The closest game was over before Monday hit

Drew led by 25.9 with nobody left to play

Week six's lesson: a final score means nothing until the clock reads zero. Drew Richardson had Sunday night locked up. Dylan McGinty did not agree, and neither did Monday Night Football.

That strip hides the real story of the week.

Dylan McGinty Finds 37 Seconds

Full credit first: Dylan McGinty's For The Birds are 5-1, winners of four straight, and he just produced the closest finish of the week by a tenth of a point. Final: 101.4 to 101.3.

Here's what that score doesn't show. Drew Richardson had nobody left to play Sunday night, parked on a finished 101.3. Dylan sat at 75.4, down 25.90 with only two players left: Jayden Daniels and Eddy Pineiro, kicking off Monday night with Washington trailing San Francisco 20-3 at the half.

Dylan once named Jayden Daniels as the player who still stings him. Monday night, Daniels did the stinging for somebody else.

Pineiro's third-quarter field goal cut it to 15.62. A one-yard touchdown to Stefon Diggs with fifteen seconds left in the third made it 10.06. A nine-yard touchdown to Rachaad White with 9:22 left made it 3.62.

By the 52-second mark it was 0.58. With 37 seconds left, Daniels found Antonio Williams for seventeen yards, and Dylan led by 0.10. Daniels' last three snaps — a spike, an intentional grounding penalty and a sack — scored nothing.

Washington lost the real game 23-17; Dylan won his by a hair. Daniels finished with exactly 300 passing yards. At 297, Drew wins this instead. Drake London's two-point conversion earlier in the week counted for two points that mattered just as much.

Drew Richardson, the lesson here isn't the Monday collapse. It's the tight end spot you set once and never looked at again.

Greg Leite Can't Buy a Break

Greg Leite outscored eight of the nine other teams this week and still lost. His 117 ran into Kristen Ginter's 151.94, the one score higher than his own. C.J. Stroud's 22.98 on his bench was the week's highest bench score, and it wasn't even a mistake: Drake Maye gave him 23.8 in the lineup.

The league's own numbers back up the bad beat. Across six games, Greg's opponents have scored 22.35 points above their own average against everyone else. The prime suspect: Harold Jimenez's Don't Sweat The Technique, which dropped 138.22 on Greg while averaging 102.30 in its other five games. Nobody's saying it's coordinated, nobody's saying it isn't.

Greg also watched Rachaad White, a player he cut loose, score 15.7 for Jim Gascon's 4*TOWN AND GOAL this week. At 1-5, Greg's problem isn't talent. It's timing.

Harold Jimenez Climbs Out

Harold Jimenez delivered the week's Beatdown, running past Jim Gascon, 114.12 to 75.38, behind Isaiah Likely's 23.9. That win pulled Don't Sweat The Technique from tenth place to seventh, and the add of the 49ers' defense paid off immediately. Harold Jimenez picked himself to repeat as champion back in the preseason; Greg Leite doesn't buy it. At 2-4, that's the receipt on file for now — not proof he's cooked, not proof he's right, just where things stand.

Three teams — Dylan's For The Birds, Kristen's Hail Mary Poppins, and Drew's The Snap — sit within one game of the fourth and final playoff spot, which is exactly why Drew's self-inflicted loss above cost more than just pride.

David Andreassen, Still Unbeaten

David Andreassen's Chase to Witch Mountain is 6-0, the last unbeaten team standing, and the current points-for leader at 820.22. He defended the Belt for a fifth straight time, beating Steven Ginter's The Empire Strikes Backfield 115.72 to 97.84, even though Steven's Jordan Love pickup scored 20.24 in his debut off the wire. David answered with his own wire score, grabbing Chris Boswell for 17 points.

He's already made two lineup edits for week seven.

Next week brings the toughest test yet for that Belt: Drew Richardson, fresh off the collapse above, challenges for it. If David Andreassen wins, that's a sixth straight defense. If Drew Richardson takes it, the Belt changes hands for the first time all season.

• 🏆 Top Score: Hail Mary Poppins — 151.94
• 🚽 Toilet Bowl: 4*TOWN AND GOAL — 75.38
• 🔨 Beatdown: Don't Sweat The Technique over 4*TOWN AND GOAL by 38.74
• 😰 Photo Finish: For The Birds over The Snap by 0.1
• 📈 Overachiever: Hail Mary Poppins, +16.8 over projection
• 📉 Faceplant: Mean Machine, -28.6 under projection
• 🪑 Bench of the Week: YAC_all_day left C.J. Stroud (22.98) on the bench
• ⭐ Player of the Week: Christian McCaffrey (30.7) — started by Hail Mary Poppins
• 🥊 The Belt: Chase to Witch Mountain — defended against The Empire Strikes Backfield, 115.72 to 97.84 (5 straight defenses)

Nearly every trophy above already has its story told, except the Faceplant — that one belongs to Kevin Gaffney's Mean Machine, who missed his projection by 28.6 and still found a way past Mathew Clark's Redcoats by 8.78, thanks to starting Bryce Young over Bo Nix, a call worth 15.36.

Elsewhere next week: Dylan McGinty, winner of four straight and leading the all-time series 2-1, meets Kevin Gaffney, who's won two straight of his own. Mathew Clark, on a two-game slide, meets Greg Leite for the first time on record. Harold Jimenez, up to seventh, carries a 2-0 series edge into a game with a Steven Ginter team that's lost three straight. And Jim Gascon's four-game skid runs into Kristen Ginter's four-game heater, with the all-time series between them tied at one apiece.

Same time next week. Set your lineups.