Peeze’s Playbook Week.5 – FlagPlus Football League

Peeze’s Playbook

Week 5

Where The Wild Things Are

By Paolo Della Rocca

At Coast 2 Coast Studies this week, the Eagle at Master Control showed us a wonderful website that randomly generates Buzzfeed Headings. I figured this would be a wonderful way to spice up my article so I loaded the page hit enter and got the following, very football related topic:

21 Problems Only Smurfs Will Understand

As such I compiled a list:

Everyone always asks why you seem so blue.
Blue popsicles feel like cannibalism.
Getting stung by an unusual insect makes you turn into a purple zombie.
They only make white Smurf hats (Phrygian Caps) in one size. The rest of the population walks around blind or is constantly holding their hats down in strong winds.
Tailored diapers aren’t cheap.
Continuously walking around topless is a difficult life. Especially in winter! Especially since no one can tell that you’ve reached the hypothermic stage where your skin starts to turn blue.
Smurf Village has only one ATM and no liquor store.
Gargamel’s cat sheds a great deal and many Smurfs are allergic to cat hair.
Related to #14, a typical Smurfs’ health plan does not cover allergy meds
The plural of Smurf is actually Smerves. One dude with a lisp and your entire culture changes.
Gargamel litters and his trash always makes its way into Smurf village
Working an entire live-long day is exhausting.
Having 8 fingers makes determining the ring finger difficult.
Smurfs can only have white beards. It ages them quite a bit.
Smurfs are never tall enough to ride rollercoasters.
All male Smurfs are bald. If you’re not Jason Statham or Bruce Willis, that look doesn’t work.
Mushroom houses may be poisonous.
The stream in Smurf Village is rumored to be home to an alligator. I can’t imagine it’s true but would you check?
Smurfs don’t have last names, having a legacy is difficult.
2.Blue ink is actually Smurf blood.
Smurfette is hot, but Smurfs don’t have sexual organs. What a tease!

Simply Prestigious

I think anyone who claims that Prestige World Wide looks as good as we had expected them to coming into the season is a liar. PWW was the consensus favorite heading into the season. Since the start of the season they have looked to be a shadow of their former selves. They lost their first game of the season and since then, they have won all of their games by a touchdown or less. This week was no exception.

Given that they were facing off against a Hugo Henderson-less Eudistes squad you would figure that PWW would run away with this one. However, the first half was a slow-paced, rugged affair as the score showed Les Eudistes leading 13-7. Prestige World Wide drove the field but seemed to be just of f on key downs and it seemed like this game may get away from them. However, the second half was another story. Alex Lever looked poised and efficient as he marched the ball down the field. His 4 touchdown passes (1 to Mar-André Paquin, another to Maxime Laflamme and 2 to JS Gradowski) would be enough to propel Prestige World Wide to victory as they would win it by a score of 27-26 over Les Eudistes.

Raphael Casey had some huge shoes to fill in Hugo Henderson’s absence. While he did throw two interceptions, he did look great overall. He was confident, kept the ball out of Lever and Co.’s hands and his receivers made plays for him (as Les Eudistes receivers are known to do). In the end the smallest mistakes and a missed convert here and there was the difference in this game. They face a tough schedule and they fall to 1-3 in a very difficult division. Les Eudistes will need to turn it around quickly or this may be there most disappointing season yet.

Da Regiment Marches on OTF

Da Regiment controlled this one from the start. Despite getting stopped in the red zone on their first drive, Da Regiment played an inspired brand of football once Matthew Rupcic intercepted OTF QB Danial White on the goal line. From that point on Da Regiment quarterback Doug Mckernan was on fire going 12/17 and throwing 5 touchdowns. This game showed Da Regiment’s dominance from start to finish. If not for a typical missed de-flag from Brent Callender this game probably would have ended in a shutout.

OTF had trouble containing the efficient and smooth Doug McKernan in this game. This is a difficult game to win because Danial White is still developing as a quarterback and seems to be more comfortable playing with a lead. Given that they only completed 8 passes in this game it did not turn out to be the kind of game that OTF typically excels at. Da Regiment win this one by a score of 31-6.

La Sauce No Longer Simmering

They had to know this game wouldn’t go well as it started with Danny D’Amour intercepting François Raymond on the first play of the game. Alex Holowach was then able to drive down the field and score to make it 6-0. Things got worse before it got better for La Sauce who’s typically hive-minded defense just looked confused and lost. Finally Raymond got his feet under him and started scrambling to make plays as he has been known to do. Thomas Ferland-Dionne started the second half with a pick-6 and suddenly there was a game on our hands. With under three minutes left in the half, Raymond hits a streaking receiver to make the score 26-25.

With plenty of time left on the clock, the experienced and poised Alex Holowach led his team down the field and positioned his offense for a late score. James Nowakowski caught a perfect pass, at the front of the end zone, for a touchdown and MetaMayhem would walk away with the win. Alex Holowach’s health is still fo some concern as the hobbled quarterback looked immobile in this game and was taking snaps from nearly 15 yards away from his snapper. On the other side of the ball the injury to top defender Phillipe Trudel seems to have affected La Sauce a great deal. Injuries are tough and I hope that these two teams, bitten by the injury bug will find a way to persevere as we reach the second half of the season.

Power Rankings

We are starting to a separation between the top teams and the struggling ones. Luckily for those teams I am not making a Top Ten Reasons you just aren’t very good list. Instead, here is my top ten list of teams that are beginning to pull ahead in Div3, this season.

Wild Boys (4-0):Another week; another win. These boys are all about business. Wild Boys will stay atop this list as long as they keep winning games.
BearSkins (4-0): What impresses me most about the BearSkins is that they do what they are supposed to each week. Few teams are able to play their best regardless of the competition. BearSkins will beat up on struggling teams and inch past competitive ones.
Les Buddays (3-1): I never really know what to do with Les Buddays. They slide down the scale one week and up the next. They put up 51 points against Solide this week and they look to be firing on all cylinders.
Past Our Prime (4-0): As I mentioned on “Calling the Audible”, the official Division 3 podcast, Past Our Prime has yet to beat a time with a winning record. This isn’t their fault of course but nonetheless, you are your résumé. With a slate of tough games ahead they will have plenty of opportunities to prove themselves.
Prestige World Wide (3-1): They just aren’t playing well enough to earn a top seed. They have all the ability in the world but they just look lack luster.However, 3-1 is still worthy of notice.
BD Bandits (3-1): BD Bandits have looked solid this season. While solid invites them to the ball, it does not guarantee them a date.
OTF (3-1): On the Fence took a rough loss last week. They look to rebound against an unpredictable Moose team.
Predators (3-0-1): I have been less then satisfied with the Predators output. If they were being honest with themselves, they would say the same.
Monstars (3-1)- There is something special about this Monstars team. If no one was paying attention before, expect people to take notice now.
Sea Assassins (3-1): The Sea Assasins took exception to the fact that I claimed that they don’t play defense. Denial is the first step. That being said, do you rreally need a defense when you are putting up 42 points a game and your quarterback is completing 73% of his passes?

Other Teams Receiving Votes:

There was a recount here. That’s the last time I use a correspondent from Florida, or use this dated joke. In the meantime, let loose, relax, and hang some chad.

Broccasion (3-1): While there only loss came in the first week of the season, I remain unconvinced. Their +3 point differential means this is easily a team that could have been 0-4. We’ll see if they can put up some points against a struggling Génie 3D.
Snatchers (2-2): If any of the .500 teams look to have some upside it would be Snatchers. They aren’t playing particularly well but I expect them to figure it out.
Moose (2-2): With their two losses coming on the first week and in the absence of quarterback Frédéric Morissette, Moose are one of those teams who are flying under the radar.
MetaMayhem (2-2): They lost two, won two and now they play some vicious defenses in Zio e Fraté and Los Luchadores over the next 2 weeks.
VPC (2-2): Anytime they’ve faced a team that can put up points and has not been struggling, VPC has shrunk in the moment. This is not something I expect from a top tier team.
Mongoose (2-2): Mongoose have been all over the map. Once they settle down and remember their team identity, they will win games.
Los Luchadores (2-2): The defense looks ready, the offense will need to catch up or this team will be a middle of the pack team through the rest of the season.

Rants Reflections and Ravings

Scoring is down to 27.8/game from 28.9 in division 3 since last winter. I find this surprising as this was supposed to be the year of the quarterback.
Rusher extraordinaire Matt Kirouac has found some hands playing with Zio e Fraté, He only played 1 week, caught 12 passes for 177 yards. They could have used him in their week 5 loss.
Writing this article on Friday the 13th has me feeling that this may be a very bad idea.
Angelo Garofolo threw the game winning touchdown for Moose this past week, this is unanticipated considering Fred Morissette was back in action.
Frédéric Dupuis and Neil Etinson both threw 7 touchdowns this week. Seems par for the course so far this season for both quarterbacks.
Valentine’s Day is upon us. I’ve met most the dudes in this league, I expect many to be sleeping on the couch this weekend.
KGP Champs D has not stopped anyone this season, they have allowed 159 points against already this season.
If GOTW was division 3 this week, PWW vs. Les Buddays would probably have been a top candidate.
With John Stewart retiring from the Daily Show, where will we get our news?

Hungover Visions of the World of Tomorrow

Unbelievably, I was unable to shake Mat Domon this week as the division behaved more predictably than ever before. However, I believe this week will have some upsets, surprises and astonishments. Here are my picks. Remember that you can tell Mat Domon to quit while he’s ahead by tweeting him @MathieuDomonFPF.

Game	Peeze	Mat Domon
Broccasion vs. Génie 3D	Broccasion	Broccasion
Monstars vs. Les Blues Branleurs	Monstars	Monstars
Predators vs. Los Luchadores	Predators
Texas BareManz vs. Rudebwoys	Texas BareManz	Rudebwoys
Bengals vs. Solide	Solide	Bengals
BD Bandits vs. La Sauce	BD Bandits	BD Bandits
Past Our Prime vs. Mongoose	Past Our Prime	Past Our Prime
The Brotherhood vs. Sea Assasins	Sea Assassins	Sea Assassins
Snatchers vs. Still C.R.A.	Snatchers	n/a
Wild Boys vs. Les Eudistes	Wild Boys	Wild Boys
KGP Champs. Vs. Da Regiment	Da Regiment	Da Regiment
BearSkins vs. VPC	BearSkins	VPC
Les Buddays vs. Pestige World Wide	Les Buddays	Prestige World Wide
Zio e Fraté vs. MetaMayhem	MetaMayhem	MetaMayhem
OTF vs. Moose	n/a	Moose
Last Week’s Record:	11-3	11-3
Record	23-19	24-18
Winning pct.	,547	.571

Saturday’s Sporadic Seagulls

Roaming around on a cold Satruday morning with no particular purpose in mind, my mind begins o wander ad I start to piece together my midseason review. Take a look next week and see what I think of your team’s past, present and future. Have any thoughts that you’d like to share with us FPF media types? If so you can email me at [email protected] or if you woud like to include pictures of Smurfs you can always reach me on Twitter @PeezeFPF..

For further analysis, tune in to the official FPF division 3 podcast Calling the Audible where GM Kolethras and I will discuss if the secret lives of Keebler elves, 8 ways to improve your memory and which book we will be debuting at book clubs populated by mostly desperate middle aged house wives. You can watch us live Thursday nights at 7:15 at www.theunclemikeshow.com or download the show via iTunes or at http://fpf.podomatic.com. You can always tweet the show live by tweeting @EagleFPF or feel free to tweet GM Kolethras @GMKole44 and let him know why you are jealous of his neckties.

Have a great and safe week of action. See you at the fields!