6/19/12
I was born ten weeks before Junior
Seau, and I was just a stupid, clueless kid attending the University
of North Texas when I first learned about Seau's unrelenting and
ferocious style of play at the University of Southern California.
I did not follow the Chargers avidly when I was in graduate school,
but whenever I caught an interview with Seau, I could not help thinking
to myself, "If I had actually become a professional athlete,
I would not have been able to handle my own success with anything
approaching the grace and humility of that extraordinary linebacker."
Now it is June of 2012. I am a stupid, clueless man--and Seau has
been lost to the world.
I listened to radio coverage of Seau's suicide the day the news
story broke. The first thing commentators wanted to discuss was
the suspicion that he had shot himself in the chest instead of the
head in order to allow his brain to be studied for damage caused
by multiple concussions. The second thing they wanted to discuss
was a lot of theorizing and armchair psychologizing about what would
drive one of the most beloved and successful sports stars of the
past two decades to take his own life. And the third thing they
wanted to discuss was how difficult it was to transition from the
topic of Seau's death to the stiff penalties meted out by the NFL
to New Orleans Saints players, coaches, and management in the wake
of the "Bountygate" scandal.
I felt sorry for the commentators. There was no graceful way for
them to move from Seau's death to Bountygate--no transition from
a suicide to a scandal that could strike the listeners as anything
but callous and unfeeling, perhaps even base and insulting.
But life does go on, and the commentators had a professional responsibility
to talk about other sports news--even though it was obvious that
some of them considered Seau a personal friend and would like to
have dedicated their entire broadcast to a discussion of his impeccable
work ethic, his irresistible charisma, his numerous charitable activities
off the field, and his enduring sports legacy.
Unfortunately, human beings do not seem to have much of a capacity
for talking about a person's most admirable qualities for any length
of time. In one telephone interview after another, Seau's friends
commented on his work ethic, his charisma, his charitable activities
off the field, and the importance of his sports legacy. That took
about thirty seconds to a minute in each case.
But then they kept talking. They explained how difficult it is for
retired athletes to switch from being the center of attention to
living life as someone who "used to be" important. They
speculated on Seau's emotional state. They guessed at what he must
have been thinking. You could hear the surprise in their voices
as they tried to explain Seau's suicide not to the people listening,
but to themselves.
In an
article published by SI.com ("Justified or not, Seau's
death puts football under scrutiny again"), Andy Staples responded
to Seau's suicide by rehashing some of the most pervasive concerns
about concussions for football players at any level (from little
league to the NFL), but the part of his article I like best is the
introduction, in which he writes: "We don't know why one of
the greatest linebackers of his generation shot himself in the chest
. . . We don't know."
We don't know. And we never will. I suppose there isn't any harm
in speculating about what Seau may have been thinking or feeling
in his final moments, but there are probably more satisfying ways
of honoring his memory.
If your fantasy football league is doing anything to honor Junior
Seau, who spent his professional career being one of the classiest
athletes of this or any other generation, I
would like to hear about it. Are you sending a portion of your
purse to one of the charities that Seau cherished and supported?
Are you naming a trophy after him? If you're doing anything at all
to commemorate his legacy, I hope to be able to share that with
readers in this column. I realize that fantasy leagues based in
Southern California, where Seau made a name for himself both as
a Trojan and a Charger, are the ones most likely to honor him. But
some Charger fans may be surprised to discover how beloved Seau
was throughout the U.S. and the rest of the world.
*****
Heartbreaking Upsets
In my final
column for the 2011 season, I featured three fantasy upsets
that should never have happened. These were head-to-head playoff
or championship matches in which a marginal fantasy team somehow
managed to overcome an opposing team filled with studs and consistent
performers.
As I expected, more responses from readers drifted into my email
account over the offseason. A lot of them came from fantasy owners
who were shocked to lose their championship games because they overestimated
the strength of their own teams. I understand the disappointment
many of these owners felt when they lost, but the teams that defeated
them were, in many cases, solid or even strong squads that might
have been favored to win in the opinion of some fantasy experts.
A reader named Jordan, for example, explains how disappointing it
was for his team (with 11 wins) to lose to a team that defied all
odds to squeak into the playoffs with just 7 victories. Jordan may
have managed his team much better throughout the season than his
opponent did, but a quick eyeballing of the two starting lineups
shows that there was solid talent in most skill positions on both
rosters:
| My Team (11-1) |
| Player |
FPts |
| Tom Brady |
31.0 |
| Ray Rice |
11.2 |
| Darren Sproles |
21.2 |
| Dwayne Bowe |
4.9 |
| Julio Jones |
15.1 |
| Antonio Brown |
8.9 |
| Jimmy Graham |
12.0 |
| Dallas D/ST |
5.0 |
| Billy Cundiff |
2.0 |
| Total: |
111.3 |
|
|
| His Team (7-6) |
| Player |
FPts |
| Tony Romo |
32.7 |
| Adrian Peterson |
6.0 |
| LeSean McCoy |
26.7 |
| Miles Austin |
11.3 |
| Plaxico Burress |
6.9 |
| Jabar Gaffney |
8.5 |
| Dustin Keller |
7.3 |
| Lions D/ST |
4.0 |
| Stephen Gostkowski |
11.0 |
| Total: |
114.4 |
|
|
I think what bothers me the most is my team
had so many chances to put up points and didn’t: Brady failed
to sneak in from the 1 twice that week, Rice didn’t score
that week, Spoles had one called back, Brown had been one of my
more consistent players and he didn't put up, Cundiff missed a FG...Plaxico
got a garbage time TD for him...McCoy scored 3 against the Jets
D...ohh the frustration.
I understand Jordan's frustration, but it is hard for me
to see this matchup as pitting a bunch of scrubs against a squad
of studs. Jordan's MVP of the season was presumably Ray Rice--the
top RB in most fantasy leagues for 2011. But his opponent's MVP
is almost certainly LeSean McCoy--the second-ranked RB according
to most scoring methods. Brady is a better QB than Romo in the real
world, but in terms of fantasy productivity, there are plenty of
weeks when we would expect them to be about equal, just as they
were in this matchup from Week 15 of the 2011 season. Peterson may
not have lived up to expectations in 2011 even before the ACL/MCL
injury, but he certainly wasn't a scrub. When I look at the lineups
Jordan mailed to me, I see two teams that both feature strong QBs
and RBs along with solid (if unspectacular) receivers. I might have
expected Jordan to win this matchup, but it hardly stuns me to discover
that the other team edged him out.
A reader named David, however, sent me the rosters of two consecutive
upsets that occurred in his league. He called these matches "double-whammy
upset specials":
Our league this year was set up, playoff-wise,
for 6 teams (four division winners and two wildcards), with the
top two teams on a bye the first week. In the preliminary round,
the bottom two seeds [both pulled off upsets. The first,] a 7-7
wildcard defeated a 9-4-1 division winner. [The second, our] version
of the 2010 Seahawks (a division winner with a lackluster 6-8 record)
beat a 10-3-1 wildcard.
On to the semifinals, where the two teams with a bye are projected
as pretty heavy favorites. I'd been struggling late, as I had three
starting running backs (Fred Jackson, DeMarco Murray, and Matt Forte)
all go down with injury and end up on IR. Still, I back-filled their
spots pretty well (although Roy Helu fell victim to the injury bug
too). I went into Sunday afternoon's late game with the following
matchup:
| My Team (11-2-1) |
| Pos |
Player |
| QB |
Tony Romo |
| RB |
Arian Foster |
| RB |
C.J. Spiller |
| RB/WR |
Santana Moss |
| WR |
Calvin Johnson |
| WR |
Steve Smith (CAR) |
| TE |
Greg Olsen |
| D/ST |
Denver |
| K |
Jason Hanson |
|
|
| My Opponent
(7-7) |
| Pos |
Player |
| QB |
Matthew Stafford |
| RB |
Beanie Wells |
| RB |
Ryan Grant |
| RB/WR |
Darrius Heyward-Bey |
| WR |
Dez Bryant |
| WR |
Malcom Floyd |
| TE |
Tony Gonzalez |
| D/ST |
Tennessee |
| K |
Stephen Gostkowski |
|
|
I watched Romo walk off the field with a hand
injury after the first Cowboys series in the late afternoon game,
and I knew my shot at a championship was done. 0 points in the QB
slot. Final score, 84-67. Late season injuries killed my season.
An even bigger upset, though, occurred in the other semifinal game.
Our joke-of-a-division-winner team, at 6-8, managed to beat the
one team in the league that had steamrolled through the season and
hadn't been hit badly by the injury bug:
| The 12-1-1
Juggernaut Team |
| Pos |
Player |
| QB |
Aaron Rodgers |
| RB |
LeSean McCoy |
| RB |
Darren Sproles |
| RB/WR |
Ahmad Bradshaw |
| WR |
Wes Welker |
| WR |
Mike Wallace |
| TE |
Rob Gronkowski |
| D/ST |
Green Bay |
| K |
Mason Crosby |
|
|
| The FF Version
of the 2010 Seahawks |
| Pos |
Player |
| QB |
Rex Grossman |
| RB |
Steven Jackson |
| RB |
Kahlil Bell |
| RB/WR |
Kevin Smith |
| WR |
Brandon Marshall |
| WR |
Jabar Gaffney |
| TE |
Jason Witten |
| D/ST |
Seattle |
| K |
Alex Henery |
|
|
The mostly patchwork team won 110-104. The two
worst playoff teams matched up for a Week 17 championship game.
I guess that's what we get for going with a Week 17 championship
game... I'm thinking it's bad mojo.
Now David's matchups are more of what I had in mind. If
I have Arian Foster to your Ryan Grant; if I have Calvin Johnson
to your Dez Bryant; if I have Aaron Rodgers to your Rex Grossman;
if I have Welker and Wallace (who finished 4th and 7th among 2011
receivers) to your Marshall and Gaffney (who finished 12th and 30th),
then yes--I do expect to win! And most people would share that expectation.
Thanks for sharing your double-whammy upset David, even if it is
heartbreaking just to look at those last two rosters in light of
the final score. If I had Rodgers, McCoy, Sproles, Welker, Wallace,
and Gronkowski as my primary players (as did the 12-1-1 team above),
then I would expect to beat just about anyone, but I would have
guaranteed myself a victory against the 6-8 team on the right.
David, your league wins the "Heartbreak Upset of 2011"
award from me, Mike Davis. There is no certificate or cash prize,
but this award is not easy to come by. The rigorous nomination process
requires fantasy football players to go through the grueling first
step of cutting and pasting FF scores into an email message, which
then, despite all of the perils involved, must be sent to my yahoo
account. All submissions are subjected to ferocious review by a
panel of exactly one judge (yours truly) working tirelessly (thanks
in large part to frequent naps!) under stringent timelines (from
say about mid-December of 2011 to mid-June of 2012 or so). At the
conclusion of this review process, after unstinting and painstaking
research (i.e. an alcohol-stained recollection that Gronkowski was
the top tight end in 2011), the Q&A column of FFToday, with
neither the authorization of the website nor the endorsement, support,
or even the passing interest of editor Mike Krueger, must formally
recognize the unnamed owner of the 12-1-1 juggernaut team mentioned
above as truly having been the most robbedest of them all.
For responses to this month's fantasy question please email
me.
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