By Dan O’Shea

In any fantasy draft, multi-category stat production is what you’re looking for above all else. Running backs who collect a lot of yards but don’t score and home run hitters who can’t do anything else are rarely top-round talent. You can say the same in the hoops world for centers who block shots but don’t get many rebounds and point guards who collect bushels of assists but don’t score.
Yet, as a long season lingers on, you realize that even the one-trick ponies can come in handy to help your fantasy basketball team beef up performance in certain weak categories. Here are a few ideas for stat-boosting specialists in every category:

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Posted on December 15, 2010

By Jim Coffman

It wasn’t even halftime and I was ready to set a pair of innocent mittens on fire.
The sound of my wife’s ultra-warm, practically mountaineering mittens thudding, thudding, thudding together punctuated the Bears’ embarrassing 36-7 loss to the Patriots. Julie, a Newton, Mass. native, is a fan of the star-spangled squad and while she was not alone on the lakefront Sunday, there weren’t very many of her brethren in our section.
When she stood to cheer – and she had reason to do so continually in the first two quarters – the sound of those mittens slamming together was enough to make a Bear fan batty.
I had actually bailed out shortly before the final indignity, that ludicrous breakdown in the Bear secondary that allowed Deion Branch to cavort into the end zone on the penultimate play before intermission. Visions of a mitten fire began dancing in my head after Shayne Graham’s second field goal made the score 27-0 and shortly thereafter I excused myself from our seats in section 235. So I only saw Branch’s catch and run – and the ridiculous punt return touchdown called back by a holding penalty that preceded it – on video monitors back on the nearest concourse.

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Posted on December 13, 2010

By Mike Luce

To fill the last week of the regular season, and to buy ourselves some time for a full-blown Season Recap, we took some inspiration from ESPN’s latest offering – espnW – to create some new properties for the Worldwide Leader in Sports. Here is our Christmas wishlist:
ESPNUSCANDAL
Pros: Clear, to the point. Resembles a word (espnuscañdal? espnusçandal?) in a foreign language.
Cons: Would look weird on a sweatshirt. Google results littered with last year’s sex scandal involving ESPN baseball commentator Steve “I Have a Thing for Chicks – Oh, and Cheating on My Wife” Phillips.
ESPNUD
Pros: Could be pronounced “e-s-p-nude.” D could stand in for Deliberations, Damages, Defamation . . . Lead anchor spot an excellent career opportunity for former Texas Tech coach Mike Leach – especially after ESPN settles with Leach for his “smear campaign” lawsuit.
Cons: Would cannibalize the value of ESPN’s 2018 project “ESPN – Unversity of Dubuque.”

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Posted on December 11, 2010

By Emory Hunt

Bears in an upset.

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Posted on December 9, 2010

Blue: It’s Week 13 and the Bears are in first place in the division at 9-3, but still the pundits write about whether Lovie Smith is coming back after this season.
Really, is the coach going to be around?
Last Sunday’s 24-20 win versus the still-not-very-good Lions might not have been pretty, but it was a win.
Being that this is a team with supposedly no talent on the offensive line, no legitimate number one wide receiver and a historically underachieving defense, there has to be some coaching involved.

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Posted on December 9, 2010

By Jim Coffman

At some point soon, the Lions will break through, especially if they can ever keep a competent quarterback healthy for a half-dozen starts in a row or so. And surely that will happen soon, what with three quarterbacks (original starter Matt Stafford, back-up Sean Hill and Sunday’s signal-caller, Drew Stanton) now all having played at least one decent game for Detroit so far this season despite the team’s 2-10 record.
The Lions have put together a scary group of playmakers on offense (Calvin Johnson at receiver, Stefan Logan on returns and reverses and Jahvid Best in the backfield), and they have that absolute powerhouse named (Ndamukong) Suh to continue to build their defense around. But the breakthrough won’t happen against the Bears in 2010 (phew!) after Sunday’s 24-20 result. The Lions have now lost an unbelievable 19 in a row versus NFC North foes since 2007.

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Posted on December 6, 2010

By Thomas Chambers

You try to come up with a fitting analogy from the world of team sports. But it doesn’t really work this time.
The closest I can think of is Jim Brown or Barry Sanders, two greats who left at the top of their games. However, the horses don’t talk and just about all of their decisions are made for them by people.
Brown and Sanders left of their own volition, famously, filled with ideas of better things to do. But who’s to say with a Thoroughbred race horse? While bred to do what they magnificently do, they still must fulfill the agendas of their human handlers.

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Posted on December 3, 2010

By Emory Hunt

Bears key is BSB: Ball security and balance.

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Posted on December 2, 2010

Blue: In each of the last couple weeks the Blue Report has mentioned a certain level of dislike for those that would speak ill of the 2010 version of the Chicago Bears. Many of these so-called fans talked of the need for wholesale changes starting with the firings of Jerry Angelo and Lovie Smith, which then somehow leads to a magical upgrading of talent across the board for years to come. But to make this happen, the 8-3 division-leading Bears would need to be losing games so that we can hope for this trip to happy land to begin sooner rather than later.
Though a season of losing football after a strong start would make for a great way to spend Sundays in the fall, this Blue Kool-Aid drinker thinks that watching the Bears play like they did versus the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 12 is a bit more positive in the area of entertainment.
Beating what had be considered the hottest quarterback in the NFL might not have been as fun and exciting as watching a team unravel over the second half of a season, but I personally prefer victory over defeat. But I’m one of those crazy White Sox fans that likes having a team that won a World Series in my lifetime, so what do I know?

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Posted on December 2, 2010

By Dan O’Shea

From 2004 to 2008, there were few running backs better than Brian Westbrook. He never lead the league in rushing yards, but he was often just as good a receiver as he was running the ball. Multi-dimensional consistency made him a hot fantasy pick every year during that stretch, but occasional injury problems became more frequent and by last season he had fallen far down the draft charts.
Until last week, he was only held in 1 percent of Yahoo! fantasy football leagues – and with good reason: Now playing behind Frank Gore in San Francisco, he was barely getting the chance to touch the ball once per game. Gore has been among the rushing yardage leaders this season, and his own Westbrook-like skills catching passes have kept him on the field practically every play.
Not anymore. Gore broke his hip in the Monday nighter this week and is out for the season. Westbrook came in early as his replacement and collected 135 yards and a TD against Arizona, and by Tuesday morning Westbrook had been picked up in an additional 30 percent of Yahoo! leagues.
He’s still available in close to 70 percent of leagues and finding a spot for him just as fantasy teams enter the playoffs seems like a no-brainer.

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Posted on December 1, 2010