Evans World – Week 7

Wow, what a week.  The injury fairy visited half the league, the top teams buckled, Nathan did something he hasn’t done in years and Berk solidified his lead.  Let’s get right to it!

RANDOM THOUGHTS FOR WEEK 7

• This weekend 5 teams hopped on board the injury train bound for … who knows. 
• I was all prepared to write at length this week about how disappointing Doug Martin has been for Kevin this season.  Even though Yahoo! made the draft pick for him, it’s a good bet Kevin would have picked Martin anyway and none of us would have said it was a bad call.  Martin came on huge last year, one of the biggest FF finds of the season, but this year he was certainly our league’s biggest 1st round bust.  So far this year he has averaged only a whopping 6 points a week.  Sadly, Martin’s injury knocked him out for the year and made Kevin’s RB calls a little easier in the future.  Here’s hoping Chris Johnson continues to post good numbers.   Fred Jackson continues to be a godsend for Kevin this season, although I doubt anyone saw him as anything other than a RB2/3.
• First Julio Jones, now Reggie Wayne.  Mike’s luck with WR has been pretty bad so far, and if I were Calvin Johnson I’d be worried about my health in the coming weeks.  Mike has already done some creative waiver moves, picking up Boykin and Pettis.  I think Shorts will be in his starting lineup for the rest of the season, whether he likes it or not.  It’s a good thing Mike used 4 of his first 6 draft picks on WR.  Did he know???
• Don’t feel sorry for Tony G losing Sam Bradford.  The 3 other QB’s on the roster should get the job done (added Ben Rothesburger just for kicks?).  Once he’s back from his bye week, Andrew Luck is the new star on his team.  Me, I feel sorry for Bradford.  He’s never really had the chance to grow and build a team around him in the NFL, and even though the team says otherwise it’s a good bet he won’t get another chance.  He’s a skilled passer whose injuries and lack of skilled players kept him from realizing the greatness he could have.  So many other QB’s can say the same thing.
• Jason is in a bit of a pickle losing Cutler for the next few weeks.  Do I see a trade coming soon?
• Sorry, Ritchie, but I don’t see Finley coming back any time soon.  That was a brutal hit he took.  Add that to his concussion from a few weeks ago and you see a guy who will take as long as needed to recover … even if that means through the rest of the FF season.  Beside, you’ll be fine with Clay.  If not, there’s a freakishly large plethora of productive TE’s out there for the picking.
• Nathan is grateful that Houston is on bye this week and hoping that Foster comes back healthy.  But if things keep going like they did this week Nathan could become Lacy’s biggest fan in no time.
• So let’s talk a bit about some of the QB choices out there this week …
• Did Tom even know that Josh Freeman had moved to the Vikings?  It’s 50/50, but benching Matt Ryan for him was a bit puzzling to me.  Sure, when Ryan has been bad this year he’s been horrible.  But Freeman is horrible all the time.  There was no chance at all he’d have a good game in his first start with the Vikes, even against the 32nd-ranked Giants defense.  But Tom chose to bench Ryan and Gonzalez.  Interesting calls, but ones I don’t agree with.  Stick with Ryan, Tom, and don’t ever bench Gonzalez.
• I think the Vikes need to fire their offensive coordinator, Bill Musgrave.  You have the BEST RB IN THE LEAGUE and you make Josh “just got here 2 days ago” Freeman pass 53 times???  Once the Giants (the worst defense in the league, remember) figured out they didn’t have to fear the pass, they loaded up the box and shut AP down.  That means zero total offense.  The game plan should have been establish the run, throw in some play action with short cross passes to keep the defense loose, then help AP to make a big play.  Instead the game plan was to put the ball into Freeman’s hands and make him win the game.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.  AP only got 13 carries and Freeman only completed 20 passes.  If I were a Vikings fan (Berk?), I’d be calling for a few heads right now.
• Berk picks up Jake Locker then doesn’t start him.  17.97 points left on the bench, not that he needed them.  Interesting …
• I’ll talk about Andrew Luck in a minute, but what a game he played for Tony G this week!
• If you didn’t get a little choked up when Peyton took the field in Indy Sunday night, I feel sorry for you, you friggin robot.  At first I thought they were booing him.  In fact, they were booing the whole Broncos team.  The minute that awesome video montage hit the screen and the crowd was on their feet and cheering for easily 3 minutes … wow.  You could see Peyton tried to focus on warming up, but I think he saw “Thanks, Peyton” on the screen and was swept away by the moment.  I don’t think anyone would blame him for that.  Waaaay better reception than Favre got when he returned to Lambeau wearing purple and white.
• Speaking of Favre, I for one think it’s awesome that he plays FF and his QB is Aaron Rodgers.  Great minds think alike, right Brett?
• Mike, if you ask my opinion, after the bye I think you start Philip Rivers from now on.  You know how I feel about the guy, but you can’t argue with the numbers.  Rivers has averaged 17.68 points this year with practically no turnovers.  Romo is averaging 17.35, I know, but aren’t you nervous every time he drops back for a pass?  Might as well save your nerves a bit from the bumpy ride Romo would take you on.  I’d say settle in with a more consistent performance from Rivers for the rest of the season.
• Tony P has a tough call each week to make at QB.  Russell Wilson is averaging 13.4 points, Cam Newton 13.65.  I think we’d all agree Wilson is the better start, but those first few games have got to make you nervous to pull the trigger that fast.  I don’t know, Tony.  Something tells me defenses are going to start playing against Newton better while Wilson will steadily open up the passing game.  I still say Wilson is the better call, but good call this past week.
• Ritchie and Nathan showed they could be beaten this week but kept their spots at the top of the pyramid.  Of course, now they get to play each other this coming week and give many of us a chance to move up in the standings!  Pick your side and root for them. 
• So something unusual happened this past week …  Nathan scored less than 60 points.  I knew there was something very strange about that, so I did some digging.  The last time Nathan scored even close to the 58.6 points he had this week was Week 5 in the 2010 season when he scored only 65.65 points and lost again to Berk.  In the 3 years since he’s easily averaged over 90 points a week and won several league championships.  I guess we all have a down week some time, even Nathan.  In case you were wondering, the lowest score Nathan ever had was in Week 13 of 2006 when he scored 48 points and lost to … wait for it … me!
• Berk is averaging 109.71 points a week and sitting happily at the top of the standings.  The good news is every team in the league has been able to score more than 100 points at least once this season.  The bad news Berk is doing it pretty much every week.  Consider yourself warned.
• I don’t know if you were following the matchup between Ritchie and me this week, but after the Sunday afternoon games I was leading Ritchie by 46 points and my team was all done.  Ritchie only had Praeter and Peyton left to play.  Mindi will attest that I was sweating bullets all night because I knew deep down there was still a good chance Ritchie could beat me.  I ended up winning by only 11.83 points.  I wish you all the same feelings as you face Ritchie and Manning in the weeks ahead.
• Glad to see you have a monster week to end your losing streak, Tony G.  You deserve it.  Enjoy riding the Andrew Luck bandwagon for the rest of the season.
• Mike, I’m worried about your team.  Let’s see how you make it through the bye week this week, but I don’t think you can afford to lose more than 1-2 of the next games in order to still make the playoffs.  Also, no more injuries to your WR corps please!
• Is it possible we will have 0 trades this season????  I’m thinking the answer is Yes.  Only 4 weeks left.

RANDOM THOUGHTS ON ISSUES THAT ARE BARELY RELATED TO FOOTBALL BUT SOMEHOW GOT A LOT OF ATTENTION THIS PAST WEEK ANYWAY

• I think the comments thrown around from Irsay, Fox and Peyton were a ton of hot air blown up as it usually is by the sports media to fill what was an otherwise slow news week.  We ALL know what happened in Indy two years ago.  It was a business decision to let Peyton go, pure and simple.  The 49ers and the Packers know all too well that is what you have to do sometimes.  It’s part of the game.  To go and make it personal, to imply that there was animosity where there was none … just tons of hot air and wasted ink.  Yawn.  Let’s get excited about how Peyton’s game has been since he left (thanks to the surgery the Colts paid for, by the way) and what it must feel like for him to return.  Thankfully the sports media sat back and shut up as Peyton took and stood on the field and received the authentic adoration of his former fan base.
• I think the sports media is pushing the issue of the Redskins’ team name more than anyone who has reason to be offended by the name.  Who gets the ink time?  Bob fricking Costas.  Let’s hear from the Native American groups who have honest-to-god beefs with the name.  Let’s hear their thoughts!  Let’s see what numbers they have to support changing the name!  Let’s hear their alternatives to names!  Nope, all the sports media is doing is shouting into the wind.  Nothing productive or substantive.  It drives me fucking crazy.  Why don’t they get upset at the stupid chant that you hear over and over again at Seminoles/Indians games???  Isn’t that offensive too, and if not, why not?  If you ask me, I can see why the team name can be offensive.  Problem is I don’t hear the offended lobbying for the change.  Until I do, I’m inclined to let the team business leaders make the decision.  Changing a team name isn’t the end of the world, nor does it have to be the end of any traditions.  I don’t remember a ton of Oilers fans lamenting the passing of their team name.  I saw them embrace the new one and move forward.  As far as new names for Washington, how about the “Washington Filibusters” or the “Swamprats” or “the Washington Union.”  Oooo … I like that last one.  Maybe I should trademark it now …
• Call me crazy, but if you want to promote awareness of breast cancer, screening and treatment doesn’t it make more sense to focus the most attention on womens’ sports events and the sporting events that more women watch/attend?  Here’s what I saw this weekend.  The Oregon’s men football team wears ugly-as-hell pink helmets.  The Nebraska women volleyball team wears nothing, absolutely nothing pink.  I’m confused.  I’m not saying take out the pink from football games.  There are plenty of women who go ape-shit at those games.  Just dial it back from a 9 to a 2.  No pink flags for the officials.  No pink socks or shoes.  Pink ribbons on the field or uniforms?  Sure.  I guess I was more shocked at how there was nothing for breast cancer awareness during a women’s sporting event and then far too much at a men’s event.  I, for one, hope I never have to see those pink helmets again.

WEEKLY AWARDS

• MVP – Hands down the award this week goes to Andrew Luck for Tony G.  Not only happy to see a big week for Tony, but happy to see Luck have the biggest FF impact of his career.  There was an outside chance Luck could have won it for Tony against Mike.  Instead he blew it out of the park.  Big win.
• Honorable Mention – I’ve got a tie this week.  I’ve got to give a nod to Vincent Jackson who finally stepped up and provided a big week for Tony P.  But I also want to praise Marshall and give my first HM award to a kicker for Randy Bullock.  Bullock had a huge week for a kicker and helped Marshall to a too-close-for-comfort win over Tom this week.  Love to see the FF K play a role in a matchup!
• Best Owner Choice – Love Kevin’s pick of Ryan Matthews in the slot position.
• Unfortunate Bench – That being said, Kevin’s other lineup let him down as Kapernick, Johnson and Williams’ points sat on the bench.  I hate, hate, hate weeks like that.  I feel for you, dude.  I also give a nod to Nathan for leaving Lacy on the bench, but I’ll be nice.
• Lawrence Philips Award – I’ve already mentioned my disdain for the sports media this past week, so I won’t pile it on anymore.  But, I do have 2 awards to give this week:
• First, I give an LPA to the football players at Grambling State.  I don’t disagree with their problems with the facilities, nor do I disagree with their boycotting of practices to protest the shitty conditions.  They get the LPA for forfeiting a game, and not just any game but Jackson State’s homecoming game.  Their selfish decision to boycott this week hurt untold numbers of folks in their university and at Jackson State.  Couldn’t their point have been made a little better without impacting anyone outside of the university administration and their own athletic department?  Bad timing, bad decision.  Pure LP.
• Second, I go outside of football to the fucked up family of Nikko Jenkins.  This family of quality citizens has been charged with multiple counts of robbery and murder.  They planned out and helped each other setup friends and strangers so they could rob and kill their targets.  So, now that they’re caught and facing trial they have the audacity to call out the state of Nebraska as “sinful” to try to get the death penalty for her family members if convicted.  Erica, the sister who helped her family kill multiple people, had the brains to write “We are all human beings.  None of us has the right to take another human being’s life, no matter what!”  Yeah, you should have thought about that before you and your fucked up family decided that it made more sense to rob and kill people rather than get a job and make something out of your lives.  Fuck you, hypocrite.

WE ARE A PART OF THE HUSKER NATION

• Nothing to report this week on the bye week.  Excited to see what team shows up for the Minnesota game.  Hoping it’s a good one, well-prepared and believing in itself.  There’s still a good chance we can win the division and go to the Big 10 Championship.  The sky is the limit, guys.  Dream big.

Hope you all have a great week this week!  Good luck!