HarleyQuinn

ESPN has... horse racing! while ESPN2 has "College Football - Toledo at Northern Illinois in MAC action. Episode - 30."

I love how the northeast gets Oklahoma State @ Texas as opposed to the more geographically closer game of Virginia Tech @ Florida State...

1. What kind of changes can we expect from Samurai Mike taking over as the head coach in San Francisco? Not much, unfortunately. It's hard to rely on Frank Gore and the running game when your defense is letting you down and forcing the offense to throw it to come back from 14-7 and 17-10 scores in the 4th quarter where they can't afford to have two straight time killing drives that could culminate in just field goals. They have some decent talent on D (Patrick Willis, Justin Smith) but it's a matter of fitting the personnel with the scheme. 2. If Indy loses on Monday, are they in deep shit? Are they in deep shit already? They're already in deep shit. They're at the point where they have to rely on the offense to score a lot to win comfortably and if the offense starts sputtering at all, their defense just isn't strong enough to shut down the opposing team (See the Jags game and Houston game for examples of poor D and comebacks needed). 3. If Dallas loses this week, are they in deep shit? Are they in deep shit already? They have a lot of injuries but I'm not that worried once Romo comes back and gets a bit healthy. They added Roy Williams at WR and while their defense isn't the best in the league, it's still solid enough for playoff contention. I can see them finishing aroud 11-5 by the end of the year. 4. Will British people (in general) ever give a fuck about the NFL? Can you defend the NFL wanting to play these games overseas? I can understand the reasoning behind in that they're trying to mass market the NFL (although one would think they'd hit Germany or other places since they were running the NFL Europe league) but I question why England of all places. It'd be like trying to sell rabid baseball fans on the game of softball as an equal if not better sport. 5. What does St. Louis have to do to maintain momentum and keep winning games? What does New England have to do to knock the Rams back down a peg? St. Louis needs to keep up the defensive play. New Engand needs to keep creating turnovers on defense (Denver had two early drives in NE territory, folks and looked good doing it) but to be honest, the offense still doesn't seem enough for me if they go up against a talented offensive team like Indy (See the San Diego game). Denver's defense is absolutely atrocious and New England was able to score at will against a poor Kansas City team too. If St. Louis can run the ball with Jackson and balance the offense while not turning the ball over, I can see them winning 28-24 or 27-20.

*Bows head in shame* I lost on a tiebreaker in a 4-4 game... ugh

Fuck... just lost on the tiebreaker. Thank god I play in the shitty AFC East division though.

THURSDAY Auburn SATURDAY Texas Tech Wisconsin Miami Boston College Cincinnati Georgia Michigan Florida State Texas Iowa State Ohio State Arizona State USC Tiebreak #1: How many total points will be scored in the Oklahoma State/Texas game? 74 Tiebreak #2: How many passing yards will Texas Tech's Graham Harrell have against Kansas? 436

A lot of huge games this week. Should be exciting! Thursday 7:00 PM ET on ESPNU: 5-2 Jacksonville State @ 6-2 Tennessee-Martin 5-2 Colgate @ 4-2 Bucknell 5-1 Hampton @ 5-2 South Carolina State 5-1 Wofford @ 7-1 Elon 6-2 Furman @ 5-2 Appalachian State Saturday 3:30 PM ET on CN8: 6-1 James Madison @ 5-1 Villanova 6-2 Weber State @ 6-1 Northern Arizona

Unfortunately, it's one of those situations where the lower teams tend to pull down the division and most people don't believe that top teams in those conferences can match up with the "bottom" teams even of other divisions (i.e. the SEC or Big 12). I think the top teams (ala BYU or Hawaii or Boise State) in their respective years were a bit short changed in terms of respect and the fact that Hawaii got blown out by Georgia (despite Boise State's win over Oklahoma) seems to have created that self fullfilling prophecy of, "The top team from the WAC, MAC, MWC, etc. won't be able to hold their own against a mid level Big 10, SEC. Big 12 team let alone a top one" kind of attitude. It also doesn't help when coaches and media have a frickin' hard on for the "tough" conferences and complain about how Florida or Tennessee have tough schedules and ignore the fact that a team like BYU didn't choose their in-conference schedule but they get penalized anyway just because the other teams suck... it's not like BYU can make the teams in their conference good.

At least I have faith in the Patriots sucking under Cassell and scoring 10-14 points.

Notable FCS Scores... #19 Furman beat #24 Citadel 34-20 #2 App State beat Georgia Southern 37-36 Lafayette upset #14 Liberty 35-21 #9 Richmond beat #10 Massachusetts 30-15 #6 Northern Iowa beat #20 North Dakota State 23-13 #5 Cal Poly beat #21 South Dakota State 42-28 Hoped you all watched the Southern game! Florida A&M won 52-49. Bryant Lee threw for 407 yards with 3 TD and ran for 64.

Whoo... Tied for 1st in PF on the week with a monster 12, upset the then #9 ranked in-division rival, and improve my conference record to 3-1. Now if only I could crack the damn Top 10!

Indeed, the free agent DL class will really be strong. Bertrand Berry (Should be better with a change of scenery from Arizona) is also a name to keep an eye on.

How in the world does New England get favored over Denver? Seriously... Patriots: 14 San Diego Carolina (3.5) Chicago (3.5) (9.5) Pittsburgh (8.5) Tennessee Miami (2.5) San Francisco (7.5) Dallas Houston (8.5) (1.5) Indianapolis (3.5) N.Y. Jets Washington (7.5) Tampa Bay (10.5) Denver

Damn week but I vow to bounce back and get the crown back!

Seriously? Eww... horrendous week by everybody in terms of picks (outside of NO and NYJ) as most weeks tend to have several teams in the 11-10 range.

In terms of animals... Maryland Terrapins. Come on... a terrapin? You couldn't have called them the snapping turtles or something instead? Just look at that. It's like the damned thing is trying to smile whilst simultaneously pulling the "tough" guy pose. I just can't take anything Maryland seriously anymore.

NFC then / AFC QB (3): Drew Brees, Kurt Warner, Eli Manning/Phillip Rivers, Brett Favre, Jay Cutler RB (3): Clinton Portis, Michael Turner, Frank Gore/Larry Johnson, Steve Slaton, Ronnie Brown WR (4: Greg Jennings, Roddy White, Bernard Berrian, Devery Henderson/Andre Johnson, Reggie Wayne, Vincent Jackson/Brandon Marshall FB (1): Madison Hedgecock/Casey Cramer TE (2): Jason Witten, Chris Cooley/Owen Daniels, Tony Scheffler *Where was Billy Miller?* C (2): Todd McClure, Shaun O'Hara/Samson Setele, Casey Wiegmann OG (3): Daryn Colledge, Steve Hutchinson, Jahri Evans/Mike Goff, Chester Pitts, Chris Kuper OT (3): Jammal Brown, David Diehl, Chad Clifton/Ryan Clady, Michael Roos, Langston Walker DE (3): Aaron Kampman, John Abraham, Justin Smith/Haloti Ngata, Robert Mathis, Mario Williams *Would've voted Terrell Suggs here* DT (3): Kevin Williams, Fred Robbins, Pat Williams/Albert Haynesworth, Domato Peko, Tony Brown LB (5): Patrick Willis, Jon Beason, Jonathan Vilma, London Fletcher, OLB (3): Chad Greenway, Chris Gocong, Danny Clark/D.J. Williams, Rashad Jeanty, Freddy Keiaho ILB (2): Jon Beason, Jonathan Vilma/Dhani Jones, Nate Webster CB (3): Charles Tillman, Antoine Winfield, Phillip Buchanon/Antonio Cromartie, DeAngelo Hall, Cortland Finnegan *Where was Tramon Williams? Brian Williams?* SS (1): Quintin Mikell/Troy Polamalu FS (1): Nick Collins/Eric Weddle K (1): Jason Elam/Matt Prater P (1): Josh Bidwell/Dustin Colquitt KR (1): Reggie Bush/Darren Sproles ST (1): Stephen Nicholas/Kassim Osgood For the offensive line, I looked at a mix of rushing success (i.e. which RBs had a high or solid YPC) and solid passing success. The defensive guys I chose solely on statistics when possible. The wide receivers and tight ends I focused more on YPR to help shy away from those who are lucky to play in pass heavy systems (thus I would've chosen Billy Miller at TE).

Quick Spotlight I-AA games... Appalachian State (4-2) @ Georgia Southern (3-3) on SportSouth at 3:00 PM ET Hofstra (3-3) @ Maine (3-3) on WABI at 3:00 PM ET Lafayette (4-1) @ Liberty (6-0) on MASN, Family Net at 3:30 PM ET Richmond (4-3) @ UMass (4-2) on CN8 at 3:30 PM ET *I have a man crush on QB Liam Coen and want to see him in the NFL somewhere* Florida A&M (4-2) @ Southern (4-2) on ESPNU at 7:00 PM ET. Everybody, watch for QB Bryant Lee on Southern. He's a 6'2" 200 lb. Junior who should already be on the radar of NFL scouts after last year. He has 13 TD vs. 2 INT this season so far.

A few more ranked upsets this week in I-AA valley... Texas State beat #3 McNeese State William & Mary beat #4 New Hampshire #17 Western Illinois beat #11 North Dakota State Eastern Kentucky beat #19 Jacksonville State Maine beat #24 Delaware Rhett Bomar Watch: 29/47 (61.7%) for 361 and 3 vs. 1. 15 for 64 and 1. Bobby Reid Watch: 29/50 (58.0%) for 311 and 1 vs. 1. 14 for 37 and 0. Ryan Perrilloux Watch: 21/41 (51.2%) for 304 and 1 vs. 5(!). 15 for 39 and 2. I absolutely love seeing these big hyped stars from I-A football (Bomar last year, Perrilloux this year) hit I-AA and struggle. It just proves that while overall talent may make a difference between the levels, individually there isn't as much disparity as one would believe.

I was feeling confident in my picking scheme and then last week shot it all to hell. Right now I just hope to get more than 6 picks right a week. THURSDAY TCU SATURDAY Georgia Tech Northwestern Iowa Wake Forest Georgia Ohio State Oklahoma Pittsburgh Stanford Colorado Texas LSU Boston College Tiebreak #1: How many total points will be scored in the Missouri/Texas game? 72 Tiebreak #2: How many rushing yards will Michigan State's Javon Ringer have against Ohio State? 68

I know that Cassell is inexperienced, especially as a starter, but can he try to throw the ball when he makes the decision? I swear there's like a 2 second delay when he mentally makes the decision and then chooses not to throw the ball resulting in him tucking it down/getting sacked/dumping it off.

Figures that my game and undefeated streak comes down to the tiebreak score... let's go New England and score 21 dead on!

Hey, I have a level 21 FS who's likely to get cut shortly from my team (budget constraints). Would be willing to help out a TSM team (I can also play CB in a pinch if you need to switch my FS there). Name: David Hunter Current (Soon To Be Former) Team: Lefkada Ionian Seahawks in Europe East A #1

Patriots: 21 (2.5) Chicago Miami Baltimore Minnesota (13.5) New Orleans (7.5) N.Y. Jets (6.5) Carolina Washington (13.5) Jacksonville (5.5) Dallas (5.5) Philadelphia Seattle (2.5) San Diego (5.5) (7.5) N.Y. Giants

ESPN's Chris Mortensen reports that owner Al Davis has received a letter from the NFL informing him that the Raiders are subject to discipline for publicly accusing the Patriots of tampering with Randy Moss. - Gotta love that it's Mort reporting this (whom Davis ripped too in his press). Rumors are it could be anywhere from a fine to multiple draft picks lost, which would be "just" what the next head coach would need to help re-build this team.