There's only one Ronnie Brown
by Rob Staton
27/9/2008
 
When you looked at the schedule for week 3 of the NFL season, hands up who thought Ronnie Brown was going to be the major talking point?
 
I'll answer that for you. Nobody did.
 
So it is with that in mind that I'm going to talk a little about my experience with Mr. Brown this week and his insane Patriots destroying numbers.
 
For those of you who do not know me, I am a massive fantasy football man.
 
Although it's possibly unhealthy for my relationship with Mrs. Rob, I am this season involved in four separate leagues. What that basically means is, aside from this column and my weekly Sunday dedication to watching hours of NFL, I now have an excuse to waste further time during the week plotting ways to hammer other grown men (and women) at fantasy football.
 
A certain Ronnie Brown seemed to be the toast of fantasy owners this week racking up mountains of points with his four touchdown runs, his touchdown pass and his 141 all purpose yards.
 
That's if you weren't one of the 99.9% of owners who dropped him from your starting line up.
 
Brown has been sharing snaps as a backup to Ricky Williams. It went almost unnoticed when Brown was projected above Williams on the depth chart just before the Dolphins kicked off what many expected to be another mundane defeat in New England.
 
In one of the fantasy leagues in which I am contesting, my weekly match-up was against a team whose owner has clearly got better things to do with his time than me.
 
Having paid little attention to his roster since the draft, he still had Tom Brady as his starting quarter back post season ending injury. Joey Galloway was also his number one receiver, despite missing most of the season so far with an ankle problem.
 
“I've got this one in the bag” I thought to myself with a smug grin, seeing it as a guaranteed win considering my team featured LaDainian Tomlinson, the 'on fire' Tony Scheffler and the returning Steve Smith.
 
Then the Dolphins and Patriots kicked off.
 
Brown runs in for his first touchdown of the afternoon late in the first quarter and like most people I barely notice who scored through sheer surprise that Miami are winning.
 
After a Stephen Gostkowski field goal gets the Patriots off the mark, Brown runs in again for his second running score.
 
I'm beginning to think to myself, “Its ok if Brown has a big game, the other guy isn't getting any points from his injured QB and leading receiver”.
 
Shortly after, he's in the end zone again.
 
By the time I hear Nick Halling announce in the Sky Studio he's just thrown a touchdown pass to Anthony Fassano, I'm starting to feel a little uneasy about this situation.
 
When he runs in a 62 yard belter in the 4th quarter, one of the most agonising defeats of my fantasy football career is confirmed.
 
I lose the match by a score of 101-77.
 
Of those 101 points, Brown contributes 41. Aside from further contributions from San Diego's defense and a handy display from Santana Moss, Brown has essentially hammered my LT included team on his own.
 
Thank you, Mr. Brown.
 
But some fantasy owners weren't as fortunate as my rival in that league.
 
Around the world many fantasy owners had lost patience with Brown. In the previous two weeks he'd only contributed 48 total yards and a single TD. In a lot of leagues he'd been benched or in some cases, released to waivers in disgust.
 
This brings me to another tale of fantasy football misery from the weekend.
 
Fortunately, this time I'm not the one to complain.
 
In one of the other leagues I compete in, I noticed that just a matter of hours before the Fins - Pats game a certain individual (who shall remain nameless) had cut Ronnie Brown in favour of Denver's running back Michael Pittman.
 
Pittman's red zone duties and three touchdown's in the opening fortnight were clearly too tantalising to pass up. Brown was sacrificed to the waivers list.
 
Indeed Pittman continued his run of scoring by netting another TD against the Saints in Denver's dramatic 34-32 week three victory. In fantasy value, he had gained a total of 6 points for his team.
 
Not a total loss then? Well, that depends.
 
If you go on to lose your weekly match by a score of 50-47 having substituted a 6 points player for one who could have collected 41 points, you might be a bit devastated.
 
It's bad enough losing a match by three points, but releasing Brown just before a monster performance adds insult to injury.
 
But I like to end on a positive note and like most stories this one shall have a happy ending.
 
I quickly snatched up Brown from the waivers list before anybody else had the opportunity to and he shall be my stud starting running back when he and the Dolphins return from their week 4 bye.
 
Good job Ronnie, now I want to see even more points for the rest of the season.