The Playoff Picture

As the final games of the regular season wrapped up on Monday, the players on the Shrapnel squad breathed a huge sigh of relief. Despite suffering through a devastating 25-point loss to divisional rivals, Green Team, the Shrapnels still found themselves in the playoff picture even with a sub .500 record. Here's a look at the upcoming playoff battles and who to bet on in the coming weeks.

Byes: Tiiiite End Jammers and Skool.
There was little suspense in the IDK division as the top playoff spots were basically wrapped up before the week began. The Jammers, not surprisingly, are the heavy favorites to take the crown this year. With the top two backs in the league with Ahman Green and Priest Holmes, the Jammers are rock solid. The return of Vick will make the Jammer team even more dangerous. In the SMG crowd, the picture was murkier. Skool knew it could lock up the top position with a first round bye by merely beating the lowly Phreaks in Week 13. They lost. However, Skool scored enough points to win the tie-breaker over Green Team. The team's leading receiver/psychic, Chad Johnson, told reporters, "The seeding is huge for us. A week's rest will be good for the team. I'm gonna play a lot of Madden and hang out with Coach Chen. Big D (McAllister) and Stevie (Davis) have been rock and I'm looking forward to the playoffs. We are the team to beat in this division and I promise you this .... we'll see you in the CTDB championships."

Ante Up at Chunky Monkeys
Unless you've been in Ethiopia the past two weeks, its wasn't hard to figure out this matchup. The high-powered Monkeys, coming off of a huge upset over the Jammers, are clearly the favorites in this one. Along with the Jammers, the Monkeys were one of only two teams to average over 100 points per contest this year while scoring nearly 110 points a week this season. Considering that the next best offense, Skool, only averaged 97 points per week, or 13 points less a week, there's a pretty big disparity between the Jammer/Monkey offenses and the rest of the league. However, Ante Up, won't just fold in this one. Ante Up features one of the most explosive starting lineups with Taylor and James in the backfield. The receiving corp features young gunners including Coles, Mason and K. Robinson and Trent Green as the signal caller. ESPN's Chris Berman broke down the matchup for the fans last night. "While Ante Up has an incredibly solid starting lineup, its hard to envision a Monkey loss at this point.

This year, the Monkeys have averaged an incredible 117 points a week when playing at home. Considering that Ante Up averages just over 95 points on the road, Ante Up is looking at a 22 average point differential this week. Couple that with the fact that the Monkeys have been peaking offensively the last two weeks (135 points per week the last two games), things could get ugly this week. The Monkeys traditionally have been a running team. While LT and Shaun have been solid this year (#3 and #6 respectively), the play of Manning and the Monkey receivers have been a big boost to this offense in recent week. The Monkeys also have the second best quarterback in the league on its bench. Oh, if only the Monkeys could play Matt Hasselbeck at the wide receiver position. Swami Sez: Monkeys by 15."

Flaming Shrapnel at Green Team
The fantasy gods smile once again upon the Shrapnel team. Despite a sloppy regular season, the Shrapnel team somehow stumbled their way into the playoffs with a sub .500 record. However, all is not ugly for GM Liao and his rag tag team. A sneaky trade for McNair, the discovery of super rook back, Domanick Davis and the rise of super senior citizen, Jimmy Smith have proved to be genius.

Green Team, on the other hand, have rumbled into the second slot after going 6-1 in its last 7 games. Featuring a young backfield of Kevan Barlow and Travis Henry, the Green Team is looking to go to its first divisional championship game ever. Berman was less sure about this matchup. "The one true weakness on the Green Team is its lack of depth. Tony G is solid as solid gets but they have no warm bodies on the bench with Rogers out for the season. The team will be relying on Henry and Barlow to carry a huge part of the offensive load. On the other side of the field, the Shrapnel team will be looking to throw and will throw it often. TO, J Smitty and Quan are probably one of the best receiving cores outside of Ante. With McNair at the helm, this is one dangerous team. Defenses must also now scheme for super rookie back, Double D, and we ain't talking about women. Davis has been rock solid this year and is easily considered a favorite to win the ROY award. The offense is underrated and if it puts it together on the field, watch out. This matchup will be very interesting and a upset could be in the making. Swami Sez: Shrapnel by 5."

Nuts and Bolts
The Phreaks finally won its second game of the season after losing 11 straight losses. Phreaks GM, Ping Shen, told reporters Tuesday, after its victory over Skool, "Well, this isn't what our organization expected but I feel that that we're gonna have a pretty good core going into next year. We've been able to secure a few extra picks in next year's draft and hopefully, that'll help us turn things around. There will be changes to this rosters and I promise the Phreaks fans that things are gonna get better and the future will definitely be brighter."

CTDB has agreed to sponsor a consolation game between the Angels and Buffy. While having no impact on their seasonal standings, the two teams, in conjunction with the league office, agreed to scrimmage match for charity. The game will be officiated by local celebrities including Michael Jackson, Madonna, and GM Roger's favorite, Sarah Michelle Gellar. Tickets, for some strange reason, are selling at record low levels.