We moved our long-time league to NFL.com and it was a much better experience compared to Yahoo Fantasy Football. I had pick #8, which is a weird place to be because in the first round you miss out on the top 5 and then you end up waiting a long time between picks, making it harder to plan your roster properly. Anyway, I think it turned out reasonably well, considering the unusual path the draft took.
What do I mean by that? The first pick was Peyton Manning! Also, in the first round, THREE quarterbacks were picked. So clearly, not a traditional RB/RB/WR/QB style of a draft. Having said that, here's my team:
Eddie Lacy
AJ Green
Randall Cobb
Julius Thomas (I was running out of true difference makers, and running backs around here were mostly meh)
Joique Bell (This was a reach in some ways, but I am hoping the Lions do at least a 50-50 split)
Nick Foles (Not a bad choice for a 6th round QB pick)
Eric Decker (Hope Geno is a good QB this year)
Fred Jackson (Carried me many a week last year, giving some love back :-))
Carson Palmer (Cards are going to throw a lot, not a bad choice for QB2, even though this was probably my highest reach)
Danny Woodhead
Justin Hunter
Pats D/ST
James Starks (Glad to secure the handcuff this late in the draft)
Jordan Matthews
So overall, just a little worried about RB2, but otherwise, reasonably satisfied with the roster. The key, as always, is the waiver wire pickups. There will be injuries and breakouts and busts, and it is how vigilant one is during the season that will determine the results.
I am so glad the Lakers did not have to go back to Utah for a possible game 6. This gives them a few more days of rest and I hope Luke Walton can come back quickly. Houston will be a tough opponent, never mind the past record and Portland has somewhat owned Lakers in Portland so it will be tough no matter what. Looking forward to the next matchup.
On the home front, the Sharks were a bust once more. I don’t know what it is about them in the regular season and what happens in the post season. They just do not work at the same intensity level as the regular season. Complacency? You betcha! Now my care level in the NHL is close to ZERO!
What a season F1 is having this year … who would have thought that at this point of the season Ferrari would have 0 points and Brawn, Red Bull and Toyota would be hogging the points!
My Fantasy F1 is taking a beating after finishing in the 97th percentile last year. Currently I am in 75th percentile. I know it is difficult to make that big a gap because the point differential between 1 and 8 is not too much, so I know the glory days are over.
I am now bummed that I took off Speed Channel from my cable package because this season would be fantastic to watch with pretty much ANYONE able to win on any given day.
Maybe having the IPL2 in South Africa was a blessing in disguise for us in the US? The games are at 3.30am and 7.30am Pacific time and I am able to watch a bit of it every day just before leaving for work and then just after reaching the office.
The games have been mostly good, and Rajasthan Royals have struggled a bit as defending champs. I was not happy to see Mumbai Indians' game getting rained out.
Still don’t know who the favorite is because T20 is so unpredictable. Delhi seems ok, but I do hope this is Mumbai’s year.
That would be great for him and a little boring for us :-)
I was actually looking forward to seeing some trades up at the top and stuff, but looks like the Lions have chosen their first pick as a QB. Hopefully now they will win a game next season …
All this is perhaps good news for Sanchez because that means he is the hot QB on the board now. Wonder if Seattle will take him. It would be good for him to sit out behind Hasselback like Carson Palmer did behind Jon Kitna.
I will be looking forward to seeing how the USC LB’s land up … there seems to be a lot of buzz around them but usually the buzz does not translate proportionately to pick numbers, so we’ll see!
What exactly has Texas Tech done to deserve #2 ranking besides beating then #1 Texas?
Let’s see the out of conference schedule - Eastern Washington (3-5 and not even Div 1), Nevada (5-4), Southern Methodist (1-8) and hold your breath, UMass (6-3 but in Div 1)!!
Granted that they were highly ranked and they beat then #1 but what was the justification before the Texas game to have them ranked so high?? Were there not enough teams with better resumes? Should teams start scheduling cupcakes so that they get to unbeaten records by October to justify a high ranking??
This is B.S. and I hope the people who rank teams week in and week out stop hyping up the Texas Tech train. They are absolutely overrated and they do not deserve to be so high up in the rankings.
Bring in what your arguments are … would love to discuss.
It is truly the most boring 2 months of the calendar … I do not care about Olympics, so the only thing to look forward to now, is the football (pro as well as college) season to start.
And what a frustrating game watch it was! Stanford beat USC and it was mostly a pathetic performance from the QB John David. Granted that his finger was hurt some time during the game, but if that was the case why was he made to pass so much??
Oh how we missed Stafon Johnson! And maybe the broken finger is actually a blessing in disguise? Is Mark Sanchez the answer?
I really do not feel comfortable, as I have said several times (even after some good passing games), with John David leading this offense. And there was at least one tipped pass I saw today, besides the 4 INT’s and if there is any sort of report card for a QB, those items should say it all. Really. Ignore the yards passing, and ignore the TD.
One thing I must also add, to be very fair to the guy, is that the WR’s of this team are very overrated and inexperienced at the same time. Patrick Turner, Vidal Hazelton both dropped easy catches very early in the game. Of course, it should not impact a QB’s performance in the game overall.
It is sort of sad that the most dependable receiver in my eyes in the TE Fred Davis!
Anyway, on the side, I was sad to see Florida did not close the door on LSU later. I truly believe LSU will now go undefeated (unless they end up facing Florida again in the SEC title game, where it may be a toss up).
Also, it is also early in the season relatively speaking. USC still has quality opponents it can beat, to earn the respect back from the community.
Here’s hoping they get the credit where it is due!
John David Booty had a monster game passing the ball this past weekend against Wazzu, but I will repeat - I don’t think he is the guy I would put the ball with at the end of a tight game. I would rather draw up a nice run play with Stafon to bail us out.
JDB’s passes are so abrupt and even this past weekend they were tipped or batted down - something just not right there.
Another important game coming up this weekend at Washington … let’s see how our pass rush does against the phenom QB up in Seattle.
Sure did not seem like it in the first game. Idaho was an underdog by 46 points! And USC won 38-10. I would not say it was the most dominant performance, but on the other hand Sark was saying that they tried to keep the gameplan simple.
But even with a simple game plan, JDB did not inspire much and I do believe (at least at this point, and through the last year) that he is not the guy you would expect to bring you out of trouble. Yes, if the going is good he will carry forward with the momentum, but on 4th and 9 from the opponents 26-yard line, will JDB be able to make a 63-yard throw? I don’t think so.
But of course, I hope I am wrong and he wins the Heisman this year. :-)
It was a relatively busy sporting day for me today, starting with an early morning DVR-ed version of the French Open finals, mid-morning DVR-ed Canadian GP (on Fox, thanks a lot!) and then the Game 2 of the NBA finals in the evening.
I watched the first one almost completely. I could not resist the “30-second skip” on the DVR for some of the boring points in the match, though there were not too many. Nadal is too strong and Federer has only himself to blame for not winning this one. He (Fed) had so many break chances, and if he had converted even a fraction of the chances he had, the story would have been completely different.
But he did not, and Nadal continues his mastery of the French Open. Can’t believe he has not lost a single match at the French Open!!
And then it was on to the F-1 race. Frankly, I am not surprised why I have not missed F-1 so far this year. There is no real “hero”. Excluding the new kid Hamilton, there is really no positive storyline this season. Maybe it is the transition season from Schumy to the next generation, and I certainly hope that is the case, but frankly, Alonso and Massa are just too boring. Kimi has some color and a wild background to make things interesting but after the first race, he has steadily disintegrated and has shown that the last couple of years may not have been McLaren’s fault but actually his.
Of course this Canadian GP was quite eventful and Kubica’s crash was simply unbelievable. With that big a crash, for him to survive and be quite ok in the hospital, shows how far the technology and protection mechanism has come to in the past many years.
In the end it was the new hero in F-1 who won a convincing race - Lewis Hamilton. Congratulations to him, and all the best for the rest of the season!
And finally, the NBA finals. The Spurs are looking just too good and too methodical to create too many problems for themselves this year. Horry is going to get another ring in his collection and the Spurs are going to be the true dynasty in the NBA today.
I am so excited that the Warriors knocked off Dallas tonight!!! I am more excited of course that Dallas lost than that the Warriors won, but both happened, so I am happy!
Isn’t Golden State a fun team to watch? It is unbelievable - you just cannot blink when they are playing (well). Long passes, big threes, fast ball movement.
Australia won the World Cup convincingly, and they deserve all the praise for doing a marvelous job, going unbeaten now for two entire World Cups! What an achievement that is! Granted, the team is almost the same, but to do it and that too without a key bowler, is fantastic.
It was always going to be an uphill climb for Sri Lanka after Australia, riding on Gilly’s masterful knock, got to 280+ in 38 overs. Speaking of a masterful knock, how amazing is it that Australia always finds a way to have one or two such brilliant performances in the big games? They are just too good.
Jayasuriya and Sangakarra gave me some hope of a Sri Lankan fightback, which there was a hint of. But I also knew that once one of them got out, the momentum would be stopped and it would be the end of the chase.
And that is exactly what happened. Sri Lanka ultimately could not keep up with the required run rate and Australia had another final wrapped up.
The question now is, who can challenge Australia? My thought is Australia A. I think Australia’s A team would be better than most, if not all, international teams. Australia/Australia A would be boring to watch for people who follow stars, but would be very exciting to watch for the true cricket lovers.
Recently I have started playing some cricket at work with some of the guys who try to play every week. I have played for 3 weeks now. Last Friday, the team who we play against (a neighboring company), chickened out at the last moment and so we decided to play an internal friendly.
We split the 11 of us into two teams of 5 each and the 11th person being the “jack” who bats and fields for both the teams. Everyone fields all the time except for the two batsmen.
We were able to play two matches - the first one was 8 overs each and the second one was 6 overs each.
In the second one, I opened the batting needing 32 to win from 6 overs. It came down to 7 off the last over and I was on strike.
I got 2 off the first ball to make it 5 in 5.
The next ball, I gave it a mighty heave and got the ball on my leg and because of that, I missed a wide ball. 5 in 4.
The next ball I got another 2. 3 in 3.
The next ball was sadly a dot ball, with me trying to do something unnecessary. 3 in 2.
The next ball was another dot ball, and now I could not forgive myself for the missed opportunity in the previous ball. 3 needed off the last ball.
I had made up my mind to go for it no matter what. Luckily for me, it was a Chetan Sharma-style full toss on the leg stump which I swung over mid wicket for a four.
A FOUR OFF THE LAST BALL! To win the match!! Yay!
Granted, the game was rank amateur level, and the seriousness was half of what we show when we play a true “match”, but still. A game is a game and I was playing the captain of our team in that final over.
Finally, after what seems like ages, the round robin crap is over and the semi finals are set in the Cricket World Cup 2007.
I pick South Africa upsetting Australia (have to stick to my earlier prediction of South Africa winning and Australia not even making it to the finals!) and Sri Lanka beating New Zealand.
I know I am going against the tide by picking SA over Australia. But it is a matter of one day’s play. And I think SA will play to win whereas Australia will play with their minds set on the finals and lifting the cup again.
New Zealand will lose to Sri Lanka on the mental front. Once again, I have to stick to my perception of the New Zealand team - that it is great one day team on its day, but it has very few days on big game days.
So, Sri Lanka-SA will set up a repeat of the exciting game that happened earlier, with Malinga creating a riot!
Sigh, the LSU fans are bitter. Against USC. Again. They just could not swallow the fact that their prized recruit, #2 ranked in the country, was going to go to USC instead of LSU.
There was some noise recently about recruiting violations, that Reggie Bush got on the phone with Pete Carroll in trying to get Joe McKnight to come to USC.
And now, Pete Carroll who normally does not name names has openly stated that LSU fans are the ones creating such stupid rumors!
LSU fans, just remember - this recruiting business is a dirty game. Les Miles has probably done the same thing to many other coaches that Pete Carroll ended up doing with you and your team. Its all a fair game though not clean. Take what you have and play with it. You’ve got to watch out for Florida, Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, etc. before you dream of playing USC.
So shut it and move on! Oh yea, and act like adults, not freaking 5-year olds!
Leave it to Pete Carroll to finish strong. After a somewhat less-than-superb recruiting season, Pete Carroll and his buddies climbed up rapidly and now have what seems to be the second-best or the third best class in the country!
Who else thinks we have the deepest roster at running back? And will all of them get decent playing time? Is McKnight the next Reggie Bush?
What about fullbacks? Looks like Martin Coleman may be converted to fullback. With Lane Kiffin gone, I wonder if the fullback will have as big a role as it seemed to be this year. Maybe if there is a game-breaker like McKnight, the game plans may change?
Let’s see - can’t wait for the season to start!!
Details on the final rankings at MSNBC, among others.
So much USC’s rebuilding year. After losing a bunch (huge one!) of studs last year to the NFL, this year USC was supposed to hang in there and maybe go to some nice bowl.
What has ended up happening is an unbelievable thing (well, believable nowadays of course). USC is a lock for one BCS Bowl, the Rose Bowl which takes the Pac-10 champion.
USC is the Pac-10 champion already.
USC can beat ucla and stake a claim to go to the BCS National Championship.
USC “survived” the year with one loss so far, with one game to go.
With two games remaining in the schedule, USC knew the worst it could do is go to the Rose Bowl and if they won the last two, they could possibly go to the National Championship game. To lock up the Pac-10 title with two games to go is a fantastic feat.
USC went unbeaten at home this season.
Yea, this is the rebuilding year. They have only 4 senior starters. Provided they don’t lose too many juniors to the NFL draft, it is going to be much more experienced next year and I can’t imagine what they would be able to achieve next year.
Seeing the game yesterday made me very happy, but at the same time I started thinking, is Notre Dame really as good as it was made out to be? If yes, then it makes USC even better than what it has been made out to be.
But what if Notre Dame was really overrated and its boosters had just unjustifiably made them ranked so high at the beginning? What if Notre Dame was not that good?
I don’t care at the end, of course. USC beat one of its biggest rivals and that too handily. If not for Booty’s 2 INT’s, the blocked punt and that one freakish run by Brady Quinn, this would have been a flawless night.
The offense did seem like it was working like a well-oiled machine, the defense has really come up in the last few games and the special teams showed up too (way to go, Cushing!).
Ok, so now it is down to the last regular season game with another big rival who is doing not that well. ucla in Pasadena. I am not as tense as I was for the Notre Dame game, but I just hope there is no over confidence and complacency in the USC team and the “looking ahead” mentality. They do need to win this one and then start the chatter.
I was a little bit unsure of how the game was going in the first half, but after seeing the defense step it up big time today, I feel a lot better in general about the health of the team at this point in the season.
The offense is sputtering, and JDB still seems to telegraph his passes, but we have huge playmakers in the team in DJ, Steve Smith and in this game CJ Gable. How cool was the catch for the first down by DJ jumping high in the air just beyond the marker? How cool was Steve Smith’s 4th and 2 conversion to a TD? How cool was CJ Gable in his monster runs at various points in the game? Awesome.
I was not willing to quote the turnover margin that USC had against Stanford because hey, it is after all only Stanford. But to create so many in one game against a team like Cal is worth noting.
USC kept the 35 points per game Cal to a miserly 9 and that says a lot. The defense deserves a huge pat on the back for doing that to Cal. Good stuff.
There is a reason to feel upbeat for USC Trojans.
Of course, next week is going to be a different game. So we’ll keep the celebration limited to tonight only. :-)
Another bad trend that USC has fallen into this year: start the second half with a punt (or a turnover) instead of coming out and scoring a TD, which was almost a certainty last season.
Lack of turnovers forced, INT on first possession of game, punt/turnover on first possession of second half … how can they keep winning like last few years?
Once again USC has started their first offensive drive with a freaking INT! What’s going on???
Also, what’s the deal with the 4-5 3rd down conversions given up in Oregon’s first offensive drive? Of course, it was a good defensive stand at 4th and 1 to stop the Ducks.
I do not intend to live blog the game but just some initial thoughts.
