Week 12 Chumleys: The Slim-leys!!!

So afraid to attempt a witty caption...

It's crunchtime for the Chumley race. Romo and Moss are your clubhouse leaders at 4 a piece, with only two more weeks of awards. Let's take a peek around the Westside FFL landscape and see who's peaking at the right time.

Game 1: Bisbee def. Death Knell - And the Chumley goes to...
Antonio Gates, TE, SD - I chose Gates over Kolby Smith because Gates straight up killed the Ravens, and Kolby Smith is a flash in the pan. As an LT owner, I become extremely aroused whenever I see the score change in Chargers games. However, all I got this week was a couple lousy Phillip Rivers TD passes, two of which went to Gates. Antonio, who was already the best TE in fantasy, had his best game of the season with 6 catches, 105 yards and 2 TDs.

Game 2: Chicago def. Larry Craig - And the Chumley goes to...
Wes Welker, WR, NE - Welker gets the nod here for erasing an eight point deficit in my matchup against Melvin heading into the Sunday Night Football game. In essence, Welker has become New England's best running back, getting multiple grabs on short passes out of multiple receiver sets, while Laurence Maroney stews on the sidelines wondering why he's even wearing a cup.

Game 3: Jabroc def. Lymez - And the Chumley goes to...
Larry Fitzgerald, WR, Ari - Larry hauled in 9 passes for 156 yards and 2 touchdowns against the 49ers on Sunday. Fitzgerald might be the most reliable receiver of the season to this point. He's posted double digit points in 7 of his last 8 games. Up next for Larry is the Cleveland Browns, and Rich will need the points as he goes up against Shawn for the #1 seed in the playoffs.

Game 4: MikeJax def. Cripplers - And the Chumley goes to...
Vikings, D/ST, Min - I already talked about the Vikings yesterday, so here's a good spot for a mini-rant. Do you know how frustrating it is watching Devin Hester run back kick after kick and not get any points for it?! Riddle me this, assclown, how is a blocked punt a scorable play, and not a punt return touchdown? The same 11 players are on the field for both events, so don't give me this "defense vs. special teams" balogna. The players don't become a special team once the punt is in the air. They're special teams from the second they line up on the field. And in other news, only one of those two events actually changes the score of the real game! Which one?! THE TOUCHDOWN!!! This is unequivocably the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. If Devin Hester only knew...

Game 5: Delaware def. Hawaii - And the Chumley goes to...
Drew Brees, QB, NO - True story...one time in college, me and Deewaan drank like 40 brees and we couldn't feel our faces.

Game 6: N. Korea def. The Patent Office - And the Chumley goes to...
Kellen Winslow II, TE, Cle - OK, I admit it, I've got a soft spot for tight ends. (That's what she said!!!) But it's hard not to reward a tight end with the most illustrious prize in fantasy football when he catches 10 passes for 107 yards and a TD. Several of Jordan's players scored slightly higher than Winslow, but K2 gets the nod. As a sidenote, anybody tired of hearing him referred to as "Kellen Winslow Jr"? Uh, yeah, we get that it's not actually his dad playing. Thanks for clearing that up, Gus Johnson.

As a final note, after listening to Verne Lundquist during the LSU-Arky game and then Gus Johnson during Texans-Browns, I am ready for some college basketball! Good thing the Eagles won't make the playoffs, that will give me more time to watch hoops. Especially my boy OJ Mayo, averaging 22 ppg, and Walbsy's boy, Eric Gordon, averaging 27.3.

Week 8 Chumleys

The surging Ball Maulers were the only Autobots team to notch a win last week.

Where does the time go? It feels like I haven't posted in weeks. There's so much ground to cover today, and I know I'll miss some things. Let's see...
-Robert Goulet died, and while my future employers went with "The Coconut Bangers Ball", I'll choose "Red Ships of Spain" any day and twice on Sunday.
-Sasquatch is alive, but it might be a bear instead.

Ok, I think I covered all the important stuff. On to those Chumley awards you've anxiously been awaiting.

Game 1: Hefty def. Aaron - And the Chumley goes to...
Braylon Edwards, WR, Cle - I was listening to a Fantasy Football Podcast at work today and they were talking about if they could redraft midseason, how would it go? Brady was taken first, Tomlinson taken second, Addai taken third, Randy Moss taken 4th. Here's my point, dude...Braylon Edwards was the next receiver they took! Braylon's definitely winning me over at this point in the season, but the second best wide receiver?? Absurdity, right? Well maybe not. 37 catches, 669 yards, 9 TD's, all while playing for the pigskin wasteland known as the Cleveland Browns. Pretty amazing season for Braylon so far.

Game 2: Shawn def. Melvin - And the Chumley goes to...
Chargers, D/ST, SD - 29 fantasy points out of a defense is re-donkey-kong. If you need help visualizing how a defense could score this many points, here's your frame of reference: 29 fantasy points is the same number the Giants defense scored against the Eagles in the 'Winston Justice' game.

Game 3: Mike def. Jordan - And the Chumley goes to...
Antonio Gates, TE, SD - Derek Anderson could have gotten the nod here after his 248 yard, 3 TD day, but I went with Gates and his 3 catch, 92 yard, 2 TD day instead. Like much of Southern California, Gates was on fire on Sunday.
Too soon, or just not that funny? You decide.

Game 4: Paul def. Craig - And the Chumley goes to...
Philip Rivers QB, SD - When you throw 11 passes, and three of them are touchdowns, you've had yourself a pretty solid day. Rivers seems to be one of the most hot-and-cold QB's in the league. He's had 4 games with two or more touchdowns, and 3 games with no touchdowns. There's no middle ground here, but the important thing is that San Diego's offense seems to have found it's spark again after sputtering through the opening part of the schedule.

Game 5: Dave def. Adam - And the Chumley goes to...
Drew Brees, QB, NO - While I'd normally give this award to Jason Elam for his kicking heroics, it would be irresponsible of me to ignore Brees's monstrous 336 yard, 4 touchdown game against the Niners. Brees has climbed out of a major early season slump to become our league's 14th ranked QB. He's tossed eight touchdowns in the last three games, and the schedule looks pretty favorable for Brees the rest of the way.

Game 6: Shelby def. Rich - And the Chumley goes to...
Joseph Addai, RB, Ind - Addai led all RB's by a 9 point margin on Sunday, and is the fifth ranked back in the league. I personally think he'll have a strong performance against the Colts on Sunday, who hopefully can get a win so we can finally read a sports story about a city other than Boston for a week. Even the Philadelphia media is Boston-centric. It's T.O. Week, and the big sports story is that Curt Schilling could be coming back to the Phillies. I just need something different. I'm even getting excited by Kobe Bryant trade rumors, even though there's less than a 0% chance he'd end up in Philadelphia. Just anything to break up the Celtics-Sox-Pats (even a moderate amount of Boston College) monopoly on ESPN programming. Enough already. I just got my Sports Illustrated in the mail and I'm scared to open it. Papelbon's on the cover and Brady's brooding up in the upper left corner.
Sidenote: It's almost impossible to type Joe's last name without typing Adidas first and then backspacing and fixing it. And it's not like Adidas is even something I type that often.

And The Chumley Goes To...

It's time to hand out some well-earned hardware.
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First of all, right off the bat, no punches pulled, let me just congratulate Dave Wanner on the phenomenal photoshoppery that you see above. I asked Dave to modify the Heisman in such a way that it beared the head of one of our league members, and he came through. You're a good man, sir.

Now, a word about the following column. When watching the VMA's the other night, I decided that there just aren't enough arbitrary awards being handed out in this world. Is Fall Out Boy definitely better than the White Stripes? I never thought so, but MTV says otherwise, so I guess I was wrong all along! Not wanting to miss out on the fun, I've decided to reward some NFL players with the official award of Fisting Jerry Dunn.

My first step was choosing a name. It seemed that most of the other names of awards were all gay sounding and ended in 'y'. The Emmy, the Tony, the Grammy, etc. I didn't want to break that rich tradition, so I went with the gayest word ending in 'y' that I could think of, Chumley.

From there I had to come up with criteria for the Chumley. What I've decided to do is hand out 6 Chumleys after every week of game. The Chumley will go to the most exceptional player on each of the 6 winning fantasy teams each week. I've decided that in this case, 'exceptional' means the following:

-Player put up a massive amount of points

-Player far outperformed expectations of self

-Player gave fantasy team a significant advantage at one position

-Player made a badass play that resulted in extra fantasy points

With these criteria in mind, I will now announce the first weekly Chumley award winners for the 2007 season. Each player's Chumleys will be carefully tabulated throughout the season, and the player with the most Chumley awards will be designated Fisting Jerry Dunn's Most Valuable Player. That player will likely get a pizza party at Chuck E. Cheez or something equally lame. The budget's tight here this season. Now, let's get on with the awards.

Game 1: Mike def. Craig - And the Chumley goes to...

Antonio Gates, TE, San Diego. Antonio gave Mike a much needed cushion at tight end, outscoring counterpart Ben Watson by more than 12 points.

Game 2: Hefty def. Melvin - And the Chumley goes to...
Marshawn Lynch, RB, Buffalo. Marshawn came out with both guns blazing in his first NFL game against a tough Denver defense and racked up 90+ rushing yards and a 23 yard touchdown.

Game 3: Aaron def. Rich - And the Chumley goes to...
Steelers, D/ST, Pittsburgh. The Steel Curtain was as effective in fantasy as it was in the real NFL, racking up 22 points in a severe beatdown on the Cleveland Browns.

Game 4: Shawn def. Aaron - And the Chumley goes to...
Randy Moss, WR, New England. Moss led the league in receiving yards, and reeled in a 51 yard touchdown in his first game as a Patriot.

Game 5: Slimmy def. Dave - And the Chumley goes to...

LaMont Jordan, RB, Oak. ESPN.com's least favorite running back on draft day turned into quite a valuable commodity for young Slims, as he was the second highest scoring running back in our league.

Game 6: Jordan def. Shelby - And the Chumley goes to...
Reggie Wayne, WR, Ind. Reggie's monster game on Thursday night gave Jordan a lead that he never gave back up in cruising to a season opening win.

Congratulations to all the winners. As the season progresses, I'll have a Chumley tracker that shows the leaderboard. For now, it's easy! They all have 1!!