Playoff Fantasy Football

For all you fantasy football enthusiasts, there's a couple ways to keep your league going beyond the regular season. My friends and I tried one league a couple years ago where you draft players, set a lineup each week, and the team with the highest point total wins after the Super Bowl, so it's run similar to how a normal fantasy league does. We didn't like it that much because some of the people didn't have any players left come the Super Bowl. Granted, that's part picking the right players, but we were hoping to find a different way of keeping more people in it.

I ran across a different "survivor" style league that we've been using for the past several years that everyone seems to like a lot better. Everyone works from the same set of players that are involved in the playoffs, and you can only use each player once. You set a starting lineup that everyone agrees upon, usually the standard QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, TE, K, D that most leagues use, and then pick your lineup from the players still left in both playoffs and furthermore those you haven't used in a previous round. The owner with the most cumulative points after the Super Bowl wins. It's a bit challenging because your goal is to pick a starting lineup of players who perform well, but their teams get eliminated. Not only that, but you also need to consider the matchups the players will face. For example, Manning only gets one game at home (barring them advancing to the AFC Championship and playing a team other than SD), where his passer rating is 16 points better. That being said, while I think the Colts will win, it's smarter to use Manning now against KC's defense than trying to use him against Baltimore next round if they win.

I'm good at picking players, but I haven't had much success picking teams that win, especially in the playoffs. At any rate, here's my picks for this weekend:

Indy over KC - KC is going to run Larry Johnson down Indy's throat this weekend, but with Bob Sanders back the Indy run D won't be quite as bad. The problem is Trent Green and how terrible he's looked since returning from that awful injury against Cincinnati earlier this year. Indy's pass D is actually pretty good, and I just don't think KC will be able to keep up with Indy in the dome.

Dallas over Seattle - Seattle wasn't nearly as dominant at home this season, and they're dealing with way too many injuries. Hasselbeck finally looks healthy, but Alexander looks like a totally different running back this year in a bad way. He had a great game against GB and another very solid outing against SD, but he's averaging 3.6 YPC versus his career average of 4.4, and just doesn't look motivated. He finally got paid, which is why he was running so hard the previous few seasons, and I think Seattle made a terrible decision to give a 28 year old RB with a history of not working hard a big contract extension. Darrell Jackson is hurt again, and even if he plays, his turf toe will not allow him to be the same. Branch has looked very ordinary for the most part since coming over from NE, and even Hackett is hurt. The worst news yet, however, were the injuries to starting corners Trufant and Herndon the last two weeks of the season. I think Romo will have a fine day against a beat up secondary and the Dallas D will do enough to keep them going into the next round.

New England over NYJ - The Jets story was nice this year, but I think it ends here. These coaches know each othe pretty well, but I think we all know Belichick will have the decided edge over his former student Eric Mangini. With Rodney Harrison out, the way to beat the Patriots is go deep, and Pennington's arm just won't allow the Jets to do that. Since they run so many short passing plays, NE won't have as much to think about and Belichick will have his defense ready to shut down the talent-bereft Jets offense. Brady is Brady in the playoffs, and the Jets run defense is horrible, so NE should have no problem here.

Philly over NYG - The Giants have been a mess in the 2nd half of the season, and I can't see them beating a Philly team that's on fire. Jeff Garcia has more than kept the offense afloat...dare I say he's actually improved it since McNabb went down. He's playing some of the best football of his career and I can't see the scuffling Giants beating Philly on the road. The X-factor here is Tiki Barber's pending retirement, and the Giants could make a Steelers/Bettis type run much to everyone's surprise, but I think Eli makes too many mistakes and the defense is not good enough to get that done.