We start this week with the 1-0 Green Machine taking on the 0-1 Gorrilaz. Green Machine was looking to add on to their thrilling first walk off win against Semi Pro and Gorillaz looking to even up their record after a disappointing first loss to Stogies. The table was set, the players were ready. GM took the ball first and after going for it on 4th and short, could not convert. Gorillaz now had a short field to try and strike first, but four shots into the endzone that land incomplete ended their first drive as well. That’s when Avenger started picking up the pace. Hitting quick curls to dax and ice and using his legs. On third and goal from the 11, avenger rumbles behind oppen and ice to sneak by the pylon and give GM a 7-0 lead after the conversion.  Lego would answer right away with an absolute strike down the sideline to captain rook. The extra point was missed making it 7-6. Unfortunately for GM, that lone score early on was their offense for the day. Now that’s not to say they didn’t have some nice plays and good drives, but the wind picked up and the passing game disappeared. Gorilaz defense was swarming and the avenger couldn’t find any running lanes either. Speaking of running….Lego took captain knish’s advice and decided why throw the ball. Lego took off again and again and the GM defense was nowhere to be found. On one play in particular lego ran right past dax who appeared to look at lego, shrug, and continue his colorful conversation with Goldberg. Lego would finish the day with three rushing tds, each one more impressive than the next. GM eventually scored again at about 9:27 but it was too little too late. The game was well out of reach at that point. Gorillaz win this one 24-13. Jewball to Lego for the electric running and huge flag grabs on defense as well. Other notable play was oren being an absolute wrecking ball on d line to the tune of 2 sacks and 1 “sack” and Mighty doing mighty things with a pick and a sack.

One other note from this game was while I was trying to line judge it seemed like there were arguments every other drive. Unfortunately, as I learned on Sunday, reffing two games is impossible. Trying to get videos of both games while reffing two games is futile. I don’t know what all the disagreements were about, but as I heard from some guys afterwards, it makes the game unenjoyable. It’s a part of the game that there will be arguments, and in a weird way it’s a good thing because it means there’s a game on the line that’s worth fighting for, but it shouldn’t rise to the level of constant fighting. That’s when it becomes too much and ruins the game. So whether you absolutely need to make a call bc you just cant help yourself or you need to insist that the line of scrimmage is six inches further than where the defense spotted it… don’t let it become a fight. Really really ask yourself whether the win or loss is worth this fight before doing it and then go ahead and play ball. not saying don’t make calls– but be absolutely sure you would have made the play but for something illegal that the other team did.

Onto the other side of the field where the 1-0 stogies were looking to continue their hot start against blop who was playing their first game. Blop short handed after losing Spira for the season and not having Ernie in this one, got off to a rough start. After blop stalls on their first drive, cool yaron takes his first play of offense and throws a dump off to dk who takes it 70 yards to the house. DK just ran through the defense and nobody stopped him. 6-0 stogies. blop took the ball back but could not get anything going at all and the stogie defense was all over the place. Whether they were catching picks or hurting zinn, the blop offense was nowhere to be found early on. Yaron gets the ball back and rifles a throw into ross for a 12-0 lead. Suddenly a fire was lit under dachs and co and the offense started clicking. dachs hits zinn on a deep ball to put blop at the 1 and a short td to prime made it 12-6. Then arguably the greatest catch we’ve seen in leagues happened. Yes there is no film… I missed it bc who the heck films extra points but dachs dropped back and threw it high and behind zinn coming across the back of the end zone. Zinn jumps up, inverts his right hand 360 degrees and just absolutely sticks it one handed while somehow landing with his feet in bounds. It was jaw dropping and surreal all in one. 12-7 stogies. Cool yaron never took his foot off the gas though and marched right back down the field with a td to daxxy to make it 18-7. Blop answered right back with a prime rushing td to make it 18-13. not one to be outdone yaron takes the snap and throws a five yard curl to blitz. Now whether blitz was inspired by the zinn catch from earlier or whether he just put the team on his back, he started to rumble. After a zinn missed flag, blitz was off to the races. 2 minutes later and he was in the endzone on a bumbling, rumbling and stumbling trek from 70 out. You can almost hear Chris Berman yelling “he… can …go… all… the… way”. 24-13 stogies. On the next possession dachs hit zinn on a gorgeous deep ball to make it 24-20 and we had ourselves a game. dachs gets the ball back with a chance to take the lead at 9:26. The drive stalls out and now yaron takes it back with a chance to ice it. A score and stogies move to 2-0. In one of the most methodical drives we’ve seen from yaron, he made throw after to throw to march stogies down the field and capped it off with an absolute dart to the back of the endzone to blitz who made an incredible fingertip catch (yes i dont have the video of this either) to end the game. A valiant effort by blop -but not enough- and stogies move to 2-0. Yaron had himself a game and in two games with stogies has matched his league win total from the past two seasons! The trash man is on a mission. While yaron deserves a jewball, blitz had himself a day with some huge flag grabs on defense and the two tds on offense. Jewball to the blitz. Captain stella another league game, another two ints for him. After being laughed out of draft night….stogies are the team to beat and in sole possession of first place with four games to play.

Game 2 was a weird one. Maybe it was the new guys, maybe it was the randomizer or maybe it was giving the ball to the wrong team on two straight drives. It was the colors of pray, bin, bert, kagan, prime, rook, and zinn vs. dark of yaron, jerry, gronk, stats, tom, werz, and whiskey. colors took the ball first and scored immediately with a pray to prime strike. after a 3 and out colors got it back but pray and yaron forgot they were not on the same team and after exchanging ints to each other, it was pray lateraling to rook after the int for a 60 yard pick six. 2-0 colors. yaron finally found the endzone a few drives later by hitting stats in the back left corner. 2-1. Unfortunately for dark that’s when the game went out of control. pray lost his pants and yaron throws a curl to werz who tries to put the moves on prime and either after realizing he wasn’t going to escape or being mesmerized by primes incredible tailoring of prays pants, he laterals it back to….kagan who turns around and waltzes into the endzone for a fumble recovery td. 3-1. The next drive for colors pray hits rook for a td to make it 4-1. Gronk had a rec td for dark at some point to make it 4-2 but after a kagan short pass that turned into a 70 yard score it was all but over for dark. except….gronk wanted to get in on the action of throwing it to the other team and after orchestrating one of the best drives of the day for dark throws a pick six in the red zone to zinn to end the game at 6-2. I don’t know if we can have multiple jewball winners from one game but the line play of rabin, kagan, and bert was just awesome. 6 sacks combined between the 3 of them. regardless….jewball to rook for coming off a huge league game in game 1 and then turning around and bringing it again in game 2 with a rushing td and rec td and just all around hustle all over the field. never Settle down rook.

Week 8 is here. Bowl season starts next week. best time of the year for football. Come get it. IJWT