America-Time: Fantasy Football

Warning: This post has nothing to do with India. My weekly dose of America, Fantasy football style!

Exciting time of the year: Fantasy football playoffs start this weekend. And it's even more exciting when ALL 3 of your teams make the playoffs. 3 for 3 baby! How u like them apples!! (In all honesty, I really should have been 2 for 3. But I managed to sneak in as the 7th seed in the Beaver Den league, thanks to a big final week, and a commish who likes to change rules on a whim. No complaints this time -- watch out for the underdog!). Let's take a closer look at the Year of Yoshi and analyze each individual team's performance and outlook.

• Yahoo League: ...is that something you'd be interested in? (SCU Alum)
  
• 9 wins 4 losses
• #2 seed
  
• Breakdown: This team has been pretty solid all season. I had a strong draft (#1 pick, took LJ -- man can u imagine if I took LT? This one would be all over! At least I didn't take Shaun Alexander), and have been relatively lucky in avoiding the injury bug. Strong, albeit slightly inconsistent, QB play from Michael Vick, running from Larry Johnson, and solid defensive efforts (we play individual defenders in this one), and I'm sitting pretty good as the #2 seed. I like my road down the playoffs as well. Hoping for a payday on this one.

• Yahoo League: Google06 (co-workers/football morons)
  
• 9 wins 4 losses
• #1 seed
• Breakdown: OK, this one...I've dominated all season long. During the draft for this league, I was pinching myself because it was like magic, every guy I wanted, I got. End result is a stacked team that has never been out of 1st and is #1 in total points, by a longshot. Sometimes it's fun playing with football idiots. This team features Vick, Andre Johnson, Roy Williams, Steven Jackson, Brian Westbrook, Fred Taylor, Jamal Lewis...pretty deep. No phenomenal performers but solid from everybody. But, the downside of playing with idiots, is that sometimes there can be some stupid trades. A bitter rival (Matt Taylor) duped the token girl in the league into giving him Shaun Alexander for a bag of peanuts, and now he has a backfield of LJ and Shaun...and also the #8 playoff seed. Of all teams I did not want to meet, this would be it. But...sometimes that's just the way the cookie crumbles -- we'll have to be ready for this one from the beginning. No coasting to victory here. Once past this horrendous 1st round matchup, I like my odds. Possibility of a payday here as well, if I get some breaks (get it, breaks? Shaun Alexander? Broken foot?).
  

• NFL.com League: Beaver Den (Crescent Valley HS Alum)
• 6 wins 7 losses
• #7 seed (based on Power Rankings. This league we have divisions. I was in by far the toughest division. Even though I had a losing record, I was tied for 3rd in overall points scored...amongst the entire league. That got me in to the playoffs despite my sub-500 overall record.)
• Breakdown: This one has not been pretty. Not pretty at all. But, it's also been my favorite team, as it's been the most exciting. The other two have run mostly on auto pilot...this one, not so much. I had a pretty terrible draft in this league. I mean my first pick was LaMont Jordan, who got me about -9 fantasy points this year, and my second pick was Reggie Bush. It's a keeper league, so I'm excited about Bush for the future, but he didn't do much for me this year (aside from 4 TD's last week -- keep that up and you'll be well worth it, Reggie). Oh yeah, and my #1 QB was Trent Green. Yeah, all those picks really worked out great! Luckily though, some good value picks in later rounds kept me afloat. Notably Chester Taylor and the Bears defense, which I reached for early in round 6. The Bears have been pretty dominant this year, and have singlehandedly kept me in a couple games. But things really turned around for me when I traded with none-other than Andy Koong, owner of the worst fantasy football team in Beaver Den history (1-12 overall!), to get Chad Johnson for Chester Taylor. Fair trade, as I was getting killed at WR and he was getting killed at RB...but a few weeks after making the deal, good ol' Ocho-Cinco really broke out in a big way, and has been HUGE for me. A few more big performances out of him, along with my supporting cast of Philip Rivers, Bush, Jamal Lewis, Roy Williams, and da Bears, and anything can happen in this one. Like I said above -- watch out for the underdog! I like the makeup of this team: scrappy, dealing with adversity, fighting together working as a team to achieve ultimate victory: PAYDAY!

So, that's what I'm looking at for this weekend. Going to be a big Monday at work for me, as that is when the scores start rolling in...(Monday morning here is Sunday night in the US). There are downsides to having three teams, primarily the fact that routinely I will have one player on my team in one league, only to be playing against that same player in another league, negating anything he does...but it's been a fun season and it's great having all 3 of my Yoshi Air Attack teams in the hunt for championships. I'll update how it goes as the rest of the playoffs unfold.

Now we return you back to your regularly scheduled India programming: