Week 15 Observations

This article is part of our NFL Observations series.

Apparently the TOMFD's destiny was losing in Week 15. That's not what I had meant by "destiny," but reality always has the last word. 

People have asked, and no I didn't hedge, either. Hedging would have involved betting on the other team each week as our equity stake got big ($6M/23 = $260,870), but it wasn't tenable. If I had bet $5K or $10K each week on the underdog moneyline, I'd have been in the hole quite a bit at this point, and what if we had won two more weeks and gotten down to the final few before losing? I'd have had to up the hedge to 50K or more on the final games, and that would have involved getting a lot of liquidity to Vegas in a hurry. You'd hate to be dealing with logistical issues of getting down bets, or risk being out 50K and then losing Week 17 or 18 anyway. It sucks not to have won anything, but I'm only out $500, and I didn't have to stress about all of that in the process. 

Normally when a big prize comes into range, you don't win it -- you're always an underdog against the field, but you come away with a story. The losing story isn't anywhere close to as good as my $3M share of the winnings (I split it with Dalton Del Don), and it's not even as good as the winning story. But it's not nothing. 

A big part of the story is everyone who came along for the ride with us, including friends and family via text, email and Twitter. There were a lot of people rooting for the Team of Destiny, and that was a big highlight for me. 

Here's but a small sampling:

And as I tweeted, my almost 10-year old daughter Sasha got into it, to the point where I made her sit next to me on the sofa for good luck, even admonished her once for standing up rather than sitting during a tight moment a few weeks back. She was more upset about it than me and asked this morning whether (1) anyone was mad at me for losing or just sad; (2) why we had to wait a whole year to do it again; and (3) whether there's one for baseball and why not?

Don't get me wrong. Losing is never good. The "life lesson" or "journey" or any of that BS is as hollow as Kyler Murray's MVP candidacy (you didn't think my feel-good intro meant he'd be spared, did you?) There is no way to avoid the sense of disappointment, nor should it be avoided. I try to embrace it head-on, digest it fully, process completely. I don't know why, but as i type these words on a grey rainy day in Lisbon, I'm almost enjoying it. 

• Mike Evans and Chris Godwin are money in the bank during your fantasy playoffs, and by "money" I mean those 100 trillion dollar Zimbabwe notes. This happened to me in the fantasy playoffs two years ago too. At least Godwin caught six short passes before leaving.
• The Saints always play the Buccaneers tough, and they finally had their full defensive line back.
• Leonard Fournette might have set the record for running back receptions had he not left with a hamstring injury.
• Tyler Huntley did a pretty good Lamar Jackson impression with 73 rushing yards, two rushing TDs and two passing TDs. Like Jackson, his favorite receiver is Mark Andrews (13-10-136-2) who apparently didn't like seeing Travis Kelce overtake him for TE1 Thursday night.
• You have to love when you have the 4.5-point underdog (Wednesday line), and they go for two instead of kicking the PAT for overtime.
• I say this every week: Aaron Rodgers is the real MVP, but the voters won't give him the award because they'll want to send a message about his choices. Unless Matthew Stafford or Tom Brady step up huge down the stretch, that means it could be Jonathan Taylor or long shot Cooper Kupp.
• The Falcons play hard, but against decent teams they are always exposed.
• The Bengals are the best team in the AFC north, but I have a hard time seeing anyone from that division doing damage in the playoffs.
• These tweets aged well:

And this clip:

• I guess the Jaguars didn't hate Urban Meyer as much as we were led to believe. (BTW -- this clip has to be seen to be believed.)
• Davis Mills or Trevor Lawrence -- who has the better career?
• Sorry if like me you had Steelers going in your fantasy playoffs. It was worse than Bucs-Saints.
• Saquon Barkley (15-50-0, 8-4-24-0) lost the first fumble of his career, and Devontae Booker (8-74-0, 2-2-8-0) outplayed him. Barkley still seems a little sluggish off the ankle injury.
• I don't see why the Giants bother starting the abominable Mike Glennon, when they have Jake Fromm on the roster. Fromm isn't likely to pan out, and he finally got some run in the second half, but why not take a longer look?
• The Cowboys offense still isn't right.
• I know it was against the Jets, but Duke Johnson (22-107-2, 1-1-20-0) looked pretty good. Strange after so much hype and disappointment, he's suddenly relevant out of nowhere in the 2021 fantasy playoffs.
• I obviously watched the entire Lions-Cardinals game, and the Lions killed them. I've rarely seen a double-digit favorite come out that flat and not close the gap for an entire 60 minutes.
• Kyler Murray looked compromised by his ankle -- he didn't avoid the rush very well, and he rushed for only three yards. He never got into a rhythm, and there was never a sense he had figured out the Lions defense.
• Christian Kirk (12-9-94-1) had a good fantasy game, but also some key drops.
• Craig Reynolds (26-112-0, 1-1-5-0) looked good for the second straight game, breaking tackles and falling forward for extra yards.
• Jared Goff played an almost perfect game and did the Rams a huge solid in the process by taking down the Cardinals.
• I didn't watch much of Bills-Panthers, but I had the Bills in the SuperContest and Gabriel Davis (out of desperation) in one playoff matchup.
• I thought my NFFC Primetime team with Diontae Johnson, Mike Evans, Rob Gronkowski, Michael Pittman, Rhamondre Stevenson and the Cardinals defense was drawing dead after one week, but looking at how many duds there were around the league, who knows?