Sofa King American Riding High in Week 1!

The King is picking up where he left off last season!  Sofa King American led the league last year with 5 Weekly High Score Prizes (including the impressive three-in-a-row in weeks 11-13), and with 121 points scored takes it for Week 1!  James had big performances from Tom Brady (30 pts), Tyreek Hill (28 pts), and the Pittsburgh Defense (18 pts).  Good way to start the season, Major General!!

Four of the games were blowouts this week (margins of 25, 33, 33 and 54) and one game was settled by just 2 points.  In Week 1 2020, no game had a margin of more than 30 points, with three decided by less than 14 points.  Also, last year in Week 1 a total of 946 points were scored, while this year only 873 points were scored.  In fact, this is the fewest points scored in the opening week since 2017 when only 706 total points were scored.  In that week, Joe’s Pats won the high score with a final score of 95.  Hahaha!

**Important schedule note** – As you have probably heard, the NFL changed to an 18-week 17 game season this year.  However, our fantasy season will remain unchanged from years past… regular season will still go for Weeks 1-13, and playoffs are Weeks 14-16.  

Onward!

BIG TIME

• Kyler Murray, QB – sprouts – 33 pts – Keeper delivers!  Murray had 5 TD’s total (4 passing, 1 rushing) to go along with 289 passing yards and 20 rushing yards.  This is how you like to see your keepers start the season!
• Patrick Mahomes, QB – Attack of Mahomes – 32 pts – Keeper delivers!  The Mahomes train just keeps rolling… he threw for 337 yards and 3 TD’s, plus added 18 yards and a rushing TD.
• Tom Brady, QB – Sofa King American – 30 pts – Brady’s only blemish on the day was having 2 interceptions.  But when you have 379 passing yards and 4 TD's, welllll, I guess we’ll let it slide.
• Dak Prescott, QB – American BadAss – 30 pts – Dak looked surprisingly good, and threw for 403 yards, 3 TD’s and just 1 pick.
• Tyreek Hill, WR – Sofa King American – 28 pts – Keeper delivers!  Hill had 11 catches on 15 targets, which he took for 197 yards and a TD.

COME ON MAN

• Mecole Hardman, WR – Attack of Mahomes – 1 pt – Hardman did catch all the balls thrown his way… unfortunately that only amounted to 3 catches for 19 yards.
• Aaron Rodgers, QB – Coors Light Drunk Guys – 1 pt – Rodgers finished with a Blake Bortles-esque stat line – 15 of 28 passes for just 133 yards and 2 interceptions.  This from a guy who was the top scorer in Week 1 last season (33 pts), and averaged 23.2 points per game.  In a pregame interview Rodgers deadpan told Erin Andrews “I’m excited for this season” without the least bit of energy or even change of facial expression.  He almost could have fallen asleep after he said it.  Seems like he carried that same energy to the field.
• Aaron Jones, RB – Joe’s Pats – 1 pt – Jones followed his quarterback's lead, and managed just 9 yards rushing on 5 carries (yuck), and 13 yards receiving on 2 catches (oof).
• Quinn Nordin, K – Joe’s Pats – 0 pts – Bill Belichick pulled the ol’ switcheroo on Joe going with Nick Folk instead of Nordin.  Seriously, how do the Patriots just have two kickers on standby?
• Robert Tonyan, TE – Longshanks – 0 pts – When Aaron Rodgers plays like a worn out sock, his receivers will likewise have crappy days.  Tonyan certainly sucked, catching just 2 balls for a measly 8 yards.

KICKERS – THE LEAST PREDICTABLE POSITION

Now, one week does not a season make, but check out three of the top kickers from Week 1:

#1 – Joey Slye, HOU – 14 points

T3 – Dustin Hopkins, WSH – 12 points

T3 – Chris Boswell, PIT – 12 pts

All three are free agents in our league, and according to Yahoo!, Chris Boswell was the most drafted of those three, having been drafted in a whopping 5% of fantasy leagues…Hopkins was drafted in only 3% of leagues, and el numero uno this week, Joey Slye, is not even among one of the 22 kickers listed as having been drafted in the Yahoo! drafts.  Probably means he is down in the below 1% range.

ALL UNWANTEDS

In this year’s draft, there were 5 teams tied for the fewest players drafted…each with just a pair of players picked:  CHI, HOU, NO, NYG and NYJ.  Since the All Unwanteds have normally been constructed from only one or two teams, I will randomly select two of these teams each week to construct the best team possible.  The two teams selected this week:  New York Jets and Houston Texans:

The league scoring average this week was 87.3 (literally can’t make this stuff up), so by the narrowest of margins, and with a team comprised almost exclusively of Texans, the All Unwanteds start the season 0-1.

BEST BENCH

With Gronk going wild in the first game for 21 points, and my starting TE posting a bagel, the first Best Bench of the season was mine for the taking.  But then out of nowhere, Deebo Samuel posts a big game against the Lions, Ja’Marr Chase catches a big TD pass, and all of a sudden Attack of Mahomes finishes with a 51-point-improvement possibility to take this week’s Best Bench!  

Timmy needed a half roster swap to get there:  D. Samuel for M. Hardman (+24), J. Williams for J. Robinson (+12), D. Swift for D. Singletary (+8) and J. Chase for D. Moore (+7).

Get your rosters ready for Week 2!!