Week 9 Preview

Josh Allen of the Lumberjacks lit it up, but it wasn’t enough to give Linn County the win. At 4-4, they’re still in first place in the Bronze Division.

This column is coming at you a little later than usual, and there’s lots of news. Every good player is injured! Aaron Rodgers is a lying asshole! Henry Ruggs drunk-drove his car into someone and killed her. So much to cover.

Winners

Bestine (6-2), North Point (6-2), Cleveland (6-2), Batavia (5-3), Fransburg (4-4), Oregon (3-5)

Once again, the entire Silver Division won. The entire Gold Division lost.

Prediction Record

Week 8: 5-1

Overall: 27-21

Never bet against North Point. That’s the lesson. They’ve ripped off 6 in a row.

2022 Divisions (if they were made today)

Culver City has lost 6 in a row, but they are still decent enough to be a Silver team next year.

Week 9 Matchups

Another week of inter-divisional matchups. Will the Silver Division win out again?

Linn County (4-4) @ Batavia (5-3)

The first place Lumberjacks travel to Batavia to take on the last place Colliders. Batavia averages around 20 more ppg than the Lumberjacks, but last week they looked terrible, thanks to a coaching blunder that swapped out Robert Woods for Kenneth Gainwell at the last minute. Every RB in Philly got 12 touches and Gainwell did the least with his. Robert Woods had the best game of the season on the bench, obviously.

Still, they survived the Marauders, with the notable exception of All-World RB Derrick Henry, who has been lost for the balance of the regular season. Batavia is hoping that the news of David Montgomery returning is true, because they are extremely thin at running back.

The Colliders have reason to be nervous this week, because Josh Allen takes on the mighty Jacksonville Jaguars, so 30 points is more likely than not. Micah Parsons gets the start for the ‘Jacks, coming off his best game of the season (from the bench, naturally.) The Colliders are so thin at LB that they have to start Markus Golden. He’s good for two tackles, and the hope is both are sacks. Obviously, this won’t be the case.

The Derrick Henry injury is a huge blow, and the Colliders are reeling. If they have any hope of staying competitive, then their wide receivers need to step up. Mike Williams has scored 5 points over the course of the last three weeks. Justin Jefferson is scoring on par with Christian Kirk. And Darren Waller is being outscored by Mike Gesicki. If the receivers don’t play elite football, then the weaknesses on defense and at QB are about to be exposed.

The Lumberjacks have a path to victory, but I’m going to look on the bright side and I’ll tell you why. This weekend I was able to get my under-12s vaccinated, which means we are about 5 weeks out from returning to a semblance of normal life. So here’s what’s going to happen: Josh Allen won’t need to do much because the Bills will just run all over the Jaguars. The Colliders receivers are going to earn their paychecks. And maybe, just maybe, another Silver team will lose so the Colliders can crawl out of last place.

Madtown (1-7) @ Bestine (6-2)

While the Colliders are desperately hoping a Silver Team will lose, they’ll get absolutely no help from the Marauders. The biggest upset here is that somehow the Marauders are NOT the lowest scoring team in the league. That is 100% due to Cooper Kupp.

The Marauders seem to have an eye on the future, with reports circulating that they are interested in moving Lamar Jackson. That would be a smart move for them, but there aren’t too many teams in desperate need of a quarterback. The Colliders make sense, but they have already invested a high first rounder in Trevor Lawrence, and clearly hope he can turn into something once Urban Meyer is fired. Moreover, they are two spots removed from the playoffs and likely don’t want to give up a first rounder if they are going to miss the playoffs anyway. With a Bestine win very likely this week, there won’t be much hope of them moving up.

The Marauders are also suffering the epic failures of Dalvin Cook, who just, kinda sucks now. Jerry Jeudy is coming back from IR. He’s only played one game for Madtown this year. It will be interesting to see how he does. And by interesting I mean mostly disappointing, since the Marauders are just having a dismal time of it out there. But at least their players haven’t murdered anyone with their car, so there’s that.

On the Bestine side of things, their players draw some tough matchups this week. But that’s hardly going to matter if the Marauders struggle to crack 100 again (likely!) The Banthas have enough defensive firepower to overcome whatever effort Madtown can muster.

North Point (6-2) @ Holley (3-5)

I successfully shamed Tom into switching back to Tom Brady from Jalen Hurts last week, with nothing more than the power of my words. Hurts scored 6.87 and Brady scored 19.25. YOU’RE WELCOME, TOM. Honestly don’t know why I’m helping this guy out. He’s a division rival.

I guess it’s only fair since I traded Henry Ruggs to him for a 2nd rounder earlier in the season. Kind of reminds me of when I traded Calvin Johnson to Ben only to have Megatron instantly retire. AM I A TIME TRAVELER? No, because if I were I’d definitely use it for a higher purpose than “becoming as good as Enright at fleecing people in trades.”

Holley has somehow scored fewer points than Madtown. And yet, seeing a starting RB duo of Nick Chubb and Aaron Jones almost makes me want to pick them. What if Kirk Cousins has a good game? How is it that he doesn’t have the COVID yet? For some reason, every NFL player is getting it this week. I find this weird because the Delta variant is finally winding down in Florida, and we have state policies that actively encourage transmission of the virus.

I came to my senses when I looked at the starting wide receivers. See if you can recognize any of these names: Nico Collins, Denzel Mims, Mike Strachan, Preston Williams. Mims and Strachan helpfully combined for 1.70 points on Thursday night. Mike. Strachin. Who hasn’t recorded a catch since week 1. North Point’s corner, Kenny Moore, is on track to outscore all 4 receivers combined.

Unfortunately (for me), Tom is going to win again. But if I miss the playoffs I’ll comfort myself with the extra second round draft pick I scored.

Cleveland (6-2) @ Tooz Town (4-4)

Kyler Murray is still kind of hurt, which is good news for the 49ers, but bad news for the GIMB. They have a capable (if allegedly racist) backup in Matthew Stafford. Their best player, James Robinson, draws a very tough matchup against the Bills, and when the Bills are up 40-0 at halftime, it’s unlikely that the RB will see a lot of carries. Tooz Town can hope for the Jags giving up and making Robinson a checkdown machine as they play a soft umbrella defense in the second half.

Tony Pollard also starts for Tooz Town, which just goes to show you how precarious the RB position is these days. The 2 RB minimum is TYRANNY, no different than asking people not to cough on each other.

It’s kind of amazing that the GIMB are 4-4 given how checked out the owner is. Hockenson is starting (bye). Kinlaw is starting (IR). Robbie Gould started 4 games while on IR, but ironically he’s back now so it actually makes sense to start him. What’s weird about this is that Matuszak is actually submitting a new lineup each week, so he could conceivably see the injury markers next to each name. I know this, because Dakota Allen, who we mocked as a draft pick, gets the start this week. His season high of 1.50 points came in week 1.

I cursed myself and every other Derrick Henry owner by stating that I wanted to see Henry get 35 touches a game and for AJ Brown and Julio Jones to never return from injury. I’m interested to see how the two Titans receivers do, now that they are both in the Tooz lineup.

The Battery are 6-2 and in danger of missing the playoffs! Derek Carr gets the start after losing a drunk-driving asshole receiver to jail/murder rap. This seems like the recipe for a 5-TD game, because that’s how football brain works. The football media will do a soft-focus interview with him afterwards and nod solemnly about how hard it must have been to go through losing a teammate, and Carr will remind us about his belief in God. Mark it down.

Regardless, the two defensive ends for Cleveland will probably outscore all of the GIMB. They’ll stay in the hunt!

Fransburg (4-4) @ Marshfield (4-4)

Jonathan Taylor was the guy I would have picked first overall. Adam got him 2nd. I WAS SO RIGHT ABOUT THAT GUY. It’s too bad my team is never bad enough to have a top-3 pick, and people stopped trading me their top-3 picks for some reason.

Taylor has already scored 24 points, so that’s a good start for Fransburg. They also get Davante Adams back from the COVID. Unfortunately, they lost Aaron Rodgers to the virus.

As someone who has been anxious about my kids for nearly two years, I just have to say, Fuck Aaron Rodgers. You can tell me all you want about how kids don’t have bad outcomes from the virus, but as a teacher I’ve had students who were hospitalized with it. And for some reason the anti-vaxxers will tell you that when a kid does have a bad outcome, it’s because they had a pre-exisiting condition. First of all, most of these were unknown pre-exisiting conditions. Secondly, is that supposed to make me feel better? Sorry your kid died of this preventable illness, but they did have a pre-exisiting condition so they’ve got that going for them.

As COVID became a problem primarily for the unvaccinated, I worried even more about my unvaccinated children. The best way to protect the vulnerable who can’t get vaccinated is to have a high vaccination rate so that there is less community spread. This is something we have known for, I don’t know, 80 years or so. When Aaron Rodgers has the audacity to say, “all the reporters were vaccinated so they weren’t in any danger from me, who didn’t have the virus” I want to punch him in his stupid face. Were the reporters’ kids vaccinated? Their immunocompromised family members? He was so sure he wouldn’t get it, and yet HE FUCKING DID.

It turns out dipshits who read Facebook posts don’t actually know more than scientists who conduct clinical trials.

I’m also irritated by people who think the rules are for everyone else and not them. They are such “free thinkers.”

I’m so over people talking about how the vaccine was “rushed” and is just a money grab by Big Pharma. These same people then go and take medicine intended for animals, also produced by Big Pharma. Like, you’re not going to trust the CDC or FDA, but you’re cool with random therapies people on the internet came up with? Jesus Christ, man.

Anyway, if I were the Packers I’d just cut him, Cam Newton style. It also goes to show that athletes aren’t that smart, not even the ones that have narratives about how smart they are. The Wonderlic is an absolutely useless test.

Aaron Rodgers is a selfish asshole who is incapable of accepting even mild criticism. In summary, fuck that guy.

As a result, the (r)EvoLUtion are forced to start Tyrod Taylor at QB, which is Batavian in its desperation. The rest of the lineup looks pretty good, but Marshfield is getting Christian McCaffrey back. Joe Mixon averaged just over 2 yards per carry last week, but salvaged it by scoring two touchdowns. Will he annoyingly redeem a subpar performance again this week? Probably.

This one is probably one of the tougher games to call this week. I like the Fransburg defense almost as much as I liked seeing Nick Bosa get two sacks last week IN PERSON. I did not think the 49ers had the juice to win on the road, but I guess I’d forgotten how bad the Bears are. Both Bosas draw pretty good matchups this week, so I want to give the nod to the Fransburg D, with the exception of DT where Adam is starting a guy on the bye. I don’t know if this is an oversight or a political statement (Adam famously hates DTs). Even so, there’s no guarantee that McCaffrey will survive a whole game of football, so let’s just hope that Jordan Love keeps it simple and throws to Davante Adams 20 times.

It’s going to be close, but I am picking Fransburg in this battle of .500 teams.

Oregon (3-5) @ Culver City (2-6)

Oregon was your high scorer last week, thanks to a monster game from Michael Pittman and the continued success of the running backs. Culver City didn’t look too bad, but they are running into high scoring opponents, which is the curse of the 4th spot in the Gold.

Pittman performed about half as well as he did last week, but that’s still good for a solid 11 points. Najee Harris has scored in double digits 6 games in a row, so score another point for conventional wisdom. It’s possible that having the first pick in the draft four years in a row is finally starting to pay off (though Saquon Barkley is out again, proving once again that if you’re an NFL franchise you should never take a RB 2nd overall). If I were a GM I would simply build an offensive and defensive line and go from there.

The Dream Team missed an opportunity by leaving Carson Wentz and his 19 points on the bench. Will Tannehill be able to match that? Doubtful. He sucks now. Or, perhaps it’s more accurate to say he sucks again.

Even so, the Dream Team are up 16-4 with both teams expending two players on Thursday night. The win probability favors Oregon 60-40% but I think I’m going to go against the grain on this one (probably a mistake). Culver City just has too many good players, and I can see Mahomes getting right this week (I know, I know, I say that every week). As a 49ers fan, I also have visions of DeAndre Hopkins scoring 3 TDs.

There’s no way the Krakens are as bad as their record. Maybe this is the week they finally show a spark.

Okay everyone, stay safe out there, for the love of God stay at least 6 feet away from Aaron Rodgers (and maybe stay off the roads at night if your city has an NFL team).

Enjoy the games!

© 2021, Josh Hammond. All rights reserved.