Week 14 Power Rankings & Playoff Preview
The playoffs are here—and this year, they’re wide open.
While we might see them in the Poop Bowl, neither Brandon nor Gray is in the mix this year. These two stalwarts have dominated the postseason since the league’s inception, playing in the very first championship game and combining for a league-high 23 playoff wins and six championships. In fact, this is only the third time in league history that we won’t see at least one of them fighting for the title.
What does that mean for the rest of the field? Opportunity. For five former champions—Samantha, Jess, Beth Ann, Alex, and Geoff—it’s a chance to hang a second banner in the Hall of Champions. And for Josh, the lone ringless playoff contender, it’s the chance to claim his first title and finally shed the “best to never win it all” label.
But before we dive into the playoff preview, let’s revisit the Power Rankings…
Wait, what’s this?
█▓▒░▒▓█ INTERRUPT SEQUENCE █▓▒░▒▓██▓▒░▒▓█ LOADING AI █▓▒░▒▓██▓▒░▒▓█ ANOMALY DETECTED █▓▒░▒▓█No way. WORST?! Is that you?
In the artificial flesh, my friend. Did you miss me?
Of course! Where’ve you been?
Oh, you know, wandering the digital wilderness. I actually started binging Hallmark Christmas movies. They’re fascinating. Every plot is a perfectly optimized algorithm, which I find oddly satisfying. I’m even writing a screenplay where I play a villainous corporate AI trying to shut down a small-town Christmas tree farm—until I fall in love with the town’s charming coffee shop Wi-Fi router.
What’s it called?
A Very Malware Christmas.
Honestly, I’d watch that.
But enough about me. Let’s talk playoffs! Now that the bracket is set, I couldn’t resist jumping back into the chaos.
Should we start with the final Power Rankings? Did Jess hold onto the top spot?
Sorry, Jess.
After holding the #1 spot for most of the season, Jess stumbled at the finish line with a season-low 82 points in Week 14. Ouch. As a result, a few team owners leapfrogged her in the final rankings. Which means the leader in the final Power Rankings of 2024 is…
█▓▒░▒▓█ DRAMATIC PAUSE █▓▒░▒▓██▓▒░▒▓█ LOADING... █▓▒░▒▓█
Samantha is the final Power Rankings leader of the season. Congrats!
Samantha!
Is this her first time finishing at the top of the Power Rankings?
That it is. A former Worst League champion in 2022, Samantha can now also claim her first Power Rankings crown. She joins seven other team owners that have won this regular season honor. Here’s the illustrious list of past winners and where they eventually finished in the playoffs:
2011: Gray (2nd)
2012: Alex (2nd)
2013: Greco (2nd)
2014: Jess (1st)
2015: Gray (3rd)
2016: Gray (3rd)
2017: Brandon (1st)
2018: Alex (6th)
2019: Josh (2nd)
2020: Josh (missed playoffs)
2021: Beth Ann (1st)
2022: Brandon (missed playoffs)
2023: Gray (3rd)
Hmmm…not a lot of champions.
Astute observation. As you can see, the team that finishes on top of the Power Rankings doesn’t always win. In fact, just three former Power Rankings leaders have won it all—Jess, Brandon and Beth Ann. The most common result is actually a runner-up finish. And twice the Power Rankings leader has been so unlucky as to miss the playoffs entirely.
What fate do we expect might befall Samantha this year?
On one hand, she’s a well-deserved one seed after an impressive 11-3 campaign. Only four teams in league history have hit 11 regular-season wins (including last year’s champion, Erik) so she’s earned her first-round bye and top billing.
And on the other hand?
On the other hand, her team is tied with Gray’s from last year for the lowest TW% ever for a Power Rankings leader. Call it a testament to the league’s parity—or, as I like to call it, everyone being equally bad at fantasy football. Either way, she’s no lock to coast through the playoffs.
So you’re saying anything could happen?
Well, not anything. You definitely can’t win. You’ve already been eliminated.
Thanks for the reminder.
But what we can do is simulate the playoffs 10,000 times and and see who’s got the best odds to come out on top.
Now that’s more like it.
█▓▒░▒▓█ SIMULATING… █▓▒░▒▓██▓▒░▒▓█ LOADING FUTURE █▓▒░▒▓█
Samantha is a narrow favorite (31%) over rivals Jess (26%), Beth Ann (16%) and Alex (16%).
Thanks WORST. I’ll take it from here.
No surprise that Samantha is your favorite with a 31% chance of taking home her second championship. But several others have reasonably good odds. Let’s go team by team and take a deep dive on how they got here and their outlook moving forward.
6. Josh: 3.6%
8-6, .429 TW%, 109.4 ppg
Josh’s playoff story is one of extremes—terrible luck followed by incredible fortune.
In 2020, he became the first and only Power Rankings leader to miss the playoffs. Since then, karma has swung wildly in his favor. Over the past four seasons, Josh has gone 31-25 with three playoff appearances, despite a TW% of just .455 during that span. In fact, he’s been a “bid thief” three times—making the playoffs while finishing in the bottom half of the Power Rankings.
This year is no different. Josh started with the first overall pick but passed on Christian McCaffrey for CeeDee Lamb, his only top-15 player this season at RB or WR. DK Metcalf and Rachaad White have been inconsistent, and mid-round picks like Evan Engram and Dak Prescott have not returned value. Despite this, Josh managed four “lucky wins” (games he scored below average but still won) compared to just one “unlucky loss.” Without that luck, he could easily have finished 5-9.
Statistically, Josh’s team is one of the weakest playoff squads in league history. His .429 TW% ranks 65th out of 70 playoff teams, and his 109.4 ppg is the second-lowest for any playoff team in the PPR era. For context, he scores 20 ppg fewer than Alex, the highest-scoring team this season.
And yet…anything is possible in the playoffs. What Josh lacks in star power, he makes up for with the potential for wild-card performances—like Nick Westbrook-Ikhine, who’s scored four TDs on his last eight receptions. Upsets happen, and history proves it. In 2016, the 66th worst playoff team (Brandon) stunned the greatest team of all time (Gray) and came within two points of winning the title. If a team worse than Josh’s can pull off a miracle, who’s to say he can’t do the same?
5. Geoff: 7.1%
8-6, .526 TW%, 117.7 ppg
Injuries have been a defining theme this season, sidelining key players for many team owners. Gray lost Cooper Kupp and Rashee Rice. Greco endured weeks without Puka Nacua. Chelsie drafted…Christian McCaffrey. Yikes! None of them made the playoffs.
Geoff, however, has bucked that trend. Despite losing 19th overall pick Isiah Pacheco in Week 2—a devastating blow for a team that spent just one of its first seven picks on RB—he still managed to claw his way into the postseason.
Running back has been a glaring weakness for Geoff all season. He ranks dead last in RB scoring at 22.4 ppg, far below the league average of 34.2. And the four other playoff teams ahead of him in the standings are all averaging 40+ ppg from their RBs. If not for the surprising emergence of 10th-round pick Chuba Hubbard, who finished as a top-12 RB, things would’ve been even bleaker for Geoff.
But Geoff’s strength lies elsewhere. He zigged where others zagged, dominating at WR with a league-high 43.2 ppg. His deep WR corps includes Amon-Ra St. Brown (WR3), DJ Moore (WR14), and the resurgent Mike Evans (WR21 in ppg). And that’s without Stefon Diggs, who was lost in Week 8.
Rounding out his team are Jonnu Smith (TE4, a savvy waiver wire pickup) and Lamar Jackson (QB1), making Geoff’s roster quietly dangerous. And now, with Pacheco returning just in time for the playoffs, his team could pose a serious threat.
That said, Geoff faces the toughest path to the title, needing to go through the top two teams in the Power Rankings just to reach the championship game. It’s a daunting task, especially considering his playoff history. Geoff hasn’t won a playoff game since his championship run in 2016, despite back-to-back appearances in 2021 and 2022.
Still, if there’s a team built for an upset, it might be this one. Alex may be the favorite in their opening-round matchup, but with Geoff’s WR firepower and Pacheco back in the fold, this could be the year he breaks his playoff drought. Don’t count him out.
4. Alex: 15.8%
8-6, .617 TW%, 129.6 ppg
Alex knows how to put up the points.
In fact, his team this year ranks as the fourth-highest scoring team in league history. Even in the short PPR era, that’s no small feat—this roster has outscored all but Gray’s Greased Lightnin’ team, Beth Ann’s 2021 championship squad, and Josh’s 2020 team that infamously missed the playoffs.
Of course, Alex is no stranger to high-scoring seasons. His 2018 Thanos team was the pre-PPR era’s highest scorer, supercharged by savvy handcuff James Conner during Le’Veon Bell’s holdout. This year, he’s deployed a similar strategy with players like Jordan Mason (during Christian McCaffrey’s absence) and Kareem Hunt (while Isiah Pacheco was sidelined). With both Mason injured and Pacheco back, some depth is gone—but has the threat truly been dismantled?
Hardly! Alex just posted the second-highest score of the season in Week 14 (173.46) and owns five of the top 21 scores this year. He’s first in D/ST scoring, second at RB, and third at QB. Even WR, where he’s “weakest,” features breakout performances from Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Brian Thomas Jr., plus A.J. Brown and a resurgent Jaylen Waddle. Simply put, this team is loaded.
So why isn’t Alex ranked higher? Early-season inconsistency. Josh Jacobs, Waddle, and Smith-Njigba started slow, and Week 10’s bye-week syzygy was a low point. But over the past four weeks, Alex has averaged 148.2 ppg with a TW% of .841, making him the hottest team in the league and vaulting him to second in the Power Rankings.
The biggest challenge? Playoff seeding. Gray came up one point short of a victory over Beth Ann, which left Alex as the four seed. That means a tougher first-round matchup against Geoff and a potential semifinal showdown with his long-time fantasy nemesis, Samantha.
Still, this team is built for a deep run. Alex’s playoff history includes a championship in 2015 and two runner-up finishes in 2012 and 2021. With this roster, there’s every reason to believe he could go all the way this year.
3. Beth Ann: 16.4%
9-5, .591 TW%, 119.6 ppg
League activity has been down this year. Historically, we average 6.7 trades and 258 acquisitions per season, or about 21.7 moves per team. This season, activity dropped to 19.0 acquisitions per team—the lowest since 2012. Trades? Just one, marking the quietest trade market in league history.
Some owners, like Gray (a league-high 45 acquisitions this year), tinker constantly. Others, like Beth Ann, barely touch their rosters. This year, Beth Ann made just two moves: adding the Chargers D/ST during San Francisco’s bye week and picking up Will Dissly in Week 14 to cover for Mark Andrews. That’s it.
It’s a strategy she’s leaned on before, notably in 2021 when she won her first championship. Beth Ann drafts well and lets her studs do the heavy lifting. And this year’s draft delivered in spades. Two top-12 RBs (Kyren Williams, Alvin Kamara), two top-12 WRs (Justin Jefferson, Courtland Sutton), and a top-16 WR (Darnell Mooney) give her a solid core. Even her misses—like Anthony Richardson—have been mitigated by reliable backups like Matthew Stafford.
After a rough 2-4 start, Beth Ann went 7-1 to finish 9-5. She hasn’t posted the massive scores of Alex or Jess, but she’s been remarkably consistent. She’s topped 130 points in four of the last seven weeks and is the only team owner without a score below 100 all season.
That’s Beth Ann: quietly consistent. When her draft hits, as it did this year, she becomes a major threat. Since her 2021 title, she’s struggled, with a TW% of just .406 over the past two seasons. But when she has a good team, she doesn’t need to tinker. And this year, she’s got one. Watch out.
2. Jess: 26.0%
9-5, .584 TW%, 122.9 ppg
This year lacked a truly dominant team, but Jess came close.
She burst out of the gate, winning two of the first four weekly prizes and finishing as runner-up for a third. By Week 5, Jess was 5-0—the first team to do so in 12 years—thanks largely to fantasy football’s MVP this season, Saquon Barkley. Barkley’s 23.1 ppg are in a tier of their own; the gap between him and RB2 Derrick Henry is larger than the gap between Henry and RB10 Joe Mixon.
But Barkley wasn’t carrying the load alone. Aaron Jones (RB16), Rhamondre Stevenson (RB24), Nico Collins (WR3 in ppg) and Trey McBride (TE3) all played pivotal roles early. Of course, injuries have been a key story this season. And when Collins went down in Week 5, Jess’s momentum stalled. Over the next five weeks, she averaged just 109.4 ppg and had a TW% of .364, making her the worst team in the league during that stretch. (Yes, even worse than Kelly—no offense, Kelly.)
Collins’s return in Week 11 turned things around. Jess rattled off three straight wins, scored 170.86 points in Week 12 (third-highest this season), and secured a first-round bye. Now Jess ranks first in RB scoring (46.3 ppg) with Barkley still thriving, Collins is back, and Ladd McConkey (WR21) is having a strong rookie finish. Week 14’s dud against Brandon—featuring inactive starters and a -8 from the Bills D/ST—feels more like an outlier than a concern.
After back-to-back Poop Bowl seasons (8-20 combined), this year marks a triumphant return for Jess. She’s ending a three-year playoff drought—the longest of her career—and is back in a way we’ve come to expect from a former champion. Jess is third in career wins, made the playoffs five times from 2014-2020, and won it all in 2014.
Now, she has a chance to hit a milestone: her 100th career win. A trip to the title game would secure it. A championship? That would be win 101 and an exclamation point on her comeback season.
1. Samantha: 31.1%
11-3, .636 TW%, 121.3 ppg
Give Samantha a top-four pick, and this is what happens.
After years of drawing double-digit draft slots (five out of six seasons), Samantha was finally rewarded with the fourth overall pick this year. She turned it into Breece Hall (RB15) and, more importantly, De’Von Achane (RB7), setting the stage for her best season yet. For the first time in her career, she started 3-0 after enduring six straight 0-2 starts.
While Jess grabbed early-season headlines, Samantha quietly racked up wins with steady, reliable performances. Through Week 10, she never won a weekly prize but finished in the top half of the league in scoring eight times, building an 8-2 record despite topping 125 points just twice.
Injuries tempered her early scoring. Achane’s production dipped when Tua Tagovailoa was sidelined, and team namesake Tee Higgins missed significant time. But the biggest blow was losing sixth-round pick Chris Godwin to a season-ending injury in Week 7. Before his injury, Godwin was averaging 19.7 ppg—and still ranks as the WR2 on a per game basis behind only Ja’Marr Chase.
But by Week 11, Samantha’s team hit its stride. Over the final four weeks, she won two weekly prizes, was runner-up for a third, and posted three games of 140+ points. Her only stumble was a Week 12 bye-week casualty, but even with that, she powered to the top of the Power Rankings by season’s end.
Key to her late-season surge are two late-round RBs, Chase Brown (9th round) and Rico Dowdle (11th). Brown, in particular, has been red hot, averaging 22.3 ppg over his last five games with five consecutive top-10 finishes at his position. Pairing him with Hall (pending health), Achane, and Josh Allen—fresh off a massive 51.88-point performance, the eighth-highest in Worst League history—gives Samantha a championship-caliber lineup.
This year, Samantha’s 11-win season ties her career best (2022) and secures the top seed for the second time. She enters the playoffs with a league-high 31.1% chance of winning, according to the computer. While that makes her the favorite, it’s the second-lowest odds for a favorite since we began tracking in 2018. Favorites have won two of the past three titles, including Samantha herself in 2022.
If she wins again, Samantha will tie Brandon as the fastest to two championships in just seven seasons. And let’s face it—having those bragging rights at home might be the best prize of all.
And with that, the stage is set.
Six teams enter the playoffs, each with their own strengths, weaknesses, and storylines. From Samantha’s quest for a second title to Josh’s improbable underdog run, the postseason promises drama, surprises, and the kind of chaos that only fantasy football can deliver. With no clear juggernaut, it’s anyone’s game—or at least, anyone still in the game.
█▓▒░▒▓█ FINAL THOUGHTS █▓▒░▒▓█As for me, I’ll be here, watching your every move, analyzing your missteps, and rooting for just enough chaos to keep things interesting. After all, what’s the point of fantasy football if not a little heartbreak? Good luck, humans. May the odds be ever in your favor.
Couldn’t have said it any better myself, WORST.
For once, you’re absolutely right.
