10 years in the league, 9 semi-final appearances, 7 championship appearances, 2 championships (with hopefully one more on the way). Those 7 championship appearances have tied Yoda's record, although he also had a 7-year head start.
When I tell my friends about my sustained success in this league, they try to discredit me by saying that people in this league must not know what they're doing or aren't very active, but I assure them that's not the case. This is a very competitive league. Prior to 2021, we had 14 teams, so the degree of difficulty was particularly high since the odds of making the playoffs were lower and the waiver wire was often barren. However, I'd argue that the average football savvy is higher across our league now than it was during my first few years in the league. Recent additions like @
Wyldesyde19, @
Holden Pike and @
Hey Fredrick clearly know what they're doing. Guys like @
rauldc14 and @
jiraffejustin, who have been in the league for a long time, have noticeably improved in their draft selections and in-season management. @
Yoda has always been a guru. At some point the pendulum is going to swing the other way and I'm going to string together lackluster seasons. Fantasy football is too random, too weighted down by injuries, too reliant on luck for it not to happen.
I think I'm a very good fantasy GM. I tend to always build strong depth through a combination of the draft, waivers and trades. However, I suck as a coach, because I rarely start the right players. I lost 4 of my last 5 in the regular season purely because of start/sit decisions, which is the most frustrating way to lose. In seasons past I typically only had to decide between who to play at FLEX or WR2 (not counting the weekly hassle of kickers/defenses). This season it's which QB, which TE, which WRs? Since I've had both Mahomes and Kyler Murray on my roster, I've started the wrong guy every week (including last week). I usually start Trey McBride, but Jonnu Smith and Njoku have also been great this year, and have outscored McBride plenty of individual weeks. It took me way too long into the season before I accepted that Jaxon Smith-Njigba had supplanted DK Metcalf as the alpha in Seattle. Terry McLaurin has had a top-five season and I've started him a lot of weeks, but in tough match-ups I've talked myself into starting others over him (like last week), even though he's proven to be an every-week starter.
So am I going to make the right decisions this week? Probably not. Will it cost me a championship? Time will tell. Every website that I check for rankings has Murray higher than Mahomes this week, but I watched a lot of that Carolina/Arizona game last week and lost all confidence in starting Murray. His decision-making is too bad; he's not running as often as in years past; he's missing multiple o-linemen; and he's proven to have a scary-low floor this season. Mahomes has been a relative disappointment this season compared to what we've come to expect from him, but I can trust him to at least get me 15-20 points. I might also be a fool for benching Smith-Ngiba given how hot he's been the past several weeks, but as of right now I'm leaning toward starting Sutton. Jonnu Smith has been better than McBride lately, and they both have juicy match-ups, but I'm planning on sticking with McBride. Dude has 92 receptions this season yet no touchdowns. If ever a player has been "due," it's gotta be McBride.
These stressful line-up decisions are the downside to having such strong depth. I rack my brain all week over who to start, then beat myself up when I make the wrong choice. Choose poorly this time and it'll haunt me for months.
(And as I've been typing this, Mahomes has already scored 2 TDs in the 1st quarter, so I'm feeling good about my QB decision at least.)