News:

Looking at the updated leader board, things are definitely tightening up. Ceilidh and Archie have joined Neil in the top spot and four more teams are nipping at their heels. We are moving into the second half of our season and with the bye week crunch well underway we can expect more of the unexpected. We also had a nice Clan McDonald gathering at the Western – Laurier game on Saturday. A good time was had by all (except Western of course).

In NFL news, the return of the veteran QB seems to be an ongoing theme. Joe Flacco has people wondering what’s really going on in Cleveland when he suddenly escaped Mordor and joined the “maybe it wasn’t him? club” with Danny Dimes and Sam Darnold. I like Flacco but we’ve seen this movie before and although the script is nice for awhile, it usually doesn’t last. Eventually he turns back into the great pumpkin.

Shark move of the week:

This week we give an appreciative nod to the sharks who are on those kick returners. Full disclosure, I was not tracking the changes to kick-off rules this year and as long as we’re being honest, I probably wouldn’t have traced them to a dramatic surge in return yardage even if I had. I’m pretty sure this is something we need to talk about in the off season but for now, the setting is the setting. This week kick returns turned Malik Washington into ARSB and Luke McCaffrey into Christian. Kudos to Ken for the latter!

Guppy move of the week:

I can’t help wondering if the pressure of being the top dog so far in 2025 is finally starting to get to Pimp Neilly a little? If he’s not hearing footsteps behind him, he must have seen a message floating in his Alpha-Bits Sunday morning that told him to bench Stafford and Swift. Never listen to your cereal Neil!

Smack talk award of the week:

I had a bit of fun with Ayden this week. As the kid in the meme said – “They had us the first half, ain’t gonna lie” but fortunately Gibbs came on strong to keep me from looking dumber than I usually do. In my experience no good deed or football prediction goes unpunished. I definitely got away with one there.

Welcome to fantasy hell award of the week:

Like an Oscar speech, I’m almost afraid to start naming people because I might miss someone. The big one this week is Mike Evans obviously because not only is that a season ender, at his age it could be a career ender.

We’re also seeing a lot of prominent players with Qs that are turning into Os late in the week and also guys who are carrying that questionable tag through multiple missed weeks.

I also feel badly for the Piper who has had to watch Justin Fields turn into Sally Fields. Actually with the way he’s playing, he might be more like Eleanor Rugby…

If for no other reason than my ability to relate, I’m giving the award to Brandon, who was struck by the curse of the single digit scorers. Guys having bad games is part of the game. Getting a sit or start decision wrong happens too but there are few things more frustrating than watching the majority of your roster just lay there motionless in the same week. What can you do about that? Nothing.