Playoff Championship Thursday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday!

The Main Event:
Over the last three years, two owners have paced the league. In 2012, Adam’s ChalicePastryCarnage took the overall title by combining a regular season championship with 2nd place playoff finish. That same year, Danny’s Sack Attack SuperPAC finished third overall, including a 2nd place regular season finish. An utterly tremendous end-of-the-year run by the slightly less heralded Obese Geese gave them the playoff trophy, however.

Last year, the two more or less swapped places, with Rockin’ the H’burg taking the overall crown with their own regular season championship and 2nd place playoff finish, while the CPCers finished 2nd overall. Once again, a lurking dark horse—the Stars this time—swept away with the playoff glory. 

And so we come to this current year, which was more of the same story in the regular season; CPC reclaiming that summit while Quality Contorl slipped into another 3rd place finish. There will be no interloper (nothing against solid teams like the Geese and Stars!) to spoil the showdown this time. This is big time, indeed.

Up to this point during their current era of dominance, neither of these owners has managed to take home the elusive big prize at the end. In fact, over the 9 year league history, Adam has never won that playoff trophy and Danny hasn’t won since the inaugural year in 2006 – despite the fact that these are the two winningest franchises in the league. The drought finally ends this year for one of these thirsty souls. This matchup is epic. Words are being written.

Who has the upper hand? Historically, the 3 seed. Rather improbably, 3 of the last 4 playoff champions have come from that slot and the trend could continue this year. Perhaps also pointing in QC’s favor is their slight scoring advantage both overall and recently in the playoffs. But these advantages are splitting hairs. Both rosters are still stacked despite suffering through a bit of attrition at the end. This game is a toss-up in the truest sense of that phrase. It will just be a matter of luck. But the one on whom the fantasy football gods smile this week may very well stake a claim to the strongest 3-year stretch in league history.

The Undercard:

Were it not for another furious Bears garbage time rally that came up just short, we might be discussing the Obese Geese in similar glowing terms – after all, they fell only two points short of an opportunity at 2 playoff championships in 3 years (and 3 in 6). But come up short they did, and instead they settle for a tough bronze metal matchup against this year’s second best regular season team, Cool Runnings. True to their name, the Runnings had a great end-of-year sprint only to go ice cold and have their worst game of the season at exactly the wrong time. A bounce-back performance from both of these two would not surprise, and would be a nice palate cleanser in a rematch of a rather ugly Week 3 win by the Runnings.

The Double Undercard:

The two lowest seeds both pulled off minor upsets to have a chance for fifth place and a solid finish to the year. In fact, the Stars have even more motivation – a victory here guarantees they will remain the all-time winningest playoff team, which is quite a feat indeed. Meanwhile, the Yakety Sacks have their own record-book incentive – a chance to pull into second place on the all-time wins list, which is perhaps an even more impressive feat!

The Triple Undercard:

Actually, this game isn’t very exciting. The Schmuckernators and TBD2 will face off, and one will win. The matchup does contain the two teams who missed the playoffs last year but made them this year. Yes, words are being written.