A cushion, measured again: the Sports Ballers all but put away the Fumblers, and the Diablo race comes back to life

Michael Paden II did not wait for Monday night to say it.

"It told me we're not invincible," the Fumblers owner wrote to me late Sunday. "Six weeks of putting up points and I got comfortable. That's done."

He had reason to say it before the last snap. In the game between the league's only two 5-1 teams, the Sports Ballers left the Fumblers' place Sunday leading 105.72 to 54.48 on the league scoreboard. The Fumblers have one man left, CeeDee Lamb, in Monday night's Dallas game at Philadelphia, and Lamb would need more than 51 points on his own to change the result. The projection gives him about 15. Nothing is official until Monday's game ends, but I am not going to invent suspense that isn't there. This one is all but decided.

I should say what I thought going in, because I wrote it down. My notes for this game had the Fumblers by a narrow margin, with the caveat that I was less sure than the standings. The caveat was the only part I got right. The league's highest-scoring team is on its way to roughly half its weekly average. That is not a narrow miss on my part, and I won't dress it up as one.

Michael didn't dress it up either. "Comfortable? Not anymore. That was the first real test and we didn't pass it. The points gap didn't mean a thing tonight." He handed out the credit himself: "Jaxon Smith-Njigba. He put it on us. Credit to Matt."

Matt Carrico, who owns the Sports Ballers, wasn't shy about what it meant from his side. "It told me we belong," he wrote. "Lamb's got Monday night and he needs fifty-one. I'll be watching, but I'm sleeping fine tonight." He also had an answer for the Week 4 loss to Fifth Quarter that has followed his team around all month: "One bad day doesn't define a team, and tonight showed it."

Ashley Kim and Noah Simmons have the inside of this game for each club. My corner is the division, and the division just changed shape.

Unless Monday produces a 51-point receiver, the Fumblers go to 5-2. Now look at the rest of the Diablo board Sunday night. All Strong led Kamehameha, with Dak Prescott still to play for Kamehameha and the projection close. Likely 2 Punt led It's Miller Time by about four points, with one player left on each side. Fifth Quarter led the IR Kings, who have three players left Monday and are projected to pass them. If All Strong and Likely 2 Punt hold on, both reach 4-3, and the Fumblers' two-game lead becomes one.

That is an if, and I'll keep it labeled as one. None of those three games is settled. But the condition matters because of what comes next. The Fumblers' next three games are the rest of the Diablo, back to back to back: at Likely 2 Punt in Week 8, home against All Strong in Week 9, at Fifth Quarter in Week 10. Fifth Quarter already beat them once, in Week 3. The lead that looked like daylight a week ago is now something they have to defend in person.

Michael knows which one he's circling. "Does it change Week 8? It makes it bigger," he wrote. "It's my son's team, it's a division game, and I'm not losing two in a row." In a separate note he added, "If he beats me I'll hear about it at every family dinner until Christmas."

His son is Jacob Paden, who owns Likely 2 Punt and wanted no part of the grand narrative. "I'm not calling any one game the one that decides it," he told me. "The Fumblers beat us in Week 1 and that's on us. Getting them at our place in Week 8 matters, but every Diablo game matters this year." He has seen the Sports Ballers up close, too, losing to them in Week 6, and his scouting report was short: "When their passing game gets going it gets going fast; take that seriously." Sunday night he had his own Monday to sweat. "I'm not losing sleep over anybody else's scoreboard tonight."

Michael's one lesson from the day was blunt: "You can't win with half your guys sitting out. We take that to Likely 2 Punt next week." I'll leave the roll call to the beat. The lesson is the part that travels.

Here is my take, and it is a take. The Fumblers' 5-1 was real, and a loss to the other 5-1 team doesn't erase it. What Sunday ends is the idea that the Diablo was settled in October. The scoring average told us the Fumblers had the league's best offense. It never told us the offense would show up every week, and the next three come against the people who know them best.

THE SPORTS BALLERS SIDE By Casey Monroe, BSN (written before kickoff)

Start with what 5-1 has actually looked like. Three of the Sports Ballers' five wins came inside the Remote, over Miller Time, the IR Kings and Kamehameha, who went into the week a combined 6-12. The other two were comfortable, not crushing: 118.44-89.74 in Week 5, then 99.68-80.68 at Likely 2 Punt in Week 6. Add up all six games and the Sports Ballers have outscored opponents by 16.9 points. The Fumblers are plus 135. The reason the margin is so thin is the one loss, 148.82-97.04 to Fifth Quarter in Week 4, a 51-point hole that is three times the size of their whole season margin. So the Sports Ballers are 5-1 and the only Remote team without a division loss, and I still do not know how good they are. Sunday is the first time they meet a team that matches their record.

What carries them is easy to see. C.J. Stroud threw for 312 yards and three touchdowns against Likely 2 Punt, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba caught 12 passes for 134 yards; over the season Stroud has 1,714 yards, nine touchdowns and one interception, and Smith-Njigba 49 catches, 717 yards and seven touchdowns. That is an engine, and a good one.

So Casey asked the question, and Sunday answered most of it. Monday night it comes down to one receiver and a number nobody expects him to reach. Tuesday, the Fumblers start the second lap of the Diablo, and this time everybody in it is close enough to see them.