Marauders Bring the Title Back to --- Wherever Merrill Lives!

I dunno.  Boca Raton, I think.  Anyway.

Yes, the Marauders won the title for the first time since I've been part of this league (which goes all the way back to last Tuesday 2007), and as you might imagine, Merrill's pretty pumped about it.  So pumped, in fact, that he has specifically requested 'a nice long write up to the league on the Marauder's championship run back to the TTFFL mountaintop'.

A 'nice long write up', you say?  I think I can manage that!  Let's give this a shot ---

Week 1: It was a cold, snowy September morning.  The Marauders' spirits were low, but their hopes were high, as they went in to wherever Pete lives --- Orion River, I suppose --- to take on Pete and his horses hippos.  Led by the surprising Dak Prescott, the hippos put up a formidable 82.9 points, which would ordinarily be enough to crush most TTFFL opponents, but not these Marauders.  With no standout performances by any one player, the Marauders instead brought out above-average play in pretty much their whole lineup to tally an impressive 105.8 points, beating not just Pete, but all other teams in the league as well.

I mean, except for Jody, who won the week with 116.2 points.

Week 2: It was a warm, sunny September morning.  The Marauders' spirits were low, and their point total was even lower, as Merrill made the questionable decision to start Baker Mayfield over Russell Wilson.  Is this the kind of decision-making you really want to have chronicled in sickening detail?!?

Well, whatever!  The mighty Marauders prevailed despite scoring only a puny 55.5 points, because Atom only managed an even punier 51.9 points, thanks mainly to underwhelming performances by Jared Cook (1.3 points), Alvin Kamara (3 points) and Ben Roethlisberger (1.5 points).  The Marauders were 2-0 and on a roll!

Week 3: It was a mild, windy September morning.  The Marauders were hosting their first home game of the season at wherever Merrill lives --- Albuquerque, maybe.  Once again, they faced a high-scoring opponent in Team Harbaughs (Mahomes!  Cook!  Hooper!), and once again, they vanquished that opponent with even mightier firepower (Wilson!  McCaffrey!  Kupp!  Hardman!).  They outscored everyone in the league, including the Ninjas, who had the second-highest score!  The Marauders were quickly demonstrating to the rest of the league that they were not to be trifled with!

Week 4: It was a wet, blustery September morning.  The Maruders went on the road again, at wherever Matt lives --- I actually know this one!  It's in Burnsville; I've been there!  I won 5 straight games of 9-ball against him!

Well anyway.  This week, they faced a laughably overmatched AirMatt team.  I mean, seriously.  EVERY OTHER TEAM IN THE LEAGUE outscored AirMatt by at least 10 points.  Adam Thielen and Odell Beckham scored 1.3 points COMBINED!  It was truly an embarrassing performance by AirMatt.  So embarrassing, in fact, that the Marauders came close to TRIPLING his score, and this was even with Mecole Hardman scoring NEGATIVE 1.6 points.

The Marauders won ANOTHER week, and were a commanding 4-0.

Week 5: It was a warm, snowy October morning.  The Marauders' spirits were high, but their blood sugar was low as they went into wherever it is Taylor lives --- let's call it Tuscaloosa --- for a slugfest against the mighty Air Apparent.

(BTW, what is the deal with the Marauders playing 4 of their first 5 games on the road?  It's almost like the guy who makes up the schedule doesn't even pay attention to home versus road games)

Air Apparent would be nipping at the Marauders' heels all season, and this game was just one example of it.  Both teams put up epic point totals --- Russell Wilson scored 31 points for the Marauders, a point total matched by Matt Ryan for Air Apparent.  Christian McCaffrey scored 29.9 points for Merrill --- BAM!  But Aaron Jones scored 33.1 for Taylor --- COUNTERBAM!  And all of the other players who started that day scored points as well!

But of course, when the dust settled, the Marauders once again claimed victory, and their THIRD CONSECUTIVE weekly win.

Week 6: It was a hot, greasy October morning.  The Marauders were once again back in the comfy confines of wherever it is Merrill lives (I want to say La Jolla).  And there was more on the line this week than just a win or loss --- this week, the mighty 5-0 Marauders faced the even mightier 5-0 Psychotic Ninjas in a battle for league dominance!

Which the Marauders won by a convincing 24-point margin.  So much for the dominance of the Psychotic Ninjas, who essentially disappeared for the next 6 weeks (but we'll hear more about them later).

Week 7: Tragedy struck.  On a freezing cold, yet somehow still warm October morning, the Marauders tasted defeat for the first time, as they hosted the Leviathans.  Despite the best efforts of Ezekiel Elliot (13.4), Josh Lambo (13), Russell Wilson (10.2) and T.Y. Hilton (9.7), the rest of the Marauders team was crap that day, and they fell to a Leviathans team led by Jared Goff (23.5), Ka'imi Fairbairn (12), Tyreek Hill (9.7) and Eric Ebron (9.5).  The rest of the Leviathans didn't play any better than the rest of the Marauders, but the damage was done.  The 13-point advantage Goff gave the Leviathans at the QB position told the tale, and for the first time this season Merrill's Marauders, the scourge of the TTFFL, were defeated.

Sorry, guys.  I just love this image, and I didn't get a chance to use it this season.

Week 8: On a dry, snowy October morning before Halloween, the Marauders hosted a hapless Los Diablos team.  So hapless, in fact, that the Marauders' top three performers --- Russell Wilson, Christian McCaffrey and Darren Fells --- were almost able to defeat Los Diablos single-handedly.  In the entire history of the TTFFL, rarely have we ever seen a team so devoid of hap.

The Marauders recovered from their week 7 loss, and appeared to be back to their dominant ways.

Week 9: November broke with a tasty, vanilla-flavored morning, as the Marauders continued their run of 100+-point performances, this time crushing Kevin and his Golden Grahams into dust.  And while the Grahams had a bit more hap than the previous week's Los Diablos, the Marauders were so dominant that just their top two players --- Russell Wilson, with a stunning 40.6 points, and Christian McCaffrey with a much-less-impressive-but-still-respectable 26.3 --- combined to outscore the whole Golden Graham's team.

The Marauders rang up their fourth weekly win, and seemed unstoppable!

Week 10: In the final game of their 5-game home stand at historic Wherever-Merrill-Lives Stadium (located in scenic downtown Tulsa), the Marauders easily disposed of the puny and insignificant Craptastics.  But the 70.6 - 57.1 final score was mundane, and the Marauders were not as dominating as they had been in previous weeks.

The Marauders were 9-1, but there were clouds on the horizon ---

Week 11: DISASTER!!!  On a hot, muggy, sulphur-laden morning in November, the Marauders hit the absolute low point of their season.  With Russell Wilson on bye and Kyle Allen stinking up the joint, the Marauders tallied their lowest point total of the season (46.1) to go down to defeat against the lowly Strike Team, wherever it is that Aaron lives (what the hell: Port Au Prince).  As bad as it was losing to Aaron, that was nothing compared with ---

Week 12: The Marauders slide continued, as they dropped their rematch against Suspended Atomnation by an agonizingly close 61.8 - 60.6 tally.  But the bleeding didn't stop yet, because ---

Week 13: On a freezing cold December morning, with rocks and garbage falling from the sky, the Marauders visited Orion River for the second time this season (the schedule maker was most likely drunk), to avenge their earlier victory over the hippos.  And avenge it they did, in spectacular fashion, losing to the River Horses by a measly 0.5 points to conclude their regular season on a 3-game losing streak.

Week 14: On a calm, sunny and surprisingly warm December morning, the Marauders played no one at all, because their early-season dominance earned them a first-round bye, despite the fact that they spent the final three weeks of the regular season playing like turds with feet.  They mostly spent the week sitting around the pool sipping margaritas, taking the occasional break to go dangle their toes in the waves.  All in all, the Marauders thought --- life isn't bad.

Week 15: On a starkly violent, wind-tossed and rain-streaked day, filled with broken promises and shattered dreams and stinking of pig vomit, the Marauders won their semifinal-round playoff game, led by the efforts of stupid Ezekiel Elliott and even stupider Christian McCaffrey.  All in all, the whole Marauders team was stupid and bad and didn't deserve to win their playoff game half as much as their kind and noble opponent, the Psychotic Ninjas, who never did anything to hurt anybody and deserved the victory much more and yes they did and nahnahnahnahnah I can't hear you and you're stupid and shut up.

AND FINALLY ---

Week 16: On a crisp, clear, cold but still really quite pleasant Christmas Eve Eve, stuffed with a wild rice, garlic and mushroom stuffing and served with seasoned Italian sausage and garnished with rosemary, thyme and shallots, coated with a lemon garlic butter and served with a side of freshly-picked asparagus, the Marauders finally claimed the title over the scrappy but overmatched Air Apparent.  The championship teams were really quite evenly matched, but the difference in the game was the ridiculous TWENTY-THREE points scored by the Colts' defense for the Marauders.  And most of THAT total came from the ridiculous TWO punt return touchdowns by Nyheim Hines, a player who wasn't even on the Marauders' roster --- which, let's face it, is enough to make you want to tear your hair out.

And with that, the Marauders claimed their first TTFFL title since --- what, 1999?  1972?  I don't know, someone will have to tell me.  That was before my time.

Anyway, congratulations to the Marauders!  Merry Christmas to all!  I will be posting usual end-of-year accounting stuff soon!

(Did you notice that I went through that entire review, and NOT ONCE did I mention that if the Psychotic Ninjas had reversed their scores in weeks 15 and 16, THEY would be the champs, and not Merrill?

I thought it was pretty damn classy of me not to call attention to that fact.  If you had to pick just one word to describe me, I'm pretty sure it would be 'class').

Hi Everybody!

Yeah, it's been a while.  I'm guessing most of you enjoyed the peace and quiet.

Fortunately, I'm back just in time for the week 13 playoff scenarios.  So, let's see --- there are five teams within one game of each other between fifth and ninth place.  Of course, three of them (Air Apparent, Psychotic Ninjas and Suspended Atomnation) have a 6-6 record, so as long as one of them wins, then it comes down to who scores the most points, so ---

NO, WAIT A MINUTE!!!

I forgot all about the stupid Kubicek rule, which means we need to take into account the individual matchups between potential playoff teams.  So if we look at the three 6-6 teams, and consider possible week 13 outcomes, then --- hold on just a minute ---

Oh yeah.  Now I remember why I don't do playoff projections any more.

Well, good luck to everyone but Aaron, I guess.  I'll try to come up with more playoff-appropriate badinage and schadenfreude next week.

Title Week Preview?

The past two weeks in the TTFFL have seen some interesting trades.  As a result, the only two remaining unbeatens have some pretty stacked rosters.  And if this trend continues, consider the possibility of this title game matchup:

	Merrill's Marauders	Psychotic Ninjas
QB	Russell Wilson	Lamar Jackson
RB	Christian McCaffrey	Saquon Barkley
RB	Ezekiel Elliott	David Johnson
WR	T.Y. Hilton	Mike Evans
WR	Cooper Kupp	Tyler Lockett
TE	Mark Andrews	George Kittle
Flex	Melvin Gordon	Kareem Hunt
DST	Steelers	Rams
K	Who	Cares?

Now obviously, this won't happen.  Because one of us will have his team decimated by injuries over the next three weeks.  And the other one will finish the season as the #1 seed, crush their opponent in the semifinals, and then inexplicably put up about 23 points in the title game.

But still.  It's a pretty stunning possibility to comtemplate.

Allow me to introduce --- the Craptastics!!!

Matt has decided that Jason will play the 2019 season under the team name The Craptastics.  And Jason's new avatar is pretty much what you would expect:

This should give Jason added motivation in weeks 1 and 13.  Congrats, Jason!  You earned it!

FAABulous!!!

I am pleased to report that common sense prevailed in the voting for our recent rule change proposal:

So --- that's that.

As far as other proposed rule changes are concerned (and there were several: superflex, changes to QB scoring, PPR scoring, an additional RB/WR/TE flex), I'm not inclined to put any of them up for a vote, because there seems to be substantial opposition to all of them.

On the other hand, if anyone else would LIKE to have a vote on these or any other rule changes, I'm happy to put them out there.  Drop me a line and let me know.

Otherwise, this closes the door on the 2018 season.  Unless another rule change is proposed, I'll (virtually) see you all next year!

Waiting in Line Sucks

Clearly under the influence of some kind of mind-altering chemicals, Adam had this to say about our waiver system:

If it's not broke, don't fix it.  Waiver system has worked fine for years.

At least one other owner has seconded this notion, and after pondering things for a couple of days, there really seems to be only one reasonable response:

Of course, it's possible that this is just a simple difference of opinion.  So I decided to do a scientific test recently.

My daughter is in the 10th grade, and is on her high school dance team.  Next weekend, they're holding their invitational dance meet, which is their major fundraiser for the year.  As part of the dance meet, they're holding a blind auction of various goods and services.

So, during the planning of this event, I went to the moms in charge (it's a dance team; of COURSE the ones in charge are the moms), and I proposed handling the auction a different way.  I suggested that everyone who wanted one of the auction items should stand in a long line, and then we would randomly choose one of the auction items and give it to the first person in line.

Of course, that person might not want it, and if they didn't, they could offer it to the next person in line --- and if they didn't want it, they could offer it to the next person, and so on.  As soon as someone decided they wanted an item, they would have to go to the back of the line before we brought the next item out.

Also, we wouldn't tell anyone what the items were ahead of time.  That way, when people were deciding whether or not to keep an item, they would have no way of knowing whether something better was available.  I explained that while this wasn't really an 'auction', at least this approach still included the 'blind' element.

I assured all of the moms in charge that this was, indeed, the fairest and best way to run the blind auction --- but the moms weren't buying it.

So, I tried my best, I really did.  But it still seems pretty obvious to me that FAAB is the better way to handle waivers.  I do agree with Adam on one point, though.  Since auction is the best way to handle waivers, we should also be using auction for our draft as well.  But I know better than to propose an auction draft to this league.

Anyway, just because we draft the wrong way doesn't mean we need to handle waivers the wrong way!  Heed the wisdom of the dance moms!

(Full disclosure: I lied about the dance moms.  I didn't suggest handling the blind auction differently, because I didn't even go to the planning meeting.  I went last year, and I know that they really don't want me to participate in the planning; they just want me to show up to the invitational and sell stuff.)

If my compelling and made-up dance moms story hasn't persuaded you, then go back and read my original essay championing the rule change, because I think I made some good points there.  Then go vote for the rule change!

http://games.espn.com/ffl/leagueoffice?leagueId=303219

Remember: The only real change is that when you put in a waiver claim, you would also include a dollar amount (which can be $0), and the decision about who gets a player is based on who bid the most, and not who happens to be first in line that week.  Nothing else would change.

One thing I didn't lie about is the dance invitational on January 12.  I really will be at the high school helping out most of the day.  So let's say this poll closes at 9:00 PM EST on January 12.

P.S. Wondering about other rule changes, like scoring and superflex?  Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about them.  Just wanted to start cleaning up the discussion a bit.

P.P.S. One other angle I considered for pitching FAAB is that our current waiver process makes us wait in line, like they did in the old Soviet Union under communism.  So I was going to make outlandish charges about Adam hating America and so forth, and say that our current waiver system is 'slavic', but it didn't really feel organic.  But if it helps you decide to vote for FAAB, then great!

Harbinger of the Zombie Apocalypse

In response to my recent proposal that we adopt the superflex rule, Kevin had this to say:

Dont really like this one. I would counter propose that we reduce QB TD passes from 6pts to 4pts. In fact this is the only league I've been in where the QB gets that many points making their value so much more than everyone else. 

Under your rule any team that has 2 good QB's would have that much of an advantage over everyone else. In fact QB's would be selected by everyone in the first 2 rounds in my estimation. 

And then on a bye week you're basically screwed unless you have 3 QB's to compensate.
By lowering the TD points everything evens out giving more value to RB's and WR's. 

Also not opposed to going to a PPR league.

To which Merrill replied:

Hate to say it, but I agree with Graham on both points.

To repeat: Merrill and Kevin agree on something!  Which can of course mean only one thing:

Uh.

Well, okay, maybe it could mean one of TWO things.  EITHER the Zombie Apocalypse is imminent, OR they're on to something.

Assuming it's the latter --- I agree with them, too.  Or more specifically, I agree that our scoring system has a bias toward QBs, and that we should address that imbalance before moving to superflex. It also weights TDs too much relative to yardage.

I'm sure it will surprise no one that I have specific responses to the concerns Kevin raised, and that I still think we should adopt the superflex rule.  But just like the FAAB rule (remember that one?  People seem to like that one), we should fix our scoring wheether or not we ultimately adopt superflex.

So here are two separate scoring systems we could adopt.  One is less aggressive, one more so (and preferrable, in my opinion).

Option 1 (yardage undervalued)

1. Change the value of passing TDs from 6 points to 4 points
2. Add 0.25 points per reception for RBs
3. Add 0.5 point per reception for WRs
4. Add 0.75 points per reception for TEs

Option 2 (yardage properly valued)

1. Double the points for all yardage scoring (0.04 points per passing yard, 0.1 points per rushing/receiving yard --- this is double how we score things currently).
2. Change the value of passing TDs from 6 points to 4 points
3. Add 0.5 points per reception for RBs
4. Add 1 point per reception for WRs
5. Add 1.5 points per reception for TEs

I'm sure the fractional PPR points will catch everyone's attention.  And if folks would prefer that all receptions are 1 pt, that's fine.  The thinking here is that giving a full point to RBs unbalances that position for players like Christian McCaffrey; at the same time, giving TEs 1.5 points per reception makes TEs in general a more desirable position (although it also makes Kelce, Kittle and Ertz even more valuable than they are already).

My big concern is that we DON'T go full PPR without also adjusting or scoring for yardage.  If we went full PPR under our current scoring system, yardage scoring would almost be irrelevant.

I'm just throwing this out for discussion.