Syracuse 44's 97 County Coroners 90 In a week that featured a number of games that were in the balance through Sunday, the battle between the Coroners and 44's was one of the most exciting. In general, Owner Chad G. Nuss's teams do not lose when the Raiders perform well. With Mike Holmgren's hapless Seattle Seahawks on the other end, Owner John Stoer had some worries. While ESPN's Tom Oates lauds Holmgren's QB teaching and his wonderful coaching (although he has won just as many Super Bowls as Barry Switzer), the team Holmgren is coaching this year is just pathetic. So pathetic, that the Coroners were smiling broadly. QB Rich Gannon reassumed his starting position and looks to hold onto it for awhile as he threw for 3 TD's, ran for one more and totaled 28 points. His favorite target on the day was Geriatric Rice who hauled in 2 TD's and had 18 points for the first time since 1993 and led the Coroner offensive flex to their best day of the season with 23. Rice was given the gameball. Sebastian Janakowski, the Polish Cannon, grabbed his top kicker spot with another nice week of 10 points. Janakowski said, "Anyone want to see my Polish sausage?" Tyrone Wheatley joined in the fun with another TD and 9 additional points. This didn't leave much action for Tim Brown who had 3 points. The non-Raiders on the offense also were MIA. Patrick Hape had a point and was mached by O-ronde Gadsen. Derrick Alexander, a keeper, had his first 4 points of the season. The all-DB defense was led by Rodney Harrison's 12 and totaled 16. Captain Pat Tillman scored 2 and was cut after the game. The 44's also played well on Sunday. TE Booger Frankfurter kept up his #1 TE play with a TD and 9 points. He's due for a fall in productivity. WR Curtis "the Difference Maker" Conway grabbed a Flutie (10 pts) TD and had a nice 9 and Tiki Barber had a TD before getting hurt. The twin Browns in the 44 offensive flex didn't hurt too much as they totaled 7 points, but James Jackson who had 30+ carries in Week 3 was singled out for criticism by Stoer. The 44 defense has cooled off some and only had 16 points collectively. Going into Sunday night, the 44's found themselves down by 34 points but had Donovan "Gameball" McNabb and Curtis Martin left to go. McNabb had what is becoming a common place all-pro performance with 24 points on 3 TD's. He is now the #1 rated player in all of Modano and is the only player with three all-pro performances. In fact, the 44's lead the league with 6 all-pro performances through 3 weeks. The 44's still had a 10 point bulge to flatten on Monday night and Curtis Martin turned out to be the man. Martin plowed into the endzone for two short TD's and got 5 more points in yards. Nuss shouted, "Damn you, Curtis Martin! Damn you straight to hell!" as Martin entered the endzone for the second time. Martin just smiled. After the game, Stoer gave the gameball to McNabb, but was surprised when Donovan didn't immediately accept it. McNabb said, "No coach, you gotta give the ball to Curtis." Stoer agreed and Martin continued to smile. In his post-game conference a contrite and soon to be angry Nuss said, "we can't lose these close games. when the Raiders outperform the competition, it's a heartbreaker to take a loss, this week we will exact our revenge against a highly touted team...the Bretts." On Tuesday morning, weeks, months and even years of haggling between the 44's and Bull City Bears came to an end as Owner Randy Chambers, impressed by Martin's play and attitude, made an offer that Stoer could not refuse. Martin will take his one gameball and tough running along with #1 TE Booger Frankfurter down to Bull City in exchange for Syrcause alum and Stoer favorite, Marvin Harrison along with salary cap throw in Kyle Brady. Stoer and McNabb could barely contain their glee. For the past year, Stoer has often woken up in a full sweat from dreams of Donovan and Marvin connecting on long rainbow bombs that fall featherly into awaiting Harrison hands and now that dream is a reality. Stoer said, "Paying a steep price, but Marvin is coming home."
P-Miss Envy 89 San Francisco Cubists 87 Another thriller came down to the final ticks of the clock as the newly annointed "giant-killer" P-Miss Envy edged the happy-to-win, happy-to-lose, just plain happy San Francisco Cubists. Owner Jason Moore has thrown off his haughty mantle, despite his championship pedigree, and become a calmer, gentler leader of his team. TE Tony Gonzalez has noticed the difference, "Last year Coach Moore made us get up at a 7:30AM wake up call for a Monday night game which was to played 12 hours later. We weren't happy but Moore is a winner, so we did it. This year we can get up any time we like, as long as it isn't after 7:45AM. He really has changed." This lax attitude has not helped the Cubist keepers. Despite not having any byes or injuries, through two weeks they were the worst performing keepers in the league. In Week 3, Gonzalez had his first good game with a TD and 11 points. The Cubists have had the best TE play in the league. Stephen Davis still has broken out with only 5 points. Warrick Dunn had a TD, 12 points and was given the game ball by Moore before getting injured. He'll be out 3-4 weeks. The Cubists defense played well with 24 points, a team high, but no stand out performances. The one thing that Moore is kicking himself about is the last minute QB switch to take brittle Chris Chandler out and put excitable Aaron Brooks in. Brooks had a tough game against the Giants but did manage to score 13 points. Chandler, without the super talented Mike Vick breathing down his neck, had a super game with 27 points. "Con sarn it all," said Moore. The Envy knew that the mountain was high. They had played well against the Cubists in the past, including last year's memorable break of the winning streak, but they hadn't played well in 2001. Early reviews were mixed. QB Chris Weinke threw a nice TD to nobody likes Wesley Walls to put the Panthers up early on the hated Packers and scored 8 points. In general, Weinke played well but had a crucial 4th down ball dropped on him by Mushy and two awful fumbles from Steve Smith to cope with. Damn you, Steve Smith! Peter Warrick had his first TD of the season with 8 points and Byron Chamberlain played well with 6 points. Then disaster struck as RB Jamal Anderson once again tore his ACL and was pronounced out for the year by master surgeon Dan Reeves. No dirty bird for you. Anderson's bagel put the Envy in a hole that even Missner did not think they could climb. Sunday night netted the Envy 14 points as Correll Buckholter overcame an awkward name and scored a TD and 9 points. Going into Monday night, the Envy found themselves down by 19 points but they had three 49ers going against Cubist Terrell Owens. Owner Perry Missner went to be early as Owens scored an early TD to put the Cubists lead at what he thought was out of reach. Fortunately, the traitorous Envy 49ers kept plugging away at the lead. K Jose Cortez found himself a home with 13 points on 4 FG's. Kevan Barlow ran tough for 5 points. But the player that put the Envy over the hump was Derek "the Rock" Smith. Patrolling the lanes from his middle linebacker slot, he notched 10 solo tackles and half a sack to score 11 points and give the Envy a two point winning margin, if you can smell what he was cooking. Tuesday morning, a bleary-eyed, guilty feeling Missner woke up to the doorbell ringing as a dozen roses arrived with a card that read, "Congratulations to the Envy for a well-deserved win. You did it with defense and special teams. Yours Fondly, Jamo." Missner immediately called his local media outlet and said, "Say what you want about how boorishly Jason Moore has acted in the past, but at heart, he is a decent guy." Even though he lost, Moore basked in the glow of his positive karma that should lead him to many a victory, unless his luck runs out - then he's screwed.
Einar's Luvable Losers 107 Peaks Island Wookies 45 The Einar had a tough initiation into the Modano way of things in 2000. Despite the successful season, Owner Steve Olsen is used to dominating the local yokels in the Ripon area. Look at his perfomance in the ESPN league of last year. He had a great team, but was unable to transfer that greatness into victories. This year, the newest owner is determined to show that he belongs. His first two victories were of the unimpressive sort, so the Einar fired up his Losers with a pregame speech that won't soon be forgotten. He asked Kurt Warner if he wanted him to go back to bagging groceries because he could get him a job doing it. He questioned LaDainian Tomlinson's heart after his mediocre Week 2 performance. And he told TE Chad Lewis that he was going to get cut if he didn't start producing. Those three players took the threats seriously as they punished the poor Peaks Island Wookies with TD after TD in a thorough assault. Warner burned the defense for 4 TD's and 34 points. Tomlinson scored 3 times and totaled 26 points. The two combined for a higher score than the entire dysfunctional Wookie team. The Losers now have the most passing yards and TD's of any team, but only the third highest average. Chad Lewis set a season high with 2 TD's and 14 points. Keyshawn and Keenan each had 7's for the flex and the game was over before Sunday at 2PM. The Einar was heard to scream, "That's it! That's it! I don't ever want you to be know as losers again!" Mike Peterson, who scored 7 points in a relief effort for Nate Wayne, said, "Coach, that's our team name - what should we be known as?" The Einar just scowled at him and said he would be benched in Week 5. Owner Will Mitchell was coming off a really bad week and didn't really need this super blow out loss to finish it. As we all remember, he started the week out by cutting keeper QB Drew Bledsoe, a Wookie original. Then he felt bad about it, but before he could reclaim Bledsoe, the nearby Syracuse 44's tendered the QB an offer. Bummer. Then Mitchell decided to cut ties with keeper RB Terrell Davis. Davis jumped ship to the Losers and told the Einar what plays were coming. Double bummer. The Wookies only got into the endzone once as Jake Plummer threw for 1 TD. The team was led by Ricky Williams' 6 points, Gary Anderson's 8 kicking points and Lawyer Milloy, who was the only Patriot secondary member not to return an errant Peyton Manning throw for a TD, with 7. The entire Wookies offensive flex had only 4 points. Even Rod Smith was held relatively in check with only 5 points. Mitchell tried to concentrate on the positive, the Pats� win as he offered these comments to the media, �I got my ass whupped worse than you could have ever predicted. But I traded 2 good players to get my poor, lung-popped injured can't move the offese bledsoe back so all is well in the world. and did you see the pats humiliate the colts with an inspired defense? it was the first time they played with any life or emotion in 3 or 4 years.The Wookies do have the most receiving yards in the league. The 45 points is a season low and the second lowest total in franchise history.(the Wookies only scored 44 in last year's Week 1 loss to the Bears). The Wookies team is exhibiting a disturbing trend: as their score goes lower, the opponent's score gets higher. The Wookies also have the unlucky distinction of having the most points scored against them with an average of 94.7 ppg. The Losers, on the other hand, are the luckiest team in the league with an opposing average of just 56.7. Early in the week, Mitchell was able to gain some redemption as he reacquired Bledsoe for project QB Matt Hasselback and gimpy RB Garrison Hearst. Bledsoe was said to have been ambivilent about his return to the Wookies. He said, "I know that Mitchell likes me as a person, but I don't know how he could rationalize cutting me. I mean, damn, I was in the hospital." Mitchell responded by offering Bledsoe a good home-cooked meal and a place to stay as he rehabs from his chest wall injury. Bledsoe politely refused as things remained a bit frosty between the two.
Walnut Creek Mountain Devils 90 Brentful Brents 68 The Brents entered their matchup with the low-flying Mountain Devils on a high the team had previously unknown. Sure, the team was showing some tension around the QB slot, but look at that starting line up, as Owner Steve Johnson had. "A line with no one in double digits," he cooed, "Not bad." He had reason to be cheery through Saturday as his unbeaten team had yet to score in the double digits itself. Johnson cautioned his team not to look past the Mountain Devils who were winless, but it appeared as if the team did just that. The Week 2 combo of Peyton Manning and James Thrash were not buying into the team's concept and had horrible games. Manning did manage 9 points on one TD, but Thrash along with starting TE Ernie Conwell only had a point. After his awful performance, Manning pinned the blame on Coach Johnson for "screwing with my head - trying to make me stupider." Manning walked out of Brentful and decided to take a week off. His first stop was the local library to get some book reading in so he could be more intelligent. On his way, back up QB inbred moron Brent Farf said, "Yo, brainiac, you goin' to the li-barry?" Manning just scoweled and hoped for a trade to non-hill billy location. Nevertheless, Manning, Green and Horn continue to be the most productive keepers in the league. On the moron side of the team, Moronic WR Bill Scroter had the other TD and 10 points. Ryan Longpoor had 8 points from the kicking slot and A-hole Green managed 8 points running on the poor Carolina sod. Even Kevin Hardy continued his strong play with 13 points for the defense. Johnson, in an unorthadox move, decided to give the gameball to Brent "Frickin" Farf. Farf did not start, but scored 24 points off the bench. Unbeknowst to Johnson, he also signaled in the plays to Manning, thereby sabotaging the starter's chance of playing well. Not to be overlooked was Owner Rob (and please correct me if I get this wrong) Uuuuua's Walnut Creek Mountain Devils. They went back to their Week 1 line up for the most part with only David Boston changed from Week 1. In Week 3, they put it all together with one exception. The guy who had been leading the team in the first two weeks, Edgerrin James came under the same malady as Manning. He only scored two points and was singled out for scorn from Coach Ooooooa. "Play better," said the coach succintly. The team also got yet another zero from Roland Williams and a less than inspiring performance from Michael Anderson who had 2. Fortunately, the passing game was hitting on all cylinders. QB Elvis Grbac, who has been visiting Dr. Ouaou (see, I can do it right if I set my mind to it) for therapy, scored a couple of TD's and 16 points. One of his TD throws was nabbed by Qadry Ismail who had 8 points, while the other was snagged by whiny bitch Cris Carter who had 11. Ouaou gave his gameball to the entire defense. LB Derrick Brooks set a defensive player record for the season with an outstanding 21 points. He collected 17 solo tackles and an interception. Charles Woodson also had a strong game with 13 points and Warren Sapp made a lot of noise but only scored 1 point. Ouaou said, "I had a feeling we were going to win this week. I could tell the Brents were overlooking us and I knew Brooksy would have a huge game against that Minnesota native." After watching the numbers roll in, Johnson could say, "Ugg." LB John Abraham, the only player in this game on Monday night, scored 4 points for the Brents and kept it from being a true blow out win for the Devils.
Weaselicious Good Cookies 76 Bull City Bears 68 Three years in a row the Cookies had been swept by the Bears. Six straight games had Owner Randy Chambers using one combination or another to beat Owner Dan Weitz's Cookies. The Bears were coming off of an impressive win and the Cookies had just been beaten soundly. To make matters worse, Mr. Shwebke of the Oshkosh West High School orchestra (and Webster Stanley Middle School) showed up at the game to raz the Cookies by playing out of tune Charge calls and "Roll out the Barrel." Weitz had had it. He wanted a win so badly that he would have done anything. The Cookies figured to be tired since they had been put through brutal practices from 1st grade sadist, daughter Amber Weitz, but the work paid off most for one man, Marshall Faulk. Faulk returned to 2000 glory with 27 points on three TD's. Faulk said, "At the beginning of the week, I thought that little girl was going to run my behind off, but I started to get it: if I work harder during the week, I will play better on Sunday. It's so simple." Without seeing anymore action, Weitz decided who to give his gameball to - Amber. "She has these guys in a frenzy. They all want to go to the tea party," said Weitz. He didn't particularly care for the team of Greasy Tumor, but he did have to give credit for QB Brian Griese throwing his one TD to TE Dwayne Carswell. New insert Jamir Miller also had a huge game for the Cookie D with 15 points and the flex had 25 points combined. The news wasn't all good though because the aforementioned Amani Toomer only had one point and K Mike Vanderjagt only had a point as well. The offensive flex only had 9 points with three each from Emmitt, Darnay and Jacquez. There was some noise from the Cookie bench as well as back up QB Trent Green had a huge 28 points. WR Joey Galloway is the only keeper yet to get any game action. With the Cowboys QB situation, it's easy to see why. The Bears have stumbled out of the gates and are 1-2 for the first time in franchise history. Chambers seems to be muddled on which QB to use in which situation. Last week Mark Brunell had a huge game while Daunte Culpepper was not very good. This week Brunell got hit on the head and scored a season worst -2, while Culpepper had 17 from the bench. D'oh. The only reason the Bear score was even respectable was the outstanding work put in by the defensive flex. At this early point in the season, the Bears boast the best offensive and defensive flexes. London Fletcher had a huge game, tackling everything in sight for 19 points. Keith Brooking had a pair of turnovers and has been put in Brian Urlacher's class by ESPN's Chris Mortenson. Even Champ Bailey had 6 points for a total of 39, 1 of the season record set by the 44's in Week 1. Marvin Harrison, in what turned out to be his last game as a Bear, only scored 3 points. Randy Moss continued to act like a punk and not play very well as he only scored 5 points. Jerome Bettis, who might now be in the offensive flex with Curtis Martin, coming on board had a nice 7 points. The Bears, Envy and Cubists have all received only 10 points this season from their starting RB's. TE Stephen Alexander continued his poor play with 0. He will also probably be headed to the bench. After the game, Chambers made whole sale changes by releasing 5 players and picking up 5 new ones. Perhaps this shake up was just what the Bears need. On the other side of the field, things look to remain status quo for the Cookies. It seems that Dan and Amber Weitz might be the unbeatable team that Dan has envisioned for the Cookie family. An excited Weitz said in his locker room interview, "To those homies that thought the Cookies had no juice I say you better represent so I can pop a cap in your asses." He continued by chanting, "Everybody say, Hey-yay. Hey. Hey. Everybody say, Ho-oooh. Ho. Ho. Now throw yours hands up in the care as if you just don't care."
Week 5 previews - Einar's Luvable Losers have a score to settle with the rest of the league after the Einar feels that his team was slighted in preseason polls. Hey, the 44's said you would win - what do you want? The Losers face the newly dubbed Giant Killers of the league, the P-Miss Envy. The Envy are coming off their first win and hope to gather some momentum. The Einar hopes that Kurt Warner keeps his passes toward Isaac Bruce and away from Envy member Torry Holt unlike he did in Week 4. So far, the Einar has pretty much the same line up as in Week 4, with LB Nate Wayne not really healthy but returning anyway. He should score 0. The Envy welcome back a number of players from injury and bye. Steve "Austin" McNair should have his bionic shoulder implants in place for amazing pin point 100 yard throws. Eddie George is glad that September is over and Brian Urlacher has been pacing back and forth just frothing at the mouth getting ready to hit something, anything. The teams split their games last year. If the Losers should falter, it looks like the 44's would replace them as the favorite to take the throne. The 44's have yet to score below 90 points this season and now have the Stoer dream combo of Donovan and Marvin. Perhaps the combo will inspire Kevin Johnson to his Syracuse heights. The 44's face off against the Devils who are also coming off of a big win. Almost like Week 4, Rob Ouaou's team will have to do without RB Edgerrin James who finds himself on the bye this week. Will Michael Anderson finally step up? We keep asking that question - now step up! The Devils secret weapons may be Roland Williams and Qadry Ismail who also went to Syracuse. Five Orange alum and only three on the 44's in this game! Hopefully, Derrick Brooks and Warren Sapp will have many, many sacks. The crestfallen Brents look to Brent Farf to bring back the winning ways to Brentful as they take on the unhappy County Coroners. This was supposed to be the week in which Owner Chad G. Nuss was without the majority of his starters, but for some reason the Dallas-Oakland match is for this weekend. In Week 7, the Raiders and Cowboys are added to the Dolphins, 49ers and Seahawks. Half of the Coroners will be on the bye that week. The Raiders should score plenty of points on Dallas, so the Coroners should have a good chance to win. The Brents will surely lose due to the unfortunate play of Farf. He finally has the spotlight and he will no doubt go back to his interception throwing ways. A-hole Green will undoubtedly put the ball on the ground a few times and James Thrash is done for the season. The Coroners welcome Ron Dayne and Corey Harris to the line up. Both had big weeks in Week 4. The Cookies face another team against which they have a losing history, the Cubists. The Cubists have won four of the six match ups. Amber Weitz has installed a new practice - 4 a days! Dan Weitz is loving it but will it prove to be too much practicing for the Cookies? The Cookies will have to go with Matt Stover since Vanderjagt is on the bye. The Cubists, whose Owner Jason Moore is jolly whether win or lose, welcome back WR Marcus Robinson from the bye. Finally, we have the first match up of the season of two teams whose records are both below .500. They also happen to be the two lowest scoring teams. The Bears are in flux. They will welcome Curtis Martin as the first real running threat they have had in two years. They also put new recruits TE Desmond Clark and K Wade Richey right into the lineup. Hopefully, they can learn the plays quickly. The Wookies can only play better. Some of thought they may play the ailing QB Drew Bledsoe just to inspire the rest of the team. Some pundits in Peaks Island are questioning the use of three low scoring defensive linemen. The Wookies should be better after ridding themselves of Matt Hassleback.
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[Editor's note: OK, this is it. I am 99.9% sure (wink, wink) that this is my final recap. It has been a pleasure to serve your entertainment needs and I have really enjoyed hearing from many of you in the locker room interviews. There is just too much else to do in life: go for a stroll, enjoy a sunset, paint a picture, play baseball, etc. I could go on for hours, but I won't. Good bye � for now]