Playoff Picks, Round 2

Last week I was 2-2, though I WAS 3-1 against the spread. Whatever. Kickoff is in 2 hours and I need to make this quick.

Seattle at Green Bay: I'm STILL not sold on the Packers, the number 2 seed in the NFC (what a shitty conference!) but the Seahawks are even worse. Shaun Alexander, you can die a slow, painful, embarrassingly homosexual death, a la Vito Spatafore. And Hasselbeck, you can go to hell too. Not because you aren't good, but because I drafted Phillip Rivers instead of you on my fantasy team. Fuck Phillip Rivers. And fuck you for being bald. If you had hair, I probably would have trusted you more and drafted you. Green Bay wins, and the Favre Fellatio continues for at least another week.

Jacksonville at New England: Yeah, the Jags match up well against the Pats, but they didn't look too impressive against the Steelers. If it weren't for a botched holding call on 4th down, we'd be talking about how badly the Steelers would lose tot he Pats. (BADLY.) Anyway, are you really going to take David Garrard against Tom Brady and Bill Belichick at home? I'm not. Pats cruise to the AFC championship.

N.Y. Giants at Dallas: Well, everyone and their mother is picking Eli and his "road warrior" Giants on the road, and not without due cause. The Cowboys haven't looked that good since the Green Bay game. T.O. is banged up (though I think he plays and plays well). Romo's IQ is dropping by association due to his blond love interest. No, not Joe Buck. Her. And the Giants are playing well. Also, this is the third time these teams are meeting this season. They know each other. Either way, it will be close. I hate both of these teams, and nothing would make me happier than a Dallas loss, but I don't think it happens this week. The Cowboys win a thoroughly entertaining game.

San Diego at Indianapolis: Norv Turner and Phillip Rivers against Tony Dungy and Peyton Manning? Ha. Ha ha. Hahahahahahahahahahahaha. Yeah. Fucking. Right. This will be the least close of the games this weekend. Indy will win handily. Remember, they DID win 13 of their first 15 games. And yes, one of those 2 losses was to the Chargers, but had Vinatieri made a relatively close field goal with less than 2 minutes left, they would have won. I'm going on the record now and saying I think the Colts win the Super Bowl.

That'll do it for now. Enjoy the games.

I Hate Fantasy Football

Really, I do. So why do I play it? And why do I have 11 teams? I don't fucking know. Only 3 of those teams matter (the other 8 are free ESPN teams), but this shit still pisses me off to no end. It's like gambling - I got hooked in 2005 when I had a team that featured Shaun Alexander (his MVP season), Larry Johnson (when he went apeshit all over the league after Priest went down), Carson Palmer (his breakout season) and Steve Smith (his comeback year). And the rest of the roster was well rounded too, not that it mattered. (You can see the final team here.) Those four usually outscored the other team I was playing by themselves.

(For the record, I did lose in the final after winning 8 straight because Smith and Palmer did nothing and my opponent had Frank Gore, who felt like breaking out in week 16 of the 2005 NFL season. You see? I told you I fucking hate fantasy football.)

Anyway, after feeling really smart about the way I drafted that team, I had become sucked in. It was really just beginners luck, kind of like how everyone wins the first time they go to Atlantic City. That isn't to say I'm bad at fantasy football, because I'm not. But ever since that first team, it seems nothing has gone right.

Let's use my two star runningbacks from 2005 as examples, shall we? In 2006, in the only league I was playing in that mattered, I was lucky enough to have the first pick. Who did I take? LaDanian Tomlinson - who, for the record, Zwill did say was the best player in football right before the drat started. He's so wise - the man who assraped the league and many an opposing fantasy team? No sir. I took Johnson. Yeah, he had a decent year, but the Chiefs had no other weapons, Herm tried to run him into the ground and there were numerous later picks that outperformed him.

Then there's Shaun Alexander. In 2006 I was fortunate enough to not own him on any teams. 2007 has not been so kind. I have him on no less than 5 teams - including 2 of the important ones - and he is making me quite homicidal. Five fucking teams. I have him on five more teams than Adrian Peterson, Tom Brady and Randy Moss combined. He hasn't scored double digit points since week two. And to think I could have had Joseph Addai on all but one of those teams. Ugh. I fucking hate fantasy football. I can't wait to play it for the next 40 years.