Week 1:
Always nice to start off with a win!
I was looking forward to this opening matchup with great interest. After being a solid foundation for my team last season I had wanted Josh Allen as my QB again this year, but Presler drafted him before me so I went with my second choice of Mahomes. Now here we were starting off the season against each other; I was anxious to see if that contested QB position would end up being the difference in the day. Turns out it wasn't, our QBs actually finished nearly exactly even. But because I had both sides of the Mahomes/Kelce connection I got the better of this round as they came up huge this week to offset low scores by other positions.
Week 2:
Two in a row!
A massive score put up by Aaron Jones combined with some unfortunate duds in AE's lineup led to rolling to an easy victory this week, even though his Defense recorded an
unreal number. I was extremely pleased with my lineup's performance here! Mahomes and Kelce came back down to earth, but I had solid numbers from top to bottom, save only one: my D/ST which I can't be second guessing my play of because no one saw that coming, it was a 20 point drop from their dominant showing last week!
Week 3:
Oh man I was lucky to escape with a win this week!
I was fully prepared for this to be my first loss; Eugene's roster had been dominant so far and he opened our matchup projected to take it by ten. It ended up being much closer though, and everything came down to Sunday Night Football: all my scores were final, his last player was active. The win would still be his if his RB came in just a couple points above his projection, which the game script seemed to be making a very real possibility, but he came up short!
Week 4:
It seems my team used last week's nailbiter as motivation to go out and dominate this week!
Ekeler rewarded my sticking with him despite three poor weeks to start the season by having an absolutely
huge day, and Pierce looks to be finding that breakout role I previously mentioned he had the potential for. I had briefly dropped him for a week due to roster management, but he hadn't done much the first two so he stayed off the radar and I was fortunately able to pick him up again just before this climb. My lineup is really coming together here I feel! Now I grant this margin of victory is somewhat misleading as Monty had a player declared out who he didn't get swapped, and had Miles Sanders on his bench who had a monster game this week, but even if he had made that switch I still would have won this matchup by 9 points.
Week 5:
We are absolutely on a roll now!
Another absolutely
massive score from Ekeler, an equally insane one from Kelce, and big projection overshoots by Pierce, Tucker, and Mahomes made this one of the most comfortable victories of my entire managing career. When I have such a lopsided win like this I always have two simultaneous thoughts. 'Man it feels good to completely dominate like that!' and 'I didn't need anywhere near that many points, I hope the offense saved some for next week in case the matchup is a close one.'
Week 6:
Did I speak this into existance? >_>
My 5-0 hot streak comes to an end as my fear manifested exactly in the possibility that had been pondered. Just 4 of those whopping
78 spare points I had last week would have been great to have here! Projected to be an incredibly close matchup from the start, it sure lived up to expectations. Laura led by what would normally be considered a very safe 16 points going into Monday Night Football where my RB was the only player yet to go. But, that RB was Austin Ekeler who was on an
absolute tear of late. He was given a solid projection of 11 points, so he would need to hit over that by 5 to manage a tie, 6 to get me an incredible comeback win. A very tall order, but if anyone could do it this was the guy. He was coming off weeks of 28 and 31 which had
shattered his projections by 17 and 19 respectively! I actually firmly believed there was a very real possibility of pulling out the improbable win here. I did not
expect it to happen, but I honestly thought there was a genuine chance it could. And there was! Ekeler
did finish over his projection, but 'only' by 2. Laura held on for a 3 point victory!
To further show how incredibly even our rosters were, bye weeks and injuries had both of our benches completely decimated this week, no one had really any other options than the lineups we put out. The best alternate move, in hindsight, I could have made would have only gained me an additional 3 points, which would have only managed a tie. Interestingly, that actually would have gotten me the matchup win on bench points,
barely, 8-6, because Laura only had a single active position there. But, if she had decided to change that one position out in her lineup, she would have had an additional 2 points, which would have beaten my best possible score by those 2 points. Just an amazingly even matchup through and through!