Evil Patriots Out to Destroy Your Fantasy Team

Not content with merely running up the score and embarrassing their opposing teams, the 2007-2008 Patriots have decided to eliminate any fantasy option that plays against them. Week 1: Jets QB Chad Pennington Culprit: Jarvis Green Injury: Ankle, pitifully hopping around the field, not being helped up by his teammates, destroyed confidence Result: Already questionable with a pelvis injury, Pennington missed the next game, and has since only led his team to one win. The loss of Pennington was likely saddled on those who took a QB too late, autodrafted, or were an idiot and drafted Vick - obviously kicking someone who is already down. Week 2: Chargers RB LaDanian Tomlinson Culprit: Patriot offense, defense, special teams, cheerleaders, concession vendors Injury: Pride, Fantasy Score Result: Perpetual 1st-3rd fantasy pick "LT" had trash-talked the Patriots since losing to them in the AFC Wild-Card game the previous season. After this game, a subdued LT temporarily lost his magic. The Chargers lost the next couple games, also effecting the fantasy value of QB Philip Rivers and TE Antonio Gates. Week 3: JP Lossman Culprit: Vince Wilfork Injury: Sprained MCL Result: After a pass was off, an offensive lineman knocked Wilfork into Lossman. Fairly called roughing the passer (this needs to be called every time whether it is an accident or not), the play resulted in an MCL sprain for Lossman. People in the above situation with Pennington were also likely in the situation with Lossman… with lesser expectations. Week 4: Bengals Players Chad Johnson, Lemar Marshall, Landon Johnson, various others Culprit: D-line, Secondary Injury: Crappy Fantasy Score/Pride, Ruptured Achillies Tendon, Eye, Hand Result: After large amounts of bragging, Chad Johnson was held without a celebration against the Pats. CJ only put up 5.3 fantasy points in the average league. Various offensive and defensive Bengal players left, creating a number of mismatches in not only week 4, but also in the games since then. Week 5: Browns RB Jamal Lewis, WR Joe Jurevicius Culprit: Pats Defense Injury: Foot, Knee Result: Jamal Lewis has a monster game in Week 2 against the Bengals, with 216 rushing yards. He had lost his step a bit in the two weeks since then, but was knocked out of Week 5 early with a knee injury. Lewis has been out since then, and has seen very little of the practice field. Joe Jurevicius going out of the game wasn't a major fantasy impact, but it certainly stung for those who patiently waited for him to put up numbers like he did with BC alum Matt Hasslebeck in Seattle. Week 6: The Dallas Cowboys Culprit: The New England Patriots Injury: Revealing that the Cowboys are not invincible Result: While not every team will be able to reproduce some of the things that the Patriots did to curtail the then-perfect Cowboys, it did highlight how frustrated they can become when Tony Romo realizes that the defense can't bail him out every week. Who knows if Tony's shoulder could act up again later this season, as well. Week 7: Dolphins RB Ronnie Brown Culprit: Randall Gay Injury: Torn ACL Result: Ronnie Brown came up lame trying to tackle Randall Gay after he intercepted Cleo Lemon. In Yahoo's most popular scoring format, Brown was the #1 ranked running back by fantasy points, a few ahead of LaDanian Tomlinson and Adrian Peterson. Ronnie was also the #4 all around point producer in that format. This will likely rank among the biggest fantasy gut-punches of the year. It's worth noting that Ronnie Brown, still ranked #1 fantasy running back, is nearly 80 points behind Tom Brady at #1 player overall.