Fantasy Football

Pretty slow news day(s) for the NFL. The big news, obviously, is Mike Vick being released from federal prison. To be honest, he’s so regularly been apart of the sports news cycle I barely had time to notice his absence. If I gave a shit about the Falcons I may have, but I don’t, so I didn’t. My apologies to the guy who part owns Home Depot.

What's not to love about this photoshop?

From a fantasy perspective, there are a slew of teams that could use a speed-demon like Vick. But will he have maintained his athleticism? Can he re-adapt to the NFL? Which franchise will be willing to take the PR hit? Will he play quarterback? Running back? Wildcat? These are all questions that have been pondered and milled over at least 1,000 times by sports pundits, local radio, national radio, NFL analysts, beat writers, columnists, every sports blog but this one and anyone who weeps during those Sarah Mclachlan commercials. And I’ll freely admit, it is intriguing. But thinking he has any place in the NFL right now is delusional at best and idiotic at worst. Right now I’d trust Mike Vick to bench-press my Cobalt long before I’d trust him to helm the QB position on my NFL team.

If I’m ranking top five teams that could use the on-field qualities the notorious dog killer has to offer, I’d go with Miami, Tampa Bay, Cleveland, Tennessee and San Fransisco. But Miami’s not touching them because Bill Parcells makes the personnel decisions, Tampa Bay already has too much invested into too many players at QB, and they feel they’re covered at receiver, Cleveland is coached by a guy who desperately wants to be Bill Belichick but is trying so hard to be “efficient” that he’s going the opposite way, Tennessee won’t take him because they don’t need no stinkin’ receivers (or at least that’s the impression they’re giving) and San Fran can acquire him if they want, but if they play him at QB he has no receivers (and two years off), and if they play him at receiver he has no quarterback. Also, I’m willing to guess that the main hub for PETA is somewhere around the Bay Area, so that should be fun.

Ultimately, the best place for him to end up on a football roster would be Miami, but Parcells would have traded him for a seventh round draft pick six years ago, there is no way in hell he’s acquiring him as a free agent now. But I think most of us will openly admit that Mike Vick would be ideal for the Wildcat, regardless of how short-lived the offensive formation ends up being. Between him and his limited accuracy, Williams and Brown, they might even be able to stay above .500 in 2009.

So it looks like he’s going to be forced to sit out a year, which for him and whatever franchise that might be willing to take (what they’ll perceive as) a chance on Vick, will probably be for the best. It will give him a year to readjust and serve as a litmus test for prospective buyers (sorry for the tinge of casual racism here), and if all parties involved are more clear on what they’re getting into, the better a chance this has too ending well*.

*= This isn’t going to end well.

Back tomorrow with something.