Week 12: We're Thankful for Football

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

It's a great time to be alive in the Fellowship. With only two weeks left in the regular season, we're going to jump into the matchups and preview some playoff potential scenarios. As it stands, there are seven teams at .500 and that's quite the spread as we enter December. Unfortunately, Jimmy and Josh have been eliminated from playoff contention, and have found themselves in the Toilet Bowl. Those are the only two teams that, without a doubt, cannot make the playoffs. Despite that, these two managers can still pose a threat. No victory is free in Middle-Earth. Let's break down Week 12 and see what the future may bring.

Dropped from rankings: McConkey Kong

*(Points Scored x2) + (Points Scored * Winning %) + (Points Scored * Winning % if played vs the median score of the week)

GOONER OF THE WEEK:

Thanksgiving is the season of giving. And there’s no one else who was better at giving the gift of a potential MVP and some wins, than our GOTW, the New York Football Giants.

Joe Schoen, the stuffing of GMs, had options this year, and one of them was to keep Saquon Barkley. And look, I’m no GM (besides my fantasy team), but I’m prettttty sure I would not let my pro bowl running back walk let alone let them sign with a divisional rival.

But that’s exactly what Joe decided to do. Ignoring the advice of the owner, and even his own freaking kid.

And what results did it yield? Oh, just the most yards from scrimmage in Eagles history.. and he did it against the Giants too. And it’s got me feelin’ really NICEY.

Let’s hope the Giants owner gets himself a load of white meat turkey, because that tryptophan will help him sleep at night.

RawbPeeple vs. Philadelphia Smeagles:

An unlikely big TD game from Nick Chubb in large part helped swing this matchup in Rawb's favor. Even if Nico had started, Josh still didn't have the horses, and it doesn't look like CMC, or the 49ers for that matter, have the legs to gallop the final dance like days of old. The PF runner-up thus far has now won three of his four matchups.

Rawb and Smeagles Turkey Day Preview:

Next week Rawb finally takes on Jess, and the week after, he's got Ron and the Stroud Boys. Realistically, with his total PF as it stands, he could split these two games, but losing both would make an eighth seed very hard to attain. For this coming matchup, Jess roughly averages 136 points per game, while Rawb's sitting at around 120 points. He'll need ceiling games from his marquee players to offset Jess' power-back tandem. That may be hard to do if the Sun God isn't his usual self this week (and we know Ekeler will probably be out with his second concussion of the season). Some of their key players squabble up on Thursday, so one of these two scoring leaders will be feasting while the other will be left in the fridge as leftovers. Rawb has some weaknesses in his RB2, WR2, and Flex spots, so he'll be hail mary-ing on the rosary for a fast start on Thanksgiving. Meanwhile, Josh will attempt to spoil Tom's second seed in the standings. And he already gave the Bodega Cats some fits as a standings spoiler about a week ago. It's a dirty Gollum role, but hey, somebody's gotta play it...lest he find himself with the toilet bowl.

Jimmy the Kid vs. Sacks in the City:

Jimmy still holds the MacSucken' after a rough bye week for his squad. Jonnu Smith does look like the truth though when the Dolphins are clicking, so we'll share in that bright spot with our Fellowship rookie league manager. With Sacks in the City, the story of steady as she goes continues. Tua, Abdullah (a fresh waiver pickup on Friday), and Pittman put in some solid work.

Sacks and Jimmy Turkey Day Preview:

Sacks has been on the lower side of scoring on average this season. She'll need to lower floor performances from Kong and Jimmy over the next two weeks. First, Alyssa sets her sights on Katie. This is one of those toss-up matchups. Kong has a great squad that can sometimes find itself pop-off shy. Alyssa will need strong showings from Rhamondre at RB and Quentin at WR, and they've both shown that they can do it as those teams have found stronger identities on offense as the season went on. With her low scoring total, Sacks would need to win out to increase those chances. Jimmy can make things tough for the Bodega Cats this week. He gets Tee Higgins and Chase Brown back. Like those Bengals, Jimmy basically plays for pride (and he also plays to avoid the dreaded toilet bowl). Dom does get Josh Allen and Wilson back from bye, and Jimmy waits to see if Pacheco will make his return--but will it even matter in that merry-go-round offense?

Bodega Cat vs. The Algorithm:

Dom's probably letting out a major exhale after taking down Trev Rev in our matchup of the week runner-up. Lamar, Zay, and Ravens D couldn't quite combine to take the two time champ down. Sorry, Algorithm, but you can only see one chip in your lines of code. The Cena of our league was for sure waving his hands after that performance from Waddle. Caleb Williams also had himself a GAME, helping to cement his number one pick status while simultaneously saving Dom's chances for playoff glory all in one fell swoop. Luke Schoonmaker and Rico Dowdle also took a two birds one-Commanders-team stone approach. It's a solid win for the two-time champ in what's been a season (so far) of false starts for the orange cats.

Bodega and Algorithm Turkey Day Preview:

Like Sacks, Dom and Trevor aren't putting up the highest scores every week. However, they're closer to the middle of the pack. One or two crazy ceiling weeks would help break some ties if it ends up coming to that final comparison in the standings. Dom walks into a prideful matchup against Jimmy. Josh Allen may play for the number one seed and show off in a big game against SF. In the final week, Dom battles Katie in a cat on ape brawl. Trev draws an eastern matchup against Tony. Tony's team has been rolling as of late, and his team really flies if Chase takes off. Last year's champ will need Lamar to carry the rest of the team to match the potential ceiling here--especially if Bo Nix shows his rookie of the year talent against the Browns. Trevor finishes his regular season campaign in his playoff judgement day matchup against Abigail. Since his PF is lower than most, Trevor should also be sacrificing old desktop computers to the silicon gods to win out with some high ceiling performances to give him a chance to defend the belt.

Beerserkers vs. LuLu Lemons:

It's our matchup of the week! These two friends went at it this week. Tucker and roll! Seriously, Justin did help keep this one or two leg lengths away from extending a LuLu streak. But it's okay! Thanos isn't back, false alarm everyone. The slippery RawbPeeple turncoat, Bucky Irving, helped the LuLu cause, yet it was Jacobs and Pollard that made the Tyson tiger sleep inside of Alex. Mark Andrews couldn't pull a vintage TE number one performance (McBride and Jonnu have first and second this week) out of his hat during MNF so Alex slips in the standings just a smidge. All the while, Beerserkers pops the double Coors Lites and takes back the king of the west crown. Congrats on a stone cold victory, Tom. The king in the west!

Beerserkers and LuLu Turkey Day Preview:

Both of these managers have strong chances to make the playoffs. In order to miss, other managers would have to ball out and they'd both have to lose out and have crummy PF totals to get bounced. Tom will look to protect his king of the west status with a victory against Josh for turkey day. He gets Tony in the last week so it's better to beat Josh into submission so he can set his sights on a red hot gooner. With Zach only a couple dozen points behind him, the Beerserkers need to keep that one game lead to guarantee solid playoff seeding. For LuLu, he draws the nickname queen Abby this week and his double-up matchup is Jess for the last game of the season. Needless to say, he'll need those ceiling games to keep these ladies off him...otherwise he'll be right at .500 with a lot of hungry teams looking to steal a spot in the bracket.

Gooning With All Mahomies vs. Haribo Lecter:

Tony's probably reeling right now. He could've been up BIG in the standings. Abigail had Smith in her lineup, but before the Eagles tipped off, she swapped Trey McBride into her flex, keeping her strong playoff chances alive and well. These two eastern teams have the same record with very close PF after this drama heavy matchup. Even with all of the Cle players in his lineup, Tony still had a respectable points total that keeps him in a solid shape. Sutton's emerged as a top 10 WR to compliment Chase. Watch out everyone because this father of three may goon all over us and keep some of us out of the playoffs for a second straight year!

Gooning and Haribo Turkey Day Preview:

With the aforementioned matchup against Trevor previewed above, we can break everything down even more. If Tony does lose to the machine next week, he still has the last week matchup to stay one game above .500 on the season. Although it's not an easy one! Tony will defend his positive record against Tom. Stay tuned dear managers and recap readers, because this matchup may be one of the cornerstone matchups of year when it comes to playoff seeding. Staying in the east, Abby plays Alex and Trevor the week after. Similar to Tony, Abigail can afford to split her final two matchups depending on how the other .500 teams fare. And if her team can stay hot (in terms of PF) going into the final stretch, then the rest of the league need to respect the nickname queen. Because it takes true commitment to a bit to keep Chig Okonkwo in a starting lineup smh.

McConkey Kong vs. Stroud Boys:

Kong's squad fell to the floor in the matchup this week. Katie's now dropped two of the last three, and it's partially because her team can really score lights out when she reaches her ceiling...but the caffeine crash is inevitable whenever her team does pop. She hasn't won two games in a row since weeks 6 and 7 respectively. On paper, AJ, DK, and the likes of Joe Mixon should be able to help her bounce back. Ron, on the flipside, keeps those playoff hopes alive. Aaron Jones and Jakobi Meyers really stepped up to play. Malik's talent continues to drown in the Meadowlands, so it's hard to be optimistic after the Bucs derailed the Tommy DeVito return train. Ron's on the edge now, so let's look ahead to see what could happen for our boy in the homestretch.

Kong and Stroud Turkey Day Preview:

First up, Ron will take on Zach and finish in a rematch with Rawb. The mafia have been taking off, so it will be hard to match the Godfather's red hot energy from the second half of the season if Aaron Jones and Nabers can't help Bijan and Brock Bowers cover the spread. While there scenarios do exist, it's way more likely for Ron to get a playoff spot if he wins out these next two weeks. In order for Katie to stay in the playoff bracket, she'll need to have more of those Taysom Hill miracle weeks. She'll play Alyssa and then Dom. Again, since both of her next matchups are also vying for a playoff spot, it would be better to win out so she can stay on track. That way, Beerserkers could drop a game or two, and she'd reclaim the top west spot. The win column is even more important since Spaghetti Mafia has been climbing up the total PF ladder.

Spaghetti Mafia vs. Detroit Lines:

What a couple weeks for the mafia. Gotta give the man his flowers. His team is looking scary now with the Detroit RB stack. It was more than enough to put Jess down this week. Sam Darnold can be up and down this season, but Cooper, Terry, TJ, and Ladd have all been solid recently. Add in some nice defense and kicker play, and even a MVP-nuclear power level performance from Barkley this week couldn't stop the godfather from a toast on the day of his daughter's wedding. Jess, in spite of the loss, is still 200 points over Zach now (with a narrow lead on Rawb in total PF). Seriously she still put up a ton of points. I MUST also say that Will Lutz can literally go get trampled at a rodeo. He got blocked by the Kansas City special teams to basically bagel on Rawb, when he was needed most, and NOW he decides to go 5 for 5??? Back to Jess: she can be shaky at WR; nevertheless, she's got more tight ends than a San Francisco nightclub to be on pace to retain her Aragorn Crown. Congrats. You're one hell of a rookie. Please, please lose the rest of your games now.

Mafia and Detroit Turkey Day Preview:

If Zach continues this scoring pace, he can blow by Ron this week and Josh after that to really cement his epic comeback. Ron is literally in a win or go home situation, so anything can happen. Ron has had some high ceiling games, so we'll watch this next matchup with bated breath--speaking for myself here as another .500 team. What about this year's Aragorn? Well, she's got moi or Rawb this week. That matchup could come down to Barkley or Hurts with the points spread. Jess gets LuLu the last game of the season. No matter what, Jess will be the number one seed. The rest of us will just have to pray when it comes time to play Weeks 15 through 17.

From all of us here at Fellowship mothership, I want to wish you a delicious, turducken-filled Thanksgiving feast with friends, family, and your potential losing opponent this week.

Do your research, set your lineups, and may you pop the fuck off!