GWBL - 2022 Season Recaps - 2nd Place

Team:

Henry Hurts - Tieg (8-6) - 2,018 points (2nd of 10)

What Went Right:

We’ll start with Derrick Henry, the 4th player taken in the draft. After an injury-limited 2021, Henry came back strong this year and finished as RB4, while only missing one game (more on that later). He had a slow start by his standard - 23 combined in Week 1+2 - but he caught fire the next six games and AVERAGED 33 points per game between Weeks 3-10. One of those included a 48 point bukake in Week 8 where he rushed for 220 and 2 TDs. On the season he averaged 25 a game and only had 4 games with fewer than 18 points.

Jalen Hurts was the other star of the show, one of the two titular characters in fact. (Real original Tieg) Hurts was a 6th round pick and ultimately ended up as QB3 on the year - despite missing 2 games (more on that later). Hurts took a step forward as a passer this year, throwing for 3700 yard, 22 tds and 6 ints. But no one cares about that, it was his rushing that really brought in the fantasy points. Hurts rushed for 760 yards and THIRTEEN RUSHING TDs this season, true video game numbers. He had three games with multiple rushing TDs…..absurd. Only one player in the NFL finished with more rushing TDs than Hurts (fuck jamaal williams) and Hurts tied for 2nd among all players. Tied with Ekeler and Derrick Henry. Just a ridiculous season and it carried Tieg’s team to the finals.

I’m not big on the “stack” strategy in fantasy football, but Tieg executed the Hurts-Devonta Smith stack to perfection. Tieg took Smith 2 rounds after Hurts and the two combined for 7 TDs - that’s 70 fantasy points alone. Smith ended up as the WR9 in our scoring after breaking out.

As with all successful fantasy seasons, Tieg had some really nice timing on his side. During Week 14-15-16, he scored 182-180-201 points and won all three games - two of which were playoff matchups. Other than the 191 he scored in Week 8, those were his three highest scores of the season. From Weeks 9 to 13 he averaged 132 points per game. Right on cue, in time for the final week of the regular season and playoffs - he averaged 188 points. Fantasy is largely attributed to luck, timing, etc and you have no shot without it.

What Went Wrong:

Piggy backing off that - Tieg’s team chose a real inopportune time to crap out. After averaging those 188 per week the prior 3 weeks, his team fell asleep at the wheel and scored 111 in the finals. That was his second lowest point total of the season and his lowest since Week 6. Fantasy is largely attributed to luck, timing, etc and you have no shot without it.

So what happened? His two best players didn’t play. Jalen Hurts got injured and missed Week 16-17, killing Tieg and countless other fantasy owners right in time for the semis and finals (awesome, got me in one league too). LIkewise, Derrick Henry decided the ONE game he’d miss would be Week 17. What a bad beat for the owners of these two. Henry Hurts, you could say.

Aside from that it was some draft busts in the form of WRs. His second round pick Deebo was injured a lot and finished outside the top 30 WRs. His 3rd round pick Keenan Allen missed the entire first half of the season. He came back strong and finished with some big games, but he was largely unavailable the first 10 weeks of the season. Last but not least - his 5th rounder Courtland Sutton fell victim to the Russel Wilson disaster.

Best Owner Move:

Evan Engram in the 15th round was a nice move for Tieg. Low cost, big upside. After disappointing owners for years, Engram finally broke out in 2022 - he’s TE5 and averages 11 per game. Of course it’s the year noone buys into him.

Donta Foreman is the other one - a FA add for zero dollars. No one was quite sure who’d take the Panthers RB job after Mccaffrey was traded, but Foreman quickly assumed the role and had a huge second half. Right off the bat he went for games with 22 and 40 fantasy points and all in all, he averaged 16+ per game the last 11 weeks of the season.

Worst Owner Move:

Not much here honestly, I guess I’d say “starting Gardner Minshew in the finals”. He wouldn’t have won anyways and Minshew did have a huge Week 16, but it didn’t work out.

Preseason Prediction:

I said he’d finish outside the playoffs - wrong again. I did say I wouldn’t be surprised if this projection was wrong, but I didn’t realize 2 players could carry a team. 5 of 9 here, yuck.

ESPN said 8 of 10 - ESPN is 7 for 9 now.

Final Thoughts:

A really strong follow up to his 2021 title, so Tieg can’t be upset with the result. All in all he’s cleared more than 1,000 on this league these past two years, so he’s in the black on fantasy for the next few years. As I mentioned in Dyl’s recap, he’s firmly established himself as a top team in this league and I’m sure we’ll see him back in the playoffs next year.