Shark Tank Football - Week 9 - Post-Election Special

Sorry for the delay. As you've probably noticed, the Shark Tank Football Blog has very high standards of quality assurance. And when that quality isn't reached, well, it just means I'm too lazy to think of anything to write.

But yes, I was in New York City and honestly, the marathon was the least exciting thing that happened last week. You can read this author's Xanga page to see who else I ran into besides all the politicians I met on my short jaunt to Washington.

But anyway… another first Tuesday of November, another change in the winds of leadership in our fair country. Some people like change. Others don't. But life in the Shark Tank is as wavy as things get. Especially with the artificial current that's pumped into the tank. Oooh… look at all the artificial bubbles!

But there's no change at the top of the standings again. Brent's I Pick Donte'..Again continues their unprecedented run towards Shark Tank perfection. If they can win their next two games, they would have devoured every team in the Shark Tank once. At this point, the rest of the fish are looking for scraps. However, after Week 13, everyone moves into a new tank and there won't be a "reset" button.

The Week 9 standings:

Rk  Team                   W-L  Total    Avg  Strk
 1  I Pick Donte'..Again   9-0  832.07  92.45   W9
 2  Dan                    6-3  612.87  68.10   W1
 3  SBXL Champs            5-4  721.15  80.13   W1
 4  Cambridge Gooners FC   5-4  685.26  76.14   W1
 5  Ophir Gophirs          5-4  640.45  71.16   L1
 6  Flying pigskins        5-4  600.73  66.75   W2
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 7  Ram Tuff part 2        4-5  719.04  79.89   L1
 8  Blue                   4-5  646.69  71.85   L1
 9  www.hughhewitt.com     4-5  482.90  53.66   L1
10  Brown Town Blues       3-6  635.70  70.63   W1
11  Woodchucks             2-7  572.48  63.61   L3
12  the Jungernaut         2-7  508.60  56.51   L3

So with the Democrats taking the House and Senate, the Shark Tank Football Blog has invited several political dignitaries to come in and share what they think of football, our country and life.

Dan (6-3) 81.04 - Ram Tuff part 2 (4-5) 75.08

Score yet another one for the new and improved Yahoo projections system as they missed Team Dan's total by two hundredths of a point. Despite receivers Joe Horn and Plaxico Burress being out of action due to being late injury scratches, Rudi Johnson and Alge Crumpler each scored while the Seahawks defense totaled nine sacks and registered a shutout as Team Dan regains sole possession of second place by edging Ram Tuff part 2 in Len Bowl XX.

Despite an All-Pro efforts from Peyton Manning who threw two touchdown passes to Marvin Harrison and Kevin Curtis catching his third touchdown pass in his last four outings, little help came from expected sources in what has to be considered a disappointing performance considering the injuries to Team Dan. Notably the vaunted Steelers defense got lit up by the Broncos and came close to putting up a red number.

We caught up with one of the Shark Tank's favorite regulars, the recently reelected governor of the State (and future American Commonwealth) of California, Mr. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Governator gave us his thoughts on battles between brothers.

"Brothers should not be fighting over silly girlie things like fantasy football. I would think that since both Lens are now fathers they would understand that partisanship breaks families apart. Look at the State of Caulifournia. I put aside partisan bickering and have appointed high-ranking Democrats into high positions. And I am a Republican. But then again, if I didn't, Maria would not spend time with me so it's a balance. But the voters of Caulifournia have spoken and I can't wait to be recalled in two years and win another election after I impose new taxes."

We asked him what he thought of Burress and Horn missing last week's action. "Wide receivers are girlie men. Back spasms and strained groins never slowed me down in Mr. Olympia competitions. They just are little sticks that I can snap in two. Now Ram Tuff needs more hot-blooded Cuban, Puerto Ricans to go with the black people. Because they have, you know, the mix of black blood and Latino blood. Fantasy football needs more hot-blooded Latinos. Better yet, some non-girlie Austrian players would be great too."

SBXL Champs (5-4) 87.12 - the Jungernaut (2-7) 55.00

This time SBXL Champs scored almost 90 points and emerged victorious. Drew Brees, a trade throw-in substituting for the newly acquired Donovan McNabb, threw for 314 yards and three touchdowns while Marques Colston continues to stomp his way towards Rookie of the Year with another 123 yards receiving and a touchdown. T.J. Houshmandzadeh continues to piss Chad Johnson off by getting another touchdown pass and Tony Gonzalez caught two touchdown passes in the rout.

SBXL Coach David L has been trying to get the word out that Colston is actually pretty good. In fact, Colston is tied for the league lead in receiving touchdowns. Not bad for a seventh-round pick. "Colston is ranked 11th in fantasy points from an offensive player. And he's tight end eligible. And if his last name were 'Bush,' he'd be regarded higher." Only if his first name were Reggie and not George W.

Colston is tied with the Jungernaut's receiver Torry Holt. Unfortunately for the Jungernaut, Holt did not score this week although Tiki Barber crossed the goal line with the football for the first time this year. But there was little else to celebrate.

SBXL pulled off a fairly significant trade this past week as they dealt Colston, Brees and Tatum Bell to the Woodchucks for Deuce McAllister and the injured Shaun Alexander. This is a risk that SBXL felt they had to take. As we know in politics, some risks are worth taking and others aren't.

The STFB caught up with the outgoing Senator from Virginia, and along with this writer, a fellow Palos Verdes High School alumnus, George F. Allen, to comment on the trade. "I don't care for any of those players except for Brees because he's white."

Umm… Mr. Senator, I thought you had only allegedly used racist comments. "Well, I saw Avenue Q last week and apparently, 'Everyone's a Little Bit Racist.'"

Sure… but… "Now that I've conceded, I can concentrate on my Presidential bid in 2008!" Don't you think that this setback would hinder you? "Nope, my campaign has the momentum of a runaway freight train. Some voters respond to my integrity. Others are more impressed by my incorruptibility. Still others like my determination to lower taxes and the bureaucrats in the state capital can put that in their pipes and smoke it!

"That's why I'm so popular! It's all about popular!" Wrong show, buddy. Go Sea Kings.

Cambridge Gooners FC (5-4) 115.09 - Blue (4-5) 63.83

In a battle of .500 teams, it was Gooners' Javon Walker who caught two touchdown passes and ran for a third and amassed 206 yards from scrimmage to propel Gooners to an easy victory over Blue.

Roy Williams had 138 yards receiving and a score while Corey Dillon scored twice and the Jaguars defense racked up three picks and a touchdown.

Meanwhile for Blue, it was once again the LaDainian Tomlinson show. LT ran for 172 yards and three touchdowns. However, when one guy amasses almost half of your team's total points output and didn't pull off the Jerry Rice or Shaun Alexander five-TD game, you're going to lose. Hines Ward had 127 yards receiving but a critical fumble at the goal line didn't help Blue's cause.

Since Gooners are based in jolly ol' England, the Shark Tank decided to take a slight departure from embattled American politicians to talk with embattled British Prime Minister Tony Blair. We asked him about the differences between American football and football everywhere else. "We will always stand by our friends in America and support them no matter the cause," Mr. Blair said. Seeing how popular American football is in America, how about the idea of fantasy American football in Britain? "Hey, we Brits will gamble on anything. And if we can bet on American football we will. We want to be just like America in every way we can. That's how we show support."

Flying pigskins (5-4) 77.91 - www.hughhewitt.com (4-5) 48.72

After poor games the last two weeks, Willie Parker redeemed himself with 137 total yards and touchdowns both on the ground and by air and Joey Galloway caught two scoring passes as the Pigskins routed HH.com to move back over .500.

For HH.com, Rex Grossman had his second bad game in the last three weeks though he managed to stay out of the red numbers. Just barely. 210 yards passing with one score and three interceptions and a lost fumble netted a quarter of a point. However, two teammates, Bernard Berrian and Chad Jackson each joined Grossman in the minus-one (less than one) club. Jamal Lewis and the Chargers defense provided the only bright spots for HH.com as they dropped their fifth game out of their last six. This week, they get I Pick Donte'..Again. Oof.

Nancy Pelosi, the expected new Speaker of the House hails from that city by a body of water, San Francisco. And she promised changes in Congress. We had to ask her about the prospects of moving the local tackle football team away from the City by the Bay to the City by San Jose. We know local Santa Clara resident, Pigskins Coach Kalvin S was pretty pumped that there will be a big time team that will bring even more traffic and congestion into his neck of the woods.

But what about Ms. Pelosi? "When people think of the Bay, they think of San Francisco. It's not called 'Santa Clara Bay' or 'Fremont Bay' or 'San Jose Bay.' It's called "San Francisco Bay". Nobody leaves their heart in Santa Clara. And we need to get past the bipartisanship two-party politics and support the 49ers staying the city. We've already lost the Pigskins to Santa Clara, we don't need to lose the area's second most popular team too."

What about the Raiders? "Who?" the Speaker said.

Brown Town Blues (3-6) 68.98 - Ophir Gophirs (5-4) 40.88

In the upset of the week, Brown Town Blues snapped a three-game losing streak by upending the Gophirs and dropping them into the mass of humanity tied in third place. BTB did not have any huge performance but many steady ones. Marc Bulger threw for over 300 yards and a touchdown. Donald Driver, Clinton Portis and Mushin Muhammad all scored while the resurgent Ahman Green went over 100 yards rushing again.

As for Ophir, Steven Jackson went nuts as he totaled 219 yards and a touchdown. But he almost accounted for half of the Gophirs point total for the week. The Shark Tank "This Week Stinks" performance of the week goes to Tom Brady who threw an uncharacteristic four interceptions. An almost Grossman-like performance. Brady's damage? 2.11 points to the bad. Bad is right. Not that it would have made a difference this week.

Speaking of low scoring, the Shark Tank arranged an exit interview with, depending on who you ask, fired, resigned, ejected and/or puppet Secretary of State, Mr. Donald Rumsfeld, to see if he wanted to talk about fantasy football instead of his… err… the war in Iraq. However, just like the American public since President Bush's second term, we only ended up with Condoleeza Rice instead.

Finally, we found Mr. Rumsfeld hiding in a hole on the banks of the Potomac River, much like Saddam Hussein when he was found in that hole before capture. Mr. Rumsfeld refused to come out because he was afraid the nearby Naval Academy in Annapolis would start shooting at him. So we had to conduct our interview using two tin cans and a string.

We asked what he thought of the lower tier of teams in the league. "I don't know much about football. I don't know much about anything apparently. I do know that Osama bin Laden is hiding either in Afghanistan or Pakistan. Or some other country. Or he's dead. One of the above."

We then asked Mr. Rumsfeld to share his thoughts on the recent trade in the Shark Tank. "I don't do trades. I don't do diplomacy. I don't do numbers. I don't do foreign policy. I don't do quagmires. I don't do fantasy football."

Hmm… any thoughts on the game between Brown Town Blues and the Gophirs? "Contrary to popular opinion, Tom Brady would not have won the war in Iraq by himself." No argument there. You need a ground attack along with an aerial assault. Duh. If he had Michael Vick, then maybe.

I Pick Donte'..Again (9-0) 101.41 - Woodchucks (2-7) 52.55

Larry Johnson ran for 172 yards and a score and was disappointed in his performance. Kevin Jones chipped in another 140 total yards and two touchdowns as IPDA continued its march towards fantasy football and Shark Tank immortality with a nearly 50-point blowout over the hapless Woodchucks.

The Ravens defense continues to stockpile points as they forced three turnovers and scored another defensive touchdown. Warrick Dunn also found paydirt as IPDA hopes to move to 10-0 next week against HH.com.

Meanwhile, the Woodchucks' bad luck continued. Heck, it's been nonstop for the last two years. This week, the bye week blues caught up with Woodchucks as they were forced to leave three positions vacant. Those that did play did well. Jake Plummer threw three scoring passes and Terrell Owens scored again. However, this was part of Matt L's strategy for the week. "Look, if we're playing the best team in the league and I don't have to drop guys worth keeping, I may as well punt the week and try to go undefeated from here and sneak into the playoffs." Good luck, man.

With the Woodchucks' luck, now departed Shaun Alexander will probably go nuts and Marques Colston will tear his ACL and Drew Brees will tear his rotator cuff and labrum. Stay tuned.

Last but not least, we conducted an interview with President Bush to see what he thought of IPDA's perfect start. "I don't need know much about perfection," Bush guffawed. "But in all seriousness, I've welcomed many successful and championship teams here to the White House and most of them actually showed up. I'm eagerly awaiting my 'I Pick Donte' Again' #1 jersey from Coach Brent L. It'll go right next to the New York Liberty WNBA championship jerseys that I'll never wear."

What about the results of Election Day? "We must put aside partisanship politics and begin a new era of peaceful coexistence." Yeah, partisanship politics is why the Republicans lost. Oh, sorry to inject political commentary. In the interest of equal time, for the Democrats, I present Ted Kennedy. Okay, that's enough.

Any final words Mr. President? "I've impressed with the way all the teams have conducted themselves. They are models of true sportsmanship and ethical fair play. From top to bottom, watching the Shark Tank's fantasy football league shows what mediocrity could result from diplomacy and ethics. Karl Rove told me to say that one. What? Oh, that was off the record??"