Handing out the Second-Quarter Fantasy Awards

	Antonio Gates visited the end zone three times last week against the Chiefs. Peter Read Miller/SI

By Bob Harris, Special to SI.com

Week 9 action is imminent, meaning it's time for the second installment of my 2005 quarterly Fantasy Awards. As always, these awards honor those players who have -- for better or worse -- distinguished themselves above all others over the four-game stretch in question -- in this case Weeks 5 through 8.

Those of you unfamiliar with the categories can find full descriptions here. Remember, players on teams with bye weeks that fall during the quarter in question are ineligible.

With the preliminaries out of the way, here you have them: the 2005 Back Page Second-Quarter Fantasy Awards.

Fantasy MVP: Antonio Gates, TE, Chargers

These awards are all about those meeting (or depending on the category, falling short of) preseason expectations. And as the Associated Press suggested Monday, the only man who's been able to stop Gates this season is his own general manager, A.J. Smith, who suspended his star tight end for the first game of the season as a result of efforts to end a summer-long contract holdout.

All is forgiven now.

His three-touchdown performance in Sunday's win over Kansas City helped the Chargers rebound from a tough loss to the Eagles and allowed Gates to cap off a 25-catch, 295-yard, five-TD second quarter.

Gates, a former college basketball star who's in his third NFL season, set career highs against the Chiefs with 10 catches for 145 yards, and his three TDs matched a career high.

Gates has six touchdowns in seven games. Last year, his 13 scores set an NFL record for tight ends.

Gates' performance spurred a debate over whether he has surpassed Kansas City's Tony Gonzalez as the NFL's best tight end.

But there is no such debate for Fantasy Nation, where for at least the time being, Gates has easily outpaced his older counterpart.

Fantasy Flop: Jamal Lewis, RB, Ravens

Although he finally ran hard in the team's Week 8 loss to Pittsburgh, the Steelers still held Lewis to 61 yards on 17 carries, far fewer than hoped.

But what else is new.

Sunday's game came after a week in which Lewis, tired of being blamed for the Ravens' offensive woes, wondered aloud about the team's commitment to him and admitted that protecting his body is a priority because he isn't under contract beyond this season.

Lewis ran for an NFL-leading 2,066 yards in 2003 and topped 1,000 last year despite missing four games because of a suspension and an ankle injury. This season, however, he's been limited to 387 yards and is averaging 3 yards a carry. He's yet to rush for 100 yards in any game and has scored just one touchdown.

And the lone touchdown didn't come this quarter.