Championship

Well. I don't know how I expected this week to feel. I guess I would've been disappointed by either team winning, to tell you the truth. But something about seeing the teams with the best records in the league facing off for the championship is even worse than when we had the #6 seed facing off against (and beating) the #4 seed in 2015. That stunk for the teams that played well all season - but at least it was surprising, and therefore a little bit exciting. Anyway.

The only person more depressed over this game is probably Bill. His team, as we all sort of hoped/expected, sort of fell apart in the end. Tom Brady (12pts) closed out the season with four straight lackluster performances after put up pretty spectacular stat lines as recently as weeks 10, 11 & 12. RB Ezekiel Elliott (11pts) returned from his six week exile and, sure, put up a double digit score - but only barely. And that against the same Seattle Defense that Todd Gurley absolutely decimated on the ground just last week. Sterling Shepard, who put up 24 points on Bill's bench last week, could only manage 4 points this week before leaving the game with a neck injury. WR Michael Thomas (6pts) ended his three game TD/double digit fantasy scored streak and WR Keenan Allen (6pts) continued his downward trend after breaking his streak last week. Not even 16 points from Kareem "The Invisible Man" Hunt could pull Bill out of this tailspin as he finished the biggest week of his season with just 84 points. (His second lowest point total of the season, for those keeping track at home.)

Jared, on the other hand, played up as he posted his highest score of the championship weeks - and third highest point total of the season. Of course, that's not a super difficult feat when your RB1 scores MORE THAN FORTY POINTS FOR THE SECOND CONSECUTIVE FRIGGING WEEK!!!!!! Yes, Nick's (very early) Christmas gift to Jared continued to pay off at just the right time as RB Todd Gurley (45pts) ran all over the Tennessee Titans (supposedly good) defense and basically put the Auto Bots on his back and carried them to their first (and last) Sports Champion Winner Trophy. But what about the other impressive scores on Jared's team, you ask? Well, those would be RB Bilal Powells' 25 points and QB Alex Smith's 18 points.... on the bench. Because only four other players in Jared's starting lineup (or whole team, really) posted double digit scores. And of those, QB Cam Newton's 13 points was the highest.

If Jared didn't have Gurley - would he have put Powell in the starting lineup and won anyway? Probably. But if he didn't have Gurley: he probably wouldn't have been in the championship in the first place and we'd likely be talking about how Andrew won another championship... this time with a score of 87 points. Ugh. I don't guess that would be much better. I mean, really, the only thing that probably would've made me happy here is if I won. Or maybe Earl.  That would've been a fine closing note. Oh - or Jeremy too, I forgot about his great season.

Ah well, to the winner go the spoils - no matter how he got there. Congratulations Jared!!

And last/least of all: Matt is the DLL because he lost to James even though James started one player who was on the IR and another who was a game day scratch. If that's not a fitting closing note for this, then I'll just leave this here....

Playoff Round 2

Jared v. Andrew

Our highest scoring Semifinal matchup was a sort of misleading score, really.

Jared had just three players put up double digit scores - but he managed to get to 120 points (117 + home field bonus) anyway. QB Cam Newton (29pts) threw four TDs against the pitiful Green Bay defense. The Baltimore D (22pts) had two INTs, two fumble recoveries, scored a TD and allowed just 10 points to the (still winless) Cleveland Browns. And last, but certainly not least, RB Todd Gurley (46pts?!) rushed for 152 yard and 3 TDs plus tacked on an additional receiving TD on one of just three passes he caught against the usually stalwart Seattle Defense. He couldn't quite have beaten Andrew with only those three players - but he came awful close. Luckily the other scrubs that make up this improbable #1 seed scored enough small amounts to put him over the top. But, on the downside, Jared lost two WRs to injuries that will keep them out next week: Antonio Brown & Marquise Lee. That's not gonna make it impossible to win the one more game he needs to win to take home the crappy trophy - but it's gonna make it harder, that's for sure!

For Andrew's part, he tried valiantly to make his way to a second straight Sports championship. A big day from RB Melvin Gordon (22pts) was great - but a less than big day from RB2 Carlos Hyde (3pts) wasn't so great. Too bad RB Jerrick McKinnon (15pts)was on the bench instead of in the starting lineup! Oh, and there's also that matter of starting QB Kirk Cousins only scoring 14pts while backup QB Jameis Winston scored 23pts on the bench. Those points sure would've been nice - wouldn't they? But I guess the real "too bad" moment was Andrew WR Kelvin Benjamin (2pts) instead of TE Greg Olsen (19pts). Because we can play math problems all day, but if he'd reversed just this one decision we'd be talking about how he squeaked out a one point win over Jared instead of how he took a 16 point loss to (basically) three players. Womp womp.

Jared, sadly, moves on the final to face the winner of.....

Bill v. Earl

Oh hey, another matchup where one team only had three players in double digits!

But unfortunately for Earl, even though QB Nick Foles (seriously) put up 24 points and RB Le'Veon Bell put up 23, he couldn't quite keep up the same level of overachieving we saw with Jared - as his third player (WR Brandin Cooks) only put up 12 points. The rest of Earl's team wasn't really even close; and it wasn't even as if he had lots of reserves on the bench - with only TE Ben Watson (13pts) outscoring a player in the starting lineup. So I guess at least Earl doesn't have to kick himself for making poor decisions like Andrew? Sure! That's one way to look at it!

For his Part, Bill did get a little bit further about the mediocrity line - even if having 5 players in double digits is really only slightly more awe inspiring than 3. Fortunately, one of those players for Bill was RB Kareem Hunt (34pts): who didn't quite put up a Gurley-esque score, but still managed 2 TDs on over 200 yards from scrimmage for his second highest week of the season. A pair of matching 20's from TE Gronk and the Minnesota D were also pretty nice and helped take the sting out of WR Keenan Allen (5pts) breaking his 4 week double digit streak. It all adds up to Bill winning his freaking 5th SLA of the season with this 128 point week. And, sadly, Bill looks to be in the catbird seat - despite losing RB Rex Burkhead (7pts) for next week's championship. (Apparently he gets some guy called "Zeke" back for that game anyway? Gross.)

Yes, that's right kiddies. For those with poor reading comprehension - let me break the bad news to you in plain English: our championship will be the 2 "best" teams in the league this season. Gee. How exciting. Wheee.

Earl and Andrew will battle it out for third place to see who gets their money back, at least. The rest of us will be forced to hope for maybe one last SLA as a table scrap since Bill is already taking home $30 for scoring the most points this season (by almost a 100 point margin over his closest competitor) and he and Jared will divide the rest of the cash somehow or another. Sigh. Sports. I hate your guts.

Playoff Round 1

I thought this year was going to be different. But the more things change, apparently, the more they stay the same.

Earl v. Jeremy

Coming into this first round matchup, Jeremy was the highest seeded of the non-bye teams. He had just beaten Earl in week 13 by a score of 116-86, not to mention winning their week 3 matchup 91-78. In fact, Jeremy had outscored Earl in each of the final four weeks of the regular season - by an average of 27 points per game! All signs pointed toward a slam dunk for Jeremy in his first trip to the playoffs in Sports league history. All signs were wrong.

Jeremy had just three players in triple digits this week - QB Russell Wilson (25pts), RB Alex Collins (24pts) and RB Dion Lewis (10pts). RB Mark Ingram (8pts) couldn't take advantage of an increased workload against the Falcons (due to the injury to his teammate Alvin Kamara), WR Tyreek Hill (8pts) couldn't follow up last weeks 38 point performance with another splashy score against the lowly Oakland Defense, WR Mike Evans (2pts) continued to be one the biggest first round busts in recent memory and TE Austin Sefarian-Jenkins (0pts) proved that, despite flashes of greatness earlier in the season, he's still the same old ASJ.

All Earl did, on the other hand, was get his second highest score of the season - despite not really having a legitimate NFL QB on his roster. (Derek Carr started and got 6 points; Josh McCown had -6 on the bench.) But hey, when you have RB Le'Veon Bell (26pts), WR Adam Thielen (21pts) and RB Leonard Fournette (19pts) - who needs a QB anyway?

And so Jeremy's Cinderella story came to a crashing halt while Earl's quest to return to his third place dominance got a major boost.

The Upper Deckers move on to round two where they'll face the #2 seeded Delco Scumbags. In their only regular seasons matchup, Earl won by a score of 136-75. However, when we take a look at the bigger picture, the he outscored Bill just 4 times out of the 14 weeks we've played thus far. So Earl will really need to hope for continued big production from his studs in addition to finding at least a double digit QB (Nick Foles? Really?) to pull off another playoff upset this week. Bill, on the other hand, will just hope to fake it through one more week until he gets RB Ezekiel Elliott back from suspension. (Whether 'Zeke can help him win his first Sports Champion Winner Trophy or his first Third Wheel remains to be seen.)

Andrew v. Tim

Sadly (for Tim), our other playoff matchup also saw another clear favorite fall by the wayside. While Andrew came into this matchup with as the higher seed - Tim had all the momentum on his side. Over the final five games of the regular season, he'd outscored Andrew by an average of 34 points per game - and that was despite a week 11 stinker where the Pandas recorded just 59 points.

Of course, it definitely didn't help Tim's cause when MVP RB Alvin Kamara (2pts) got knocked out of the game and into the concussion protocol just five minutes into his TNF matchup against Atlanta. (In the previous five games, any one of Kamara's scores would've given the TPs more than enough points to take this one home.) And then there's that whole matter of benching the Broncos D (16pts) in favor of the Patriots D (2pts). Because, you know, Tim totally should've been able to predict that Jets QB Josh McCown would give the No Fly Zone a free pass just 2 weeks after decimating the Carolina D while the recently intimidating Pats D would get absolutely crushed by... Jay Cutler - even though they dominated them in their week 12 contest. (Still worthy of the BBB, regardless of the justification.) Not even late season gold RB Jamaal Williams (22pts) or a season high score by WR Dez Bryant (16pts) could pull Tim out of this hole, though.

It seemed like (almost) all of Tim's luck was bad for this matchup... so, of course, (almost) all of Andrew's was good. TE Zach Ertz remained in the league concussion protocol, so Andrew picked up Eagles TE Trey Burton as a fill in. Logically, Burton scored 19 points (one point higher than Ertz's season high) against the 6th best pass defense in the NFL. And, as if that wasn't enough, Dolphins RB Kenyan Drake(20pts) - who just two weeks ago could only manage 9 points against the Pats - dropped 114 rushing yards and 79 receiving yards for a total of 20 points against that same Patriots Defense. Those two players were really all Andrew would need to put away Tim, despite the long odds against him.

Yes, if Jeremy's was a Cinderella story - then Tim's was a Rocky screenplay. After losing the consensus #1 RB in the draft, David Johnson, halfway very first game of the season - he somehow managed to cobble together a 7-5-1 record and stormed into the playoffs on a scoring tear. But it was all for naught as one bad week ended his movie just like Jeremy's story. Andrew, on the other hand, continues his quest (however shakily) to be the first back to back champion since Randy did it in our first and second seasons.

But if Andrew wants to keep his "feel good" story going, he's going to have to go through #1 seed Jared and the Autobots in order to do it. In their only regular season matchup this year, Andrew failed miserably - losing by a score of 36-92. And out of the 14 weeks we've played thus far? Andrew's team has been outscored by Jared's in all but three weeks with season totals of 1049-1278, in favor of Jared. I'd say Andrew is a long shot to pull this one out - but hey, stranger things have happened. <eye roll>

.....

And lastly - I know I said we'd forego talking about the other rubbish matchups in the "post season" here. But I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that Matt, who came into the loser's bracket as the #12 seed, won his first SLA award with a whopping 124 points this week. That means that there are only three teams that will pay full price to play this season, having not won back at least $5 of their entry fee, if nothing changes in the final two weeks: Nick (duh), James (double duh)... and championship "contender" Andrew.

Oh, Sports.

Week 13

Well lads, that's it. It's all over but for the crying now. Some teams barely missed the playoffs while some barely made the playoffs. Some teams have been out of it for a while and some have been all up in it for even longer. And the one thing we all have in common is that only one of us won't be crying or rambling on about "what might have been" at the end of the season. Gosh. That's depressing. Let's change the subject.

Tim v. Bill

Oh, wait, before we change the topic from depressing - we have to reference Bill's two game losing streak heading into the playoffs!

Yes, though we once wondered if Bill would lose any games this season - regression has lately bitten him right in the Scumbags. Is 95 points a bad score? No, of course not! But is it a bad thing when TB12 only scores 5 points and K.Hunt only scores 6? Indeed. Now, this was clearly an anomalous week for Brady. He's had just one other single digit score this season - and that was all the way back in week 1. Hunt, on the other hand - clearly becoming the rule, not the exception. Once regarded as the biggest steal in out draft, The KC RB hasn't scored a TD since week 3 and hasn't posted a double digit fantasy score since week 7! And while some of the pundits say that it's just a matter of time until he has another big day, considering the workload entrusted to him, it's getting harder and harder to buy. Bill better keep his fingers crossed, because I'm not sure anyone is eager to hang their playoff hopes on Rex Burkhead (22pts)! (Although, at least he'll have Zeke available in week 16 to help him win third place!)

Now, on to brighter thoughts: after weeks of wondering whether the Trash Pandas were syncing up at just the right time - week 13 seemed to answer that question with a resounding YES! What team doesn't want to have their best week of the season in their final regular season matchup; a game they must win in order to keep things shiny? I mean... right? Tim's lone misfire this week was WR JuJu Smith-Schuster (1pt) who had a quiet night even before he made an illegal hit and then taunted his incapacitated victim. (The upside for the TPs is that Smith-Schuster was only in the lineup because Michael Crabtree was suspended for illegal activity of his own.) But other than that one little hiccup, it was all double digits for Tim this week - highlighted by the continuing emergence of RB Alvin Kamara (24pts) with his second straight multiple TD game, not to mention his 4th 20+ point game of the season. Also in the 20 point club this week was some guy named Jamaal Williams (20pts) who's scored a score (see what I did there?) in two consecutive weeks now. If you think that Tim just picked Williams up because he had an empty bench spot and all of the other Green Bay RBs were injured at the time - you're absolutely correct. I don't think anybody saw this kind of production coming from Williams, especially after he failed miserably with his first audition as a lead back earlier in the season. But hey, luck is 90% of winning in fake sports - so Tim'll take it!

With the win, the Trash Pandas cements their spot in the post season and move up from the #6 seed to #5 - which means Tim'll face Andrew in the first round of the playoffs instead of Jeremy. (Who ever though that'd be a favorable move?) Bill, despite his failures these past two weeks, still gets a first round bye after winning the Sweaty Jocks division with a record of 9-4. And, truth be told, it couldn't come at a better time since he would've been without Gronk (16pts) - who will be suspended this week because he's an idiot.

Jeremy v. Earl

In what turned out to be a warm up game for their first round playoff matchup, this contest saw Jeremy and Earl both flash and fizzle a little bit. (Jeremy just had a little more flash.)

Earl is no stranger to the fizzle at this point, of course. He's lost four of his last six games and hasn't scored over 100 points since week 6! What's more concerning is that with just three players in double digits this week, I don't know if I can see things turning around any time soon. QB Derek Carr (14pts) was serviceable and RB Leonard Fournette (13pts) saved a lackluster day with a TD to account for 2/3 of that equation. Not surprisingly, RB Le'Veon Bell (25pts) turned it up against hated AFC North rival Cincinnati to complete the trifecta. But instead of winning the week for Earl, Bell just made the loss not quite so bad. Ouch.

(Oh, and I guess this would be the point where I just wouldn't be doing my job as an instigator if I didn't mention that earlier in the week Earl dropped QB Alex Smith (41pts) to pick up QB Tyrod Taylor (0pts). So there. Consider it mentioned.)

Jeremy scored 30 more points than Earl - despite having just one more (4) player in double digits. It just happens that the one additional player was WR Tyreek Hill (38pts). Hill has had an up and down season, but this was definitely an upswing as he dropped 185 yards and 2 TDs on the unsuspecting Jets Defense. And speaking of unsuspecting - who saw WR Nelson Agholor (22pts) putting up 141
yards and a TD against the Seattle D? Even without Sherman and Chancellor, that's still impressive for a guy who's previous high mark for yardage in a game was 93! The bad news is that RB Joe Mixon (3pts) followed up a breakout 24 point performance in week 12 with a stinker against the Steelers... AND landed in the league concussion protocol. The worse news is that WR1 Mike Evans (3pts) is still MIA - failing to post a double digit score since week 7, which is also the last time he scored a TD. But hey, a win's a win - and this win got Jeremy the 3rd seed in the playoffs! This is his  highest regular season finish ever. By far.

(In the interest of shared ridicule, I would also like to point out that had Jeremy started RB Alex Collins (21pts) instead of Mixon and the Miami D (28pts) instead of Philly (2pts) - he would've finished the week with 160 points. And that would've usurped Jared's 156 points in week 4 as the highest score (thus far) of the season. Not starting a Baltimore back instead of a guy who just put up 24 points the week before? Forgivable. Not starting a D against the Broncos instead of a D against the Seahawks? C'mon brah!)

As I mentioned, the win secures the #3 seed for Jeremy while the loss still allowed Earl to squeak into the playoffs as the #6 seed. And that means these two crazy kids are going to go at it again next week... when it really matters! Will Jeremy flash Earl again? Or will Earl flash Jeremy this time? Either way, someone is going to be traumatized by this time next week - that's for certain!

Jared v. James

I feel kind of bad typing "Jared v. James" for this one because it gives the illusion that James actually competed in a contest this week. But seeing as how he didn't even score half of what Jared did - that would be a miscategorization, really.

Yes, James posted 57 points total - which was a resoundingly losing score, obviously. But it was also a full 16 points less than Jared's bench score! (Okay, so that number is overly inflated thanks to the 41 points from QB Alex Smith sitting there. Because Jared picked up Alex Smith after Earl dropped him. And also didn't play him.) Let's just not talk about James' season any more.

Jared, however, is still solidly in the conversation, unfortunately. That's right, just one year removed from finishing the season as our DLL - Jared ends the regular season as the #1 seed with a record of 11-2. Much of that success can be attributed to RB Todd Gurley (15pts), whom Jared now infamously stole from Nick early in the season when all the "experts" kept insisting that Gurley couldn't possibly keep up his high scoring ways. And now, late in the season, WR Antonio Brown (18pts... on the bench), whom Jared infamously stole from Matt, is turning things up; proving that not even turf toe can keep him from having a 100+ yard game. Oh, and who could forget... RB Marshawn Lynch (23pts)? Wait, what? Is this 2010? Did I get stuck in a wormhole? Nope. You read that right. Beast Mode romped on the pitiful New York football Giants for his first 100+ yard game of the season. Plus TE Travis Kelce (21pts) came just 6 yards shy of a 100+ yard game of his own, though he at least kicked in 2 TDs to make it worthwhile. Shoot, even fricking "RB" Tarik Cohen (15pts) took a punt return 61 yards to the house to inflate his score in this one. It was mostly a perfect storm for Jared even though it didn't make a lick of difference to his season. (Note: this 77 point win was pretty impressive - just not quite as impressive as his 98 point win over Dustin in week 4.)

At any rate, Jared is in the cat bird seat; waiting to see which wildcard winner he'll try to be waaaaay luckier than in week 15. (Fun Fact: while his 1278 point for was the second highest total in the league, Jared also had just 928 points scored against him in the regular season. 80 points less than his next closest competitor. No wonder he finished 11-2!)

Oh, and I know I already said we won't talk about the other guy anymore. But FYI - that goes for all the other losers after this recap too. I know the consolation bracket still "means something" - but really, who cares?

Kevin v. Nick

Aha! After a brief diversion to a game that may as well not have even happened - we come back to a matchup that actually mattered! Well, for Nick anyway. All Kevin was playing for in this one was pride... and as it turns out, he had plenty to be proud of as he ruined the last shot the former champ had at a playoff bid.

Now, sure, the final score in this one is actually a little deceptive. Nick lost by 32 points - but both teams had 6 players who only scored single digit totals. Both teams also got 16 points from their QBs (Marcus Mariota and Carson Wentz) and 12 points from a rising young WR (Devin Funchess and Robby Anderson.) The biggest difference, besides the fact that Kevin's single digit scores were mostly 8's and 9's while Nick's were mostly 2's and 3's, ended up being the Defense. The LA Rams scored an impressive 22 points for Kevin while Detroit only managed -3 for Nick. Ouch. That's a pretty damning swing.

Just to reiterate: Kevin killed Nick's season. Because had Nick won, given Earl's loss to Jeremy, the Pig Skins actually would've advanced to the playoffs. But Kevin shut that door - just because he could. Womp womp. These teams drop down to the consolation bracket now. And, again, who cares?

Eric v. Matt

Oh, while we're on the topic of "who cares": this matchup. It meant nothing going in and means nothing coming out. The Cowboys D scored 17 points for Matt and Alfred Morris scored 20 for Eric. There's your highlights. Good year, fellas.

Andrew v. Dustin

And lastly, just barely meaning something, was our lowest scoring matchup. Basically the only thing Dustin could've done with a win is make Andrew the #5 seed instead of #4, thus losing him the 3 point "home field advantage" bonus. But he couldn't even do that much.

I mean, if Dustin had started RB Derrick Henry (21pts) or RB Matt Forte (14pts) instead of RB Jay Ajayi (4pts), WR Julio Jones (2pts) or WR Davante Adams (4pts) he could've done it. But he didn't. So not even some more late game heroics from QB Ben Roethlisberger (16pts) could help this spoiler's cause.

For his part, Andrew had RB Kenyan Drake (23pts). The end.

So Dustin falls off the edge of the world while Andrew postpones his fall off the edge of the world for one more week as he'll make a procedural appearance in the first round of the playoffs against Tim - even though his team hasn't scored more than 90 points in a game since week 8. When he scored 117. And beat Tim. Ohhhhh fuuuuuudge.


Sports.