Ladies, Gentleman and Dylan,

Welcome back to week number 5 of George W Bush League entertainment. Congratulations to everyone that won this week and my condolences to everyone that lost. Despite the fact that half of us lost, it was a really good week in the league. We had a lot of high scores and Week 5 was much higher scoring than Week 4. In fact, our league scored 103 more points in Week 5 than in week 4. Simple math shows that equates to 10 points per team. If you round Kenny and Rob D’s scores up 1 point, every team scored 100 or better this week. We had some huge performances, some questionable performances and of course, the return of Tom Brady.

I’m going to start this week with a very important subject in fantasy football – trash talk. Talking trash in fantasy is a dangerous game. Either your team backs it up and wins, or your team lets you down and loses. On one hand, you can look like Babe Ruth calling his shot and on the other hand, you can look like the Cleveland Browns list of quarterbacks.

This week is a cautionary tale of talking trash since my opponent chose to do so during the Pats game on Sunday. Let’s see how that went…

Dylan

Dylan x2

Dylan x3

That’s not actually what Dylan said. What he actually said was:

“Marty”

“Marty x2”

“Marty x3”

He of course was referencing the three touchdowns that Martellus Bennett scored during Sunday’s Patriots game. Dylan was bragging because Martellus scored touchdowns on catches of 7 yards, 5 yards and 36 yards on his way to a 27.7 point game. That is huge for a tight end in fantasy and made it look like Dylan was going to run away with our matchup. What Harambe failed to realize was that Tom Brady was on my team. The same Tom Brady who made his season debut and scored 38 points this week. The same Tom Brady who threw all three of those touchdown passes. This is why I never talk shit during fantasy matchups. - because it can come back and bite you in the ass.

Okay, now that I’ve gotten this out of my system we can continue. There is lots to cover this week, so I’m just going to keep it simple and recap the matchups. As with last week I’m going to include an interview with one league member at the end - stay tuned.

Matchup 1: WellJustTellUr MotherWeAteItAll won 133.6 to 108.5

After putting up 124 in a win last week, my team put up an even better line this week with 133. First crazy stat of the week – that 133 was only the 4th highest score in the league during Week 5. Only 2 points higher than the 5th highest team (Frader). I told you it was a high scoring week. So how did I do it? Tom Brady of course. In his first game back, Tom put the fear of God into the rest of the NFL by dismantling the Browns in Cleveland. Over a little more than 3 quarters of playing time, Tom threw for 400 yards and 3 TDs. He also rushed for 2 first downs and had an A+ celebration right in the Brown's grill:

Even though the Sox suck and got swept by Cleveland, Tom showed Cleveland who’s boss.

Some other highlights included Jordan Howard of the Bears and Amari Cooper of the Raaaaiiiddehhhsss. Howard had an even 30, Cooper had 26.8 and together with Tom, those three combined for 94.8 points. Can I get an Amen? Amen.

Last week I said that Jordan Howard was hot dogs, not legs. He immediately made me look stupid by rushing for 118 yards while catching 3 passes for 45 yards and a TD. He’s now scored 52 points in his last two games and has a stronghold on the Bears starting RB job. He’ll also be in my lineup again this weekend for a semi-favorable matchup with the Jaguars. Even though he made me look stupid, I still think Howard is going to regress. After this week in Jacksonville, he goes up against an underrated Packers defense and then the Vikings. I can assure you he won’t be in my lineup for that week and the following week he has a bye. I’m going to stand by my decision, I think we’ve already seen the best of Howard.

I was wrong about Howard, but I nailed it with my Amari Cooper prediction. I said he was too good to be putting up such low numbers and he proved that he is too good to be putting up such low numbers. This week he went for 138 yards and a TD on 6 catches. Half of his points came on a 64 yard TD catch, but that shows you he is a deep threat as well as a possession receiver. The only concern here is that he did it against the Chargers. The Chargers suck, they really really suck. (Water sucks, it really really sucks – The WaterBoy).

I always mention the negatives on my team because I refuse to let piss poor performances go unnoticed. AJ Green is culprit number one this week as he really disappointed me. I’m not mad, I’m disappointed. Andy Dalton scored 27.5 points for Dylan’s team, yet AJ Green scored just 7? Andy Dalton threw for 269 yards and 2 TDs, yet AJ Green had just 4 catches for 50 yards? So frustrating, that’s the second time this has happened. Lamar Miller is culprit number 2. While you can’t judge a player based on a matchup vs the Vikings, he is killing me. Through 5 weeks he has yet to score a TD and his point totals have gone down each of the last three weeks - 16.9, 16.1 and 4.5 this week. You usually don’t win when your first two picks combine for just 11.5 points, but the rest of the team picked those two guys up. Game, blouses.

Matchup 1: Ken Killed Harambe lost 108.5 to 133.6:

Although it hurt him this week, the return of Tom Brady is huge for Dylan and all Martellus Bennett owners. I’m going to say that about any team that has anyone on the Pats, so get used to it. Martellus Bennett is now a clear cut top 10 TE in fantasy and Dylan can plug him into his lineup the rest of the year. The best part is that Dyl doesn’t have to deal with Travis Kelce’s inconsistent ass anymore and could even trade him to a TE needy team. Since Tyler Eifert isn’t coming back and Coby Fleener sucks, maybe Broke Back Caleb could make an offer? Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match.

The "matchmaker" from Mulan. Most underrated Disney movie ever.

I mentioned this above, but Dylan got 27.5 points out of Andy Dalton. The best part? Dylan picked up Dalton last week for $5. Although his team didn’t get the win, it was a nice pickup by the Chylan. Speaking of pickups, I have to talk about Jordan Matthews. When I saw that Matthews was a free agent last week, I couldn’t believe it. Why did Guy drop him? How could Guy drop a player that he picked in the 9th round? How could Guy elect to keep Adam Humphries over Matthews (who?)? So many questions, so few answers. The one question that did get answered was: “who would break the bank for Matthews?” The answer was Dylan, who spent $33 dollars on the free-agent WR. The next highest bid was Frader at $25. Lamone and myself bid $15, while Tieg bid just $12. The fact that only half the league bid on him is kinda crazy, but bye weeks make things tricky. Ken Killed Harambe spent 22% of its FAAB budget on Matthews, which isn’t too unreasonable. He is a talented player and is technically the #1 receiver on the Eagles. Unfortunately it didn’t work out so well for Dylan this week and Matthews only scored 8.5 points. Having said that, I think it will pay dividends going forward.

Speaking of dividends - Dylan acquired Todd Gurley from Ken this week and it paid off immediately. Gurley put up 20.9 points against the Bills on 23 carries for 72 yards and a TD. You can’t argue with the volume, but the average yards per touch continues to concern me. Through 5 games, he has 105 carries. That’s good. Through 5 games, he’s averaging just 2.7 yards per carry. That’s bad. One silver lining is the receiving numbers. Gurley only caught 21 passes last year, but through 5 weeks he has 11 receptions and is on pace to nearly double his reception total from last year.

Ken Killed Harambe, but Ken also killed Dylan’s team this week. How? Todd Gurley did so well…. Oh yes, but Jeremy Hill did not. Somehow, someway, Ken was able to unload Jeremy Hill on to Dylan. The curse that is Jeremy Hill. The frustrating, infuriating, mind boggling headache that is Jeremy Hill. Somehow Ken was able to get something in return for him. Amazing. After scoring 37 points combined in weeks 3 and 4, Jeremy Hill pulled a Jeremy Hill this week. His 2 points on Sunday were pathetic. Do you want to know how many RBs scored more than 2 points this week? Sixty. Yes, sixty running backs scored more than Jeremy Hill this week. The fortunate part is that Hill is injured now, so Dylan should be able to just sit him on the bench.