So last time I covered three weeks in one post, now I’m doing two. Maybe next week I’ll do just one. Who knows? The regular season may be it for this MBS mainstay, as I have important playoff things to worry about. We’ll see, but there will definitely be some more retrospective graphs and charts as we wrap things up and I explore the source of my last LeagueStory post: Flourish. Seems like they’ve got what it takes to give dumb guys like me who can’t code the ability to make nice-looking animated data visualization. Isn’t technology wonderful? Anyway, let’s take a look at the past 2 weeks before it’s Sunday again:
From a cursory look at the trusty chart for Week 13, it looks like this is the highest percentage of players dropped due to being on IR or BYE so far. There were also a few players added who were on BYE , including our most expensive McBackup for the second week this year. Our healthy and fearless Commissioner dropped a quarter of his entire FAAB budget for Chuba Chubs, beating out Tommy by a single buck and Kris and Max by A Few Dollars More (shoutout Clint Eastwood I guess). As I mentioned, the Panthers were on a bye week, which means my analyses of dollars spent to points became even more useless than it already was. On the other side of this transaction was Mike Gesicki, who in the span of one week found himself dropped from Thomas and Friends, then picked up by the REAL Thomas (and Friends), and finally dropped again for Foster “Australian for Beer” Moreau, the man who replaced the injured Waller-by (that’s TWO Australia jokes in one sentence, omfg). It’s safe to say that if Mike G got passed around like that this past week, he’d almost certainly have COVID by now.
So the closest game of Week 13 was Ryan vs. Brad, a slim 3.82 points made the difference. Looking back, the chart seems to show that it didn’t have to be this close. Every Wire move made by Brad helped him out by a little bit, and every move Ryan made resulted in negative net points. It just wasn’t enough to make the difference where it mattered. Something similar happened with the match-up between Brent and Thomas (8 points). There wasn’t one move made by Thomas that would have given him the dub, but if he kept Mike G then he would have lost by 3.9 instead of 8. Pretty funny how the losers of both of these close games played each other in an even CLOSER game the next week.
One game that actually had real Wire consequences in Week 13 was Kris vs. Beans. Both teams are trying to save face after some seriously stinky performances for the bulk of the regular season. I think that deep dive I did into Kris’ long-term performance and close win against Ryan in Week 9 (go back and check it out;)) really whipped the reins against the hide of the Norse Horse, because he’s been running like a madman as of late and actually finished with the third most points in the regular season. This ascension has been complemented by two Week 13 moves that undisputedly gave him the win over the Founder of our humble website. First was bidding on Tevin Coleman in auction (first FAAB spent on a Jet this season!) and getting a 9 point return on a $2 investment. Second was somehow knowing that Sony Michel would return to a form not seen since Week 16 of *2018* (100+ yards and a TD). Those 20 points plus Tevin’s 9 truly made the difference, as Kris ended up winning by 24.42. As we know, Beans is focused on next season, so it’s all good.
Aside from Kris’ return on Tevin, the best auction move was made by me by grabbing the Colts Defense for $10 and 16 points. Aside from the superficial $25 loss Andrew took on Chuba, the worst move was Abie dropping $21 on Matt Breida who only scored 1.3 points. Woof. Moving on…
Week 14, it’s like the leap day of football. It’ll be interesting to see how they handle regular season stats from here on out and comparing them to previous 13-week regular seasons. For the second week in a row, the most expensive auction player for the week was on a BYE, this time in the form of me dropping $13 on Kenny Gains. I’d like to think I was looking to future match-ups, which I think the podcast did mention as a guess for why I did that. Next up was Ryan, who spent $9 on Tevin Coleman (one for each point he scored the previous week heheh). What was wrong with Ty Johnson though? Apparently nothing, because he ended up scoring 7.7 after being dropped from Marzy’s Martians. Max really did have decent amount of opportunities to win against his out-of-this-world opponent and just didn’t take them. The cherry on top was when Max picked up Jermar Jefferson after Jamaal Williams went down (not such a bad trade after all I guess) and Jefferson cracked a nice stinky g00se egg all over Max’s Bama Butt. At least this pick-up of KJ Osborn made it a little less embarrassing for the guy that talks about sports for a living.
Lastly, I just want to talk a little about the insanely close game between Thomas and Brad. It was decided by 0.46 points, the second smallest margin in LeagueStory and it was the two rookies, we truly love to see it. I think everyone was heartbroken that Brad ended up on the losing end of that match-up, even Thomas himself. I’m pretty sure he could have lost and still made playoffs, but I’m not gonna check because this column is getting pretty close to rambling (y’all are thinking “close? it’s been all rambling for the past two years!” it’s okay). Why couldn’t Jaylen Guyton get one more reception, even for 0 yards??? We’ll have to ask him when he comes onto the pod. Why couldn’t Beans bid a few more dollars on the Packers D to sabotage Thomas and help out his buddy at the bottom? Why didn’t Brad pick up Money Mac who scored 11 as opposed to Daniel Carlson’s 2? I could go on, but I won’t. Let the old boy get some rest and start working on those jokes.
So there we go! Thank you as always for reading, it’s really appreciated and I always have a fun time writing about you guys and the players you all decide to go with each week. Since this might be the last edition of The Wire for the season (I’ll still be keeping stats and decide to write something if anything significant happens), I’m thinking about creating a feedback survey to see what you guys like and don’t like about the column and how I can improve. Be brutal, I need it. There will be some kind of incentive too, maybe $5 or something for your time. Can’t wait for the playoffs, see y’all there, Go League!
Must Be Sunday 