2020 Power Rankings-Week 8

## Introduction

We have passed the halfway point in a fantasy season some did not think would take place. While some teams have struggled to maintain a consistant roster, others have flourished in the chaos.

## Stat Chat

* Duck Punchers sets a league record by notching their 9th season with 6 or more regular season wins.
* Pain Train becomes the 3rd team to reach 80 wins.
* Stupid Idiots is on a three-game win streak for the first time in franchise history.
* Stupid Idiots ties Jar Jar Stinks! on the all-time regular season win list with their 18th W. Jar Jar finished their career 18-21. Idiots is 18-28.
* Papa loses to Stupid Idiots for the first time in franchise history (5-1).
* Pain Train moves into a tie for 2nd on the list of most wins against another team with their 12th combined victory against GBM.

## Top vs. Bottom

One of the biggest disparities in 2020 with an average of 70 points per game splitting top-scoring Duck with bottom-scoring Shotti.

## Top Score = Top Four

Last week we discussed the remarkable season that Duck Punchers is having, and he followed up the blurb with another stellar performance. This week he could become the first team in LOC history to break 2,000 points in just 8 games.

So how have other top-scoring teams through seven weeks faired come December?

Stupid Idiots is an outlier, with every top scorer from 2016-2018 winning the Glory Bowl and every other top scorer finishing in the top four. But it is worth noting that Stupid Idiots did not finish with a bye due to some bad scheduling beats and Paddock 9, the league's 2019 champion, was the second highest scorer by a narrow margin through seven weeks.

While a championship is never guaranteed, his top score likely means an incoming bye week for Duck Punchers. That locks in the ninth top-four finish for a top scoring team through half the season. And before we go calling this a MattJinx in the making, keep in mind that Duck is 6-1 and no team with 7 wins has EVER missed playoffs in the 10-team era.

## Matchup Recaps

* Sweet Dee ends their freefall with a win in an underwhelming Matchup of the Week showdown against ma ma mommsa said, sweeping the season series (6-8). **Next Matchup: N/A**
* Pain Train dominates GBM to move into a tie for second (12-4). **Next Matchup: N/A**
* RIPDab splits the season series with Paddock 9 after another convincing performance (7-8). **Next Matchup: N/A**
* Duck Punchers predictably deconstructs Shotti Bunch in their first matchup since the 2019 Salty Dolphin Bowl (7-9). **Next Matchup: Week 13**
* Stupid Idiots gets on the board against Papa's Posse and is on their best stretch in team history (1-5). **Next Matchup: Week 13**

## Team Records By Month - October

Just like that another month is in the history books. Let's take a look at the updated graph of everyone's performance by month.

Duck Punchers had the best month with a 3-1 record (Idiots was also 3-1). They improve upon their league best record for the month. Shotti, who went 1-3, has performed so well in the Halloween month that they still have the second best record at 30-10. Sweet Dee, who scratched and clawed their way to a 2-2 October performance, is still just 0.200 all-time.

The worst performance was Garoppoblow Me, who went winless and falls below 0.500. Papa went 1-3 and they are the first team to break 30 losses in the season's middle month.

Looking forward into November, we see that Pain Train is historically the hottest team. That is shaping up to be the case again in 2020, with his WR group getting stronger as the weeks go on.

Duck Punchers and Garoppoblow Me also have solid months. GBM is also getting healthy and has an average strength of schedule for the last six weeks.

On the other end of the spectrum, Paddock 9 has trouble finishing and is just 16-26. It's worth noting that Sweet Dee has never finished with over 6 wins, but would need to finish just 2-4 over the last six games in order to reach 7 wins. They average 1.7 wins in November.

Shotti, whose worst month is November (18-19) will likely continue that trend with their 2020 season essentially over.

Due to a scheduling quirk, we will have a record six games that qualify as November games (typically, the final week of the season is in December and I lump that into the November record).

## Most Wins Against an Opponent

This week, Pain Train continued their dominance over Garoppoblow Me. Let's see who else is on the list of most wins against another team.

Perhaps that is why GBM is so bitter this year. Three of their losses have come against teams they have dominated for the entirety of their franchise history.

Duck Punchers has a chance to move into 1st place on this list if they take down momma in week eight.

## Trade Tracker

Starts:

* Mixon: 1
* CEH: 2

Remember when Chris was begging us to cancel this trade. If only, huh?

Starts (Pain Train):

* Metcalf: 2

Starts (Sweet Dee)

* Chark: 3
* Kelley: 1
* Slayton: 3

Bad week for all three wide receivers and both teams got the win. Safe to say the trade had no effect in week seven.

Starts:

* Freeman: 3
* Miller: 1

Now that Scotty Miller plays for RIPDab and Freeman may ride the bench all season, I really should stop tracking this idiotic trade. But it's too funny. I have to see how this plays out.

## Absolute Standings

Huge disparity with The Stupid idiots, who is basically having the opposite kind of luck they had in 2019. Last season, they were the best team in the league by points scored but kept catching shit matchups. This year, they've had great luck with the scheduling and it has helped compensate for lackluster on the field performances. According to the absolute standings, they wouldn't even be sniffing playoffs this season.

Other than the already covered GBM nonsense, most other teams are in the same spots they would be.

I am curious how people feel about the standings structure where you combine your matchup win with a win or loss based on your score vs. the rest of the league. In other words, you win your matchup you get a W. But if you are a top five scoring team in the league, you get a second W for that week. I know it's probably something we'd never institute in the LOC because everyone fears change, but I actually really like it. There have been SO many times where a good team has played another really good team that week. Take Paddock 9 in week seven. 232.28 points and gets a loss, while Stupid Idiots scores 191.78 and gets a win. If this win/loss style was used, both teams would still end up with a win and a loss for that week.

I like it, but I also get that it cheapens the matchups. But also, I'm not so sure the matchup format is the best way to gauge who is the best fantasy player.

## The Greatest Game - Week Seven

Week seven of 2020 gave us more of the same, with the good teams dominating their opponents and beginning to set themselves apart from the pack. But in the past, some of our closest battles have been fought in week seven.

### 2014 - Ma ma momma said vs. The Shotti Bunch

* Final Score: 234.03-233.64
* Why it's Nominated: The battle of the previous two league champions ends with a win for Momma despite forgetting to set their lineup, handing Shotti his first back-to-back loss in two seasons.

When momma went down to Dallas for the weekend, he forgot to take Percy Harvin out of his lineup. But Shotti was 0-3 without AJ Green, who wouldn't be suiting up for the week seven showdown. Momma had Shotti's number back then and this was a great matchup mainly for some of the names involved. Dez Bryant, Arian Foster, DeMarco Murray, Andrew Luck vs. Peyton Manning, and let's just throw in Eric Decker and Cecil Shorts for the fun of it.

Momma would finish 10-3 with a bye and lose the Glory Bowl to Duck Punchers, the first of two straight Glory Bowl losses. Shotti would get his revenge in 2015 with a championship victory over the once great momma.

### 2017 - Duck Punchers vs. Paddock 9

* Final Score: 210.12-209.00
* Why it's Nominated: In a game that became known as "The Tale of the Photo Finish," Duck Punchers comes back to beat Paddock 9 after Paddock 9's last player makes a key block for Duck Punchers' last player.

On a weekend when "Boo 2: A Madea Halloween" finished number one at the domestic box office, Paddock 9 found themselves in a terrible horror movie of their own as they saw a huge lead evaporate on Sunday and disappear like the ghost of the Patriots Dynasty on Sunday night.

It all started with huge days from Alex Smith (P9) and Dak Prescott (DP). Then Paddock 9 made their first error in starting Adrian Peterson, who everyone knows is Duck's guy. You don't start a Duck guy against Duck.

On Sunday night it came down to Taylor Gabriel and Brandin Cooks (Duck Punchers) vs. Rob Gronkowski (Paddock).

P9 held a slight lead until Gronk blocked for Cooks on a TD pass from Brady, giving Duck Punchers a lead. Gronk had an off day, but performed just well enough to keep up with Cooks as the night went on. But on the clock killing drive in the fourth, Cooks was hit on a first down pass to both end the game for New England and seal the win for Duck Punchers.

This game was so close that we had to wait for stat adjustments, which actually gave DP slightly more points.

The game tied the franchise series 6-6 and the teams would meet two more times that year, including in the 2017 Cinco De Lose-O game.

### 2019 - Pain Train vs. Garoppoblow Me

* Final Score: 197.38-194.03

* Why it's Nominated: "The Akins Game" sparks a massive run from Pain Train that almost culminates in a championship while it simultaneously sends Garoppoblow Me on a death spiral from which they still have not recovered.

In the week leading up to the game, Garoppoblow Me told anyone who would listen that they had a secret weapon for that coming Sunday. For the first time, GBM had opted to stream tight ends for the entirety of the season, and thanks to a SiriusXM talk show they were convinced they had just the guy to start.

That guy was Jordan Akins. For whatever reason, GBM had it in his head that Akins was the guy that was going to surprise everyone and make him look like a genius.

The only problem is, as the week went on and the buzz from that Monday morning talk show wore off, GBM began to doubt his risky decision. So at the last second, after talking him up all week, Akins was benched for Gerald Everett.

Akins ended up with just 7.30 points, far from a league winning genius move. But the beauty of the story is that his replacement, Everett, only scored 3.10.

That's a difference of 4.20 points.

Garoppoblow Me was only defeated by 3.35 points.

It turns out he was right. Had GBM trusted his gut and started Akins, not only would he have won the matchup, but he would have finished the season 6-7 instead of 5-8 and made the playoffs thanks to the point tie-breaker with MMMS.

Meanwhile, this was just the spark Pain Train needed. They finished the last seven games 6-1. GBM has gone 6-10 since that game and some say he has never recovered.

## Power Rankings

### 1(1). Duck Punchers

Russell Wilson and Tyler Lockett account for 25% of the team's total points. But six other players on the roster have over 90 points on the season, the most in the league.

### 2(2). Paddock 9

Their power grows as they assimilate the good players from Shotti Bunch into their collective. Josh Jacobs is just the spark they need to get over the hump and they are already the most consistant scoring team in 2020.

### 3(3). RIPDab

When they win, they win big. They are averaging 269.59 points in games they've won this season. That drops to just 204 in their losses.

### 4(6). Pain Train

Pain Train is back and looking to go on a tear, much like last season after a victory to GBM in the same week. They face Papa and Momma in their next two games and victories in both matchups may be enough to lock in playoffs with four games left to play.

### 5(5). The Stupid Idiots

Another walk in the park for a Stupid Idiot team that has historically not caught a single break. But the stroll may be over in week eight against Paddock 9.

### 6(4). Ma ma momma said

I told momma to stay hot and they went cold on me!

### 7(7). Sweet Dee

Sitting pretty at 5-2 but an unfavorable schedule over the last six weeks.

### 8(8). Garoppoblow Me

The sad reality for GBM is that this looks to be another lost season, but at the very least they can escape 10th place if they can beat the lowly Shotti Bunch. That's a big if.

### 9(8). Papa's Posse

Papa is likely done for 2020, and rumors of his retirement have circulated the tabloids. He likely won't pull an upset against Pain Train but he does have games left against Shotti, GBM, and the Stupid Idiots. Maybe he can save some face.

### 10(10). The Shotti Bunch

Shotti is playing week eight with a Frankenstein team. His QB is from Pain Train. His TE is from Duck Punchers. His defense is from The Stupid Idiots. Two of his WR's are from Paddock 9, another is from GBM.

## Matchup of the Week - Shotti vs. GBM

There isn't much to say. These two teams suck but someone is going to win. These two teams were the best regular season forces from 2015-2018, but over the last two seasons both have fallen from grace. This week, one of their seasons officially ends. Shotti, if he cannot get his third win, will not have the scoring he needs to win a tiebreaker for the 6th seed. Meanwhile, GBM falling to 1-7 means he will not have the necessary wins even if he runs the table. It isn't going to be pretty, but it's going to be football.

## Conclusion

The next time a writeup drops we will have had our presidential election. I think we're all ready to enjoy some football without political ads every five seconds. Stay safe, stay sane, and best of luck.