By JIMMY D / NFL fantasy email bag | Jimmy's archive

For all intents and purposes, September is the end of the year.

The gardens are wilting, the trees are fading, the birds are fleeing and for most of you, your baseball fantasy team is dying.

Presuming it hasn’t been dead for months.

Jimmy hates the end of summer. If not for the rebirth of NFL and NHL within the next month, Jimmy might not be able to take it.

But in the meantime, we sort through our bumper harvest of email comments and complaints.

Hey Jimmy,
I was wondering if I could get your opinion on my football pool. I am in a keeper league and we get to keep three keepers and I am trying to decide who to keep. My players I am thinking about are the following:
Carson Palmer, Ronnie Brown, Hines Ward, Brian Westbrook, Deuce McAllister
I am leaning towards Palmer, Brown and Westbrook. Any advice?
Thanks,
ChrisH

Chris,
Those would be Jimmy’s selections. McAllister is not the long-term proposition in New Orleans with Reggie Bush in town and Ward is solid, yet unspectacular.
Philly plans to pound Westbrook even more this year, many think Ronnie Brown is primed for a real breakthrough and Palmer has worked like a dog to return healthy from the ACL tear (where he was slated to start the preseason Monday Nighter).
Good luck with that trio – it sounds like a good start to a winning season.
JimmyD

Jimmy,
I can't believe you placed a mediocre performing Manning, pressure crumbling Hasselbeck, and injured Palmer ahead of a proven three-time Super Bowl winner.
That is just ludicrous Jimmy and your column should be banned for a month because of it so that others don't follow your advice. However, I do think that the rest of your listings were bang on, so I give you marks for that.
Also, I would advise you to leave the third-person crap out of your column.
It is childish, Seinfeld proved it was not cool at all, and I usually skip your column because of it.
Mathieu G

Mathieu,
Patriot Nation always gets after poor Jimmy when he picks on Tom Brady. The Pats got away from Pats Ball last season because of injuries, forcing Handsome Tom to throw more (hence his 500-yard spike). With refocused attention on the ground game with Corey Dillon and Laurence Maroney, and with Deion Branch still holding out, count on Brady’s number to dip.
The latest Big Board at Yahoo! rates Brady No. 52 – behind Jimmy’s Top 3 and Eli Manning as well.
About Jimmy’s third-person schtick; he likes to speak about himself in the third person. That way, when he’s wrong or gets lost half naked in the corridors of a Vegas casino, we can say “Jimmy did it.”
JimmyD

Jimmy,
You mentioned Ladell Betts last week in your column. About a day later, T.J. Duckett was traded from Atlanta to Washington. I’m assuming this makes Betts not a good bet?
HalAButt

Hal,
You’re bang on. Betts was showing as a mid-round pick based on the shoulder injury of starter Clinton Portis. But Duckett’s arrival pushes him to No. 3.
Duckett’s departure from the Falcons creates another sleeper candidate in Jerious Norwood. Warrick Dunn is the main back in Atlanta, but Norwood galloped for 100+ yards this weekend against Tennessee. True, it’s the preseason, but the Falcons peddled Duckett to make room for Norwood.
JimmyD

Jimmy,
Who is this Wali Lundy guy and why is he planning on taking away carries from Domanick Davis in my keeper league?
Angry Al

Al,
For starters, Davis has a wonky knee so Houston needs to find out if Antowain Smith, Wali Lundy or Vernand Morency can hold the fort and evolve into a No. 1. Smith is a relic, Morency has not been good in preseason.
Lundy was an afterthought draft pick out of Virginia, where he led the Cavaliers the past few seasons. He seems to have the inside track right now.
JimmyD

Hey Jimmy,
What’s the status of the Jimmy D pool? Still on? Same address? I haven’t seen anything in the paper, so I was just wondering. I want to defend my crown!”
JimmyC

JimmyC,
We are still hunting for a sponsor for the game. Stay tuned. I will have details by next week and possibly via email later this week.
JimmyD

Stay busy, stay lucky.
JimmyD

JPoole@herald.ca