Snappers 118, Guns 109: Snappers win a shootout thanks to Blake Grupe somehow dominating Justin Tucker
Factory 116, MSG 87.5: Factory adding Jordan Mason goes on the shortlist for waiver wire pick up of the year
Torpedoes 111, Weasels 102: More PK domination, this time Brandon Aubrey over Evan McPherson
SOL 93.5, Maulers 37.5: Officially the lowest week 1 score for a defending champ in league history
Swerve 89.5, Chumps 86: Jayden Reed outscored all three of Chumps WRs combined
Yanks 82, Mayhem 69.5: My history of starting the wrong QB rears its ugly head
Ruminations and Cogitations (Blogosphere edition)
The silver lining to Maulers 37.5 points is that help is on the way. Practice squad baby!
Your week 1 awards: Hard Luck to Guns for losing with 109 points, Dumb Luck to Yankees for winning with 82, and the Bench Mob goes to Maulers 45 – 37.5. That might be the lowest ever bench score to ever win the Bench Mob.
I updated the EXEMPT values on the rosters this weekend and charged $10 for changes to practice squads. PS moves will auto-charge $10 for the rest of the season. Let me know if something doesn’t look right.
The Players of the Week are Josh Allen (Guns) and Saquon Barkley (Torpedoes) with 31 points each.
The other top scorers at each position were:
WR: Jayden Reed (Swerve), 29 points
TE: Isaiah Likely (Torpedoes practice squad), 21.5
PK: Jake Moody (MSG) and Chris Boswell (FA), 26
DST: Bears (FA), 27
The main reason I created this blog was to better integrate media, as opposed to attaching pics or send inline links to YouTube videos. It wasn’t until after I set it up (and paid for it) that I found that I can’t embed NFL videos. So you’ll be getting a reduced dose of links going forward, so as to lessen the interruption to the narrative flow. I’m not terribly worried about it though, since I doubt any of you ever clicked on the links anyway.
Top 5 plays of the week
5. Seattle’s Ken Walker flew into the end zone against the Broncos, with a bonus prediction from the color commentator
4. DeeJay Dallas scored the first kickoff return TD under the funky new rules
3. Cheat Code scored from 80
2. Kevontae Turpin took it to the house, with bonus trenchant analysis from Tom Brady
1. Man, what a throw this was from Anthony Richardson. 65 air yards? Holy crap.
Indy coach Shane Steichen seems to have figured out what Richardson does best – keepers and deep shots. Now if he could just stay on the field.
Week 1 Overreactions
- For the third year in a row, the Carolina Panthers will grab the #1 overall draft pick.
- If the Browns can get out of Deshaun Watson’s contract because of the new charges against him, they need to do it ASAP. Even if they can’t, they need to turn to Famous Jameis. At least he won’t be afraid to throw the ball.
- Joe Mixon will win the 2024 rushing title.
- Josh Allen will lead the MVP race until he misses several games due to injury.
- Daniel Jones will be permanently benched by the end of September.
Trivia question: Who was the only week 1 starting QB with zero vertical pass completions (balls thrown 11+ yards downfield)?1
Worst performance, bad team: Carolina. See overreaction #1.
Worst performance, good team: Cincinnati. I mean, it’s not the end of the world. KC lost their opener last year, but at least that was to Detroit. The Bungles lost to the Brady/Belichick-less Patriots at home.
Best performance, bad team: New England. 1-0 on their way to 4-13.
Best performance, good team: Dallas. Might as well give it to them now, they’ll surely appear elsewhere on this list later in the season.
I’ve previously written that the highest possible scoring play based on our rules would be a TE scoring a 90+ yard TD, which would go for 15.5 points (9 for receiving yardage, 6 for the TD, and .5 for the reception). But there is another play, albeit an even more unlikely one, that would go for a lot more. Can you guess what it is?2
Uni watch, week 1
I don’t hate brown uniforms, and orange is my favorite color, but there’s something about the Browns unis that are off. It might be that the orange is too bright. Or maybe it’s the serial predator at QB.
BTW I think the San Diego Padres pull off brown quite well.
Good God, what were the Giants wearing? That looked like the unholy union of a Michigan Wolverine and a Montreal Canadien, but naked from the waist down. Without question the worst NFL uni ever.
The Commish Track of the week is Slit Skirts by Pete Townshend. I added it to the draft playlist this year thinking I might have to skip through it if people complained, but it turned out to be the track that got the most positive comments. Besides, it’s catchy as hell.
All of the Commish tracks this season will be taken from the draft playlist, so stay tuned.
Sorry but I just don’t get the two anthem thing. Are we really promoting racial equality by segregating the national anthem?
Frankly, I think they should stop singing the anthem before games anyway. It started at baseball games during World War I, and started being played at every football game after World War II, which is fine. It makes sense to play it before games during wartime, or at international events like the Olympics or World Cup, but playing it before every regular season game in every sport is overkill. It becomes less special when you hear it that often.
I say play it on Opening Day/Week 1, for the championship game or series, and on Independence/Memorial/Veterans Day weekends, and leave it at that.
This November, eighty years after the Battle of the Bulge, the USA is finally paying Germany back . . .
When those are your poster boys, you’re not even trying to sell it.
Game day snacks, ranked (non-chip version)
- Popcorn
- Peanuts
- Chex mix
- Mixed nuts
- Crackers with pepperoni/salami
- Pretzels
- Celery sticks with peanut butter
- Grapes
- Pizza rolls/mozzarella sticks
- Baby carrots
The 80s Babe of the Week is Heather Thomas.
She was my favorite of the two hot blond Heathers on TV in the 80s (the other will turn up in a future R&C). She starred in The Fall Guy and Zapped!, where her topless scenes were sadly done by a body double (yay for integrity?) but at least she wore a cheerleader outfit.
I’m excited about the babe category this year, and believe me there are no shortage of 80s babes to choose from. It will be hard to pare down the list, but I’m up for the challenge.
That’s a wrap it for week 1. It’s good to be back. We’ll end it with a Dad joke: I have the world’s worst thesaurus. Not only is it useless, it’s useless.
Good luck to everyone (almost) in week 2,
The Commish
- Kyler Murray ↩︎
- If a TE threw a pass, caught it off a deflection, and ran 90+ yards for a TD, he would score the same 15.5, plus 4 for the TD pass and 3 for the passing yards, totaling a whopping 22.5 points (aka 60% of Maulers week 1 score) ↩︎
Ruminations & Cogitations 
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