[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: Ok, one more and we're in...
And then what?

Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty happy how things are going. Our rookie quarterback is playing much better than we could have hoped for. Yes, a first round pick, but the lack of progress and the toned down expectations of how good he can become, made me worry. And quite simply, if Brandon Bell crashes back to earth in week 17, we'll have nothing to show for his promising season.

The defense is even more puzzling. I refuse to think our game plan is horrible. We've been there, done that. It may not be the best possible, but the way this football works, there's just so little you can do to figure out what does or does not work. It's all a crapshoot, shots in the dark. It is quite obvious that Kirk Hitchcock must be feeling like he's doing it all by himself. He's leading the league with 8 interceptions, ties for the lead with 18 passes defended, but more shockingly, has already made 110 tackles (fourth in the league) even ahead of our linebackers, although Daquan Espino might still get ahead of Kirk.

Our completely revamped game plan on the offense has worked, well, most of the time. We've played pretty horribly in about a third of our games, but in the rest I was actually impressed by how smoothly we could march downfield, running left and right, seeing Bell use plenty of his receivers, but mostly fixing Theodore Bondy. I am disappointed that he's still

Paris won't be an easy game. Yes, we won in their place, but it's still a game to be played. I should be confident, I know we can beat them, but I try to temper my expectations. We've already had our upset victories to boost our record, but also saw a couple of horrible things gone wrong games. But, honestly, I'll be disappointed if we choke this season, we've been leading the division for most of the season. It's our season to lose and we're not going to let that happen. Right, team?

Go Merchantmen!