Monday Update: What You Play For

Gentlemen,

That is such a great speech in the middle of a really dumb movie.

THAT'S GONNA MAKE THE FUCKIN' DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WINNING AND LOSING, BETWEEN LIVING AND DYING!

The time is finally here. The playoffs are about to begin. The entire season is a precursor, a demanding trial for the right to be here right now. Everything that has happened the previous 13 weeks no longer matters. It was simply prerequisite for the right to play this week.

If you can muster up 3 more wins (or in Gow/Dallus case, just 2), you will earn the right to be called "champion". Your name will be engraved on the trophy (which will one day be purchased...) and it can never be removed.

Can you feel the excitement???

Now... four of you are no longer with us, some mercifully thankful to be done. That is the cost of the regular season - 4 teams do not earn this chance. And that makes this a sad day for us all. Not only have we lost 4 brethren, but it means the end is very near for us all as well.

Coconuts*, Whitebread**, Crabs, and Titwarmer*** - your season ends today. Godspeed.

* Coconuts is your winner of the L'Ass'T Place Trophy. After being in the Championship game for the past 2 seasons, Coconuts is back in familiar territory. I believe this is his third or fourth L'Ass'T Place. How do you feel about that Juan?

** There was a time when I thought one of the stronger fantasy players in our league was Whitebread. He claims a championship from before this league was formed. He had probably the best team I ever saw lose to Mark Brunell. He was a mainstay in the postseason. When he spoke, he seemed to know what he was talking about... But right now, that is all ancient history. The last time Cracker made the playoffs was 2009 - the year Obama was inaugurated and that dude landed a plan on the Hudson. Make sure you remind him of that when he's cocking off at next year's draft.

*** There still exists a very small chance that Ned slips in. This would involve Gow picking up a WR in tonight's game and said player scoring 26 points. Gow has already told me he's not going to do so, but want to be transparent about this.

For the rest of you... this is what we play for. As Mike Tice once said, "Enjoy the season." Only one of us is going to win this thing. But we made it this far. If you can't have fun playing this game with the elevated stakes, then why play?

Good luck to you all, except whoever plays me. I hope your team dies in a fiery plane crash.

Yes, all of them. Separate plane crashes. Not a terrorist attack, just coincidental terrible piloting decisions.

And any players that I have on said planes are still ok. Really flukey.

Please note: the GIF above is actually a test plane, intended to crash. I actually googled "Fiery plane" to see what was out there. It turns out there's a lot. But when you watch them, they are definitely not what I would deem to be "funny" considering ... you know ... people are dying.

Ok I only hope all your players get seriously injured in said plane crashes.

The Games
NOTE: I'm going to do a playoff preview tomorrow or Wednesday, touching on each team. It will also include full-season Power Rankings. Because of this, I don't want to get too much into projected playoff stuff here. Just a review of the regular season finale.

Jerks (147.44) defeats Gow (121.56), or does he? Gow benched Roddy yesterday when news broke that he was OUT. That allows him the opportunity to swap anyone on his bench for a WR playing tonight, if we wants. The only available WR projected to score more than 0.0pts is Brian Hartline. Assuming this result holds, it will have saved my season and put me in the final playoff spot. Gow has the #1 seed locked up.

Crabs (112.46) currently leads Titwarmer (105.34), a result likely to change after tonight. Ned still has Tannehill and Wallace playing tonight, while Crabs has something called Caleb Sturgis. Ned is an 84% favorite, which if all results hold would make him the first above-.500 team to NOT make the postseason since we went to 6 teams.

Crapswell (150.82) edges Dallus (140.20) in matchup the featured two destined playoff teams. This could very likely be a preview of a semifinal next week. Andy has quietly built himself into a serious contender.

Also, rumor has it Andy was texting Gow trying to convince him to pick someone up to knock me out of the playoffs. Hey Andy...

Fredricks (177.90) destroys Coconuts (94.54), mercifully putting him out of his 2014 FF misery. Juan got 40 points from DeAnde Hopkins and still managed to be nowhere near close to winning. Bill has an outside chance to hit 200pts, which would be the highest single-week total of the season.

Kenni (123.06) leads Whitebread (102.88). Whitebread still has Chris Ivory playing tonight, but Yahoo calls this one 99% for Kenni. I do not agree with those odds, although I still think Kenni is the favorite. Should Whitey actually pull this out, Kenni would fall down to the 6th seed.

Tomorrow's Standings

Should Yahoo's projections hold, here would be the final regular season standings:

Place	Team	Record
1st	Gow	9-4
2nd	Dallus	8-5
3rd	Crapswell	8-5
4th	Kenni	8-5
5th	Fredricks	7-6
6th	Jerks	7-6
7th	Titwarmer	7-6
8th	Crabs	5-8
9th	Whitebread	3-10
10th	Coconuts	3-10

I just want to point out a couple teams here... At separate points throughout the season:

• Bill was 1-5
• Andy was 2-4
• Ned was 2-6

Every season I stress the importance of not giving up, continuing to fight, and playing to the last game - this is why. Teams and seasons do get turned around. What looks bleak midway through the season does become an afterthought come playoffs. Remember this next season when your team sucks in Week 6 and you're considering a fire sale...

Tonight

I look forward to the texts about where people are meeting.

Spoiler alert: you're meeting at BWW.

Enjoy the game, boys.