Dumdum, dumdum, DUH DUH DUH DUH Dumdum Dumdum . . .
FLASH AH AAAAAH!
For any of you who are wondering, that's the opening drum line and first lyrics to Queen's Title track for the Flash Gordon movie.
And if Freddie Mercury wasn't singing in your head when you first read it . . . he's certainly in there now . . . will be there all day . . . and I'm certainly not sorry.
So . . . surprise surprise . . . Josh Gordon . . . aka Flash . . . will be spending the 2016 NFL season sipping cucumber water, in a terry cloth robe, contemplating the meaning of life.
It's a sad fantasy day for all of us who had him stashed. We were ridiculed, cajoled, our fathers shook their heads in disappointment.
I had a little bit more evil in my heart. I wanted to do what I did in 2014, which was to hold Gordon until the week before he was about to go on, and sell him to the highest bidder.
I made the playoffs that year.
It was a good plan.
It was an even better plan when Gordon showed us this preseason, that he was still able to shred a secondary.
But alas . . . news comes in that there's a warrant out for his arrest. We Flash-Stashers breathed a sigh of relief when it turned out to be a paternity suit and of no interest to the NFL.
We just prayed he would stay away from any intoxicant heavier than Gummy Vitamins.
In a blog I never got around to posting in Week 2, I wrote this:
"If I was running the Cleveland Browns, I would send Gordon off to a farm in Siberia with an MP3 player that only had 'Eye of The Tiger' on it. He should be plowing snow, not co-eds."
I was extremely proud of that line.
But now there's news that he's decided to enter rehab instead of returning to football.
It's probably just as well . . . what probably happened is that he wasn't going to pass a drug test and decided to hide away instead of getting a lifetime ban from Goodell.
The Players Union really needs to renegotiate their stance on marijuana.
It's just silly.
Though . . . not quite as silly as the debate over Colin Kaepernick.
When people talk about the protest rather than the issue, I've decided to send the DJ's an email saying that Josh Brown, the kicker for the Giants . . . BEATS HIS WIFE! . . . LeSean McCoy got into a bar brawl with an off duty police officer . . . and Adrian Peterson is a child abuser.
I know that last one was soooo 2014, but if my brother can still hold a Michael-Vick-Grudge, then I'm going to cuddle my All-Day-AP-Rage.
In fact, I drafted McKinnen just so I could root for a Peterson injury, which makes me look really petty, but pretty effing smart now, don't it.
I don't know much about protests, I'm not even sure I'm allowed to have an opinion.
For my two cents . . . The Star Spangled Banner isn't a very good song; it's hard to sing the standard melody, the singer is always gonna go flat in the beginning, let alone the butchery that happens when the vocalist lets loose on the word 'Free'.
I love me some Gospel and R&B, but even if you miss one out of every ten notes, that still hurts when unaccompanied by a decent back up band.
Not to mention what happens when a troop of bagpipes get a hold of our national anthem.
Don't know if you saw that one, but my kilt wept.
Or maybe I just peed a little.
Either way.
The point being . . . it's good to talk about an issue we need to talk about, and the most American thing anyone can do is to shake up the establishment.
Anyway, since I haven't posted in four weeks, this blog is gonna be a long one, so Frank: don't forget that you only have a fifteen minute break . . . and Pro Tip: If you flush right after the log drops, the smell won't linger as long.
Since y'all already know the news, I'm gonna skip right down to Fantasy Land followed by Crazy Stupid Predictions and then go to lunch.
FANTASYLAND:
Teddy's Stump Speech: 2-1 (3rd place)
Trump's Twitter Game: 2-1 (4th place)
Cheney's Shotgun: 1-2 (7th place)
Draft Grades: A-, B-, C+
Now my buddy Steve likes to say if you finish Week 4 at 2-2, you're in pretty good shape.
The reason being, you don't really know what you're team is like until they've put up or shut up, and the Yahoo Draft Grades are only capable of showing off how good their auto-drafting is.
Auto-draft and you're gonna get high scores.
Heh, heh.
Now the draft for Teddy, and the draft for Trump, went pretty damn good. I felt prepared, I got the players I wanted, I had a good balance of solid and risky, I didn't draft either Josh Gordon or Arian Foster and there wasn't much overlap, so if one team went down, it wouldn't effect the other.
Cheney was a different story. I was in the 11 spot, and I realized, to my utter horror, that I had no plan for the back of Round 1.
This is a league where you don't get your draft order until 30 minutes prior to go-time.
I hate the very back of the draft. Your first two picks are always riddled with question marks. Round 2 is a scary place to be. Here's a list of the guys that went in Round 2:
Bell, McCoy, Reed, Robinson, Freeman, Allen, Lacy, Hyde, Cooks, Newton, Ingram, Martin.
How many of those guys would you want on your team in Weeks 1-3?
So, I'm staring down the barrel of Round 1, hoping there's a run on QB's and that someone is crazy enough to take Gronkowski (sucker). Which did actually happen, so I end up with a choice between A.J. Green and Adrian Peterson.
You already know how I feel about AP, and it's a PPR League, so I feel good with Mean Green.
Then I gotta pair him with someone.
RB's fly off the board at an alarming rate, so it's grab one now, or you'll be looking for Ameer Abdullah to lead your back field.
I get McCoy. Solid choice I feel. He's got some miles, like 40 year old hooker miles, but with Watkins to stretch the field, he won't see a lot of stacked boxes.
(Addendum: He sure will now . . . but unlike a 40 year hooker, he's gonna get a lot of touches either way.)
Now looking down the barrel of a very long Round 3, is when I start to fall apart. I grab Watkins on a hope and a prayer, and then I make the first real mistake of the draft, I stretch out for Russell Wilson.
My theory being, he was so good after last year's Bye Week, so poised, so efficient, and they're gonna have a healthy Jimmy Graham and a game plan to boot.
He's Top 3 in every single expert analysis. Every single one.
I could've gotten Matt Forte . . . that hurts a little.
But no worries, I feel super good about my back half strategy, where I diligently mopped up some break out kids like Marvin Jones, Ebron, and Stafford, which is a shit ton of Detroit, but so far so good. I got Christine Michael and McKinnon, to back up McCoy, Gore, and Jennings and a line-backer crew that are all household names.
My projections are competitive, and this time, I've got Flush Gordon as a mid-year lottery ticket.
Game On!
WEEK 1
Teddy has a solid win, Trump has a solid win, and Cheney . . . well . . . here's the thing . . .
I lost by one single play.
It's Monday Night, the score is tied: 210 to 210.
If I'd gone with my original game plan and not bet the horse on Russell, I'd've won, but alas,
Only men left on our rosters are two Line Backers . . .
My Timmons to Mike's Shazier.
It's back and forth all night. If either of us win it'll be by a fraction of a point.
Then . . . tragedy strikes. Ryan Shazier catches an interception and runs it for 20 yards.
I don't have to see the look on Mike face to know that he's nodding his head with a slight smile that say's he knew all along.
The silence in the room was palpable. My boys look at me, raise their beers, my wife pats my head, my son asks me if this means we'll lose our house.
"I don't know, Timmy." I reply. "I don't know"
Somewhere . . . a dog farts and leaves the room.
WEEK 2
I pull off the hat trick.
But the bad one . . . where everyone loses . . . horribly and without honor.
Mike tells me that's what happens when you draft A. J. Green.
Adam tells me he feels bad that my teams aren't very good at football.
"Maybe next year." I say.
"Probably not." he replies.
WEEK 3
I have an epiphany. Rather than relying on information or skill or expert analysis . . . maybe I should consider counting on luck.
I noticed, over the last year, every time I've worn my 49ers jersey, #38 Jarrod Effing Hayne, I've been totally waffle stomped.
I won the jersey in a raffle the very day Jamaal Charles torpedoed my 2015 team.
I was wearing it when I drafted Cheney's Shotgun, and then again during all of Week 2. And the Niner's have not looked good since Hayne left, and Hayne didn't even make it into the Olympics.
The Jersey might be cursed.
Without considering alternatives, I awoke last Sunday morning and tossed on a UC Davis tank top.
I don't support them, but I do owe them a truck load of money for my step-son's degree, and the all cotton material is actually quite comfortable.
When the coffee kicked in and I finally leaned back in my easy chair . . . every one of my teams lit up the scoreboard like they were playing pin-ball while the rest of the leagues were sipping tea on a croquet course.
Later in the day, I removed my tank top, and the points stopped rolling in. I shit you not. All got quiet on the western front.
Now here's where it gets weirder: I've sown up Teddy's match pretty well. And, despite having benched my #1, #3, & #4 draft picks, Cheney's Shotgun has a 150 point lead and will finish off the week with 270 points.
That's what you get when you have Marvin Jones on all three teams . . . Mike
So it's Monday Night . . . again . . . and I need exactly 44 points from Brees and Coleman to win this week's match. That's about half of what other entire teams will score in their entirety.
No easy feat I'm saying.
I don my Lucky UCD Tank.
TD Brees, TD Coleman, TD Brees, TD Coleman, TD Coleman, TD Brees.
I officially pull off my first hat trick.
The good one.
WEEK 4
Thursday . . . Tank Top . . . A.J. Mutha Fuckin Green . . . Mike.
Now who knows what the official ending will be, but I'm feeling pretty good despite losing Flush Gordon and Sammy Watkins in the span of a half hour.
and I'm certainly gonna wear my UCD tank top til Tuesday.
CRAZY STUPID PREDICTIONS FOR WEEK 4
The Detroit Defense makes Hoyer/Jeffery 2016, look like Hoyer/Gordon 2013
The Bills dominate for 3 mins 42 seconds, then you should all go home.
Leveon Bell used as a decoy . . . It's Wheaton's day to shine.
The Jets bench Fitzmagic after INT 4, and from nowhere, The Real Flash Gordon returns out of the comic books and leads them to victory . . . Ah aaaaah . . . he'll save every one of us.
The Browns get some good news. Any good news. Doesn't matter.
Well . . . that about wraps it up for this week. I'll be posting on Wednesdays from here on out, assuming of course that my lucky tank-top continues working it's magic, or at least my wife hides the hari-kari swords and promises to let me binge watch Luke Cage this weekend.
You really need to go back to work Frankie.
Safe travels Mr. Steve.
A. J. Mutha Fuckin Green . . . Mike.
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