Sunday will mark the official start of T-Money’s defense of
Super Bowl IX.
In order to get to Super Bowl X and keep that trophy at
home, he’s going to need some great picks as he’s at the end of the round and
he’ll be the last person to official click the draft button on Sunday. (Well, he should have been, but News Team ruined that. I'll get to that later.)
Only eight teams will actually click the DRAFT button in
Round 1 as the other eight teams selected keepers who were designated for the
first round. That means they’ll have to wait a little longer to make that first
pick.
Nine QBs were kept, including six in the first round. A pair
of RBs were also kept in the first. Here’s a quick glance at how the first
round will look.
1. Graybill’s Generals, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Eddie Lacy, RB
2. Chalupa Batman _______________
3. World of Noise, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Matt Ryan, QB
4. Choo Big TeeDees _______________
5. Real Houserville _______________
6. Philly Cheese Steaks _______________
7. Shark Attack _______________
8. Channel 4 News Team, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Aaron Rodgers, QB
9. Jerkin’ My Kirk Herbstreit _______________
10. Team Boyer, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Tom Brady, QB
11. Jersey Bombers _______________
12. Jimmy Jammers, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Marshawn Lynch, RB
13. Sunday Slackers, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Drew Brees, QB
14. Dottsville Toasters _______________
15. Fear and Loathing, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Andrew Luck, QB
16. T-Money, AUTOPICK KEEPER, Tony Romo, QB
Those are the keepers you will not have to worry about. The
ones on the PDF, however, you will. Please, I cannot stress this enough. Do not
make me have to take away your 2016 first-round pick and your keeper.
DRAFT STRUCTURE
As noted, we’ve gone to a straight draft this year to make
it even all around. I have the draft time set for 11 a.m., but we will start
at noon, or perhaps a few minutes after as we get all 16 teams situated.
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| Mac and Cheese and Drafting! |
The draft room will open at 10 a.m. for online users, and
those attending the live portion of the draft at my house should arrive after
10:30 a.m. Lunch will be provided and ready at 11:30 a.m.
I will have a Google Hangout set up and rolling, and this
year, I’m putting it on the big screen! Connect with me on Google Plus if you
haven’t already and I’ll get you in the Hangout.
The first five rounds will be set to 120 seconds per pick.
This allows for teams to announce their picks. I’ll save time at the live draft
and you won’t have to get up and go to a podium like we’ve done in the past.
Here’s how we’ll
strive to do it:
1. Announce aloud, whether in-person or over Google Hangouts, that your pick is ready. (DO NOT CLICK DRAFT YET)
* If
there’s less than 15 seconds left on the draft clock, I’ll hit pause so you can
quickly announce it.
*If
there’s more than 15, just go ahead and announce your pick aloud.
2. Here’s the base idea for announcing, but by all means,
HAVE FUN WITH THIS: “With the NUMBER pick in the NUMBER round,
the TEAM NAME selects PLAYER NAME.”
3. Once you have announced, go ahead and click DRAFT PLAYER.
Don’t do it before the announcement, otherwise, the whole point of this is
lost.
After five rounds, we’ll cut down from 120 seconds to 60 as
we’ll likely stop announcing picks. (However, feel free to still do it. I just
won’t be able to stop the clock for you.)
FIVE THINGS TO WATCH
FOR
1. BRADY BUNCHED UP
UNTIL WEEK 6: Team Boyer’s tasked with drafting to survive Weeks 1 through
5 until keeper Tom Brady comes back Week 6. It will be interesting to see who
he grabs first at QB and how long he waits to get him. One would imagine he has
to address other needs first, but could he take a QB as early as the third or
fourth? It's like building a deck. You can't add deck chairs until you build the foundation. It certainly will be interesting to see how he plays it.
2. NOISY PICKS:
As usual, it’s always fun to see what World of Noise does. It’s an annual crapshoot
when it comes to him drafting, and as is the case most years, we’ll just wonder
who will be drafted first: his kicker or Jason Avant?
3. ON THE DEFENSIVE:
Every year, I giggle at the defenses selected in the fifth or sixth rounds. Last
year, the first defenses went off the board in the sixth as Choo Big TeeDees
tried to cash in on the Seahawks after their epic 2013 season, and Dottsville
grabbed the Panthers four picks later.
The Seahawks finished sixth overall in defensive fantasy
scoring and the Panthers were 18th. Thirteen more defenses were selected before
yours truly, the Jimmy Jammers, picked up his one and only defense, the Eagles
in the 15th round. Why the Eagles? Because they were playing the Jaguars Week
1.
Philly went on to have the No. 1 fantasy defense. So go
ahead silly drafters. Take the Eagles in the sixth round this year. I dare you.
In fact, I urge you. Do it. Because the more defenses that go early on are the
more position players on the board for me.
4. DAWSON’S SWEEP:
If you get to the point where you’re tired of hearing Real Houserville talk,
it’s probably the end of the fourth round.
Thanks to his mega deal with News Team and his sly waiver
pickup of Adrian Peterson last season, he will sweep through the first four
rounds collecting six more players to go with Peterson. If Peterson is back to
his top form, there’s no reason why Dawson shouldn’t enter the year as the
odds-on favorite to win the title. That would mean he should have seven of the
top 96 players in the JFL. At most, a few teams keeping late-round picks could
have five, but most will have four if they’re lucky.
Again, this is a “should.” Dawson could easily screw this up
by getting too cute with those six picks, so no pressure, don’t screw this up.
Noise will be waiting for you to do so.
5. FORTUNATE FOOL?: It’s the other half
of that mega deal. For Dawson to get a second- and a fourth-round pick, that
meant someone had to give them up. News Team was that someone, and with Aaron
Rodgers being the big fish in that deal, he becomes the first-round pick for
the News Team.
So besides the eighth pick in the third round, the News Team
will be doing a lot of, well, let’s let Jack Johnson sing it:
Sitting, waiting, wishing.
He’ll be sitting anxiously watching all the
top-tier RBs and WRs and TEs go off the board. Hell, the Toasters may even take
the Seahawks defense in that time. Maybe he can enjoy some Banana Pancakes in the
meantime.
He’ll be waiting a while. Thirty-nine players
will go off the board (including his Rodgers pick) before he gets to click the
draft button for the first time in the third round. Another 28 picks will disappear before he gets
his next player. I imagine he’ll be hearing the sound of players disappearing
off his queue all afternoon. He better start looking at the fantasy Top 300
charts Upside Down as he wonders where did all
the Good
People go.
And lastly, he’ll be wishing he never made this deal. At
least this year, of course. QBs are important in the JFL, and if you can get
yourself a top-tier signal caller, you’re in good shape to make a run at the
title. But, it doesn’t mean you will. Especially when you’ll be piecing
together a team of sleeper picks.
News Team will have to make some great picks, run into some
luck and hope it’s enough to lead him back to the Super Bowl. He’s won two
titles already, and perhaps that’s why he brought Aaron Rodgers back. The man
who led him there twice should be the one tasked with getting him back there.
In the end, I’m sure he believes that he and Rodgers are Better Together.
QB STARTERS RULE
(ADDING A DRAFT CLAUSE)
One hiccup to the rule for three starting QBs where you must
have only two declared starters heading into a weekend revolves around the
draft.
We need to enact a rule for the draft that states you can’t
take three projected starters in the draft. There’s one QB battle going on, so
the Bills QBs will not count, but I have created a list of QBs who are
projected starters (below). No team will be allowed to have three of any combination on
their roster in the time leading up to Week 1. If you draft a third QB and he’s
the third projected starting QB you have, we will not stop the draft. We’ll
keep going. After the draft, the LM — yours truly — will automatically drop the
third QB acquired. I will then go to the 15 teams that draft right behind that pick
of the QB and use that order to see who wants the QB, if anyone. So if the guy
in front of you has three starters and you want his third, know that after the
draft, you’ll have first crack at getting him (if you need a second starter).
The idea behind this is so one team doesn’t draft three
starters just to have trade bait after the draft. Even without the draft clause,
they’d be forced to drop before Week 1 starts, but this should eliminate any
issues with them dropping a player late and the usual waiver order taking
precedence over who would have selected after you made the illegal draft pick
Here’s the Week 1 projected starters list that we will
follow. Remember, you can’t have any combo of three on your team. If I’ve named
a starter who you have a question about or if I made a mistake, please let me know.
AFC East
Bills, starter not named.
Ryan Tannehill, Dolphins
Jimmy Garoppolo, Patriots
Ryan Fitzpatrick, Jets
AFC North
Joe Flacco, Ravens
Andy Dalton, Bengals
Josh McCown, Browns
Ben Roethlisberger, Steelers
AFC South
Brian Hoyer, Texans
Andrew Luck, Colts
Blake Bortles, Jaguars
Marcus Mariota, Titans
AFC West
Peyton Manning, Broncos
Alex Smith, Chiefs
Derek Carr, Raiders
Philip Rivers, Chargers
NFC East
Tony Romo, Cowboys
Eli Manning, Giants
Sam Bradford, Eagles
Kirk Cousins, Redskins
NFC North
Jay Culter, Bears
Matthew Stafford, Lions
Aaron Rodgers, Packers
Teddy Bridgewater, Vikings
NFC South
Matt Ryan, Falcons
Cam Newton, Panthers
Drew Brees, Saints
Jameis Winston, Bucs
NFC West
Carson Palmer, Cardinals
Russell Wilson, Seahawks
Colin Kaepernick, 49ers
Nick Foles, Rams
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