Season 12 - Playoff Update

Our regular season has come to a conclusion and Round 1 of the playoffs is underway in the former card group (thanks COVID), now fantasy group, CNK.  But before we dive into the dynasty league, let’s check in on the Guillotine and Best Ball leagues, sponsored by Garrett South LLC. 

 While Mitch can’t win a playoff game in his Luther league (that we are all tired of hearing about), would rather play Fortnite than talk to his wife, critiques his 7th grade daughter in basketball the same way he would a senior football player, belittles his son about being undisciplined for not getting up early enough to make himself some eggs because he “needs the calories” and consistently refers to one of his classes as “math for dumb kids”, he certainly is killing it in the marginal fantasy football world. His neck remained intact as he took home the title in the Guillotine league, besting his brother-in-law, with a ridiculous final roster.  A true testament to holding onto as much FAAB as you can until the end to craft a great roster using the waiver wire. **cough, cough…ABEL!!**  Mitch is also poised to take home the best ball trophy as he won the most regular season points (although South made it interesting in Week 14) and now faces Garrett in the title match.  We’ll see if he has enough horses in his stable to complete the fantasy triple crown: Guillotine title, Best Ball title and #1 pick in CNK (more on that to come).

 

Mitch trying to win the things none of us care about.

Now let’s dive into our beloved dynasty league.  Week 14 brought some intrigue as half the league was contending for the final two playoff spots.  Lazer had clinched the #1 seed several weeks prior and we got some new blood in the postseason as Riley safely secured his spot.  Kyle had the wins lead but needed at least one of two wins in the final week to clinch his spot as South and Finken had substantially more points than him.  Going up against Mitch nearly locked that in beforehand, which is fortunate because Kyle lost the median match and would’ve been out having played most anyone else.  Kyle sneaking in means he is making his first playoff appearance since 2018 and Riley’s since 2019.  We were beginning to wonder if the COVID vaccine had more side effects than initially thought for those two.

Riley and Kyle showing back up to the playoffs.

So then it came down to South and Finken.  Finken needed to get two wins on the week and see South go south.  It was set up ideally as Garrett was playing Lansink, who ended up posting an all-timer of a score after Josh Allen, Puka and Chase all went nuclear.  Finken got that loss out of South to Lazer and two wins of his own over Abel’s line-up of injured and non-starting players.  But South didn’t cooperate and posted an all-timer score of his own to get the median win and punch his ticket.  Seth technically had a chance as well but didn’t have enough points to make it work.  The good thing is he’ll have all offseason to work on his scoring stats with Chris’s sister....and two-a-days start Jan 1. 

 

Seth is looking forward to the offseason.

So now that the field was set, Chris took his sweet time and eventually (after what felt like hundreds of texts) choose to face off against his arch nemesis Kyyyyyle in round one of the playoffs, leaving South and Riley to duke it out on the other side.  The remaining four began their round robin to determine who buys lobster and Dom Perignon at the draft.  

After one week, Chris holds a commanding lead over Lehman that seems more insurmountable than Anthony Richardson trying to get a 50% completion rate.  In the other matchup, Riley holds an almost 50 point lead on South, even without sniffing out adding Cook or Bateman to his lineup.  He even left Strange on the bench and pre-whipped Riley would’ve definitely sniffed out that strange…  There have only been two weeks all season when FIT outscored Smells Low by 50+ points so things are looking pretty grim for South.  At least he won’t get destroyed by Chris in the title game again.  Our only hope to take Chris out in the playoffs is a stat correction. 

 

Finken bitterly watching the playoffs from the outside.

In the consolation bracket, Finken posted his 4^th 200 pointer of the year and would have the lead over anyone in the playoffs, if not for all those ridiculously close losses throughout the year.  He’s definitely come to terms with this and is reportedly handling it well, definitely isn’t bitter and angry.  Seth won a tight one over Mitch in the other match.  We’d preview this week’s matchups but we have no idea who’s playing whom in the loser’s bracket this week because the stupid Sleeper app won’t allow us to manage any of that.  So we’ll all just get to guess on who’s playing whom, won’t that be a fun wrinkle?  Thanks a lot Riley. 

And since we’re talking about the loser’s bracket, we do have a lot of draft order set.  The 1st pick did not come without some sweating between the two competing parties.  Well, at least Mitch was paying close attention.  Reached for comment, Mitch exclaimed “it turns out trying to score less fantasy points than Abel is like trying to suck a golf ball through a garden hose.”  When asked to share his other experiences in sucking a golf ball through a garden hose, Mr. Curtis said something about South’s mom and then trailed off as he turned back to his Fortnite game with Lehman.

In case Chris doesn’t have his cheaters on, that is a 0.72 point gap between I’m Out and Play It Backwards in “Max Points For”.  It's amazing that a whole season of tanking between two terrible rosters resulted in the #1 and #2 pick being decided by less than a point.  Some of you are probably just seeing this information but one of us had to sweat this out in real time.  You might think it’s pathetic to create a spreadsheet so you can realize the exact moment all of your tanking paid off……and you’d be right, here it is:

One more Dowdle checkdown or a garbage time Tee Higgins TD (or literally one more freaking point all season long!!!) and Play it Backwards’ status as the 6th least volatile member of the league, might have come into question.

 

The rest of us when Mitch says he's 6th least volatile.

While we are on the topic of draft order, here is what the 25 picks look like as of right now with a fair amount of movement still possible with how the playoffs shakeout.  Mitch and Abel had better pray this is a good draft class otherwise....

2025 Draft Order

1.1 Mitch

1.2 Abel

1.3 Mitch (via Finken)

1.4 Abel (via Seth)

1.5 Projected (Mitch via Kyle or Abel via South)

1.6 Projected (Mitch via Kyle or Abel via South)

1.7 Projected (Riley or Abel via Chris)

1.8 Projected (Riley or Abel via Chris)

2.1 Mitch

2.2 Abel

2.3 Finken

2.4 Mitch (via Seth)

2.5 Projected (Jared via Kyle or South)

2.6 Projected (Jared via Kyle or South)

2.7 Projected (Chris or Chris via Riley)

2.8 Projected (Chris or Chris via Riley)

3.1 Seth (via Mitch)

3.2 Chris (via Abel)

3.3 Finken

3.4 Mitch (via Seth)

3.5 Projected (Kyle or Kyle via South)

3.6 Projected (Kyle or Kyle via South)

3.7 Projected (Riley or Riley via Chris)

3.8 Projected (Riley or Riley via Chris)

4.1 South

*Bold denotes current entry point in draft

 

Now is also the time to start thinking about the draft.  First, we need to set a time as people will start making summer plans over the Christmas holidays so Seth, if you could let us know when your anniversary is so we can plan it for that weekend....

 

But on a serious note, this will be the last power rankings of the season as we all have better things to do over the holidays.  But in all seriousness, it was another fun season (even if Chris wins his 8^th title) and want to thank almost everyone for continuing to make this a great time.  And let’s all try and make a resolution to try and get together or cards, games, Top Golf, pickle ball, a movie, darts or whatever on a more regular basis.  I’m sure all of our psyches could use it.   Merry Christmas and have a safe holiday season!