Fifty-one points, both ways: the Sports Ballers answer Week 4, and the rest of the Remote waits on Monday night

I have spent a month not quite believing in the Sports Ballers. Sunday night I ran out of reasons.

Here is the number that did it. In Week 4, Fifth Quarter beat Matt Carrico's team by 51.78 points, a loss so lopsided it swallowed most of what the Sports Ballers had built across the rest of their season. I called it the honest asterisk on a 5-1 start, and I kept asking whether five wins, most of them over clubs that were struggling, told us very much. On Sunday, at the Fumblers' place, against the highest-scoring team in the league, the Sports Ballers led 105.72 to 54.48 when the afternoon was over. That is a 51.24-point margin. Within half a point, the asterisk now has a mirror image.

It isn't final. CeeDee Lamb still plays Monday night for the Fumblers, and the league scoreboard projects him to lift them to about 69. I do not think he finds 51 points by himself, but I will call it a win when the game says so.

Carrico doesn't need to wait. "We looked like the best team in the Remote, because we are," he told me Sunday night. I asked whether the Week 4 loss changes how he judges five-and-one. "No. That was one bad day. Tonight is who we are."

My weakness, and I will own it, is that I go easier on a team that's losing than on one that's winning. I wanted the Sports Ballers to face a real test. They got one, with Jaxon Smith-Njigba scoring 26.8 and Trevor Lawrence on a bye, and they passed it by a lot. My colleague Noah Simmons has the full Sports Ballers story. Mine is about what Sunday did to everyone chasing them, and the answer is that all three of them are waiting on one game in Philadelphia.

Susan Herzog's IR Kings trail Fifth Quarter 77.3 to 71.2, but they still have three players to come, Javonte Williams for Dallas and Jalen Carter and Cooper DeJean for Philadelphia, and Fifth Quarter has nobody left. The scoreboard projects the IR Kings to about 95. If there is one team in this division I would not hand a projection to, though, it's this one. "Look at last week," Herzog told me. "We were ahead after Sunday and lost it Monday night. We score. We've got to finish." This week they try it from the other side. "We just have to start winning the close ones," she said, "and this is a close one."

Jim Miller's team trails Likely 2 Punt 89.2 to 84.86, and it may come down to a kicker. Brandon Aubrey kicks for Dallas on Monday, and Likely 2 Punt has Downs left on the same field. The projection keeps it close, with Likely 2 Punt about two points ahead. Miller was without Montez Sweat, suspended for the week, and the defense he is proudest of held anyway; Alex Singleton scored 17.5. "If you're asking why we're not further up, it isn't the defense," Miller said. "The offense has to convert." Baker Mayfield, just back from injured reserve, scored 6.66. I think Miller's diagnosis holds up.

Kamehameha trail All Strong 106.02 to 87.3, with only Dak Prescott left, and the scoreboard projects him to bring them within a point and a half. Jeff Carrico wanted his receivers and backs to carry a game after a tight end and a kicker won him Week 6. "A tight end and a kicker carrying the scoreboard is how you survive a week, not how you build a team," he told me. Jameson Williams (23.6) and Braelon Allen (16.4) did their part. One small, painful detail: Malik Willis scored 26.62 on Kamehameha's bench. I'm not going to second-guess starting Prescott. It is the kind of number that only matters if Monday comes up short.

So here is the Remote as best anyone can say it before Monday. If the projections hold, the Sports Ballers go to 6-1, the IR Kings and Miller Time sit at 3-4, three games back, and Kamehameha fall to 1-6. Projections are not results, and the IR Kings proved last week that a Sunday lead isn't one either.

After that, the schedule does the arguing. Week 8 opens the division rematches: Miller Time go to the Sports Ballers, and the IR Kings visit Kamehameha. "Sports Ballers are the team to beat right now," Miller told me. "Beatable? Every team is, over a stretch. We see them next." Jeff Carrico sounded the same note about his: "IR Kings come to our place next week, and I'm not conceding anything in this division." Herzog isn't looking that far ahead. The IR Kings host the Sports Ballers in Week 10, and "I'll get excited about Sports Ballers when it's Sports Ballers week."

Here is my take. Last week I kept saying the Remote's records and its scoring didn't line up. Sunday lined one of them up: the Sports Ballers' 5-1 finally looks like 5-1. What hasn't changed is the middle of the division, Miller Time defending well and not scoring enough, the IR Kings scoring and not finishing. Monday night decides whether either of those sentences gets rewritten this week. I'd lean toward the IR Kings finally closing one. Past that, I would not bet on much.