I’d like to welcome everyone back for another read. Each week it’s getting harder and harder to decide who to pick to interview, I always like to mix up the divisions, pick someone who played the previous week, and try and get someone from a different team. Since I haven’t interviewed anyone from Honor Game so far, so I decided to pick their QB, Dave Daoust. If you play in division 2 and don’t know who he is, where have you been hiding? He is the man under center and is leading in every passing category. Let’s get to it and see what he has to say.
Q- Are you and your team really having fun dominating in Division 2?
A- Anytime you're playing football it's fun, win lose or draw. If it's not fun anymore, you need to find a new hobby. We all (Honor Game) love the game, it's in our name, and we have a good bunch of guys who are all great to play with. There is a great team vibe with us with no drama. We go out to have fun, get better and be competitive, but we focus on competing more so versus ourselves on a game to game basis as opposed to versus our opponent. While we may be 9-0, we are humbled in that we know there is still so much more for us to work on as a team to get better. Grinding and working toward becoming a better football team on a weekly basis will always be my favorite way of having fun... And I don't think we've hit our state of dominance yet, our prime is ahead of us.
Q- Who is Honor Games biggest threat to winning the title this season?
A- The teams in this division are getting better every week! I do feel as though Primetime is the most athletic opponent we have dealt with and they need some props for their ability to go up and get the ball on D. Ball Dropping Frenzy was our smartest opponent thus far, making good adjustments during the game and finding some matchups here and there. They'll find a clever way to a win a game one of these weeks. Really, every team is improving, starting to find out who they are and building on that. Our team is very focused on bringing home the championship and we made sure to make that statement with our first 9 games. I believe our biggest threat to winning it all this season is ourselves. We need to stay poised, focused and make sure we don't beat ourselves. We need to let our opponent make their mistakes and capitalize on them, and stay Honor Game. (pun intended)
Q- Do you think that this team could compete in division 1?
A- If you asked me this question week 1, I would've told you most definitely not. With these 9 games under our belt, I think we could definitely hold our own versus a Division 1 team now. We have had the time to work on our chemistry and rhythm, and have installed a system on offense and defense. It's tough to play Division 1 without integrating as a team first. Maybe after we win this D2 championship, we can organize a game of D1 champs vs D2 champs and find out!? Jon book it! (ed’s note: spring tryout day maybe!) We got a month-long bye; we're going to be starving for football when we get back.
Q- You have played in the summer and won a title as a receiver. Would it be more satisfying to winning it as a passer?
A- Winning last year felt great. Our team worked hard, played hard and put out, game in and out. We put every big win behind us, and went into the next game just as hungry as the last. That's what it takes to win consistently. While it was my first MFL championship, I have won championships in other leagues prior as a WR. When we win this season, it will be my first championship as a quarterback so it will surely have a special place up there for me. More importantly though, there are a couple of guys on our team that have never won a championship yet who have played many seasons, so the most satisfying part of winning this season will be winning with them and getting to share that championship feeling, being a part of their first chip.
Q- Do you prefer throwing or catching a TD?
A- Trick question? I prefer throwing the TD and catching the TD on the same play, but it’s kind of hard to pull off and I haven't quite mastered the Mariota special yet. Haha! Seriously, 85% of the time, I would rather throw the TD... but when you get one of those sideline toe-tapping snags nobody thinks you're coming down with, there's no better feeling than that!
Q- What made you decide to throw this season? Is it to prove that you can? And any chance you play QB in the summer?
A- I love playing QB. It's a very challenging position. I like to think I was always good at football, but I was a horrible thrower of the football my entire life so I made a point to try and get better. Like I tell everyone on my team every week, the most important part of every game is getting better as a player and as a team, and I lead into that with what I've done with this position over time. I'm still learning, I don't think you can ever stop learning. It's new and different from all the years of safety, corner, WR... and I'm getting old so less running is less painful the next day. I only asked to play QB or sub in at QB all Fall season long!! If it was up to me, I would play QB every MFL season! I love what Jon and the guys have done with this league, it's very fun to be a part of.
Q- You have a few brothers that all have play football, who is the best out of the bunch? And what makes that person the best.
A- I couldn't tell you, honestly. I know all of us really well and I am dead honest when I tell you bizarrely, all of our skills are extremely different. Devin is the fastest and most agile. Derek is the biggest, and was an amazing big slot WR who can make short and deep plays and post up vs anyone. Dilan is a beast in the short game on defense and also plays a great big man on offense, dominating his defender with body and solid hands. I get by being the smartest (don't tell them that though), I'm sneaky on the field with reading the opponent and getting in the soft spots of zones, have a real feel for it. We all have great hands and ability to track the ball, to go with a family inheritance of the infamous flag football spin move. My hands are the best of the bunch but not one of them would ever admit it, and I don't blame them.
Q- Are you surprised that no one has picked up on the play you run often on converts?
A- I'm not surprised. There's more to it than you have seen. The day someone does what they need to do in coverage on one side, they will see that it exposes them on the other side. Come cover it, I dare you. You haven’t seen that plays full potential yet; we haven’t hit option 2 or 3 because of what the coverage has dictated. I'll be surprised the day someone does stop it consistently, it’s a couple years old now and well tested.
Q- I know you are a Giants fan, Terry is a Cowboys fan, and your brother is an Eagles fan. Do you have a Redskins fan on the roster? If not, you need to find one.
A- Come gameday, our fanhood goes to the side and we are all simply Honor Game. There are no distractions over which NFL team we root for. Today isn't gameday though... Both Terry and Devin have horrible taste in NFL franchises and need to come bleed blue.
Cowboys and Eagles suck (ed’s note: this is scientific fact). The famous Philly special had an illegal formation of only 6 men on the LOS that wasn't called somehow, and people think this is the best play in Eagles history... yeah, it’s the worst play in stripes history. I'm not sure Terry was alive the last time the Cowboys were relevant, he runs like he's only 21 years old. Thankfully there are no Redskins fans on the team, and let’s keep it that way.
Q- With you being the captain and forming the team why did you only bring one brother with you? You could have been team Daoust.
A- Ahh the good old PRIMETIME days. Our team for the longest time was PRIMETIME and other teams used to joke that with only 1 ball and 4 Daousts there weren’t enough balls to go around for all of us, which was kind of true, so we came up with a slogan; ‘Ain't no I in Team, but there are 2 "I"s and 2 "ME"s in PRIMETIME’. My brother Derek has been trying to recover from a torn ACL for 2 years now. He had surgery a year ago, but the ligament stretched and he is waiting to redo it. Really sucks. Hopefully he's patched up and back out soon. My brother Dilan is a great player, but we wanted to be fair with Div 2 and not over-stack the team. If all 4 brothers were on the same team, we would've surely had to enroll in Div 1. We have played so many seasons all 4 brothers on 1 team. There wasn't pressure to build another. We are also a bunch of crazies on the football field together. You know how they say 3 is a crowd and 4 is a party? Yeah... we party hard. As brothers, I think our favorite game was a playoff game in another league where we squared up 2 Daousts on 1 team, and 2 Daousts on another. The game came down to the final 3 plays and Derek ended up catching the game winning TD on a 4th down and goal, booting Dilan and I out the playoffs. We all played major roles for our team in that game. It was pretty cool! Maybe one day MFL will see all 4 brother's rockin it together again, but if so, Jon's going to have to up season rates to include additional referees and security fees.
I want to thank you Dave for taking part and good luck the rest of the season and into the playoffs.
My Picks Division 1
I ended up getting both games wrong last week, which shouldn’t have happened, but I listen to what JC had told me and I had to figure Dom wanted revenge after last time they played each other. This week I won’t be listen to anyone or taking revenge into play when I make my picks this way I can get back to picking the winners. Here are my picks and this week’s winners.
Henchmen vs Petit Phoques
I like both the rosters and I could have gone either way on this one, but I picked Petits Phoques because they won’t lose two games in a row. This week their roster will show up and they will show who they are against another top team. I see this being a tight game and the team that gets more converts will win. Speaking of converts they have to play an overtime shoot out to finish off the game from a few weeks ago, so this is almost a two for one game.
Joey’s Lovers vs D#Nasty
I hate to keep picking against D#Nasty, but they just don’t seem to fit well with the larger field. They are all solid players that are having a hard time getting to the sidelines and dropping deep consistently. I feel that with the experience that Joey’s Lovers have they should be able to win this one without breaking a sweet. Even after writing that it wouldn’t shock me to see D#Nasty get their first win of the season.
