Catching Up (Consolation Playoff Push)

First off, allow me to apologize for not keeping up to date on the weekly recaps, but I felt that at that point in the season to do so would have been pretty repetitive every week.  However, we have reached that portion of the season where I am playing meaningful games again, even if they are only my opportunity to climb out of the cellar in the consolation playoffs and avoid losing the bottom rung game of the consolation ladder on the final week of the season (AKA the Toilet Bowl Game).

To briefly recap up to this point why I’m in jeopardy of playing in the toilet bowl next week – my top 3 draft picks, all running backs, got off to incredibly slow starts.  My fourth pick, Randall Cobb, broke his leg early in the season.  My strategy of waiting until the late rounds for a quarterback while adding depth at other positions did not pay off.  When I tried to alter that course by trading for a quarterback, I landed Robert Griffin III, who has run hot and cold all season long and that Redskins team supporting him ended up falling well, well below expectations and now he is benched for the last 3 games of the season.  Stevan Ridley, who at one point got to be very reliable, suddenly wasn’t and got himself benched.  And once my team ended up at 1-6, I began the process of rebuilding for next season at the price of futilely competing down the stretch this year.  If it does end up that I finish in last place, I am perfectly okay with that because I got paid handsomely for the pieces of my team that I sold off and I am in great position for next season.

Here is the outlook on the members of my team for the final two games of this fantasy season.

QB – Nick Foles, tremendous matchup this week in the dome at Minnesota against a very poor defense.  I think Foles has a very good chance to be the top point producer at quarterback this week anywhere in the NFL.  Against Chicago next week, Foles is a maybe play.  My backup option now that I’ve jettisoned RG3 (even in a keeper league, he’s definitely not worth using a pick in the first three rounds to retain) is Alex Smith, who gets to rough up the Raiders this week and then maybe earn a start over Foles on my team when he plays the Colts in week 16.

RB – Maurice Jones-Drew has easily been my most reliable guy at RB the past 4-5 weeks.  However, during his 103-yard rushing performance against Houston last week, he pulled his hamstring and has sat out of practice all week and is listed as doubtful.  The fact that he might not play on a week where he has an outstanding matchup against a Bills defense that has performed horrendously against the Falcons and Buccaneers the last two weeks is a real shame.  However, I picked up Jordan Todman to play in his place should he be declared inactive because my other options this week are CJ Spiller, Stevan Ridley and Ray Rice, none of whom I have any confidence in this week.  In fact, I have a lot of confidence that Ray Rice will do next to nothing against the Lions on Monday night.  Ridley isn’t really playable until Hobo Bill stops Belichicking Ridley owners and gives him back his lead back status and Ridley proves he can handle it without getting himself benched again.  Right now, if MJD is active, he plays and Spiller is my 2, simply because he’s the lesser of all the other evils and believe it or not, he has the best chance for success and the smallest chance of a major breakdown compared to Rice and Ridley this week, in my humble estimation.  However, next week Rice gets the Patriots, who have not been up to their usual levels on defense in past weeks, so maybe Rice could put together a big game next week, but this week he rides the bench for me.

Wide Receiver – My three healthy or semi-healthy options are Cecil Shorts, Julian Edelman and Da’Rick Rodgers, who broke out last week in a big way against the Bengals.  However, he’s still very unproven.  I also have Randall Cobb, if by some miracle he gets cleared to play in either of the next two weeks.  Shorts and Edelman are my two guys this week with Rodgers as play B if Shorts, who is listed as questionable, is declared inactive this weekend.  Or if by some miracle the Packers magically clear Cobb and put him on the field against the Cowboys, he may become a must play for me at my weakest position.

Tight End – Charles Clay has a very good game against the Steelers and a solid game against the Jets the week before that and he matches up against the Patriots this week, who have proven to be weak over the middle lately.  I am very excited about his prospects this week.  And due to some poor matchups and unreliability issues at running back and wide receiver, I will be starting two tight ends this week with Coby Fleener in the flex against the Texans, who have given up the tenth most points to tight ends over the course of the season and he continues to lead the team in targets in recent weeks despite Rodgers emergence last week.  I also have Dennis Pitta on my bench, who is potentially a great play next week when he also matches up against the Patriots.

Defense / Special Teams – Detroit Lions.  I picked up the Lions this week because they match up against Turnover Joe and the Ravens, whose offensive line sucks.  They can’t move the ball on the ground unless they’re matched up against horrible run defenses like the Bears or Dolphins (the two teams that Rice went over 20 points against this season).  Plus, Flacco throws more than his fair share of interceptions and when they get down to the red zone, it always seems like they’re having to settle for a field goal.  So, I figure they should be held to less than 20 points easily with a couple of interceptions and maybe Earnest Ross can return a kick for a Touchdown and boost their point total.  Plus, the Lions play a horrible Giants team next week.  I’m not scared to play them despite the Eagles having a huge game on the ground against them in the snow last week.  I think that was a huge outlier for a defense that has been tough on the run all year long.

Kicker – I already played Nick Novak this week against the Broncos and he got me a respectable 9 points.  Maybe I’ll stick with him next week against the Raiders or maybe I’ll find an option I like better.

So, here is how it shakes out.  I only need to win this week or next week and either win means I don’t finish in dead last.  A win this week would be preferable because it automatically moves me out of the toilet bowl game altogether and a win is definitely doable this week, though I am a little scared that my opponent has Russel Wilson, Marshawn Lynch AND the Seahawks defense, all against the New York Giants dumpster fire squadron.  A good sign is that he still has Tavon Austin in his lineup and he is very questionable this week, so it’s looking like a 0 in that spot for my opponent and your opponent putting up zeroes is never a bad thing.

*Fingers Crossed* for luck for my team this week and best of luck to all of you, whether your champions hopes are still alive or whether you’re trying to avoid finishing in the cellar like me.

Week 4 Recap – Canton Heroes vs. off alot

Another bad week from me.  Another week of underperforming running backs lands me with the lowest score in the league for the second week in a row.  It happens.

By the way, if anybody wants to know, I won the championship in four out of the five fantasy baseball leagues I played in this year.  I was in the third place game in the fifth league, but devoted my time to the other four and didn’t pay much attention to it and still ended up with a 5-5 tie, but lost the tiebreaker and thus ended up in 4th place there.  4 1sts and 1 4th – Yeah, I’ll take that every single year please.

Back to football.

Let’s start with Ray Rice, who granted we all knew was going to be limited due to his injury, but the entire Ravens running game was overly limited in that game against Buffalo, who had just given up over 120 yards to Bilal freakin’ Powell the week before.  The Bills defense is obviously a doormat, or if they aren’t they’ve got me fooled.  But even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while and the Ravens pretty much stuffed a handful down their throats and helped them out this week.  The Ravens still only lost by a touchdown, but I have to think that if Ray Rice or Bernard Pierce either one is healthy for that full game (Rice’s hip and Pierce’s strained calf) that they don’t have to rely on the throwing game so much so early and then Flacco doesn’t throw the five interceptions that he threw and the Ravens score a couple of more touchdowns and win that game by at least two scores.  Despite those five interceptions and Rice only getting 5 carries and Pierce only getting four carries, the Ravens still only lost that game by a field goal.  The Bills are not that good a team and don’t get fooled by the obscenely low fantasy numbers the Ravens guys put up this week.  So, the fact that I played Ray Rice, expecting that even though he was limited, 40-50 yards and a TD or maybe even 2 TDs wouldn’t have been surprising at all.  Instead, he only got 17 yards.  He did almost get a touchdown catch at the end of the game, but Flacco must have thought he was throwing to somebody else because he threw it a mile over poor short little Ray Rice’s head.  Way to justify your big contract, Joe.  Your team was in a game they should have easily won, but because of you they were behind in the final two minutes and you lead them down to the red zone and have a chance to redeem yourself and you throw a 12-foot high pass to a 5’8” running back.  Get the ball down a little bit for Rice or throw it to somebody else.

Try as I might, I just can’t get Stevan Ridley on the bench and keep him there.  With Randall Cobb and DeAngelo Williams on their bye week, I was kind of forced to play Ridley at the Flex behind Rice and MJD as my lead two backs and Ridley actually outperformed them with his best game of the year so far (though he has set the bar incredibly low there).  So, things are a little more promising for Stevan Ridley, though it seems like everyweek somebody wants to jump on the bandwagon of one of his back-ups in the timeshare.  Last week it was Brandon Bolden, but he was a non factor.  This week, they’re jumping on LaGarette Blount because he managed to break a 47-yard touchdown run.  That’s what we call a lucky break.  Look at the rest of his stats for the game.  You take that one run away and he’s got 8 carries for 17 yards, barely over 2 yards per carry.  He’s not going to be fantasy playable.  He’s just eating up a spot on your roster that could be better used.  Hell, you’re probably better off with a back-up kicker than you are with Blount.  Unless you’re desperate or stupid, you’re not putting him in whereas while I don’t advocate holding two kickers, you would at least presumably use your second kicker and you should not be using Blount.  Even if Ridley gets hurt, that job goes to Bolden or Vereen if healthy.  Blount might get a bigger share in the run game this next week because of that lucky break making his stats look all pretty, but don’t expect more than that 2.2 yards per carry from him moving forward.

Now, you could notice that I’m 1-3 at this point and just disregard some or all of the advice above, but this is common sense stuff I’m talking about here.

To recap some of the roster moves I made over this past week, my trade for Robert Griffin III went through, so the Heroes wave bye-bye to Pierre Garcon and say good riddance to bad rubbish in the form of Jay Cutler via that trade.  Now, it’s RG3’s bye week, so I need a quarterback and since I’m up against Peyton Manning this week, I need lightning in a bottle and I can’t rely on Geno Smith after his terrible day against the Titans this week, so I’m going with Brian Hoyer and hoping the Browns / Bills game tomorrow night ends up being a shootout and I get proven right about how crappy that Bills defense is.  Don’t get fooled by the week they had against the Ravens.  Remember what they did two weeks ago against the hapless Jets’ offense which prompted me to add Geno Smith on the off chance he used that game for a launching pad for a hot streak (he didn’t).  But hey, that was before I had RG3.  After this week, unless he gets hurt, I shouldn’t need another quarterback for the rest of the season.

With that 2-for-1 trade going through, I had an empty spot on my roster, which I used to grab Percy Harvin, who should become the Seahawks #1 target for Russell Wilson rather easily once he’s healthy.  And since he’s hurt, I got to stash him on my IR slot and create another open space on my roster, which I used to grab Greg Jennings, who Fear the Roo made the mistake of dropping.  Unfortunately, I didn’t play Jennings because of the Vikings QB situation, but I knew that having Matt Cassel take over for Christian Ponder would be a beneficial move for Jennings.  I just wanted to see it in action for a week before I trusted him enough to plug him into the line-up.  He’ll probably be seeing plenty of playing time for the Heroes moving forward presuming that Christian Ponder doesn’t get handed the reins at QB again.

So, here is an updated look at the Heroes roster for Week 5.

QB – Robert Griffin III (bye), Brian Hoyer

RB – Ray Rice, Maurice Jones-Drew, DeAngelo Williams, Stevan Ridley, Bernard Pierce

WR – Randall Cobb, DeSean Jackson, Greg Jennings (bye), Eddie Royal, Cecil Shorts

TE – Coby Fleener, Charles Clay

D/ST – Broncos

K – Sebastian Janikowski

And so you all have the opportunity to laugh at my misfortune, here is my Week 4 Box Score.

Canton Heroes – 60.7

– QB – Robert Griffin III – 14

– RB – Ray Rice – 1.7

– RB – Maurice Jones-Drew – 2.8

– WR – DeSean Jackson – 3.4

– WR – Eddie Royal – 4.2

– TE – Coby Fleener – 13.7

– Flex – Stevan Ridley – 7.9

– D/ST – Broncos – 12

– K – Sebastian Janikowski – 1

off alot – 93

– QB – Tony Romo – 18.5

– RB – Adrian Peterson – 26

– RB – Alfred Morris – 7.1

– WR – Calvin Johnson – 10.4

– WR – Hakeem Nicks – 3.3

– TE – Tyler Eifert – 3.9

– Flex – Lamar Miller – 12.8

– D/ST – Bengals – 4

– K – Garrett Hartley – 7

Draft Recap – 2013 Let the Wookie Win

Coming in, I was set up really well at Running Back with Ray Rice of the Baltimore Ravens and Stevan Ridley of the New England Patriots, but with the way RBs ran off the boards with the rest of the keeper selections, I couldn’t let Maurice Jones-Drew of the Jacksonville Jaguars pass me by with my 3rd round pick because despite all of the injuries last year, there seem to be very little doubts that he’s all set and ready to reclaim his elite status, so in a league where you can start 3 running backs – why wouldn’t you take him in the third round if by some miracle he was still there?  So, I did.

Following that, I was really hoping people would be passing on Larry Fitzgerald of the Arizona Cardinals in the early rounds and I might be able to snag him with the 2nd pick of the 4th round, but he was taken one pick ahead of me and I went with option B – Randall Cobb of the Green Bay Packers, who if you watch the show Firefly from which my team draws it’s name, you can’t really have a Heroes of Canton team without a man called Jayne, or barring that the best player in the NFL who shares Jayne’s last name – Cobb.

After that, I was thinking that I might be able to get a good quarterback in the 5th round, but I wasn’t really expecting any of the ones I would take that early to get back to me (Colin Kaepernick of the San Fransisco 49ers, Robert Griffin III of the Washington Redskins, or Andrew Luck of the Indianapolis Colts for example).  Instead,  I selected a second wide reciever, DeSean Jackson of the Philadelphia Eagles with the next to last pick of the fifth round.

Then, in the sixth round I made a questionable choice, taking a fourth running back in a league where you can only start 3 running backs at a time.  However, I consider having a fourth running back with a starting job on lock down to be a great trade piece later in the season.  Perhaps once some of the teams who waited too long on Running Back will look at my 4 starters and decide that my fourth running back, who happens to be Deangelo Williams of the Carolina Panthers, is looking pretty good and they might want to trade for him after watching the teams with 2-3 solid running backs run roughshod over them in the first few weeks of the season.  By the way, Williams no longer has to sit behind backfield running mate Jonathan Stewart because Stewart is injured and out for the season.

In retrospect, I probably should have taken Matthew Stafford of the Detroit Lions or Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks over Williams to fill my quarterback position, but I thought at the time that with so many QBs already off the board via keepers that there were some other teams out there waiting back on quarterbacks and one of them might make it back to me.  But since I had no intention of drafting either of the next two QBs on most people’s boards – Tony Romo of the Dallas Cowboys and Michael Vick of the Philadelphia Eagles, I probably should have pulled the trigger on Wilson there instead of Williams.  We’ll see how this plays out over the season, but if Maurice jones-Drew winds up not being over his injury or if Bill Belichick goes back to thinking he can win a Super Bowl without a running back who goes for more than 600-700 yards in a season, I will wind up being very happy that I have Williams sitting on my bench and ready to step up.

Fast Forward to the next to last pick of the seventh round, and of course Stafford and Wilson are both off the board, but sitting there is Washington Redskins receiver, Pierre Garcon, who I very happily grabbed to go along with Cobb and Jackson.  I followed up three picks later with another receiver, who despite having to catch his passes from Blaine Gabbert, should expand on his breakout season last year and that’s Cecil Shorts III of the Jacksonville Jaguars.  And if MJD winds up returning to his elite status of old, he’s going to take a lot of heat off the skittish Gabbert and allow for an even bigger year for Mr. Shorts.

In the 9th round, I couldn’t afford to wait on a quarterback any longer, what with Romo and Vick going off the board, leaving no more buffer between the quarterbacks I couldn’t let get past me any longer and the out-of-towners on autopick who would take them out of my starting line-up and place them on their bench without even realizing it.  So, I grabbed Carson Palmer, of the Arizona Cardinals, who I look at this year like an older and only slightly less desirable alternative to Matt Stafford since those offenses figure to be among the most pass-happy in the league.   Not to mention the fact, that he now has Larry Fitzgerald to throw too, which gives him a far greater weapon than anything he had to work with in Oakland last season when he still managed to be fantasy-relevant.

In the 10th round, I played it safe and backed up Ray Rice by taking Ravens’ back-up running back Bernard Pierce, as he was nearing the top of the basic best available boards and would be autopicked before making it back to me 20-some picks later.  With 4 starers and a handcuff for the best one, my running backs were more than set for the season.

In the 11th, I figured that since I was the last one to take a quarterback and since some teams had in fact selected two quarterbacks before my one, I thought it would be prudent to grab a backup quarterback, something I might not normally do.  So, I grabbed Jay Cutler, thinking he could have a big year or at the very least provide a serviceable tag-in for Palmer on weeks where Palmer faces a tough defense.

After that, I played to get around the autopickers again, taking a defense higher than I normally would before the out-of-towners started grabbing back-up defenses.  I got the Broncos defense, which ended last season ranked number 2 at the position.  They’re an older squad for sure and have depreciated in value, but with 6 games against the other 3 struggling offenses in the AFC West (Kansas City, San Diego, and Oakland), I figure that’s 6 weeks of decently easy games for them, which translates into plenty of points for me and some of those divisional games will be coming in playoff weeks.

At this point, I still don’t have a starting tight end or a kicker, but a kicker picked before the last round is a wasted pick, so I took Fred Davis of the Washington Redskins as my starting tight end, figuring he could wind up being a break-out star at a weak position across the boards and if not, I can find a replacement off the waiver wire to tide me by.

Then, we reached the part of the draft where people start taking a flyer on random players that probably 10-out-of-12 team owners in the league probably weren’t even thinking about taking.  My 14th and 15th round flyers were both Wide Receivers since I figured my 5 running backs were stacked and there was a greater potential for letdown at receiver.  So, I took Dexter McCluster of the Kansas City Chiefs and Rod Streater of the Oakland Raiders.  McCluster is the kind of weapon Andy Reid can make great use of and Streater is a guy that has caught the attention of some experts while winning the number two receiver job in Oakland where he could become a favorite target for quarterback Terelle Pryor.  I also think that if anything happens to Jamaal Charles, given Knile Davis unproveness in the league, we might just see McCluster get a long hard look at the job.

I finished up with my kicker, Sebastian Janikowski, “The Jankster”, of the Oakland Raiders and my team will probably feature a variety of kickers over the season until I settle on one for the playoff push.

Here’s how my team lines up.

Quarterbacks – Carson Palmer, Jay Cutler

Running Backs – Ray Rice, Stevan Ridley, Maurice Jones-Drew, Deangelo Williams, Bernard Pierce

Wide Receivers – Randall Cobb, DeSean Jackson, Pierre Garcon, Cecil Shorts III, Dexter McCluster, Rod Streater

Tight Ends – Fred Davis

Defense / Special Teams – Denver Broncos

Kickers – Sebastian janikowski