OBITUARIES - 9TH PLACE

Team/Record/Owner:

Coming in 9th place with a record of 4-9 and 1,511 points scored (7th most) is You Done Messed Up A A Ron! Owned by Jon Frader.

What Went Right:

Frader’s wide receivers have performed really well for him this year. He took 3 WRs with his first 5 picks and the investment paid off. Michael Thomas is WR5, Deandre Hopkins is WR8 and JuJu Smith Schuster is WR9. Aside from Ken’s friend Hasudin, Frader is the only person with 3 WRs in the Top 10 of WR scoring. Hasudin and Frader are also the only two teams to have 3 WRs in the top 15.

On the whole, the three WRs have 254 catches for 3,339 yards, 20 TDs and 604 fantasy points. They each have 80 or more catches, 1,100 or more yards and average 6+ TDs. As someone who’s struggled with WR production all year long, this is pretty impressive.

What Went Wrong:

A number of things went wrong, but I want to highlight two draft picks here. These draft picks were what I like to call “reaches”. “Reaching” is when you select a player much higher than you should because you really like them and “need” to have them (awesome insight Commish).

The first one was Aaron Rodgers – he was the first QB taken in our draft at #35 overall (4th round). A 4th round pick is too early for a QB, but Rodgers has the potential to be worth it. Unfortunately for Frader, the Packers have been an unmitigated disaster this season and Rodgers is one of the main culprits. (Aside from Mike McCarthy and a terrible defense - but, a terrible defense should actually help Rodgers…) After Week 13’s middling performance (18.8 pts), he’s QB11 on the year. Maybe he’s still dealing with the knee injury that he suffered in Week 1, maybe his issues with Mike McCarthy have just derailed his season. Whatever the reason is Rodgers has been nothing short of a let down. To make matters worse, Rodgers had some of his worst games in the last two weeks of the regular season. A Aron averaged 15 points per game in those two games, but If you take out our “points per completion rule”, he’s averaging 13.5 fantasy points in the last two weeks. Yikes.  

The Jaguars D was the other reach pick – 9th round, #86 overall. I don’t need to tell you that the 9th round is way too early for a defense, that’s common knowledge in fantasy football. That being said, this was the one time you could make an exception. The Jaguars were supposed to be a once in a generation type defense. They were the #1 defense in 2017 and averaged 12 fantasy points per game. They scored 8 TDs, while registering 21 interceptions and 55 sacks. They were dubbed “Sacksonville” for cryin out loud. Sadly for Frader this pick flopped as well. Through 13 weeks the Jaguars are the 22nd ranked defense. NOT EVEN IN THE TOP TWENTY! They have scored 1 TD this year, while notching 9 interceptions (20th) and 24 sacks (27th). They are coming on a bit as of late, but they’ve been dreadful for most of the year.

Overall Frader reached really bad twice. Both of them were complete failures and both were a big reason why he finished 9th. FAILLUUREEESS

Best Owner Move:

Drafting Tarik Cohen in the 12th round was probably Frader’s best move (#115 overall). Cohen has more or less taken the starting job in Chicago and has registered 315 rushing yards, 59 catches, 660 receiving yards and 6 TDs on the year (plus 1 passing TD). He’s currently RB12 in our fantasy scoring. (Unfortunately Frader didn’t start him that often, but see below for that.)

Worst Owner Move:

Setting his weekly lineup proved to be a tall task for Frader this year – especially with regards to his running backs.

In Week 3 he started Sony Michel (8.2 points), but benched Chris Carson (29 points).

In Week 4 he started Jordan Howard (5 points) and Rashaad Penny (9 points), while Sony Michel (25 points) and Tarik Cohen (33 points) were on his bench.

In Week 9 he started Chris Carson (6 points) and Tarik Cohen (7 points), while Jordan Howard (20 points) was on his bench.

In Week 11 he started Tarik Cohen (7 points), while Jordan Howard (11 points) was again on his bench).

Week 13 was a fitting end to the season – he started Chris Carson (15 points) and Sony Michel (11 points), while Tarik Cohen put up 34 points on his bench.

This is some of the worst roster management I’ve ever seen and I didn’t touch on his QB or FLEX decisions (there were more in there). Some of it is just bad luck, but holy shit pick an RB and stick with him.

Speaking of roster management, roster construction seems to be an issue for Frader. He currently has two kickers on his team and that’s been the case for the last three weeks. Why do you need two kickers? Oddly enough Robby D also has two kickers on his roster right now – I guess it’s not surprising that they’re the worst two teams. (They probably just gave up, which is even worse.)

Draft Recap/Prediction:

I predict Frader goes 8-5, earns a playoff bye AND IS YOUR 2018 GW BUSH LEAGUE CHAMPION. While there are some question marks about his RB group, the rest of his team is elite at every position. He got boned with the David Johnson pick last year and I think the luck reverses this year.

Man I am killing it with these predictions. 0-2 so far.

Applicable Quote:

“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” – Mike Tyson

Frader had a plan on draft day – go heavy with WRs and have the best WR group in the league. He then figured he could piece together an RB group with mid-round picks and waiver wire adds. I’ve heard it referred to as the “Zero-RB strategy” by fantasy experts and it wasn’t uncommon. While he executed the plan well with regards to his WRs, he got punched in the mouth when it came to RBs. You need a balanced team to win in this league and you generally need at least one elite RB. Frader had neither and it led to a 9th place finish.

Final Thoughts:

It’s been a rough few years for Frader and he’s missed the playoffs again. I have 8 years of recorded history for our league (starting in 2011) and Frader has missed the playoffs just 3 times. Playoffs in 5 of 8 years isn’t bad, but the sequencing of it has been tough. After making playoffs each of the first five years, he’s failed to make the playoffs each of the past 3 seasons. It’s actually the 2nd year in a row he nearly got the Gabriel. The last time he was in a playoff game was during the 2015 season so if Frader makes the playoffs next year, it will have been almost 4 full calendar years since his last playoff appearance. Can he break the streak next year and get back to the dance?