GWBL WEEK 9 - WHAT YOU MISSED (PART 1)
Welcome back one and all to another edition of GWBL entertainment - Week 9 edition. It’s been a few weeks since we last checked in, so let’s see what you may have missed. From 1st to last place:
Tool Time - Rob D (7-2)
It’s been more of the same for Rob D as he’s won 2 of his last 3. He continues to pace the league and somehow continues to do it without his #1 pick doing much of anything. Jonathan Taylor has quietly (?) been one of the bigger busts in fantasy football given the struggles of the Colts offense and his own injuries (missed 3 games). Doesn’t matter for Rob D though, he’s still in 1st place.
So how has he done it? Nick Chubb continues to produce enough fantasy points for 2 RBs, more than making up for the lack of Jonathan Taylor. Chubb averages 26 a game and is RB3 even coming off his bye. (That factoid will be N/A soon, thankfully we’re almost through the major bye weeks.) He’s also found a lot of production from the Island of Mediocre RBs, getting elite point totals from the not so elite Jamaal Williams and Jeff Wilson. This came up in the league chat, but Jeff Wilson as a spot starter in Week 9 was especially frustrating for RB-challenged teams like myself. Wilson was traded on Tuesday, picked up by Rob D on Saturday and had stolen the starting RB job from Raheem Mostert by Sunday afternoon (Mostert is on my team, obviously). Wilson scored 18 points in a Rob D win and scored a receiving TD. That receiving TD was his first receiving TD since 2018. LOL. Typical.
He’s pretty much clinched playoffs and is close to the bye so we’re looking at the likely #1 seed here.
I Love Kissin TDs - Kev (6-3)
Like Rob D, Kev’s been on a roll lately, winning 2 of his last 3. Honestly Kev should probably be 8-1 at this point as two of his losses were horrible luck. He lost 105-109 in Week 6 and then lost 167 to 193 in Week 8. Losing when your opponent scored 109 is misery defined and the 193 in Week 8 were a season high for Lamone. Could very easily be 8-1.
Mahomes continues to pace Kev’s team and had a noteworthy performance in Week 9 - 44 points. I wish I could slap all the fantasy “experts” who said to “wait on QB” in draft season. This year has easily been the most frustrating year for QBs in fantasy history and I will be taking Josh Allen with my first pick next year*.
Aside from QB Kev’s relied on very solid production from up and down his roster, seemingly alternating every week. One week Dallas Goedert puts up 26. The next week Josh Jacobs puts up 45. The week after that it’s Mccaffrey with 33. On and on. One scary note though - Aaron Jones got hurt this last week and will need to be monitored. Given the Packers season is done they may take it easy with their only good offensive player.
In any case we’re likely looking at a top 4 seed in the playoffs here.
Jimmy 2Times n the Mafia Don - Dyl (6-3)
*Speaking of the Josh Allen….. Dyl’s QB had a little injury scare this week. Normally a UCL injury is a death sentence but football is different than baseball. And Josh Allen is different than most people. I saw a clip where he threw a 70 yard pass after tweaking the injury. I think he’ll be fine, but just in case Dyl should probably add a bench QB. (Want to trade for Russel Wilson? LOL)
I buried the lead here - Kenneth Walker has been a complete stud and saved the RB room for Mafia Don. Dyl spent 148 of his 150 FAAB budget on him and Walker has been worth every penny. His last 4 games have been 23, 36, 16, and 36 points. The fact I drafted this guy and then dropped him 2 weeks in makes me want to puke. The fact Frader added him then dropped him after that makes me want to puke for Frader.
Deandre Hopkins is another thing you may have missed - Kyler Murray certainly missed him while he was out. In the 3 games he’s been back he’s totaled 72 fantasy points on 26 catches, 298 yards and 2 TDs. That’s more than Kyle Pitts’ has in catches and yards this entire season. FML.
As with our other top teams, Dyl’s won 2 of his last 3. Crazy stat - Dylan scored the exact same amount of points in Weeks 7 and 8. 131.35 to the decimal. Crazy. Things are looking pretty good for Dyl right now, Josh Allen pending.
Super Coopers - Keetz (5-4)
Another top team, another team on a nice run right now. 2 of his last 3 and averaging 157 a week in that span. This past week he put up a league high 170, the third time he’s put up 168+ in a week. Ridiculous, I’m definitely revisiting the scoring after this season. Anyways let’s look at some individual performances.
I was wondering who the lucky Travis Etienne owner was and we found him. Etienne has suddenly morphed into Derrick Henry and totaled 53 carries in the past two games alone (33 and 35 points). This is a guy who only rushed more than 20 times TWICE IN HIS FOUR YEAR COLLEGE CAREER. And that was back in 2018!! It’s been almost 4 years since he had a game with more than 20 rushing attempts and he’s done it twice in a row now. Props to Keetz for identifying the talent and hanging on to it (unlike me/Frader with Kenneth Walker), but this is one of the things that’s irritating the hell out of me in this 2022 season. The completely weird and inexplicable outputs from players - some good but mostly bad (looking at you Aaron Rodgers and TB12). If you told me Etienne had 53 carries in a 4-5 game span I’d say “yeah, that seems about right”. Instead he gets that many in a 2 week span, back to back. Prior to those 2 weeks his season high was 14 carries soooooo yeah put this one in the “classic 2022 fantasy season” column.
Sorry, that got negative. Let’s end on a positive - TJ Hockenson. Hockenson got traded to the Vikings and it’s seemingly unlocked a new level for him. It always seemed like Detroit couldn’t maximize his talents but so far so good with the Vikings. 9 catches on 9 targets for 70 yards in his debut. Good things to come here.
Hill Bill - DMO (5-4)
Things were looking really good for DMO the last time we checked in, but he’s gone 1-2 in his last three and didn’t even set a complete lineup in Week 9. I’m not sure anyone on his bench could have made up the difference in his Week 9 matchup, but it’s not a good sign either way. He does have “2 under 2” so we can give him a pass for this week.
Widening the scope - his team’s actually struggling a bit the last 5 games and he’s only averaged 126 per week in that span. Good in a normal league, not good enough in this inflationary environment (comeon, it’s election day I had to). He had a lot of byes in that period but Week 10 seems to be the last of his major bye weeks. If he can right the ship he’ll have no problem making a playoff run.
