Week 2: The Projected Score Beguiled Me, and I Did Hope

I know we shouldn't rely on the default projections, because they're historically garbage, but this week had some really bad ones.  Some came in 30 points under projection, some were 80 points over, and then there was TJ, whose projection was off by 0.37.  Hopefully, they get their act together soon, but who knows with how weird this week was.

Skyler vs Chad:  This was one of the ugliest games of the week, where Chad kept his foot on Skyler's neck and didn't let up once. At no point did Skyler lead. This was the second week in a row where Skyler's starting QB got hurt and left in the middle of a game. He had no one score 20+ points, and only three people hit double digits. When Allen Robinson is your best player, you know it's a long week. Meanwhile, Chad had three people score 25+, including Amari Cooper (25+), Jaylen Hurts (38+), and Tyreek Hill(42).

Tommy vs Brady:  This 22-point win for Tommy was the third closest game of the week, which goes to show just how bad the blowouts were.  Brady was bit by the injury (Jeudy) and ejected (Evans) bugs this week, while Tommy got a nice boost from newly acquired James Robinson. Their QB's (Carr for Tommy, and Stafford for Brady) were the only 20+ point scorers, but the big difference came from Tommy have 5 double-digit scorers, while Brady only had 3.

Brandon vs Matt:  Brandon bowed out early this week and sat 4 people, which made this the easy blowout of the week (a gap of 115). Brandon had no 20-point scorers, Matt had 4 (Mahomes, Buccs, Chubb, Waddle) get over 20, with Waddle also scoring 40+. Looks like everything is coming up Lundin these days.

Rob vs Trevor: In Lee Corso's voice "Not so fast my friend, everything might be coming up Lundin, but Rob had the best week".  Rob had five people score 20+ (Williams, Murray, Jones, St. Brown, and Diggs), with St. Brown and Diggs combining for 84+ points. Trevor had two players score 20+ (London and Buffalo), and with the 4th highest score of the week, had no shot. This was easily the bonanza though as they combined for 350 points.

Tyler vs TJ: TJ won by 14, and his defense scored him -5, and he only had one player score 20+ (Christian Kirk).  Tyler had two guys score 20+ (Kupp and Andrews), but the rest of his team was 'bleh' while 7 of 9 for TJ had double digits.  Even though this was within 14, it wasn't the nail-biter of the week.

Kyle vs Jordan: This game was determined by fewer than 7 points, and won the award for the nail-biter of the week, and was also the nightly-nail biter as both had players going on tonight. Jordan and Jefferson got it close for a minute, but Kyle and Brown were able to put it away, even with a scare visit to the blue medical tent. Each team only had one 20+ point scorer.  Herbert led the way for Jordan with 29+ points, but Kyle got a victory thanks to Lamar (48+) and the crazy Ravens/Dolphins game. I should add that this was the battle of ineptitude, as it was the only game that failed to break 200 points combined.  AKA put their scores together and they still lose to Rob this week.

I can't remember the last time we had all games where leads didn't change on Monday.

Award Season

MVP: Lamar's big game gets Kyle the big win, and he is the sole undefeated team in the West

LVP: Davante Adams had a stat line of 2/12/1 in the first game his grandparents have watched him play as a pro.  I've put up better flag football numbers before, and I was on the offensive line! The last time he had a game this bad was all the way back on October 22, 2017 against the Saints when Hundley was his QB, and he went for 2/12/0.

Unluckiest Team of the Week: Trevor with the 4th highest score, but still lost.

Luckiest Team of the Week: Kyle gets this for the narrow and late win, and for being the 9th lowest scorer (could have been 10th) and still finding a way to win

High Scorer of the Week: Rob broke 200.  It doesn't happen often, but it's amazing when it does. Rob and Ren both did it in 2013, and then it didn't happen again until 2018. Brady broke it in 2018, Tyler in 2019, Tyler in 2020 (in an inconsequential game), and Skyler in 2021, and now Rob in 2022.  He was the first person to do it in league history, and is the second person to join the 2x200 club. 2 of the 6 people who broke the 200-point plateau won the championship the year they broke 200.  I think most of us would take a 33% chance of winning the trophy right now. Congrats Rob on being one of the two front runners for the title this year.

Lowest Scorer of the Week: Rob Brandon wins on a technicality, but Rob Brandon had to sit 3 4 people to narrowly win this award over Skyler by less than a point (who sat one player to counteract Brandon's tanking), but we all know Skyler has the worst team of the week (again).

King of the Court: Tommy beat Brady to keep hold of his belt for another week.

Game Previews 

*Written before week 2 is final.  I will update for standings and for projected matchup awards once it is final.

Skyler (12) vs Brady (8): Skyler has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Brady has 0 players on Thursday and 3 players in primetime.  This is the battle of ineptitude front-runner given their current standings.

Tommy (3) vs Chad (5): Tommy has 3 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. Chad has 2 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. Analysis A) they both beat me and I hate them, Analysis B) they are potential playoff teams, Analysis C) almost there, Analysis D) eez nuts.

Matt (1) vs Trevor (6): Matt has 1 player on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. Trevor has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Given their standings, this is a strong candidate for the weekly bonanza.  That being said, any game Matt is in will likely be the bonanza.  He is the only team to have over 300 points for the year, and he's currently at 340.  

Rob (4) vs Brandon (11): Rob has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Brandon has 0 players on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. [Insert not that funny of a joke here about tanking].

TJ (9) vs Kyle (2): TJ has 0 players on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. Kyle has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. I'm calling my shot -- Kyle has Zeke on MNF, it's projected to be a close game, and he's going against TJ.  What I'm saying is congrats on the Monday Night Miracle, and starting 3-0 for the first time in your career.

Jordan (7) vs Tyler (10): Jordan has 0 players on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. Tyler has 0 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. Some people need participation trophies to feel included, other people are snowflakes who are offended when life isn’t fair to them. The winner of this match will get an imaginary ice trophy to commemorate the union of those people.

Good luck to everyone but Brady this week.

*Footnote - I receive a 'complaint' about referencing something I shouldn't in the title, and I would say read Genesis 3:13.  Also, by including scripture references, this can count as ministering to Chad, so let's hope he doesn't catch on.

Week 1: Let There Be Football

Football is here, and it's a magical time.  I thoroughly enjoyed having football on the TV nonstop on Saturday and Sunday. That being said, I heard that Jocelyn and my children are looking for someone with a bit more personality and attentiveness to be in their lives.  All applicants can put their resumes directly in the trash.  You'll know you've found the right one when you see my team in there as well, next to the Titans kicker and their offensive coordinator's ability to call a good game. Anyway, let's get to the point of this post

Game Recaps

Skyler vs Tommy: This was the third closest game of the week (Tommy won by 20), but it never felt close, nor did it feel exciting – which is why it’s the winner of the battle of ineptitude this week. Each team had only one player score 20+ points (Mixon for Skyler, Pittman for Tommy), and each team had 4 other players in the low double digits, with 4 other players in the single digits. Skyler’s single-digit players scored a combined 13 points, while Tommy’s combined for 27 and the ‘studs’ of the game had a difference of 6 points in the favor of Tommy as well. This game came down to a lot of little things that added up to a comfortable Tommy win.

Chad vs Brady: This game looked like it would be tight going into Monday, and then the Broncos stack of McManus and Judge, Doug, Trudy, Jerry Jeudy put things to bed pretty quickly. With the Monday night tension, and with this game being the Weekly Bonanza, it was the best game of the week in my opinion. Chad started out hot Sunday morning and took a lead he wouldn’t relinquish until Monday night. His hot start was thanks to a 20+ point game from Jalen Hurts while getting double-digit games from 5 other players.  Brady was able to make his comeback though thanks to three 20+ point games (Jameis, Jeudy, and Kelce).

Matt vs Rob: ::Opens up last year's week 1 report, and decides to copy and paste:: “Stop me if you've heard this one before -- Rob's opponent started out great, so instead of picking up a kicker or DST, Rob decided to sit out this week and play for the #1 waiver pick.”  Well, this is weird that I referenced this habit last year. Anyway, moving on to this week. Rob gave up thanks to 6 players scoring double digits for Matt.  3 of those 6 went for 20+, and 1 of those 3 went for 40+ (Mahomes).  Matt had a total of 162.8 points, and his lowest scorer was Ish Smith with 0 points.  Coincidentally, “Oh ish” is what the rest of us thought when we saw Matt’s score but didn’t want to swear in our minds.  Rob sat 3 people, had a tight end that scored 0 and ended up as the lowest scorer of the week (more on that later). Murray and Diggs combined for 50 for Rob, so he definitely has a solid foundation to build on.  Throw in an extra 20 from Ammon-Ra St. Brown, and Rob looks like he’ll be just fine. This was the biggest blowout of the week.

Brandon vs Trevor:  The Nail Biter of the Week, with the Monday Night Miracle/Nightmare (depending on who you are) made this for an excellent game as well. Trevor started out hot with a stellar showing from his DST on Thursday night, with his Kicker adding in another 7 points.  You might say it was a ‘special’ night for his special teams. Not to be outdone, the very recently acquired (like 30 minutes before kick-off) Josh Allen put up 37 points, which allowed for Brandon to finish Thursday night with the lead. The Sunday morning games saw some back and forth until the Sunday afternoon game saw Brandon take a roughly 25-point lead. Brandon getting the lead was a little surprising as only CEH and his K scored double digits (CEH was part of the 20+ club) (I should add that even though this was the nail-biter, it was the second lowest scoring game of the week). Trevor made his furious comeback by stacking Mr. Unlimited with his church-going WR, Courtland Sutton.  They combined for 30 points and got Trevor a 3.5-point win.

Jordan vs TJ: This was the blowout of the week featuring non-tanking teams.  Jordan put up 148 while TJ put up 92. TJ had one player get 20+ (Joe Burrow, who lost 10 points on turnovers), and another four players score double digits, meaning 4 more were single digits.  Meanwhile, Jordan's lowest 5 scorers all had single digits and combined for 16.3 points.  Of his top 4 scorers, Herbert was the lowest at 29.26, while Barkley, Davante, and Jefferson all scored 30+.  We are in trouble if Jordan can figure out his bottom half of the roster.  Jordan was probably sweating out Friday and Saturday after Cam Akers scored 0 points on Thursday, but he obviously ended up doing just fine.

Kyle vs Tyler: Another big blowout, Kyle won by around 46 points. Tyler had one player score 30+ (Cooper Kupp on his ridiculous TNF stat line), but the rest of his team struggled. We all thought George Kittle was going to dominate his game, but where the rest of Tyler’s team didn’t figuratively show up for the game, Kittle literally didn’t show up for his game.  We all make mistakes Tyler, it’s ok. Kyle’s big three were Lamar, JTT, and AJ Brown, who all scored 25+ points. If AJ Brown will consistently be this good, he could end up being one of the bigger draft day steals.  Not that the first pick of the 3rd round is stealing, but he went behind Sutton, Higgins, Tyreek, Keenan, Evans, and Lamb. 

Award Season

MVP: Wilson and Sutton for the late theatrics on Monday to get Trevor the nail-biting win.

LVP: Most of the people on Brandon’s team.  Dameon Pierce looked like he had a ways to go to be the lead back in Houston, Thielen had 3 whole catches while Jefferson feasted, and CeeDee Lamb only caught 2 of 11 targets. If he catches even 5 of his 11 targets  (45%) Brandon likely wins (for his career he catches 65% of his targets).  They all win this award, but CD was the ‘L’-ist VP of the bunch.

Unluckiest Team of the Week: I want to give it to Brandon for the way he lost, but Chad would have beat 7 other people this week with his score, so Chad gets the award for being the highest scoring loser.

Luckiest Team of the Week: I want to give this to Trevor since he narrowly won on Monday night, but Tommy would have lost to 7 other people this week given his score but he still won, so Tommy it is.

High Scorer of the Week: I don’t think Matt knows this since he claims his app is broken, but he is the highest scorer and the league leader after week 1.

Lowest Scorer of the Week: Rob wins on a technicality, but Rob had to sit 3 people to narrowly win this award over Skyler by less than a point, but we all know Skyler has the worst team of the week.

King of the Court

This is a new award I’ll try and track. If we simply look at this as ‘winning team stays’, whoever currently is the king will lose the title if he loses in a given week, and his new opponent will take over as king of the court.  We know Jordan won the last championship of pre-historic times.  We could count him as the belt holder starting week 1 of the 2010 season.  If we decided to wait to award the first king of the court to our first champion with documentation, Geoff would hold the belt starting with the first game of the 2011 season.  Fortunately, the belts were unified in week 12 of 2011 when Kyle, holder of the prehistoric belt, beat Jordan, holder of the modern era belt, to create the undisputed King of the Court.

It frequently changes hands each season.  The longest streak is shared between Jordan and Skyler at 8.  If we track simply since unification (since that is the easiest and it’s undisputed), Brady leads at 25, Skyler is in second at 22, and Chad is in third with 20. We nearly had some constitutional crises as Geoff left the league shortly after holding the belt (fortunately not during his reign), and then Konner won it while subbing in, and only lost it in the last week of the consolation bracket before his forced retirement.  He lost it to Ren.  Fortunately, Ren only held it the first week of the 2019 season. Had Ren won the league that year, he would have also caused a crisis by retiring with the belt.  2019 was also a mess since I inadvertently screwed up the schedule when Chad decided to come back, and in my haste, I retroactively forced him back in the league during the offseason between 2019 and 2020, but the blog was thorough that year, and everything was accounted for.

More often than not, the champion collects the belt either in his run leading to the playoffs or by winning in the playoffs.  This last season was no different as Skyler won the belt from Brady in the semi-finals and kept it as he won the championship.  However, he crapped the bed in the first game of this season, and now Tommy is the undisputed King of the Court and holds the belt.   That will put extra pressure on his upcoming matchup with Brady.  Speaking of which, let’s get to the game previews

* denotes that the team is incomplete.

Skyler* (11) vs Chad (7): Skyler has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Chad has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. In the running for the battle of ineptitude. Tommy (6) vs Brady (4): Tommy has 2 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. Brady has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. The winner will be the King of the Court Brandon* (8) vs Matt* (1): Brandon has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Matt has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Rob* (12) vs Trevor (5): Rob has 1 player on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Trevor has 0 players on Thursday and 4 players in primetime. In the running for the battle of ineptitude. These two have a combined 5 players on Monday night, so I expect this to be the nail-biter of the night and the Monday night miracle/nightmare, but who knows Tyler (9) vs TJ (10): Tyler has 4 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. TJ has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. In the running for the battle of ineptitude. Jordan* (2) vs Kyle* (3): Jordan has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. Kyle has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. The clear front runner for the bonanza and the game of the week.

With two games on Monday night this next week, almost every matchup will be affected by Monday.  The only one that doesn't is Tyler vs TJ.  I'm sure TJ is thrilled to not be the victim of a Monday Nightmare.

Good luck to everyone but Chad this week.

2022 Fantasy Draft Recap and Week 1 Analysis (Just Under the Wire)

As I'm way behind, let's power through this.  I thought I'd wait on the draft recaps until closer to the season for a couple of reasons.  We still don't hall have DST's or Ks, but I'd rather try and get this out before the game tonight. 

According to Football Guys, here are the draft rankings.  This is somewhat broken given the number of incomplete teams.

According to FantasyPros, below is a screenshot of the Draft Rankings.  Take that with a grain of salt as I don't have a K or DST, but they are somehow better than my WR, TE, or QB. It's probably because half of us don't have a K or DST, so I'm average in those positions compared to the rest of the league. 

*Since this screenshot was taken, Brady has risen from 90 and in last pace by himself to 91, and tied in last place with Brandon*

* on player name denotes that they are missing starting positions

Skyler* vs Tommy: Skyler has 2 players on Thursday night and 2 players in primetime. Tommy has 0 players on Thursday and 0 players in primetime. 

Chad vs Brady*: Chad has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. Brady has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. 

Matt vs Rob*: Matt has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. Rob has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. T

Brandon* vs Trevor: Brandon has 1 player on Thursday (the very recently acquired Josh Allen) and 1 player in primetime. Trevor has 2 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. 

Jordan* vs TJ: Jordan has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime. TJ has 0 players on Thursday and 2 players in primetime. 

Kyle* vs Tyler: Kyle has 2 players on Thursday and 3 players in primetime. Tyler has 1 player on Thursday and 1 player in primetime.