Tell me if you've heard this before: Dave took a tough loss to Babel in the quarterfinals.

Quarterfinals Recap

https://blingaleague.com/week/2017/14/

Babel def. Dave, 147.00-122.75:

See the tagline up at the top. This game featured only five players with less than ten points - and three of those were defenses and kickers! Ben Roethlisberger's 32.30 put this one away for Babel on Sunday night, even though Antonio Brown put up 28.40 for Dave in the same contest. Only the Bengals defense (-2.00 for Dave) was truly bad in this one.

Derrek def. Rob, 142.33-66.35:

Funny enough, the last time Dave and Babel had an epic quarterfinals duel, Rob played in the other game and failed to break the 70-point barrier. But even a decent week would have been futile for Rob, as Derrek got 33.07 from Le'Veon Bell, 23.20 from Davante Adams, and 21.73 from Cooper Kupp.

Weekly Awards

Team Blangums: Babel's 147.00 cracks the top ten of all-time playoff outputs (link).

Slapped Heartbeat: Rob's 66.35 is the eleventh-worst score in playoff history (the eight worst if you omit fifth-place games (link)).

Weekly MVP: Ben Roethlisberger's 32.30 was key for Babel's big win.

Dud of the Week: The Cincinnati defense put up -2.00 against the Chicago Bears juggernaut, which didn't help Dave's cause.

Blessed Cahoots: We all know that last week, Allen got a walk-off win to finish his Blingaleague career. But had Allen not gotten the the clutch field goal from Chris Boswell, Derrek would have been the #3 seed instead of Dave. Derrek would have then taken an incredibly tough-luck loss to Babel this week. So Derrek can say "Blessed cahoots!" and thank his long-time rival. (Meanwhile, Dave can curse Allen loudly.)

Semifinals Preview

Pullman's MondoSquad (Pulley, 11-2, #1) vs. Keep Calm & GordOn (Babel, 7-7, #6):

Pulley leads all-time series, 9-6 (link).

These teams have met twice in the semifinals before. In 2008, Pulley defeated Babel on his way to winning Blingabowl I. And Babel returned the favor in 2014 on his way to winning Blingabowl VII.

This year's matchup looks to be a good one. Tom Brady (Pulley) and Ben Roethlisberger (Babel) face each other on Sunday afternoon. That appears to favor Babel, as Brady's been a little off lately and Roethlisberger gets to face the suddenly-weak-again Patriots defense. But it wouldn't be surprising to see Brady go off, along with Rob Gronkowski, for the Pullman.

Some other matchups work against Pulley, as well. Todd Gurley's been a monster all year, but visits Seattle, the only team to hold him in check so far. And Babel will send the Jacksonville defense - nicknamed "Sacksonvile" for good reason - against Houston and Tom Savage The Human Sack-Fumble.

Pick: Keep Calm & GordOn.

The Chocolate Donuts (Kevin, 10-3, #2) vs. D's Nuts (Derrek, 9-5, #5):

Derrek leads all-time series, 7-3 (link).

This matchup has much less history, with this game being the first time Kev and D have faced off for the second time in a season.

Kevin's duo of Philip Rivers and Keenan Allen faces a Chiefs defense that has looked vulnerable the last several weeks, but DeAndre Hopkins and A.J. Green face a pair of tough defenses in Jacksonville and Minnesota, respectively. Jimmy Graham faces a Rams team that gave up a few TDs to tight ends last week, but Graham himself is coming off a big fat zero.

Derrek figures to get a big game from Le'Veon Bell against the Patriots, and it will be interesting to see how Davante Adams (@CAR) does with Aaron Rodgers back. But I think this game comes down to D playing the right QB; it's been tough to predict which of Matt Ryan (@TAM) and Alex Smith (vs. LAC) would score high each week.

Pick: The Chocolate Donuts.

Season Postmortems

Rob Gross, 8-5, 1286.46 points, 4th

7.0 expected wins (.537)

https://blingaleague.com/team/3/2017/

Rob made the playoffs (again) and failed to make it out of the quarterfinals (again). He's in love with Deshaun Watson as a keeper; had the rookie stayed healthy, perhaps Rob would still be alive?

Dave (and Kyle) Fultz, 8-5, 1417.90 points, 3rd

9.3 expected wins (.716)

https://blingaleague.com/team/5/2017/

By expected wins and points, Dave was the #1 or #2 team all year. But losing his last two games - despite scoring at least 108 points in each - caused him to miss out on a bye, which meant he faced his quarterfinals bete noir, Babel, and lost despite a score with an 87% record of winning.

Closing Thoughts

Good luck to all our semifinalists!

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