Welcome to Week 7 of the Crunch Time Fantasy Football League. We’re looking at all of the matchups; the good and the bad! We’ll even show off our prediction skills, all brought to you by “The Commish”.
The Standings
Before we look at the Week 7 matchups, lets look at the standings as we near the mid way point of the season.
Irish Pride are in first place with a 5-1 record and the most points in the league with 706 points.
Four teams have a 4-2 record. The Darque Warriors are in 2nd with a 4-2 record and 650 points. Taco Man is in 3rd with a 4-2 record. The team named “Joe Buck Yourself” is in 4th place with a 4-2 record. The Gamblers are in 5th place with a 4-2 record.
The Pimps are in 6th Place with a 3-3 record and the Top Dawgs are in 7th place with a 3-3 record. Any one of these 4-2 and 3-3 teams can jump or fall big in the standing in 1 week with how close it is.
Then, we have the Midway Monster with a 1-5 record. They got their first win last week. In 9th place are the Jesters who have a 1-5 record as well and are on a 2 game losing streak.
The Swashbuckling Scallywags are in last (10th place) with a 1-5 record and a big hill to climb.
Game of the week
This week’s Game of the Week is undoubtedly the matchup of the #1 ranked “Irish Pride” who have a 5-1 record and are facing the #4 ranked “Joe Buck Yourself” who has a 4-2 record. The Irish Pride also have the most points scored in the league. The Irish Pride are coming off their first loss of the season last week where the Dark Warriors beat them 113-106. Is this an anomaly or are the Irish Pride starting to slip?
Joe Buck Yourself is on a 3 game winning streak and is coming off his highest scoring week of the season. This matchup is primed for an upset. ESPN is even giving Joe Buck Yourself the advantage here.
Historically, these two teams have faced off twice so far. Last year was Joe Buck Yourself first season and the two teams split their two meeting. They have a 1-1 record against each other.
Hypothetically, if these two teams faced each other every week this season, the Irish Pride would be winning those matchups with a 4-2 record. The Irish Pride have scored over 100 points every week, where Joe Buck Yourself has done it 4 times.
The QB matchup here is Lamar Jackson on Irish Pride againt CJ Stroud on Joe Buck Yourself. Lamar Jackson is the #2 Scoring player in the league and Stroud is the #8 scoring quarterback. Stroud is super talented but Jackson is just more dynamic with his passing and running ability. Jackson is scoring 7 points more per game than Stroud.
While the Irish Pride have the advantage at quarterback, Joe Buck Yourself is dominating the running game. Joe Buck Yourself, also known as JBY has the #1 running back in Derrick Henry. who is blowing away the competition. “King” Henry’s speed and power has been exciting this year and JBY has been reaping the benefits. The Irish Pride have Kyren Williams at running back so he will be counting on him to somewhat keep up with Derrick Henry.
Joe Buck Yourself will be welcoming back their star Wide Receiver named Cooper Cup this week. He’s been injured since week 2 and JBY is hoping that this will give them extra help in this big matchup.
If Joe Buck Yourself’s two other running backs in Breece Hall and Chase Brown can continue their stud play as of late, this is where JBY can have the edge. Hall had an 18 point game last week and Brown has 3 straight double digit scoring weeks. Those two players have an advantage over the 2 running backs that Irish Pride are starting this week in Trey Sermon and Tank Bigsby. They’re a bit lower tier of players, but could have a decent week.
The Commish agrees with ESPN that Joe Buck Yourself has an edge here. The Irish Pride very well could be headed for a 2 game losing streak.
Other matchups
Very quick previews:
The Pimps who are 3-3 face the Top Dawgs who are also 3-3. The Pimps have a pattern going here. They have gone Win, Loss, Win, Loss, Win, Loss. So this game should be a win, right? However, the Dawgs, who started 0-2 have come back and have won 3 out of their last 4 games. The Top Dawgs and The Pimps have faced off since the league’s inaugural season in 2000 and are all tied up in this matchup over the years with a record of 16-16. The Pimps star players are their running back Saquon Barkley and wide receiver Drake London. The Top Dawgs star players are rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels, rookie wide receiver Malik Nabers, and the player they kept from last year (their keeper) in wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase.
ESPN predicts this to be a close game, but The Commish does not. The Commish sees the Top Dawgs stomping The Pimps down and making them run home to mommy.
Another matchup is the 1-5 Midway Monsters facing the 4-2 Taco Man 9000. This is Taco Man 9000’s first year in the league and the first time these two have ever faced off. Midway Monsters won their first game last week, can they do it again? They may have had a rough start but ESPN did rate the Midway Monsters as the #1 team to enter this season. What happened? The Midway Monsters will rely on wide receiver Garrett Wilson and running backs Josh Jacobs and David Montgomery. The Monsters chose to start quarterback Kirk Cousins instead of Patrick Mahomes. Is that the right call? We will see! As for Taco Man, he is counting on his wide receivers Justin Jefferson and Marvin Harrison Jr. These two wide receivers are exciting, so scoring could be high.
The Commish is taking Taco Man here. TacoMan9000’s quarterback Brock Purdy is simply amazing!
Another matchup is the Green Bay Gamblers who are 4-2 face off against the 1-5 Swashbuckling Scallywags. The Scallywags are in last place for a reason….they can’t score points. Christian McCaffrey is possibly returning in a week or two, but he is still on Injured Reserve for this matchup. So, the Scallywags will have to lean on Najee Harris to lead at running back. That’s not ideal. The Scallywags are relying on quarterback Jalen Hurts to set the tone at quarterback, which fortunately he finally had a good game last week. It was Hurts’ first multi-touchdown game since Week 1. Meanwhile, the Gamblers are playing this week without C D Lamb who is off on a BYE week this week. So, the Gamblers will need the rest of their team to pick up the slack, namely players like Kyler Murray, Kenneth Walker, and James Conner.
The Commish predicts a huge upset here. Scallywags winning by nearly double digits.
The final matchup this week is the 1-5 Jesters versus the 4-2 Dark Warriors. The Warriors broke their 2 game losing streak last week when they took out the then undefeated Irish Pride. So, they are riding high. Javonte Williams (running back) already played his game this week for the Jesters and scored and amazing 23 points, so now the Jesters are up 23 to 0 right now. Can the Dark Warriors make up for that? Well, they have the firepower to do so. The Dark Warriors have Josh Allen at Quarterback, Aaron Jones at running back (returning from injury), and the likes of A.J. Brown and Mike Evans at wide receiver. Those players can score often!
The Commish predicts the Dark Warriors takes this one in a tight game. Another tough loss for the Jesters.
Stay tuned for next week
Keey an eye out for next week. The Midseas will be here. It’s our Midseason Award Show!