The
Decepticons won for the second time in three weeks and given this late
season surge their odds of winning the PQBFL title have greatly
increased. They knocked Bas out of the race this week and the
wobbling Wax still hang on but they are now behind by 5 rank-points
without the tie-breaker. Unless Dec stumbles next week, the race
might be over before week #17. This week was the lowest scoring
of the entire season so given that Dec’s QB-RB-RB-WR-WR all scored
double digits was good enough, even though Mahomes had his second
lowest score of the year with 18.25 pts. Defense did it again for
Dec. LB D Jones intercepted a pass and returned it for a TD,
further padding his lead at the top LB in the league in average per
game (15.3 pts), in front of co-Dec LB Wagner (12.3 pts). JJ Watt
did almost as good as Jones with 17 pts, thanks to 2 sacks and a forced
fumble. The Saints D was awful early during the season but they
have been improving lately and held the Panthers to only a TD this week
for a total of 14.5 pts. It’s one of those years for Dec, even
when the coach makes a rare mistake of starting an injured kicker, the
backup scored zero on the bench so no consequence for sleeping at the
wheel.
The Ballers finished second for back-to-back weeks and took over 6th
place in the standings ahead of OldNo7 by a single rank-point.
That battle is probably going to go down the wire until the last
week. After a huge pop in week #14, D Henry did not rest on his
laurels and followed up with another big game with 24 pts. D
Watson was also productive with 25.75 pts, and Ju Jones scored a TD to
contribute with 17 pts. Even WR Golladay had a decent game with
14.25 pts in replacement for injured ODB. It is because of
defense that Dec beat the Ballers this week, not offense. The
Bears were so-so in their win against the Packers with only one
turnover and no sack for 5 pts. The Bears are still the top
defense in the PQBFL by a wide margin (11.6 pts) vs Vikings (Adm) at
8.1 pts per game but this week was not their shiniest display.
LBs V Williams (3 pts) and M Jack (6 pts) had a week to forget, and DB
Ju Simmons’s 7 pts was nothing to write home about either. Only
DL C Campbell beat his weekly projection with 12 pts. Rookie LB
Edmunds also failed to top his projection with 8 pts this week.
WaxOnWaxOff scored a very subpar 125.75 pts but got away with third
place by closely edging a competitor, this time beating Beaud by only
2.25 pts. J Mixon was the team leader with 2 TDs and 129 yds
rushing for a total of 21.75 pts. The other starting RB Carson
benefited from Penny’s injury to get the lion’s share of carries and
scored a TD to finish with 17.25 pts. The Steelers did not do
much on offense but A Brown caught a TD on four short receptions to
salvage an ok week with 13.25 pts. Starter Roeth did not fare as
well with 2 INTs and 12.5 pts. Wax was able to beat Beaud in part
because of kicker Gould who had his best week of the year with 12 pts
while backup Boswell was limited to 3.5 pts on the bench so it was an
excellent coaching decision. Rookie LB Leonard continued to get
the job done with 14 pts – that guy won’t stop. The TE position
has been problematic as of late because of injuries to J Reed and J
Doyle, and now this week Hooper scored a goose egg. The Rams D
was even worse finishing into negative territory against the Eagles,
which is a coaching call which did not pay off given that the Bills D
scored 5 pts which was better than negative.
The BeaudoinBrothers finished in the middle of the pack in 4th place
which allowed them to move closer to the Admirals in the
standings. LB L David led the way with 22 pts in a big game with
10 tackles, 2 assists, 2 sacks, 1 fumble recovery and 3 QB hits.
DL Mack was not too bad either with 2.5 sacks and 3 QB hits for 16.5
pts. With this game he has taken the lead over A Donald (Wax) as
the top DL in the PQBFL. The best on offense was rookie J Allen
who has been doing very well since coming back from injury. This
week he scored 20 pts and he has averaged over 21 pts per game in the
four weeks since coming back. The rest of Beaud’s offense was
dreadful except perhaps for D Johnson who scored a short TD, but
everyone else was limited to single digits. The worst news was K
Allen getting injured early in the game before he could catch one pass
– this cost Beaud 3rd place for sure. Luck did not even throw a
TD pass because the Colts got ahead early with TD runs by M Mack (Dec)
so Luck played conservative the rest of the game with the Colts D
shutting down the Cowboys. For the same reason, TY Hilton’s
contribution was modest but at least he caught 5-85. Bone-head
Fournette barely played in the second half when he got benched so he
only scored 5.25 pts.
OldNo7 finished 5th with a mediocre 115 pts and lost 6th place in the
standings to the Ballers. Old has scored more points overall than
Ball so they would hold the tie-breaker but they need to do better if
they want to avoid finishing 7th. Old did not submit a lineup and
it means injured McCoy started and suspended D Lee did as well.
Given that T Coleman scored 20 pts on the bench, plus a few extra
points from a backup LB, Old could have easily finished 3rd instead of
5th, and depending on the choice of Defensive Flex player, Old could
have finished 2nd by starting D Buckner who also scored 20 pts on the
bench. Old’s WRs were awful this week, Thielen had his worst game
in week #14 but he did even worse again in week #15 with only
2-19. A Cooper’s miracles are over and he was limited to 6
pts. Kelce was fine but did not score so he ended with 10
pts. Old’s only 2 high performers where D Cook with 26.5 pts and
M Ryan with 26 pts, otherwise Old would have finished dead last without
them. Even rookie Michel was disappointing with only 4.75 pts in
a loss in Pittsburgh.
The Admirals finished in the bottom 3 for the fourth straight week, in
the bottom half for the 6th straight week, and lost two more
rank-points to Beaud and might not even finish the season in the top
half after dominating through 9 weeks. C Newton is simply not
healthy and had an awful 2.5 pt game on MNF. With A Smith injured
and D Carr on the bench, it’s not like Adm has a lot of options
here. Gurley bounced back with 20.25 pts after a few up down
downs since week #9, but Ingram did not get the job done with only 6
pts. Similar to the QB position, at RB Adm is short on options
because J White had to give way to injured RBs coming back (S Michel,
Burkhead) and White is no longer productive. D Hopkins finally
had a good week with 32.5 pts after not exceeding 11.5 pts since week
#9. However co-WR M Thomas was so-so with 7-49 and no
score. Ebron was even worse with only 1 reception for 8 yards,
which is not what Adm was used to from the 3rd best TE in the PQBFL
this year. On defense, Adm did not get anything done, with only
21 pts total from the 4 individual defenders plus the Steelers,
everbody scoring between 2 pts and 7 pts.
The GloriousBastards put themselves in prime position to steal the
PQBFL title from Dec after 14 weeks but fell flat on their face in week
#15 and are now out of contention. GB came to within 0.5 pt of
finishing last, something they only did in week #1. With 99 pts
it was the first time this year that GB did not top the century
mark. We should have expected that things would get rough after K
Hunt was released. A Jones was doing well but unfortunately he
got hurt and left the game after only scoring 0.5 pt. It’s going
to be slim pickings from the bench with only Cohen and P Barber as
viable RB options with A Jones and K Hunt out. Starter E Elliott
did not score a TD and lost a fumble to finish with only 8.5 pts.
QB Goff started over Brady which was the wrong move, Goff threw two
more INTs without a TD for 6 pts compared to 14.25 pts from
Brady. On defense, D Davis saved the embarrassment of last place
with 16 pts on MNF but the rest of the defense was shitty with 4 pts
each for R Jones, B Martinez, and C Jordan. The Texans barely did
better with 5 pts.
FlyingElvis finished in their most familiar spot: last place.
This was the 7th bottom finish in 15 weeks, ouch. FE is now an
enormous 21 rank-points behind Old in 7th place so they are
mathematically guaranteed of finishing last. FE has finished in
the bottom half of the standings 14 out of 15 weeks which is mind
boggling, the only decent week being week #4 with 2nd place. This
week there were a few decent games from FE such as DB K Joseph having
his best game of the year with 12 pts, the Jaguars D being solid with
13.5 pts including a TD in a loss at home against the Skins, and
Cousins who scored 18.5 pts, right in line with his weekly
projection. However FE was sunk again by poor RB production,
Drake only carried the ball once despite Gore’s injury which means
Ballage is ahead of Drake the depth chart – how low can Drake go.
Drake was a 5th round pick, what a bust. Duke Johnson was better
with 4.25 pts but he is on his last legs in the PQBFL. Ty Hill
had an off week with only 7 pts and Funchess also does not belong in
the PQBFL, with a second consecutive goose egg. Gronk
disappointed once again with only 4 pts, who knows how low his 2019
value is going to be after this year.
