Week 3 Recaps - Matchup 4 and Matchup 5 — Protector Of The League

Matchup 4: Zeka-A-Virus wins 126.6 to 112.2:

Nice win for Keetz this week, a really solid win. I’m gonna go straight for the low-hanging fruit and talk about Ezekiel Elliot. I was skeptical when the Cowboys picked him at #4 overall in last year’s draft. Jalen Ramsey, Ronnie Stanley, DeForest Buckner and other guys at more important positions were still on the board. The year before, they had Darren McFadden rush for over 1000 yards and they had just signed Alfred Morris. The pick made no sense. I’m a running-backs guy, but in today’s NFL you can get replacement level running backs for next to nothing (See Patriots: Dion Lewis, Patriots: LeGarrette Blount, Patriots: Antowain Smith, Patriots: Corey Dillon). As a result, I was skeptical when they picked him that high. Nonetheless, Zeke has been a revelation for the Cowboys and especially in fantasy football. This week he had a career high 30 carries for a career high 140 yards. Overall that got him 26 fantasy points, which as you can imagine, is also a career high. The crazy part is that he got vultured for not one, not two, not three, okay three touchdowns this week. Dak Prescott had a short TD run, Alfred Morris had a short TD run and Lance Dunbar had a short TD run. If Zeke had those three TDs, we’d be talking about a 45 point game.

Including Keetz’ bench, his WRs easily put up the highest number for any WR corps in the league. Allen Robinson broke out of his early season slump with 2 TDS and 21 points, while Mike Evans continued his stellar season with 26 points on 132 yards and a TD. These guys are a combined 12 feet 8 inches and combined for almost 50 points on the day. Keetz’ bench receivers were not to be outdone, as Emmanuel Sanders and TY Hilton actually outscored Robinson/Evans. They are only 11 feet 8 inches when stacked together, but they combined for almost 60 points. Hilton had 29.4 points on 174 yards and a TD. With no Donte Moncrief there, Hilton should thrive. Sanders had the best game of his career with 30.2 points on 117 yards and 2 TDs – I guess the (Trevor) Semen on the ball is helping him make those catches.

His WR group is good, but Keetz might have the best TE group in the league. Dwayne Allen had a shit day (5 points), but he’s the Colts #1 TE and should see better games. Zach Ertz is hurt, but once he’s back he’ll be really valuable in the MVP Carson Wentz’ offense. In another league I’m in, one guy named his team “The Ertz Locker” after Ertz/the movie The Hurt Locker. Ertz immediately got hurt, gotta love the irony. Last but not least, Jimmy Graham out of nowhere with a 19 point game. If Graham is really back, then that could be a huge trade asset for Keetz. Or he can continue to hoard three TEs on his roster.

Overall this was a huge win for Keetz and prevented him from going on an 0-3 run to start the season. Up next is a matchup with another 1-2 team, Frader’s squad.

Matchup 4: Unnamed Team loses 112.2 to 126.6:

Let me just put this out there, Dylan’s team name is an abomination. He started by not changing his team name, which is a weak move. He then changed it to a commonly known joke, which was better but not great. He then changed it to “unnamed team”, which is quite possibly the lamest team name we’ve seen in this league. It’s not quite as bad as Victorious Secret, but it’s not much better than Charles in Charge. As you may know, I’ve done a lot of fantasy leagues with coworkers. They’re pretty much all accountants, so creativity does not run high. Not only that, but a number of the guys in the league are over 40 and have trouble coming up with good names. Unnamed Team is on par with those over-40 guys. It just seems like a team name that some older dude with 3 kids would come up with. You’re better than this Dylan, I know you are. If you can come up with “Guy Top Kierney Bottom”, then you can come up with a better name than this. GTKB was one of the best names this league has ever seen, only behind “Ken Pays For Match.Com” (Robby D for the win). Let’s pick it up Dyl, I know you have something in there.

Back to the point, tough loss for Dylan this week. He has to be the only person in all of fantasy football to have the Chiefs D and STILL LOSE. In all seriousness, if your defense scores 30 points then you have to have to have to win. That’s a gift from the fantasy gods and unfortunately it was squandered. He also had a huge game from Mark Ingram (23.7 points), which was really promising. Some people (including me) were pretty worried about his production after two weeks. Those worries were put to rest as Ingram rushed for 77 yards and caught 4 passes for 30 yards and a TD. I was actually hoping Ingram would have a bad week so that I could try to buy low on him. Alas, he is no longer a buy low candidate. I wouldn’t have been able to get him even if he had a bad week, Dylan is impossible to trade with. He usually goes into “ignore text” mode when you offer him anything, which is ridiculous because we live in 2016. The trade offer usually ends up expiring, because he never even counters. Oh well, I already made my one trade for the year.

Dylan also had a nice performance from Travis Kelce – 18 points on 89 yards and a TD. One other big positive for Dylan this weekend – Christine Michael. Michael is going to be the Seahawks starter for the foreseeable future and Dylan picked him up as a free agent (way to go Frader). Savvy pickup by Dylan that’s going to pay big dividends.

Ultimately Dylan’s WRs ruined him as he got 4.6 points between Kelvin Benjamin and Will Fuller. Kelvin actually got shut out by the Vikings, which is ridiculous. He scored 18 against the Broncos, but got zero against the Vikings? I think it’s official that the Vikings D is the best in the league. Fuller on the other hand was just a victim of the Pats game. He’ll have better days.

This week Dylan will take on FLACCOPiAN TUBES in a roommate battle for the ages. Like Bart Scott, CAN’T WAIT.

Matchup 5: Broke Back Caleb wins 143.2 to 138.8:

Wow. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. What a comeback win for Kev. What an unbelievable, once-in-a-lifetime comeback win for Kev. Going into the Monday Night game, Broke Back Caleb was down 53 points. He had Devonta Freeman and Coby Fleener going and it looked like his week was over. Freeman had a hugely disappointing week 1, but bounced back a bit in week 2. Fleener had been a huge bust so far and Kev picked him up off waivers before the week. Through two weeks, Freeman and Fleener had combined for 25.9 fantasy points. This week, they combined for 57.4 and Kev won by 4.4 points. They literally doubled their production this week. Wow. To make matters worse, Lamone actually almost escaped with a win. He was up by about 2-3 points and the Falcons were running out the clock with under three minutes to play. Devonta Freeman then took off for a 16 yard run, which brought the game to the 2 minute warning. Lamone was still up at this point and you figure they’d kneel down right? Wrong. The very next play Devonta Freeman busted a 48 yard run and Kev busted his load. That 48 yard run was the difference in the game - WOW.

Kev also had big performances from Melvin Gordon and Jarvis Landry. Gordon continues to be the lone workhorse in the Chargers offense and he netted 19 points on 35 rushing yards, 43 rushing yards and a TD. He’s now scored a touchdown in every game this year. Jarvis Landry continued his big year, scoring 26.5 points on 7 catches for 120 yards. Through three games he has 24 catches, 314 yards and 1 TD.

As with all matchups, there were some negatives. After exceeding expectations through two weeks, Larry Fitz and Eric Decker regressed this week. Ryan Fitzpatrick completed more passes to the Chiefs than he did to Eric Decker and Decker finished with 3.6 points. The Cardinals got embarrassed by the Bills and Larry ended with 9.5. Together, their two quarterbacks threw 10 picks this week. Hilarious.

I said Keetz has the best TE group, but I might change that vote to Kev. He’s got Fleener’s Wiener, Antonio Gates and Tyler Eifert. Anyone need a tight end?

Matchup 5: FLACCOPiAN TUBES wins 138.8 to 143.2

I won’t mention the brutal, devastating, soul crushing, dick cutting loss that Lamone suffered on Monday night. I’m sure he’s been thinking about it all day and if he watched the game last night, then he probably didn’t sleep too well. That must have been so brutal to watch and that’s why I never watch the Monday night game if any of my matchups are still pending. I just don’t want to watch the heartbreak. Let’s pour one out for Lamone and move on.

I said Dylan has to be the only person to lose with the Chiefs D, but Lamone has to be the only person to lose with Marvin Jones. Jones had 40 points on 205 yards receiving and two TDs. He now leads the NFL in receiving yards, with 83 more yards than the #2 guy. A lot of his damage was done on a 73 yard TD catch, but either way this is really promising for Lamone. I thought Jones would be a great pick before the draft, I thought he was a great pick once Lamone got him in the 10th round and it is now officially one of the best picks in the draft.

Speaking of best picks in the draft, how about David Johnson? The 9th overall pick in our draft continues to produce and put up another 28.4 points this week. The best part is that the Cardinals were losing the whole game and Johnson still put up big numbers. Usually running backs suck when their team loses, but Johnson is a huge part of the Cardinals offense.

I just noticed this, but Lamone had a bad week in fantasy and his players had bad weeks overall. Out of the 9 guys he started, only one of them was on a winning team. Out of the 15 total guys on his roster, only 3 were on winning teams this past week. That doesn’t mean a ton for fantasy purposes, but it’s interesting.

I have to mention this - Lamone suffered another catastrophic injury. If he didn't have bad injury luck, he'd have no luck at all this year. Keenan Allen out in Week 1 with a torn ACL. Danny Woodhead out in Week 2 with a torn ACL. Jeremy Langford out in Week 3 with a high ankle sprain. Langford isn't out for the year, but we won't be relevant again until mid-November. Awful week for lamone, but he's got a big matchup at the Chyl-Zone this weekend.