“freespirit Soars into 1st Place!” (Wk 6)

Week 5 MVP Award Winner –
freespirit (33 Points)

As the Week 5 games got underway, five club members decided not to trust the 0-4 Autopicker and so they switched their pick to the LA Rams.  1 of those 5 players was freespirit, who sent me a text saying: “Switch me to L.A.”  Seattle ended up winning the game 30-29 and The Autopicker finally won its first game and now stands at 1-4 (make that 2-4 after this week).  Thus, freespirit was off to a really bad start for the week, allowing 13 other club members to start out 2 Points ahead of her.  But she came soaring back quickly with a set of dominant picks for the Sunday games.  Among her great picks were both Games of the Week with Buffalo and Green Bay, the Double Stakes of Baltimore-Minnesota, a correct pick of Carolina with TJ, and she was the only player in the entire club to get the Triple Crown of Houston-New Orleans-Oakland and land the prestigious 7 Point prize.  All of this added up to her scoring 33 Points, winning the Week 5 MVP Award, and moving into 1st Place with a huge 8 Point lead.  The Week 5 MVP Award Runner-Up was Nighthawk with 29 Points.  Nighthawk has quietly moved into a tie for 4th Place and it appears that our 2008 Club Champion is going to be challenging for the club title once again.  One other brilliant pick made this week was done by Badwater Nessie, who was the only player in the entire club to correctly pick Indy over Kansas City on Sunday night.  That takes a lot of courage to pick a 10 point underdog to win like that.  But it pays off big time when you are right.  Our current Top Five in the club is (1) freespirit, (2) Slick Chick, (3) Bob Swerski, and (4) Drummer Boy and Nighthawk.  However, everyone in the next five positions down to 10th Place are all within 5 Points of entering the Top Five.

Taking a break from football for a moment, I wanted to make brief mention that perhaps we could all keep The Cat in our prayers.  As many of you know, he and his wife are serving down in Ecuador as regular pioneers and there is a lot of civil unrest going on there.  Even in his own neighborhood, there are sounds of gunshots and tires burning in the streets.  So our thoughts are with the brothers and sisters there including The Cat and his wife.

Moving over to Head to Head Weekly, we have Captain Jack Sparrow putting on an absolute clinic in Division One.  He has now completed a sweep of his entire division and sits at 4-0 all alone in 1st Place.  He can now officially forget about his Head to Head misery last season.  In Division Two, Bob Swerksi and Double-Double remain undefeated at 3-0-1 and are tied for 1st.  Which one of these two great players is going to blink first and take a defeat?  In Division Three, freespirit is in 1st with a decent record of 2-1-1.  In Division Four, Nighthawk remains undefeated at 3-0-1 but The Cat is hot on his tail with a record of 3-1.  Let’s not forget that the All-Time record for most regular season Head to Head wins is 9-1 and that is shared by The Cat (2000), Annie-mole (2000), and Hoosier Daddy (both 2000 and 2010).  During that season in 2000 (19 years ago), The Cat actually went 8-0 and swept his entire division (we had a lot more players back then in each division).  Looking at Pro Bowl Team Weekly, there seems to be two dominant teams early in the season.  The first is McTriple Play, who have started out 4-0 and are on fire.  The second is defending champs Wild Animals, who improved to 3-1 after winning their 3rd straight game.  These two titans will be meeting for the first time this season in Week 6.  Which team will come out victorious?

The Club’s Week 5 Picks

Here are the club’s picks for Week 5.  Everything has been scored on these sheets with the exception of the Monday night game.  As you may notice, the entire club picked SF for the Monday night game, barring any last minute switches from club members.

“Slick Chick’s Brilliant Switch!” (Wk 5)

Week 4 MVP Award Winner –
Slick Chick (25 Points)

It was another week of upsets in the NFL this past week which caused a number of club members to have low scores once again.  However, several club members were not picking conservatively, and as a result ended up having big weeks.  The first was Slick Chick, who scored 25 Points to win the Week 4 MVP Award.  Slick Chick had already served notice on the club that she was a force to be reckoned with, as through the first three weeks of the season she was the only player to pick all three Triple Crowns correctly.  As the Sunday day games played out during Week 4, she was 1 of only 4 players to get both Games of the Week correct with NYG and Jax.  (The others were The Rickster, Bob Swerski, and Halibut J-Bird.)  Then came the e-mail which I usually dread getting which notified me that she was making a switch.  The reason I dread those e-mails is that last second switches before kickoff usually do not work out well and then result in a loss of Points.  But not this time.  Slick Chick said: “I am keeping things interesting and switching to the Saints tonight. At home, Teddy Bridgewater, why not?”.  Slick Chick proved to be right as the Saints won 12-10 and she picked up an additional 6 Points for the week that only 2 other club members got (The Cat and freespirit).  The brilliant switch helped propel Slick Chick from 8th Place into 1st Place as she edged ahead of previous leader Drummer Boy by 2 Points.  And with that, our 2010 Club Champion is on top of the club once again.  The Week 4 MVP Award Runner-Up went to Bob Swerski with 21 Points.  Bob Swerski’s great week was helped by being the only player in the entire club to correctly pick the Double Stakes of Cle-Sea.  Bob Swerski now finds himself in 3rd Place, a mere 6 Points behind Slick Chick.  Rounding out the Top Five, we have #4 Captain Jack Sparrow and tied for #5 freespirit and Stinkerbell.  That means that all three of our girl players in the club are currently in the Top Five together.  Congrats to our girl players on accomplishing that notable feat!  The third best score last week came from The Cat, who scored 19 Points on a tough week.  The only reason I mention that is because The Cat employed his secret strategy for picking which he only uses a couple of times per years.  And it paid off for him once again, as it did last year when it got him an MVP Award.  Our September Player of the Month has been announced and it was Drummer Boy.  Drummer Boy earned the feat by having 2 Weeks at #1, 2 Runner-Up MVPs, and spending all four weeks at either #1 or #2 in the standings.  Well done, Drummer Boy!

Head to Head Weekly and Pro Bowl Team Weekly have both had 3 games played now and there have been some interesting developments.  You might recall that last season, Captain Jack Sparrow became the first player in club history to have a winless regular season in Head to Head play as he finished with a record of 0-9-1.  This season, he has completely turned things around and is on top of Division One with a perfect record of 3-0.  Bob Swerski and Double-Double are leading Division Two with records of 2-0-1.  Mr. T is leading Division Three with a record of 2-1.  And Nighthawk leads Division Four with a record of 2-0-1.  In Pro Bowl Team Weekly, the dominant team so far has been McTriple Play, who remain undefeated with a record of 3-0 after defeating The Supernovas last week by a score of 42-37.