2022 Season Preview — The Worst League

Welcome back, Worst League!

It’s been almost nine months since Beth Ann defeated Alex to claim her first title. Long enough that several actual children have been born in the interim. Yes, by my count, the Worst League now has nine children, not counting the dogs. (No, I’m not keeping track of this in a separate spreadsheet.) Turns out we’re a very productive bunch on the field and off.

This year, there’s also another new edition to the Worst League—Chelsie! It’s bittersweet as we say “au revoir” to Whitney and her two years of service. Sorry to see her go out with the last-place punishment. (Hope that wasn’t the impetus for her departure 😬. Nick, tell her we said “hi.”) But the silver lining is we all get to reconnect with another friend, and we’re so glad to have you in the fold, Chelsie.

Joining Chelsie will be the 11 other returning members of the Worst League, all hopeful with the dawn of a new season and hungry for fantasy glory. So without further ado, let’s get to it.

To preview the season, we’ll be doing what we did last year, breaking down the prospects of every team owner entering this season with a look back at where they’ve been and what their outlook is moving forward. We’ll go in reverse draft order starting with the back of the draft and work our way back to the top. And yes, we’ve got life updates for almost every team owner. (Erik, it’s not too late!) These were so fun and I appreciate everyone taking the time. I think you’ll enjoy them as well.

Alright, let’s start, appropriately enough, with our reigning champ.

12. Beth Ann

I married my best friend and partner, Robert, on Sunday, August 21 in Hood River, Oregon. It was the most perfectly imperfect weekend—we wouldn’t have changed a thing and are still floating after the best day of our lives. We leave for our honeymoon in Italy a week from tomorrow and plan to drink wine at lunch every single day. Robert told me to throw in a football pun like “I punted the single life and scored with this stud.” I countered with something sassy like “I feel like I got short-changed and want my quarterback.” We're so funny.
Our Golden Retriever, Riley pup, is turning one next month. She loves to chew on my smiley face slippers (officially on my third pair) and Robert’s stinky socks. She loves Star Wars like her parents and has dug ALL of the holes in the backyard. She’s our best pal and makes life so much fun.
My job at Starbucks has quickly evolved into more than just Sustainability & Ethical Sourcing. I’m teaching workshops and classes, mentoring senior leaders, and ultimately nerding out on coffee. I’ll travel down to our farm in Costa Rica again in December. Still not quite sure where this path is leading me, but it feels so good. If anyone wants free coffee, you know where to find me.
We finished the interior house reno! But house projects never stop, so we’re moving on to the exterior reno because that sounds like a great idea. Hoping to wrap up everything house-related by next year, at least that's what we’re putting out into the universe.

All hail the reigning champ! 🙇‍♂️

Last year Beth Ann won her first championship in just her third season thanks in part to a stellar draft that included Justin Jefferson AND Ja’Marr Chase—two young WRs that will likely both go in the first round this year. In fact, Beth Ann’s draft was so good, it famously powered her to the championship with eight of nine players she drafted starting throughout the playoffs (the first champion to achieve that feat).

And apparently, that’s by design. With three years of service, we now know Beth Ann relies on the draft more than any other team owner with 94% of her total scoring coming from players she drafted. (By comparison, league average is 77%.) Put another way, Beth Ann makes 6.3 moves per season (trades + free agents) compared to 22.1 for the average team owner. That’s the difference between picking up one player every 2-3 weeks versus picking up 1-2 players each and every week.

No question, it’s been working for her. Over the last two years including the playoffs, she’s 21-10 with back-to-back one seeds in the playoffs. That’s tops in the league with the next-best record belonging to either Gray or Jess who are both 17-12. And despite her lackluster 2019 debut season in which she went 4-8, she’s now second in the all-time Power Rankings with a career TW% of .578, trailing only Gray.

But if she’s going to continue that success this season, she’s going to have to do something she’s never done before, which is draft from the caboose. In three years, Beth Ann has twice had a top-three pick (selecting Alvin Kamara both times) and never drafted worse than seventh (selecting Dalvin Cook). This year, she’ll draft 12th, which means many of those elite RBs and WRs will be gone by the time we get to the turn. But it’s not all gloom and doom. The 12th pick has had its moments, making the playoffs in five of 11 seasons, including top-three finishes each of the last two years. And in 2016, Geoff won it all from the 12 spot.

Can Beth Ann keep her winning ways going despite drafting from the back? I wouldn’t bet against it.

11. Samantha

Well, here we are. Another year has passed, and I have yet to win a Fantasy Football Championship and am once again drafting at the 11th position. Eerily similar, not much else has changed. Brandon, Ollie and I are still living in Houston, TX. After bopping around for a bit, it seems we are here to stay (at least for a while longer). In addition to work, I spend most of my time trying new restaurants, working on my podcast (Freudian Scripts—check it out if you haven’t yet), playing tennis, and reading. I have read 24 novels this year! If you are also an avid reader, find me on Goodreads.

No one has had worse luck with the draft order than Samantha.

Since joining the league, Samantha has drafted 11th, 10th, 11th, 6th and now 11th again. That’s a record four double-digit picks in just five years. The only other team owner with four double-digit picks is Alex, and he’s been in the league twice as long with four top-three picks to boot. In fact, Samantha’s average draft position of 9.8 is two spots worse than even the next-closest team owner.

Despite that fact, Samantha has been relatively successful with three playoff appearances in four seasons, which is the most successful rate of any team owner in the league. Even Gray who leads the league with eight career playoff appearances has made the playoffs just 73% of the time compared to 75% for Samantha.

Entering this year, Samantha is coming off her best season yet. Though she went 7-7 in the regular season and lost in the first round of the playoffs, she finished third in the final Power Rankings with a TW% of .552—both career bests. Were it not for Calvin Ridley’s decision to step away from football for his mental health, not to mention four close losses of five points or less, including a 3.14-point loss to Alex in the quarterfinals, Samantha could have easily ended the season playing for prize money in the final week as she has more often than not in her short tenure in the league.

Given all that, she’s certainly due for some luck to go her way this season, even if she has to wait—yet again—until the next-to-last pick in the draft to see it.

10. Chelsie

Wow! I feel like I’ve missed so much, it’s been over a decade and I’m thrilled to reconnect with this group. Since Austin... Patrick and I got married and will celebrate our ninth wedding anniversary in September. Mille, goldendoodle, joined our family and turned eight in July. We spent 6-ish years in Kansas City before moving to Seattle, where we currently live. We’ve been in Seattle for 3 years and can honestly say OMG. Being this close to the mountains and ocean is incredible. Patrick is the President of Hallmark Business Connections (the B2B side of Hallmark cards) and I’m still with VMLY&R (8 years strong), as a Group Connections Director, leading the social practice on the west coast.
This year we’ve been traveling a lot; Austin, Amelia Island, Kansas City, San Francisco, Napa, New York, Big Sky, PNW coast, and in late September, we’re heading to Australia! When I’m not traveling or creating TikTok strategies for clients; I’m gardening, baking, reading, hiking or Peloton-ing. All this to say, I’m still the same gal from grad school, but with a few more grey hairs.

Welcome, Chelsie to the Worst League! She is now the 18th member in the history of our league, joining eight of the league’s founding members plus newcomers Josh (2014), Samantha (2018) and Beth Ann (2019). Chelsie will draft this year from the 10th spot, though she is certainly not the first league newbie to start her career with a double-digit pick. (Just ask Samantha.)

As a reminder, make sure to check out our rules and scoring settings over on the league page. In short, we’re a 12-team PPR league with 1.0 point per reception. Rosters are pretty standard (1 QB, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE and 1 flex with a defense and kicker). We play head-to-head every week with a 14-week regular season followed by a three-week, three-round playoff from Weeks 15-17. The top six teams based on win-loss record (with total points serving as a tiebreaker) make the playoffs with the top two receiving first-round byes. Prizes are awarded to first-, second- and third- place with weekly prizes for the top scorer each week of the regular season.

Some additional rules we’ve adopted over the years—trades process immediately (no vetoes, though they can be brought to a vote after the fact by the commissioner), TEs are flex eligible, and each team has two IR slots, which you can use for inactive players listed as Out (O) or on injured reserve (IR). Lastly, we do have a last-place punishment (determined in the group chat), which was implemented for the first time last year. To keep all team owners invested, the recipient of the punishment is determined by the loser of the consolation ladder, the final game of which in Week 17 is affectionately known as the Poop Bowl.

As for these writeups, they started informally in 2014 as a series of infographics that I would share via email. That evolved to a Facebook group and then eventually this website in 2018 (and occasionally a podcast hosted by Alex). Here we keep track of lots of historical information and statistics, the most important of which is true winning percentage (TW%), which informs our weekly Power Rankings. In short, TW% is your win percentage if you played every team every week (and not just the one on your schedule) and is therefore a better measure of team quality. Don’t worry. It doesn’t have any tangible impact on your team or whether you make the playoffs. It’s just fun to monitor.

Speaking of which, let’s talk about this year’s schedule and how we can use TW% to determine who has the easiest and toughest roads ahead. As a reminder, every team plays every other team in the league at least once. But because we play a 14-week regular season, we play three of those teams one additional time. The way the schedule sets up, those three “repeat opponents” occur in Weeks 1-3 and then again in Weeks 12-14.

In order to make things more fair, we adopted a rule change last year to randomize the schedule every season, so that you don’t always have the same three repeat opponents. Given that, we can go ahead and take a look at this year’s schedule based on the average career TW% of your three repeat opponents to determine who got the toughest (or easiest) draw. Note that for Chelsie, we estimated a TW% of .500, which is average.

Samantha, Brandon and Geoff are predicted to have the toughest schedules this year.

As you can see, Samantha has the toughest schedule this year because she faces Josh (4th in career TW%), Gray (1st) and Geoff (8th) twice. Other tough schedules include Brandon (vs. Erik, Josh and Gray) and Geoff (vs. Gray, Jess and Samantha).

On the flip side, Chelsie, Josh and Jess have the easiest schedules. The computer thinks Chelsie’s schedule is particularly soft because of repeat matchups against Nick, Alex and Greco, two of which are currently ranked in the bottom three of the career Power Rankings. That being said, it’s not as “easy” as it seems. Alex and Nick finished second and third in last year’s playoffs, respectively. And Greco is a former champion with more playoff wins than all but two other team owners.

So, please, take this chart with a massive grain of salt. Team owners do fluctuate in quality from year to year and can vary wildly from their career numbers. For example, last year Alex was predicted to have the second-hardest schedule in the league in part due to repeat matchups with Brandon and Josh. Of course, neither of those two made the playoffs last year. And as a result, Alex’s schedule was actually the second-easiest (as you can see by looking at the gray bars in the chart above) behind only Erik. So these predictions, like any prediction about fantasy football that I make on this site, are almost certain to be wrong.

But the one prediction I can guarantee, this year’s champion will make his/her way over to the Hall of Champions where we honor all of our former champions. Might Chelsie join this elite group in her first season? Only time will tell.

9. Nick

Nick and Whitney had a child! Von Enzley Myers. Born 4/22/22. Loves Virginia Tech and fart noises. Dislikes naps and stomach aches.

Who are you and what have you done with Nick?

Following the worst season in Worst League history in which he went 1-12, Nick’s team became a juggernaut in 2021. His jump in TW% from .201 to .623 is the largest one-season leap ever. If the Worst League had a comeback player of the year award, Nick would have won it. Yes, he finished 7-7 and got bounced in the semifinals due to some of the worst injury luck we’ve ever seen, but he spent nine weeks atop the Power Rankings, ultimately finishing second—the best mark of his career.

Nothing illustrates his transformation better than this chart from last season, which I’m resurfacing here. Put simply, it’s a plot of every season by every team owner in Worst League history. The orange dots are Nick. And as you can see, his 2021 season (top right) is an extreme outlier in terms of both activity and TW% compared to his typical performance. Another stunning statistic—last year, he made more moves in one season (66) than he had in the previous 10 years combined (60). And it paid off with a third-place finish and the best season of his career.

Nick in 2021 represented a dramatic departure from Nick of the past.

So the burning question for Nick this year is, “Can he repeat last year’s breakout success?” Of course, it starts with the draft. And for one of the luckiest team owners in terms of draft order, the ninth spot is low. Nick’s average draft position of 5.3 is third-highest among active team owners and includes a record four #1 picks. Most recently, he selected Christian McCaffrey first overall in each of the last two seasons.

This year, he won’t have that luxury, selecting from the back third of the draft for just the second time in the last 10 years. But if he keeps up the same hustle we saw from a year ago, you have to wonder whether or not a championship could be within Nick’s grasp. Crazier things have happened.

8. Brandon

This year, Samantha and I moved…to a new apartment two floors up in the same building here in Houston. But we are house shopping, so more updates to come. At work, I celebrated my 10th anniversary at GSD&M where I’m working on all things Pizza Hut. Recently, I just got briefed on a new assignment for the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie; so, yes, dreams do come true.
Speaking of dreams, the highlight of my year was probably getting to go behind the scenes at the Final Four in New Orleans for the Duke/UNC game and Coach K’s final game, which was INCREDIBLE. Until, well…the final result. That’s me in Caleb Love’s locker the day after, contemplating why God lets bad things happen.
Speaking of bad things, my fantasy team is ready to bounce back this year. So, here’s to only good things this season, the best of which is reconnecting with all of you.

Can we just forget last year happened?

After three championships in four years, Brandon’s so-called dynasty went belly up in 2021. Not only that, but it was one of the worst seasons of his career with the fewest wins (five), most losses (nine) and the second-worst TW% of his career, trailing only 2016. His ninth-place finish in the final Power Rankings was also tied for the worst of his career, just the second time he’s finished in the bottom half.

But we’re not here to rehash last year’s failures or reopen old wounds (Brandon’s or Derrick Henry’s). We’re here to look forward. And for Brandon that starts with the eighth pick. Unfortunately, the eighth pick is…cursed. DUN DUN DUUUUN!!!

If we look at the historical performances of all teams sorted by draft pick, we find that no pick has performed worse than the eighth pick and by a significant margin.

No pick performs worse than the #8 pick.

As you can see from the chart above, the eighth pick is last in almost every statistical category including wins (56) and TW% (.428), is next-to-last in points and has only four playoff appearances in 11 seasons, which is tied for eighth. It’s also one of only four positions in the draft (the others being first, second and sixth) to have never won a championship.

And if we look at the general arc of the curve from picks 1-12, we see that there’s a clear dead zone from picks 5-8 where performance dips. Teams in this range historically find themselves with a TW% below .500. Compared to teams who draft at the beginning or end of the draft, they win at a lesser rate, score significantly fewer points and have the fewest number of former champions—only Jess in 2014 (seventh pick) and Brandon in 2020 (fifth pick). All of which supports the hypothesis that’d you’d rather draft closer to the turn than be stuck in the middle.

But for Brandon, he’ll be looking to buck that trend of the middle-pick dead zone. After having his five-year playoff streak broken in 2021—formerly the longest active streak (a record that now belongs to Gray at three years)—Brandon is hoping to return to the promised land in 2022 and hopefully bring some honor to the long-suffering name of the eighth pick.

7. Erik

Erik had an up-and-down 2021.

After a hot start, scoring 172.16 points in Week 1, he struggled for much of the year, finishing in the bottom half of the league in scoring in 10 of the next 13 weeks. Despite some nifty in-season moves, including a trade of Kyler Murray for Cordarrelle Patterson and the waiver-wire addition of Michael Pittman, Erik finished 6-8 and 10th in the final Power Rankings. Falling short of his early season promise, he became just the third team owner to start the season in the top two of the Power Rankings but go on to miss the playoffs, joining Trevor (2012) and Alex (2013).

As a result, Erik missed the playoffs for the third time in the last four years, ultimately finishing 10th in the final Power Rankings. And if anyone is hungry for some playoff success, it’s Erik who hasn’t won a playoff game in a decade. Yes, you read that right. Erik’s last and only playoff win came in the consolation game against JT in 2012. That’s the longest active drought of playoff success in the league.

But hope springs eternal. And though he’s drafting from the middle, this is familiar territory for Erik. In fact, this is coincidentally the third time in the last four years that he’s had the seventh pick. And the other time? He drafted eighth. Judging based on his past behavior, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Kansas City native selected Travis Kelce in the second round if he’s still available. It would be the third time Erik has selected Kelce in that range in the last five years. If anyone can lead Erik back to playoff glory, perhaps it’s the new targets leader for Patrick Mahomes. He’s gotta be due, right?

Alright, let’s move into the top half of the draft order, starting with…

6. Greco

Hiii, Greco here! Still living in Atlanta, Decatur to be exact, with my husband Nick, my two kids June (almost 5) and Emery (almost 2) and my handsome dog Sampson (almost 8). I'm still a Creative Director at 22squared working mostly on Toyota stuffs.
I didn’t have a baby, or switch jobs, or move to a new city, or renovate a house—yet somehow it still feels like a really full/crazy/happy year? Anyone else? Oh, we did buy another boat! So there’s that. (Follow me for financial advice.)
HIGHLIGHT: my real teams did waaaay better than my fantasy team this past year. GO DAWGS! GO BRAVOS! WOO!! #1 BABY!! Who knows, maybe I'll be a real fantasy contender again once my kids go to college!
Picture 1 is of Nick and me celebrating the natty in our living room solo bc our youngest had covid. Fun times.
Picture 2 is from a trip back to Austin for the kiddos spring break. 6th street looks weird in daylight.

Greco’s not lying. Her real teams appear to be hogging all the luck.

Because on the fantasy fields, it’s been a rough four years. Aside from a miracle run to the championship game as the six seed in 2020, the wins and points have been few and far between. Over that time, she’s 17-36 with a TW% of .335, while averaging a league low 110.8 ppg (or 77.0 ppg pre-PPR). All of those metrics rank dead last in the league.

Last year, her team showed promised at times. But big bets on WRs fizzled, including regressions for DK Metcalf and Robby (now Robbie) Anderson, both selected within the first five rounds. And at RB, Javonte Williams’ emergence was too little too late. As a result, she finished 4-10 and last in the final Power Rankings—her third year with double-digit losses in the last four seasons.

The one silver lining for Greco last season—she avoided the last-place punishment in the first inaugural Poop Bowl, handily defeating Whitney by nearly 60 points. Perhaps that’s the springboard she needs to get back on the right track. Remember, prior to this most recent skid starting in 2018, Greco had seven straight winning seasons to begin her career, including five playoff appearances, four top-three finishes and a championship in 2012. She still ranks fourth in all-time wins and third in playoff wins.

Somewhere inside there’s a fantasy champion lurking, lying dormant, ready to break out.

5. Josh

The past year has flown by so quickly. On the family front, Oliver is about 14 months old and quickly helping to make our house feel small. Kelly is starting a new grad program for school administration, so we’ll all be plenty busy for the next couple years. Our little fam has had some fun adventures this summer and is looking forward to stomping on leaves and watching football this fall.
On the work front, I’m still liking working at Meta and continue to support the Facebook Marketplace seller experience team. I recently moved into a new role as a content design manager and it’s been fun to spend more time helping people grow their careers.

Here’s a trivia question for you: which team owner has the longest active playoff drought in the league?

If you’re good at context clues, you probably figured out that it’s Josh. (Cheater.) But if I hadn’t included that question to start his season preview, I doubt many of you would have guessed that Josh was the answer. I certainly wouldn’t have. After all, since 2017, Josh leads all team owners in TW% (.605) and points (7,057). And for his career, he ranks fourth in the all-time Power Rankings, trailing only Gray, Beth Ann and Brandon. And yet, Josh is the only active team owner to miss the playoffs each of the last two seasons, last making the playoffs in 2019 when he came up short against Gray in the finals.

And it’s been a rough couple years with Josh narrowly missing the playoffs both times. Last year, trades for both Kyler Murray and Rob Gronkowski backfired due to injury. Finishing 7-7 and seventh in the final Power Rankings, Josh ultimately came up one-game short of the three-game winning streak he needed to sneak into the playoffs. And in 2020, Josh notoriously became the first team owner to lead the league in points and finish #1 in the final Power Rankings but miss the playoffs.

But all of that just convinces me that Josh is due for a return to form. Case in point, the fifth pick has made the playoffs more often than almost every other pick in the draft. Only the first pick has as many playoff appearances—a total of six in 11 years. And if Josh does make it there, perhaps he’ll finally break through to claim his first championship. As it stands now, Josh is the only team owner among the top-six in the all-time Power Rankings whose name isn’t in the Hall of Champions.

Which, speaking of trivia, is another fun fact that I know he loves I bring up year after year.

4. Geoff

Moved back to Austin early last year and settling in now. Love being back in the home of this league! Marianne and I are doing well and our boys, Charlie (5) and Jack (3), are just about ready to take over the day to day operations of my fantasy team. That ought to get me above .500 TW%.
I’m still working in Product Management. Changed companies this summer and working on some cool stuff at Rev now. Fun note, this past spring, I worked part time in the evenings as an adjunct instructor at our alma mater, where I taught a Product Management boot camp course.
Y’all coming visit sometime and we can catch up over a Long Island pitcher at Shakes delightful evening cocktail like adults.

Though it ended with a dud, Geoff had a terrific season in 2021.

Tied for the most wins in his career, Geoff rocketed to 9-2 and clinched the league’s first playoff spot with weeks to spare. Through the first 11 games, Geoff ranked third in TW% (.620) and scoring (125.4 ppg), ultimately securing the two seed and a first-round bye in the playoffs behind Tyreek Hill, Najee Harris and Lamar Jackson.

But then the last three weeks happened. Inexplicably, Geoff’s team fell off a cliff. From Weeks 12-14, Geoff ranked last in TW% (.030) and scoring (72.4 ppg), and it wasn’t even close. His true record over that time was an astonishing 1-32, meaning he only beat one team in scoring over the last three weeks. To blame were a couple late byes, poor depth and multi-week injuries to Lamar Jackson and Adam Thielen. In the end, he was unable to recapture his early-season magic and ultimately lost by 25 points to Alex in the semifinals and by nearly 30 to Nick in the consolation game.

Despite that, it was a marked improvement for Geoff, giving him his first winning season since 2016 and one of the best years of his career. Now with the fourth pick, Geoff is back in the top third of the draft for the first time since 2018—the year he drafted Le’Veon Bell in his lockout season and finished with the worst team of all time. Hopefully, things go better than that, which I anticipate they should. And Geoff deserves it. He’s so rarely drafted from the top half of the draft, selecting from the back in six of the last eight years.

Looking for his first playoff win since 2016, the year he won a championship, Geoff is primed to build off the success of last year. And the fourth pick is a great spot to start.

3. Gray

Hey Hey, it's Gray! Another big year for the Pou family as we welcomed our fourth member, Emma Eileen Pou. Emma came into the world on July 19th and has captured all of our hearts, even her big brother Robert’s.
Life is good in Louisiana. Business has been good as well. We recently became the agency of record for the University of Texas...at Tyler :). When I am not home feeding an infant or inflating a portable jump house for the 2 year old, I am responding to RFPs or developing marketing strategies for my current clients. Well. gotta run! Something broke. Or something stinks. Most likely both!

In 2021, Gray made the playoffs for a third straight year, the longest active streak in the league. Unfortunately, he was not able to make much noise once he got there, getting bounced in the first round by Nick. In fact, it was the second straight year that he narrowly missed a first-round bye and instead got eliminated in the quarterfinals, underscoring yet again the importance of the first-round bye.

All in all, it was actually a disappointing season for Gray, at least by his lofty standards that left many wondering (or at least me) what might have been. That’s because Gray traded away two powerhouse RBs in 2021. First, he sent Austin Ekeler to Nick in exchange for Christian McCaffrey right before McCaffrey’s season-ending injury. Bad break there. Then, he traded Leonard Fournette for Matthew Stafford, proving that if there’s one thing we can count on each and every season, it’s some Gray/Fournette drama.

(Remember, Gray traded back two spots in the 2018 draft, passing on Saquon Barkley in his stellar rookie season to select Fournette, which ultimately led to the worst season of Gray’s career. Then Fournette redeemed himself in 2019, leading Gray to his second championship. Now, after Gray turned his back on the former LSU Tiger, you had to know Fournette was going to go off, powering Alex to the playoffs.)

Finishing the regular season with an 8-6 record but eighth in the final Power Rankings, Gray’s team was not quite as good as his record would have had you believe, which was why it wasn’t much of a surprise when he bowed out early. By TW%, 2021 was actually the second-worst year of Gray’s career and just the second time he’s failed to finish within the top half of the rankings in 11 seasons.

This year, Gray is back in the top-three of the draft for the fourth time in his career. Most recently, he drafted third just two years ago when he selected Ezekiel Elliott third overall. And the year before that, he picked Zeke fourth overall. Might he go Zeke again? Doubtful given his current ADP. But his old buddy Fournette is going to be real tempting late in the second round if he’s still there.

Finally, one last note for Gray in this preview—he is nearing a serious milestone. The career wins leader is currently sitting on 98 total wins including the regular season and playoffs, which means he is just two wins away from 100. He should no doubt hit it at some point this season. But can he get there before Brandon who is just three wins behind at 95? Notably, they play each other in Week 3, which, depending on how things go the first two weeks, could easily be for the record.

2. Jess

I never expected in my mid-30s to start the year saying “Yeah, we moved in with my parents” but that’s how 2022 kicked off! A move across the country (in a snowstorm) while 32 weeks pregnant to a place where we had yet to find a suitable house on the market—I need a nap just thinking about it. We finally closed on a house only two days before my due date and had only been living there for 6 days before Camden was born.
So anyway, we live in South Carolina now—I typically say a “southern neighborhood of Charlotte” because that means more to people. My brother, SIL, nephew and niece (born 4 weeks after Cam), SILs parents and my parents all live here. We wanted the cousins to grow up together and are super happy with the move...not to mention all our friends are already prepping for the Great Midwest Hibernation.
Apparently, there’s a city in SC called Camden. It’s the oldest inland city in the state. Cam also reminds me of Cam Newton. Will my kid go to school and people think of these references? Maybe Baker Mayfield will perform so well that’s the only name people around here will remember? Why am I even mentioning anything about the Panthers? These are things I never thought I’d think about, but here we are. Anyway, I miss you all + can’t wait for another memorable season.
Go Pack Go!

Would you have believed me if I told you that the team owner who drafted Jonathan Taylor last year—in the second round, no less—failed to make the playoffs?

Every year, there’s a team owner or two that finishes in the top half of the Power Rankings but misses the playoffs. And last year, that was Jess. Despite a dismal 1-3 start to the season, Taylor, along with eighth-round pick Deebo Samuel, helped Jess bounce back. In fact, she was the best team in the league from Weeks 5-13, ranking ahead even in TW% of Beth Ann. But with Taylor on a Week 14 bye in the regular season finale, she could not come up with enough points to keep pace with Samantha for the tiebreaker and came within one Christian Kirk catch of replacing Nick in the playoffs.

Yes, she missed the playoffs, snapping a three-year streak. But she still has eighth straight seasons of a .500 or better record, dating back to 2014, which is second only to Gray. And it’s her eighth straight year in which she’s finished in the top half of the Power Rankings. That’s the longest streak in the league by a mile. Year in and year out, Jess is a contender. And I wouldn’t expect that to be any different this year.

Especially because this year, Jess has the second pick—the fourth time she’s had the #2 pick in her career, previously selecting second in 2012, 2015 and 2018. Notably, she made it all the way to the championship game the last two times. Might she do it again in 2022 with her running mate from last year, Jonathan Taylor?

I guess that all depends on what the guy with the #1 pick does…

1. Alex

Currently living in Denver! Enjoying the mountains, skiing, still playing basketball, just doing Alex stuff. I have an almost 2 year old Cockapoo named Vinny. Been dating my girlfriend Kristina going on almost 2 years now. Currently work as an Account Executive at Udemy.

Last year was a tremendously successful season for Alex, arguably his best since the Thanos days. (For Chelsie, that’s what we called his dominant team from 2018, the highest-scoring team of the pre-PPR era.)

But last year, it wasn’t dominance that Alex displayed, but rather an indomitable will. Overcoming injuries to Saquon Barkley, Nick Chubb, Gus Edwards and Jerry Jeudy, Alex staged what is arguably the greatest comeback in league history, rebounding from a seemingly lost 2-5 start to win an improbable six of his final seven games and finish 8-6. Let that be a lesson to anyone that stumbles out of the gates. It’s almost never too late.

Thanks to the aforementioned trade for Leonard Fournette, Alex stormed his way to the three seed in the playoffs. There he took down Samantha (his own personal fantasy kryptonite and the Doctor Strange to his Thanos), slipped past a hobbled Geoff and faced Beth Ann in the finals. Only by then, his team was a shell of its former self, having lost Fournette and Chris Godwin to injuries in the first round of the playoffs. Even for Alex, it was just too much adversity to overcome.

For his perseverance, Alex was rewarded with the #1 pick. Yes, that’s his third #1 pick all within the last six years, which means he’s been getting the top spot almost every other year since 2017. And since he’s our commissioner, I know that seems like some funny stuff’s going on. But Alex had the 12th pick just last year. And if we look at the average draft position of every team owner, Alex’s is 6.3, which ranks sixth. So. It all balances out. (Unless you’re Samantha.)

Lastly, you know I love to check in on the QB whisperer’s performance every year. So let’s take a look. Remember, from 2018-2020, Alex somehow managed to draft the eventual QB1. And most impressive, it was almost always a later pick. In 2018, it was Patrick Mahomes in the 12th round. In 2019, it was Lamar Jackson in the 11th. And in 2020, he picked Josh Allen in the sixth. But last year, the QB whisperer finally saw his streak come to an end. Ultimately, Samantha nabbed the eventual QB1 in the fourth round (Josh Allen again). But Alex’s QBs weren’t too shabby. He drafted both Matthew Stafford (seventh round) and Jalen Hurts (11th round) who finished as QB6 and QB9, respectively. Given that he was able to get two top-10 guys in the later rounds and turned Stafford into Leonard Fournette, I say the legend of the QB whisperer officially lives on.

If he can do it again this year, Alex could once again threaten for the league title.

Good Luck to Everyone This Year

Well, that about wraps up it up for the 2022 season preview. But as you know, we’re just getting started. For those who are able, I look forward to seeing you on a Zoom tomorrow night during the draft.

See you there!