Mary Shelley would be proud. And we didn’t have to rely on autonomous beings, sentient robots, or artificial intelligence to figure this out. (Brooding, emotional androids are so last year.) We applied common sense to an otherwise nonsensical activity we torture ourselves with every year. I don’t know how Bagel Time does it. I don’t know how he still has a full head of hair. I’ve never seen someone obsess so much over the weekly goings-on of this fantasy football league. More to come on this nut case.
Xzibit would also be proud. I thought that by the end of the season, this would all sorta worked itself out and the impact would be minimal. Nope – this shit went full West Coast Customs. The most significant improvement of this new design benefitting Christian’s Brothers.
- Christian’s Brothers (+5): Under the normal head-to-head construct, Christian’s Brothers wouldn’t have made the standard 8-team playoffs this season. This new format appropriately shifted his standings from ninth place to fourth place. Under this format, he gets a fucking bye week in the playoffs! If this had been any one of us under the old format, we would’ve gone richter! I say old format, because I may not change this back (TBD). CB scored the fourth highest points in the league, but suffered four head-to-head losses after putting up point totals of 176.05, 172.35, 160.35, and 160.10. That’s just absurd considering that as a league we averaged 155.42 per week. (Reggie – this pursuit of happiness was because of you. When you speak of me, speak highly.)
Highlights on the impacts to the rest of the league (in order of benefit):
- The Brady Bundchen (+4) – This outfit would’ve also missed the playoffs using the old recipe. TBB benefitted by a shift in standings from tenth place to sixth place. No real devastating weekly losses this season, and he did pick up a lucky win in Week 6, but fair is fair.
- UnLockin Yo Schtuff (-4) – This cheesehead dropped four spots in the standings from seventh to eleventh place. This was the difference between making the playoffs or not under our previous composition. UYS grabbed a lucky win in Week 8 inflating his head-to-head standings. His 139.80 output that week only bested two other squads.
- The Whiteshadow (-4) – Ditto the above. Whitey dropped from eighth to twelfth. This squad would’ve pulled the last seed in the playoffs after averaging the lowest weekly output in the league. Seeing a pattern here?
- SKOLya’gain (-3) – Sorry honeybun, you were screwed out of 2nd place this season. Fifth place is still an honorable performance. I’m falseheartedly proud of your Thursday evening and Sunday morning activity.
- Davante’s Inferno (-3) – Then there was Davante. Your ambassador of quan (sp?) slipped from fifth to eight place in the standings. DI picked up two lucky wins in Week 5 and Week 12. In both weeks, his outputs would have only topped two other teams. That’s a shift from 2-0, to 4-18. I’m sure it’s been a refreshing change of pace for everyone this season away from the recurring Davante’s Inferno narrative.
- Guns N Rosens (+2) – GNR’s benefit wouldn’t have pulled off a playoff bid under the old schematic, but he does shift up in the standings from eleventh to ninth. GNR suffered the unluckiest loss of the season in Week 5 when he put up 195.55 points and faced one of the only two teams that topped that total. On the plus side, he gets to face last year’s Regular Season Champion AND this year’s Regular Season Champion in the first two weeks of the playoffs. It’s fine.
- Trouble Hunter (+2) – Damn, I thought this one was gonna take the cake there for a minute. TH put up 170+ points in three of four matchups, which at one point put her in the top five. Then, over the last three weeks of the season she averaged 106 points per week, including a league low 77.95 points in Week 11. The early season performance shifts TH in the standings from twelfth to tenth. At least you’re not dead last, but damn girl, what happened? Do we need to talk?
- Wanted Dez or Alive (-1) – Wanted has been middle of the pack all season. He drops a spot from sixth to seventh, but didn’t benefit from anything that impactful as a result of the formula this year. He would have been sitting right there in the middle of one my fancy charts. He was 10-1 in Week 12 though. Don’t sleep on him. A few of us have been prepping well for a playoff run.
- Bagel Time (+1) – Mr. Bench Swap himself did it again. He torpedoed a shot at the Regular Season Championship by prematurely texting shit about his opponent’s performance before the week was out. Queue my quote from last year, “Bagel Time texts are the fantasy football kiss of death. He voodoo’d and hoodoo’d his own team all season with his bullshit premature digital ejaculations.” The godfather texted psalms and salutations after Pascal put up a donut on Thursday night. He’ll never learn. Shit’s getting deep though – he’s finally managed to completely set fire to his housemate’s ability to play fantasy football. Hope it works out for him. Bagel Time shifts from fourth to third place. He picked up a tough loss in Week 3 after putting up 176.95.
- Reason to Kerrigan (+1) – Last season’s League Champion is poised for another title run. RTK shifts from third to second place. He inked a loss in Week 2 after facing one of only three teams with better scores. He leads the league in total points (2,069.05), weekly average (172.42), single-game high score (234.00), and Tight End performance (31.60).
- Filthadelphia (±0) – Nothing. He gets nothing. Because he doesn’t need anything. He doesn’t require special treatment. *Unless he’s hiking Dead Woman’s Pass, but that’s neither here nor there. He won the Regular Season Championship even-handedly. I’ve since tried to put together a proverbial schedule where he wouldn’t have won and I couldn’t do it. He killed all of us. Filthy went 11-0 four times, 10-1 once, and 9-2 once. Over six weeks he went 63-3. That shit cray. Good thing someone close to him railed against picking up the status quo #1 draft pick. I’m not gonna do the math on Barkley in his lineup, I’m just sayin’, it would’ve been a very different year for Filthy.
At the end of the day, this didn’t influence who would’ve won the Regular Season Championship and the lion’s share of the regular season cash winnings. This experiment would have altered a few playoff spots, but everyone plays this year, so no harm no foul.
We are back to head-to-head matchups for the playoffs. You get no help from Dr. Frankenstein, X, or the commissioner going forward. It’s win or take your ass home.
Defense 2020
This shit is going away next season. We will not be applying the blanket 25 points bonus on the front end for the DEF position anymore. All other DEF points will remain the same. We pulled the crazy points totals away years ago when we had all the position bonuses built in. It doesn’t make sense to have a position accounting for up to 42% of the weekly average. The league needs to be more balanced across positions, without altering them. Removing bonuses is the best way to do that.
Bench Spots 2020
I’m thinking of experimenting with limited Bench Spots next year. Max two. I’ve been itching to play a season with little to no bench spots to test our skillset. Lombardi Legends was supposed to address that, but I never really got buy-in from the league on that. If not for next year, perhaps the 10-year anniversary in 2021.
League Leaders (Regular Season Weeks 1-12)
QB – Trouble Hunter (Deshaun Watson HOU, 58.00 points, Week 5)
RB – Filthadelphia (Christian McCaffrey CAR, 47.70 points, Week 5)
WR – SKOLya’gain (Will Fuller HOU, 52.70 points, Week 5)
TE – Reason to Kerrigan (Darren Waller OAK, 31.60 points, Week 7)
K – UnLockin Yo Schtuff (Harrison Butker KC, 18.00 points, Week 9)
DEF – The Brady Bundchen (Eagles PHI, 64.95 points, Week 5)
LB – The Whiteshadow (Cory Littleton LAR, 21.90 points, Week 1)
Single Game – Reason to Kerrigan (234.00 points, Week 3)
The Lombardi Three 