FANTASY REPORT: WEEK 3

Well that didn't take long. 3 weeks into the season and the fantasy league is devoid of both unbeaten and winless teams. For all the people who were initially scared that they were going to get curbstomped every week because they lost a player to an early injury, or forgot to show up to the draft, or didn't know much about fantasy, the (very early) playoff hunt is absolutely wide open. Unlike last week, there were actually quite a few close games this time, at least until Monday night anyway, when basically every major fantasy player in the Cowboys/Cards game put up either a great performance or a terrible one. Which brings us to...

Biggest Upset: AlphaMales 92.00, LousyPack 75.72

Boy was this a nutty finish. Rol held close to a 10 point lead over Mike with 8:20 to go in the second quarter of the Monday Night game, and both teams had one player active: Rol had the Arizona DST, which had largely shut down the Dallas offense to that point, and Mike had Larry Fitzgerald, who had put up terrible stats to that point. Then...chaos. The Cowboys reeled off 28 points in the last two and a half quarters, taking away all the points Rol had gained from the Cards DST (they finished with 0 points). Meanwhile, Fitzgerald went off, posting 149 yards and a TD pretty much exclusively from that point onward (he finished with 21). The end result was the last unbeaten going down in dramatic fashion. 

Closest Game: Doomfist 61.58, Hangin with Hernandez 49.10

Why the fuck do you guys each have two wins with these kind of stats? Whatever. The lowest scoring game of the week was also the closest, largely due to some utterly abysmal player performances. Only three players between the two teams put up double digit points, and Doomfist's defense put up -4; and he still won by 12 points. Just to list some of the utter disasters; Andre Cooper (1 point), Jason Witten (0 points), Thomas Rawls (0 points), Javorius Allen (3 points), Baltimore's defense (-4 points). This game was the fantasy equivalent of that 3-0 Steelers win over the Dolphins in 2007.

Biggest Blowout: The Longest Foot 108.92, Super Club of Athletic Buddies 52.66

SCAB had two players post 0s and his defense score -1 points, but it really wouldn't have mattered; Seth had Tom Brady, Chris Thompson, and Carlos Hyde, who put up 36, 25, and 21 points respectively. You're going to need a career day or two to get past that barrage. Seth had pretty weak efforts from the middle of his lineup, but no one on SCAB that doesn't play for Atlanta had a good fantasy outing, so meh. Here's hoping Brady's learned to stop starting fucking Phillip Dorsett. Seriously. Don't start him even if every single Patriots' receiver gets injured and they're starting the Kraft family at WR.

And now that I've said that he will promptly go off for 30 points against me this week.

The Rest

Nohrian Scum 123.56, The Loins 103.46

It Ertz When Eifert 113.60, Arch 81.62

Arminillo 105.10, Dongos Gridiron Gamers 78.88

Week 4 Standings (I call this working smarter, not harder)

According to the score tracker on the website, Fitzgerald had roughly 3 fantasy points until 4:45 left to go in the third quarter. Can't speak for how many catches he had (especially since I don't think the number of receptions is directly tied to fantasy points outside of the yards that go with them). But yes, 3.4ish points through two and 2/3rds of a quarter, which extrapolates to around 5 points for the whole game, is a pretty bad game by Fitzgerald standards.

I'll take the Packers.

I will take Green Bay for Thursday.

I think a big part of the problem is that the "common wisdom" used for fantasy football hasn't really gotten with the times; it's suggested we approach fantasy football drafts the same way you did in the early-mid 2000s. Back then, RBs were significantly more reliable for lots of yards and at least one TD per game. Marshall Faulk, Larry Johnson, Priest Holmes, Shaun Alexander, LaDanian Tomlinson, Edgerrin James, Tiki Barber, Clinton Portis, Corey Dillon, Ahman Green...all of these guys fit into that category at some point between 2000-2006. The rules have changed, or, at least, the enforcement of them has, to favor passing much more. As a result, QBs account for far more points. But for some reason, fantasy advice has never really adjusted.

I think I'll take the Bears to beat the crap out of the Packers this week!

...is what I would say if I was an idiot. I'm picking Green Bay, of course.