Week 1 Power Rankings — The Worst League

Sep 13

Sep 13 Week 1 Power Rankings

Like Aaron Rodgers left Achilles, the season has officially popped off. Maybe your first-round pick balled out or your 12th-round defense paid off in Week 1. Or maybe you’re Burrowing your head in the sand after a dismal performance, screaming OH MY GOD! Either way, the lucky 13th season of the Worst League is officially upon us. We’re back.

This year, I’m trying to take it easy on my mental health and my burgeoning carpal tunnel with more streamlined posts. You can expect the same stats and cool factoids you’ve come to know and tolerate, but less words overall. The upshot is maybe I can finally get these to come out earlier in the week (thinking Wednesdays) since there’s less to do. At the very least, I promise not to pull a Kadarius Toney and drop the ball completely.

So without further ado, here are the first Power Rankings of the season.

Erik leads the Power Rankings for the first time in his career.

In previous years, I’ve written a couple of paragraphs for each of you as we counted down through the rankings. This year, we’re doing bullet points with some observations of things that stood out to me. As always, if you have a question about league history, you can always hit me up in the group text.

Erik leads the Power Rankings for the first time…EVER!
Now the only active team owner to never lead the Power Rankings is Samantha, ironically last year’s champ.
The king is still Gray with 51 out of 168 weeks (30%) on top.
Scoring overall was down this week. Teams averaged just 105.9 ppg, which ranks sixth-lowest of the PPR era out of 42 weeks.
The offenses’ loss was the defenses’ gain. Teams averaged a whopping 12.58 ppg from defense (historical average is 7.56) with eight teams getting double figures.
Erik’s 35 points from the Cowboys D/ST ties the league record for most points from a defense set by the Patriots D/ST (Gray) and Eagles D/ST (Alex) both in 2019.
With 141.24 points scored, this was Josh’s highest-scoring Week 1 of his career.
Brandon had the third-highest scoring team this week but comes away with the loss.
Both he and Chelsie are the two team owners this week with “unlucky losses” (games in which a team finished in the top half of the league in scoring but lost anyway.)
On the flip side are Gray and Greco who came away with “lucky wins” (finished in the bottom half but won anyway.)
Gray’s matchup was particularly close. He won on the Bills’ last offensive drive of regulation thanks to three straight Stefon Diggs receptions from Josh Allen, pushing him past Samantha by just 1.64 points.
Gray hasn’t lost a Week 1 game since 2019.
Samantha hasn’t won a Week 1 game…EVER. She’s 0-6 in Week 1 for her career. (Editor’s note: Samantha says “that’s what happens when you pick 10th every year.”)
Nick’s J.K. Dobbins had probably the most significant injury of Week 1, also tearing his Achilles. He was coincidentally the biggest reach of the first five rounds, going 52nd overall despite an ADP on draft day of 85.3.
Geoff starts the year 11th in the Power Rankings, which is one spot better than last year. He has had the worst or second-worst Week 1 score in three of the last four years. But he did rebound to make the playoffs just last year!
Speaking of injury, Jess—who lost the Poop Bowl last year—drafted Cooper Kupp, Jonathan Taylor and Aaron Rodgers (albeit as a backup) and consequently had the lowest score of Week 1.
It’s her worst Week 1 score since 2017, which was pre-PPR scoring. Typically a strong starter, Jess lost her Week 1 game for just the second time since 2013.