Jaguars Let Leftwich Go
For those of you who have picked up Byron Leftwich in your fantasy team, we must regretfully inform you that the Jaguars have decided to release him and instead start David Garrard. The move was not unpopular or unanticipated, but nonetheless quite noteworthy due to the importance of Leftwich within the previously conceived scheme of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Leftwich was a first round draft pick that has never fully panned out as a sort of Michael Vick-type quarterback, sans dog fighting issues. He has been injured for most of his career, and is not seen as an investment that will pay out for the team. The decision to dump him was made by Jack Del Rio, coach of the Jaguars. Said Del Rio of the decision, “To make a decision this bold requires some strong conviction, and I have that.”
Garrard will now take the reigns of the offense for the Jags in their opening day game. He is still one of the more risky QB starters for your fantasy team, so you might want to see how he plays in his first start of the 2007 season before making him the cornerstone of your team.
To get Jacksonville Jaguars tickets, go to StubHub.com.
NFL Preview Time
The NFL season is right around the corner. In fact, the college football season will be starting up here in a few hours, and the football highlights on ESPN will be non-stop for months to come. So as you are getting ready to root for your team- the one you have loved sicne your childhood or the one that you just picked last night in a fantasy football draft, you will want to be the most well-informed fan out there. When people start talking smack in the office about your players, or a guy makes a ridiculous comment about the Bengals across the bar, you will want to have a good, insightful and wry comment with which to retort.
Well, lucky for you, you can get some of the best expert NFL hubub at ESPN.com in their team-by-team analysis. One of the best features in the preview section is the “Cloak and Dagger” section, where (allegedly) an undercover operative for ESPN gives his take on a player or team under the guise of anonymity. Of course, it could just be hogwash, and they are making it all up so that they don’t have to site their sources. But who knows?
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
NLF Playbooks Revealed
The NFL season is close at hand, so the sports news websites are filled with information about what to look for this year. You can take a look at what ESPN thinks will be the “go-to” plays for each NFL team if you would like. They have a nice graphic of each play that will be the bread and butter for every team in the league. For example, the Saint’s option run play will be something they will use frequently, and the Bears will use a hesitation blitz. Of course, the plays they outline are fairly obvious, and there are probably a lot of NFL coaches and coordinators who know this stuff like the back of their hands.
Preparation is a big part of being the best player you can be. And it’s not just physical preparation, its mental stuff, game films, play books, knowing the game. Just like the players on the field, you have to be prepared for your Sunday afternoon performance- get the nacho dip ready, make sure you know when the teams are playing, and even know how to recognize when the 49ers are setting up for a quick dump to their tight end. In the end, failing to prepare is preparing to fail, even for football fans.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Fantasy Top Picks
If you are an avid football fan, then you are probably bored with being just a fan of one team, probably the one in your region. This is why being a fantasy football manager has become so important- because even if your team, say the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, is not going to be very good this year, you can still cheer for your own team, your fantasy team, which can be just as good as you can make it. So now that you have invested time and money into a team, you will need to get the edge on the others. You need a fantasy draft sheet.
You can buy a football magazine at the store or you can do your research online. CBS Sportsline has one that they have compiled for their fantasy purposes. Of course, it is good to remember that each fantasy league will be different, and scoring is not standardized. Make sure you match up your fantasy cheat sheet wit the way your league works. With the NFL season inching ever closer, you need to get your fantasy team in tip-top shape and prepare to earn your money back.
To get NFL football tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Vick Apologizes, Quinn to Sit at Start?
One of the best things to come out of the Michael Vick scandal happened today. Michael Vick publicly apologized to his teammates, coaches, friends, family and fans for making mistakes and, as he put it, acting in an “immature” way. Most of the people who saw the apology said that he seemed to genuinely be sorry for his actions, and that the apology, though perhaps late and not enough in itself to make up for his actions, is probably the first step in a much longer journey back to public redemption. Vick plead guilty to conspiracy in his dog fighting case, though he did not accept a plea for some of the more damning charges.
In other news, Brady Quinn, one of the most famous draft picks in the last NFL Draft, is not expected to start for the Cleveland Browns on opening day. This was related to the media by Browns GM Phil Savage. The ultimate decision will be coach Romero’s, and nothing is official quite yet. Brady Quinn has done well in the Browns preseason games, but had missed some of the camp due to contract negotiations.
To get Cleveland Browns tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Friday is Fun NFL News Day
Because it’s Friday, we here in the blogosphere are going to take a little break form the hard, dry facts of the day and give you some fun NFL news. One place that’s always a good bet for news that will make you laugh is The Onion, a fake news website that sometimes delves into the sports world. Yesterday there was a short article about the NFL titled “Meaninglessness Of Preseason Game Plunges Jeremy Shockey Into Existential Crisis.” If you have some spare time at work, you really ought to check it out.
There are a lot of other sports articles that poke fun at the sports world- the triteness, the corruption, the bad behaving athletes. It’s refreshing to get sports news, even fake sports news, that isn’t messed up in some sort of conflict of interest. You wouldn’t find such mockery at ESPN or the other sports news websites, as it would be against their best interest to make fun of the thing that they are trying to promote. I am reminded of something that John Stewart, the host of The Daily Show, once said (though it was probably a quote he stole somewhere). Sometimes only the jester can get away with telling the truth.
To get NFL tickets you can go to StubHub.com.
Madden ’08: Helping Fantasy Managers?
The newest version of the ever-popular video game series called Madden has been released, and there are plenty of things to digest about this year’s version. Madden ’08 has several upgrades and changes that make it better and more user friendly than last year’s version, and the game-testers and programmers if this series are hoping that their changes are more well-received than the latest Windows. For instance, improvements to the defensive aspects of Madden ’08 will allow people to better facilitate a complex defensive—change strategy, focus on a single offensive player, or even change the mindset of a cornerback from say, cover deep to blitz.
Some people have also taken to using the player rankings to help them in their fantasy football leagues. Of course there is nothing wrong with this, pre se. Fantasy football is such a guesser’s game that maybe the programmers of Madden really do know which players are the best headed into the year. Of course, it has Brian Urlacher as the best player in the NFL, and Frank Gore as the number 111th. Who do you think is going to earn you more fantasy points?
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Fantasy Football Fantasy Hall of Fame
If you like to spend a lot of time on ESPN.com, and you are running a fantasy football team this year, then you have probably checked out the fantasy football page. One of the features, among many helpful ones, is a not-so-helpful one called the Fantasy Football Hall of Fame. If you have a spare couple of minutes, you might want to check it out. Basically, the Fantasy Football Hall of Fame is a virtual e-Canton that commemorates the best players of year’s past. You can search for inductees by year, position or highlight. In 2006, LaDainian Tomlinson made the Hall of Fame as a Stud and Bears kicker Robbie Gould made the Waiver Wire Wonders list.
Of course, this stuff will not help you pick a team this year, but it’s a good time waster to see all of the players you should have picked. What else are you going to do, NFL Fans? Read yet another article about what a mess this whole Michael Vick thing is? In fantasy football you don’t have to answer a bunch of legal or ethical questions, just who you think is going to get the best numbers.
To get some sweet non-fantasy NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Manning, Barber Exchanges Barbs
Tiki Barber, the all-time leading rusher for the New York Giants, and Eli Manning, the current Giants quarterback, are engaged in a war of words. The battle started when Barber was commenting on a Giants preseason game the other day, calling out Eli Manning’s leadership abilities. Manning fired back at Barber today in the media, bringing up the fact that Barber had created distractions during the season last year relating to his retirement decision and his thoughts about the coach.
Amani Toomer, a wide receiver for the Giants, wondered if the feud wasn’t spurred on my outside forces looking for boosted ratings. Said Toomer, “I thought Tiki and Eli were pretty good friends. It’s kind of strange to have him say something like that and to make a point of it like that. Maybe he had somebody else in his ear kind of coaxing him into saying stuff, because I don’t believe he really believes that. I don’t know why he’d say something like that.” I tend to agree with Toomer. Barber was probably saying something that he would have normally kept quiet about, except that he was trying to fill air time during a preseason game.
If you would like to get New York Giants tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Vick Takes Plea, Warren to Oakland
News form the Michael Vick saga is here. Today it was announced through Vick’s legal team that he has agreed to take a plea deal with federal prosecutors in his impending dog fighting case. The other co-defendants have also agreed to take plea deals, and it was seen as an inevitability that Vick would take one as well, limiting the amount of jail time and fines that he would potentially be sentenced. Of course, it is a near guarantee that Vick will have to serve at least one year in prison for his part in the dog fighting ring, but the exact details of the agreement have not been specified as of yet.
In other news, a Denver Broncos defensive back has found work in a very unlikely place. Gerard Warren was traded today to the Oakland Raiders, probably the Broncos’ most hated rival. Denver had been looking around for a buyer, and hadn’t found one until yesterday, when the Raiders took Warren on a roster which includes Warren Sapp. The move will not make much of a difference in the overall picture for either of these team, but is noteworthy because two teams who supposedly hate each other have found an agreement to make.
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