Preseason Contest!

Today is a wonderful day: one of my dearest friends is at the hospital, gearing up to give birth to an amazing baby boy or girl and I, for one, am thrilled. Welcome to the world little one, can't wait to meet you.

Another reason to love today? It's the start of the 2009 preseason - hurrah for football! And with the start of football is a FFLibrarian/FantasyFootballXtreme contest. Those who came by the site last year will remember that I gave away free season-long subscriptions to FFXtreme in some weekly preseason contests - and we're doing it again this year! So if you'd like to win a subscription to FFXtreme, e-mail me the name and rushing yards for the RB that you think will have the most rushing yards in this week's preseason games. It's a way to keep the preseason games a little more interesting - and thank you all for being loyal readers!

• As seems par for the course this time of year, let's hit up the big injury and roster news for the day. First up, just something to keep an eye on for now: Braylon Edwards caught his foot on the turf and left practice early yesterday. May not be a big deal but stay tuned on that front.
• More injury news to just be aware of for now - Dallas Clark will miss the preseason game with a slight concussion. Also note the Colts o-line changes/injuries in this article.
• Next, Denver waived Ryan Torain making the backfield slightly less crowded. I of course pay a great deal of attention to Broncos news and so far I'm kind of entertained by the fact that Peyton Hillis seems to have a quote for every Denver story. He's a well-spoken dude so it works for him, but I do sort of enjoy waiting for my Hillis commentary now on each Denver piece of news. In other Denver news, a ruling on Brandon Marshall's battery charges are expected tomorrow...
• As always, Advanced NFL Stats puts together an interesting article in Comparing Running Performance and how to rate how well a player runs. What I find particularly interesting here is a nugget towards the end about Adrian Peterson, and that it's really just 2.2% of his runs that push him beyond average and into the exceptional runer realm.
• The Hazean has a mock draft database - not sure I noticed this feature before but it's something interesting to scope out. I'm participating in two real drafts right now (both over e-mail) - one that I mentioned yesterday has only gone through Round 3; the other is in Round 13 now and I'll post my team and thoughts on my best and worst picks sometime soon.
• In case you haven't taken a look at FFXtreme before and are wondering what they're all about, you might want to take a look at a new feature they have up - their Player Pages. I really like the ease of seeing historical player stats and fantasy analysis in one shot. Added bonus if you're a subscriber? You can get projections for each player.
• I'll be the first to admit that I don't really know very much about Philip Rivers. Perhaps it's that whole Broncos/Chargers thing but I've somehow avoided becoming a Rivers expert. Sports Data Hub is here to clear things up for me in Ten Facts You Need to Know About Philip Rivers.
• The Bruno Boys are figuring out which kickers are likely to bust (yes, kickers) so read up...though I must say I'm a bit more of a Prater believer - he'll have a year of experience under his belt and the iffy offense is almost perfect for an increase in field goals if you ask me.
• KFFL.com is one of my favorites - take a look at part of their debate series on Chris Johnson vs Steve Slaton with pros, cons, and a final verdict on the superior fantasy player.

By the way, I've been at a Starbucks all morning writing this post up (can't wait for my in-home Internet to be set up tomorrow morning!) and there was a man in here who definitely used the line, "You'd look great in that all black outfit in my black Mercedes down the street" to a woman at the table next to him. He even got up to point out the car. Spectacular.