The Year in Review - 1996

 

Expansion:  In our third year, we expanded the league from 10 to 12 teams by adding Bobby Bondesen and Rob Hunter.  Now we had four teams in each of the three divisions.  The good thing about this format is that now six teams would make the playoffs instead of four.  The only rule change was that we decided to pick the winners of three NFL games each week.  You would get one point for each game you got correct. 

 

The Draft:  We had the draft in the boardroom at work during lunch.  Jessie bought pizzas since we were nice enough to reschedule the draft for him.  Unfortunately for him, Beaman was attending his birthday luncheon and missed the first five rounds of the draft.  We made the 2nd and 4th round picks for him, but skipped him during the 1st, 3rd, and 5th rounds.  Talk about a cutthroat league!  Likewise, Cory missed the first nine rounds and was skipped every other round.  Danny picked Emmitt Smith, who was coming off a 25 touchdown season in 1995, with the first pick.  The rest of the top five were Steve Young, Brett Favre, Jerry Rice, and Scott Mitchell.

 

The Season:  Darrell began the season at 9-1, although five of his victories were by eight points or less.  Since inception, this pushed Darrell's overall record to 37-7, an 84.1% winning percentage.  Mark won his first seven but lost to division rival Darrell during week 8.  Mark's opponents were only averaging 25 ppg against him until Darrell ripped him 82-38.  Rob and Beaman each lost their first five games while Cory began the year at 3-8.  Beaman would have had an okay team if he had participated.  He got his first three NFL picks correct and then failed to make any more.  He had the #1 kicker (Al del Greco), and the #2 defense (Panthers) and Quarterback (Testaverde).  But he scored a total of five points from his wide receivers and tightends all season long.  39 starts between J.J. Stokes, Tamarick Vanover, and Irv Smith netted him zero points.  Poor Rob.  His opponents scored a league leading 51 ppg against him through the first eight.  After a six game losing streak, Gary was 1-10-1 and out of the playoffs. 

 

The Playoffs and Trash Talking:  Mark defeated Darrell the final week to win the #1 seed and a bye in the playoffs.  Mike won seven of his final eight while averaging 60 ppg to claim the other bye.  Martin won the other division and beat Danny in the first round.  Darrell easily spanked Jessie by 50, 87-37, to advance to a third meeting with Mark.  Mark won 55-46 to face Mike in DangerBowl III, who had eliminated Martin 51-28.  We were all ready for some good trash talking when Mark responding with "Just good sports, whatever the outcome!!"  Wimps!  The outcry was overwhelming.  "Kick these guys out of the league," shouted Jessie.  "Bobby and I have been talking trash all week and where fighting for 6th place.  Toughen these guys up."  Beaman responded with a classic:  "Man alive, reading Mark and Mike attempting to write trash to each other is like watching that part of "Babe" when the pig says to the sheep, "Get into the pen, ya-y--ya butt-heads!"  Weak!  Stop this puked up vanilla pudding--gosh, I'm just glad to be in the game-- it's honor enough just representing my division--may the best man (or woman) win--be so kind as to pass me the marmalade--Mr. congeniality dog droppings sprinkled with powdered sugar nonsense, and start entertaining us with some straight-out-of-the-butt still steaming dog dropping macho promises of total destruction that only one of you will keep.  That way, all we losers can ride number 2 and in so doing forget how pathetic we are."  The remarks were better than the game in which Mike won 56-19 to become DangerBowl III Champion.  Mike's top players included the 49ers, Mark Brunell, Curtis Martin, Ricky Watters, Wesley Walls, and Michael Jackson (hee hee).

 

In the loser's bracket, the Cannibal Bowl Championship placed Cory, who had lost to Beaman, versus Rob, who had lost to Gary 26-21.  At least the loser's bowl had good trash talking with Rob stating:  "are the Cannibals as bad as their record?  At first glance the reasonable fan would surely say NO!!...They're not NEARLY as good as their record!!  Cory lost to Rob, 32-26 to win his second straight loser bowl.  The following year we renamed the loser bowl after Cory's teams, the Cannibals. 

 

Milestones:  Brett Favre won the League MVP for Bobby with 181 points.  Darrell had the top two runningbacks with Terry Allen scoring 149 points and Terrell Davis scoring 127.  Darrell won the league scoring title with 908 points while Mike was a close second with 899.  Cory and Gary failed to break 500 with 498 and 497, respectively.

 

The Year in Review Links for 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004