The Toilet Bowl - Week 7 Preview
Bob & Carl sat at the corner table in Hooters, Nottingham, supping beer and having a jolly fine time of it as a fine set of sumptuous sauce covered thighs hoved into view and were perched appetisingly on the edge of their table. They tucked in.
Back in London, Bond stepped onto the platform at St Pancras station, looked right, and left and spied the timetable.
’15 minutes to departure’ he mused. Bond grabbed a paper and a coffee from the wizened old news stall vendor peddling his goods adjacently, and sat down on the nearby bench, twixt a family from Runcorn and a student whose was oblivious to the fact that his inadequate headphones were clearly offering no external protection to the casual passer by. Bond secretly cursed the continual acoustic interference. ‘Tosser’ thought he.
Bond turned to the back page. The headline read ‘The Toilet Bowl – can Coaches bear the strain?’
Game of the Week.
Fear Factory v It’s A Lottery
Without a shadow of doubt, this is the game of the season so far. Whilst the rest of the Coaches can still dream of post season glory, the Bowl season has come early for these two Coaches. Something has got to give. Can Coach Botond put the fear of failure to one side to inspire his forlorn hopes? Or will the Lottery, now that they have run out of feet to shoot themselves in, finally get it together for the Commissioners charges?
The Factory have been through the mill in the QB department this season. Favre, Freeman, Gradkowski have all come and gone and now Big Ben has strapped himself into the Factory foreman’s hot seat and will look to fan the fire in the furness against a Miami defence that has proved to be ho hum against the pass this season. The danger for the Lottery this week with Brees at the helm is if the Saints get ahead early and then sit down to tinkle the Ivory for the rest of the game it will be sweet, sweet music being heard on the Factory floor. Edge : Factory
Much was expected from the Factory’s M&M running back pairing at the start of the season, but with the dip in the form of Matthews and the injury to Moreno it just hasn’t happened yet. As a consequence both backs are unlikely to dominate the backfields this weekend either, although both have decent opportunities to do so against the Raiders & Pats. The Lottery have to rest Tomlinson after his ultimately pointless heroics last week and Addai is banged up (again), so the burden falls on the shoulders of the Brown bruiser Hillis who will be seeing the bulk of the goal line work and be relied to help out former Longhorn legend, rookie QB, Colt ‘Bones’ McCoy (Go ‘Horns). Fantasy zombie, Marshawn Lynch who, according to Coach Carroll will be seeing a lot more of the ball in weeks to come will have a’monster’ game this week against the Cards.
Edge : Lottery
The trouble with Randy Moss going back to Minneapolis is that it came a year too late for the Purple posse as Favre is no longer the toughest gunslinger in NFL town and unfortunately has more important things to worry about these days. In addition, Steve Smith (no the other one) is no longer the no.1 in New York and the rise of power runner Torain will impact the value of the other Moss struggling to flourish in Washington. Problems abound for the Factory. Coach Andy probably would have benched Walter the softy even if he hadn’t been on a bye and reinstates Lance Moore to join forces with his Saints play caller in what Coach hopes will be a double whammy points return against the Browns. Harvin’s headaches have abated and he ironically has benefited most from Moss returning to the Vikes. Austin will lead the line again for the error strewn Cowboys and should make amends for his 13 point pass interference penalty last week. Question - Are the Cowboys the lottery in disguise?
Edge : Lottery
Witten or Celek? Or Olsen? Well spin the bottle, its back to Witten for the Lottery after they released Celek in midweek. Witten has been a fantasy enigma for a couple of seasons now and needs to get back to being the tight end of 2007 pretty soon or else he is in danger of becoming a fantasy dinosaur this season and in seasons to come. Talking of which.... Shockey has benefited from being Brees’ safety valve underneath this season when he can’t go deep and should prosper against the Browns if he is fit. However, his uncertain status does limit his appeal somewhat at this time.
Edge : Lottery
Fresh from their mauling against the carefree Seahawks the Bears face up against a rather more mundane Redskins offensive scheme. Shanahan will make sure they run the ball often and hard, and when that doesn’t work, McNabb will dink and dunk to Cooley and the receivers inside. There will be plenty of scope for the Bears to score well here as McNabb can hold the ball too long and the Redskins will stall often. The Packers take on the Vikes in a divisional matchup at Lambeau. Favre got abused by the Cowboys D in his last game and should see more of the same treatment this week although the Packers vaunted D has been ‘D for disappointing’ thus far this season.
Edge : Lottery
Coach Botond’s quest for the first pick in next years draft gathers further momentum as the Lottery will ditch their weekly custard pie throwing Keystone Kops routine to do just enough this week and finally get that ‘W’ in the column and hobble to victory to much celebration in CNFLE HQ! Normal service will be resumed next week however, rest assured.
Verdict – Lottery by 13
Tim Riggins Bench Warmers v Ttttaylor
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| The Rookie launches his own clothing range. |
Fresh from thrashing the little green mind bender last week Riggins boys now sit at an impressive 5 and 1. Go figure! Ttttaylor doubled his wins last week with a well earned victory against Royale, hitting the century mark in the points for column again in the process.
Riggins receivers are a mess this week, with Johnson, Wayne and Holmes all sitting out on byes. Given that the receivers are the Riggins strength this year, and the running game has been almost obsolete this spells B-I-G Tea-rubble.
Ttttaylor has ttttroubles of his own this week with the news that Dallas Clark will sit the rest of the season on injured reserve, however former lottery TE, Olsen, will be an adequate replacement and with Chris Johnson battering the Beagles and Mike Williams leading the Pittsburgh throw and catch game with Big Ben back in the cockpit, Ttttaylor should have tttto much in the ttttank for Riggins this week. Although the way that the Bench Warmers have risen to the occasion each week so far we reserve the right to be wrong, crystal ball or no crystal ball!
Verdict : Ttttaylor by 10
Yoda From Wales v Royale With TD’s
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| Yoda. Down but not out. |
Beware the wounded animal that’s been wounded first and then laughed at and mocked after losing two on the spin. I don’t think that we ever really established if Yoda was an animal. More of a goblin if push came to shove and it was all about scientific classification, but in any case beware. Again. Royale take one step forward, one step back, one to the side, do the hokey cokey and you turn around and thats what they are all about.... whhoooaaaahhhh.....
If ever there was a week to play the Yoda then this is it! All the big names sit on the bench leaving big holes at all the skill positions. Peterson will need to run all day, Marshall has a tough assignment against the Pittsburgh defence, and can Hasselbeck be counted on to lead the line? Not sure.
Royale on the other hand, have the League leading gun slinger in Rivers ready to roll, and both running backs are getting better week by week. Although Sims-Walker has been a flop, Bowe finally played last week like we all remember in his rookie year.
Royale could be one to watch in the second half of the season and will join Yoda at 4 & 3 as Yoda’s mid season slump reaches a third week. When do they play Fear factory?
Verdict : Royale by 7
Bryants Baptists v Seventy Nine FC
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| Looks like a bad case of bye week fever. |
After 6 weeks of master planning, is this the week that the Baptists finally prove they are the masters of strategy against a banged up Niners who although they have a pair of losses through six weeks, are still to be reckoned with?
Just as we thought the Baptists were making progress they drop a heartbreaker again last week as they failed to breach the French resistance. This week however, although they too have bye week issues, the starting line up remains largely intact. Forte and Mendenhall will lead the Baptists charge, although both will play second fiddle this week to their respective pass crazed QB’s. Is it time to bench Steve Smith? Yes that one.
For the Niners, read the Yoda, as they too have been struck down with a one week ‘chronic bye fever’. Manning, Best, Edwards, Folk and newly acquired Indy TE Tamme all sit this week, which means some juggling is required for Coach Martin. Cassell has a tasty looking matchup against the Jags but is a limited qb option, and Lloyd could have a big game against the Raiders but that’s about it for this week for the Niners folks.
Despite the Niners two losses being by a combined points total of less than 5 points, this week the matchup and events have conspired against them. The Baptists will perform as they have done week in week out, but will have too much for a Niners outfit reluctant to lose too many of their stars on the waiver wire to make up for this weeks shortfall.
Verdict : Baptists by 10
Super Swedes v French Leader.
The Swedes streak extended to three as they came from behind in week 6 to vanquish Seventy Nine FC by a narrow squeak. This week they face off against French Leader who kept pace in the race for Division 3 with a victory against the Baptists. This is an intriguing matchup indeed, and both teams need that win to keep momentum as we move into the second half of the season.
Romo, Romo, why for art thou? ... that is a sentence is it not which sums up the Cowboys signal caller who is a fantasy god year in year out and has led the Swedes on their recent great run. If the line can protect him then he will score bundles again this week. Mojo is coming back into better form each week, and we figure he will run all over the Chiefs who appear to have been found out. Roddy White will continue to produce for the Swedes.
In the absence of any other viable option Rodgers will be forced to throw all day. So watch the Vikes D pin their ears back and get after him. Boldin, Welker and Maclin will all score well this week for the Leader, especially Boldin who will be too classy for a poor Buffalo secondary.
The Swedes will continue on with their super ways this week and temporarily disrupt the recent French renaissance. The French will still be challenging for the playoffs barring a disastrous second phases of the campaign however despite this loss. Look out for the Swedes to use this win as a platform to chase Riggins boys and Royale hard for that Division 1 crown.
Verdict : Swedes by 6
The Bone Factory v The Hairy Frog Disco
If it wasn’t for the Toilet Bowl, then this surely would have been the game of the week as the Bone, coming off a storming 140 point week face up against the new #1 ranked team who just scraped past the hapless Lottery last week. What is it they say about good teams finding a way to win when they don’t play well? No it’s not that, they’re just lucky.
The Bones’ mammoth points haul of last week should have come as no shock. After all they hit the high hundreds earlier in the season, and with the matchups at the top order this week, they could conceivably post another big one again. Gore will lead the charge as the 49ers build on last weeks win in time for Wembley against an inept Panthers outfit. Jennings will ransack the Vikings backfield as Rodgers has no option but to spread the ball around in the air and Matt Ryan will pass to get ahead against the Bungles. However depending on whether he has early success, he could pass the baton to the Hairies Turner. Brown could be a key figure this week.
The Disco will have to be firing on all cylinders this week to maintain their lofty status, all the star names are available this week and all have reasonable matchups. Brady could explode in a west coast shootout with the Chargers. The big decision rests with whether the Disco head coach rides the Ivory bandwagon, or re-instates Beanie Wells to what has been a disappointing backfield return thus far. My guess is that Ivory will be the pick as the Cards have been unable to persist with the run once they fall more than two scores behind. Mason will continue his recent good form and score heavily against the Bills.
Whether the Falcons get ahead and whether the Pitts D stuffs up the Dolphins. Two critical areas of the weekend fixtures that will determine the outcome in this match. The former goes to the Bone, the latter the Disco. The Bone rocks right now, and they are so hot they are larva.
Verdict : Bone by 10
As we reach the mid point of the season, it’s clear that this is the most competitive CNFLE ever. The pre season favourite, Ttttaylor, has struggled to find any consistent form, the overwhelming early season leader, Yoda, has dropped back into the pack, the Disco have lost form just at the wrong time which has left a vacancy for favourite in the League. Is it time to take the Rook seriously? Whoever hits their straps now will gather momentum all the way to Playoffsville.
Wins for the Lottery, Ttttaylor, Royale, Baptists, Swedes and the Boners sees the League condense with three teams at 5 wins and a host of four win teams chasing hard. Big mo is riding the Scandinavian backs as Coaches Peter and Lars will look to push on. Is this the season that an 0 & 3 team finally makes the playoffs?
Vasco De Gama CNFLE II official bookmaker.
Yoda from Wales 2/1
Bone Rocks 2/1
The Hairy Frog Disco 2/1
Seventy Nine FC 2/1
Tim Riggins Bench Warmers 2/1
Royale with TD’s 2/1
Super Swedes 2/1
French Leader 3/1
Bryants Baptists 6/1
Ttttaylor 6/1
It’s A Lottery 20/1
Fear Factory 40/1
Anyone wish to bet a couple of Carltons* on who might be the winner? (Please bet responsibly).
Good luck for the week 7 gentlemen.
CW & BB
* A Carlton is the imaginary currency of the CNFLE II. Each Coach starts with an credit account of 10 Carltons that they can use over the course of the season on hypothetical wagers without damaging the ‘real life’ finances unduly.
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