Fantasy Football Week 9 Roundtable

Bruno Boys Whooley: It's Halloween, and boy do the Bruno Boys have a treat for you. That's right folks, we're here once again with our week 9 edition of the Bruno Boys Roundtable, where we sit around and discuss everything fantasy. Happy Halloween!

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Week 9 Burning Questions!

1. With their week 8 win over the St. Louis Rams and the Buffalo Bills' loss to Miami, the New England Patriots have played themselves back into a tie atop the AFC East. Will the Patriots be able to claim the division title even without Tom Brady?

Bruno Boys Whooley: Just because Tom Brady is down and out, doesn't mean, by any means, that you can write New England off. In recent years, no team has been better than the Patriots at finding ways to win, and it's very possible they can make it six years in a row atop the AFC East.

To do so, though, they have to remember that Matt Cassell is not Tom Brady, something they've been able to do these last two weeks, adjusting the team's game plan to better suit Cassell's skills. However, even that doesn't guarantee anything as each and every team in the Patriots' division has imporved mightily since last season. For the first time in a long time, the AFC East will be a dog fight.

Bruno Boys Ziza: Is it possible that the Patriots can win the AFC East? Sure. I know they are minus their QB leader in Brady but they still have plenty of puzzle pieces to work with. I really don't think that there is a standout team this year in that division.

Who is going to win it besides the Patriots? The Dolphins? Nah. The Jets? Probably not them either. The Bills are the only team that could give the Patriots a good run for their money making for some interesting football later on in the year, but I would not say that the Bills will be playing this type of ball later in the season either.

To me, it is the Patriots' division to lose, and until they are unseated, I will go with my preseason favorite of New England.

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2. With 4 straight games of 16+ fantasy points, is it time to consider Houston Texans' quarterback, Matt Schaub, an elite fantasy quarterback?

Bruno Boys Whooley: It's crazy to think that had Sage Rosenfels not coughed the ball up twice in the final minutes of the Houston Texans match-up with the Indianapolis Colts back in Week Five, that he could be the man under center for the Texans right now.

Luckily, for Matt Schaub and all his owners, that's not how things played out. Schaub is the still the one under center, and he is excelling. Is he an elite fantasy quarterback, though?

My answer is a resounding yes.

In each of the last four weeks Schaub has played, he has ended up in at least a tie for one of the top three spots among fantasy quarterbacks, going for 20 or more fantasy points in three of those outings.

Yes, some of the credit needs to go to the many weapons Schaub has at his disposal in RB Steve Slaton, WR Andre Johnson, WR Kevin Walter, and TE Owen Daniels, but I don't see how that can be held against him. After all, no one is discrediting Tony Romo due to all the weapons he has in Dallas.

Schaub will be one of the more highly coveted QBs in next year's fantasy drafts.

Bruno Boys Ziza:  An elite fantasy quarterback? Let's not get too excited just yet. Let me remind you guys of something, it was only a year ago that everyone was singing glowing praises for Derek Anderson in Cleveland.

He has torn up some pretty weak defenses including the Lions and the Bengals to pad his stats, but he still only has 10 TD's to 7 INT's. He also has not played more than 11 games in a season, and during that season he had 9 TD's and 9 INT's.

Now, I am not saying he is not worth having on your team, because he is. Ride the hot streak. But, I wouldn't consider him an elite quarterback just yet. He has some pretty cupcake defenses to go against for the remainder of the season, so his stats should remain pretty good, and probably set many owners up for a very heartbreaking 2009.

Schaub is definitely worthy of being started during the right matchups, but to me an elite QB is one that you start no matter what, and to me he is not.

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