Post-Draft Rankings vs. Season Results
12. Gotron (Oliver) finished 3rd as Cum Gutters
In 2023, he should name his team Go Gutters
11. One Ass Cheek and Three Toes (Doak) finished 4th as AJ Dillon 100 Years
We’ll just erase that Derrick Henry bit from history
10. Roy (Kennedy) finished 7th and earned the #1 Pick in 2023
9. Goingback2back (Corey) finished 8th
8. Squanch This (Max) finished 9th as Piss Master
7. You’re Doing it Wrong (Shelby) finished last
6. Scary Terry… Bitch (Coleman) finished 6th as Krombopulos Michael
5. So long Cooper Kupp :( (Cameron) finished 5th as Lyfe is Short
4. Fart 69 finished 11th despite having the most losses
3. C’mon Football (Spencer) finished 10th
2. Tiny Rick (Evan) finished 2nd
1. In-N-Out 20 min. Adventure (Sean) finished 1st
It feels good to have outplayed my terrible draft, but it feels great to have nailed the top two teams that early on. What was it that made me think Sean’s team was so good? I think I was trying to jinx him. Looking back, it was the overall depth he started with. Sean had six starting RBs and four WRs who were #1 on their team’s depth chart. His only question mark was Jalen Hurts, who I figured wouldn’t be bad enough to sink him; instead, Hurts was essentially the top QB in fantasy, arguably the best value draft pick in every fantasy league this season.
This also means I don’t have to do a large-scale draft revisit. We know what went wrong with Brian (everything). We know Oliver’s team was terrible the first half of the season, when he was starting Aaron Rodgers, and he had significant injuries to his starting WRs and TJ Watt. We might remember that the confluence of the CMC trade, the Justin Fields explosion, the Brandon Aiyuk breakout, and the return on Keenan Allen spurred a crucial winning streak that not only got Oliver back in the playoff mix but convinced him he could win the whole championship. Shelby’s situation is less cut-and-dry, but basically her players stopped scoring points. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense. The part where Stefon Diggs scored like 10 total FP in three playoff weeks was unforeseeable.
The one season I would like to dig into is Spencer’s. His season pivoted on the decision to draft Dallas Goedert over Jalen Hurts, which was a sensible decision. Goedert has the makeup of a top-3 TE, and he became a top-3 TE this season. Jalen Hurts’ most recent game before our draft was a trainwreck against the Bucs defense. But this is why we don’t do safe shit. You can’t find a star TE in free agency, not really. But even the best TE is only scoring like 15 points per game, still has a floor of zero, and still has a ceiling around 30. Jalen Hurts’ potential was much more exciting. But at the time, I clearly didn’t see it that way. It’s just something you try to learn as you keep banging your head against this fantasy football wall. Spencer’s team lived and died by its QB even more than Cameron’s. Spencer drafted Trey Lance, Lance played his first game in a typhoon, and then he broke his ankle the next week. Dak also had a crazy injury, so Spencer was able to snag him in free agency and parlay him into a healthy Trevor Lawrence. Lawrence was truly a roller coaster. In 16 fantasy games, Lawrence was a top-5 QB five times, including #1 in Week 14. He was a bottom-five QB three times, including #32 in Week 17 (against HOUSTON). He saved Spencer from last place in Week 15, but then he helped Spencer finish with the worst single week of the 2022 Mortydome season. 77 points is almost impossible. And the Jags won that game 31-3!
Friends, I can’t write a championship recap. It was just too weird. I think we’re all pretty convinced Evan would have won. But Sean wasn’t out. The tandem of Ja’Marr Chase and Tyler Bass could have matched Josh Allen in that game. The real tragedy is the points Evan left on the bench, specifically when he benched Chris Godwin. But this isn’t like a Monday morning, oh bro you shoulda known, whatever. I’m just a hardcore Godwin fan talking to a group of people who are mostly also hardcore Godwin fans. I’m also sad that Sean benched Mark Andrews. It is especially sad that Dalton Schultz outscored Mark Andrews, that Schultz outscored Godwin!
I do feel deprived of a Josh Allen championship game. I don’t think they should have kept playing the game. I often don’t think American football makes sense as a popular sport in the 21st century. I think it should have underground appeal like bareknuckle boxing or… okay, bareknuckle boxing is basically a very popular professional sport now, so nevermind. This is the world we live in. Athletes collapse in other sports, too. It’s just the nature of asking people to go balls to the wall for extended periods of time, to ignore their pain lest they should lose a shot at generational wealth. I said I wasn’t going to focus on this kind of stuff this year. I was going to watch football and enjoy it. But this happened while the football game was going on. This wasn’t behind the scenes! And then the NFL tried to make these guys, who were pretty sure they just watched a guy die, keep playing! Of course I realize that there are professions where workers are expected to keep working when people die in front of them. What I didn’t realize until this week was that this has happened to way more people who work in, like, non-life-or-death professions. Like, you don’t even have to work at a hospital. You can just work in plain old hospitality and play through death. That’s wild to me. Pre-internet, this game would have kept going. The reason Elon Musk is destroying Twitter is to prevent the working class from having a real-time impact on big business. Even just the perception that Twitter is sinking is enough to make casuals dive off the side of the ship. I can’t keep going.
My point is that Josh Allen and Jalen Hurts were the story of this fantasy season, and it’s a little sad that they didn’t get to play championship games. It’s not the way I like to see things go. Having Brock Purdy and Jamaal Williams win the fantasy championship is cool. Those guys had unprecedented success, and it’s cool to celebrate the less-than-obvious. It’s also cool that tackles-leader Zaire Franklin is the top-scoring IDP on the championship team. But to have a championship team with Ja’Marr Chase scoring zero points, while facing a Josh Allen-led team whose starting IDPs led all IDP crews in scoring this week? Even Jamaal Williams’ 27 FP don’t make it add up. The fact is Sean’s team was competitive. If it wasn’t, he wouldn’t have scored more points heading into the final game of the week. Had Josh Allen gotten hurt in the first quarter, we’d have the same wondering, the same gut feeling that this matchup lacked completeness. We have to live with the results. As a Lamar Jackson fan, I’ve been watching what feels like fake football for weeks now, just living with the results.
More importantly, had Oliver not bailed on his team for ridiculous keeper fliers, he would have buried Sean and Evan this week. It is fun to score more points than everyone else. We should all try to score the most points every week. My one exception is if you are guaranteed to win the cash game by being less than competitive with parts of your lineup that don’t matter. I will also say, as someone who has tanked for the cash a few times, I would have felt better being closer to Kennedy in the points going into the melee week than I would with ten extra dollars in my pocket. But if you’re Brian, and you’re totally out, tank for that cash and gobble up all the keepers. I wish Josh Allen had played a full championship game, I wish Jalen Hurts had played at all, I wish Lamar had come back, but I really wish Oliver had enjoyed the last drop of a season where he went into championship week with the best starting lineup, rather than picking up fucking KJ Osborn and Kyren Williams. I also wish I had started Tom Brady so that I could have given Oliver a loss for his irreverence.
We’re not going out on regret though. Here are some reasons to celebrate.
Shelby – You helped maintain this league’s (dubious) integrity by holding your best player when no one would offer a fair price. The fantasy gods have set your free from Kyler Murray. You have two electric Bucs as keepers heading into next year.
Brian – Cam Akers looks like a legit starter again, and he’s an early keeper. Browns QB is totally gross but if you’re all about points, you’re getting a lot of points from a late keeper.
Spencer – You got that extra 3rd Round pick in the Mike Evans trade. And you’ve got enough keepers to maybe score another good pick ahead of next year’s draft.
Max – Jerick McKinnon’s last four games were pretty amazing. You almost snuck into the playoffs, and you’ll start next year with a top-3 pick.
Corey – Joe Burrow cemented himself as an elite QB, you get to keep him ahead of next years’ draft, and you get to pick 2nd. 2022 will always be the year you flipped the league on its head by suspending keepers, and it was the year you got back-to-back wins against Shelby, with the long-term result that you both missed the playoffs.
Kennedy – the season of Roy was magical and entertaining, and it ended with you securing the #1 pick. At no point was your team nice to look at, but your team name and avatar were always good times.
Coleman – You had a cool fucking team, and you stacked keepers from the jump. It sucks that making the playoffs probably precludes you from picking Justin Jefferson again next year, but it was fun watching your rookie RBs and elite IDPs shred the league on your way to double-digit wins.
Cameron – Another year, another scoring record. Cameron broke 200 twice, and he was just a few points off of leading the year in scoring. The best part is that it was what seemed like his death knell, drafting two Raiders, that propelled his team back into the playoffs. Cameron made zero RB work, with the unheralded 10th Round pick (and late keeper option) of Tony Pollard.
Doak – I had no business making the playoffs, and I won a playoff game. I also got two 4ths for players who didn’t help other playoff teams. I really enjoyed the Derrick Henry payoff (in both senses), and I look at my end-of-year roster and think, Damn, I love these dudes. And I won two slap bets!
Oliver – Isiah Pacheco was a great late pick, even though it took a while for him to get cooking. The combo of Mahomes and Pacheco to start next year will alleviate the pain that comes with a lesson burned into your scalp from your flight too close to the sun. Growth is always good.
Evan – You got this far without paying a damn thing! You’ve re-asserted yourself as a dominant force, and we’ll always kind of think of you as a co-champ for this season. And you get to slap Sean the next time you see him.
Sean – You’re the champ, and on top of being the champ, you get to keep the QB that got you most of the way here. And you might be shaking off that league villain title by being the one who finally buys us a trophy. Two trophies! We’re not worthy!
I legitimately don’t know what else to say. I can’t believe the Bucs made the playoffs, for one thing. I wrote a lot less Bucs content this year, something that’s mostly Brady related. These Bucs are bad, and they’re kind of boring for the first 55 minutes of most games. This most recent game against Carolina was the most fun of the year, and we have to hope it’s a sign of things to come in the next few weeks. The most exciting thing to come: Ryan Jensen. It’s not just a boost to the offensive line. It’s inserting a A-grade talent into the second-most important position on our offense. It’s getting Jensen and Mason on combo-blocks. It’s a line of five actual starters finally giving enough push to give Fournette some runway, and furthermore to give Rachaad White space to explode. This can be the type of line that helped Ronald Jones score a 98-yard TD. I am stoked for the Bucs’ first playoff game. Imagine if the whole starting defense is out there, too? It’s possible. Well, except Shaq. But the scheme of the defense is making Tryon-Shoyinka and Anthony Nelson look like legit starters.
Anyway, it was another great Mortydome year. It was maybe the first year I’ve written a note every week. It’s definitely going to be different for me next year. Every season we’ve had a new parent, that parent’s team has had basically their worst season. But can I really do worse than drafting Kyle Pitts has the #1 TE? Lamar over Mahomes? Like, I had the Kelce-Mahomes stack on a platter, and I went Pitts-Lamar. I can’t do worse next year. But I’m excited to see how it ends up happening anyway. I refuse to write a sign-off speech. All I can say is this is probably the last note that isn’t hashtag-dadcontent. So look forward to that.
