HELP WANTED Did you take one in the groin on the fantasy gridiron? Have some humorous quips about the NFL? Send me your best Groin Shots and Couch Comments Sunday night or early Monday each week and I'll add them to this column. This will really help me out as the holidays are fast approaching. Email

The fantasy playoffs are here, and the curse of the first overall pick continued this week, not to mention the diabolical "Campo Factor".

Groin Shot of the Week Candidates
Brad Johnson. Another Rich Gannon in the making perhaps? Johnson passed for 4 TDs and 276 yards against a Falcons defense that had been pretty awesome as of late. Johnson certainly made some fools out of people who kept him on the bench. But hey, at least some of that must have gone to help out Keyshawn Johnson owners, right? Ah, crap...

Terrell Owens. Making a much anticipated return trip to the home of the Cowboys, where he generated so much goodwill posing on their star back in 2000, Owens caught 12 balls for 123 yards and 2 TDs, including the game winner with 00:12 seconds left. What a way to put it to Cowboy fans already reeling in mediocrity hell.

Jeff Garcia. Those playing against Owens and Garcia this week can certainly think about what might have been while icing down their groin. Something best termed the, "Campo Factor." Garcia had only moderate success through 3 quarters, until the Campo Factor came into play. Benefiting from a prevent defense, Dwayne Goodrich playing absolutely horrible coverage but getting no help, plus one of the worst decisions to try a FG all year, and Garcia cranked it up with 3 TDs in the 4th quarter.

Comments From The Couch

• You had the first overall pick this season. Marshall Faulk was the clear number one choice. Although he has been hobbled lately and the Rams look bad, the fantasy playoffs are here and you cannot, not play him in an interstate showdown against the Chiefs. Sigh. There's always next season...

• You could not really ask for a player to better ease himself back from injury. I'm speaking of Deuce McAllister of course. Dresses but essentially misses 1 game. Then comes back with a "moderate" 99 yards a 1 TD performance to show us he is a-okay. Then the playoffs start and BAM!, McAllister peels off a 3 TD day. Sweet, and definitely necessary facing off against the likes of Priest Holmes.

• I know Tommy Maddox had his receivers drop some balls, but he sure looked like he could have used another week off. I guess there was actually some validity to the Maddox-Kordell Stewart debate.
  [Contributed by S. Carter]

• I would like to know what on earth Tom Coughlin was thinking when Jacksonville called a man defense against a final play Hail Mary that Cleveland ended up converting to win the game? That is just the stupidest thing that you could do and it cost the Jags a win on Sunday. Stupid, just stupid.
  [Contributed by P. Jugasek]

• What kind of pass interference call was that on Corey Chavous on Green Bay's game winning drive? Do you really think that Brett Favre needs any help engineering yet another come from behind win? Come on, that call was just horrible. No way that same call would have been made if the game was played in Minnesota.
  [Contributed by P. Jugasek]

  [Mike: I particularly liked the Na'il Diggs tackle covering Jim Kleinsasser that wasn't called myself.]

• All right Gannon, that's now 10, 300+ yard reminders that I should not have traded you off my dynasty team way back in the preseason. Enough already! I get the point! However, I still don't know whether to give you the MVP vote or Priest Holmes. At least Michael Vick, or should I say the Bucs, helped narrow the field down a little this week.

• It certainly seemed like a bad weekend for punters. Dave Zastidul of the Ravens looked like a lost sheep out there deciding to pass? punt? run for his life? before going back to punt, which was - no surprise - blocked. The hit on Jeff Feagles by N.D. Kalu of the Eagles took the cake though. Someone on the Seahawks punt blocking unit must have had it in for Feagles the way they opened a hole for Kalu to run through.

• I think it's about time we changed Matt Hasselbeck's nickname from "Mr. Preseason" to "Mr. Garbage Time".

• Just when you thought he was going to pull a Michael Westbrook, Steve Smith, two weeks removed from a suspension for whuppin' a teammate's ass, exploded on Sunday. He had 5 catches for 144 yards and a TD to go along with his 2 punt returns for TDs. This was a major contribution to the Panthers scoring 52 points in the game, which accounts for a mere 24.8% of their total points scored this season.
  [Contributed by S. Carter]

• Not only did the Panthers score more points (52) than the Texans gained in offensive yards (47), but so did the Chiefs (49). If the Texan players want to request something like a little time off of practice from coach Dom Capers, who do you think they send at this point, David Carr or Aaron Glenn?

• Does anyone besides me think that the new Nike apparel commercials are just plain stupid? Plus, if you have DirecTV, you probably saw the ads for the NWFA, a professional football league for women. They apparently have a TV contract. Yeah, that's going to fly.
  [Contributed by S. Carter]

  [Mike: I'll agree that the inner city pull-up competition is pretty dumb.]

• Who saw the James Stewart play in the Cardinals-Lions game? Good for you if you didn't. After taking the handoff and falling over his own lineman, Stewart seemed to think he was tackled and threw the ball to the ground. A Cardinal player ran over to cover the apparent fumble. Oops. However, since he threw it forward it was declared an incomplete pass after review. That about sums up how the season has gone for both of these teams all in one play.
  [Contributed by S. Carter]

• Reading in the news this morning that Redskins defensive co-ordinator Marvin Lewis is leaving for a head coaching job at Michigan State. So, that's one down. How many co-ordinators do you think Steve Spurrier will go through in his Redskins tenure? Safe to say money is not the issue here.

• What an absolutely brutal performance by the Rams. I do believe that it's now fair to say that the Rams are just as bad as...let's say, Arizona?
  [Contributed by P. Jugasek]

  [Mike: I guess we'll find out next Sunday in the...(yawn!)...Cards-Rams showdown in primetime on ESPN. Could be early to bed that night.]

And The Winner Is...
Giving it to Garcia this week. Talk about some divine intervention propping him up from probably a below average day to a superstar day all in a single quarter. The Cowboys replacing injured Derek Ross with Dwayne Goodrich, who was brutal. The Campo FG call. What on God's green earth was that? You know it's bad when Pat Summerall is out coaching someone. Even the near INT by Roy Williams on a pass that slipped through Terrell Owens' hands. So close. Yep, that performance was a definitive square shot in the groin for many I'm sure, with a pain that could linger until July or August of next year.

:: comments to mike macgregor