Author: admin

Week 3 MVP Award Winner–
Iceman (27 Points)

Week 3 came to a dramatic and controversial conclusion on Monday night when Seattle was awarded a TD on the final play of the game that gave them and 8 club members the victory and 3 Points.  While several club members were outraged over the bad calls of the replacement referees, the result stands and Seattle gets credit for the win.  As a result, the replacement referees are now having an impact on The Football Club.  With the assistance of the big Seattle victory, rookie sensation Iceman won the Week 3 MVP Award with 27 Points.  Going into Monday night, Iceman trailed Drummer Boy by 3 Points.  But by coincidence, Iceman had the opposite picks of Drummer Boy with Seattle and Under.  When the game was over, Iceman had picked up 4 Points and moved ahead of Drummer Boy, thus claiming the MVP.  The key to Iceman’s big week in the club was picking both Games of the Week correctly with Atl & Hou.  And not only is Iceman our Week 3 MVP, but he is also our new #3 player in the club.  That’s an excellent showing for a rookie player.  While Drummer Boy is no doubt distraught over the decision of the replacement refs to award a TD to Seattle, he is still happy that he scored 26 Points to become the Week 3 MVP Award Runner-Up and move into the Top Five in 5th Place.  That should be the goal of everyone in the club, to at least reach the Top Five once during the season.  It’s something that is very tough to do, especially with 28 club members playing this season (which is our most since the 2000 season).  Papa Tuna maintained his quest to tie Unknown Artist’s legendary 17 Weeks at #1 record by scoring his 3rd Week at #1 this past week.  Obviously there is a long way to go and there are a lot of tough competitors challenging for the top spot, but the replacement refs helped Papa Tuna pad his 1st Place lead with the Seattle victory.  Although it was only a 3 Point game, there was actually a 6 Point swing between #1 and #2 on Monday night.  If Green Bay had won, Papa Tuna’s lead would have only been 3 Points.  But with the Seattle victory, Papa Tuna’s lead is now 9 Points.  That’s because Papa Tuna had picked Seattle, while club No. 2 player Captain Insano had picked Green Bay.  3rd Place is currently a tie between Iceman and fast-charging player freespirit.  They both have 63 Points and stand 12 Points out of the top spot.  Rounding out the Top Five we have the aforementioned Drummer Boy and Captain Jack Sparrow, both with 62 Points.  Captain Jack Sparrow is starting to pick really well as he threatens to release the Kracken and make his charge for 1st Place.

Moving over to Head to Head Weekly, a few players have remained undefeated and taken control of their divisions.  We have Papa Tuna (2-0) leading Division One, Mr. T and Double-Double (both 2-0) leading Division Two, Drummer Boy (2-0) leading Division Three, and Captain Insano (2-0) leading Division Four.  The Rickster is also undefeated at 1-0-1 and Catfish is undefeated as well at 0-0-2.  In a battle of titans this past week, Hoosier Daddy made Captain Jack Sparrow walk the plank 25-21.  Mr. T sent notice to the club that he means business by beating the struggling Bob Swerski 23-19.  Catfish continued his streak of ties by tying his main rival The Rickster 17-17.  And The Cat squeaked by The Beav 19-17 in a very closely contested match.  In Pro Bowl Weekly, the two hottest teams are Daddy & His Boys and Wild Animals (both 2-0).  Big surprise, huh?  Not really.  These two teams long record of winning club titles speaks for itself and they are both off to a fast start.  Especially Wild Animals, who won the 2011 Pro Bowl Team title and have now won 5 straight matches.  Meanwhile, The Black Pearl and Mighty Megalodons both picked up much-needed wins last week.  I fully expect these two teams to be in full contention for the title.  On the other end of the spectrum, Dark Lords of the NW, Beasts of the Bay, and Team Baby Tuna continue to struggle as they look for their first win.  Two of those teams are matched up against Daddy & His Boys and Wild Animals this week, so they might have to put their hopes on hold for another week unless they can pull off a miracle victory.

On another note, my apologies for the woes of the Autopicker last week.  I was trying to do what was in the best interests of the club when I had the Autopicker switch from NY Giants to Carolina last week.  The Autopicker always chooses the favored team.  When last week started, NY Giants was favored by 3 points.  But then it was announced that 4 of their main starters were not playing, so the Las Vegas line shifted to Carolina and made them 3 point favorites.  That’s why the Autopicker changed over.  I know a few of you were frustrated with the Autopicker.  But keep in mind you can always ignore the Autopicker and send in your own pick for Thursday night.  The Autopicker just exists to save time for both me and all of you so that we usually only have to turn in picks once per week.  And finally, Baby Tuna is ready to meet everyone, now that he has been kept safely at home for a full month.  We will be bringing him to our own meeting at Glen Ellen for the first time on this Wed night.  And we hope to visit Terra Linda for their weeknight meeting next week to see steveluvsal and Dixie Slick.

As the Sunday games concluded with the big Baltimore win over NE, 6 club members found themselves with 20+ Points– Drummer Boy, Hoosier Daddy, freespirit, Iceman, Papa Tuna, and Captain Jack Sparrow.  Several of these players are in the running to be the Week 3 MVP, depending on what happens on Monday night.  Looking over today’s games, sadly 4 club members picked Cleveland with TJ and took a -2 from their score– Caveman, Rad Dad, Staubach, and The Beav.  Triple Jeopardy is so dangerous, I can never say that enough.  If you select it, make sure you get the game right.  The Point Spread games were tough this week.  Only one player swept all 3 of them and that was Jacuzzi Splot.  The Double Stakes of Dal-Arz proved to be tough for most of the club.  Only 7 out of 28 club members got it– Nighthawk, Bob Swerski, Papa Tuna, Captain Jack Sparrow, Double-Double, Drummer Boy, and steveluvsal.  Only 4 players got both Games of the Week right with Atl & Hou– Drummer Boy, Hoosier Daddy, Rad Dad, and Iceman.  And so that’s where we stand going into Monday night.  I am happy to report that Papa Tuna has clinched a 3rd Week at #1 no matter what happens.  But Monday night’s game will be interesting.  About 1/3 of the club (9 players) have picked Seattle and 2/3 of the club has picked GB (19 players).  We will see who is right and who picks up 3 Points tomorrow night.

The notoriously bad Autopicker had a terrible result once again, as the NY Giants crushed Carolina on Thursday night.  For those of you who don’t know, the way The Autopicker works is that it selects the favored team according to Las Vegas odds.  Due to multiple NY Giants injuries to starting players, The Autopicker went with Carolina for tonight’s game, because Carolina was a 3 point favorite (meaning they were expected to win the game by 3 points).  With this loss, The Autopicker is now 1-2 this season.  Last season, The Autopicker ended with a 4-3 record.  The purpose of using The Autopicker is to make things easier on club members.  Club members who agree with  The Autopicker’s pick do not need to send in their own picks for Thursday night.  But those who disagree and want the other team can simply send in an e-mail.  It saves time all the way around.  It’s too bad that it doesn’t pick better, because many of us lost 2 Points tonight.  Not so for 6 wise club members who went with the NY Giants– Dixie Slick, Mr. T, Hoosier Daddy, freespirit, The Beav, and The Rickster.  Well done!

Week 2 MVP Award Winner–
The Beav (30 Points)

Week 3 Main Page Column

Early season jumps from the bottom half of the Points Standings to the top half are somewhat commonplace during the early part of the season.  But they aren’t usually done in quite as dramatic fashion as what we saw from Week 2 MVP Award winner The Beav this past week.  The Beav stepped up and scored 30 Points on a very difficult week of picks and jumped from 17th Place to 3rd Place in one week.  The Beav proved that he is going to be a force to be reckoned with this season, both personally and as part of long-time team Transformers.  Looking at The Beav’s picks, it is obvious that he started out brilliantly by picking Miami with DJ.  He followed this up by getting an extremely difficult Double Stakes of Buf-St.L, both Games of the Week with Phil & Indy, and then topping it off by nailing a Triple Crown with NYG-Sea-SD.  The MVP Award Runner-Up was fast charging Captain Insano with 27 Points.  Both these players have moved up into the Top Five and are putting extreme pressure on current club leader Papa Tuna who now stands at 50 Points with 2 Weeks at #1 after 2 weeks of play.  If Papa Tuna wants to match the amazing record of 17 Weeks at #1 that Unknown Artist pulled off back in 2007, he is going to need to make better picks than he did in Week 2.  Rounding out the Top Five, we have a couple of familiar faces that have decided to join the party.  Defending 2011 Club Champion Captain Jack Sparrow stepped back into the spotlight along with 3-time Club Champion The Rickster as they are now tied for 4th Place with 41 Points.  Looking back to Week 2, a lot of club members were frustrated when Seattle soundly beat Dallas to disrupt the Triple Crown.  However, 3 club members wisely had picked Seattle over Dallas and had also picked NYG and SD.  By doing this, they became our 3 Triple Crown winners for the week and scored 7 valuable Points– The Beav, freespirit, and Captain Insano.  As usual, I’m also going to post my list of shame for those who picked Oakland with Double Jeopardy and took a -1 Point from their final score– Papa Tuna, Hoosier Daddy, Drummer Boy, Bob Swerski, Captain Insano, The Rickster (who should have learned from last week when Oak burned him), Captain Jack Sparrow, and Fuegoburns.  The lesson learned is obvious, if you select DJ (now TJ), make sure that you get it right and don’t cost yourself valuable Points.

Head to Head Weekly started back up last week with a grudge match between Hoosier Daddy and Papa Tuna.  If you’ll recall, this heated rivalry started back in 2010, when Papa Tuna ruined Hoosier Daddy’s bid for a first-ever perfect 10-0 season by beating him 34-26.  That would be a tough loss to take, especially knowing that his only loss came when he scored 26 Points, good enough to beat just about anyone else.  Then, in 2011, Hoosier Daddy got sweet revenge when he beat Papa Tuna 3 times in one season– 23-22, 20-18, and 18-17 (SB Tournament).  So what would happen this season?  It was all decided on Monday night when Papa Tuna’s pick of Atlanta led him to victory over Hoosier Daddy by a score of 20-14.  Another interesting match took place between steveluvsal and 2011 defending Super Bowl champion Rad Dad.  Rad Dad took his winning streak from last season into this match and was hoping to get off to a good start.  But in a nail-biter, steveluvsal knocked off Rad Dad 18-17, thus sending him to his first defeat this season.  In other matches, C Master V’s return to the club was successful, as he beat Bob Swerksi 17-13.  And despite both scoring the second lowest Point totals this week, Catfish and Caveman pulled out a 10-10 tie with each other, which is much better than a defeat.

Pro Bowl Weekly also got under way, with all 8 teams competing against each other.  Since we have an even number of teams this season, there will be no bye weeks, but each team will play a full schedule of 12 games.  The 2011 defending Pro Bowl Champions Wild Animals got off to a good start by sinking The Black Pearl 58-47.  This was actually a rematch of last season’s Pro Bowl Championship game, which Wild Animals won by a score of 88-67.  Despite a name change and a promise by The Black Pearl’s captain that his team would find a “tasty” meal with Wild Animals, they proved to be too tough to tame.  The strongest Week 2 team was Transformers, who combined to score 66 Points and deliver a crushing blow to sentimental favorite Team Baby Tuna by over 20 Points.  I can already hear the sound of Baby Tuna crying in my ears after that devastating loss.  And in the battle of newly formed teams, Beasts of the Bay and Dark Lords of the NW battled to a 50-50 tie.

Today’s games featured quite a few upsets that threw the club into chaos during Week 2.  Many club members struggled… as an example, 11 people missed both Games of the Week.  But after the Sunday night game concluded, there were a few stand out players for Week 2.  The Beav had brilliant picks across the board and he has clinched a share of the MVP Award with 30 Points going into Monday night (which means he has a potential Week 2 score of 36 Points).  The scary thing about the Beav’s picks is that he missed the Sunday night game when he picked Detroit.  If he had picked SF und, he could have been headed for a 40 Point week.  The next best player was his Transformers teammate Jacuzzi Splot, who scored 23 Points.  Right behind those two was Captain Insano, who reasserted his dominance with 21 Points.  Which brings me to the Den-Atl matchup.  For the Monday night 6 Point game we have 14 club members with Denver and 10 with Atlanta, along with 1 undecided at this point.  Should be a great game.  Going into Monday night’s game, the Top Five has not fared so well.  The scores so far are Catfish (10), Papa Tuna (14), MJD Hogg (11), Nighthawk (10), and Bane (14).  So those players really need to get tomorrow’s pick right or they could be in trouble.  And that means the door is open for everyone else to pick up some major ground.