Lots of injuries already to some key NFL players but surprisingly little fantasy impact. Ryan Grant puts a enormous hole in Derek’s team. Stafford being out only dings Calvin Johnson a little. What the Jets are doing with Greene is just terrible news for Kevin. And did anyone see Mike Vick? Dude so deserves to be the starter.

*Week 1 Review – Highlights from Week 1

Chris has beaten me two games in a row and that shit sucks. My underperforming RBs hurt. The terrible performance by my WRs hurt more. As always, I leave tons of points on the bench. I had 2 monster performances by my benched WRs. Watching the game Monday night was painful because Chris’ QB was throwing to my TE and every time they scored, Chris’ kicker would score too. I was watching that Bears – Lions game too and that catch by Calvin Johnson was nuts. Well done, Chris.

Tim is coach of the week. Hell, probably coach of the week for the next 3 games too just from this one game. Forte and Foster put up 73 points. My whole team put up that many. That’s more than Alex, Kevin and Derek. Dave just didn’t have a chance against shit like that.

Rhett’s coaching was perfect in his win over Kevin. He left no extra points on his bench. Solid performances all around save for the 49ers DST. Romo should have had another TD. Kevin’s team just sucked. Flacco, Greene and Andre Johnson were disappointing. Greene appears to be the biggest concern with the expected even split with LT and all the fumbles.

Brian edges Derek’s depleated team but not by that much. I need to mention that I’ve probably stolen Carson Palmer for the second year in a row and the guy I gave Derek, Mason, took a big hit when the Ravens picked up Houshmandzadeh. Grant’s gone. Turner’s inconsistent. Bowe continues to be terrible. And Hartley, the kicker Derek took super early, missed 2 FGs in one game! It was tied, I think, going into the games on Monday.

Matt was the only other player to break 100 this week. Chris Johnson and Ochocinco were huge. The rest of Matt’s team showed up too though his QB brought is D game. Alex’s 6th round DST was actually the best scoring DST out of all the ones started. Thumbs up!

*Best plays and worse plays (yeah, that’s right, not worst, just worse than the best)

Tim started Forte instead of Best or Hightower and came up huge. Forte could have had 6 more but missed the end zone 3 times from the 1 yard line.

The Chinese had didn’t start the right 2 WRs. Two bench WRs outscored the starters by 40 points. The long tradition of terrible coaching continues for the Chinese. Collie should wind up as the 2nd WR (but 3rd receiving option after the TE). Garcon keeps dropping balls and Gonzales might be hurt again.

*Interview – Thanks to Chris for his wise words

Newsletter: Let’s talk about the draft for a bit. Did you have a strategy going into the draft? What was it? How well did you carry out that plan?
Chris: Drafting #2 pretty much guaranteed me AP, and I’m happy with him. As long as he’s healthy, I think we’ll have a long and happy relationship together.
After that, I felt like wideouts would go pretty early on, at least compared with years past, and they did. I’m happy with my starting lineup, and based on game 1, Miles Austin looks like he’s gonna be a stud this year. If my front 8 stay healthy I’d say I have a good shot at the championship.

Newsletter: How do you feel about the picks you made? Which were the ones you feel great about and which ones do you think are soft?
Chris: I like Austin and Peterson, and I’m glad I picked up Rivers. He did well for me last year and I expect more of the same. My starting lineup looks good, but if injuries come into play, I feel like my bench is garbage. I really hadn’t read up on any deep players, so I was clearly just picking at random from the middle rounds on. I’m praying to the Gods of good health.

Newsletter: What are your thoughts about your opponents’ teams. Which one look strong? Which ones do you expect to play like Brian’s team last season? Were there any picks by your opponents you had thoughts about – good or bad?
Chris: I think Tim and yourself both picked good teams. Even Matt’s team looks sharp this year (no offense dawg).
I think everyone is pretty on the ball these days when it comes to draft day, so I’ll just stick to the shitty picks.

First off, Hartwick has no business picking up a fucking kicker in the 6th. The 6th!!! Seriously? I’m never going to let him live that shit down. There should be rules against that kind of stupidity. I was surprised with Rhett’s first pick too. Although I’m a big Benson fan, I agree with you in that he could’ve gotten him several rounds later. Alex’s team looks like a drunken abortion, and I’ll be happy to take his money at the end of the season. [-ed. – Derek’s kicker was actually round 8 but the point stands.]

Newsletter: How do you feel about your team’s performance in this week’s win against me going forward?
Chris: It was really nice to have a rematch of last year’s finale to start the year. I can’t say for sure that Dave didn’t plan that. We should do that every year. It was even nicer to be on the winning end (again) of that matchup. You always put up a good team and it’s nice to beat a worthy adversary. You’ve just gotta be seething these days, Frankson. I mean, how does it feel to invest so much in failure? Kind of like high school?

Newsletter: You’re up against Rhett next week. Give us a preview.
Chris: I haven’t checked out the matchups yet, but I’ll be checking the scores from a beach in Okinawa. Basically, I can’t lose this weekend. [ed. – I’m seething alright. Going to come piss in you beer on your little Okinawan beach. Just kidding. I’m too unemployed to travel.]

*Looking forward

Next week, the Chinese play Matt’s team. I’m not looking forward to this game. Schaub should perform better for Matt. Chris Johnson is there. McCoy is up against Detroit. Rough week for me.

Kevin plays Dave. Kevin needs to hope LT doesn’t take all of the good carries away from Greene. Imagine another fumble from Greene. Andre Johnson should recover for Kevin and Jennings could be huge against The Bills. But Dave’s team looks stronger.

Brian goes up against Tim. Another blowout? No way Forte is huge again and no way Foster is either. And Rodgers is going to smash the Bills through the air with Grant down. Moss is going to be covered by Revis and Marshall doesn’t have much for a QB. I think Brian wins this one.

Chris is going to beat Rhett. The Eagles DST are up against the Lions and their backup QB. That’s 18 points right there.

Alex and Derek. Looks like a close game. But Grant, Bowe and Mason can’t be helping. There aren’t many options on Derek’s bench either. Alex wins a close game.

Damn it. You guys had a shitty shitty draft. All of you. What where you all thinking?

Now that the trash talking is out of the way, you whores sure didn’t draft at all like I expected you all would. According to historical data, many RBs are drafted early. I was so confident this would continue, I even made a little chart to help me predict when guys might go. You can take a look if you feel like it.

2010 Draft Prediction

I was pretty damned wrong. I planned on going RB, WR, WR, QB?, TE?, RB in my first 6 rounds based on my projections. Great depth at RB was the key to my success last season and I would say it was a big part of why Chris was able to hang in there and make the playoffs through those tough weeks and then win it all too. But I projected terrible value for RBs drafting 5th. Instead, I thought I would go WR, WR like I did last year.

I had some teams and players I wanted to target too. I’m expecting SF to be huge this year due to the 2 first round OL they picked up and Detroit to a lesser degree. The Cowboys are going to be amazing too but I think prices will be too high. I wanted to stay away from Larry Fitz and V. Jackson. I wanted guys like J. Charles, Crabtree, M. Floyd, LT, Forsett, A. Foster, M. Bush, one Bears WR and Flacco or Palmer as QB if I missed on Romo in the 4th.

Round 1: Gore over Johnson because I want a top RB as the backbone of my team. 2: Sjax is a good value here. Safer choice than the rookie. Lower ceiling though. 3: Glad Dave took Fitz because I wouldn’t have picked up a WR if Dave took Colston. Welker’s injury concerns me. Not a value pick with Colston at all. 4: Charles in the middle of the 4th is a huge value even though I’m set at RB. Could pass it up. Very happy CBS had him way down on the list. 5: Toughest choice of my draft. Didn’t intend on getting a TE and looked very hard at Smith WR CAR. But Gates is a fucking sure thing and even better with Vjax out. Was really hoping Boldin would fall to me. 6: Crabtree is a value in the 6th and I like him way more than Derek’s pick of Bowe. 7: Hope he blows up. 8: Little chance he blows up but I’ll take a shot in the 8th. 9: I’d have taken Williams if Brian hadn’t. In hindsight, I should have taken Forsett. 10: If I wasn’t so light at WR, I’d have taken LT.

Aside from some of my own picks I liked, I thought the following were good picks:

Chris getting Cal Johnson late 2nd is great.

Tim getting Marshall late in the 3rd could be a big value (or he could suck cow tittie).

Beannie Wells to Matt at the end of the 6th is good value.

Forte to Tim is a value at the end of the 7th.

Kevin’s pick of Forsett 9th is what I should have made myself but QB empty was freaking me out a bit.

Chris getting Daniels in r14 is brilliant. How did we all miss that? If he didn’t make that other TE pick in the 6th, he would be even more brilliant.

And I thought these were terrible picks or at least big reaches:

1 Rhett – Benson R1? Could have taken him 2nd easily. Maybe even 3rd.

1 Alex – Reaching for Williams there.

2 Matt – Schaub 2nd round is totally reaching.

5 Brian – Hines Ward is going to suck for half the year at least.

6 Alex – A DST in the 6th? Really?

6 Chris – Shiancoe in the 6th is some reach.

7 Matt – HUUUUUGE reach for Zach Miller at the top of the 7th. That run on TEs was awesome.

7 Kevin – Portis is totally washed up.

8 Tim – Hightower is a terrible pick here. Don’t you remember what happened with Lendale White last year?

8 Derek – A fucking kicker?!?!?! Did you just get kicked in the head?

And my reviews of the teams:

Brian’s team is solid but his WRs are a bit soft but he has depth. Little depth at RB.

Dave’s team looks shaky to me. No depth at RB at all and Mendenhall looks like a huge ? to me. All his WRs have big footnotes.

My team is iffy at QB, amazing at RB, OK at WR and top notch at TE.

Kevin went nuts on WRs and has great ones. Soft at QB and RB. I expect LT to really cut into Greene’s output.

I don’t see top talent anywhere on Alex’s team except at QB. Had a really bad draft.

Rhett says a little prayer every night hoping Vjax gets traded. Pretty solid team. Especially if Reggie Bush is consistently useful. Doubt that happens.

Derek has 7 WRs and is still soft there.

Chris is making a serious run at a 3peat. His team looks very good.

Matt couldn’t get over his love for Kickers from last year and has 2 of them still. I see him hurting for a playable WR backup.

Tim took some big ass risks that might pay off. Has unproven guys starting for him and a bunch of has beens and second stringers on his bench. I wonder who he starts when Marshall lays turds every week?

Predictions: Rhett and Chris win their division. Wildcards go to Frankson and Kevin.

Look for more interviews starting next week. Let’s play some fantasy football!