With the season on the line every week in a game of chance, it’s important to get square with your god. But as often as we refer to the fantasy gods, we fail to define them, to identify them, to single them out and focus on which ones are useful to us where. If you’re lost at sea, the most Dionysus can offer you is a painless death, but you also aren’t exclusively relying on Poseidon. In fact, you might be lost at sea because Poseidon wants it that way. Your best bet to get home safe is probably Eos, but the Greek gods are famously vain, so you would actually have to know who she is and call her by name. In that vein, I am here to introduce you to the only beings left who can help you now, assuming you’re not beyond help at this point (looking mostly at Brian).
In a twelve-man league, there are twelve gods. It’s a coincidence, but don’t confuse that with a lack of meaning. If nothing else, coincidences clue us into to natural relationships we may not have otherwise considered. It’s a coincidence that in order to avoid the last-place game, Kennedy must defeat his own first-round pick in Ashton Jeanty. It’s a coincidence that the five teams that spent the most FAAB missed the playoffs while the five teams that spent the least made it. It’s a coincidence that Shelby and I are the other two teams and that we came into this new FAAB format with very similar strategies. It’s a coincidence that Sean went all-in on keeping Puka and McBride, and now they are tied for the league lead in receptions. All this to say just accept that there are twelve gods. Also accept that there is no hierarchy. If there were, we could start to make sense of this dumb game, and after 25 years of playing, I can assure you there is no sense to this dumb game.
The patron saint of Mortydome and also the god of grey goats. Joe Flacco has had his fingerprints on our league since its earliest iteration, when we wrote our draft picks on the wall of our apartment junior year. We were on Yahoo, we didn’t have waivers, but we had to wait until 9AM Tuesday morning for free agency to open. I remember because that is when I took a class simply called Demography, and I would get to demography five minutes early so that I could open my laptop to make free agent moves because there was no such thing as a fantasy football app for a phone, or at least not a phone that I owned. Joe Flacco played for four or five different teams in our league that season, and at one point he faced the same team three consecutive weeks because we were a total clown show. It actually pissed off enough people that like half the league bailed. What? How? Because the trade deadline had passed, and the way we moved Flacco from team to team was by getting together and timing the drop so that the next team could add him instantaneously, and this happened like ten minutes before kickoff, and you better believe Flacco won those games. If you have the opportunity, and you aren’t in love with your current QB, get you an old gunslinger. (This is a Phil Rivers plug.)
Simply a fantasy god. Who among us has not had Josh Gordon on a roster? And yet, the man played one full season, his rookie season, and that wasn’t even THE season, which was his sophomore season, in which he was suspended for the first two games. Then he was dog shit for four full seasons, including two years suspended, then he played with Tom Brady and had a renaissance, and then he was suspended for the fantasy championship that season. He was dog shit again upon his return, and Brady said get this dude the fuck out of here. He was exiled to Seattle, eventually signed with the Chiefs, sucked a whole butt, and then in his final season he played two games for the Titans and drew one catchless target. But the spirit of Josh Gordon lives in every player who has one magical season and then burns a hole in every fantasy bench one by one for a month at a time until five years go by and we finally give up. Josh Gordon is younger than Adam Thielen and Travis Kelce, and it’s been seven years since he was fantasy relevant, 13 years since his glory year, and yet if he came out of retirement next year and he was repping with starters during camp, he would be drafted above those guys. He is the fantasy god of lost causes and the saying “I can’t quit you” (In Josh’s case, “you” is drugs).
Not technically a god but as much in control of the natural world as any god. Just ask Coleman. After riding his RB STAck to the brim of the playoffs, merely needing to not be outscored by 40 by the third worst scoring team in Mortydome during the melee, meaning Coleman only needed to score 127 FP (coincidentally the average score of the second worst scoring team, coincidentally Coleman’s twin brother), Coleman has been bounced from the playoffs. This is ignoring the karmic gray area of buying low on injured Omarion Hampton. I don’t know about you guys, but it seems like every time I try to get an injured star on the cheap, it blows up in my face. I tried to scam Joe Burrow as a late keeper for some FAAB, and immediately my star and favorite player ever got the worst injury of his career and maybe won’t recover until next year. Only by dropping Burrow did I return to the noble playoff path (six-fold? Too cute?).
The god of keeping it simple and not taking it too seriously. Sean’s back was against the wall. He had two stud keepers and a first round pick, but he didn’t have a 2nd or 3rd. I don’t know if he planned it or he just went with the flow, but he stacked Cowboys, and he murdered us. He didn’t get cute with that first either. He took the best player available, and he got the best player overall. John Madden would say something along the lines of “I just tried to draft the best players,” and while you might think, yeah, they’re all trying to draft the best players, no, I assure you, they are not. Specifically John’s GM/owner Al Davis was not. He was trying to draft the fastest players, he was trying to outsmart the other teams by taking players he saw as undervalued, only he drafted them at stupidly high value. You get cute, you overthink, over-tink, you dishonor the legend.
Literally the best fantasy player there ever has been and ever will be. In 2006, he gained 2,300 yards, converted 106 first downs, and scored 31 TDs. He should have been the last non-QB to win MVP, but Adrian Peterson won it in 2012 despite scoring only 13 TDs and not even breaking the rushing record (voters were bored and feeling cute). CMC’s first full season with the 49ers is the modern equivalent of LT’s MVP season. CMC had 300 fewer yards and 10 fewer TDs. This is why default-drafting the best RB #1 overall is a dead strategy. The game has changed too much, and being wrong at RB is the surest way to tank your season (Cameron and Kennedy know what I’m talking about).
If you can’t guess who the best RB will be, you can still be the best team by simply maxing out on starting RBs. We’ve tried 4-WR, and it’s had its moments, but the cyclical nature of the league is undeniable. The passing boom preceded the nickel boom preceded the bully ball boom. The Lions’ offense has survived the brain drain by beefing up and beating the shit out of people. The highest scoring teams in Mortydome either have Josh Allen or they start three RBs.
The god of galaxy brain, Cordarrelle Patterson lived three lives as a fantasy superstar. He was an electric gadget player as a rookie, scoring three rushing TDs, four receiving TDs, and two return TDs. This was pre-Deebo. Teams didn’t know how to weaponize that versatility. It took five years for the Pats to convert him to RB (coincidentally also the Josh Gordon renaissance season and that one completely insane James White season), and it would be another two years before I correctly guessed the Falcons would make him a bell-cow (they didn’t, but for a 30-yo RB convert, he was elite). If I wasn’t too busy sniffing my own farts, I would have sold him to Sean for a 2nd-rounder (an actual offer I rejected) rather than holding out for the keeper year, which got off to an awesome start, but then he got hurt and was never the same. The legacy of CryptoHenry is the (for sure my) belief that teams have the blueprint to maximize the elite athletes. (They don’t. Teams suck. I hate them.) Jeremy McNichols should have had 1,000 yards a year (I mean, his fault for not knowing how to read a playbook until he turned like 27, but still).
Fantasy baseball is the OG fantasy sport, and Bill James is the OG fantasy analyst. He is of course known for Sabermetrics, the driving force behind Moneyball, but he also coined the “Plexiglass Principle” which boils down to: teams that significantly improve or decline one season have a tendency to bounce back the next. In other words, regression. Saquon Barkley and Justin Jefferson were terrible process picks this season. They overachieved last season, and the assumption they were extremely likely to repeat (i.e., be worth top-3 picks) didn’t make any sense. Sean’s Cowboys triple stack was far from a guarantee, but it was rock-solid process. Dak nearly won MVP in his last full season, the Cowboys assembled the best receiving corps of Dak’s career, and without Dak they turned Rico Dowdle into Jim Brown. Javonte Williams was an elite draft prospect just four years ago, he missed his second season due to a catastrophic knee injury, and he wasn’t a fit in Sean Payton’s offense. Sean wins every year because Sean has no religion, no affiliation. He is a numbers man, through and through.
The highest drafted IDP in Mortydome history until Travis Hunter this season (and that’s got asterisk all over it; Travis Hunter the DB only would have gone in the mid-keeper range), Watt was a third-round pick by Sean in 2017. Sean then double-dipped, taking Luke Kuechly in the 4th. Sean was two years removed from winning it all, one year removed from losing in the semifinals. Following the Watt/Kuechly fiasco, he missed the playoffs five years straight. Max, I’m sorry you missed it. It was a thing of glory. It is his villain origin story. JJ Watt is why you don’t use your time machine (1.21 JJWatts, remember that?) to kill Hitler; you most likely would have just transferred power to someone less insane. Also, you don’t draft IDP before the 5th Round. They have elite weeks, but they max out at literally half the points of the best five flex players. You’re better off drafting the George Pickenses of the world in the 4th.
The superflex position used to be called OP (stood for Offensive Player). We used to have one. We don’t anymore, and I can’t remember why, but I have to assume it’s because I made the executive decision to nuke it after our first year going from 10 teams to 12. (Corey and Shelby used to co-manage a team lol like what were we even doing.) And then the first year of not having superflex, Oliver and I convinced ourselves that drafting QBs in the first round was zigging while everyone else zagged. I drafted Andrew Luck fifth overall. He threw multiple interceptions in each of his first three starts, missed two games, threw multiple interception in two of his next four games, then missed the rest of the year. Oliver drafted reigning MVP Aaron Rodgers three picks later. Rodgers threw 30 TDs, but it was a different era; he finished 7th in QB scoring. Cam Newton won MVP, Shelby drafted him first overall the following year; he finished 17th. The next year, Brian drafted Jameis 11th overall; he finished 22nd among QBs. The next year, Oliver drafted Rodgers 12th overall; he finished QB6. Starting in 2019, we finally cut it out. For two years, nobody drafted a QB in the 1st. Mahomes was a keeper both years; Cam drafted him with an extra 1st when he re-entered the draft pool; he finished QB4. Then everything changed. In 2023, Evan “auto-picked” Josh Allen fifth overall. It was immediately panned. He went to the championship and arguably would have won if Damar Hamlin hadn’t died. Josh Allen has been a first-rounder ever since, and drafting Josh Allen in the first became such a no-brainer that I decided it was finally time to trade up to draft Lamar ahead of him. It’s Andrew Luck all over again. I’m swearing off the first-round QB forever.
The Hades of the fantasy football draft. We don’t have to get into why. Just don’t do it. I say this having enjoyed an espresso martini to kick off this year’s draft and let me remind you of my high-leverage draft picks (note: after trading for extra late keeper slots and Oliver’s 1st, I didn’t have a 2nd, 6th, 7th, 8th, or 10th):
3. Autopick Mahomes, deleted, autopick T-Mac
4. Swift, Ridley, Diggs
5. Bill, Roquan (1st IDP taken)
And then I closed the draft with Trevor Lawrence even though I said no Jags and I needed a fucking kicker because I made too many picks and I wouldn’t be able to set a lineup without trading/dropping. I was blessed to be able to take advantage of Coleman’s sleep deprivation by trading Lawrence, Jeudy, and $20 FAAB for TJ Watt.
I’m swearing off the first-round QB, and I’m swearing off the pre-draft cocktail. (I’ll never swear off the pre-draft cocktail.)
We’re just cool kids doing young stuff. You guys keep thinking I’m a religious leader. This isn’t real life; this is a video game. Everyone here is my grandson. We are at an arcade that’s been taken over by terrorists, the power went out, the game restarted, and your identity has been splintered into all the non-player characters. All of you, collectively, are Morty. Just do a Die Hard. You’re nailing it. Good luck!
Byes: Coleman, Shelby
Coleman spent a 2nd and a 4th to finish in seventh place, but at least he’s avoided last place and secured a top-4 pick in next year’s draft. Honestly a pretty good finish considering his starting position: no 1st, no 5th, basically only one keeper. But if you want to feel sorry for yourself, you can think about the time you forgot to close out a trade offer and ended up giving Breece Hall away for nothing.
Shelby made a run there, dealing huge losses to Coleman, Evan, and Sean, eclipsing 200 FP in the latter. She did unfortunately fall apart in what should have been a cakewalk in Rivalry Week, when she only needed 123 but only scored 108, with the winning points on the bench. But she knocked Sean out of contention for the top seed, effectively threw an alley-oop to Corey using Coleman’s head as the ball, and most importantly, maintained integrity, so she’s rewarded with keeping the Jerry away one more year while also having a stake in the dark horse championship contender.
Oliver, Brian, Kennedy, and Cameron are the four teams at risk of finishing dead last and paying shipping for the privilege of putting a highly questionable trophy in a prominent location of their home. Oliver, Brian, and Kennedy have been expecting this for weeks if not months.
This is new territory for Cameron. He’s out of his element. He’s doomed. Unless he gets really creative at QB, he’s starting Bo Nix against a top-five defense, while Kennedy starts undead Brock Purdy against a bottom-five defense, a defense that just let Shedeudy drop 42 FP. Cameron is afraid to start a CeRBerus whose third head is either Blake Corum or Ken Walker, but he’s comfortable spending $27 FAAB to start Jerry Jeudy against the defense that leads the league in INTs. Cameron is down to four good players: Saquon, SunGod, Aubrey, and Parsons. Kennedy hasn’t had four good players since he traded away his top two picks for a future 2nd and 4th. Taking down Cameron this week has the bonus of improving that 2nd. But right now, when it matters, he’s got the Purdy-Jauan stack, the best Ravens receivers in a shootout, and he’s one IDP away from starting the whole Browns defense. Ice that final Bobby, baby. Devin Bush is a former first-round pick playing his balls off. Go all in. This matchup is just a race to 130 FP.
Oliver drove the dagger into Brian’s late-season playoff chase. Worse, his dog shit team gave Brian confidence to hold his best trade pieces through the deadline. As of the writing of this note, Brian is playing games with his lineup. He’s loaded up on tertiary Bucs and doesn’t have a QB or DB. Otherwise, he’s stacked. Oliver’s loaded up on crap at every position but QB, which is a gambit, of sorts. Oliver’s starting his best lineup. It’s all he can do. It’s been good enough to net him 305 FP in the last two weeks, most recently a season-high 159. If Brian doesn’t already have a claim in for Cousins, then his best options at QB are Mariota and Rivers. Or just re-tread Cam Ward and play for next year. (Update: he added Mariota)
Byes: Spencer, Sean
Spencer scored a melee-low 98 FP, Spencer’s lowest score since 137 in Week 6. BUT that was with three hollow lineup spots, Jalen Hurts setting the NFL record for turnovers by an individual player on a single play, and starting Chris Rodriguez for some reason (the reason was CMC’s bye week). Spencer’s trade for Kittle and AJ Brown is the stuff championships are made of. No other playoff team even added a player at the deadline. Sean didn’t need to. Max should have. Evan, Corey, and I didn’t have enough assurances.
Sean finishes a game back of Spencer despite scoring 15 more FP per game, but what matters is the bye. Sean would have been picking between Maye vs. BUF and Dak vs. MIN. He would have been starting Jonathan Taylor in Phil Rivers’ first game since the COVID season against the league’s best defense, and if Seattle isn’t the best, then it’s Houston, who is facing McBride and probably holds him to his season low. The bright sides for those of us potentially facing Sean next week: Rico Dowdle is back in a timeshare, George Pickens’ ego did in fact erupt, and Breece Hall is one awkward step away from getting shut down for the season.
We’re all varying degrees of garbage compared to Spencer and Sean. We each have holes in our lineup, and aside from Max, we’re surprised we’re even here. Maybe Evan isn’t, but that’s just willful ignorance when you look at Jefferson and Egbuka’s stats the last month (33 FP combined, barely above 4 FP per player per week). This thing is being held together by James Cook, Kenny Gainwell, and Cam Little. Can’t wait to lose by 30 while Chim Dike and Alec Pierce score 60 on my bench. The worst part is I’m leaning Dike over Higgins and Neal. It’s playoffs, and I’m still doing the return-man scam. I’m starting Lavonte just to feel something. Jk I’m feeling confident. Lamar got back on track, the Ravens are letting Henry have his 20 carries per game again, and that’s the engine that drives the rest of it. I think if they combined for 50, and I can scrape together 90-100 from everyone else, that’s enough. I am worried about what Evans’ return means for Baken Eggs. I feel like Evans will decoy/block the whole game, draw AJ Terell away, and open up Egbuka for 20 FP, getting Baker over 30 in the process. And Justin Jefferson can’t just stay dead, not against this Swiss cheese Cowboys zone defense. The rest doesn’t worry me, which is why I’m feeling good about 150 being the mark.
Josh Allen goes on the road against the Pats, who are coming off bye. It’s the worst matchup he’s had since Houston, and while the Pats aren’t in their league, they are probably at least in Pittsburgh’s league, and the Steelers held Allen under 25 FP. If the Pats hold Allen under 25, then Max needs something crazy from one of Jacobs (@DEN), Davante (vs.DET), Nico (vs. ARI), Kincaid (@NE), Watson (@DEN), or Shaheed (vs. IND and the weather here suuuucks right now). I hate Max’s IDPs. Always have. Bolton is fine. The rest can and should go, but I respect Max for playing the regression game against Corey, whose lineup is totally insane but also probably due for the dark side of regression now that it’s a one-week game again. Stafford revenge game is cool, helps neutralize a big Davante game. Bijan cooked the Bucs before and will cook the Bucs again. JSN I don’t love this week. The weather is one thing, but the Colts playing game-specific defense is the killer. Michael Wilson’s fairy dust will run out against the Texans, you can’t start two TEs, man, not in the playoffs, but luckily Kyle Pitts is the Falcons de facto WR1 and Bowers is the Raiders legitimate WR1. Bucky’s little body is all beat up, but he’s apparently just gonna keep grinding until someone breaks him clean in half, so good on him. I want to squeeze Diggs in the lineup against the Bills. I’d probably be too afraid to bench anyone but Pitts, but Wilson is the obvious move. The Texans D is just that good. Josh Hines-Allen and Ernie Jones are cluuutch pickups this week. Ernie faces the Colts, who should run the ball 40 times. Hines-Allen faces the Jets, who might be forced to start Brady Cook, who took six sacks and threw two picks last week. Max’s ace in the hole is Chris Boswell on Monday night after all of Corey’s players are done. I would love nothing more than for this matchup to come down to that. I love kickers now.
