It was the best of times, it was the worst
of times…
As we finish Week One and head into the
meat of this fantasy season, I think that Charles Dickens’ prophetic novel The Tale
of Two Fantasy Teams teaches us a lot about the highs and lows of life.
Sometimes one of your players will break
out a 50-yard touchdown run and you’re on top of the world. Maybe your team
dropped 140 points on some sorry ass excuse of an opponent. Maybe you wind up
with 2 players in the top 10 at their position. Or, maybe your beloved team
craps the bed and you wind up with 3 injuries and 50 points.
Fantasy football isn’t about money. It’s
not about calling shots or trophies or jinxes… It’s not about setting records
or making enemies or talking shit. Fantasy football is about the love of the
game. It’s about coming together every week for 16 weeks and being connected to
11 other people that you care about. It’s about turning things around after a shitty
week because you know you have to see the same people 7 days from now. Fantasy
Football is about working our way to the top even if we slip towards the
bottom.
It’s the best of times and it’s the worst
of times. But through it all, it’s the times that we make it. Let’s get to some
rankings, shall we?
For the newbies, these rankings are
generated based off of the algorithm below:
(1+ Winning %) x (Team's PPG/League's Total
Points) = NPRP
NPRP is the key number. It stands for “Nick’s
Power Ranking Percentage.” The higher that number is, the higher your rank. Let’s
get started.
1.) (LW #2) Talkin bout’ mockdrafts?, 1-0
[116 PPG, .253 NPRP]
The first words uttered when you saw this.
Mock Drafts? Don’t talk about Mock Drafts.
You kiddin me? MOCK DRAFTS?
Matty “A Staycation on the Strip qualifies
as being out-of-town” Ice pulled out his 3rd Highest scoring
performance this week to open the season. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of things in
my day, but a strong start from Matt was not something I though I’d witness in
my lifetime. I mean, this guy got a BMW and IMMEDIATELY put in subwoofers. This
guy moves somewhere and the sink immediately gets filled to the brim with
peanut butter-crusted knives.
Nonetheless, Matt is our frontrunner at the
moment, and we can’t exactly say that we didn’t see it coming. Matt came out of
the draft looking like a different man. Was he getting help through an
earpiece? Was he possessed? I can’t say, but his team looks impressive.
MATT YOU THOUGHT I WAS DONE WITH THESE ARNOLD GIFS?
Even with duds like Melvin Gordon, Sammy
Watkins, Brandin Cooks, and Greg Olsen (who totaled 9 points), the kid still hit
triple digits. That’s almost half his team scoring less that 5 points. Does he
need depth at RB? Sure he does, but you can’t argue with the king (as much as
that pains me to say).
The season is young though, Matt, and you
have another test ahead of you this weekend…
2.) (LW #10) The Northern Champ, 1-0 [109 PPG, .238 NPRP]
Even after the shellacking I laid on him in
the preseason, Ryan has put together one hell of a team.
Despite the lack of a half-decent
Quarterback, the Hewett of the North has assembled a team with 1 Top-10 Running
Back and 4 Top-10 Wide Receivers. How can he be stopped?
That was simply hyperbole, of course. While
Ryan generally fits the profile of a future champion (low preseason rank,
league newcomer), a strong week one performance general has not boded well in
this league. Still, Ryan now holds the record for the highest-ranking Hewett
(not including Corey’s #2 ranking in the 2013 Preseason), and that’s something
to celebrate in his kingdom of the north.
It's one win. So what?
Don’t party too hard, though, because next
week you face the first ever champion of the Captain’s League dating back to
when it was known as the Elite 8: William Brown.
Luck struck Will’s team this week and it
doesn’t look like it will stop in the immediate future. You may want to invest
in a serviceable quarterback or perhaps a FLEX if you want to keep up this
streak and eventually move into 1st…
You know what they say, you can enjoy Lake
Tahoe when it’s warm, but once the cold sets in you’re stuck in a hotel in Reno
with a girl named Tawnya and the sense that 3 showers a day might be good
enough. In other words, enjoy the win, but we are FAR from playoffs.
3.) (LW #4) Rank This, 1-0 [94 PPG, .205 NPRP]
We got exactly what we expected from Dave
this week. The guy missed some of the games doing some yard work and put up
just shy of Dave’s average 96 points. Call him Mr. Consistent.
Me though? I think there’s a conspiracy
afoot. How can Dave always wind up in the top half of the league when we walk
away laughing at his draft? We take a peak and question how Dave wins when his
strategy is “If I’ve heard of them after round 8 then they’re a good pick.”
That’s almost the exact opposite of what the late rounds are for. That strategy
left Curtis with 3 players who aren’t even in the NFL anymore.
My theory? Dave is Mr. Sandman. He lulls
you to sleep with these boring, unflashy picks. Guys who don’t jump off the
page. Guys who you look at and say “Why would you want him?” Dave takes the
guys you don’t want because he gets them at a bargain. He snags guys who are
boring to watch but will net you an average of 8-10 points a game every single
week. That’s how he wins.
He’s Billy Bean.
Lamar Miller? Alshon Jeffery? Giovani
Bernard? These are guys you wouldn’t go out of your way to see if they were
practicing in your backyard, but Dave takes them like a junkyard muscle car and
makes them serviceable.
Sure, Dave’s only 3rd and we’re
not too worried about him taking the top spot again this week, but why aren’t
we? Dave just put up 94 points, well above league average, without his #1
overall pick.
Things aren’t turning around for Dave, per
se, but I think that he’s putting himself on course for his best season yet,
and we need to either stop him early or get out of the way once this train gets
rolling.
4.) (LW #3) Laced Jam, 1-0 [87 PPG, .190 NPRP]
Not the start you want for a team that was
supposed to be “perfect.” Seriously, who says that about their team?
And calling shots on the blog? Who are you?
Will? Remember when you ran the hottest show in town with your salsa? Before
you sold out and started using last place for ad space? Remember when it was
actually about the love of the game and you didn’t just write that to appease Lindy?
Sure, for the first time ever you had 2
really good running backs, but what on Josh Gordon’s green kush was up with
that WR corps? That was pathetic. And scoring less than 90 points? Don’t even
consider this shit a win. You hardly score more points than the guy who doesn’t
know his kicker isn’t on a team.
And what’s with this team name? Remember
when having a strong name meant something? Now it’s just bad puns. Jeez, Nick,
have some self-respect.
There are a few positives, though. Had you
listened to the so-called “experts” and started Forsett against the Broncos,
you wouldn’t be walking away with a win. Then again, you started what wound up
being your 2 worst WRs, so take that as you will.
I sincerely hope you learn to set a decent
lineup this week when you play the top-ranked Matty Ice (I threw up in my mouth
just typing that). Lord knows what would happen if Matt actually went
wire-to-wire this year.
5.) (LW #11) Judge Richard Berman’s Team, 1-0 [85 PPG, .186 NPRP]
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
Will shut off his alarm and opened his
eyes. He could smell the faint waft of incense and sunlight-toasted cotton. It
was another beautiful day in LA. His eyes wandered to his phone. 15 texts from
10 different girls.
“My numbers are getting low,” he thought to
himself as he marked all the texts as “read” without responding. After a spell
in the sauna and a Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwich he fired up the record player.
It was a smooth jazz kind of day.
At around noon he grabbed a bite to eat at
Beach Pizza where he watched the news that his idol, Tom Brady, would indeed be
playing week 1 despite the NFL’s best efforts to hold him down.
Will identified with Tom. His entire life
he had been a handsome, conniving, victim in a world out to get him. Like Tom,
though, he really didn’t care. He knew that, at the end of the day, he had one
of these that he could fall back on.
He took a bite out of his buffalo chicken
pizza when his phone rang. “Is it #24?” He thought to himself as he grabbed his
phone out of the pocket of his trenchcoat on this Mid-September afternoon. It
was the station.
“Talk to me,” Will asserted to an authority
figure on the other end to whom no respect was given.
“You mean…” he paused. This was the moment
he had waited for. The Primetime DJ at KLMU had been arrested for smoking weed,
something that would have been legalized had Bobby B actually voted for it.
This meant that Will’s number had been called and, like Tom Brady taking over
for Drew Bledsoe, Will was now #1 in the rotation.
He changed out of his trenchcoat into a
crew neck by POLO by Ralph Lauren, put on his Ray Ban Clubmasters, and set out
for the studio. One song had been on his mind all summer, and this was his time
to play it.
He easily got 14 phone numbers on the 5
minute drive to the studio, and as he entered he could hear the voice of
someone that he gave less than no attention to. They were probably telling him
how to do his job and no one tells Will Brown how to spin the hits.
He shut the door, flipped on the On-Air
light, grabbed the mic, and took a deep breath…
“I’m
baaaaaaacccccccccccckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk”
Westbrook heard you were comin.
How did Will do it to him?!?! Bobby B spent
19 years raising this kid right and this is how Will repays him!?!? The
overtime win?!? I haven’t seen Will do someone this dirty since he won by 75
points while starting Randy Moss at flex.
But Bobby B should know not to step to the
champ. He should know what Will has been through in this league. He should know
that Will has seen his fair share of comebacks in his quest to get one of
these. Will’s like Tom Brady: He’s cool under pressure even when Mike Wallace
is the only weapon to use.
Will knows that if you’re going to win the
lottery, you have to earn the money to buy a ticket, and boy did he earn that
paycheck this week. You know what I mean?
Great stuff by Will. All he needed was Tom
and Jason Witten to take down Bobby B like a lumberjack, but we’ll get to him
later.
Will plays #2 Ryan Hewett next week in
their first ever matchup. I guess it’s time to see who exactly won that trade.
6.) (LW #1) Staff Infection, 1-0 [80 PPG, .175 NPRP]
I almost don’t even want to write that team
name. Hell, I’m this close to changing it back to PROBATION PROBATION.
Curtis, I know you’re not reading this
blog. I don’t want to assume you’ve quit yet, but you haven’t been in
possession of Matthew Stafford in 8 months. We’ve had teams change their name 3
times since then. Get it together.
Curtis, lost in a field somewhere instead of setting his lineup.
Secondly, you still have Trent Richardson
on your team: a player that one ESPN analyst called “The worst running back of
all time” after he got cut ONE MONTH AGO. If that’s not bad enough, you have a
bobblehead on your team in Wes Welker. Do you get that joke? He can’t play
football anymore because they don’t make a helmet bigger than the moon to
prevent this guy from getting concussed.
I won’t even point out what else is wrong
with your team because it’s a waste of time and it makes it harder for everyone
else. Luckily, you got to play Corey “What’s the opposite of the luck of the
Irish?” Hewett this week and walked away with a win.
Please, Curtis. Set a lineup. Make a team.
Have fun. It’s week two and I have zero indication that you’re actually in this
for the long haul like you said you were.
If you don’t get it together, we might have
to cut you…like Trent Richardson…who you still have on your team…
7.) (LW #6) Fast Eddie, 0-1 [99 PPG, .108 NPRP]
I know it hurts. We all do.
Eddie's reaction to his first Fantasy Football game.
Even though it resulted in a loss, I have
to hand it to Eddie for both his gutsy start of Deangelo Williams and his
foresight to pick up James Jones last week when he was an afterthought to
everyone else.
Eddie’s put together a little bit of a
squad here, and even with the loss he is still one of the 3 highest scoring
teams in the league. Is this guy a prodigy or is this just a case of beginner’s
luck?
Well, I’d hate to call it luck when the man
loses to the notoriously mediocre Matt Smith. Then again, it’s even worse to
call him a prodigy when his #1 back is Carlos Hyde. Yes, Hyde is currently the
highest scoring RB in the league, but the guy couldn’t beat out Frank Gore when
the 49ers were looking for every excuse to get rid of Frank Gore. That’s like
not being able to beat someone who’s already knocked out in a boxing match.
But let’s give credit where it’s due: Fast
Eddie clearly got his nickname from his ability to expeditiously pick up random
players on the waiver wire every night. I admire his lack of sentimentality
almost as much as his name.
It was a good first outing, Eddie. You
scored more points this week than any other team that lost, and I can’t rip you
for that.
8.) (LW #9) Lindy’s Lynch Mob, 0-1 [97 PPG, .106 NPRP]
In what was probably one of the most
existential games in this league’s history, Lindy and her lattes lost to a
Hewett this weekend.
This reminds me of the classic
film Jurassic Park. In the movie, Ian Malcolm (played by American hero and multigenerational
heartthrob Jeff Goldblum) briefly describes something known as chaos theory.
Chaos theory is the idea that every action has a reaction that causes regular
things to occur differently. For example, a change in temperature or bloodflow
will allow a droplet of water placed in the same exact location to fall in a
different direction just mere seconds from one another. I promised Jeff one
shoutout in the blog this year.
This matchup had all the elements for a
classic TCL victory for Melinda: She was talking down her team for 3 weeks (and
hitting the over on how many times she brought up Brandon Bolden’s 1 point on
Thursday), Ryan guaranteeing a win Week 1 against Mama B, and the fact that
Gronk put up 28 points in the first game of the year. But somehow, some way,
things fell differently.
But perhaps the fact that she had to face
Peyton Manning (and not even a GOOD Peyton Manning) threw her off her game.
While her team scored points, she could not overcome the power of the North,
and now her life is in shambles. I caught her hiding away in the guest room of
her mansion crying herself to sleep. Are you okay, mom? Is there anything we
can do to help?
Other than the loss and blatantly racist
team name though, there isn’t much wrong with Lindy’s team, per se, except…
BRANDON BOLDEN?!? WHY WOULD YOU START
BRANDON BOLDEN?!?!?!? You have Ryan Mathews on your team! If you’re not going
to use him then trade him to Matt! There’s sentimental value there! That was
(literally) your first mistake. Sorry you had to pay for it. It’s almost like
this is karma for letting Father Max eat my birthday cake…
9.) (LW #12) Joe Buck Yourself, 0-1 [88 PPG, .096 NPRP]
It was one hell of a week for Sean in
fantasy. After struggling early on Sunday, there were whispers of a comeback.
At one point our league’s phone got a call from an anonymous source that Sean
might be stealing Dave’s calls based on how easily he was taking down a
60-point deficit.
But then it collapsed like a deflated ball
on Belicheck’s sideline. It got so low that Sean almost benched his defense to
get a better spot in the Waiver order heading into a tough Week 2 matchup
against Fantasy prodigy Fast Eddie.
But then echoes were heard in the distance…
Sean’s team pulled within 10 points, and
his winning mindset returned. He started the Vikings defense with pride against
a dumpster fire offense hoping to clinch the victory with just one defensive
score…and the fire overtook him. Sean Brown, the wildcard, fell to Dave.
After a struggle to score points in week
one though, Sean is not phased. He’s been here. He’s experienced the highs and
lows. He’s stood in the pouring rain waiting for his time to steal wins and
make enemies. He’s a grizzled veteran of these bombarded trenches, and one loss
won’t keep him down.
But let’s look at the positives, here:
Sean’s team name is unrelated to Star Wars this year, meaning that I no longer
have to continue this streak of finding Star Wars gifs. What else…um…you had 3
guys in double digits? I guess mostly that your name isn't Kessel Runners anymore.
This is hard. Just please try to bucking
get a win this week so that the roast doesn’t come your way like it’s about to
come Dad’s.
10.) (LW #7) Mr Rodgers’ Neighborhood, 0-1 [85 PPG, .093 NPRP]
This past summer we had our first ever
Rules Summit. There, we voted on rules and regulations to help the league run
more smoothly, and to make things more fun. We voted on re-naming the league,
expansions, financial compensation, and scoring.
Robert “We should have kept Reagan until he
died” Brown voted down a lot of things, including the proposal for fractional
scoring. Fractional scoring means that, rather than getting 1 full point for
every 10 rushing yards, players would score .1 for every yard gained (except
for passing, which gets .04 for every yard). Like with the current scoring
system, ESPN would do everything for us, but that didn’t matter to Mr.
Red-Blooded American because “It’s too complicated.”
You know what’s complicated? Explaining how
you lost to your youngest son in Fantasy football, the same son who got screwed
by ESPN when he drafted an injured player as his WR2, because of a tiebreaker.
You know what adds to that complication? The fact that you would have won had
we implemented fractional scoring. That’s right, you would have had 89.66
points to Will’s 89.32.
Bobby B had he voted correctly.
You could have walked out of here with your
head held high. You could have gone into your non-profit Tuesday morning with a smile and told everyone that you’re a
winner and they are too…but that’s not true. Now you have to buy them tissues
when you tell them that your vote took something from them. You took away a
reality where the world is bright and anything is possible because math,
something you describe first and foremost as “beautiful,” is “too complicated.
So pop on your Hawaiian shirt, make
yourself a sandwich with everything on it, and enjoy your comfort food for the
next 6 days, because your vote does matter, and it cost you big time.
You know what might make you feel better
though? Go hop in that Jeep Rubicon. Throw on your favorite flannel, some
jeans, some big ass boots, and just drive. Feel the power beneath you in your
red-blooded American 4x4 as blood rushes through those conservative veins.
Drive until the air is clean and the trees are tall. Then, step outside, light
a fire, and take a nice deep br-What was that? Did you hear that sound? It…it’s
coming deeper in the woods…OH NO!
TIMBERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
OH GOD. MY CHEST. I-I CANT BREATHE. THIS
TEAM COLLAPSED RIGHT ON MY RIB CAGE. I don’t think I’m gonna make it, dad.
You’ll have to go without me…
Bobby B crying at his non-profit.
Hey, hey. Don’t cry, big guy. We still have
15 weeks to go! Now who’s a big Rubicon man? YOU are!
Keep your head up, because next week you
get to play someone below you. And there’s nothing that gets a win streak going
quite like knocking out a scrub. Who’s that scrub?
11.) (LW #8) Nick’s Team, 0-1 [75 PPG, .082 NPRP]
This guy.
I don’t even want to come out and say it’s
happening again. I don’t. I don’t want to mention years past and the whole
5-win thing… I don’t want to call it a curse or even insinuate that perhaps the
kid needs to bathe in Holy Water to exorcize the demons. I’m just saying that
the second best player on his team right now is Bishop Sankey.
Some guys own a house and a condo. They
have it all. Some might even say that they live the dream. They drive a Rubicon
and can fly to DC once a month and get to come home to change into a Hawaiian
shirt and sip rosé. But the rest of us? We have to pay rent. We struggle. We
work hard and no one gives a crap except for the way they look down on us for
not having the financial security of someone who makes 6 figures. They forget
about what it’s like to make less than 50k. They forget how you work so hard at
one aspect of your life just to see another wither.
Some guys make $100 million but can't buy respect.
You know, sometimes you’re riding high. You
get a week off work, you enjoy a royal flush here, some quads there… and then
Adrian Peterson gets shown up by Jerrick McKinnon.
Some might say it’s just his destiny,
others that it’s an unfortunate coincidence. But perhaps this is all just the
consequences of some long-past betrayal of some kind. Was it in this life or
another? Did Corey betray a king in the middle ages? Or perhaps his was deemed
a witch in Salem? Did Corey steal the love of another man or drive a knife so
deep in a friend’s back that it penetrated the barrier between this world and
Hell itself?
It’s unfortunate, really. You can’t blame
Corey for the way his team betrayed him in Week One. And you can’t for sure say
that this is going to be a bad season after just one game, but it’s just that
past history that makes you wonder…
How long you spendin at the bottom?
12.) (LW #5) Wiggity Wiggity Wack, 0-1 [74 PPG, .081 NPRP]
I really don’t know what to write here.
Cheryl is coming off of a championship
season with her nose to the fantasy grindstone. She was wired for Week One with
a blossoming rivalry against yours truly. With just primetime games to go,
Cheryl was down by 25 points. A sizeable margin, no doubt, but she had 5
players left to play, including her top 3 draft picks.
That’s when the best of times became the
worst of times.
OBJ, last season’s golden child, only put
up 4. Dez? He broke his foot after matching that 4. Joseph Randle? Even after
he got going the Cowboys needed to put the ball in the air. After Sunday night,
Cheryl’s team seemed (for lack of a better word) deflated.
It's really not.
Now I spit on this team in the preseason. I
hated her running backs, I thought that it would be all bark and no bite, etc.
But I have to say after facing this team that it does not deserve to be in this
position at the bottom of the league.
Cheryl, I’d love to rip your team if it
came out and put up points and I still won, but this was fluky. I look forward
to Week 9 when Dez is healthy and we meet again.
Nicely done!
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