NBD - Week 12 Review A

With a triple-header on Thanksgiving Thursday, and nearly every single game involving some players from the Monday Night Saints-Pats tilt, this may have been the most prolonged week of NBD excitement and suspense to date. Now that it's over, though, you'll all have to savor it for a few weeks because the regular season is, for all intents and purposes, over. Sure, there is still some jockeying to be done for playoff seeding, but the six post-season contenders are decided. Congrats to Joe, Elliott, Jon, Michael, Ray and me. To the rest of you: better luck next year. Let's see how we got to this point...


The Death Panel (112) defeats Woody's Warriors (102)
This was probably the match-up with the greatest playoff ramifications, as I came into Week 12 at the bottom of the top six (at 6-5), with Woody right behind me (at 5-6) and ready to narrow the margin and make Week 13 a must-win situation. The Warriors came strong out of the gate, as Knowshon Moreno (17) had his best fantasy day as a pro on Thanksgiving. Antonio Gates (24) and Thomas Jones (15) continued the scoring, and by the end of the four o'clock games on Sunday, Woody was at 92 points and I was at 34. That is not a mis-print: at 8:15 on Sunday night I had thirty-four points. But then Ray Rice (16) lit a Death Panel spark that would continue to burn quietly all day Monday until it erupted into a full-blown conflagration on Monday Night. For all the details, see my Magical Monday Night write-up. 

Who Gonna Check Me Boo? (108) defeats Sexy Cheeseburger (97)
The average fantasy QB (6th/7th in the league) gives you something like 18 points a week, and for the big boys it's often well north of 20. And the average team scores somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 points a week, meaning that our quarterback is responsible for something like 20-25% of our weekly scoring. That's a big chunk, and it's usually something you can't do without. But Colly's team long ago showed that the quarterback was the least important member of the squad, so losing Matt Ryan (1) to turf toe early in Sunday's game dimmed Who Gonna Check Me's chances at victory, but only barely. And sure enough, the rest of Cletus's players carried Ryan's water. Chris Johnson (25) capped off a record-setting November in which he ran for 800 yards. In a month. Only nine other backs have that many yards all year. Plenty of folks are going to win fantasy leagues on CJ's shoulders this season, and Colly might be one of them. Johnson was supported this weekend by Marques Colston (18), the Minnesota D (14), and Roddy White (12), among others. Their combined efforts overcame a respectable day by Sexy Cheeseburger, featuring Tony Romo (20), the San Diego D (18), LaDainian Tomlinson (14), Matt Prater (14) and Santonio Holmes (13). That seems like a roll call that should earn you a win, but Beanie Wells (4), Vincent Jackson (4), and Jerricho Cotchery (1) all disappointed in a big way.

Deuceburger (94) defeats Goin' Rogue Y'all (78)
All season long, Manning has sat by and watched as the best efforts of Matt Schaub and Adrian Peterson, legitimate fantasy superstars, have gone wasted by the rest of their shitty teammates. All they asked for was for one other Deuceburgerer to step up. Perhaps a free agent pick-up. Perhaps somebody who Manning had traded for Brett Favre, sitting idly on the bench. Well finally, now, with only a few weeks remaining, that star has emerged. And he was there all along! Terrell Owens (16) has now caught for 293 yards and two touchdowns in the past two weeks, and along with Schaub (16), Peterson (14), and the Denver D (16), led the 'Burger to a rare victory this week. Unfortunately, it's too little too late to matter, and it comes over a team who has already given up on 2009. If Haller had played his 2010 treasures this year, he might have actually won this one, though. After all, LeSean McCoy (12) did well, but Jerious Norwood (11 on the bench) would have been an improvement over DeAngelo Williams (5) and Chester Taylor (14 on the bench) absolutely embarrassed Mike Wallace (0). As it is, though, only Philip Rivers (21) and Jason Witten (10) were the only other active Rogue-Goers to make double figures, and that wasn't enough to win this one.