Playoff Fantasy Football

Was recently introduced to a style of playoff fantasy football that I had not seen before, and wanted to get some additional opinions on strategy from other readers.

Basically, you pick a full team (2 QB, 3 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 Kicker, 1 Def/ST, 1 Wild Card), but you must select one (and only one) from each team in the playoffs–and any person in the league can choose the same guy (ie, everyone would presumably want Drew Brees).

Let’s assume a standard scoring for this (6 pts/TD, 4 pts/passing TD, 1 pt/10 yards rushing/receiving, 1 pt/25 yards passing, etc).

Here’s the lineup I came up with:

Green Bay: Rodgers, QB
San Francisco: Gore, RB
New Orleans: Brees, QB
NY Giants: Cruz, WR
Atlanta: Gonzalez, TE
Detroit: C. Johnson, WR
New England: Brady, Wildcard
Baltimore: Rice, RB
Houston: Foster, RB
Denver: Prater, K
Pittsburgh: Defense/Special Teams
Cincinnati: AJ Green, WR

Let us know who you have in the comments…

Buyer Beware: Polian tenures come with ups and downs

I was shocked when I heard news yesterday about Bill Polian—not that he had been fired, but that apparently Twitter was blowing up with Vikings fans & local sports media wanting to quickly make a move to bring him in as the voice of authority for the team.  Digging deeper showed that many other media & fan bases, including Chicago, Oakland, and even Dallas were clamoring over the opportunity to hire a “proven commodity” in Polian.

But they all seem to be overlooking one significant factor – Bill Polian’s track record is generally one of building teams that are great in the regular season, then failing in the playoffs, or ultimately in the big game itself. Essentially he is to football exactly what the local media uses in Minnesota ridicule the Minnesota Twins – regular season success followed by postseason failure.

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NFL Picks, 2011 Season Week 16

As one would expect in a week where an 0-13 team finally wins, and a 13-0 team finally loses, picks last week were amongst the worst we’ve seen all season—still, when you’re 11-5 (Tony) and 10-6 (Andy) overall, that’s not a terrible week.

That puts us at 150-74 (Andy) and 149-75 (Tony) for the season, which  puts us on par with many national “experts”.

This week, four games are picked differently—about as many as we’ve ever picked separately, and probably enough to give one of us a solid lead heading into Week 17.  Or, if things go as normal, we’ll split and still be just one game apart…

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NFL Picks: 2011 Season, Week 13

Andy finished 11-5 last week, which would normally be a solid week—unfortunately, he was up against my great football mind, which went 13-3 for the week. OK, to be fair he pretty much handed me the Green Bay/Detroit game…and the Carolina/Indianapolis game.  Still, I’ll take tied after 12 weeks.

Week 13 brings three matchups where we differ, so we’ll definitely see a leader heading into Week 14. Andy appears to be using some of my own logic against me, avoiding two west coast teams that are heading east in picking Miami over Oakland (which might be a solid pick, given how the Dolphins have been playing) and Jacksonville over San Diego. I think the running games from Oakland and Tampa Bay (over Carolina) will carry the day, and that the turmoil in Jacksonville with Jack Del Rio being fired will reign.

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2012 Football Hall of Fame Inductees

This afternoon apparently marks the announcement of the semifinalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2012, and so far we’ve managed to not officially gone on record with our picks for this year.  So here goes…

In 2011, we hit on 3 out of 5 picks (Sanders, Sharpe & Dent) while missing the obvious Marshall Faulk and the longshot Ed Sabol, while picking Dermontti Dawson and Tim Brown. So how will we do this year? Keep reading to find out…

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