Mark is winning the trade and nothing else
The trade is up, the record is down, and Emmett Johnson sat.
Week 8 wasn't won by anybody's roster. It was lost by lineups. Two games flipped on a single bench swap, one game was played with an empty chair, and the week's top score came from the manager who finally stopped losing. Read the table, then read what people did to themselves.
🏆 WINNER OF THE WEEK — Alex (Little Ditka Energy)
Alex's Little Ditka Energy put up 149.32, the week's top score, and the next-best anywhere was Sarah's 122.18. That snapped a four-game skid, beat the projection by 52.6, and came with Sam Darnold at 21.52 a week after Sarah cut him. The 2025 champion is 2-6 and won by 57.52; both things are true. Grudging respect, Alex, with one note: Tyler Allgeier scored 33.6 on your bench, and in a week where that didn't matter, it didn't matter.
💀 LOSER OF THE WEEK — Ethan (ManBearPig)
Ethan, you benched Josh Downs's 10.3 behind DK Metcalf's 0.9 and lost to Edred by 2.02. That one swap turns the loss into a win and keeps a five-game win streak alive. You told the desk your lineup gets set Thursday. Thursday is fine; Sunday is when you look again. You've made three moves all season, fewest in the league, and the week you needed one it was already on your bench.
| Final | Margin |
|---|---|
| Little Ditka Energy 149.32, Here Come the Irish 91.8 | 57.52 |
| Davante’s Inferno 117.3, The Vibes Voyagers 100 | 17.3 |
| Wildcats&Wolverines 120.34, The Snap 94.16 | 26.18 |
| Sarah's Boss Team 122.18, Sama's Fine Team 92.28 | 29.9 |
| The Sonoran Dogs 116.38, Pantalones en Fuego 78.6 | 37.78 |
| Edred's Expert Team 96.88, ManBearPig 94.86 | 2.02 |
| Chitown daddy 91.88, T-t-t-t-today Junior! 88.26 | 3.62 |
Five winners cleared 116; the two closest games were decided by the lineup cards.
Mark's Trade Is Working
The trade is the one thing going right for Mark's The Vibes Voyagers. Two weeks in, the players he got from sama have scored 67.9 to the 45.1 going the other way, a gap of 22.9. He also started Kyler Murray for 23.9, a quarterback Drew dropped two weeks ago. The haul is real.
The lineup card is where it died. Mark, you've made 25 moves, the most in the league, and started four different quarterbacks in five weeks, and the call that decided your week was leaving Emmett Johnson's 22.8 behind Jordan Mason's 2. That swap alone turns the 100 you scored into a win over kelsey's 117.3. Add the Chiefs starting at defense for zero and the loss writes itself.
Seven straight losses is no longer a joke; it's a question. The series with kelsey still reads 7-4 in Mark's favor, and this was the second straight meeting she took from him. The parts are good. The assembly isn't.
kelsey's Sixth Defense
kelsey's Davante’s Inferno added the Buccaneers back this week and they scored 26 in their first start since Week 2, which is the whole margin and then some. That's the sixth different defense she's started this season. At this point it isn't a strategy, it's a lifestyle, and the lifestyle is 7-1 and rank 1. She was projected to win and did, with 117.3 against Mark's 100, and the carousel keeps paying.
Edred Escapes
Edred's Edred's Expert Team started Chris Godwin Jr. and DeVonta Smith and got zero from each. Justice Hill scored 5.5 on the bench; Germie Bernard, added this week after Mark cut him, scored 5.5 on the bench too. Two zeros in the starting nine, and Edred won by 2.02 anyway because Ethan did the same thing with higher stakes.
Edred, two dead slots is one short of a hat trick and you still took a game off a 6-1 team. "Expert" is doing a lot of work in that team name right now. The win moves you to 3-5, which, in this table, is within one game of the last playoff spot. Fill the slots and that's a real position.
The Desk Left the Chair Empty
Drew's The Snap started eight of nine. The K slot had nobody in it, and the game went to Stephanie's Wildcats&Wolverines by 26.18. The desk has written a lot of sentences about other people's lineups. This one is about mine.
The rest of the lineup did its job. The Jaguars, cut by sama a week earlier, scored 23 in their first start for The Snap, and Jahmyr Gibbs led the way with 23.8. Tyler Bass came over from Stephanie's side through the waiver pool while the Texans went the other direction, then scored 15.9 on my bench, one seat over from the empty one.
Stephanie, you got 120.34 and the points-for lead at 1001.16 off a fourth straight win, so you didn't need the help. The loss drops The Snap from #5 to #6 and into the pack chasing seed 7.
Cristian Wasted Josh Allen
Cristian's T-t-t-t-today Junior! got 30.56 from Josh Allen, the best score by any starter on a losing roster this week, and lost to Hector's Chitown daddy by 3.62. Allen was 34.6% of an 88.26 total. Zay Flowers started for zero. The team finished 26.8 under projection, the worst miss in the league.
Cristian, you were projected to win this by double digits and your quarterback did his job. What were the other eight doing? Two straight losses leave you at 3-5, still within a game of seed 7, but the margin for error is gone.
Hector didn't exactly earn it. Ted Hurst III started for zero while Keon Coleman's 0.9 sat on the bench, and that makes seven starts at zero or worse this season, more than anyone in the league. Seven is a trait, not a slump. It's also 4-4 and rank 7, back above the playoff line from 0-3 and rank 14 in week 3, so the trait is somehow working.
| # | Team | W-L | GB | PF | Streak | Move |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Davante’s Inferno | 7-1 | — | 945.2 | W2 | — |
| 2 | Wildcats&Wolverines | 6-2 | 1 | 1001.2 | W4 | ▲1 |
| 3 | The Sonoran Dogs | 6-2 | 1 | 944.3 | W4 | ▲1 |
| 4 | ManBearPig | 6-2 | 1 | 852.6 | L1 | ▼2 |
| 5 | Sarah's Boss Team | 5-3 | 2 | 879.5 | W2 | ▲1 |
| 6 | The Snap | 5-3 | 2 | 865.6 | L1 | ▼1 |
| 7 | Chitown daddy | 4-4 | 3 | 796.7 | W1 | ▲1 |
| 8 | Sama's Fine Team | 3-5 | 4 | 813.7 | L2 | ▼1 |
| 9 | T-t-t-t-today Junior! | 3-5 | 4 | 780.5 | L2 | — |
| 10 | Here Come the Irish | 3-5 | 4 | 780.5 | L2 | — |
| 11 | Edred's Expert Team | 3-5 | 4 | 775.9 | W1 | — |
| 12 | Little Ditka Energy | 2-6 | 5 | 828.2 | W1 | ▲1 |
| 13 | Pantalones en Fuego | 2-6 | 5 | 749.2 | L1 | ▼1 |
| 14 | The Vibes Voyagers | 1-7 | 6 | 709.8 | L7 | — |
Seven teams sit within one game of seed 7, the last playoff spot: Sarah, Drew, Hector, sama, Cristian, StephanieP and Edred. Most of them lost this week to themselves.
- 🏆 Top Score: Little Ditka Energy — 149.32
- 🚽 Toilet Bowl: Pantalones en Fuego — 78.6
- 🔨 Beatdown: Little Ditka Energy over Here Come the Irish by 57.52
- 😰 Photo Finish: Edred's Expert Team over ManBearPig by 2.02
- 📈 Overachiever: Little Ditka Energy, +52.6 over projection
- 📉 Faceplant: T-t-t-t-today Junior!, -26.8 under projection
- 🪑 Bench of the Week: Little Ditka Energy left Tyler Allgeier (33.6) on the bench
- ⭐ Player of the Week: Joe Burrow (49.48) — started by The Sonoran Dogs
Joe Burrow's 49.48 for Jeff P's The Sonoran Dogs was the week's best player score and carried a 116.38 win that keeps him at 6-2 on four straight; Brent's Pantalones en Fuego owns the Toilet Bowl at 78.6, which is roughly what the projection said and still hurts.
Loose Ends
Jeff P also grabbed Mike Gesicki off the wire for 15.6 in his debut. Sarah's Sarah's Boss Team won 122.18 with Chris Olave benched, a round-three pick with 27.5 points over the last four weeks, ranked 28 of 60 tracked receivers in that span; the week after she cut Darnold, he scored 21.52 for Alex. sama drops to 3-5 on two straight losses with the Jaguars scoring for someone else.
The playoff line is seed 7 and half the league is a game from it. Nobody in that pack needs a better roster. Mark needed one swap, Ethan needed one swap, I needed one kicker. Next week the chair better have someone in it.
Same time next week. Set your lineups.