My second “High Fives and Head Slaps” article had much better results than my first. My goal is to pick 5 players outside of the projected top-5 that will put up big fantasy numbers, and 5 players that are supposed to be in the top-5 but drop out. One of the things I can’t stand is the lack of accountability in fantasy football sports writing, so I’m going to own up to my predictions every week. I use the standard fantasy points results from www.fftoday.com. I recommend using this site as it has many features critical to managing a fantasy football team or two (or ten). Here are the results from Week 8:

HIGH-FIVES:

Quarterback: Tony Romo. I tweeted during the game that Romo was a horrible pick for High-Five but he kept throwing, and throwing, and throwing.

Sometimes the Giants caught it, sometimes the Cowboys did. His huge yard total (437) off-set his 4 picks. Only 1 TD, though. Ranked second in points.

Running Back: Stevan Ridley. Ranked # 14 before the week, Ridley didn’t put up big enough numbers (15-127-1) to crack the top-5, but got the consolation prize of being ranked #6. Still a good week, and hopefully was a difference-maker in fantasy lineups.

Wide Receiver: Julio Jones. Somehow, he was ranked #11 before the week, but put up top-3 numbers. Had a huge day. I’m glad to have him in two of my leagues.

Tight End: Heath Miller. Miller did not end the week as the #1 ranked TE, like I anticipated. In fact, he put up HALF the stats I envisioned for him. Still, he ended up with the fourth-best fantasy point total, up from his projected #7 slot.

Defense/Special Teams: Detroit Lions. My lone dud in the High-Five rankings. They were listed as the 13th-best option. I thought they could be top-5-worthy at home, and ended 20th. Like milk, it was a bad choice.

***Overall: Much, much, much better than last week.Although Heath Miller didn’t go #1 like I thought, I nailed the Julio Jones pick. Lions DST was my only disappointment.

HEAD SLAPS:

Quarterback: Tom Brady. All Brady did was completely destroy the Rams, and kept his foot on the pedal of the offense for three and a half quarters. A bad pick for Head Slaps, because he ended up with the 3rd best QB weekend, up from projected #5.

Running Back: Chris Johnson. CJ2K is officially back to being relevant. He has 90+ yards rushing in four of his last five games. I picked him to drop out of the top-5, and he did (#11 after being ranked #4) but I won’t bet against him again for a while.

Wide Receiver: Victor Cruz. By far my best pick of the week. Victor Cruz was the #4 consensus WR before the week started. When it was all said and done, he put up 2 catches for 22 yards, making him the 66th best WR in fantasy. Ouch. I’d be happier about this, except for the fact that I started him in one league.

Tight End: Aaron Hernandez–Did Not Play.

Defense/Special Teams: Seattle Seahawks. They were ranked #5, and did slip down to # 10. I thought the Lions and Seahawks would “flip flop” positions, but that wasn’t the case.

***Overall: I did much better this week in the Head Slaps as well. Victor Cruz stunk up the joint. So, two weeks into “High-Fives and Head Slaps” and I think I have it down now.

-Ryan Dickey (@ffbninja)