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01-28-2001, 09:38 PM
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#1 | ||
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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House Arrest Black Squirrels, 2042-2045
I’m playing this career under a fairly lengthy series of house rules—trying to compress most of the game’s many areas fertile for abuse, and to simultaneously make the game: challenging, interesting, steerable, and realistic. Since the house rules are fairly rigorous, I’ve adopted the name “house arrest” for this system.
If you are interested in the full story of the Squirrels, here are the links back to the entire posted history. The first link starts off with some general, more detailed musings about the house rule concepts that I’ve been following, and then gets into the team story-- the rules have evolved in minor ways over time. Black Squirrels, 2002-2007 Black Squirrels, 2008-2011 Black Squirrels, 2012-2017 Black Squirrels, 2018-2021 Black Squirrels, 2022-2025 Black Squirrels, 2026-2029 Black Squirrels, 2030-2033 Black Squirrels, 2034-2037 Black Squirrels, 2038-2041 To save you the research, the short version of the rules I’m using follows: FOF 2001, Wall Street, empty cupboard start with the 2002 expansion team Ticket prices no higher than those of my nearest geographic competitor (Denver) Several contract restrictions, including: -no signing non-rookie players, other than the second half of the 20-stage FA process -no unrealistic contract durations for first and second year players (generally 3-4 years only) -no backloading of contracts – annual salary increases up to 25% only -any free agent seeking a bonus gets one at least as big as the second year’s salary -URFAs get one year deals, with one exception per year (see below) -One URFA per season may get a 7yr deal: x = rookie min, 2x, 3x, 3x, 3x, 3x, 3x No contract renegotiations, and no franchise tag – everyone re-signed through the free market Full roster of 53 each season (no going cheap by leaving roster holes) Player from home state college at each position group (RB/FB, WR/TE, OL, DL, LB, DB, QB/P/K) . . .I confess I have probably slipped up once or twice here, but I’m making an earnest effort Making effort to sign and hold Colorado players whenever practical I’m allowing some slack with my Colorado school guys – re-signing after camp sometimes No initiating trades – may only accept CPU trade after adjusting it (reality check) In short, the team is being almost exclusively built from within, with a few fill-in types from the late rounds of free agency. Once my players get past their first contracts, I compete (if possible) on the open market to retain their services. Here is the short history of the team—the GM performance printout:
We suffered a couple years without a solid offense, but we got a breakout RB in the 2039 draft, followed by a surprise breakout QB in 2040, and now we have pieces in place for that offense to flourish behind our outstanding offensive line. We took a disappointing tumble in last year’s playoffs, but we should come back and get through our financial challenges to put together some strong seasons ahead. The story continues below... [This message has been edited by QuikSand (edited 01-28-2001).] |
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01-28-2001, 09:42 PM
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#2 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2042 pre-draft
No headlines this year, the team loses no retirees, and there are no relevant HOF announcements. The team lost $23m last season, as it was an expensive year for player bonuses. That might not subside soon, either—we still don’t know how solvent this franchise truly is. We oddly dropped from the 100% attendance echelon, selling 99.2%-- the first time in quite a while that has happened. Only 2 teams stayed at 100% (fewer than usual) so it may be a global phenomenon of the economy. I’m not looking to make a move with my front office. However, in looking through the coaches available, I am literally blown away by one guy—Jacksonville’s coach, Greg Rash. 3 EXC ratings, 8 VGs, and only a couple minor weaknesses. Wow. I check out my guy Todd Rowan, who is admittedly very good, and decide that I’ll probably stay put. I expect that the bidding for coach Rash will be furious, and I cannot afford a bidding war. However, if he’s available for anywhere near the $14m I’m paying Rowan, I may have a change of heart—Rash would almost certainly promote faster and better player development on our team, and he’d be a better offensive coach as well. I decide to put in a $14m offer for Rash. If I’m the high bidder, I’ll make the switch, but I can’t afford to spend a lot more. In the first week, Greg Rash takes his offer from Jacksonville for about $16m. Had I known, I probably would have been willing to go that high. As we begin free agency, we have a pile of available cap room—and some decisions to make.
We have 25% of our cap room available, and how do we spend it? I want T Tommie Monroe to end his career with us, so he’s a guy I’ll make every effort to keep. LB Christian Smith is solid, and I don’t think I can afford to lose him—I’ll make an earnest pursuit there. Fortunately, I was mistaken last season when I believed that RB Fouse was up for this year—however, both he and QB Markowitz are up next year.) A conundrum is with WR Perry Thagcher. He still has good (but no longer great) apparent ratings, but his performance has been pretty uninspiring. A composite season from the last four years would look something like this: 60 catches, 770 yds, 6 TDs, 9 drops. These are not the “anchor-type” numbers that I’d be looking for from one of my highest-paid players, and I think I’ll hold back on offering him the huge deal I’m sure that he’ll demand. I start with 3yrs, $56m to T Tommie Monroe—a lifelong Squirrel and my stalwart at LT. LB Christian Smith is looking for bigger money than I had imagined—probably $15-18m a year. WR Thagcher is looking for only about $15-18m as well—a bit less than I had imagined. My 5% rule draws a line around $16m this year—we can work with these demand, I believe. However, I will sit back on LB Smith and WR Thagcher—these are positions where I often can find starter-worthy players in free agency, so I have a backup plan, which could cost us a lot less. T Tommie Monroe takes our offer right away, suggesting to me it was probably too generous. Anyway, he’ll almost certainly be with us for the end of his career. WR Thagcher gets an offer from Philadelphia for about $17m a year, and now I need to decide whether he’s going to stay with us. I put in a 3yr, $46m offer to Thagcher—I could use the cohesion boost he will provide, though I’m not willing to outbid the Eagles for him. S Brian Hastings has gotten a big offer from the Eagles as well, and I find it very unlikely that I’ll be able to keep pace there—he’ll almost certainly depart this season. After week 2, The Eagles land both of our former Squirrels. LB Christian Smith gets an offer from Baltimore, for over $18m a year. I decide that I’ll put in a reasonable offer, and hope that his loyalty keeps him here. I offer 4yrs, $61m—less per year than some other offers, but in the picture. In week 6, LB Smith takes my offer, to my surprise. We get to week 11, and I start to look at the available talent. I’m intrigued by the number of DEs in the mix this year—a few young guys and one quality veteran. We’re losing DE Blaine Scott this off-season there, and adding a proven guy would be a huge advantage—I feel optimistic that we can do so. In the final weeks, DE Stan Huffman remains unbid. He is a 15th year veteran, and he’s 35, but he has gotten an incredible 31.5 sacks in the last two years—he doesn’t seem to be done quite yet. I decide to put in an offer for him—his demands are quite modest, really. I also look at DE Arnold Shaw, another solid player who remains available here. He’s got 43.5 sacks in his 5 years in the league, and is solid, but perhaps not spectacular. He’s also looking for good, but not ridiculous money. I put in 4yrs, $45m for DE Arnold Shaw, and also offer 2yrs, $17.3m to DE Stan Huffman. These two ought to do a lot for our defensive line depth—a weakness in recent years. That’s all I do in free agency this season, but it’s a pretty big opportunity for us. Heading into this draft, we hold a late pick, and we have to adjust our mindset—we won’t be getting the top-tier prospects from this position. Our focus this year might be at WR—we look as thin there as I can recall in our history, though this reflects an evolution in my own thinking as much as the transformation in the players I have around. For the most part, we need to add defensive talent—we’ll be spending big money next year to retain our young QB and RB, and we’ll need stability on the D to keep things solid. |
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01-29-2001, 07:17 PM
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#3 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2042 draft and camp
We have pick #34 in this draft, and only one extra pick, in round three. Bottom line—the top-tier players are very likely not part of our considerations at all. This year, we’d like to grab a WR who can contribute, and perhaps a DT. LB is a spot where we could use quality contributors, especially if we plan to go with the 3-4 formation, which is in some doubt right now. My scout and I identify RB Grady Inrgam as a future superstar—he looks like he’ll be tremendous. I also see DE Mario Heath as a future star pass rusher. Among local players, there is a good CB from Adams State, as well as a good OG from Col State. Past that, a lot of riff raff. As my first pick approaches, I see several options, none outstanding. LB looks like a possibility, but not overwhelming with only one relative standout. Regrettably, the LB I covet goes just ahead of me to Indy, and we have to move to plan B (or C or D). My scout loves players at DE and G—just the places we don’t really need anyone right now. I finally settle on the best WR available, who should step right in and start for us this year.
It’s not nearly as exciting as having multiple early selections, but we come away with some guys who will help. The WR tandem look pretty good, and they are right on time. I’m up to 50 players following the draft, and I haven’t even looked at my RFAs. Doesn’t matter—they are all asking for absurd money. I really don’t find much to like among the URFAs this year, so I pick up a local LB, who can help me fill that requirement for a while. LB Antoine Hitchcock has a little skill in run defense and man-to-man, but hopefully won’t be making anything more than a cameo appearance in my defense. We head into training camp with only 57 signed players, fewer than usual…
In training camp, I have trouble deciding between the 4-3 and 3-4 formations on defense. With my veteran additions, I feel I go six deep with decent quality DL, and only 4 deep at LB (with a more gradual dropoff). I decide that I’ll return to the more comfortable 4-3. We get through the camp, and come out—here is my scout’s assessment:
I see my two rookie receivers had solid camps—I again escape the big bust hit. In fact, everyone looks just fine. No big breakouts, but nothing to cry about, either. I pretty easily cut a few rookies to get to 53, and then we decide to at least peruse the free agent pool. Nothing much to see there, either. An easy transition.
My QB Todd Markowitz was a drafty day sleeper, in part because he rode the bench at Notre Dame for most of his four years. The guy who anchored the Irish through that time? QB Bobby Rose. Rose looks like he might finally get his chance to take over for Carolina this year, and it would be great if he could step up and become a legitimate rival to Markowitz. As for my team, and this year, I think the arrow is still up. Markowitz’s abilities jumped again, and RB Benjamin Fouse looks very strong again. This offensive line looks remarkable, and we should have our way with many teams simply based on their strength. On defense, we picked up a veteran addition, and our secondary is stepping into its own nicely. Run the ball, stop the run. Win 12 or 13 games, and go from there... |
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01-29-2001, 11:01 PM
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#4 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2042 season
My setup is pretty elementary, and very familiar. I decide to use LB Christian Smith again as my designated blitzer, but I’ll do so from the strong side this time—to see if that yields different results. Our team looks good everywhere, coming into shape. The second best roster rating is a 78—I’m surprised it’s that high, honestly. Chicago and Buffalo are both in the70s, and Seattle and KC are both at 55. The division could get turned upside down with those guys getting good (if they really are). I’m predicting good things from Miami this year and beyond—they used their top pick to get RB Grady Ingram, and I’m honestly saying that the sky is the limit for this young stud. Our team’s cohesion remains up and down—60-83-79-85. We added two new faces (older players) to our DL, and while we need to adjust, they’ll help out in time, I’m certain. We’re in the top ten or so everywhere but the passing game. QB Todd Markowitz is dinged up coming out of the exhibition season (after being third string) but he’ll get the call for our opener. We’ve got several injuries on our DL already, but at least right now we have the depth to handle them. We get off to a shaky start, losing 24-13 in Oakland. Markowitz tried to play, but couldn’t and Uhlenhake stepped in, and was okay, but bot too strong. Now Markowitz is listed as 3-5 weeks, and I sit him down for now. Damn. We come home and beat the hell out of the Chargers, 28-0. A decent offensive game, and a good one for WR Burgess, with 102 yards and 2 TDs. We win again 24-10 in KC, and get to 2-1. RB Fouse has another hundred yarder, and we sail pretty cleanly despite a somewhat sluggish offensive attack overall. The Patriots stay unbeaten ad they hands us a 17-14 loss. We let two different bums get 80+ yards rushing against us—awful. After our bye, we get Markowitz back. We get a win in Portland, 28-14, as the running game explodes for a 45-229 day, and we allow Markowitz to ease his way back. We come home and host Denver, and the Broncos inexplicably beat us 32-30. Markowitz gets hurt again, and Uhlenhake comes in to throw an interception returned for a TD, the difference maker. Markowitz is again listed as 3-5 weeks. Ouch. Home for KC, we get a 28-17 win. S Brenden Honeycutt gets an interception TD, and we roll on from there. We come home, and nip the Jets 14-13. We are outplayed, but we win with 3 interceptions, and we don’t turn the ball over at all. We then go into San Diego, and lose to the lowly Chargers, 24-15. Turnovers were the story there, too—we lost that battle 3-0, and the game along with it. In Atlanta, we get pounded 44-14, and the season is unraveling right before our eyes. QB Harry Wayne ripped us up, and we allowed them to run on us much better than we could on them. Terrible. We activate QB Markowitz, even though his broken foot isn’t yet 100%-- we need help immediately. We host 8-2 Oakland, and this is a critical game for us. If we fall to 5-6, it’s big trouble. Fortunately, we come through with a big 20-6 victory. We run well, we stop the run, and we win a big game. Now we need more of that. We go into Denver, and hand the Broncos a beating, 34-14. Now, we’re 7-5, and we take on 7-5 Seattle at home. We win a 30-3 rout, and look even more like a playoff team every week. S Brenden Honeycutt is again the player of the game, two weeks in a row without scoring in either game—impressive. We host 9-4 Cincinnati, and at 8-5, we are a player now. We’re one game behind Oakland, and are in the playoff hunt. This is a big game, for a non-division opponent. We edge them 34-30, to get right into the thick of the conference-wide playoff hunt. We’re now tied with Oakland for the division lead, and are still in the hunt even for a bye week. We get a 17-7 home win over SF to stretch our streak to five straight wins. In our finale, we are playing for a bye week. If we win, we get the #2 seed. If we lose, we could tumble all the way out of the playoffs (but more likely to either the #3 or #4 seed). Still a lot on the line here. Our opponents, Seattle, still have thin playoff hopes—but they must beat us to have any shot, of course. Todd Markowitz has 3 TDs in the first half, and we bury the Seahawks 28-18, and take this one away.
Stat leaders: QB Todd Markowitz: 1,637 yds, 56.1%, 6.76 ypa, 10/11, 71.9 QB Grady Uhlenhake: 1,574 yds, 53.1%, 7.02 ypa, 13/7, 81.9 RB Benjamin Fouse: 279-1,177 yds, 10 TD (4.2 ypc); 48 rec-550 yds, 3 TD WR Dominic Poole: 50-817 yds, 6 TD (49.5%, 6 drops) WR Trent Burgess: 57-739yds, 6 TD (55.3%, 2 drops) OL unit: ~34% KRBs, 31 sacks allowed C Drew Bloomer: 45/114 KRBs (39.4%), 6 sacks in 461 pass plays LB Marvin Ellison: 92 tackles, 3 sacks DE Stan Huffman: 9.5 sacks, 1 block, 4 hurries S Clyde Dillon: 78 tackles, 7 int, 6 PD, 37.6 PDQ S Brenden Honeycutt: 57 tackles, 6 int, 5 PD, 38.4 PDQ CB Leslie Bailey: 38 tackles, 6 int, 7 PD, 43.1 PDQ Overall stats (off/def/avg): Rushing: 3.8 / 3.5 / 3.8 Passing: 6.8 / 6.1 / 6.4 Rushing offense: 2nd Passing offense: 21st Rushing defense: 5th Passing defense: 19th I’m comfortable with our overall stat output—QB Markowitz did not put up great numbers, but when he played, the running game showed its strength. Hopefully, we can get more of the same as we head into the playoffs. With Pittsburgh losing their final game, I think we may have nipped them for the AFC’s top seed—criminal at 11-5, but it’s all about the matchups. Hopefully we’ll be more focused in these playoffs than last year. |
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01-30-2001, 07:07 PM
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#5 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2042 postseason
Cincinnati and Oakland roll through their opener, and the Raiders come to visit us in our opener (confirming that we are the #1 seed, by the way). The big news is that their starting QB Peter Kirk is listed as doubtful, but my scout says he’s slated to play anyway. My DEs are licking their chops. They are a running team, mostly with RB Shannon Schulters, who had 15 TDs this season. They’ll use a 3-4, and their LBs are their defensive strength. A solid 9-7 team. Maybe a little better, it would seem. (I accidentally quick-simmed this game, so you get the cliff notes version here - sorry) We suffer through a long first quarter, and the first scoring chance is our 35 yard FG with 2 minutes left in the opening period. However, things open up soon after—Markowitz throws for a TD, but the Raiders roar back to tie it up at the half. Markowits gets another TD pass in the third, and we lead 17-10 after three. In the early fourth quarter, we strike quickly for two more TD passes, and put the game away—we win it, 37-17. We will now get to host Pittsburgh in the AFC Championship game. Pittsburgh is starting QB Wesley Villegas, a young guy who will gamble a bit to much. They, to, are a strong running team, and that will be their focus—with RB Scottie Collier leading the way. Their great CB corps from years ago has since been broken up, but they still play good defense, and get a lot of sacks. In the early going, this is crazy. Markowitz gets picked off for a TD on our first possession, but he then rallies right back to hit a 59 yard TD and we’re back even. It’s back and forth, with neither team able to do much on the ground. In the early second, Pitt gets a long pass, down to our 24. Our defense toughens, and they come away with only 3. We respond, however, with a nice drive for a Fouse rushing TD. We runt he two minute drill to try to get a long FG, but we miss a 50 yard attempt. In the third quarter, our first possession is a major clock-eater, a 13-play, 8 minute drive that results in a short TD pass to Fouse, and a 21-10 lead. Pittsburgh responds with a nice drive of their own, but they cannot finish it off, and get only a short FG. It’s now 21-13, an 8 point lead. Pittsburgh gets god field position later, and with 5:43 left, they hit a 31-yard TD pass to get within 2, and they convert the two-pointer to tie up the game. From this point on, it’s like overtime. We punt from out 27, but they get a great return, and take over at our 47. One play, and they are at our 21 with 1:39 left. They get the TD, and go up 28-21 with only 10 second left. Double ouch. Ballgame. Thought we had it, but it slipped away. The injuries in our secondary definitely hurt (had a third starter go down during the Steelers game) but we couldn’t move very well on offense, and it caught up with us in time. The Steelers, for what it’s worth, go to the Superbowl and get waxed by the Bucs, 41-20. Cincinnati’s QB Duane Vance is the big award winner, with the triple award. RB Grady Ingram has 1,419 yards to win OROY and second team RB-- he’ll be very good for Miami. My former safety Brian Hastings gets second team with Philadelphia. Among current Squirrels—RB Benjamin Fouse gets first team RN honors, a bit of a surprise. FB Dean McKay gets first team honors as well—he is becoming a fixture there. C Drew Bloomer and G T.J. Robson both make the first team unit as well. On defense, S Clyde Dillon makes the first team list also. I had a sense that this was “the year” to bet it to all happen. With RB Fouse and QB Markowitz both looking for new contracts next year, I’ll probably have to budget an extra $30-50m to keep them both, meaning a big dump of other quality players. This team didn’t really have any weaknesses, and I thought this might have been our chance to really dominate. I wasn’t happy with the 5-5 start, but since we ended up with the #1 seed, it obviously didn’t matter. The loss—maybe injuries, maybe we just aren’t as good as I had hoped we would be. Regardless, I think the path gets a little steeper from here, as the money problem ought to be front and center this season ahead. |
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01-30-2001, 08:57 PM
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#6 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2043 pre-draft
We have two retirements from the team. DE Stan Huffman was a one-tear addition, gave us some sacks, and rode off into the sunset. Solid guy. G Marc Cintron was a lifer. Signed to a one-year URFA minsal deal, he was a training camp phenom, and we locked him up for good. He gave us 15 years of great service, and was one of the anchors for the oustanding lines that won back to back titles with us. Qualifications for linemen to get into the HOF are always tough, but this guy probably deserves it. My scout has seen some movement in his abilities. Thegood news is his rating in young talent is up to Excellent. However, he has only a “good” in several areas—RB, WR, LB, DB, and a fair with DL. Once again, I’ll look at the market, but I expect to stay put. Here is our roster situation, in this all-important year:
DE Brian Meyer was a guy I had planned to keep until the bitter end. However, at this point, it might be getting bitter sooner than we had expected—his skills have really diminished, and he projects as our third DE this year. With that in mind, he’ll be looking for close to $20m a year, and that would be tough to pay out. LB Kelly Kennedy is another guy I plan to keep—and still do. He, too will be pricey, but he’s an anchor player—need to have him come back. I’ll go up to $16-18m if need be. LB Marvin Ellison may be even more expensive than Kennedy, as he is younger. I don’t see how I can let him go, but the money will talk here, I fear. I’d rather have Ellison than LB Christian Smith, who is currently making $16m for us—so that is a consideration. C Drew Bloomer is a proven all-star, and I don’t see how I can not re-sign him. S Clyde Dillon may have to go, just due to money problems and our depth at safety. The, we have RB Benjamin Fouse. He might be the best running back this franchise has had. What to do? He’ll likely cost us about $20m to keep—and I feel like we really have no choice. He’s now a fan favorite, and he’s been the engine of our offense. I’ll just have to do what it takes. And among our younger players, the same can be said for QB Todd Markowitz. We get to wait on him, but how could we allow him to just walk? We’ve got other young talent on this list, but we’re already way over our money limitations. A tough season ahead. I find LB Kelly Kennedy particularly difficult to deal with, and end up just submitting his exact request- 3 yrs, $37m, which isn’t really all that much at all. I also put in a bid for LB Ellison, 4yrs, $62m, a bit more generous for the younger player. C Drew Bloomer I also pursue—he receives an offer for 4yrs, $58m. S Clyde Dillon wants $13m a year—he is very good, but I just don’t think I can do it. That brings me to RB Benjamin Fouse. His suggested starting offer is for $3yrs, $118m—nearly $40m a season. I put in a bid for him, and go for 4yrs, $168m—he’s very tough to deal with also. This does not bode well. After week one, the good news is that nobody has signed elsewhere. The bad news is that I’m in for a tough ride here. RB Fouse is getting offers from all over—Cinti and NE are both over mine. I increase to 4yrs, $175m, right on par with the best of the rest. A lot of money—about 14% of my salary cap. With LB Kelly Kennedy, I bump up to 4yrs, $56.5m—just edging out Denver (the bastards). C Bloomer is up to 3yrs, $49m. This is getting pricey, and the QB isn’t even on the list yet. Week two, no changes. In week three, Dallas steps in and signs away my LB Marvin Ellison—I hadn’t seen that one coming. In week four, we get something positive. RB Fouse re-signs our deal, and he’ll be back again. Now we’re focusing on LB Kennedy (even more critical now) and C Drew Bloomer. In week five, LB Kennedy agrees to our deal, and at least we have one guy back there. I decide to go and directly beat Atlanta’s offer to C Drew Bloomer—I really want to keep him. It works, and he signs in week six. After week 7, my safety Clyde Dillon starts to get offers. I decide to put in for him, especially since we might need to go very heavy nickel this year. Despite my offer, S Dillon signs with Minnesota, and at the same time DE Brian Meyer signs his first offer, a good deal with Kansas City. When we get to week 11, we are down to $46.5m in cap room, and we still have to try to re-sign our young QB Todd Markowitz. This will take some doing, to be sure. In the late weeks, I bid on young DT Curtis Carr, and he joins us for a 4yr deal. He should be a good situational pass rusher, giving some DL depth. For the same reason, I grab DE Eugene teinbeck, who should be a decent third or fourth DE if he develops this year. Those are my only moves in the FA market this season. I am again offered a first round pick (early) for DE Alvin Fincher. He’ll make $5m this year, then he’ll probably walk. This pick could be a major impact player for us—I decide to take it. I realize it puts us in a tough spot at DE, but we’ll try to patch things together a bit. I get a 3rd round pick offered for DT Calvin Manke who really doesn’t look any good to me, and decide I have to take that. So, my two young acquisitions now have room to play. We look into the draft with a lot of newly-punched holes in our defense. We could stand to add a top-grade DE prospect in this draft, or a strong linebacker of the future, or also a safety we could depend on. None will be easy. Offensively, we are in generally good shape, but on defense we’re taking on water. |
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01-31-2001, 07:45 PM
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#7 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2043 draft and camp
Holding picks #9 and #32, we’ll probably get one top-tier player, and then have to sit for a while. We check out the cream of the crop, and this draft looks pretty good. Interestingly, this draft contains by far the best Colorado school QB I’ve seen in this career—Carlton Henderson from Col State is superb, an early first round pick for sure. There is also a very good OG in this draft from Colorado—probably a first rounder himself. Overall, I think the best-looking player may be safety Winston Hare, who is completely topped out except a measly 92 in interceptions. He looks quite impressive. RB Curtis Copley looks like a future star as well. I also see a remarkably symmetrical QB—his ratings are (39/80, 40/82, 40/81, 40/81, 39/79, 62, 39/78, 39/79, 51, 52). Personally, I think I smell a bust here. However, I’ll revisit him afterwards. I’m convinced that I’ll get a top-grade player with my #9 pick, and that’s what the team really needs here. QBs Jeremy Garrett (Mr. Symmetry above) and Carlton Henderson (The Col State guy) go 1-2. Regrettably, S Winston Hare goes just ahead of my pick, at #8. I select the top LB available, Dexter Vang.
I tab Colorado RB Blain Heath as my long term free agent rookie. He’ll fill the #3 or #4 RB slot, and will keep me in line with my local product rule at that difficult area. Oakland offers me a second round pick for DT Dwight Larson, and I’m faced with the same dilemma—we’ve got young talent there, but are we going to be okay right away? I don’t know, but seeing my financial situation, I’ll need to release someone, so I might as well loose the guy who gets me something. We re-sign QB Todd Markowitz to a new 5yr, $121m deal. Not as bad as I had feared it might be. This makes signing rookies to fill up the roster even tougher. I’ll have to wait until after camp—I may need to make some cuts to be able to re-sign my punter and kicker. Here is the roster heading into camp—only 51 signed:
I have a fairly routine training camp, though I am starting to re-think many of my ideas about how to best go about it. Regardless, I decide to keep close to what’s been working pretty well lately. After camp, here are the scout’s impressions:
Our youngsters all look fine—no busts. I still can’t believe C Jesse Morris, who looks positively sensational. Oh, I check out QB Jeremy Garrett, the #1 overall pick. El busto magnifico! The guy from Col State will be a real stud, though. Four of the top five picks were QBs, and only #2 worked out—1,4, and 5 are all worthless scrubs now. Arizona offers me their first round pick for my backup QB Uhlenhake. My rookie Duffy looks almost as good already, and Uhlenhake is in the final year of his contract- I have to take this deal. I get everything together for our final cut of 53, and we trot them out for the season:
What to make of this year? Hard to say. Our offense ought to be fine—our line looks fabulous, and our skill positions are good, to complement our freshly paid QB-RB combo. We should be fine there. As for the defense. Ah, that. I see holes a-plenty. Our LB corps is pretty solid, but we’re weakened on the DL and in the secondary, pretty significantly. It may turn out to be tough. We might need to have Mr. Markowitz going to the air a little more often—we could get into some high scoring games, I fear. I hope I did the right thing, committing everything to my two young offensive stars, and basically dismantling my defense in the process. It looks like we have set the tone for this team—we’ll focus on moving the ball, and dare our opponents to run with us. |
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02-01-2001, 03:11 AM
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#8 |
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Pro Rookie
Join Date: Oct 2000
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Nice draft!!! PS - hmmmm, wouldn't it be nice to know that safety's 40 time?  |
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02-02-2001, 08:03 PM
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#9 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2043 season
No major surprises with my team’s setup. I do move a little more toward zone defense that usual. My third CB Barton will be able to handle the nickel back duties fine, but we cannot afford to take any injuries in the secondary. On the franchise value screen, we’re a close 97, just behind New Orleans. Seattle and Oakland are next within the division, but way back at 47 and 44. Our franchise value, incidentally, is tops in the league (after hanging around #2-4 for most of the last two decades). Our cohesion ratings are an inclined list: 62-71-73-88. We get a high rating in our secondary, despite starting a rookie at safety. Interesting. He are stacked with early home games, and then will be on the road down the stretch. We end up at home for Seattle in our finale. Exhibition season ends, and we are essentially unscathed. Nice bonus. We host Oakland for our opener, and the Raiders get a 16-13 win in overtime. An even game, they just played solidly and shut down our big play attack. We win 12-7 in KC, and get our record back to even. It’s our defense who earns this one—not exactly how it was supposed to be working. We come home, and beat SD 24-10. RB Benjamin Fouse is the engine behind this one, with 185 yards and 2 TDs. QB Todd Markowitz really hasn’t made a real impact yet in this early season. Buffalo visits next, and they get to 3-0 with a 28-24 win. They got 2 TDs on returns, which boosted a subpar effort from their offense. We get a bye week, and hope to regroup for an effort to escape the reaches of the .500 record we now boast. Regrettably, the Cowboys come in and win 23-21, and send us to below sea level. At 2-3, we now head into Denver, to take on the 4-2 Broncos. They salivate at the opportunity to kick us while we’re apparently down. Fortunately, we rebound right on time, and beat the Broncos 23-3 in their place. We play okay on offense, but it is again the defense who stands tall. On the season they have probably outplayed our offensive unit—and I wouldn’t have seen it as possible. Cohesion/expertise at work? In SD, we get another lopsided win 41-10. RBs Fouse and May again lead a good running game, and we start to look more like the team I had hoped to field this year. We win 31-14 in Boise, to get to 5-3 at the halfway point. We lose DE Arnold Shaw for a few weeks, which could hurt a bit. In a major “doughnut” game, we eke out a 22-20 win at home over Kansas City. We’re up to 7-2, and within one game of Oakland for the division lead. A good Philadelphia team comes to our place, and they edge us 31-29. We were down by 24, but rallied in the fourth quarter with 3 return TDs to make it interesting. We were pretty well outclassed in the main stat categories—Philly looks very good. Now we head into Oakland, for a big division game. Our hopes are enlivened by a great 31-6 win in Oakland, getting us back within one game of the Raiders. RB Fouse has 3 TDs, as we just handle them in every way. Now, we host Denver, who are one game behind us now. We handle them pretty well, 30-6, with three fourth quarter TDs to top off a fairly close game to that point. On the day, we rushed for 332 yards—Fouse 168, May 129—in our best effort to date in that department. Our 29-10 win in Seattle gets us to 9-4, and we’re again rallying late to gain stature among the league’s top teams. Rookie QB Frankie Duffy plays most of this game, with Markowitz injured. Todd has a hip pointer, and may miss the rest of the regular season. In week 15, we go into Pittsburgh, a matchup of two 9-4 teams. There are six teams with 9 wins right now—that is very possibly the entire AFC playoff contingent. This game has a lot of weight for seeding purposes. We get a 20-17 win in Pitt, even through backup QB Duffy gets hurt and we go the second half behind third stringer Rutter. Next week, Rutter will have to start—he’s our only healthy option. We are in NY to face the Giants, who are 10-4 like us. We end up with a 24-21 victory—courtesy mostly of a KR TD by WR Kitchings, and an interception TD by Barton. QB Rutter is pretty poor. In our last game, Seattle comes in and beats us at home, and we drop to 11-5. Rutter throws 51 passes—a lot more than I would have preferred he even get near. I’m very hopeful that we get Markowitz back for the playoffs. Fortunately, we get the tie breaker over Oakland, and win the division—the resulting #2 seed gives us a healing week off.
Stat leaders: QB Todd Markowitz: 1,968 yds, 55.4%, 6.26 ypa, 12/9, 75.1 RB Benjamin Fouse: 275-1,296 yds, 14 TD (4.7 ypc); 62 rec-530 yds, 1 TD RB Aaron May: 105-579 yds, 6 TD (5.5 ypc) WR Dominic Poole: 50-638 yds, 3 TD (53.7%, 6 drops) WR Michael Kitchings: 8.12 PR avg, 26.1 KR avg, 2 TD OL unit: ~35% KRB, 31 sacks allowed C Drew Bloomer: 30/92 KRBs (32.6%), 3 sacks allowed in 391 pass plays LB Kelly Kennedy: 86 tackles, 2.5 sacks DT Curtis Carr: 8 sacks, 2 blocks, 6 hurries S Brenden Honeycutt: 86 tackles, 7 int, 1 TD, 9 PD, 42.6 PDQ CB Buddy Coleman: 29 tackles, 7 int, 11 PD, 56.0 PDQ Overall stats (Off/def/avg): Rushing: 4.3 / 3.0 / 3.8 Passing: 5.8 / 6.5 / 6.4 I’m starting to wonder if I did the right thing by re-signing QB Todd Markowitz. To date, this guy is all ratings, no production. Admittedly, my mostly default offense is pretty run-oriented, but this seems downright silly. Our run defense was the big pleasant surprise—one of the best numeric performances we’ve had for some time. Young LB Dexter Vang, playing about half time, had 50 tackles and accounted for 15% of tackles while he was on the field. He looks promising. This year, it’s hard to say whether this team is a championship squad. We played tough defense, and put together a good late run (again) but I’m not certain we have all the fundamentals in place. RB Benjamin Fouse is probably the key—if we can get him rolling behind our line, we might be able to control any game. |
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02-02-2001, 09:54 PM
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#10 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2043 postseason
Indy beats Pittsburgh in the opening round, and earns a shot at us in the divisional playoffs. The Colts were A fairly unspectacular team, but they have gone 11-6 so far. They are just a bit better than average at everything—but they’ll try to run on us. Should be a ground-oriented game. We’ll go with Rutter again this week, as my top two QBs are still listed as questionable. I’m hopeful that if we get through this game, we can activate Markowitz for the AFC Championship game. Our first possession, is short, we punt, and the Colts return it for 90 yards and a TD. We respond with a decent drive for a FG, and we’re back alive. At the end of the first quarter, we are driving again, and we finish it off with a short TD pass to FB McKay. When we next get it back, though, Rutter tosses a pick and the Colts get great position. They add a FG, and it’s 10 apiece. Despite the tie score, we have to feel like we’re in control—we have outgained them 103 to 8 so far. As the half approaches, Rutter hits Nixon for a 46 yard play, to set up a FG to take the lead. The third quarter is mostly back and forth, but late we get a drive going, and Rutter finds Wayne for a TD, and we lead 20-10. Early in the fourth, our defense again sets us up, and Rutter throws his third TD to put the game essentially out of reach. The Colts get a pair of late TDs, and with only 1:25 left, suddenly there is a moment of pressure. However, we recover the onside kick, and look to be in good shape again. We take the knee, and we get away with a 30-24 victory. We’ll take on the New England Patriots in the AFC Championship game—the Pats were only a wild card team, so we get to host the game. The Pats are gamblers—they play an aggressive bump and run defense, and will blitz like crazy. We’ll try to handle the pressure—we’ll get Todd Markowitz back as our starting QB for this game. We take over first, and turn it over after a few plays when WR Poole fumbles after a nice catch. The Pats convert for a FG, and we get a second chance. We respond with a good possession, yielding a FG of our own to tie the game. The Pats’ drive is a long one, and it carries into the second quarter, where they continue the trend and add another FG. Later in the second quarter, Markowitz hits Fouse for a swing pass that goes for an 11-yard TD, and we take our first lead. That score holds up until the half. In the second half, we come out and feature a steady diet of Benjamin Fouse—running and catching the ball. Looks good. We get all the way to the Pats’ 3, but end up with only a FG. After the Pats’ throw an interception, we cash it in with a one-play drive, a 25-yard TD to Nixon. We go up 20-6, and look to be in control now. However, just like last week, we start to lose it. The Pats march for a TD fairly quickly, and get back within 7 points. We come back with another solid drive, but again come away with just a short FG. With 7:46 left, we are back to a 10 point lead. We stop them, we get a good drive going, we eat up some clock, and we put the game away with another TD pass. We round it out, and take a 30-13 win to head into the Superbowl against the New York Giants. We head into the Superbowl in as good health as we have seen since the season opened. The Giants have a few dings, but are in generally good shape, too. They are a balanced offensive attack, with WR B.J. Givgore their main weapon. Their strength is their run defense, which just keeps opponents in check. It should at least start out as a running-based contest—we’ll go to the air, though, if they shut down our running attack. They may start sooner. The Giants elect to receive, and get a couple first downs before pinning us at our 14. The first quarter is a grind back and forth, but we eventually get backed into bad position. They manage to get in for a 33 yard FG attempt, but miss is wide left. We dodge the bullet, and take over at our 23 as the quarter expires. We again get stuffed—the Giants defense has accomplished their original goal—they really have shut down our running game. In the second quarter, the Giants get into our territory again, and break off a 32-yard carry for the TD. We finally respond with some signs of life on our own side, and we march for a tying TD on a pass to Nixon. The 7-7 deadlock holds until halftime. We open up the third quarter with a TD drive, putting us up 14-7. They can’t move it, and we get a good return from Kitchings, and take over at their 46. We add a 39 yard FG, to move ahead by 17-7. Early in the fourth, the Giants are moving into our territory, and the Squirrel faithful sense (or fear) another late-game collapse. From our 25, they surprise us with a run up the gut on third and long, and it goes the distance for the score. It’s 17-14, with 14 minutes left. A trade of punts takes it to 9:40. Another uninteresting exchange ticks it down to 6:46. From here, if we could just get a couple of first downs, we could probably cinch the game. Our three plays get us nine yards, and we have to send it right back over to them. They take over at their 24, with 4:35 left. Now, our defense has to step up. . . again. The Giants’ WR Givgore makes a big play to get to their 49 for a first down. Soon, however, they face 4th and 8 from our 49, with 2:44 to go. They punt, and we get one more chance to win by moving the ball. Fouse gets the carry for 8 yards, and the Giants call time out. Markowitz keeps it, and gains 5 yards for the first down. The Giants stop the clock at 2:19. On first down, Markowitz tries a quick pass to Poole, but it is tipped away- very dangerous. Another pass is dropped by Fouse, and we face third and 10. Markowitz runs a draw for 5 yards, but we face 4th and 5. We get only a 33 yards punt, they add a 13 yard return, and the Giants take over at their 42 yards line, with great field position. With 1:47 on the clock, the Giants get their last shot. The first pass is underthrown and incomplete. My defense reads the next play well, and it’s also incomplete. On third and 10, their QB drops back and finds his main man Givgore for an incredible 45 yard play, down to our 13. With 1:07 left, they practically have the chip shot FG in the bag, and are looking for the kill. They run around left end, get a big block, and take it right in for a TD, going ahead 21-17 with 58 seconds on the clock. Ouch. We get it back at our 28, and get it to the 40, but it takes the clock down to 19 seconds. Down 4 points, we need a major miracle here. After one incomplete pass, Markowitz halus back, and throws downfield. . . and WR Nixon somehow comes up with it, falling out of bounds at the Giants’ 15 yard line. There are 7 seconds left on the clock. On the next play, after a time out, we line up with a three-wide formation, and Markowitz drops back, pumps deep, but then dumps off a short pass to Benjamin Fouse into the right flat, where he is “covered” by a linebacker. Fouse breaks free of his tackler, gets to the three yard line, and takes on the Giants free safety head on. It’s a mighty clash, and both men are reeling, but Fouse falls forward and lands with his hips on the goal line. The clock shows zero, the referee’s hands are up, and the scoreboard reads an improbable Colorado Springs 23, New York 21.
The Squirrel faithful are reeling. . . the most incredible ending to a Superbowl. All the whispers of mismanagement during the preseason, as the team shed so many talented players in order to retain two young blossoming offensive talents, and in the end—those two players converted the biggest single play we’ve ever experienced, and delivered the trophy to Col Springs. On the season awards board, we have a number of notes. QB Todd Markowitz did, indeed, receive the Superbowl MVP award. We also had a few first teamers—FB Dean McKay (again), and C Drew Bloomer are both so honored on the offense, and safety Brenden Honeycutt is on defense. Guard T.J. Robson is a second team guard, and young TE Greg Loom is named to the second team also. Curiously, RB Benjamin Fouse is not named to either al-star team (he had the third highest rushing total in the league) but he does manage to take home the coveted league MVP award (and that’s all). Young RB Grady Ingram for Miami is the second team RB, and looks like he’ll be a solid star for some time. Jacksonville’s RB Curtis Copley had 1,094 yards to get OROY, and he ought to be a good one, too. A good regular season for us, and a wonderful ride through the playoffs. It would be tough to rank this as a “great” team, but the ring is the thing, and we just got it. |
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02-02-2001, 10:12 PM
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#11 |
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College Starter
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Berkeley
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Wow! Why couldn't we have gotten THAT Super Bowl this year? Kind of reminds me of last year's except your guy actually made in the endzone. Congratulations!
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02-03-2001, 07:20 AM
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#12 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2044 pre draft
We have no major headlines—no retirements, and no league HOF admissions. The HOF class is illustrious, including Miami’s great QB Marhsall McDonald, and Oakland’s QB B.J. Erickson. Also admitted is a great safety from Colorado, Spencer Gustafson. He was drafted ahead of my pick by Denver, and posted great numbers for them and onward. Tough to see a Buffalo get into the HOF without ever playing for our team. Our franchise, with three home playoff games last season, ought to have done very well. However, considering the bonus money we paid out to Fouse and Markowitz, we aren’t too upset that we finished $23m in the red last year (after a $70m uptick in bonus payments). We were back among the four 100% attendance teams as well. I remain comfortable with my front office team, but I’ll need to re-sign Coach Todd Rowan this year (good timing for him). I submit a $16m offer, which would put him right about into the middle of the pack. He takes the deal immediately—it was twice was he asked for, and a bit more than I had been paying him, but I didn’t want to take any chances. Here is our roster picture as we begin free agency:
A very modest amount of cap room this year, but it should be a quiet season for signings anyway. My trade page says that I’ll need just about every penny of that$22m just to sign my rookies (including two extra second round picks, one #38 overall), so any FA signings will need to be accompanied by cuts. DT is the obvious trouble spot. I have two young guys in Curtis Carr and Tommie Lee, but if we let Kanell go we’ll be very young inside. I don’t see any easy way around it, and that’s my plan. We may be moving toward the 3-4 anyway, which would de-emphasize the need for depth there. FB Dean McKay is a guy I’d very much like to keep—he just racks up awards like crazy (four first team honors in his four years—amazing). I’m also wiped out at WR, but I simply can’t imagine re-signing any of my expiring contract guys to their demands, so we’ll have to go young there. If I want to re-sign FB McKay, the guy who almost has to go is LB Christian Smith, making over $15m this year. He’s okay, and he contributes to our pass rush and cohesion, but is overpaid. The other possibility would be T Tommie Monroe, but he’s a lifer, and a local guy, and we cannot let him finish up somewhere else—we’ll eat his $22m in salary for this year, and he’ll probably quit after that. I start with a 3yrs, $26m offer to FB McKay. How could I let this guy get away? He’s a fabulous lead blocker, and really does it all. After week one, I have to bump up top outpace Pittsburgh. Then the Eagles outbid me, too. I bump up to 4yr, $45m for him. He takes the deal right afterwards, and we have our fullback locked up. DT Kanell signs a deal with GB in week 10, and gets his big money. After week 11 arrives, I find little to like in the free agent pool, and we make no more moves at all. As we look forward to this draft, we have defensive needs aplenty. LB is now near the top of that list, along with a quality safety. My front formation will probably depend on what caliber of LB or DT I can acquire in this rookie class. I also really could use a pass rusher from DE, where my team remains pretty seriously thin. On offense, the only area if need is WR, where we need bodies and we’ll need more next year. Many demands, we’ll see how well we can afford this team. I’m offered the 5th pick in this draft plus a pretty good safety for QB Todd Markowitz. Honestly, if I had not just won the Superbowl with Markowitz, I’d be very tempted by this pick—I’m now pretty much convinced that despite his many red bars, Markowitz is just a good (and not great) QB since he has only average accuracy and power. He’s visually deceiving, with his impressive red lines, but his weakness are in the critical areas. Nonetheless, we can’t be trading our Superbowl MVP quarterback, and we’ll sit tight. |
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02-03-2001, 09:28 AM
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#13 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2044 draft and camp
It’s okay that we lack an early pick this year, as it’s a direct result of our on-field success. We have two extra second round picks, including the #38 overall selection, so we’ll be grabbing almost back-to-back picks at 36 and 38. My hope is that we see a star quality player almost anywhere slip to us there, and then we can spend the other early picks on need areas like linebacker, safety, or perhaps defensive tackle. Wide receiver is a fall-back plan, but I’d prefer to focus on defense. In this draft, I see DE Mark Gilbertson out of Florida as a realtive standout. Alogn with the top wideout Andrew Wayne, he looks like a great draft prospect. It’s a good draft for offensive tackles, and there look to be several future stars there. No QBs among the top handful of picks, though I’m sure some desperate teams will bite anyway. QB Mike Jennings out of Air Force could be one of those early “reach” picks—he is the type with very solid current ratings, and pretty even (but not great) potentials. At another position, I’d forecast him as a bust, but at QB, I’m not so sure. My guess is he’ll go too early for it to affect me. There’s a good punter from Colorado, who would be a great improvement for us, and also a decent kicker. Overall, a so-so year for local players. As I had thought, QB Jennings goes at #14 to Fargo. When my pick arrives, I’m absolutely shocked. DE Mark Gilbertson has fallen all the way to us in this draft. I realize that my scout is only rated “fair” with defensive linemen, but this guy look incredible. I grab him quickly, and hope that it isn’t too good to be true. At LB, the draft thinned out very quickly, and I’m faced with the choice of reach there early, or wait and get fill-ins later.
After the draft, my financial problems come into sharper focus. We have $7m in cap room, remaining, and we have only 43 slots filled. I can probably resolve this by making a few extra cuts of only middle-range players, but I will definitely have to make cuts. I decide that the first cut will be DE Eugene Steinbeck, and I’ll count on my young additions at DE to help fill in for his departure. I also feel as though I ought to re-sign LB Claude McCurdy (now that I couldn’t get a star-caliber replacement in this draft). He’ll take around $10m this year, and I’m not sure how I find that much money. I pick up WR Brenden Kunz as my long term free agent for this year, filling a need position, and also looking like he has more upside then most FA wideouts. I’ll go into camp with only 52 players, and after camp, I’ll make whatever moves I need to make to afford a full roster. Tight year, needless to say.
I’m hopeful that my DE selection works out, both in camp and on the field—I won’t really know until he’s played for a while. Regardless, I’d like to see good results from a generally underwhelming camp. Didn’t find anyone who looked like a great breakout player, but who knows? My camp settings are pretty much the usual—I decide to stick with the 4-3 for now, especially since my LB situation will be weakened significantly. Here is the scout’s writeup after camp:
My rookies look fine—DE Gilbertson looks very solid. The minor disappointment is WR J.R. Kelly, whose highest apparent skills seemed to round down a good deal. URFA DE Kris Maupibn, a local guy, wasn’t quite as good as he looked originally—I’m glad I didn’t use my long contract on him (which I considered). All in all, not too bad. I get a trade offer for C Jesse Morris. He looks like he’ll be fabulous, but when I drafted him he only took a two year deal, and I’ll almost certainly be unable to re-sign him after this season. So, even though he projects to be an absolute star-caliber player, I have to let him go for Denver’s third round pick—a terrible value, but there was no better option. After trading away Morris, we have just enough to replace him with two rookies, and we fill our roster with practically no cap room left. A paper-thin margin, but we field a team, and have our offensive system coming back for another bite.
This year, we will certainly have out sights set on another title run. Last year’s offense was not as powerful as we had hoped, but our defense (especially stopping the run) was a pleasant surprise. This year, I fear that we won’t be able to maintain that level, with our depleted LB corps. I hope that our offense picks up a bit, especially in the passing game. We probably have a shot, but don’t come in as prohibitive favorites. |
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02-03-2001, 06:20 PM
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#14 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2044 season
For this year’s team, our setup will change fairly little. On defense, I am going to blitz my top two linebackers (including the MLB) rather than just the willie. With our DEs, I’ll use White and Gilbertson as a sort of platoon at the left end position, and Shaw on the right side. I’m again using a heavy nickel package, this year particularly to cut down on my LB depth problems. We have the 100 roster rating again, with Green Bay next at 72. Denver is fourth with a 60, and I suspect they might be heading toward good things—maybe they’ll finally get back into the playoff picture. My team’s cohesion ratings are 70-79-69-89. Our offensive line and secondary are among the top-rated units in that regard. It looks like a balance schedule this year, we’ll get a fairly even balance of home and road games. We’ll be done with Denver early, and perennial contender Oakland will be finished after week 12. We’re at San Diego for our finale, which could be good—they have been awful in recent seasons. In the preseason, we take the hit we don’t want—RB Benjamin Fouse is hurt. Fortunately, he will probably only miss a few games, but he’s critically important to this team. Young LB Dexter Vang is also out, probably for a month or so. I cannot believe that Antoine Hitchcock, my local guy fill-in stiff, will be starting for us as we open the season. Despite the injuries, we get an opening win in Oakland, 27-21. WR Dominic Poole and RB Aaron May picked up the slack for Fouse’s absence. We host Denver, and have a shot to get a leg up on our two top division rivals. After falling behind 17-3 in the first quarter, we rally for 17 points in the fourth and we take a squeaker 20-19 over the Broncos. We are at 2-0, without our best player. We tumble in Kansas City 25-23. We rack up almost twice as many yards, but they get a kick return TD and 4 turnovers (we got none) and they come away winners. RB Aaron May again shows that our running game is flexible (our line has a little something to do with it, perhaps) as he gains 140 yards on the day. We welcome Fouse back, but get paved by the unbeaten Colts, 38-13. Fouse gets 26 yards on 13 carries, and the rest of the team isn’t much better. A very poor showing, needless to say. We get our bye week, and welcome LB Dexter Vang back aboard. A 20-9 win in Chicago is a good sign. QB Todd Markowitz seems to be off to a better start than usual—he’s up to 11/6 in his ratio, which is decent and for him better than usual. He’s throwing for 8.35 ypa, which is very good. A nice start. The surprising Seahawks get to 6-1 with a 16-12 win at our place. No real excuse—we outgained them and outplayed them, just couldn’t outscore them. We lose DT Tommie Lee to a serious knee injury, and are sent scuttling for replacement parts. I cannot afford to sign anyone without a cut, so I release a LB to pick up a rookie DT. Regrettably, the cut puts me to only $1,200,000 in cap room, and I cannot get a single rookie to sign for that little, they want just a sliver more. Ugh. We get a 36-24 win at home over KC, much needed. The Chiefs put up TDs on a punt and kickoff return—otherwise, we handled them pretty well. New England beats us in a rematch of the AFC Championshiop game from last year, 26-14. QB Todd Markowitz is hurt, and it is pretty serious—he’ll miss at least a few weeks. At 4-4, this next stretch will be critical, and we’ll be without our signal caller. On the road, into Denver—not the best way to start out a critical string of games. The Broncos get 3 defensive TDs to win 38-13, and send us to 4-5 on the year. We’ve been slow starters lately, but this is looking bleak, even for us. We lose 35-23 in Green Bay, and my backup QB Duffy gets hurt—for the second straight season we’re starting a rookie QB, who is patently unready for the duty. We are taking on water, and I don’t know what we’ll be able to do to get back into the picture—we’d almost need to run the table from here on out. We get a start, with a 19-13 home win over Oakland. Rookie QB T.J. Downes does a decent job running the show, and we eke out a win. We go to Settle, to face the 9-2 Seahawks. They look tough, but we really outplayed them our first matchup. This time, it’s another even game, but they come away winners, 34-27. QB Downs throws for 365 yards, but he does have two picks, which both hurt. In week 14, San Diego comes in and beats us, 19-6. This team has seemingly given up on everything. At 5-8, we’re cooked, and almost certainly will be yet another Superbowl champion who misses the following year’s playoffs. With Markowitz back, we whip Baltimore 19-3, and then take Tampa Bay 41-17. We are, however, still eliminated from the playoffs—8-8 won’t get us in. We finish strongly in San Diego with a 34-7 victory, but our 8-8 record will leave us on the outside looking in.
Stat leaders: QB Todd Markowitz: 2,475 yds, 61.8%, 7.93 ypa, 18/16, 84.5 (11 games) RB Benjamin Fouse: 204-884 yds, 7 TD (4.3 ypc); 41 rec-504 yds, 2 TD RB Aaron May: 136-562 yds, 1 TD (4.1 ypc) WR Dominic Poole: 66-980 yds, 7 TD (58/9%, 6 drops) OL unit: ~35% KRBS, 35 sacks allowed LB Kelly Kennedy: 94 tackles, 2.5 sacks DE Arnold Shaw: 9 sacks, 4 blocks, 7 hurries S Brenden Honeycutt: 56 tackles, 4 int, 12 PD, 41.1 PDQ Overall stats (off/def/avg): Rushing: 3.8 / 3.4 / 3.8 Passing: 7.2 / 5.9 / 6.5 These stats are not so bad—they look like the numbers of a winning team. However, this team was unable to make big plays—zero return TDs on the season, and only two defensive TDs. The biggest number that totally leaps out, though is our turnover margin, which usually varies from about 5 to 15. This year: minus 27. We were absolutely awful in giving the ball away, and that cost us a lot of games. In the playoffs, the Seahawks make it all the way to the Superbowl, where they match up against Detroit. The Seahawks kill the Lions 44-13, to take home their title, as they run all over the hapless Lions defense. WR Andrew Wayne stormed the league in this, his rookie year—he had 1,678 yards to earn first team honors, and also offensive rookie of the year. I had a feeling he’d be good—but who knew? He is edged out for league MVP by RB Curtis Copley of Jacksonville, last year’s top rookie. We get a few mentions. TE Greg Loom is named to the first team for his solid 519-yard season. FB Dean McKay is placed on the second team, which is a first for him (he’s always been on the first team). G T.J. Robson also makes the second team, as does our rookie kicker Rodney Mayers. Not the most thrilling recognition, but we’ll take it. A tough season. Paying so much for RB Fouse and (to a degree) QB Markowitz is leaving little left over for the rest of the team. This coming year, we’re going to have a number of veteran players who we’d like to re-sign in free agency, but we’ll see how far we have to “bend” elsewhere to keep this offense intact. |
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02-04-2001, 02:06 AM
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#15 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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Notes on this Offensive Line
My team’s rebirth in the middle 2030s (two straight titles) came in large part due to some veteran additions to our offensive line, which magically made our offense work much better. (how about that?) Since then, we’ve made more of a commitment to maintaining our offensive line at a higher standard than before, and the results have been generally good. Over the last number of years, I ended up acquiring a number of early draft picks on the offensive line. This was part planning, and part just following the whims of the random draft (and taking the most appealing players with my early picks). That said, I now have an assemblage of very good, young offensive linemen, who give me a chance to undertake a pretty fascinating enterprise. First, here is what I have on hand. I’ll ignore my longtime starter at RT Tommie Osborne—he’ll soon retire, but his presumed replacement is already on hand. This data is (where appropriate) from my scout, who is rated VG with OL: LT Carl Osborne, 5th year Signed through 2045, currently makes $11.8m Ratings: 76/79, 80/84, 89 90/252 KRBs (35.7%) 15 sacks/1,572 pass plays=0.95% LG T.J. Robson, 4th year Signed through 2046 – currently makes $12.5m Ratings: 86/96/75 124/354 KRBs (35.0%) 19 sacks/1,867 pass plays=1.02% First team 2042; Second team 2041, 2043, 2044 C Drew Bloomer, 7th year Signed through 2045 – currently makes $17.5m Ratings: 94/78/62 207/624 KRBs (33.1%) 25 sacks/2,794 pass plays=0.89% First team 2042, 2043; Second team 2038 RG Richie Peel, 4th year Signed through 2045, currently makes $6.3m Ratings: 86/96, 76/85, 54 72/184 KRBs (39.1%) 17 sacks/1,054 pass plays=1.61% RT Lamar Grayson, 2nd year Signed through 2048, currently makes $5.4m Ratings: 67/82, 50/63, 78 6/23 KRBs (26.0%) 1 sacks allowed /110 pass plays=0.91% Most of these guys are pretty much developed into their full potential, Grayson needs one more year. But with this group, all within five years of one another (and all but one within three years), I seem to have a singular opportunity to let the line grow old together. Thinking through the arithmetic, I’m pretty convinced that it is possible. First of all, they all are signed through next year. In addition, I have my current RT Tommie Monroe, who is nearing retirement—but currently making $22m. Right now, I am spending a total of $75m on my top six linemen. In more or less current dollars, if I resolve to hold on to each of these five guys as they demand open-market contracts, I should expect that I could sign them all for perhaps $16-17m a year—a total of $80-85m, which honestly isn’t much more than I’m paying now. Of course that is quite a lot, but theoretically, I could end up with positively enormous cohesion from this unit, and might be able to differently allocate my camp time around that knowledge. I think it’s an interesting enough idea that I’ll plan my future of the franchise around it—we’ll be a franchise built from the offensive line up, and we’ll see what happens. I’m not convinced that it will be an “optimal” strategy per se, but it should give me some interesting financial challenges elsewhere on the team, and at the same time should drive the offense in the right direction. |
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02-04-2001, 03:24 AM
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#16 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2045 pre-draft
We go another year without a major headline—no retirements, and no new hall of famers. Actually, we haven’t added a team HOF member since 2039, and I’m not sure who might some along next, to be honest. DE Brian Meyer retired from KC this off-season—he might have a shot of making the team HOF, I’d guess. Our balance sheet was even more red than last year—we lost $33m in 2044. We went from three home playoff games to none, and the team slipped substantially in the standings, and it showed. Our attendance stayed among the three with perfect marks, but I’m not sure if they’ll all stay for this year. My scout needs a new contract. I’m pretty comfortable with him in the saddle, and I want to keep him. He made $1m last year, which would put him in the lowest third this year. I expect to have to pay a bit more, but I’m not sure how high to bid. I start with the same $1m, and we’ll see what happens. He grabs the deal, and Luke Flowers is back aboard with us for another five years. Here is our financial picture—the roster, sorted by salary this year:
With $70m in room, we’ll go after our two secondary starters Bailey and Honeycutt. I’d like to keep T Tommie Monroe, but if he’s looking for $20m or so (again), it’s just not going to happen. Losing TE Loom and WR Poole will be a dent in my passing game, but I’m not sure what choice I really have in the matter. This is just going to be a team with holes. I kick off with 4yrs, $86m to CB Leslie Bailey, who has been very solid for me. I spent a tough period looking for a reliable cornerback, and this guy came along and has done very well for 10 years. This contract should wrap up his productive years with us, assuming we get him. S Brenden Honeycutt was from the same draft as Bailey, and we want to keep them both going. I offer 3yrs, $36m to Honeycutt, and hope that he stays also. As for T Tommie Monroe, I’ll give him his chance to go out and make some more big money, if he can land a deal. I simply cannot afford the $18m or so that he is suggesting. If nobody else takes him on, we will, but he’ll get his chance for one more lucrative deal. After week one, we are pending atop the lists for Bailey and Honeycutt. T Monroe looks like he’ll get his deal—Atlanta is talking $17m a year with him for 4 years. In week two, the Rams step in and get T Monroe for three years—they must have put a lot up front. In week three, TB puts in an offer for S Honeycutt, as do several other teams. In week 5, S Honeycutt accepts my bumped-up deal, and he is done. CB Bailey is still sitting out there, but in week 6, he accepts my offer, and the two foundation players of my secondary are aboard for another go-round. In week 11, I check out what’s left in free agency. Lots of tight ends, oddly enough. I contemplate a solid-looking LB for about $8m—it’s been such a weakness for us. The guy, however, really isn’t any better than a solid middle-round draft pick, and I decide that I’ll perhaps try to fill that vacancy with, say, a middle round draft pick instead of a multimillion dollar contract I’d want out of in a year or two. As FA closes, I have only 36 players signed for this year. When I add 7 draftees, I’ll still have 10 spots to fill—that’s more than we really want to have. I decide to pursue some fairly cheap free agents—T Rickey Ackerman should be a fine third tackle, but I cannot find anyone else who makes sense to bring aboard. I get a trade offer that (to my surprise) masses muster—Fargo wants DE Arnold Shaw, and they’re putting up the #8 pick to get him. DE Shaw would be my starter at RDE this year, but he’ll leave demanding more money after this season almost certainly. My young guys Gilbertson and White will advance this year, and could man the two starting jobs—though I might need another body in the draft. I decide this is too good to pass up, and I take the deal. That gives me picks #8 and #17 in the draft—pretty strong positioning for a team that still believes it is a title contender for now and the near future. In this draft, we’ll look for immediate help on the front seven, in any position. Looking into next year, we will expect to lose several valuable players, and we might do well to try to acquire some RB and WR depth here also. I think that with the trading of DE Shaw, we may have freed up the cap room to re-sign WR Dominic Poole—but we’ll see how things look after the draft, as we have a lot of roster slots to fill. |
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02-04-2001, 11:46 AM
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#17 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2045 draft and camp
There looks to be a lot of talent in this draft, including a lot at WR. I identify C Sam Naquin as one of the top overall talents, and CB Butch Mahoney as another. RB Ed Monaco from Jackson State is a pretty likely OROY candidate, as is RB Darnell Hawn. There’s also a very intriguing LB Kim Duncan, who is already very talented, and looks like a potential redliner—he might be a genius player, I don’t recall seeing a “redliner” who looked this good in current ability. There are two top prospected from Colorado schools—WR Andrew Culpepper is an almost certain bust, and S J.B. Del Barco looks solid, and could be a good middle round pick for us. In the first 7 picks, we see 4 DL go, and the top redliner LB (whom I will be watching). I’m very torn, but I decide to stay on defense, and take the best of the remaining LB talent with my first pick—it’s such an overwhelming team need. I’m pleased that CB Butch Mahoney does slip to my next pick, and we come away with two potential stars from these first round picks.
I made one large mistake in this draft. In round two, had trouble choosing among about four LBs, all of whom looked good. I decided to wait at LB, take a WR instead, and (of course) all of them went before I came up again. The third round LB I get is substantially lesser than the guys I coveted in the second round—a costly error. After the draft, I have $19.3m in cap room left, and eight slots to fill. At $1.2m each, it looks like I’ll have about $10m left over—enough to sign one quality player, or else to forage a bit in the after-camp marketplace. I decide to re-sign WR Dominic Poole to a 3yr, $33m contract—he’ll be a bit of stability among a pretty mediocre WR corps—hopefully he can breakout a bit further and help our passing game step up. “Little Donnie” Jamison is my long-term URFA, a decent-looking running back with some receiving skills, who I hope will step in and take over for Aaron May when he departs (after this season). I feast on a number of rookie fill-ins, and head into camp with exactly 53 players, and $1.44m to spare—enough to afford one upgrade if I need it.
I have a serious concern about my top two draft picks—both had a bit of the “symmetry” profile that sometimes is a tip off to a rookie bust. If both guys bust, I’m in serious trouble. I’m crossing my fingers that things work out okay. I have two rookies for whom I harbor breakout hopes, and for some reason I’m starting to think that S T.J. Whipple might come through. We’ll see—I hope the good news outweighs the bad. In camp, I put a little more time into my defensive formations, giving strong time to both man to man and zone defense. I’m going to be more balanced this year, and I may be moving globally towards more zone defense in general. Here is the scout’s summary after training camp:
Well, my #8 overall pick at LB is el busto. LB Kelvin West has $30m tied up in bonus money, and probably $65 total over 6 years, and he’s probably good enough to be a fourth LB or so. I’ll try to pick my spot with him—who knows when we can cut or trade him? CB Butch Mahoney, on the other hand, is every bit as advertised—he should be stellar. I get no particularly good news anywhere else—neither of my potential redliners actually broke out in camp, so I have no real banner headline from this draft. We pick up a Colorado receiver to round out our local requirement there, and I head into the season with a full roster of 53, and very little room to spare under the cap (once again).
This season, I’m hoping that our defense steps up a bit, and we can get back to a more solid run defense than last season. I again believe that our offense will be solid, but that may depend on the output from the QB position—last year, Markowitz had a good showing when he was healthy, but when he went down, we had difficulties. I’ll hope that Markowitz stays healthy, and that we get the running game going to set up a more effective passing game. |
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02-04-2001, 07:53 PM
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#18 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2045 season
I shift a little more in the direction of zone defense for my secondary, and I will again have each of my top two LBs pretty heavily involved in blitzing. I start CB Drew Morris as strong safety, where his big hitting skills will be an asset. I will use rookie CB Butch Mahoney in our often-used nickel-back role. He’ll get a lot of time as well, I suspect. On offense, I bump up my middle distance passes a bit more, but generally keep things in place. I’m going to do a lot of running behind the center and left guard, which I expect to be (rightfully) the bread and butter of this offense. We’d like to see a very big season out of RB Benjamin Fouse—we have all the pieces in place for a monster year from him. Our roster is once again the holder of the 100 rating, with Seattle close behind at 95. Denver is third with an 81, suggesting that this division could be a real dog fight. Our cohesion is again pretty variable—65-83-68-89. I love the fact that our secondary has such high cohesion, even though we are rotating in and out a bunch of young players into important role. CB Bailey and S Honeycutt are anchoring it down there, and our 89 is second highest in the league. We escape preseason with two LB injuries—Dexter Vang and Kelly Kennedy. Why? Why every year? I’ll keep Vang in at MLB, but Kennedy will miss several games. I also have a serious injury to WR Brenden Kunz, who is a long-termer, but has lost much of his apparent ability with a torn hamstring muscle. He wasn’t ever going to be great. But now he’s only of borderline value. This season, we have a long stretch of home games in the middle of our season, leaving the early and late portions mostly on the road. We’ll finish with games in KC and SD, and I’m hopeful that those two aren’t improved over last year. Our opener in Cleveland is a 13-9 loss. Our passing game was horrid, gaining only 134 yards on the day in 28 attempts. We come home, and get a 10-9 win over KC. Again, not the offensive performance we’re looking for. I’m starting to seriously question my QB’s readiness to be a serious leader. He has a ring, but I’m not sure the team is totally ready to follow this guy, as he has never been able to elevate his game beyond “good enough most of the time.” Disappointing. We go into Portland, and get a 21-3 win. We smartly resolve to keep the ball on the ground, and we run on 43 of 60 offensive plays. In New England, our defensive dam bursts, and we lose 38-21. We give up almost 400 yards, and our red zone defense looks pasty. RB Benjamin Fouse is not exactly earning his keep so far this season, with only 218 yards in 4 games. We next host San Diego, and we turn around the NE score on them, winning 38-21. This one was a great response to our concerns about running the ball—we rack up 348 yards on the ground, with Fouse tallying 225 yards (with a high of only 42). Markowitz throws 18 passes, and it looks good from here. We host 3-1 Denver next, and it’s a predictably important early divisions battle. Seattle looks very tough at 4-0, and neither of us wants to lose more ground in the division race. We get a 24-17 win, with Fouse going to 100 and 2 TD, and LB Darren Caraway posting 8 tackles and 2 sacks. A good win for this team, and we will now get LB Kelly Kennedy back aboard. Regrettably, he’ll just replace the seemingly injury-prone LB Dexter Vang, who will miss a few games now. Now we host Seattle, who is 5-0. Surprisingly, it’s a shootout. We jump out to a 27-7 halftime lead, the Seahawks come back in the third and early fourth quarters to get close again, but RB Benjamin Fouse rips off a 52 yard TD which all but seals it away. Fouse has another heroic day with 266 and 3 TDs on the ground—our running game has really taken shape in the last few weeks (actually, since I lamented it here). QB Todd Markowitz is again felled with an injury, and he will miss a few weeks. We still have Duffy as our backup (though this will be his final year with us, it seems). This is becoming a standard portion of every season with Markowitz—he is simply not a 16-game kind of guy. Not surprisingly, Benjamin Fouse has leapt to the lead of the leader board in rushing yards, with 809 in 7 games (that’s 584 in the last 3 games - whoa). We get another tremendous offensive day, with QB Frankie Duffy coming out quickly and throwing two TDs. He goes 17 for 22 on the day, a very nice performance. However, we go into Oakland, and it’s ugly. They beat us 23-13 as Duffy throws four interceptions. We slip to 6-3, but we’ll finally get our starting pair of LB bookends back and healthy at once. We host 6-2 St. Louis, in a big middle-season game. I don’t want to slide into a multi-game losing streak here, as we’re just on the periphery of division contender status as it stands. We can’t get much going offensively, and we tumble to 6-4 with a 20-7 loss to the Rams. At 6-4, it’s not the end of the world, but now we have rather little margin for error. Week 11 is our bye, and we need it. We go into Denver, and the situation is much the same as our last clash. They lead us by a game, and neither o us can afford to fall further back in the playoff race. At 6-4, a loss here would really stack the deck against us. Instead, we beat the Broncos 16-0, and pull even with them in the division hunt. 7-4 isn’t gong to get it done for the division, though—Seattle stands at 10-1 already. So, we’re probably talking wild card. We now must go into Seattle, and try to take on the Hawks. We handed them their only loss of the year at our place earlier in a shootout—we’ll try to keep things more controlled in this game. However, it’s Seattle who controls things, as they cruise to a 38-14 win. Our next game is another big one—against 9-2-1 Indianapolis. If we take a loss here, it’s probably all over. QB Todd Markowitz throws the game winning TD pass with 17 seconds remaining, as we squeak by 21-20. With a follow up 23-3 win over Oakland, we get to 9-5 on the year, and are in the picture—we’d be a wild card if the season ended now. In Kansas City, we tumble 30-27. We came from 14 pints down in the fourth quarter to tie it up, but the Chiefs kicked the game winning FG in overtime. We slide to 9-6, and our playoff hopes are in jeopardy. If we win our last game, we’re definitely in, but if we lose it, we’re almost certainly out. In San Diego, RB Benjamin Fouse pushes us into the playoffs with a 133 yard, 2 TD day to lead us to a 30-27 win. We held a big lead, gave it up, but then kicked the winning FG as time expired. We get to play in the postseason, and we’ll have to take on Denver—by virtue of our head-to-head dominance, we get to host it this time around.
Stat leaders: QB Todd Markowitz: 2,408 yds, 56.0%, 7.40 ypa, 15/15, 75.7 (13 games) RB Benjamin Fouse: 337-1,522 yds, 13 TD (4.5 ypc); 30 rec-332 yds, 3 TD WR Dominic Poole: 55-960 yds, 7 TD (52.8%, 4 drops) OL unit: ~37% KRBs, 25 sacks allowed C Drew Bloomer: 57/130 KRBs (43.8%), 4 sacks allowed DE Mark Gilbertson: 13.5 sacks, 2 blocks, 5 hurries DT Curtis Carr: 7.5 sacks, 6 blocks, 2 hurries CB (SS) Drew Morris: 87 tackles, 3 int, 1 TD, 8 PD, 29.4 PDQ CB Leslie Bailey: 47 tackles, 5 int, 3 PD, 32.0 PDQ Overall stats (off/def/avg): Rushing: 4.2 / 3.7 / 3.7 Passing: 7.4 / 7.0 / 6.6 Rushing offense: 160.0 ypg (1st) Passing offense: 189.1 ypg (34th) Rushing defense: 96.6 ypg, (11th) Passing defense: 239.6 ypg (30th) Well, we were able to focus the offense on the running game, which is what we wanted. The numbers from the line were very good, and Drew Bloomer broke the league record for KRBs in a season—he’s a lock for first team again. The defense was a bit shaky, but I think we are moving in the right direction. Seattle looks like a very strong team, but we look like a solid playoff team to me. We’ll try to give them a run—but first, we have to beat the hated Broncos. [This message has been edited by QuikSand (edited 02-04-2001).] |
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02-05-2001, 05:59 AM
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#19 |
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Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Manchester, CT
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Dear Quiksand, GM:
Be assured I will be making the trip down to Colorado Springs for this playoff game. It will be a great pleasure to watch my Broncos dismantle the Sad Squirrels and knock your sorry asses out of the playoffs. Your truly, Marmel
__________________
81-78 Cincinnati basketball writer P. Daugherty, "Connor Barwin playing several minutes against Syracuse is like kids with slingshots taking down Caesar's legions." |
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02-05-2001, 06:41 PM
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#20 |
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lolzcat
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
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2045 postseason
Denver is a solid defensive team, which (I suspect) is why they’ve crept their way up the standings over the years, rather than having a fluky winning season or two. Their QB, Tyrell Shepard is nothing special, and we’ll hope to take advantage there. The key is probably whether their good run defense can stop or slow our running game. They start with the ball, and our banged-up defense gets it first shot. Two of my leaders—S Brenden Honeycutt and LB Kelly Kennedy are both hurt. Kennedy will try to play, Honeycutt is our for the season. They end up getting one first down, and punting it away. Or first play is – surprise! – a handoff to Fouse. He runs up the middle, gets a key block by C Bloomer, and rips it for 10 yards. Nice- follow the script. We drive into scoring range, but commit a penalty on the FG play, and have to punt. Our next possession, though, we go 65 yards for a nice TD pass (a short dump to the backup FB Ioja). The 7-0 score holds through the first quarter. On our first possession of the second quarter, we pick right back up, and march 77 yards for another TD pass. Next time, we drive 91 yards, capping it off with a 33 yard run by Fouse. It’s quickly getting out of hand, as the Broncos defense has been on their heels quite a lot here. Denver’s QB Shepard is looking for a way to make a play, but his pass is picked off by CB Morris, and run back 46 yards for the score. The 28-0 score at halftime says a lot—this one is pretty much over. I the third quarter, Denver cashes in two turnovers to get 10 points on the board, and to make it look a little more interesting. Their run defense has stepped up, and we suddenly cannot move with the ball. In the middle of the fourth, they get another TD, and it’s 28-18 after the conversion. With under 7 minutes to play, Markowitz is picked off again, and the Broncos take over at our 49. Our defense comes through, and we get it back unscathed. This drive eats up some clock, and puts Denver in a tough spot. Our defense handles the endgame fine, and we come away with a solid 28-18 victory—one that could have been a total embarrassment based on the first half. We head into Seattle to take on the monster Seahawks, defending Superbowl champions. They have an accurate passer, a power running game, and a solid defense led by shut-down corner Derrick Cavazos. We beat them in our place, but they got us back when we visited them during the regular season. Their 14-2 record gives them home field here and throughout—they look like the team to beat, of course. We get a good start, when Fouse runs for 21 yards on our first play. Markowitz throws to Poole for 43 on the next play, and we’re on to a roaring start. We sputter after that but take the 3 points, for a solid start. On their first possession, they penetrate deep also, they also fizzle out, but they miss their short FG, and we keep our lead. In the early second quarter (after a pair of fizzled drives on each side) we get good field position, and march in for another short FG. A 6-0 lead is okay, but we’d much rather have gotten at least one TD. Seattle answers with a FG drive of their own, and it’s 6-3. But for an oddly shanked kick, we’d be tied. We’ve had most of our luck so far passing the ball, but Markowitz pushes his luck, and we get picked off right before halftime. They have one play, kick the FG, and it’s 6 all at the break. Seattle takes the second half kickoff, and they engineer a TD drive to take the 13-6 lead. We respond, but again we fizzle, and settle for a 43 yard FG. The third quarter ends (not much left after the two long drives) at 13-9, as we take over at our 35. It’s trouble as they stop us, and then move quickly into our territory. Fortunately, we intercept their QB Barker, and get it back at our 12. We cannot move well, but at least we get to punt it out away from our side. A few nice runs, however, and they’re right back into scoring range. Barker connects on 3rd and goal from the 13, and he gets the TD pass to go ahead 20-9 with 4:18 left. That looks bleak. A Markowitz interception all but seals it, and they march in and tack on a classless TD in the waning moments. It’s a 27-9 final, but we played right with them for most of the game. Seattle crushed Indy in the AFC Championship game 33-3, and takes on St. Louis in the Superbowl. It’s as it should be—the #1s beat the #2s to advance. Seattle manhandles the Rams 24-3 to win their second straight championship. They look very fierce—we gave them a much better game than anyone else in the playoffs, it would seem. Seattle’s RB C.J. Woods gets the Superbowl MVP award, but they are fairly sparsely represented on the all-star teams, with CB Derrick Cavazos their only first teamer. Theirs is a total team effort. We get a lot of play in the awards board. RB Benjamin Fouse gets laureled again, with the triple awards—first team RB, OPOY, and MVP. He couldn’t quite duplicate his 2,000 total yard season (of 2041) but he came close, and got the big hardware for the effort. He obviously had help, and that is also reflected on the awards board: FB Dean McKay, C Drew Bloomer, G Richie Peel, and T Carl Osborne all make the first team list. G T.J. Robson makes the second squad, as does CB Drew Morris (whose inflated tackle totals come from playing safety almost all year). The “threepeat” has only been done once in this league, in 2011-12-13 by Cinti. We’ll see if the ‘Hawks have the horses to get it done. As for us, we have our sights set on Seattle, and another step toward big picture success. |
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