Walking Wounded
Injuries begin taking toll on contending teams
Injuries are a part of the game when it comes to football and year in and year out, a key injury here and there can affect a team. Just ask Brian, whose team struggled down the stretch after an injury to Priest Holmes. You can also ask about half the teams in the PFL, who either through randomization or bad luck, started a total of 8 players who missed games due to injury. And that doesn't count Standale Big Knox' Andre Johnson and the Whooping Llamas' Ben Roethlesberger who went down during their key inter-divisional matchup this week. In a low-scoring affair, it was 36-33 going into Monday night, but yet another stellar performance from LaDanian Tomlinson was enough to push Jeff to the victory. LT's 18 and Carson Palmer's 19 were enough to overcome Big Ben's 22 before his injury. With the 75-60 win, Jeff improves to 3-2 while Jeremy's two game win streak ends and the Llamas fell to 2-3.
Around the League
Grand Rapids Greased Lightning 148 Ironwood Cox 98
In a battle of two 3-1 teams, battling for early supremacy in the PFL East, Nick's Greased Lightning had their best offensive output of the season as four players topped 20 points in the win. Shaun Alexander (24), Anquan Boldin (21), Jake Delhomme and Edgerrin James (20 each) led the charge. Tom Brady had league-high score for the week with 29 in the loss. Nick reclaims the King of the Mountain Trophy after Mike earned it with a week 4 win over Jeff.
Yukon Icebreakers 83 Muskegon Mudhens 71
Yukon caught a couple breaks in their divisional win over the always-tough Mudhens. Drew Bledsoe stepped in for an injured Michael Vick to score 27 points and overcame a subpar week from his highly rated receiving corps (Harrison, Owens and Houshmendzedeh combined for only 6 points). Brian's randomized lineup put up a fight, but it was not enough to avoid falling to 2-3 on the year. Yukon improves to 3-2 with the win.
Eugene Levies 65 Alaskan Assassins 43
It wasn't pretty, (in fact, Eugene Levies coach Duane Foreman conceded defeat) but the banged up Levies were able to pull one out over the even more injury-ravaged Assassins in the lowest scoring game of the year. Stephen Jackson led the Levies (4-1) with 19 points while Jermoe Bettis' team-high 12 points on Monday night made the score more respectable for Alaska (2-3), who las now lost three straight.
Climax 69ers 114 Crazy Jimmies 81
Paul took four weeks of frustration out on the hapless Jimmies in a battle of two teams that have struggled to put things together this year despite talented rosters. Steve Smith led a strong team effort for the 69ers (1-4) and Marc Bulger put up 24 in the losing cause for Jim (1-4)