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Andy Richardson

A quick whirl around the league at the highlights and lowlights of the games I paid the most attention to on Sunday…

Random Thought: Gotta mention the Thursday game between the Bears and Washington. I’m not going to talk about the fact that a lot of people didn’t get to see it, because you know, I did, I have DirecTV and the NFL Network, and if you love football and want to see all the games, it’s worth whatever sacrifice you have to make in your television setup. No, it’s the fact that there were a ton of injuries in the game, including to both starting quarterbacks, plus tight end Chris Cooley (who returned, bless his heart – my fantasy teams thank you), and although most of those injuries could easily have happened on a Sunday, you can’t help but think that maybe there’s a reason football is played on a weekly basis, and not every four days. Thursday football is great for fans, sure, but then again, is Todd Collins throwing a touchdown to Todd Yoder really good for anyone?

Cowboys-Lions: The Cowboys really have a lot of good players on the offensive side of the ball. Everyone talks about Tony Romo and Terrell Owens, and that’s reasonable, but then there’s Jason Witten, who steps up whenever he gets the opportunity – teams focus on stopping Owens, as a for instance – and Marion Barber, who looks like he’s never going to get stopped when the team gets around the goal line. (I’m aware it happens, but not much against the Lions.) Even though they almost and probably should have lost, you have to think it’s going to be very tough for any NFC team to beat them in Dallas in the playoffs.

The Lions are kind of a strange team. Their defense gets a lot of turnovers, but the personnel is pretty poor. Jon Kitna has thrown for 3,400 yards but just 15 TDs; thirteen NFL quarterbacks have thrown more. Numbers are spread among a host of wide receivers (at least Roy Williams’ injury seems to benefit Shaun McDonald and Calvin Johnson, who are now the starters), and it’s risky to ever start their running backs because you don’t know if there’s going to be a game where they only get 5 carries. After starting out 6-2, they’ll likely finish below .500. Looking at them, it’s hard to have much confidence in their fantasy prospects next year, since it seems like they’re going to have to make some dramatic changes – personnel, coaches, something. They’ve lost six of seven. This whole Mike Martz offense thing isn’t working for them. And Matt Millen … Well, I just don’t know how he still has a job. I don’t even know how he GOT the job, since my major memory of him was punching the brother of a Patriots owner (Jonathan Sullivan is the name that sticks in my mind, though I could be wrong) after a playoff game back in the ‘80s.

Raiders-Packers: This game was a tale of two halves. There was never much doubt who would win, but there was plenty of doubt as to whether any Packers besides Ryan Grant would put up even serviceable fantasy numbers. Early on, Grant ripped off 9- and 10-yard runs on seemingly every other play – really, it’s incredible how inept the Raiders are against the run – while the bitterly cold (23 degrees) temperatures seemed to play a factor in Brett Favre being off target, balls clanging off receivers’ hands, and the team passing up a 40ish-yard field goal to go for it. In the first half the Packers scored twice: a Grant TD and a punt return, and they added another special teams score in the third period.

Fortunately for those who started Favre, Greg Jennings, Donald Lee, and Mason Crosby, all of those players ended up coming through with solid numbers, killing my planned theme about how you should avoid quarterbacks, receivers, and kickers in upcoming cold weather games. Nevertheless, Favre’s touchdowns were both kind of flukey – except in the sense that long TDs to Jennings seem to happen every week – and I think the point remains: If you start certain players in cold-weather games, you need to be prepared for elements holding stats down, particularly in the passing game.

As for the Raiders, remember early in the year when Josh McCown was playing well, followed by Daunte Culpepper playing well for a couple of games, and there was some talk about how they should have drafted another player besides JaMarcus Russell? Well, I don’t know if Russell will be a good pro or not, but clearly this team needs him to be, as soon as humanly possible. Russell will probably start one or two of the team’s final three games. There’s certainly little benefit to starting McCown, whose only touchdown should have been intercepted by Al Harris. One more thing: After Favre threw a TD to Lee to put Green Bay up 38-7 in the fourth quarter, I saw a Raiders player actually shaking Favre’s hand. I guess he really is the Sportsman of the Year, if even the players he embarrasses shake his hand – and during the game, too!

Dolphins-Bills: I didn’t watch all of this game (Did anyone?), but I watched enough. Enough to say that my guess last week that Trent Edwards would be the starter for the foreseeable future in Buffalo was correct. Enough to see that Marshawn Lynch is healthy, and should help some fantasy owners in their playoffs next week when the Bills play a surprisingly huge game at Cleveland – winner gains control of the second wild-card spot in the AFC playoffs. Enough to see that the Dolphins probably ARE going to go 0-16, without question: The Ravens have enough pride and talent to bounce back from their pounding by the Colts to win; it barely needs to be said that Miami isn’t going to win in Foxboro in week 16, and I can’t see them beating the Bengals in week 17, either. It’s over for them. Over for Cam Cameron, too.

Colts-Ravens: You kind of knew this one was coming. Just as the Colts and Eagles both lost their next games after giving their all in frustrating defeat against the Patriots, the Ravens’ loss was even more frustrating, so it makes sense that their hangover would turn out to be even more pathetic. It defies logic that a team that played so well against the Patriots could lie down like dogs just a week later against the Colts, but football is a game of emotion, and the Ravens, somewhat understandably, didn’t have any left for this game.

As I watched it, regretting having left Anthony Gonzalez on my bench in one league, while starting Dallas Clark in several, I couldn’t help but think about all the fantasy leagues that might be decided by one team, in one week, being able to take advantage of a team that came out as flat as the Ravens. Would Joseph Addai have scored 3 TDs against the Ravens’ usually dominant run defense on any other week? I seriously doubt it. That’s the NFL, and that’s fantasy football. I thought of it when I saw Reuben Droughns stop to take on a tackler rather than just putting his head down and running into the end zone, and I thought of it when I saw Chris Brown start to celebrate on his way into the end zone...and end up getting dragged down awkwardly, and apparently injured on the play. I thought of it when I saw the Vikings score 27 points at San Francisco, while Adrian Peterson got totally shut out. A zero for the NFL's leading rusher even in a blowout win against San Francisco. How can anyone predict that? That might end up costing me -- and many, many fantasy owners -- a playoff spot.

You can’t plan for that kind of stuff, and you definitely can’t script it. Whenever you start to get too proud of your ability or too down on the decisions you made, you see something that reminds you: There’s an awful lot of luck involved.

Andy watches as many games as he can each Sunday. If you do the same, feel free to add your own observations from the previous day’s games below.

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