Vol. 8  No. 5 -  Oct. 2, 2003 Football Happenings ( or... It's in the hole! It's in the hole!!) Super Bowl XXXVIII in

Current Standings at a glance as of 9-30-2003   Name W L T Pct GB 1 Michelle Brown 36 21 3 .632 - 2 John Kardel 35 22 3 .614 1 3 Mrs. Cap'n Dom 35 22 3 .614 1 4 Jeff Burns 34 23 3 .596 2 5 Dick Vanek 33 24 3 .579 3

In This Issue:

• We're late, we're short - Blame it on Tiger Woods
• Current Standings - Here's to you, ...
• It's just a Fantasy - Or is it?
• Rush of Blood to the Head - Ralph's thoughts on Mr. Limbaugh
• NFL Happenings - SportsChrome joins the fun!
• Extra Points - A faster 3 minutes in Football Happenings you will not find.
  
  

We're late, we're short...
Blame it on Tiger Woods

 Yes, I know, we're late this week. Oh sure, we could use any of our long list of excuses as to why we're late and why this issue is basically short as compared to the fun-fulled page you have grown accustomed to seeing here, but instead I'll tell you the flat-out truth. Once again, a Video Game has taken control of the lives of those of us at the FBH-HQ. Last week, EA Sports released their latest version of the BEST Golf game ever made... Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004. And once again, all other non-essential exercises are put on hold while we waste away the hours engrossed in this awesome gaming experience.

 I could go on for hours talking about how great this game is, and it still wouldn't do it justice. Like to play Golf? You'll love this game. Hate to watch Golf on TV? You'll love this game. Do your feelings on Golf fall somewhere in between those two? You'll love this game. It's engrossing, and calming, and when you glance at the clock and realize it's 5am and you haven't been to sleep yet, you'll play one more round and then (maybe) shut it off.

 So if you think this issue is short on substance, and late in publication, well, it is. But don't blame us... Blame Tiger!!

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It's Just a Fantasy
Or is it?

  Daniel Okrent, known as the father of rotisserie league baseball (you may remember him from the Ken Burns documentary), had this to say about the difference between Trekkies and fantasy sports fanatics – (I’m paraphrasing here) – “With Star Trek, there is a common experience – the show – Trekkies can share and be excited about. In rotisserie leagues, there is nothing more interesting than your own team, and nothing less interesting than someone else’s team.”

 While this is certainly true, I have the opportunity in this forum to share with you things that I notice as life goes on that are of some sort of interest. I’m sharing this story mainly because it is unusual, not because it is a “vanity” piece. I’m sure you all would have a difficult time imagining me writing one of those (ha ha).

 Sunday’s end of MLB’s regular season meant this year’s conclusion of Bob’s fantasy baseball league (The Jersey Shore Invitational). Bob has dominated the action, winning in each of the previous three seasons we’ve been doing this. I, and my partner Kenny D, have had decent success – usually running second most of the year and ending up somewhere in the top 4.

 This season was different. Bob’s Matawan Sharks lead briefly at the all-star break, but sputtered in the second half because of bad luck and injuries. Will Wong’s well-balanced Wildwood Crusaders team lead for something like 75% of the season. Meanwhile Ken and my Toms River Adventure spent most of the season in the pack running between third and seventh place. Our very potent offense was being held hostage by very sub-par pitching.

 In August, TRA’s fortunes began to change and, after the pitching staff at least rose to decent levels, we found ourselves suddenly ahead of Wildwood with three weeks to go in the season. Typically, the championship is all but clinched around this time. At that point, Commissioner Bob said he thought TRA would hold on for victory, but it would be more exciting for us if we had to sweat it out.

 Being a fantasy sports guru, however, Will was not about to quit and shrewdly pulled his team back into the lead entering the final weekend of action. Too many weird things happened to detail here. Suffice it to say, it was a real nail biter. Naturally, Ken and I were monitoring the race via Yahoo’s StatTracker all day Sunday. (To be more accurate, I was very closely monitoring it and Ken was telling me I needed to practice detachment.) We had closed the gap during the day as we were able to eke out enough pitching stats gain ground and Dave Schwade's Red Bank Roughriders had an RBI outburst and passed Will outright.

 With only about 4 MLB games left in the season, Will was still ahead by 1/2 point; 74.5 to 74.

 We were tied with Will in HR and were behind him in BA by .001, so we had three main possibilities for passing him: hit more HRs than he did (one could very well do it at this stage), pass him in batting average (starting to look very bleak), or get one more pitching win. While the batting end wasn’t looking likely, we had the Padres' starter, Jake Peavey, who came out of the game after 6 IP ahead 5-3. All we needed was SD to close out three innings at home vs. Colorado and we'd pick up a full point in wins and be ahead by 1/2 point overall.

 When Colorado scored 5 runs in the top of the 7th, our main hopes turned to the far dicier "win in relief" scenario, as we had both the Colorado and SD closers.

 In the penultimate game, Alex Cintron of Arizona got his 4th hit of the day in the bottom of the ninth. We were hitting around .400 that day and inching closer, but would it be enough? The Cards defeated Arizona and there was only one game left.

 Some 2,600 games over the past 6 months and it comes down to the end of the last game, and the late innings of the last game, to boot? This just doesn’t happen. As time and opportunities continued to run out, the flame of hope had not quite gone out in our dugout, but it was flickering pretty hard. With words of consolation ringing in the air, Ken left my house to go home.

 Then it happened.

 San Diego's Mark Loretta hit a solo HR in the bottom of the eighth. We were ahead again.

 In the general scheme of the world, the event was insignificant. The Padres and Rockies were playing out the string in an otherwise meaningless game. Nobody made or missed the playoffs because of it and the Padres didn’t even end up winning that day. I only imagine about 4 roto-geeks across America cheering wildly and the same number slumping in front of their monitors.

 Will's Brian Giles came up to bat next and, thankfully, did not make it back-to-back HRs, and we just had to hold on. Then our Phil Nevin added his fourth hit of the day and that caught us up in BA and added an insurance point.

 Final score, TRA 75, Wildwood 73.5. Hip, Hip, Hooray!

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To quote Comedian, Author, Political Analyst Al Franken: "Rush Limbaugh is a big fat idiot".

Enough said. NEXT!!

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 It is our great pleasure here at FBH to welcome aboard what we hope will be a weekly contributor to this area of Football Happenings. As I'm sure most of you know, our good friend Rob Tringali, Jr. is a professional sports photographer. His business, SportsChrome sells Rob's photos to publications such as ESPN: The Magazine and others. Their website (www.sportschrome.com) is a treat to browse as Rob and his staff do a great job capturing sports in images. Each weekend, Rob is on the sidelines of some NFL game somewhere shooting away. From now on, we hope to be able to use a couple of his images from whatever game he shoots each week. Watch for them!! (framed in Red)

Trent Green and the Cheifs escape Baltimore with a win

Game One, 9th inning, Yanks-Twins Yes, I know it's a Baseball shot, but it's so good, I couldn't resist using it here.

Brees' leap wasn't enough for San Diego while Carr's leap was just enough for Houston

Emmit gives thanks for TD #1 as a Cardinal

Punting is not Chicago's only problem

Carolina crunches Atlanta...

...while their animal and uniform cousins, the Lions, try to get out of Denver

[ ESPN’s experiment with Rush Limbaugh has come to its inevitable end when Limbaugh tendered his resignation yesterday. (Who had four weeks in the pool?) More on that from me in next week’s FBH.

[ Rutgers is 3-1? What the…Well, I suppose victories over Army and Navy are a good sign (we sometimes don’t win those games). I’m not sure if the Knights could take the Air Force Academy, but it’s time to investigate getting the Coast Guard academy or the Salvation Army training center on the schedule. Scarlet fans will come back to earth next week as we face AB’s Hokies of Virginia Tech

[ Good news from our buddies Mikey “Almond” Joyce and (The) Ardis “formerly known as Kelly” Joyce – baby number two has arrived:

“The last few days have been wonderful and crazy. My second child, another son, was born on Wednesday afternoon. Ardis and son are doing great. I am doing fairly well myself, but my schedule has been less than regular in the last few days.

The details? Name: Aidan Joseph Joyce. Born: Wed., 9/24/03 at 4:42 pm.

Weight: 7 lbs., 6 ozs. Length: 21. I will send pictures as soon as they are available.”

That’s just fabulous news and we at the LBFBHHQ wish the Joyce family all the peace and love in the world. And I can’t think of a better use of the home team defaults.

[ Happy Birthday to my favorite green bird, Angelo “Sheehy” Forgione who became a Dad himself about this time last year. Hoot! Hoot! I’ll have a cold one in your honor.

  In last week's P on the PP, we asked if you were a viewer of the ESPN Original Series "Playmakers". As I suspected, 24 of the 34 respondents have never seen the show. It is a bit of a surprise that of the 10 who have seen it, 7 of us actually like it. Not exactly a glowing recommendation for non-viewers to tune in. I count myself among those who watch and are entertained by it. Is it a solid look into the real world of Pro Football? Certainly not. It's a dramatization. You want to know what REALLY goes on inside an NFL locker room? Get a job as an NFL player. Until then, there's always room in our lives for a little bit of fiction.