We’re welcoming Max, and I don’t want to scare him, so this note is going to be simple, straightforward, on the rails. I’m not going to spend a thousand words touting Lamar for MVP or comparing Kirk Cousins to Clementine from Eternal Sunshine. We are strictly doing a little rules summary, a little waiver action, all-business recaps, and hard-boiled previews.
But first, let’s poor one out for He Whose Year It Is and Always Shall Be. Tim wasn’t always an active participant—most of the last three years, he was downright aloof—but dammit if he didn’t give us some of our best moments as a league. His team was mostly garbage, to be sure, but he demonstrated one of the beauties of this league: everybody has a chance to win it all. Tim’s departure ends a six-year run of consistency in league ownership. It might even technically be a year longer than that, depending on how you view Kennedy’s quick dip out and then back in, combined with league expansion to twelve teams that brought Corey in.
It feels like a legitimate breakup, and it’s kind of sad. It’s just a game, one that Tim was barely even playing anymore. His heart wasn’t in it anymore. It makes you think about the toll these couple years are taking. It makes me want to encourage everyone to embrace what you enjoy. We’re getting closer and closer to being a league full of married people. In a couple years, we might all have kids.
I’m going to share something I haven’t told everybody yet. It’s not a secret; it’s just not easy to talk about. Stephanie and I had two miscarriages over the summer. The first was about six weeks along. The second was about eleven. The first hurt. We cried for a couple days. We were reassured by statistics that this happened to one in four pregnancies. We had only even known she was pregnant for about a week. It was disappointing, for sure. The second time, we knew about as soon as you can know, so we spent about eight weeks making plans, getting excited, looking forward especially to the 12-week mark, again going off statistics about when most miscarriages occur. We called it “the little bean” and tracked its growth using an app.
At eleven weeks, that thing was a fetus. It has the shape of a human being. We were less than a week away from our 12-week appointment with the OB/GYN when Stephanie started spotting again. The bleeding got progressively worse. At one point she felt a pop, a gush of liquid, similar to water breaking before labor. It was, you know, the gestational sac or whatever. Soon, everything would be on its way out...
Grief followed, obviously, and there’s no way to handle grief except to go through it. In my case, reality kind of collapsed on itself. I’d just spent two months thinking exclusively about what kind of father I would be, how I would prepare myself to prepare a child for the world. Suddenly, none of that mattered, and it took my brain a solid week to adjust, to get out of the habit of thinking that way, to wholly accept the loss. Miscarriages are pretty common. Having a second miscarriage, even having one as far along as we were, it’s much less common. The doctors wait for your third miscarriage before they start investigating. But no matter how evenly you deliver the news that it’s not anyone’s fault that these things happen, I don’t think any woman can easily accept that everything is okay. What’s wrong with my body? What’s wrong with me? These are the thoughts of a reasonable woman whose just spent the entire summer pregnant and is as far from giving birth as possible.
Anyway, friends, it’s been just a brutal time being us. We feel like monsters for what we feel when we see other pregnancies, other births, other children growing. It’s gotten a lot better in the past couple weeks. God, I have no idea when it even happened now. I went through brain fog to the extent that I thought something was seriously wrong with me. I couldn’t focus on anything, couldn’t remember anything, couldn’t want so much as a cookie or even a hug. I was disappearing from the inside out. I hurt my back because from just lying around slumped over for hours at a time, multiple times a day. It still hurts about six weeks later because I’m washed. I’m Julio Jones without the resume to rely on.
Hmm… how to pivot off that…
Hey, Max is here! Welcome, Max! Enjoy the splash of my cannonball!
We know Max. We like him. He’s quirky, and he’ll fit right in. His team sucks, and it’s probably for the best since Cameron is intent on melting our faces off anyway. Seriously, it’s the ideal year to not give a shit about fantasy football. We’re all making the playoffs, which means there’s practically no incentive to trade until the deadline. Even when we make the playoffs, at best we’re just biding our time, watching Derrick Henry devour our hopes and dreams until it’s next week and he’s hungry again already. Jesus. 250 points. Jesus. It’s going to take Evan three weeks to score his next 250 points.
What Sean’s 235 last week and Cam’s 250 this week should remind us is that this has always been a weekly game. In an anomalous season when the wins don’t mean as much, you chase records. Derrick Henry’s doing it. Tom Brady’s doing it. Trevon Diggs is doing it. Go for broke, people. Experiment with your teams. Do everything in your power to enter Week 14 capable of winning it all. Even you, Max. Even you. I mean, again, technically, only Cameron can win it all, but all the more reason to pour yourself into the weekly nature of the game. You might as well chase second place so you can get your money back from this rigged machine.
Which, speaking of the championship and second place, I’m going to recap the rules that aren’t explained in the league scoring page on Sleeper.
Buy-in: $50 x 12 = $600
Weekly cash games wins $10 per ($170 total).
Championship loser wins $50.
Championship winner wins $380 and makes a rule for next year. Past rules included removing team defense, converting one RB to a FLEX, adding IDPs, points per first down, changing draft order, and of course the complicated keeper rules.
Keeper Rules:
Each season, each team will keep two players. There are two types of keeper, based on their “value” from the previous draft.
Early Keepers are players drafted in Rounds 3-9.
Late Keepers are players drafted in Rounds 10 and on or acquired in FREE AGENCY.
If a player is acquired via trade or waivers, that players retains their keeper value. But if a player is dropped, clears waivers, and becomes a true free agent (green plus-sign), that player’s value becomes that of a late keeper.
Example: Tyler Boyd was drafted in the 7th Round. (You can find this out by going to Boyd’s player page and tapping the History tab.) Right now, Tyler Boyd is eligible to be kept next year as an early keeper. If Max drops Boyd and no one adds him in the initial waiver cycle, whoever ends up with Boyd at the end of the season has him at late-keeper value.
Integrity clause: put simply, don’t add injured players hoping to get them as keepers next year. I won’t honor it. A player has to suit up for a game between the time you acquire them and the end of the season. They don’t have to be in your lineup.
Weekly Waivers run Wednesday at about 3:05 AM Eastern.
Players are on waivers from the time their game starts to the time weekly waivers run.
When a player has been on a roster for 24 hours or more, dropping them results in them being on waivers. Players dropped during the week are on waivers for 23 hours before they become free agents.
Waiver priority is “rolling” meaning waiver order only changes when people use waiver claims. When you add a player off waivers, you automatically go to the bottom of the waiver list. When you add a free agent, it doesn’t affect your waiver spot.
You can trade future draft picks, but you can’t trade future firsts. Just kidding. But seriously, don’t trade your future firsts. I won’t blame anybody for Cameron’s dominance, but I will suggest that maybe the price of a future first is a 100-point loss to exactly the person to whom you traded the first. If you absolutely must trade a first, maybe do it for a player with keeper value. But also, don’t do it.
Weekly cash games are decided by whoever won the week prior. You can make the cash game whatever you want as long as anyone can win it and it’s related to fantasy football. If a cash game feels fucked up, I’ll say something,
Generally if anything feels fucked up, somebody should say something. We’re all reasonable people, and none of us is desperate enough for $300 to do anything shitty. That said, if you do something stupid or shady and get shit for it, eat your shit like a good little piggy. No one REALLY cares. I mean, occasionally Oliver and I care, but we’re crazy.
We vote about things. We don’t vote about everything. Sometimes I just do things. Again, if something seems fucked up, talk about it.
I think that’s everything? Either way, I’m down to move on.
QBs
There’s always something. Most of the time, there are 10 or more QBs available. The sexiest thing out there right now is probably Tua, but that’s a matter of taste. Tua does not feel like a safe play in a bad matchup. He was great (for fantasy) against the Jags and will probably be good against Atlanta this week. But against the Bills? No.
Sidebar: what’s up with Miami not getting a bye after the London game? Has this ever happened? I swear every team gets a bye after London. Jacksonville is getting a bye. Why does Miami have to bear it and then, damn, not get a bye until Week 14?!
The only other guys even on my radar are Derek Carr and Carson Wentz. But starting either of those guys without having to feels like bad process.
RBs
It’s pretty bare here, too. That’s just what time of year it is.
Mark Ingram leads the Texans in touches…
Rhamondre Stevenson MIGHT split work with Damien Harris…
Um…
The Browns have to start someone at RB. Hunt is going to IR, and Chubb’s status is unclear. D’Ernest Johnson did stuff once. Demetric Felton is a solid receiver…
Seattle might have lost another starter. DeeJay Dallas, Travis Homer, or Rashaad Penny could take over…
Colts’ backups could be good if anything happens to Taylor?
You are better off making a trade than seriously counting on any of this.
WR
Christian Kirk and Robby Anderson have to be added if you have room and need.
Elijah Moore and Marquez Callaway are a sketchy but have high upside.
Nico Collins should get a lot of targets, and Tyrod is coming back.
Amon-Ra St. Brown is also getting volume.
Devin Duvernay is interesting. He gets return yards, and the Ravens are drawing up more and more plays on offense specifically to get the ball in his hands. He’s a poor man’s Cordarrelle, which I guess means he’s Dogecoin? Duvecoin?
The point is: there are still quality WRs out there. And if these guys get added, there will be others to replace them.
TE
Please. If you don’t have a TE by now, you’re pretty effed.
Pat Freiermuth and Dan Arnold might be your only hopes.
K
Stop.
DL
Khalil Mack
Cam Heyward
Harold Landry
Maxx Crosby
Joey Bosa
Chase sacks and TFL.
LB
Demario Davis
Tremaine Edmunds
CJ Mosley
Nick Bolton
Anthony Walker
Chase snaps and tackles. Note that when looking at an IDP’s game logs, where it says Snap %, it’s actually showing your total snaps. You’re looking for numbers over 50. You can also just sort by snaps and try to cross-reference who has a ton of both snaps and points.
DB
Kendall Fuller
Taron Johnson
Minkah Fitzpatrick
Malcolm Jenkins
Chuck Clark
You want DBs who are used in a variety of ways because their DCs are putting them in position to make plays. Going strictly for picks or tackles usually doesn’t work. You either get five points every week or you ride a wild wave of highs and lows. Sean got extremely lucky with Trevon Diggs. But it is Week 7. At this point, if a guy has a high total points (as long as it isn’t all in one game and his snap counts look decent), you might as well just try him.
Kermit Mahomes 250 – 151 What It Is
Per Cameron, his margin of victory was higher than Evan’s total, and meanwhile Shelby scored enough to beat seven other teams. So it’s a dominant performance from Cameron. One week after Sean shattered the previous high score, Cameron shatters it again. Now it’s out of reach, right? Per Kennedy, Cam left 4.5 points on the bench. And though his IDPs were good, only one really dominated. Imagine if instead of renting Josh Allen at DL he had rented Maxx Crosby. I would say, Imagine if Shelby had kept her first-rounder, but it doesn’t matter. Mahomes isn’t really driving the bus here. Sure, had Cameron not had the freebie to luxe Mahomes, he would have had to spend a different pick at QB, would surely have ended up with something less than, but would he be significantly less dominant? He was #1 in the melee, and his five wins have come by 85, 35, 30, 35, and 99. Like, what are we doing? At this rate, Cameron is going to lap whoever’s last in scoring at the end of the year, probably more than one person! Right now, he’s leading last place (Evan) by 470 points, or 75 per week. After 17 weeks of this, he’s going to lead last place by 1275 points. Wut? And this is with Darren Waller playing only okay. My only concern for Cameron is how does he maintain his edge? How does he keep from becoming complacent? Can someone really go undefeated in Mortydome, and if one does, shouldn’t we just fucking murder him?
Shelby’s doing great. She’s not killing total points, mostly because her WRs are inconsistent and she’s down to one starting RB whose only value comes when his team is losing (and his team is 6-0). It sucks to waste that TJ Watt performance, but man, how fun is it to have a rooting interest in TJ Watt? He’s an early keeper candidate above a lot of RBs and WRs at this point. Even just looking at Shelby’s decision for next year, who would you keep between Deebo and Watt? Watt has 81 points in five weeks (he missed a game), while Deebo has 100. So we’ll have to monitor that as the season goes along.
Also, any shit I can give Shelby for giving Cam the first pick, I can give Brian for letting Derrick Henry get past him. We couldn’t have known, sure. But in the future, I’m going to think more about the physical nature of the game when picking my players, specifically my RBs. I kind of did it this year, going for Najee early-ish. He is not Henry-sized, but he is a massive man at 6’2”, 230.
Also also, scoring 150 points no longer gets you anything. More on that later.
Chutback 143 – 141 JCor
The end of the Bills game was the end of this game. It’s stupid the refs didn’t give Allen the first down. It’s even stupider that Allen ran into the one defender positioned well enough to stop him on the sneak. Had he gotten the first down, Corey still would have trailed by about half a point, but you’ve gotta believe that Allen would’ve had a hand in the TD. Like much of what happens in fantasy football, it comes back to Derrick Henry being more than we can comprehend.
Oliver reaches 5-1, which has to be his best start of the season from so far the best team I’ve seen him put together. However, the wins have not been that convincing. Oliver was #2 in the melee, but his wins have been scores of 142, 142, 110, and 143. Granted his score in his lone loss was 206. It’s actually come down to Mike Evans and Amari Cooper not being enough. It’s getting to the point where you might bench one for Brandin Cooks because at least you know Cooks is getting the volume every week. I mean, don’t do that, but do let it worm around in your brain until you go insane enough to trade me Evans. I have to commend the Darrell Henderson pick. I didn’t believe in it, especially when the Rams traded a decent pick for Sony, super especially when Henderson got hurt. But after that downfield, over-the-shoulder TD catch, I’m a believer. Henderson could end up being the steal of the draft. (We’ll find out my official stance around midseason when I do a draft rewind.)
Corey’s team is back to where they were two weeks ago. Everything is pretty good except that Myles Gaskin can’t be your starting RB. The worst part is I actually believe the Dolphins will get their heads out of their asses and start feeding him. I wouldn’t be starting Myles Gaskin until it happens, but I would believe, maybe as Corey does, that Gaskin will eventually become the starting RB, and the one shitty RB draft strategy will be vindicated.
Suck it, Jerry 186 – 155 Jerry
Brian’s team is finally matching its potential with its overall record. The IDP situation is weird but working, and we have yet to see a week where the whole offense gets going at once. I think the possibility of Dak and JT combining for 60 points each week is real. I think Brian may have finally hit the RB wall, though, now that Gibson’s shin fracture appears to be limiting his playing time. But just in time, Henry Ruggs is having a serious breakout. He’s not just getting open deep either. I mean, he’s mostly just getting open deep, but he’s getting really open really deep. Whatever he’s doing, it’s enough for Brian to flex him while he waits out another RB injury. Dropping Chuba prematurely was bad. When you throw in that you dropped him to scoop Matt Ryan a week early, it’s… it’s unbecoming of a man of your stature, Brian. Especially to, what keep the Lions’ backup?
Spencer is fifth in total points, but he’s basically fourth. But he’s 0-6 now. He’s posted scores of 140, 161, 152, 154, 169, and 155. If he were anything but the reigning champ, I would feel bad. Maybe if it hurt his playoff hopes, I would feel bad, but since it does neither, it’s just kind of funny. I don’t have to explain that his team is good. The numbers bear that out. I kind of hope he wins one, but I kind of hope he keeps losing. It’s funny. It’ll be even funnier if he wins a playoff game, and it’ll multiply with each successive playoff win. But if he repeats as champ, we burn down his house.
SimpleFun 132 – 128 Squanch This
If you don’t know how close Max came to winning his first week in Mortydome, this one also came down to the final drive of the Bills game. Max was up by less than a point, and he just needed Emmanuel Sanders to not be involved at all in the final drive. Then Josh Allen connected with Sanders on a 30-yard bomb and it was over. Even if Sanders lost a fumble later, it wouldn’t be enough.
So Max’s shitty team loses on probably Sean’s worst week. And it is a really shitty team. With Kareem Hunt on IR, Max will have to lean on James Conner and JD McKissic for RB points. Somehow, it’s only the third-worst RB situation in our league, though. He’s even got Tony Pollard. He might start three backup RBs and be as competitive as if he used three WRs. I like Tyler Boyd, but he’s had a couple meh weeks in a row, granted the lack of showing against Detroit makes sense since they use Boyd when they need to and they definitely didn’t need to.
But the Rodgers-Adams stack is good. Calvin Ridley should be good. The IDPs are good. You’re fucked at TE, but half of teams are usually. I think this team is good enough to steal a playoff win.
Even with a win that puts him at 5-1, Sean kind of comes down from his cloud of dominance this week. The Ravens’ RBs stole Lamar’s TD chances, Mike Williams finally took his mask off, Chase Claypool proved he can still bust, and Sean would have lost to all but two teams. He’ll get Jeudy back soon, Montgomery in a few weeks, so we like him more as the 170-point team he was early than the 130-team he’s been lately (wild anomaly week aside). But 5-1 is misleading. But at the same time, we’re almost halfway through our regular season. At some point, you just don’t have enough time left to lose enough games to fall out of the top four (first-round byes). Sean’s not quite there, but even if he slides the next few weeks, he probably only needs eight wins total to get a bye.
Slut Dragons 149 – 86 Tiny Rick
In the battle of Burrow vs. Herbert, my stance that that Herbert was the obvious top QB in that class did not appear to hold up. But the real competition can be judged next week. Herbert had just had his worst game of the season against the Ravens, and Burrow goes to Baltimore next. The last time Burrow played in Baltimore, there were no fans, and Burrow had negative fantasy points. Granted, Herbert was off against Baltimore. I don’t know if it was because they got too much pressure early on and sped up his clock, but he was off-target on the key downs he usually thrives on. I don’t see Herbert staying bad, especially with a bye week coming at the perfect time for the offense to re-establish itself (read: feed Keenan Allen). I don’t think Burrow is bad, but I think his offense is still in the stage of being bad against good defenses. But for fantasy, maybe it doesn’t matter. Burrow has had multiple TDs in every game, and it’s not even volume-driven. In fact, he has yet to throw 40 times in a game, hovering around 30 most games. Last year, his low was 30 (against Baltimore).
Anyway, I’m not going to talk about the fantasy matchup here because ew.
But I will say that Kennedy is hanging around on the fringe of being a championship contender. He has three legitimate RBs, maybe four with Mitchell, and he has the correlation between Burrow’s points and Chase’s points working in his favor most weeks. Higgins might be overkill, but so far, that’s better than whatever Allen Robinson is doing. It might be time to trade one of the RBs for a legitimate second WR. Maybe it’s not worth it yet. I think we should all be in on one thing at this point, and it’s hoard your RBs until you need to make a splash move for the playoffs. You don’t know which of them will get hurt, unless you’re Brian and the answer is all of them.
Evan, I got nothing for you. You’re last in points, and if not for Spencer’s weird season, you’d be last in everything. Sometimes, that’s just how it goes. You’ve got the QB. You’ve got enough at RB. Sanders has turned a corner, and Barkley will be back. When Russell Wilson is back, Lockett will be good again. It’s just a matter of taking a blunt object to the dome each week until about Week 11 or so. Oh shit, the Eagles have the Week 14 bye, so you won’t even have Sanders for that first playoff week. Yikes. Well, at least you know you’re fucked and can score a draft pick or two at the deadline instead of making a desperate trade the other way.
MD Portal Juice 160 – 134 Scary T, B
I had fun this week. I like when Matt Stafford scores a lot of points. It was a little less fun when Sam Darnold decided to show up and score 18 points in the final five minutes, but I like drama, too. I watch the Bachelor.
Coleman had a bad week, but at least Jaylen Waddle made you look smart. That fifth-rounder seemed like a steep price, but now it looks pretty good. The Alabama connection looks strong, even if the stats were a little weird. And Miami finally started using Waddle on kick returns, which is especially cool since their defense is ass now. The Bateman pick looks strong, too, maybe not immediately but definitely with that late keeper potential. Another late-round bullseye. Three years straight of finding sick talent in the double-digits. I love it. It’s gonna be a shitty few weeks with no Wilson, but seeing what you’ll do about has started off fun.
I ran out of time for legit previews. Maybe next week!
Shelby over Doak
Spencer over Oliver
Brian over Corey
Cameron over Coleman’s knee, getting spanked
Sean over Evan
Max over Kennedy
To everyone getting married this weekend, cheers and enjoy the lovefest!
To everyone undefeated in fantasy football, suck it.
