campaign in 2011, but for him to come in and produce similar fantasy numbers to Cam Newton is crazy.
Griffin was a play away from being in charge of the 2-0 Redskins, but his clutch pass to Josh Morgan late in the game that set up a potential game-tying field goal was spoiled by the fact Morgan stood up and threw the ball at the defensive back.
Fifteen yards back, the field goal was a long shot and a big miss.
Without the penalty, we may be talking about a 2-0 RG3.
Either way, we’re talking about a QB who is ranked No. 1 in all of fantasy football with 34.2 points in Week 1 followed by Week 2’s 37.2 points.
Go ahead, Mr. Dotterer. You can give us all the “I-told-you-so” laugh. We deserve it.
Now, here's my ticket. Can you show me to my seat on the Toasters Express?
Houserville ..........129.4
Team Boyer ........127.1
Well, if I got one thing right in the previews, it was that I thought there would be a few extremely close matchups.
I also said that there was a potential that home-field advantage could come into play this week, and it nearly did for these two.
Both had players going on Monday night, and with Boyer holding a 13-point lead heading into the Falcons-Broncos game, he looked to be good shape with Jacob Tamme going.
But the Ville’s Demaryius Thomas had a huge touchdown and totaled eight catches for 78 yards for 15.4 fantasy points.
Tamme fell way short of his expectations, garnering just 1.7 points.
This poor performance spoiled a great Week 2 by a trio of Spacklers — Marshawn Lynch (18.2), Hakeem Nicks (27.9) and Vincent Jackson (19.8).
Nicks was questionable with an injury, so I wasn’t high on his upside for this week, but he and Jackson made the best of a shootout between the Giants and the Bucs.
Lynch’s performance was welcomed after a slow start in Week 1. Lynch ran for 122 yards on 26 carries. His touchdown helped the Seahawks defeat the Cowboys, but it wasn’t enough to help the Spacklers avoid an 0-2 start.
He could have pulled off a victory if Matt Forte didn’t leave the Packers-Bears early with an injury, scoring just 8.8 points. In all likelihood, had Forte played the full game, he would have scored another 2.3 points to get the win.
But that wasn’t the case, and the Ville’s Cam Newton and C.J. Spiller combined for 60.2 points. Newton ran for 71 yards and a TD and threw for 253 and another TD in the Panthers’ win over the Saints, while Spiller exploded for 123 yards and two TDs.
Kudos to Dawson for starting Spiller. The back had a huge Week 1 on the Ville’s bench, and you have to be careful making “reactionary” roster moves, but this worked and it looks like he should be in the lineup for the rest of the season.
Percy Harvin will also remain there after yet another week of double-digits, scoring 17.6. He was quietly one of the best WRs in 2011 and he’s on pace to do that again in 2012.
He may very well be a key cog on a Super Bowl squad.
Yes, I’m getting way ahead of myself, but the Ville is 2-0 after beating two playoff teams from 2011, and it’s looking good after two weeks.
Sunday Slackers ........130.4
Jimmy Jammers ........107.6
This year’s Jimmy Jammers is a bit different — and a bit risky.
One of his key players was expected to miss the first couple weeks, and after surviving a low-scoring affair in Week 1, the Jammers couldn’t do it again, going up against the high-flying Slackers.
Waiting for Ryan Mathews wasn’t bad after Week 1, but in Week 2, Matthew Stafford and Julio Jones let the Jammers down. The two combined for 19.8 points as the Jammers lost by 23 points.
Stafford struggled and only salvaged double-digits in the waning minutes with a late touchdown drive.
Jones dropped a difficult touchdown catch and really didn’t get the targets on Monday, as Roddy White was the star. This may be a case of the defense focusing on him after a huge Week 1, and after Week 2, teams may realize there’s no stopping this Falcon attack. White and Jones are too good, and when you add in Tony Gonzalez, Matt Ryan has a lot to throw to.
The defense isn’t that bad either and should get them to the Super Bowl.
It won’t be a defense that leads the Slackers to a Super Bowl, but instead, it could be Reggie Bush, who scored 34.3 points with 172 rushing yards and two TDs.
For Parker, this was payback.
Bush was instrumental in the Slackers’ 2011 demise, as he broke free for more than 200 yards rushing and two scores in Week 15 last season.
The Slackers used the “Can’t beat them, join them” motto and drafted Bush, and it definitely paid off.
If it wasn’t for that, the Slackers may have been in trouble, because Antonio Gates was a no-go — a big zero points — and both Randall Cobb and Torrey Smith had lackluster days, combining for 12 points.
Still, the Bengals defense got the Slackers a TD and kicker Matt Bryant scored 10 points, which was just icing on the cake.
But he's tasted that cake before, winning in Week 12 of 2011, only to be spoiled in Week 15.
Fear and Loathing.....167.9
World of Noise..............99.1
If Fear and Loathing had read my preview — I’m just assuming he didn’t because of his without-mercy performance in Week 2 — he would have known that all he had to do was score 100 points to win.
Well, he went a little overboard — like the number of Honey Boo Boo references in this column (one, this single reference, is in fact "overboard").
The Fear put up 167.9 points, which ranks sixth all-time in JFL history. It was an astounding performance with four 20-plus-point players.
Perhaps it was the years of frustration being unleashed in one mighty roar.
After losing three straight to the Noise, I’d be upset too.
But now, it’s time for the Noise to be upset.
This is now 12 fantasy games of 100 or fewer points for the Noise in his last 16 games.
Stealing from Dawson, the Noise’s running back Michael Turner was clocked at a speed that is 10 more than his average over the last 16 games. The Noise has averaged an astounding 87.5 points during that time.
What’s strange is that this problem was supposed to be over.
With Matt Ryan and Turner, things were looking brighter, but the Noise has a serious wide receiver problem. DeSean Jackson is a good fantasy threat, scoring 12.8 points in Week 2, but the rest of his wideouts are a mess. Robert Meachem is just as useless as he was in New Orleans, and he proved that with zero points on Sunday.
Marques Colston, who remains in New Orleans, had another unimpressive week with 5.5 points. The receivers on his bench were equally disappointing as Anquan Boldin and Nate Burleson each had less than 2 points.
Fear had no issues with his wideouts as Roddy White scored 17.8 points and Mike Wallace had 14.4.
In his FLEX, Fear used a running back, and Willis McGahee made the most of the position on Monday night, rushing for 113 yards and two TDs for 24.8 fantasy points — just to put an exclamation point on a long-awaited win.
Finally, Fear is back on the board. And one thing is for sure: the Noise will not keep the Fear out of the playoffs with a season sweep.
Chinese Organ Thieves............109.8
Jawz Attack................................89.3
I couldn’t have been more wrong about Trent Richardson.
The first-round pick scored a pair of touchdowns and totaled 145 yards for 27.3 fantasy points on Sunday against the Bengals. This comes a week after the Eagles defense stifled him for just 4.6 points.
Thinking that it was more of a sign of how bad Richardson is (when compared to the gaudy predictions) as opposed to how good the Eagles defense was, I surely thought he wouldn't be a huge factor this week.
I guess the Eagles defense is actually pretty good, and so is Richardson.
Despite the poor Week 1 performance, the Thieves stuck with his guy and it paid off big time.
Without him, he could have easily lost this matchup.
But we can’t call the Thieves Mr. Faithful for that alone. He also benched Week 1 starting QB Philip Rivers for Peyton Manning, who managed just 14.9 points on Monday night.
In fact, at one point, Manning was in the negatives after throwing three first-quarter interceptions, at which point Schiavo texts me and remarks about how he’s getting a little worried. He led by just a few points, and if Manning moved any further in the negatives — you know, closer to Rex Grossman territory — we’d be talking about the Attack’s come-from-behind victory without having a player score a point in the comeback.
But that wasn’t the case as Manning led the Broncos (seriously almost typed “the Colts”) back to within six points against the Falcons.
Rivers was dominant throughout against the Titans, scoring 31.9 fantasy points and placing the Thieves in a real pickle. Does he roll with Manning because he can trust him a bit more? Or does he roll with the inconsistent Rivers? Tough call right now.
Outside of Manning and Richardson, the only other skill position to get the Thieves double-digits was Rob Gronkowski, who of course scored a TD and had 14.7 fantasy points. Other than that, Adrian Peterson, Jeremy Maclin, Steven Jackson and Stephen Hill were all disappointments, and they really gave Jawz a chance, but he too had his issues with low-scorers.
Donald Brown had just 4.5 points, while tight end Jermichael Finley scored 2.4 points. Even worse, Larry Fitzgerald had 0.6 points, by no fault of his own. Teams are targeting him and Kevin Kolb isn’t.
Fitzgerald has to be regretting the contract he signed in the desert.
Jawz has to be regretting the waste of a first-round draft choice on him.
And the Jammers is ecstatic he didn’t keep him.
Graybill’s Generals................118.4
Channel 4 News Team............81.7
I think I get it.
I see what you did, Nick Nikish, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
You’re my bodyguard, my secret service agent, my Bruce Willis.
On draft day, sitting with the No. 10 pick, you ran up to the podium and dived in front of the bullet aimed straight for my fantasy heart. That bullet had a name on it and it read "Jamaal Charles."
My draft day gut feelings have been great over the years, having selected players who have helped my franchise remain successful, but man, I was way wrong with Charles — at least through two games.
He has 10.5 fantasy points through two games and looks to have re-injured his surgically repaired knee.
It’s not looking good, and had it not been for Nick jumping in front of that bullet, Darren Sproles, the back with nearly 40 fantasy points and no rushing yards, would not have returned to the Jammers.
The News Team’s RB situation is a bit shaky now with the injury, and could cause trouble if Charles doesn’t turn it around.
Still, as much as I want to discuss the 2.8 points Charles had Sunday, he wasn’t the only player with less than 3 points. The News Team also dealt with a 2.8-point performance from Brandon Marshall and a 2.9-point outing from tight end Jared Cook. He didn’t have many options on the bench either, nothing that would have lifted him over the Generals, who moved to 1-1.
If it weren’t for the Giants’ huge comeback against the Bucs, we may be talking about how the News Team won a ugly low-scoring affair, but Eli Manning and Victor Cruz went crazy in the comeback, combining for 71.4 points for the Generals.
Together, they nearly beat the News Team. Manning had 510 passing yards and three touchdowns, including 179 yards and a touchdown to Cruz, who made up for a tough Week 1 performance.
LeSean McCoy added 14.3 points for the Generals, but the rest of the squad wasn’t great. Alshon Jeffery had 0.9 points and Aaron Hernandez suffered an injury before recording a single point. Beanie Wells was mediocre with seven points, as was Denarius Moore, who had 7.3.
On the bench, Ben Tate scored 22.5 points with a pair of TDs and 74 yards, but who could have really predicted that, especially when the News Team’s Arian Foster still scored 21.9 fantasy points.
If that’s going to be the norm for the Texans’ running game, perhaps Tate will be in the lineup the next time these two division foes meet.
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