Evans World – Week 9

Before I begin, let me first say how awesome the Chicago Bears are, as a team and an organization.  They are truly a model for perfection at the highest levels of professional football.  All other teams pale in comparison to their greatness and their awesomeness.  How anyone could possibly root for another team is beyond me.

That being said, let me give you all a friendly piece of advice: don’t ever make a bet with your wife and lose.  It sucks.  She makes you do and say really bad things.

RANDOM THOUGHTS FOR THE WEEK

• Take a look at the standings, folks.  It’s anybody’s league now.  This past week the top 4 teams all lost, and the playing field has never seen so even.  10 teams are definitely in the running for a spot to play for the money.  I can’t recall, even in our greatest years, when so many had a chance to win.  I wish I could say I love it, but I’m at the very bottom of that list and just lost my starting QB for the next pivotal 3 weeks, so my chances aren’t so great.  Don’t worry, I’m not giving up but I’ve been analyzing and losing long enough to get a good sense of what is coming.  Set your lineups, do your research, sacrifice your chickens, do whatever you have to, but winning means survival now more than ever.  4 weeks left.
• As far as this past week is concerned you were either a big winner or a big loser it seems.  I think the biggest winners of the week were Kevin and Gary.  Both of them were in must-win situations with lineups that were questionable to win their matchups against the top 2 teams in the league.  Thanks to some amazing play by almost their entire lineups they are very much in the running and (if there is momentum in FF) moving forward strongly into the final quarter of the season.  Will players like Foles continue to have huge weeks?  I’d say doubtful, but I honestly thought to myself Sunday morning that Kevin didn’t have much of a chance this weekend because he had to start Foles.  50 points later, I’m happy to confess that I was wrong.  And let’s not forget he got the big win without starting a DEF.  All bets are off when facing Kevin.  Also, don’t underestimate Gary’s 2-game winning streak.  Those were huge wins, not just in matchups but in point totals.  Consider yourselves warned.  Gary’s got a really tough schedule ahead, but I can’t help but think his chances have improved significantly.
• This past week I saw some of the most impressive FF decisions I’ve ever seen.  They were made by Nathan.  Nathan had picked up Keenan Allen in mid-October and got a below average week out of him in Week 7 and then hit his bye.  After that he also picked up Marvin Jones, the Bengals WR who was truly en fuego.  Last week Nathan dropped Jones for Mike Tolbert and started him over Arian Foster, his #1 draft pick who was a game-time decision.  How many of you had to look up where Tolbert is playing?  Nathan knew, and Allen and Tolbert had massive weeks.  I don’t know where Nathan gets all of his information, but his research methods in all the years I’ve played with him have been Olympian in accuracy.  Starting Allen and Tolbert may have seemed easy to him, but to me they were amazing, unbelievable choices.  Great, great work!  Were it not for Foles’ monster week, it would have been another easy win for Nathan to put him at the top of the league … again.
• Need a break at work and want to read something interesting?  Take a look at the record book section of the Yahoo! site.  Interesting stuff.
• I don’t know about you, but the last thing I wanted this morning was an e-mail summary from Yahoo! about how Marshall kicked my ass.  I’ll leave it turned on for the rest of you, but WTF.

WEEKLY AWARDS

• MVP – Hands down the award goes to Foles and Kevin for one of the highest scoring weeks in EW history for a single player.  He came very close to beating Peyton Manning’s score of 51.14 points from Week 1 of this year.  That’s really only sad if your Ritchie who had Peyton on bye this week and whose team only managed to make 4.96 more points than Foles.  I doubt Kevin expected that kind of week (hell, who did?), but the win has got to feel good.
• Honorable Mention – Like I said, if you won this week you probably won big so that means plenty of options for the HM.  Calvin Johnson was a monster again this week for Mike, but I’m going to give the award to Marshall for Brady and Green kickstarting another huge week for him.  Take a really close look at the standings and the team point totals and you’ll understand why Kevin, Mike, Gary and Marshall are so grateful for huge point weeks.
• Best Owner Choice – Already gave special kudos to Nathan for his choices this week.  I also give a nod to Mike for starting Riley Cooper who rode the Foles train to success this week.  Best choices were definitely made by Tony G who picked up and started Stacy and Mike James.  Tony averaged 70 points during his 6-game losing streak.  He’s averaged 100 points since.  A much better way to finish the season, if you ask me.
• Unfortunate Bench – It’s worth noting that Chris Johnson sat on Kevin’s bench this week, but I don’t really blame him for sitting him.  Same with Jason and Eddie Royal who is now on his 4th team of the season.  But I’ll give it to Berk for benching Marlon Brown who he picked up back in September and never started.  He’s back on the waiver if anyone is interested.
• Lawrence Philips Award – I’d love to give it to Ritchie Incognito but I’m still getting all the info on that and may need to touch on it again in future weeks.  Instead, the award goes to Justin Blackmon who disappointed Tony G and countless other FF owners for years, finally getting the boot for the rest of the season.  For some reason, weed mattered more to him than playing in the NFL and making millions of dollars.  I don’t know about you, but outside of Ricky Williams has anyone ever had weed that good that it would warp you to act that stupidly?  Oh, but he’s going to rehab so he’s forgiven and he’ll be fine.  Whatever.  Thanks Justin for providing yet another example in honor of LP of someone with authentic talent getting wasted on their own stupidity.

WE ARE A PART OF THE HUSKER NATION

• So, where were you when you saw the play?  Me, I was holding Alex who had just finished his milk.  I honestly had to suppress my natural instinct to throw/spike whatever I was holding at the time in triumph.  I’m sure he’s glad I did.  Instead, I watched the play unfold, gently laid Alex onto the floor and then proceeded into my victory dance.  For me there’s little honor to win on a hail mary, but for some reason in college football it is always considered a moment of glory.  I still get chills thinking about Matt Davison’s catch in Columbia (not a hail mary of course), but that year the Huskers were honestly looking at the end of a national championship run!  Kellogg’s play will be replayed again for years and years and I’ll love to watch it.  I’m glad we won, don’t get me wrong.  I just can’t help but hate it a little because we’d played so poorly up to that point.
• I love where the offense can go with Beck, Armstrong and the players they have.  I really hope nothing there changes.  Armstrong needs to spend the summer watching tape and learning how to read defenses so he can audible at the line and prevent some of the losses/turnovers, but I have faith he can do it. 
• Still sure that Papuchis needs to go, but at least the defense was prepared this week, made a few adjustments and had the players (mostly) in the right positions.  Improvement is good.  Perfection is still impossible with him in charge.

Hope you all have a great week!