Yes, I have been remiss in my duty as league blogger. As a
sign of my neglect in football, I didn’t realize until a week later that CBS
awarded one more point to PJ and gave him the win two weeks ago. If we had a 1st
and 11 or I was on the ball, I would have noticed.
Lack of comments on the blog, no 1st and 11, and iPad
games diversions were some reasons. Also, scandalously, I joined a FantasyBasketball league in November (at Donny’s behest). While I had been holding my own, my focus
there has dwindled a bit now that some of my key players (Bradley Beal, Jeremy
Lin, Derrick Favors) are injured.
My loss is now your gain as I now can pay attention to what’s
going on in the FADUCO League. Wait, Hai hasn’t posted the team matchups for the playoffs
yet? Hmmm, I’m not the only one showing apathy this past month. Due to the lengthy amount of time I put into this first preview, I'll do the Hai vs.Victor one tomorrow if I have time and if Hai puts up the playoff matchup.
Semi-final Game 1:
Bill (2) vs Donny (3)
Around a month ago, after upsetting Victor, Donny would have
been the #1 ranked team. But then he nosedived to the tune of three straight
losses to Caucasian teams and now has little confidence in his players. There
is no single player to blame, it just happened that either RB, WR, or DST
failed to show up in each different game. More importantly, he saw his
opponents score an average of 87 points during that losing streak. However, he
still has a relatively balanced and healthy team. I chalk it up then to overall
bad luck and not some fundamental weakness.
Bill has been playing .500 ball with the Asians the last 4
weeks. However, absent one bad performance vs. Hai, he has averaged a healthy
82 points. He did have the bad luck to face a rejuvenated Victor in the final
week and lost despite scoring over 90 points.
Let’s look at each team’s positions:
Quarterback
Cam Newton has been decent the last 4 games for Donny, with
no game where you could blame him for the loss. He’s become more consistent
than he was earlier in the season. Cam has scored more than 4 points on average
at home, with a much lower standard deviation than his road games as well. His
next two games are…… at home! But if you think that is remarkable, just look at
Drew Brees. A full 16 points better on average at home than on the road
(standard deviations are roughly similar). Drew sure loves his Cajun home
cooking. For Week 15, Drew plays….AT St. Louis. Then, on Week 16, AT a tough
Carolina road game. Poor Bill. Edge:
Donny (Slight)
Running Back
Knoshown Moreno is probably the best pick of the FADUCO
draft. He’s 5th in RB Scoring average and has only 3 games where he
scored less than 6 points (my personal threshold for RB decency). However, Alfred Morris has been a victim of
the Redskins dysfunction and Mike Shanahan is suspected by some (okay, many) to
be trying to throw away the season. Therefore, I don’t see too many TD
opportunities for Alfred. Since week 11, he has been very pedestrian. I wouldn’t
be surprised if Donny starts Gio Bernard instead. Conversely, for Bill, 9th-ranked
DeMarco Murray has been on a hot streak since week 10. He also faces a Green
Bay team that is will probably be trailing most of the game and so will get
some more carries than usual. The
problem for Bill is that his #2 RB is a bit unsettled now between Danny
Woodhead (#21) and Maurice Jones-Drew (#25). Both have performed better than
their ranking indicates, it will be a managerial dilemma for Bill. Edge: Bill (slight)
Wide Receiver
For most of the season, Megatron was carrying Donny’s team
and was on track for an MVP season. He has underperformed in the last 3 weeks
and not coincidentally so has Donny. But I think that Megatron shall return to
being a force this week since he won’t have to play in the snow. Also playing
in a dome this week: Pierre Garcon. Unfortunately, his circumstances are a bit
less favorable (see Morris, Alfred). Bill’s strength going into the season was
his WRs, and that hasn’t changed. Demaryius Thomas has been a model of
consistency since week 7 (11.5 pts average, lowest was 7 points). Desean
Jackson may be the second best draft pick this year, he’s now a certified stud
or at least solid starter. He’s cooled a bit the last 3 weeks but remains a
must-start. Edge: Bill (medium)
Tight End
Julius Thomas may possibly be the 2nd best Free
Agent pickup after Nick Foles. He’s healthy again and is good for at least 1 TD
throw from Peyton. Of the 11 games he’s played so far, he caught at least one
in 9 of them. As of press-time, Mr.
Cosgrove hasn’t replaced Rob Gronkowski yet and there is no bench TE. Possible
free-agent pickups I see are Garrett Graham and Brandon Myers,
replacement-level average at best. Edge:
Donny (strong)
Kicker
I didn’t bother to evaluate whoever is Donny’s kicker (note:
it’s Mason Crosby) because Bill’s Matt Prater just kicked at freakin’ 64-yarder
last week. And he gets to kick again at Mile-High this week. Edge: Bill (strong)
DST
Donny has the best 1-2 punch of defenses in the league: The
revitalized Chiefs and the always dangerous 49er Defense. For this week, the
Chiefs face Oakland (KC’s D scored 27 points the last time they met) and 49ers
face the now-decent Buccaneers, both on the road though. Bill’s best Defense is
14th-ranked New Orleans, and his bench D Eagles is a bit similar in
scoring average. Both are also on the
road, so no home-field advantage for either side. Edge: Donny (medium)
Overall Edge:
This race is almost too close to call. It basically may boil
down to which Thomas is the one Peyton favors this week – Julius or Demaryius. It
wasn’t by design, but both teams each have 1 strong, 1 medium, and 1 slight
edge in my category ratings above. Bill did defeat Donny two weeks ago, that
was a pretty close but well-managed affair 82-76. I suspect this week shall be
similar. If I were a gambling man, I’d stay away from this bet. Past playoff
history becomes my tiebreaker, so I’m going with Donny over Bill, who has
suffered more playoff heartbreaks than Marty Schottenheimer and Norv Turner
combined. Donny over Bill 86-82
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