El Tri Fantasy Football, Week 9 Power Rankings

Mickle has spent his entire short career in this league complaining about his players, and in week 8 he wrote the material himself. He started Jeremiyah Love, a $31 buy sitting on 47.9 points for the season, got 2.3 out of him, and left Tyler Allgeier's 33.6 on the bench. That is a 31.3-point swing, the worst start/sit call of his season, in a game Vince took from him by 4.70. Tee Higgins went for 32.5 against a 13.0 projection and it changed nothing. Zay Flowers posted a clean 0.00 against a 16.69 projection and that changed everything. Spencer Shrader contributed 1.0, which is a kicker score you have to work at. Grade the whole lineup with hindsight and it comes to 79.88% efficiency, last in the league for the week. He remains the top team in this post regardless: the best all-play mark in El Tri at .693, a 38.52% claim on the one seed, 95.16% playoff odds, and D'Andre Swift returning 138.7 on a $22 bid. There is $49 of draft money sitting on his bench as his roster stands today. Andrew's 1-0 comes next, the one opponent he has faced once and beaten once since joining in 2025. The roster needs nothing. The man in the robe pressing the submit button needs supervision, and he can get back to declining Drew's trade offers after he reads this.

Eric manages his lineup better than anyone in El Tri and has a 3-5 record to show for it, which is the fantasy equivalent of doing your taxes correctly and still getting audited. Week 8 he captured 98.59% of what was available to him in hindsight, and the biggest thing he left on the bench was Jakobi Meyers and his 3.4 points. No button to un-press. No bench to scream at. Lamar Jackson, a $13 quarterback, posted 0.00 against a 22.17 projection, and the Jaguars defense Eric streamed in outscored his own starting QB 21.0 to zero. Josh Jacobs went 20.2, Jaxon Smith-Njigba 20.8, and Max still took it by 7.86. That is four straight losses, the longest skid of his year. He leads the league with 1,024.08 points. No week has held him under 100.88, the highest worst-week in El Tri, and he has not finished a single Sunday as the low scorer. Hand him Luke's schedule instead of his own and he is 7-1 rather than 3-5, a four-win swing across eight weeks and the worst schedule draw in the league. His receivers grade at +6.31, second-best position group going; quarterback sits at -3.64 and tight end at -3.29, which is Brenton Strange's 6.5 rendered as arithmetic. Mero next, a team he trails 11-13 across 2011 through 2025. Two injured players travel with him, because of course they do.

The commissioner ran a 100% efficient lineup in week 8, which is the one decision all season he did not put to a poll. Bryan dropped 145.18 on Daniel and won by 35.32 with a roster built out of the dullest names available: James Cook for 17.1, T.J. Hockenson for 13.8, and Tony Pollard, a $10 buy who went for 27.2 and has produced 109.5 on the year. Braelon Allen added 22.3 from the flex. The Seahawks defense posted 1.0 and nobody noticed, because when every starter clears his number the kicker could mail it in and you would still cruise. Three straight wins now, matching his longest run of the year, and his recent form of 130.39 is the best in the league. He has also absorbed 967.46 points against, more than anyone, and faced the toughest slate in El Tri at 120.93 per opponent, so the 5-3 undersells him. Jason's Weenie Hut Jr. is up next, a series Bryan owns 14-8 across 2013 through 2025, which explains why he keeps scheduling polls instead of gloating. MarShawn Lloyd at $10 for 31.3 points stands as his worst spend of the auction, and that is the whole indictment. Dinger woke up, thought it was morning, and cooked the entire league breakfast.

Max cooks one enormous cut of meat and puts nothing else on the plate. Josh Allen's 26.56, Jahmyr Gibbs' 23.8 and Michael Wilson's 22.8 did the heavy lifting in week 8, and trailing behind them came Hunter Henry for 4.5, the Bengals defense for 2.0, and Colston Loveland for 8.0, a $19 buy sitting on 57.4 points for the season and the worst money he put down at the auction. He beat Eric by 7.86 with a receiver room grading at -3.64, the weakest position on a roster ranked second in the league at 138.06 strength. He is 6-2, second in the league in luck, and his two defeats came by a combined 36.06 points, the third-smallest total of defeat in the league. The hindsight bill keeps arriving though: 88.34% efficiency last week, 101.70 points over the season he could have captured with perfect lineups, tenth in El Tri, and $26 of draft money sitting on the bench as the roster stands today. Vince next, a series split 9-8 across 2013 through 2025, and the Glizzy scores at roughly the same clip he does, so somebody is winning this by three points and claiming it was the plan. GO MAX, the best record in the league, still grilling tri tip.

Mero started Jacoby Brissett for 3.46 while Jordan Love put up 21.52 on his bench, the worst start/sit of his season at 18.06 points, and won by 30.58 anyway. That is the Mero experience distilled: the hat is somewhere in the house, the Guinness is split, and the result lands in his favor regardless. Brock Bowers beat his projection by 11.49 with 24.7, Jaylen Warren went for 20.8, Kyren Williams keeps justifying $39 with 133.5 on the season, and the Snakes were put away without a fight. He also owns the single biggest week in El Tri this year, 166.58 back in week 5. The schedule has been a feather bed: 814.40 points against, the fewest in the league, and the softest opponent slate at 101.80 per week. Against that, giving 105.50 points to hindsight on the season feels like a tax he can afford. Three injured starters, which for a man with his shoulder history is practically a theme week. Jadarian Price at $15 for 16.7 points is the one buy he would take back. Eric is next, a series Mero leads 13-11 across 2011 through 2025, and Eric is going to spend the entire week telling anyone who listens that this one is already rigged.

Daniel has a guy, and the guy is Parker Washington. In week 4 he started him for 1.5 points with Romeo Doubs and his 20.8 on the bench, a 19.3-point swing that still stands as the worst call of his season. In week 8 he looked at the same name, remembered whatever it is he remembers, and started him again: 3.1 against a 13.88 projection, inside a 145.18 to 109.86 loss to Bryan. Jonah Coleman cleared his projection by 10.09 out of the flex and Matthew Golden put up 17.4, and the rest was Evan McPherson kicking 5.0 and an 83.57% efficiency grade, eleventh for the week. Of the $200 he carried into the auction, $92 of it is still on his roster, the smallest surviving share in El Tri outside the 1-7 team, which measures how much August hype he has since cut loose. He has played zero one-score games all season; his Sundays are settled by halftime in one direction or the other, and his rank has swung more than anybody's in the league because of it. He is 5-3 with an 87.31% claim on the field, so the sky is intact. Luke next, an opponent Daniel holds 8-4 against from 2018 through 2025, which gives him seven full days to decide on Parker Washington again and seven more to not rehab the knee.

Vince has now played three one-score games, more than anyone in the league, and his total margin of defeat across four losses is 14.04 points, the smallest figure in El Tri. He loses the way he dips a chip in salsa mid-dance: elegant, doomed, over in a second. Week 8 he was on the right end for once, taking down Michael 128.98 to 124.28 thanks to Joe Burrow going nuclear for 39.48 against a 22.88 projection, Tyler Bass chipping in 16.0, and Kenny Gainwell adding 14.0 out of nowhere. Bijan Robinson, his $66 headline buy, managed 7.6 and still leads the roster with 140.8 on the season. Rashee Rice at $34 for 46.3 points is the spend he would like back, though 14.8 last week was a start. The depth question remains: Chig Okonkwo for 2.2 and Germie Bernard for 5.5 is what happens when you build a roster with no second layer and then try to patch it with 34 transactions, second-most in the league. Three straight wins has him at 55.80% to make the field. Max is next, a matchup Vince trails 8-9 across 2013 through 2025, which means the margin will be four points and an Arnold Palmer will be thrown.

Jason has never led a week in scoring this season. He has never finished one at the bottom either. Eight weeks of perfect room temperature, the Weenie Hut Jr. brand operating as designed. His best score of the year is 133.38, ninth in El Tri, while the league's average best week sits at 143.32, so his season high would read as a letdown on most rosters in this chat. Week 8 went 125.64 to 119.50 to Andrew: Trevor Lawrence 19.4, Keenan Allen 10.2, Chad Ryland 9.0, Sam LaPorta 5.0, another loss inside a touchdown, two in a row now. His three wins carry 59.76 points of combined margin, second-lowest in the league; his losses add up to 135.88. The defining move of his year came in week 2, when he started the Buccaneers defense for 4.0 with the Patriots defense and its 20.0 on the bench, a 16-point donation to a man who did not need it. He has zero injured starters and zero banged up heading into next week, tied for the healthiest roster in El Tri, so no doctor is available to take the blame, and $194 of his draft budget is still sitting on the team, which means he likes what he bought and the players disagree. Bryan next, who has beaten him 14 times in 22 meetings from 2013 through 2025 and will put the fifteenth up to a league vote first.

Dozo has the eleventh-best roster in El Tri by strength at 109.00 and the fifth seed, which is the fantasy equivalent of folding every all-in and somehow leaving the table up. His luck delta is the highest in the league. His drafted players have produced 626.30, tenth of twelve, while his waiver pickups have produced 437.00, second-best in El Tri. The man drafted a dud and cooked the leftovers into something edible, which is on brand for the group chef. Week 8 he beat Jason 125.64 to 119.50 on the back of Bhayshul Tuten, a $21 buy who went for 28.9 and sits at 110.8 on the year. Jared Goff gave him 9.04 against a 16.09 projection, Jason Myers kicked for 1.0, and the Commanders defense sat on the bench with 14.0. He still won by 6.14, because that is the deal he has made with the universe this season. Travis Etienne at $34 for 25.4 points is the spend that has not landed. His playoff number is 36.97%, lower than his record suggests, and the model has him likeliest to land eighth at 22.86%. Michael's Prime Sutton is next, the team that beat him the one time they met in 2025. Andrew will put up 110, win by three, and say nothing about it.

Luke won a football game with 93.30 points, which is how a budget gets passed at two in the morning with nobody in the room reading it. Trey McBride went 16.7, Kyler Murray 19.9, the Broncos defense turned in 1.0, Zach Charbonnet 4.4, George Pickens 5.8, and Jacob's team scored five fewer than all that. The man who empties his auction wallet in the first hour has barely touched the thing since: 13 of his drafted players remain on the roster, the most in El Tri, with $195 of the original budget still accounted for, and that roster returns 4.691 points per dollar, second-best in the league. The buying is fine. Sunday morning is the catastrophe. His season efficiency of 86.50% is the worst in El Tri, the 132.96 points a perfect lineup would have captured is also the worst, and last week he left a 25.44 quarterback on the bench to start a 19.9 one. His average flatters him by 3.41 points over his median, the widest gap anyone carries, so the typical Luke week is worse than the Luke average. He has $22 of draft money parked on the bench right now, and the sheet has him likeliest at tenth (30.66%) with eleventh behind it (26.22%). Daniel next, who has taken eight of their twelve meetings from 2018 through 2025 and will spend the week trying to pry that benched quarterback loose for a kicker and a handshake.

The 2025 sacko co-op is running it back with a new twist: the draft was the disaster this time. Their drafted players have produced 431.20 points, last in El Tri, against 664.88 from acquisitions, first in El Tri, which is the statistical fingerprint of Drew rebuilding a roster by hand while Omeed explains to the group chat that the bottom half is the bottom half. Six drafted players remain. Justin Jefferson at $53 for 72.4 points is the worst buy on the board, and the whole operation returns 2.156 points per dollar spent, the lowest figure in the league. Week 8 they lost to Mero 115.16 to 84.58 with Will Reichard kicking 0.00 against an 11.20 projection and Keon Coleman managing 0.9. Kirk Cousins beat his number by 11.53 for 28.18, which is the saddest sentence written about this team all year. They have been the lowest scorer in El Tri three separate weeks, more than anybody. Three injured players head into next week against Jacob's Sell The Team, a series split 8-8 across 2011, 2012 and 2017 through 2025. Their most likely finish on the sheet is eleventh at 45.53%. Omeed will have plenty to say when they win that one and will be unreachable by phone if they do not.

Jacob's backfield is Ollie Gordon II and Omarion Hampton, and on Sunday the two of them combined for 10.6 points. The position grades at -5.56, the deepest hole on any roster in this league, and it has company: tight end sits at -4.52, which is Dallas Goedert producing 5.2 against an 8.33 projection. He lost 93.30 to 88.20 to Luke, a fourth straight defeat and the longest skid of his season. Tetairoa McMillan 8.8, Rome Odunze 10.7, Jordan Addison 10.1, Aaron Jones 5.0: a full lineup of men who all arrived at the same unhelpful number. His best week of the whole season is 122.30, the lowest high score in El Tri, and his ceiling of 104.06 is last in the league, so even the dream version of this team loses most weeks. Only $90 of the $200 he brought to the auction survives on the roster, the smallest surviving share going, and the roster returns 3.109 points per auction dollar, second-worst in the league. Back in week 5 he started the Jaguars defense for 4.0 with the 49ers defense and its 20.0 on the bench, a 16-point swing in a season with no margin to give one away. The Snakes next, a team averaging 100.26 points a week, split 8-8 with him across 2011, 2012 and 2017 through 2025. One win on the table, and both sides are praying the other one forgets to set a lineup.