2020 Season Recaps - 3rd Place

3rd Place: Slight Brees (6-7) – Tieg Bean

Coming in 3rd place with 1,531 points scored (6th) is Slight Brees, owned by Tieg Bean.

What Went Right:

I have to say it - Tieg was lucky to even make the playoffs, never mind finish in 3rd place. That sounds harsh, but let’s look at the facts: making the playoffs with a 6-7 record is fortunate considering he lost more games than he won. He also scored fewer points (1,531) than his opponents scored against him (1,630).

Oh yeah…. we could also throw in the fact that he started off the year 0-6 and still made playoffs. Really? 0 and 6 and still made playoffs????!?!? Only Tieg.

Speaking of “Only Tieg”, we all know where this is going. Taysom Hill. This is an absolute SAGA, so hold on to your butts:

Heading into Week 11 Tieg was 3-7 and on life support. If a team has ever started 3-7 and made playoffs before, it’s news to me. Lamone started 0-5 and made playoffs last year, but he was 4-6 heading into Week 11. Tieg made playoffs after starting 0-4 in 2018, but he was also 4-6 heading into Week 11.

Anyways Week 11 comes around and Drew Brees has been ruled out for 2-4 weeks. Tieg makes a nice play by adding Taysom Hill - who had been QB and TE eligible all year - to his TE spot. Hill wasn’t expected to start at QB for the Saints, but he was expected to get touches and be a part of the offense. Surely he’d be better than the slew of waiver TEs Tieg had trotted out on his way to the 3-7 record. Good play by Tieg and was within the rules at the time.

On Friday of that week, in a shocking move, the Saints bypassed Jameis Winston and named Hill their starter at QB. All of a sudden anyone who had Taysom Hill got to start a 2nd QB in their FLEX or TE spot. Considering the fact that all but maybe 5 TEs are an abomination in fantasy football, this was a BIG advantage. Tieg parlayed that advantage into a 140-138 win over Kev in Week 11, when Hill contributed 29 points from his TE spot – while playing every snap at QB.

On Monday of the following week, ESPN changed their rules and declared Hill ineligible at TE. I’m not here to say whether I agree with their move or not, just to explain what happened. Anyways while they didn’t remove him from anyone’s starting lineup, they blocked every team that had him in the TE or FLEX spot from making waiver claims or editing the rest of their lineup until he was moved to the bench or QB spot. If you were fortunate enough to not have any injuries, byes, or covid issues heading into Week 12, you could keep him in your TE spot and employ what at that time - as decided by ESPN - was an illegal lineup. This of course put every league/commissioner in a tough spot as ESPN pushed the decision making on to them.

At this point Tieg was 4-7 and I was playing against him in Week 12. This is where my mistake occurred – I should have immediately put it to a league vote and let the league decide on whether or not to allow Tieg to continue to start Hill at TE – after ESPN declared it illegal. Alas, I didn’t take Tieg’s team seriously, didn’t want to look biased because I was playing him that week and ultimately decided to do nothing. I assumed the situation would resolve itself by the time playoffs came around or that Tieg would lose one of his last 3 matchups. Tieg went on to beat my team by 20 in Week 12 when Hill scored exactly 20 points. I’m not claiming that Tieg beat me solely because of Taysom Hill, because as long as Tieg got 1 single point from whatever TE he would have started (instead of Hill), he would have beat me anyways.

Week 13 rolled around and at 5-7 it was win or go home for Tieg. (He also needed some help from Ken and Lamone.) I noticed Tieg had a bye-week player in his starting lineup and figured this was the end of the Taysom Hill saga. Surely Tieg would drop the gambit and fill out a full lineup in the penultimate week of the season right? Wrong. In a definitively slimey move, Tieg fielded an incomplete lineup and won his Week 13 game. As I mentioned in Ken’s recap, it’s arguable that Tieg would have won anyways since Ken’s team didn’t do much in Week 13. Sure enough Tieg snuck his way into the last playoff seed.  

Week 14 rolls around and I again assume that Tieg will take Hill out of his lineup. Surely he’d want to put Chris Godwin in his lineup, or at least start a Kicker? (Kicker DNP in Week 14). Nope. Tieg rolls it back with the same illegal and incomplete lineup and wins again in Round 1.

While the Taysom Hill start didn’t cause Tieg to win (see Rob D’s writeup), enough was enough and I decided to take action as commissioner. I could just feel something unsavory coming. I could feel it in my bones. So I texted Tieg 1 on 1 and asked him to remove Hill from the TE spot and field a legitimate lineup. He wasn’t receptive to my texts, so I put it to a league vote - after a 6:4 vote I removed Hill out of his TE spot. Ironically enough Drew Brees ended up playing in Week 15 and Tieg lost to Kev anyways, so it all ended well.

To close it out - I don’t defend my slow response. I 100% unequivocally should have acted after Week 11 when ESPN did. Instead I dragged my feet and assumed the situation would resolve itself. That’s on me and I apologize to everyone in the league for not being more proactive. Ken and Rob D were probably impacted the most, so that apology goes double to you guys. I do defend the decision to act eventually and the decision was justified - Tieg did not win the league with a QB in his TE spot/an illegal lineup.

At the end of the day, the season is tarnished to some extent. Is my title coming with an asterisk? Some of you will say yes, but I say no. Looking back at the Round 1 and 2 matchups, I still would have beat Frader and Keetz given the scores. Rob D would have lost to Ken in Round 1 and Ken would have lost to Kev in Round 2. In this alternate timeline, Kev and I meet in the finals again and I still get lucky and win. Not the most iron-clad logic, but not a stretch by any means. And rant over.

What Went Wrong:

Kenyan Drake had a terrible start and Chris Godwin was a bust. David Johnson and Terry McLaurin also had some tough moments. I’ve spent a lot of time on this recap already so we’ll move on.

Preseason Prediction:

“I predict Tieg goes 6-7 and misses the playoffs.”

 Another miss and I’m not 3 right and 5 wrong.

Final Thoughts:

Here’s to hoping that for the first time in 3 years, Tieg doesn’t do something in 2021 that causes drama for the league. Slainte.