The View From Wisconsin

One of the good things about being in multiple Fantasy Football leagues is that you have the hope that at least one of your teams can make it to the playoffs. Unfortunately, this year I had my Yahoo public team not even make the playoffs, while in the NQRFPTFL (the one I usually want to win, because it's against friends), I lost in the first round and am heading for the seventh place game after a loss this week.

That leaves my NFL.com Fantasy team in the Packers Green and Gold League. Despite a week 14 loss to the second place team in my division to give them the division title, I managed to make the playoffs as the wild card. They had a tie back in week nine, which put them a half-game ahead of me. Our two teams were the only ones with nine wins on the season; the playoff picture was still cloudy for most of the league through week 14.

Welp, because of how NFL.com does the playoffs, I ended up playing the division champions again for a second straight week. This time, though, he did something that was completely shocking - or should I say, Shockey-ing. He started the Saints TE even though he was listed as inactive for the game against the Cowboys. Of course, that wasn't the dagger, as Wayne Larrivee would say; he had Drew Brees starting as his QB. Brees, of course, had one of the worst games of the season against the Cowboys that week. Add to that the Colts "resting" Pierre Garcon that week, and he likely had about 20 points flushed down the toilet.

And then Big Ben Roethlisberger dismantled the Packers defensive secondary the next night to make anything he did moot. I advanced to the championship this week against a squad called the Lonestar Packers - I'm under the assumption he's a Packer fan lost in Texas. My tear-the-hair-out moment was whether or not to start Big Ben or my backup QB, Tony Romo. NFL.com suggested Romo, because of his recent play and because of the matchup against the 'Skins. I couldn't bring myself to not have Roethlisberger out there, though, since he was so good the previous week and the overall statistical picture suggested he was the better play.

Ben and the rest of my squad managed to get me 89 points, while he had only 60 points after the day games. He has one player going at the moment - Miles Austin, WR for the Cowboys. As I type this, he already has one point for the game vs. the 'Skins (11 yards receiving; yardage is at 1 for every 10 rushing/receiving and 1 for every 25 passing). He needs to get 29 more points, because if we tie at 28 points, I will likely win the week due to bench strength. He currently has 46 points to my 23 on the bench, less Romo's totals; since most if not all of Austin's points would be matched with Romo as well, I'd likely have more than 46 points on the bench.

Austin did have one 30+ point game this year in our league - he torched KC in week five, and after the bye he drilled Atlanta with 29 points. I got 24 and 33 from Romo those two weeks as well, so I'd be able to get the points from him. (Update: Austin just got 19 yards, which gives him 3 points for the game - but he just lost 14 yards on a Wildcat run. Ooops.) This could be a long night for me with this game. What's worse is that the NBC station in Milwaukee is "blocked" at work, since that's the station we have our educational channel set up.