Letter From The Commish

This coming week contains a special Thursday night game. As such, be sure to submit your Week 7 rosters by gametime on Thursday night or else your lineup from Week 6 will carry over for this week. Transactions must also be submitted by gametime on Thursday but I can't guarantee I'll be available Thursday evening. If any team intends to start a player that is being picked up this week, the Commish encourages you to pick up the player Wednesday night or earlier on Thursday. The Commish will probably arrive back at league headquarters around 6:30pm on game night but could always run late if detained.

Week 7 is the 3rd division week of the season. After Sunday, each team will have played the other teams within the division one time each. Only three teams stand 2-0 within the division. They are the NFC Norris, Greenback Iguanas and Strange Highways. The Dewey division is beginning to shape up as 1999's version of the Moe division in 1997. For you league vets out there, you remember that as the year a 7-8 Grande To The Party team stumbled its way into the playoffs and, in fact, all the way to the finals before proving mortal. All four division teams still had a mathematical chance of winning that division going into Week 15. It made for an entertaining division and an entertaining league that season and it was the only time in league history that a sub .500 ballclub found itself in the playoffs.

Just a thought: the Commish has it on good authority that Coach Wassem had counseled Coach Will around Week 2 to pick up Jeff George. Think Coach now wishes he'd done that?

Week 6 saw its share of injuries. Among the players who went down for one reason or another were Darnay Scott (bruised ribs), new Jets QB Ray Lucas (sprained ankle, 2-3 weeks), Herman Moore (leg), Cory Dillon (ankle), Marc Brunell (bruised ribs), Dan Marino (shoulder), Charlie Batch (bruised arm-huh?), Robert Smith (abdomen, 4-6 weeks), Randall Cunningham (good old fashioned benching), Eric Moulds (hamstring, 2-3 weeks), and Jake "The Snake Finger" Plummer (finger, 4-6 weeks). Those affected? Grande To The Party's QB of the moment becomes Brian Griese and Montezuma's Revenge is without starting RB Smith while he has surgery on the ab and also must be uneasy about Dillon's ankle since such injuries to a RB can linger. Keyshawn Johnson's value went up and right back down all in the same game as Ray Lucas looked impressive in the 1st half but was stymied in the 2nd half and eventually hurt his ankle. The Clams continue to play without Steve Young and Michael Irvin and only this week saw the return of Wayne Chrebet from his preseason leg injury. The NFC Norris' Brett Favre and Rickey Williams have been playing through injuries for much of the year and the team was without Carl Pickens for the 1st part of the year. The woebegone Doggies will now try carrying on without QB Jake Plummer. Didn't they used to have Brad Johnson? The very week they picked up Derek Loville, he was hurt and hasn't played for two weeks since. Of course, Terrell Owens missed Sunday's game as well. The P Swords have suffered bad luck at QB for the 2nd straight year, losing Brad Johnson last year but getting Randall and now losing Vinny T in Week 1 and trying to survive on the 49ers 2nd stringer the past three weeks. PMS has two banged up QBs. The Iguanas have been the league's answer to Darwinism, getting fat off the pickings of other teams' injuries. James Stewart, Jeff George, Olandis Gary. And simultaneously, losing Jamal Anderson and Shannon Sharpe. The Highways went about four weeks without Herman Moore while the Steamers lost Terrell Davis though they continue to hold on to his roster spot and they've been without Joey Galloway and Rob Moore for all of or for major portions of the year. The Mystics survived without Cecil Collins the first couple weeks and the Retreads have done well without Fred Taylor for the past month and Bam Morris at times. The Retreads must now learn to experience FFL life without Eric Moulds the next couple weeks.

Fun with numbers: while Montezuma's Revenge stands 2-4 despite outscoring its opponents by five points for the season, both the NFC Norris and the Palace of Swords sport 3-3 marks while allowing 10 and 21 more points than they've scored, respectively. The King of Dogs have given up 43 more points than the next team, the Stanley Steamers (255-212). While Grande To The Party is +40 (pts. scored - pts. allowed), the Greenback Iguanas are +38. Oh yeah, the Party is 3-3. The Iguanas are 5-1. Nine of the twelve league teams stand at .500 or better. Four of them are in the Howe division. In fact, all four Howe teams would be OVER .500 after Week 7 if the Steamers beat the Highways and the Retreads defeat the Mystics. So, only three teams are under .500? It doesn't seem possible but give the King of Dogs credit for helping to make history. At 0-6, the Dogs have lost to five of the nine .500 or better teams. Their sixth loss was to Montezuma's Revenge, a team that the Commish still feels is better than its 2-4 record would indicate.

Your playoff teams as of today are the Bearded Clams, Greenback Iguanas and Natural Mystics with the Strange Highways owning the wildcard. The Highways and Mystics would be playing a 3rd game while the Clams and Iguanas would be paired together in the other 1st round game. While the weather may be getting colder, the football season is just warming up. Pile up the leaves, get a running start, then...

Go deep, I'll throw it!

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