predicate.

Three more teams managed to secure a playoff slot in Week 12, leaving only two spots unclaimed as we head into the final week of the season. Both of the top two Caption This teams secured a ninth victory, so they are both headed to the playoffs and remain neck and neck in the divisional battle -- although the Chicago Rhyparographers do have a decided advantage in that contest, thanks to their 7-1 divisional record. The Pacific Coast Pirates also clinched the Your Mom division thanks to a well-timed 6-game win streak.

Five teams are still contending for those two playoff spots: Grim And Frostbitten, The Hooligans and The Pantywaists have the inside track, as they all control their own destiny and can advance by winning their next game (or through a tie or loss, combined with ties or losses by their rivals). The Beefalo Balls need both a win and a loss by Grim And Frostbitten to advance, and The Wrong Petersons' task is all but insurmountable, but they are still mathematically alive with a win and a lot of help.

Just a couple more weeks of couplets to compose...

It took us eleven weeks, but we finally have some teams that have absolutely, positively clinched playoff berths -- and two of four divisions have been clinched as well. Congratulations to the Oak Ridge Trinities on claiming the coveted Stabby Action Banner, as well as The Headbangers for the corresponding award in Fried Soup. The trophies will be awarded at the conclusion of the regular season, just two weeks away!

Congratulations are also in order for the Chicago Rhyparographers, who could still finish second in Caption This, but have racked up a 7-1 divisional record -- best in the league -- which ensures that they cannot be eliminated from playoff contention by our first tiebreaker.

Time again for that slightly less popular internet phenomenon: No Girls, Eleven Couplets.

Just one week after our last undefeated team lost a game, the Baystate Wicked Cheatahs follow suit by grabbing their first win of the season, finishing off a 9-game losing streak. And this wasn't a lucky strike against an absentee manager, either -- the Chicago Rhyparographers were the victims, and lost their 1-game advantage over the second-place team in Caption This as a result.

This puts them in rather precarious company where the playoffs are concerned. As it stands, there are six teams with the same 7-3 record. When you add the 9-1 Headbangers to the list, that leaves only one playoff spot (theoretically) available to somebody who doesn't yet have their seventh win. Which in turn means that a bad streak in our three remaining regular season games could still wash one or more of those teams out of playoff contention!

Cometh the couplets...

Our long national nightmare is finally over! The Headbangers lost their game this week, ending a remarkable 17-game win streak stretching back to Week 8 of the 2007 season. However, their quest for the Silver Streak trophy still received a major boost, as their closest rival in that contest also lost in Week 9. This takes the league's longest currently active win streak down to 4 games -- so the Great Lakes Steamers will have to win out through the end of the regular season and win a playoff game to pull ahead. A tall order!

In playoff hunt news, all four 2-6 teams from last week took a seventh loss in Week 9, thereby eliminating them from contention in all likelihood. Condolences are hereby extended to The Iron Yuppies, Army of Darkness, Los Tastiks and the Arcane Nitehawkez, who battled bravely but simply couldn't get a good bounce this season. Better luck next year!

Couplets, eh? I gotcha couplets right here!

So much for that! After enjoying one brief week among the cadre, the Beefalo Balls were summarily banished back to the ranks by those unruly Hooligans, thus restoring Pigskin's status quo ante.

It was quite a loss for poor Cy Guy -- moving to 4-3-1 dropped him from 4th place all the way down to 10th, since competition in the cut-throat Your Mom division remains fierce. Indeed, even The Pantywaists are momentarily out of playoff contention despite their 5-3 record, thanks to a deficit in total scoring of only 5.8 points.

Special Saturday edition of couplets starts...right now!

No team with a losing record has ever made the playoffs in the history of Pigskin, and the luckless Baystate Wicked Cheatahs guaranteed a losing season by dropping their seventh straight game. But on the bright side (if you can call it that) they have also made themselves prohibitive favorites to collect our Streak of Piss award. Since the Army of Darkness finally managed to collect win #2 this week, the second-longest losing streak in the league is now only two games, which would require one of those teams to fall off a cliff and the Cheatahs to win their next contest for them not to take the Piss.

On the other hand, the Beefalo Balls are having their best season in history. Not only have they beaten their inaugural record of 3-10 already, but they claimed first place in the Stabby Action division with their win this week -- the first time since Week 3 that a divisional crown has changed hands. The Oak Ridge Trinities are only half a game back, though, and with the return of RB Brian Westbrook to their arsenal, team BEEF will have a fight on their hands when the two clubs clash in a couple of weeks.

It's coupletin' time!

EDIT: I apologize for omitting one of the games in the first draft. This has been remedied.

It was a weekend of surprises, both in the NFL and in Pigskin. The top three teams in the mighty NFC East lost out to lowly St. Louis, Cleveland, and (slightly less lowly) Arizona, although the last-place Eagles salvaged some pride by dropping 40 points on the 49ers.

Over in Pigskin, the undefeated Chicago Rhyparographers took their first loss at the hands of a 2-3 team, while The Wrong Petersons managed to score their second tie in two games, and now own the very strange record of 1-3-2. It won't be easy to make a playoff run from a 1-3-2 start, but hey -- at least it's not 1-5.

You came for the couplets, so without further ado...

Fried Soup was our most active division again this week, as the bottom three teams got into a tussle and flipped around. The Defenestrators are having the most trouble with our first tie-breaker, as all three of their losses have been against teams in their own division.

The league also logged its first tie of the season in Week 5, as The Wrong Petersons and The Show battled to a stand-still. Ties are rare in our league, with only one happening in each of the past three seasons. But last year's occurred in the playoffs, and required some improvisation by the Commish to decide who got to move on. So if we have to have one, better we get it out of the way now.

Brace for couplets!

With roughly a third of the season behind us, the divisional rankings are starting to harden. None of the top two teams in any division budged this week, although some new teams have managed to wedge their way into a potential playoff berth with those all-important divisional wins.

Still, it traditionally takes at least seven wins to guarantee a ticket to the post-season, and even our best teams still only have four. So there's plenty of time for a shake-up in the standings. But sooner would be better than later for the eight teams who are currently sitting on a losing record. :)

Couplets ahoy!

Some inter-divisional play this week did good things for the Stabby Action division, which is no longer crowding the bottom of the standings. And the Your Mom division also had a good Week 3, with all three 1-1 teams grabbing a win. This puts 80% of their division into playoff contention -- if the season ended week 3, which it does not.

Caption This, however, continues its deadlock, with all five teams still ranked the same for the third straight week. A divisional win over squorch's team in Week 4 would do the Baystate Wicked Cheatahs a lot of good, as they have repeated their trick of scoring lots of points but still falling short of victory.

Now on to the couplets!

Week 2 didn't feature much upheaval in the standings, except in the Fried Soup division where all five teams moved around. Stabby Action and Your Mom each only swapped two teams, and Caption This swapped none.

Stabby Action seems poised to become the Fried Soup of 2008, as it's currently the home of our 17th, 18th, and 20th place teams. But it's still early days yet. :)

Let's get to the couplets!

Welcome to our first Pigskin recap of the season! Last season's sonnets proved a little kludgy and light on the details, so this year I've decided to go with one rhyming couplet (in iambic pentameter, of course) for each game, and an 11th couplet at the end for summary, preview or commentary purposes.

As ever, there are two things to keep in mind when reading through this analysis:

1) It's just my opinion. I could be wrong. I probably am.

2) Nobody knows ANYTHING until Week 2.