News From Ball Street

News From Ball Street is like news from Wall Street. It rhymes, see what we did there? Here we watch the stocks (ehh, ehh?) of players who are rising and falling, and decide whether you should target these shooting and sinking stars. Clever, I know. I used to have an old third cousin twice-removed from my uncle or something who always used to wake up every morning and say, "Another day, another dollar." Try telling that to stock brokers. Nowadays it's "Another day, another dollar," strikethrough text and all. The DOW dropped another 500 points Wednesday. Reportedly, our stock market continues to weaken because traders are worried that the global economy is weakening. Kind of like since everything sucks, so do we. Make sense? Yeah, I didn't think so. You should be in the mindset of finding the jewels among the crap. The bright spots among the darkness. The Seinfield reruns among crappy modern sitcoms. That's not to say that avoiding the Paris Hilton's My New Best Friend's out there is not important, because it is. You have to equally stay away from the pyrite. Through listening to the archaeologist. Stock Up Mewelde Moore/RB Pittsburgh—The 26 year old certainly has made the most out of his opportunities. Filling in for an injured Willie Parker and Rashard Mendenhall, Moore has proven himself to be a fully capable NFL starting running back, putting up 250 total yards and three touchdowns in his two starts. However, Parker will be back soon, very probably this week, and while Mewelde has definitely cemented himself as the third-down back and will surely continue to be highly involved in the Steelers offense, he's only a backup. Course of Action: Sell Houston Passing Game—Andre Johnson, who started off slow, has averaged 150 receiving yards over the past three weeks, including a 131 and one performance against the third-ranked Indianapolis pass defense. Matt Schaub has thrown for 646 yards in the two games since coming back from his injury. Owen Daniels is starting to show that he can consistently produce solid numbers. Get them all right now if you can. Course of Action: Buy Steven Jackson/RB St. Louis—Over the course of Jackson's past three games, he's had a week with 188 yards and a score, 111 yards and nothing, and 176 yards and three scores. In that middle game, he was without Orlando Pace. Pace is back. So is SJax. Course of Action: Buy (if you can) Stock Down Ronnie Brown/RB Miami—I sense that people never really believed in Brown. No one truly bought that a guy coming off an ACL injury could fly back to the top of the league so quickly and score eight touchdowns in four weeks. Now that he's had 77 total rushing yards in his past two games, swoop in and snag him from the doubtful owners. The only two defenses who have really shut him down are the Ravens and Jets, the best and fourth-best run defenses in the NFL, respectively. Course of Action: Buy Dwayne Bowe/WR Kansas City—Bowe has dropped three straight touchdown-less weeks with under 90 yards. Losing the top two quarterbacks, Brodie Croyle and Damon Huard, on an already weak depth chart to season ending injuries and having Tyler Thigpen or Quinn Gray as replacements does not help your cause. Get rid of him while you can. Course of Action: Sell Roy Williams/WR Dallas—I could plug any Cowboy in this hole. The entire franchise is rapidly losing value. But not in a "Crap, the Titanic is sinking" way—more like "It's the bottom of the ninth and the Yankees are down one with one on as Reggie Jackson comes to the plate." Just wait. It'll resurrect. Coming off a goose-egg weekend, Williams can be had on the cheap. When Romo returns next month, he'll be a stud again. Might as well get him when it's easy and stash him on the bench. Course of Action: Buy We talk to strangers. FFWritersWithHair@gmail.com