Brandon Narrowly Defeats Jess to Repeat as Champ
The entire season was all coming down to Jared Cook.
Jared Freaking Cook.
No, not Dalvin Cook (the 13th overall pick). Or Brandin Cooks (the fifth-rounder). We’re talking about the other Cook. The Titan turned Ram turned Packer turned Raider who in his 10th season was finally having a career year in Oakland. Though he went undrafted in September, he was picked up by Jess on waivers following a Week 1 injury to Delanie Walker. Since then, Cook’s actually been all you could hope for from a tight end this season, solidly in fifth place among his position group behind only Kelce, Ertz, Kittle and Ebron.
And yet, he’s not the guy you want to pin your fantasy hopes on. Entering Week 16, he was just as apt to go off for 100 yards or a touchdown as he was to score five points or fewer. Literally, Cook had seven games of the former and seven games of the latter.
But come Monday night, there he was, Jared Cook, the only player left to play for either team with Jess facing a three-point deficit (87-90) and needing four points from Cook to win given the playoff tiebreaker goes to the higher seed.
At first, things were looking good for Jess. Oakland’s first two pass plays of the game both went to Cook, which resulted in two completions for 20 yards—two points. With 2:57 left in the first quarter, the score was already 89-90. Jess needed just two more points or 20 additional yards to win. A touchdown would also do it. And Cook had more than three quarters of game time to get it done.
Unfortunately for her, those were the last points Cook would score all night. In fact, while he was targeted on the very next play, resulting in an incompletion with 2:32 to go in the first, that would be his last target of the game. Incidentally, it was his first game of three or fewer targets since Week 9.
By the time the fourth quarter rolled around with the Raiders up multiple scores on the Broncos, the game plan was run-run-run. As the clock struck zero, the final score read Jess: 89, Brandon: 90. Jared Freaking Cook…
Or as Brandon put it while tracking the game via app, “Jared Freaking Cook!!!”—a name which will live in infamy.
Week 16 Recap
Brandon defeats Jess in the title game as Samantha defeats Nick in the consolation game.
Brandon defeated Jess 90-89 in the closest championship game in league history, eclipsing the 2016 matchup between Geoff and Brandon that ended 158-156. This championship is Brandon’s second in two years, making him the first back-to-back champion in league history. Now with three titles in eight years, he is still the only team owner with multiple championships.
In this year’s championship game, Deshaun Watson was Brandon’s unlikely MVP. On draft day, Watson was a slight reach, selected 57th overall—a few picks ahead of his ADP—and was just the third QB off the board ahead of Cam Newton, Russell Wilson and Carson Wentz, not to mention Patrick Mahomes, and Drew Brees.
For most of the season, Brandon’s faith in Watson went unrewarded. Brandon ranked 10th out of 12 teams in QB scoring this season, even starting Jameis Winston over Watson in two games at the midpoint of the season. I’ll admit I was even searching for possible upgrades at QB at the trade deadline.
But Watson had a great finish to the season, averaging 20.5 ppg over his last four games, giving Brandon plenty of confidence to start his fifth-round pick in the title game. Watson responded by passing for more than 339 yards and two TDs, then rushed for 49 yards with another two scores. His 35 total points were the second-most in Week 16, trailing only Aaron Rodgers’ 42. It was also the most points scored by one of Brandon’s players this season and tied for fifth-most by any player started this year. Only Amari Cooper had a greater playoff performance, his critical 39 points coming in a Week 14 win for Samantha over Alex.
As it turned out, Brandon would need every one of those 35 points. Melvin Gordon (11 points) and Damien Williams (17) played well, but nearly every other starter underperformed. Adam Thielen scored just 8 points. Late-season trade acquisitions Brandin Cooks and Travis Kelce combined for just 10. Free agent pick-up Kalen Ballage was a risky play at flex that busted with just 4 points. And Brandon’s defense (Colts D/ST) and kicker (Adam Vinatieri) combined for just 5.
Had Brandon lost, there would have been plenty of second-guessing to go around. Days before the title game he dropped the Dolphins D/ST in favor of the Colts D/ST—a decision that cost him 12 points. Ditto for Brett Maher and Vinatieri (a difference of 7 points). Also, a pair of Andersons—C.J. and Robby—both scored 20 points or more and were available on the waiver wire, the latter of which was picked up by Samantha in her consolation matchup with Nick. Either would have been a superior replacement for Aaron Jones than Ballage.
Speaking of Jones, his absence proved to be a key storyline in the championship game. As a result of his Week 15 injury and Jess’s move to pick up his handcuff several weeks prior, Jamaal Williams was poised to get the start in Week 16. He responded with 21 points, the most by any player on Jess’s team in the championship game—obviously a huge blow to Brandon and a huge boon for Jess.
Unfortunately for Jess, what proved to be Brandon’s greatest surprise on Sunday was Jess’s biggest disappointment. That would be the QB position where Philip Rivers scored just 3 points on 181 yards passing, 0 TDs and 2 INTs. It was easily his worst performance this season, the first in which he scored fewer than 12 points and was tied for the fewest points scored by a QB that was started this season. That is severely ill-timed.
For Jess, there will be plenty of woulda-coulda-shoulda’s to think about. What if JuJu Smith-Schuster hadn’t fumbled away the final pass of the Steelers-Saints game? That’s two points. What if she’d started Adrian Peterson or Julian Edelman? Both outscored players at their position in the starting lineup. And obviously, there’s Dak Prescott (16 points), who Jess picked up the day before the title game and was clearly contemplating starting over Rivers in a tough matchup against the Ravens.
That being said, you’ve got to judge your fantasy season on the process not the results. And if I were Jess, I would’ve started the exact same lineup she did. Hard to bench Joe Mixon. Ditto for Smith-Schuster. And Rivers was the sixth-ranked QB entering Week 16 with more points scored than Aaron Rodgers, Russell Wilson and, yes, Deshaun Watson. Sometimes, that’s just the way the fantasy cookie crumbles.
As for the consolation game, that obviously deserves a few words as well. Samantha defeated Nick handily by a score of 114-72, topping all scorers in Week 16. That was thanks in large part to the unexpected performance of two New York Jets, the aforementioned Robby Anderson and Eli McGuire, both of whom scored 20 points. Those point totals plus 45 points from her TE, defense and kicker were more than enough to put away Nick despite just 5 points from Tom Brady.
As a result, Samantha caps her first year in the league with an impressive third-place finish, defeating both the top overall team (Alex) and top overall seed (Nick) with her only loss coming to the eventual champion. She also led the league in points scored during the playoffs with 290, ahead of both Jess and Brandon, even on a per-game basis. Her 96.7 ppg in the playoffs are the most by a non-champion (excluding Josh this year who played in just one game) since Gray in 2015 and are especially impressive considering that she did it without first-round pick Odell Beckham Jr.
Meanwhile, Nick remains winless in his first foray into the playoffs. Though he improved upon the 54 points he scored last week with 72 in Week 16, he didn’t get nearly enough production from Tarik Cohen (1 point), Demaryius Thomas (3), Eric Ebron (2) or the Texans D/ST (0). At least he can sleep soundly at night knowing no combination of players off his bench would have made the difference.
Nevertheless, it was certainly a disappointing finish for the #1 overall seed and the only team with double-digit wins this season. In fact, Nick’s 63.0 ppg career average in the playoffs ranks last among all team owners. Still, even if it didn’t end the way he’d hoped, it was a very successful season for Nick and hopefully a sign of more good things to come.
All-Time Power Rankings
Now that another season and playoffs are in the books, I thought I’d share something that I usually keep locked away in my spreadsheet. And that is the career record for every active team owner. We’ve each played a lot of games (104) and true games (1,144) over the last eight years and I’ve been keeping track the whole way. Just like we do for each season, we can measure the performance of every team owner by TW% for the entire history of the league.
Gray leads all team owners with a .632 career TW%.
No surprise, but Gray, despite his down year, is still the all-time leader in TW% (.632) and consequently #1 in the all-time Power Rankings. As you can see, he also leads in career wins with 64. It’s not featured in this chart, but he still maintains his all-time points lead with 9,933, which is 277 points more than his next closest competitor. However, his league-leading career scoring average did drop by more than 0.8 ppg.
This year’s champion, Brandon, ranks second. As mentioned previously, his three championships lead the league. He went back-to-back for the first time in league history and is a mere 3 points away in the 2016 title game from going back-to-back-to-back and possessing half of the league’s four championships. #humblebrag
Not far behind Brandon is Alex, whose historic season pushed him past Greco (and almost Brandon) into third. He also ranks second in career scoring to Gray. Joining Alex in moving up the rankings past Greco is Josh who, though he’s played just five seasons, ranks fourth. Josh remains the highest-rated team owner to have never won a championship (or win a playoff game) for that matter.
Speaking of Greco, she drops two spots into fifth, following her first losing season in league history. Nevertheless, she still ranks third in career wins with 58. Greco is the last of five active team owners with a TW% above .500.
Next up is JT, Erik and Jess, who all moved up in the rankings following relatively successful seasons, despite the fact that the first two missed the playoffs. As for the latter, you might be surprised to learn that Jess ranks eighth all-time, especially after how we characterized Jess as one of the most successful team owners over the last five years—.576 TW% which ranks second. The problem remains that she was the worst team owner over the first three with a TW% of .297. Given more time, it’s likely she’ll continue to move up the board as she jumped two spots this season.
Meanwhile, falling in the ranks are Trevor and Geoff in ninth and 10th. Geoff especially plummeted significantly by four spots following his historically bad season. However, his 2016 championship continues to give hope to team owners of all stripes.
Samantha’s rookie season places her 11th in the all-time Power Rankings, which is a little lower than what you might expect. But her sample size is much smaller than any other owner. Recall that Jess ranked 11th after her first season while Erik ranked 12th. Their fortunes have obviously changed for the better.
Finally, while Nick had a very successful season, Samantha slots in one place above him in the rankings, which pushes him down a spot into 12th. Previously, he was 11th ahead of Terryn. Still, he raised his TW% by +.016 in what was the most successful season by TW% of his career.
Until Next Year
That’s it for 2018!
Thank you all for a wonderful season. I swear I would have enjoyed it just as much even if it hadn’t ended the beatific way it did. And that’s because of all of you. I loved the new WhatsApp group chat. Loved the near-record activity this year, which was second only to 2015 and just barely. (Yes, I measured that too.) And I almost always enjoyed the challenge of writing this blog week in and week out.
42 posts…
89,945 words…
32 tables…
9 charts…
1 very understanding spouse…
And countless hours later…
We finally close the chapter on yet another successful season and year. That’s more words by the way than in The Great Gatsby, The Catcher in the Rye, or either of the first two Harry Potter books. It’s also more than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Shakespeare’s Macbeth—combined.
Here’s wishing you all a happy and healthy 2019.
I’ll see you all again in September!
