When you make it into the fantasy playoffs, all you want is normalcy.  Stack up your best guys versus his best guys and let the best man win.  Unfortunately, what we got this week was a rash of untimely injuries and strange happenings that left many fantasy owners scratching their heads.

Here are my “Preseason Busts Who Inexplicably Decided to Show Up this Week” Awards from the weekend:

RB Charles Clay, Tulsa - 160 yards of offense and 4 touchdowns
WR Darius Darks, Iowa State - 100+ receiving yards and a score
RB Brandon Thermilus, Buffalo - 150+ yards of offense and 3 touchdowns
RB John Mosure, Colorado State - 190+ yards of offense and 2 touchdowns
WR Alex Torres, Texas Tech - 11 catches for 160 yards and a score
RB Baron Batch, Texas Tech - against what we all thought was a stout Oklahoma defense, BB cranked out 200 yards of offense and scored twice
RB Jaycen Taylor, Purdue - 170 total yards and a TD

Here are the Week 12 Duds - “Guys You Will Be Cursing All Off-Season”:

RB Bernard Pierce - injured on his first carry of the game.  Temple went on to rush for 275 yards and 3 scores without him.  Oh, what might have been…. 
RB Ralph Bolden - Bolden just might have been the Tease of the Year.  He opened the season coming out of nowhere to lead the country in rushing, only to disappear from the fantasy radar for a month.  He closed the season strong with a few big outings, earning back our trust heading into a tasty match up against lowly Indiana.  He rewards us by logging one carry before giving way to Jaycen Taylor. 
WR James Cleveland, Houston - Cleveland carried the WR corps of many fantasy rosters.  Dinged up, the coaching staff decided to rest him yesterday.  My UH source actually talked to James after the game.  He told him that he definitely could have played but the coaches decided not to take any chances in a game they felt they could win without him.
WR Greg Salas, Hawaii - Salas was also dinged up heading into Week 12.  He decided to give it a go, but was only about to muster up a 8-52-0 statline, far below his nation leading averages.
QB Kellen Moore & WR Austin Pettis, Boise State - this duo picked a fine time to produce season low fantasy production.
WR Eric Page, Toledo - his team racked up 47 points and 450 yards of offense.  The team’s most dangerous weapon only touched the ball 4 times for 43 yards.  No Wildcat.  No deep bombs.  nothing.
WR Toren Dixon, Rice - last week’s hot waiver wire pick up was a giant bust catching only 1 ball for 4 yards.  That kind of production might have been easier to take had Rice been shutout on the day.  But now, they put up a respectable 30 points.  30 points, and 4 yards out of Dixon?  Hard to believe.
TE Aaron Hernandez, Florida - put up a giant goose egg against FIU. That’s the last time we put him in the top spot on our Big Board.
Rutgers Defense - There was some discussion in our forums wondering how the Scarlet Knights were only 8 point favorites over the ‘Cuse. The lesson learned: never mess with Vegas.  The Rutgers defense stunk up the joint.

Other Ramblings from my day on the couch:

ESPN Gameday is becoming tough to watch.  I could do without the schlocky celebrity game picks (Amanda Beard?), and I fear Herbie has become too chummy with the top tier coaches and has lost some objectivity.  And can someone explain exactly what Desmond Howard adds to the broadcast?

You know what else is tough to watch?  The Big Ten.  Suffering through the noon slate of Iowa-Minnesota and Ohio State-Michigan was a real downer.  However, the only other options I had at the time were on non-HD channels, and I’m addicted to HD.  Anyway, our apologies to anyone who had a fantasy player going in that Hawkeye-Gopher borefest, where the number of punts (17) outnumbered total points scored (12). 

Kudos to the Pac-10 for offering up an exciting brand of ball.  The Big Game was outstanding.  Toby Gerhart and Shane Vereen put on a great show.  And Oregon-Arizona wasn’t too shabby either.

This week’s Bad Karma Award goes to the Arizona student body, who had made their way down onto the field in the closing seconds to prepare to storm the goalposts.  Then Masoli to Dickson happened with 0:06 left.  Whoops!

One thing that had me laughing was the Versus coverage of The Big Game in the final minutes.  They continued to show the “stare down” between the Cal and Stanford students in between each play.  It’s a wacky tradition where a group of students from the away team goes down onto the field with “The Ax” and stares up at the opposing team’s student section stands.  Goofy?  Absolutely.  But Versus loved it.  They kepy cutting back to these menacing stares after each play.  And bravo to the one Cal dude who seemed to be the leader of the pack.  His stares were particularly icy.

There’s nothing better than watching your fantasy stud rack up the stats in a multiple-OT thriller.  We haven’t had enough of those kind of games this year, but Jeremiah Masoli owners were loving life yesterday and he racked up some nice points in the extra periods.

Maybe Les Miles can car pool with Andy Reid to Time Management School.

My beloved Nittany Lions have owned Sparty recently, winning 5 of the last 6 match ups, and racking up a total score of 91-32 over the past two seasons. The always angry-looking Mark Dantonio will be happy to see Daryll Clark graduate.  DC has passed for 651 yards and 8 TD (with no INT’s) in his two starts against the boys from East Lansing.

It was good to see UConn get a win for Jaz, especially at the hands of Notre Dame.  Randy Edsall seems like a class act.

Speaking of the Fighting Irish, I guess all of the momentum from that “dominating” bowl win over mighty Hawaii is gone, huh?  I think SMU is bowl eligible.  Maybe ND can beat up on the ‘Stangs in the MAACO Las Vegas Bowl to help jump-start their 2010 campaign?

I think if Nevada played Notre Dame today, they would put up a 50-spot.  The three-headed monster of Kaep-Lipp-Taua is on fire now.  They face Boise State Friday night on the blue turf in a game that should be very, very entertaining.