Written by Cory Puffett
Published October 26, 2017 to Puff on the NFL

We are officially halfway through the 2017 fantasy campaign. All is certainly not right with our league. We have two teams sitting atop the league at 6-1 with a combined breakdown of 74-80. Cory’s wins above expectations (WAE) stands at 2.8 and Danny’s WAE is at 2.5, currently.

And when you have particularly lucky owners such as Cory and Danny, you invariably have unlucky owners on the other end. Brandon’s WAE is -1.1, Andrew’s is -0.9, and Sean, at 0-7, has a WAE of -1.9!

That said, with seven weeks still remaining, there is still plenty of time for Cory and Danny to regress to the mean if they don’t get their teams on target. Danny already seems to have done that – he has finished in the top half in scoring each of the past four weeks after posting an 11-22 breakdown with a 2-1 record through week 3. Cory, on the other hand, had a 25-8 breakdown through week 3, tied for the second best in the league, and has taken a massive tumble since then.

Andrew remains the only owner with at least 100 points in every week this season.

William was involved in a game decided by one point or less for the third time this season! He beat Viroj by a score of 129.7-129.4 and is now 6-1-1 all-time in such games. This was the highest-scoring game in league history to be decided by such a narrow margin. William was also involved in such a game last week and is the second league owner to be involved in two straight such games (Nolan was involved in two straight in 2016 and both owners went 1-1 in those two weeks).

William’s score is good for #72 on the league’s all-time single-game team scoring list. Viroj sits at #75 and has the third highest score for a losing team in league history.

The top scorer and winner of the Tom Brady Award in week 7 was Will, whose 135.9-point total is good for #43 on the league’s all-time list and is the third highest score of the season so far.

In all, teams scored 1285.0 points in week 7, the 18th highest scoring week in league history and the third highest league total for the season. It is the 10th time in league history the six losing teams averaged at least 100 points.

While Will won his 8th career Tom Brady Award, Cory took home his 8th Peyton Manning Award – his third of the season.

From an individual player standpoint, there were plenty of high scores this week but only two made the all-time top 40 list at their positions. Ezekiel Elliott’s 43.0 points for Viroj puts him at #5 on the running back list in league history and is the third highest regular season performance at the position.

Amari Cooper gave Anthony 38.5 points and was good for #6 on the all-time single-game wide receiver list.

The luckiest owner of the week was Cory, who won against Eric despite a 2-9 breakdown because Eric posted the lowest score in the league this week. Brandon also had a lucky win despite a 5-6 breakdown against Adam.

With two lucky winners, we also had two unlucky losers. Anthony had a 7-4 breakdown but lost to Andrew and his 8-3 breakdown. The unluckiest, though, was Viroj. His 9-2 breakdown was the best breakdown during a loss so far this season.

Our top coach this week was William, who earned 21.5 points and a win by nailing two coaching risks, starting Jermaine Kearse and Chris Thompson over Terrelle Pryor Sr. and Marshawn Lynch. Andrew is honorable mention after earning 11.4 points and a win by starting Nelson Agholor over Martavis Bryant.

Our worst coach this week was Viroj, who cost his team 18.7 points and a win by failing on both of his coaching risks. He started Ed Dickson over Evan Engram and the Seahawks D/ST over the Rams. Eric is honorable mention after costing his team 13.5 points and a win by starting Keenan Allen over Latavius Murray.

Will had four players in the top five at their positions, one at each offensive position. William had three such players and four others had two each. Cory was the only owner this week without any such players.

Check out the review of Week 7 below:

Game of the Week: Eric Meyer at Cory Puffett

Entering this week, Eric held a 4-0 all-time advantage against Cory head-to-head, with two of those wins by less than a point. It was shaping up to be another close one – Cory held a 0.2-point lead with less than 10 minutes to go in the fourth quarter of Sunday Night Football, but a late Falcons drive gave Matt Ryan about 8 points and gave Cory a relatively comfortable win as his schedule luck continues.