(copied and pasted from email which is how I traditionally do this part of the year) Friends and Family,
Another year has closed on HardCorps Dynasty and your esteemed commissioner has yet again failed to place. I therefore end the league as I suck at it and never make any money.
...just kidding. My rebuild is heading in the right direction! I actually made the playoffs for the first time since ... well shit, my alcohol laden brain can't even remember. Let's move on.
Everyone pay their respects (because you've already paid your money) to Geoff aka Maximum Effort: this year's HardCorps Champion!!! Huzzah, huzzah, huzzah!!!
Let's take a look at how the championship bracket shaped up this year:
Division Winners:
Drew, despite being the division leader ALL year, was bumped out of playoff contention in week 14 by the Miracle on Turf, Berserkers, the lowest ranking division winner. Lance started the year 0-6 then lost only one game in the final 8 (to the only other person that started off as bad as he did, Captain Checkdown) unseating Drew at the top of the worst division in the league. What a story that was!
Then we have Geoff. Maximum Effort made it look effortless. Weak after week just dropping dubs in the win column and avoiding worrying about whether he was going to make the playoffs or not. Geoff's kind heart was revealed when 2 of his 4 losses came to the 2 worst teams in the league. It was a maximum effort towards making Jason and Larry feel better about their horrid seasons.
Finally Dave, our highest ranking division winner. Heavy Betty started out the year with win after win despite very weak performances (earning scathing coverage from the HardCorps Dynasty media team), however, things changed for him around mid season and he ended up dropping monster games at the cyclic rate moving from 5 or 6 in the PF category up to 1st. This was enough to earn him the Points For crown AND his division title.
In the Wild Card Slots:
This year's wild card slot race was a doozy. Each division ended up sending 1 wild card team resulting in an even 2 participants per division.
Thor
With two players threatening and then ultimately overcoming Drew in the Thor Division nobody knew what was going to happen in this division up to the last week. What ended up happening was a three way tie with each manager having 7 wins sending Drew out of 1st place and into the consolation bracket due to tie breaker rules (total points). Berserkers took the division title and Steve slid into the wild card slot.
Odin
Despite finishing last place in the Odin Division, Bennet was in the wild card race until the last week when a win would have put both Re Re Set and Brown Eye at 7 wins each but Bennet having the tie breaker and kicking me from the playoffs. As it turned out, I got the win and took a wild card slot with 8 wins.
In the zero anxiety wild card slot we had Missy. Never really in trouble from the rest of her division, and certainly not threatening to take the title from Geoff, Missy cruised to what appeared to be an easy wild card slot with 8 wins, but had Drew won just 1 of his final 4 games, and Missy had lost her final she would have missed the playoffs. But the 8th win was Just in Time and Missy coasted in as the 2nd 8 win wild card team.
The Playoffs:
ROUND ONE .... FIGHT! ding ding ding
As often happens, the first round hosted one of the best games. And, consequently sent a deserving manager home for the year. OP Mcfury was slated to play his division rival Berserkers and came ready to play. Steve, dropped a whopping 150.66 points on the week. But Lance's miracle year was not over. Berserkers was sitting on Josh Allen, Amon Ra St Brown, AND Jameson Williams when Detroit hosted the Bills in a freaking shootout for the ages. Josh Allen registered what seemed to be his 14th 40+ point game, and the sun god posted up 30. Williams followed with a respectable 11. Toss in James Connor's 28 points, and Lance threw a monster 164 points on the board, handily foiling what should have been a winning effort from Steve. Them's the breaks I guess. Steve, we don't blame you if there was a little fury afterwards nobody should lose a playoff game when they score 150 points.
Elsewhere in round 1 despite a respectable 117-point game and good performances across the board, I was unable to overcome Missy as Baker Mayfield tossed 4 tuddies in TB's week 15 trouncing of the Chargers. Add to that Denver's defense, eager to get into the playoffs, played lights out to the tune of 1 TD, 2 fumble recoveries, and 2 INTs Giving Missy a deciding blow with 20 points. Final result 129 to 117. Good bye commissioner.
ROUND TWO
Round two finally saw the demise of Berserkers and their untouchable run as well as the exit of the season point total leader. In the 1 seed game, Dave found himself pitted against Missy. Dave tried to flip the script on her by snagging a defense that dropped 25 points on the board. But pathetic performances from his RB and TE room stifled his ability to put up a playoff worthy score. Meanwhile Missy's stud RB/WR duo of Saquon Barkley and Justin Jefferson held true to form and combined for 58 points. Baker Mayfield held serve with 25 allowing Missy to cruise to another playoff win 128-110.
Our number 2 seed game saw the unflappable Geoff plodding along against the scorching hot Berserkers with 8 wins in the last 9 games, but as mentioned, this was to be the end of Lance's dream run. With all the momentum of a Tesla Cybertruck going 100MPH, Lance stormed into round 2 with winning on his mind. Josh Allen had other ideas. Posting one of his worst performances of the season, Allen acquired only 13 points against the sad sack NE Patriots barely even notching a win for his team. James Connor provided another brilliant effort, and the S Brown/Brock Bowers tandem notched him 31 points. But Geoff never had any doubts going into this semi-final match. The Joe Cool to Tee Higgins connection had been paying dividends all year, and did so again this game to the tune of 40 points. However, the real magic of this match up came from a pair of RBs in the form of Achane and Hubbard. Combining for nearly 60 points alone, Chubba and Devon gave Geoff the firepower he needed to mail in the semi-final DUB. C'est la vie Lance!!!
FINAL WEEK
In the battle for third place we found two powerhouses who had been served a dose of reality. Dave vs Lance ended up being rather subpar due to the fact that Dave seemed to have had his soul drained by the previous week's loss. He surely must have thought himself invincible being tied for the best record in the league and having the season high score. But the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Lamar Jackson did Lamar things and found himself accounting for nearly HALF of Dave's total point output on the week. Despite moderate performances from his starting WRs, the negative total from his defense and 0 points from his High Tide Waddle resulted in a lackluster 80 points. Lance, however, wanted to finish with flair. Securing double digit points from all but one of his players, allowed him to post a finish-on-a-good-note total of 137 points. But, even had he advanced to the championship game, that total would still not have made him the champ. That title is reserved for one man and one man only...
The HardCorps Championship
Going into the matchup we had methodical Geoff, who was basically just counting the days until he was going to inevitably play in the championship game. However, slowly gaining steam over the last 3 games with scores of 128 or better in each, Missy saw her chance and was prepared stake her claim on the top shelf of the podium ~~~~Enter Sandman music begins to play, Geoff emerges from the tunnel and his team takes the field~~~~ Maximum Effort immediately delivers a body blow with Joe Burrow negating Baker's 40 points with 40 points of his own. The blow sets up a jab-hook combo from Tee Higgins who staggers Missy with a 35 point masterpiece against Justin Jefferson's 13. Missy is counting on the 25 points from Ladd McConkey to keep her in the running, but, unfortunately, the 40 points from Baker Mayfield happened in large part because of the 2 tuddy passes to Mike Evans who just happened to be playing for Geoff (as if he had planned it all along). Evans' 25 points negates the 25 from the good Ladd. Hurting badly, Missy rallies and her RB stable shaves 22 points off the lead by outperforming Geoff's RB duo who lost Chubba Bubba to IR. Justin Time throws a stiff jab with 13 points from Andrews hoping to further close the gap, but no, Geoff slips and comes back with an overhand gaining two more points on the back of George Kittles' 15pnts. Geoff follows the overhand with right-left body combo gaining 5 more points with Warren gaining 14 to Deebo's 8. Missy drops her guard to her body to stop further damage, and Pickens regains those 5 points with George Pickens outperforming Mike Boone (Geoff's desperation flex play). But, alas, this was the moment Geoff was waiting for. He chucks a haymaker in the form of his favorite team's defense (Seattle) slapping a 16 point game at Chicago while Missy responded with a -1 point performance from Pittsburg. Spittle and perhaps a tooth or two flies into the crowd as Missy goes down. Geoff raises his arms in victory posting 152 points to Missy's hard fought 133. It was a great final matchup resulting in a pretty exciting overall championship bracket.
This was already very long so tomorrow I will recap the consolation bracket in a similar fashion....just kidding!!!! Nobody cares about you losers!!!! :) But for real, this took me about 2.5 hrs to write so I don't want to do that for the consolation bracket.
I know I'm later than usual on the post-season stuff this year, but I still owe you all the final writeup with standings and earnings. I will get that turned out soon, but I wanted to do this recap as a slight change from the way I've done it in previous years. We'll engage in the typical new rules/rule change discussions shortly after that.
-The Commish.