Nobody had more wins in 2022 than the
GloriousBastards (5) and season 2023 got off to a similar start
thanks to a come from behind win on SNF to beat OldNo7 with a
nearly perfect defensive performance by the Cowboys defense: 2
TDs, 3 turnovers, 7 sacks, one block, only 171 yards allowed a
shutout for a total of 38.5 pts which annihilated their weekly
projection. It
would not be the first time that a pre-draft trade turns out to
be completely lopsided but this time it might be Bas being on
the winning side of it, unlike in the recent past. The Dallas defense was
acquired for a bag of peanuts from Wax a few weeks ago before
saved teams were announced.
But it was not only DAL which shined on defense, LB
Roquan Smith was also lights out with 8 tackles 8 assists and
one sack. On
offense, in a week where many of the top tier QBs struggled,
Herbert’s 19 pts was below projections and he lost the game, but
nonetheless it was good enough for 4th best QB in the
PQBFL. Also RB A
Jones was largely dismissed as a top RB and was not cut from
Bas’ team but he beat all RBs this week, he even beat elite RBs
CMC (Old) and Ekeler (FE) who were 2nd and 3rd. A Jones’ 22.5 pts was
against the Bears however so time will tell if he can keep this
up.
OldNo7 started the year on the right foot with
164.75 pts and was crusing for the win until an unlikely late
surge by Bas relegated Old to second place. Despite the mild last
minute disappointment it was a solid week all around with
various contributors for Old.
Ty Hill justified his franchise player status with 33.75
pts to lead all WRs by a wide margin. Amon-Ra also scored,
as CMC did. On
defense both LBs Singleton and TJ Edwards reached double digits
and the 49ers were the best of the bunch with 18 pts in a tough
road win in Pittsburgh. That
game somewhat played against Old however because the 49ers
limited RB N Harris to only 2.75 pts, that said Old’s backup RBs
did not do much better on the bench so Old was not going to
finish first even with a different starting RB. In fact Old finished
first in the PQBFL for coaching efficiency this week so there is
not a lot more that could have been done except for a perfect
lineup with 100% coaching efficiency would have resulted in a
tie with Bas.
In an otherwise messy week #1 Adm somehow managed
to finish in the blue to salvage a decent week. Three of the top 5
scores by Adm were on defense.
DB Winfield had 4 tackles 4 assists 1 sack 1 forced
fumble and 1 fumble recovery for 18 pts. The Packers defense
was almost as good with 15.5 pts thanks to a defensive TD and 4
sacks. LB Devin
White’s 13 pts was adequate and even the duo of DLs Crosby +
Hutchinson combined for 17 pts which is not bad considering they
were the worst of Adm’s defense.
Offense was more erratic however. D Watson barely beat
his projection with 18.75 pts and Olave was adequate with 13
pts, but Chubb + D Henry did not score a TD which limited their
output. In
addition, Tee Higgins had a shocking goose egg despite being
targeted 8 times. At
TE it could be a long year for Adm with nobody scoring more than
4.25 pts; starter Dulcich had a pedestrian 3 pts. The story was a bit
different at rookie where Gibbs only scored 5 pts but backup Zay
Flowers showed promise with 14.25 pts and could soon find his
way to the starting lineup unlike the TE position where the
cupboards are bare.
The BeaudoinBrothers finished tied in 4th
place with 131.25 pts. The
Bros could have finished third if T Kelce had not been injured
but it cannot mask the fact that it’s very unlikely Beaud could
have finished top 2 this week even with a healthy Kelce. Hurts’ 10.5 pts
matched the lowest that he scored all of 2022 except for the
final week of the season when he was playing injured. Mixon and Stevenson
both failed to reach their projection with only 13.25 pts
combined and starting WRs Adams and Metcalf were only marginally
better with 20.5 pts and also failed to meet their projection. Unlike the RB position
where the bench was equally weak as the starters, at least at WR
the Bros had top games from everybody on the bench – Ridley
Pittman and Aiyuk were all top 6 WRs in the PQBFL this week but
unfortunately all wasted efforts on the bench. Defense was mediocre
for Beaud but LB Quay Walker saved Beaud from a bad week with an
INT returned for a TD otherwise Beaud would have finished 7th.
ProfMJ escaped week #1 with a finish in the top
half of the standings without any big game from any single
player. Pollard led
the way with 15.25 pts but that was mostly because of two short
TDs as his yardage was average (70 rushing yards) and he had a
fumble not lost. LB
Oluokun scored 14.5 pts which was better than his already high
projection and rookie J Addison scored a long TD to finish with
14 pts which was the week’s third best rookie score and
considering that Jay Flowers was benched by Adm, it was the
second best starting rookie score.
Prof has some question marks exiting week #1 however, the
biggest of which was and remains QB. Geno Smith was
horrible in week 1 with only 112 passing yards for 10 pts. Daniel Jones was even
worse with 104 passing yards and 2 INTs. Backup D Carr scored
13.25 pts but he was drafted to be QB3 not QB1 so it’s not
entirely comforting. Also
WR Lamb was drafted third overall during the draft but if the
Cowboys focus on the running game which would benefit Pollard’s
stats it will come at the expense of Lamb who was limited to
only 7.75 pts despite Dallas crushing the Giants.
FlyingElvis had high expectations for 2023 but
started poorly with 6th place and only moved up from
7th to 6th after a scoring error on Dec's team was fixed. Actually, before MNF
FE was in good posture for 3rd place but in a tight
pack from 3rd to 7th FE came out towards
the bottom. MNF was
very painful in part due to franchise player Josh Allen who
turned the ball over 4 times and cost the Bills the game and
massively underperformed his projection. G Wilson was able to
score a TD in that game but losing A Rodgers was definitely not
good news for his outlook for the rest of the season and it will
be very difficult for him to produce at the level of a third
round pick to return adequate value on the investment. JK Dobbins scored 8
pts this week before going down and is lost for the season which
is another blow to FE’s offense but at least FE has more depth
at RB than at WR with Etienne and Akers on the bench scoring
22.75 pts combined which was fine unlike the three backup WRs
who scored 12.25 pts together (M Brown + JuJu + Alec Pierce). One positive this week
was the explosive performance of 20 pts by B Wagner which is a
further exclamation point on the aberrant result that he lasted
until the very last round of the PQBFL draft which makes no
sense at all. Wagner
was the 4th best scoring LB in the PQBFL this week.
WaxOnWaxOff started the year with a catastrophic 89
pts and avoided last place by the slimmest of margins 0.25 pt
over Ball. Joe
Burrow was jaw droppingly bad with only 82 passing yards and no
TD for 2.5 pts and backups will not be there to bail Wax out at
this position with Pickett (6.75 pts) and Stafford (11.75 pts)
both not being starter material.
Barkley only scored 5.25 pts but at least he was playing
a tough defense so it’s too early to panic, although co-RB
Herbert showed he is not the answer. Ju Fields had a bigger
rushing day than Herbert did, and rookie R Johnson was the one
with the rushing TD, not Herbert.
At WR Jefferson had a busy day with 9-150 but no TD
therefore he simply matched his projection 17.5 pts. The real problem was
Drake London who is not ready for prime time. The second year WR was
targeted only once and did not catch that ball so he got the
goose egg and considering how Kirk was ignored by T Lawrence in
favor of Ridley then who will be WR2 for Wax is a key worry at
this stage. Wax was
supposed to have iron-clad defense but none of the superstars
reached double digits. The
Pats came close with 9.5 pts but more was expected of LB Bolton
(7 pts) and B Baker (5 pts).
Even worse was Nick Bosa with only 3 pts – he was
probably rusty for sitting out the preseason before signing a
contract.
The Ballers finished last with only 88.75 pts and
came up short in their attempt of at least finishing 8th
when Diggs scored 20 pts on MNF but DB Sauce Gardner was the
guilty party with only 3 pts while Ju Simmons was benched with 4
pts which would have been a difference-maker. There were many
disturbing games in week #1 for Ball, the major one being Lamar
Jackson only scoring 1 point after all his off-season hype so it
was a big letdown. Perhaps
losing DK Dobbins will put more emphasis on Jackson again at the
center of the offense. Star
RB Josh Jacobs had a huge workload in 2022 so it’s sometimes a
worry for the subsequent season as some RBs cannot repeat one
year later, and week #1 did not do anything to dispel those
concerns. Jacobs
carried the rock 19 times so usage was not the issue but he was
limited to 48 yds so only 2.5 ypc and he did not score. Equally disturbing was
Deebo Samuel’s role in the 49ers offense. It seems Aiyuk is
clicking with Purdy, not Samuel.
Both WRs got almost the same number of targets (8 to 7)
but Aiyuk’s stat line 8-129-2 easily surpassed Samuel 5-55-0. At TE Waller was
supposed to be the centerpiece of the Giants passing offense but
he only scored 4.75 pts as the Giants had no passing offense to
speak of in week #1.
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