GWBL - 2021 Season Recaps - 10th Place - GABRIEL
Ladies and Gentlemen - the playoffs are here and 60% of the league has been eliminated. While the semi finals are the focal point of the league right now, it’s also necessary for us to honor the fallen. As with past years, I’m going to give a recap of each team and how their season went - things that went well, things that didn’t go well, good roster moves, bad roster moves, etc. Ultimately we’ll try to paint a picture of what happened - outside of just the final standings. In reverse order of the standings:
10th Place: A Finkle In Time - Jon Frader: 3-11 record, 1,571 points scored (9th):
What Went Right:
Frader got the third pick in the draft which was a good start I guess? He was guaranteed to get one of the top 4 RBs, which ended up being Alvin Kamara.
The first half of the season went reasonably well for Frader. He was 3-4 through 7 weeks and firmly in contention. He had a couple of ugly losses in there, but his team put up 140+ in each of his 3 wins.
I won’t try to polish this turd so let’s move on.
What Went Wrong:
The second half of Frader’s season was an unmitigated disaster. He lost 7 straight games to end the year and averaged 105 points per week. During that 7 game losing streak he failed to top 100 in 3 games - nearly half of the time. The highest scoring team (Bob D) in our league scored 129 per week, while the 5th highest scoring team (Luma) scored 126 per week. Averaging 105 per week just isn’t going to cut it in this scoring set up.
Frader “earned” the Gabriel with a walk off Week 14 loss, paired with a Week 14 win by Kev. This is actually the 2nd time he’s been the Gabriel, with 2016 being the last time.
A lot of things went wrong so I’m going to bullet point the rest:
Alvin Kamara had a relative down season and is only RB13 (3rd RB drafted). He’s played really well when healthy, but missed 4 games from weeks 10-13, all losses for Frader.
His 2nd round pick Calvin Ridley is WR94 on the season. Yes, nearly 100 WRs have been better than him. Injury? No. Poor QB play? No. None of the usual excuses here, this guy just didn’t want to play football this year. Sadly for his owners (I am one), it came to light that he wanted to take a mental health break and he has not played since Week 7. There were also no updates so you had to hold this guy on your roster in case he came back - which he hasn’t. I hate to sound crass or not take these issues seriously, but what a let down this guy was. Just quit on his team and boned his fantasy football owners. The frustrating thing is he was playing pretty well and averaged 11 points per game when he did play. Oh well, hopefully he’s okay and is back next year.
The 3rd round wasn’t kind to Frader either - AJ Brown is barely within the top50 WRs and has missed 4-5 games with injury. He had a few big days and ultimately averaged 10+ points per game when he did play, but he had 6 games with 7 or fewer points.
This is getting crazy - Frader’s 4th round pick was kind of a bust as well. Robert Woods had a slow start to the season and tore his ACL before Week 10. As with Ridley/Brown he was effective when playing (!3 points per game), but it was too small of a sample size.
Rounds 6-7-8 were not good for Frader either. Kareem Hunt missed a ton of time with injury, Chase Claypool is a clown and Raheem Mostert tore his ACL in Week 1.
Eeeeekk what a rough season….
Best Owner Move:
Adding Cordarrelle Patterson for $50 of FAAB on Wednesday 9/22. At the time I thought it was an egregious overpay, but Patterson has had a career year. He’s a top 10RB despite missing a game and averages 18 points per week. He’s always been talented, but never found a consistent role on the 3-4 teams he was with prior to signing with the Falcons. Surprisingly, the Falcons were able to unlock his talent and Frader reaped the benefits.
Worst Owner Move:
Tough to pinpoint one bad move he made, but I’ll say Week 12 when he started Mark Ingram even though he was declared out well in advance of game time. He probably wouldn’t have won the matchup anyways, but it put an accent on his season and caused unnecessary drama in the league group chat. (It was Thanksgiving and the night game so you figured he would have been on top of it? Especially with the time zone preference, but IDK).
ESPN Projection:
ESPN ranked Frader as the 8th best team after the draft, but saw him fall to 10 in-season. Not bad ESPN, I’d say that’s 1 for 1.
Final Thoughts:
What a ridiculous string of bad luck. Injuries mainly, but underperformance as well. You also can’t plan for something like Calvin Ridley’s absence, that’s unprecedented in fantasy football or really sports in general. Just have to chalk this up as a wasted season and move on.
Aside from the bad luck, Frader had a lot going on during 2021 with a move, an engagement, a wedding to plan, etc. Considering the fact he didn’t change his team name from 2020, it’s fair to wonder if he just “wasn’t into it” this year. He’s still a threat in the league as evidenced by the fact he made playoffs in 2019 and 2020, but he’ll need to refocus next year and try to make a comeback.
