A Football Life:

2022, Week 12 Preview

Written by Cory Puffett
Published November 23, 2022

It’s hard to believe we’re already this deep into the fantasy season. Just one week now separates us from the divisional round robin we close every regular season with. We’re set up for a very exciting final four weeks.

We have six managers above .500 battling for four playoff spots. One division could be locked up this week with Brandon holding a commanding three-game lead in the West; he needs to win and he needs all three of his division rivals to lose. Four games all going a specific direction is a lot to ask, but it could happen.

With the trade deadline passed, the waiver wire is now the only place to turn to address roster issues. Alex Kincaid made a big splash Wednesday morning with a $50 claim on Samaje Perine, doubling the next highest bid. It’s the fifth claim won this season with a bid of at least $50. Here’s a quick glance at how the others have turned out, at least so far:

Week 4: Romeo Doubs, GB WR ($82)

Brandon made the first and biggest splash of the season to this point when he went big for the Packers rookie wide receiver. Christian Watson was supposed to be their top rookie pass catcher, and while he’s come on strong recently it was Doubs who had the hot start.

Brandon overbid by $73, essentially wasting more than a third of his total budget for the year. Since then, Doubs appeared in his lineup just once, scoring 4.05 points in Week 5, and has not played in either of Green Bay’s last two games. He’s currently sitting on Brandon’s TAXI squad and is doubtful for this week with an ankle injury.

Week 7: Adam Thielen, Min WR ($55)

Adam Thielen was a bit of a surprise cut. He had certainly been disappointing for Evan, who drafted him 61st overall in September. He scored only 17.55 points in three starts for his Dark Avengers, leading to him cutting him to add Robert Tonyan on October 19.

Two days later, after his waiver period had processed, Sean won the sweepstakes, though it wasn’t much of a contest. Sure, four managers bid on him, tied for the most attention a player has received on waivers this season, but the next highest bid was Will Massimini’s $11 attempt, so Sean wasted nearly a quarter of his budget.

Thielen went on to score 17.60 points in two starts for Sean before being used as a trade piece to acquire Tyreek Hill and Rhamondre Stevenson from Alex Kincaid, whose team Thielen now plays for.

Week 9: Antonio Gibson, Was RB ($65)

Perhaps this one can be justified as Brandon wanting his cousin back on his team. He once sent Brandon Aiyuk, $20 of FAAB, and spent one round of mid-draft capital to get him from Cory Puffett.

Gibson had averaged nearly 11 points per game for Alex Kincaid across the season’s first five weeks, but his efficiency and usage numbers were going down and Brian Robinson’s return appeared imminent, so he traded Gibson to Stephen, who never inserted him into his lineup before cutting him on November 4 to pick up Deon Jackson.

Brandon had tried to get Jackson but fell $40 short of Stephen’s bid, so instead two days later he scooped up Gibson, only officially overspending by $19 this time, though in a sense he overspent by $65 seeing as Anthony’s $46 bid would have failed due to an invalid IR.

Since adding him, Brandon has plugged Gibson into three starting lineups and the Commanders running back is producing at a clip just above what he was doing in those early weeks for Alex, with 33.49 points in that span.

Week 11: Christian Watson, GB WR ($58)

Cory could have had him in Week 11 for zero dollars if he’d only been more patient. Officially, Cory only wasted $19 on this bid as Evan bid $39, but Watson started the year on Cory’s roster. In fact, Cory had drafted him to place him on his TAXI squad and hopefully have him as a second keeper in 2023.

He got impatient, though, and cut Watson in Week 7. Apparently, Romeo Doubs made him forget that most rookie wide receivers don’t start producing until the second half of the season, even when there’s a vacuum at the position just begging for him to fill it.

We’ll see how many starting opportunities Watson gets the rest of the way as Cory has a lot of talent on his roster, but Watson did start in Week 11 and scored two touchdowns for the Packers and 19.58 points for Cory.

So, we’ll see how the Perine splash works out for Alex. He’s not currently in his Week 12 lineup, nor should he be according to FleaFlicker’s current projections. Clearly, though, the value could be there if Mixon misses extended time after suffering a concussion on Sunday.

With that, let’s get to this week’s matchups, starting with a very intriguing game of the week!

Game of the Week: Sean Kennedy (-4) vs Cory Puffett

Cory leads all-time series 8-4

Whichever manager wins this week, it’ll be a milestone for him. Cory (8-3) is looking for his 15th career Peyton Manning Award while Sean (9-2) is playing this week for the 10th of his career. They are ranked 1-2 in this week’s power rankings and also have the two highest projections to open the week, suggesting this could be the seventh time in AFL history, and the third time this season, a manager loses with a 10-1 breakdown.

A win this week for Sean will guarantee that, even if he goes 0-3 during the division round robin, he’ll be at least in a tie for a playoff spot. A tie might not work out too well for him seeing as Evan might be involved and at that point have a better division record, and he’s already lost to William Battle head-to-head, but a win against Cory could open the door for William to win the central and then Sean could get in over Cory on the strength of this victory.

Cory, meanwhile, has the smallest division lead over any of our three leaders despite having the second-best record in the league. William Battle’s team is surging, riding a four-game winning streak and really putting the pressure on Cory to not fall asleep. This is a super exciting matchup, but the stress of this game plus all the high cholesterol food Cory is sure to put down at Thanksgiving might not make for a great combination.

The biggest factor in the outcome of this matchup is likely going to be Ja’Marr Chase. He’s expected to return to practice this week, but will he be active Sunday in Tennessee? And if he is active, how involved and how effective will he be? If Chase doesn’t play, Sean will likely turn to Parris Campbell or Cole Kmet and the door could be left wide open for Cory to take advantage.

Current Coaching Risks

Cory currently has Foster Moreau slated to start over Tyler Higbee at tight end and has the San Francisco 49ers defense against New Orleans in his lineup over the Minnesota Vikings against New England.

Sean has the Denver Broncos slated to face Carolina, but FleaFlicker currently likes the New York Jets against Chicago a little better.

Anthony Battle vs Alex Mayo (-10.5)

Anthony leads all-time series 3-1

We’re a week away from Anthony (4-7) having to make some big weekly decisions between starting Tua Tagovailoa and the controversial Deshaun Watson. This week, though, Tua gets a layup opponent in the Houston Texans and Anthony will hope for a lot of passing before the game gets out of hand.

Meanwhile, Alex (7-4) is hoping to see a bounce-back for Josh Allen this week. The Buffalo quarterback is still the QB2 in the AFL this season, but he’s totaled just 30 points over the past two weeks, which is more than enough reason to raise an eyebrow at his 25-point projection for this week, even if it is against the Detroit Lions.

This matchup could potentially come down to the defenses. Anthony has the Philadelphia Eagles, the AFL’s DEF6, facing the Packers while Alex has the AFL’s #10 defense, the Indianapolis Colts, slated to start against the Pittsburgh Steelers, giving the Bills defense a week off.

Alex badly needs a win to stay in the playoff hunt while Anthony is one of six managers with less than five wins and is trying to stay out of the Snyder bracket.

Current Coaching Risks

Alex has no coaching risks based on his current lineup and current FleaFlicker projections.

Anthony added Juwan Johnson to start at tight end this week, but if Gerald Everett is active, FleaFlicker says he should get the start.

Alex Kincaid vs William Battle (-25)

William leads all-time series 2-1

The biggest opening line of the week begs the question: can Alex (4-7) even make this game competitive? He cut Trey McBride to make that Samaje Perine claim, but that leaves Kyle Pitts in his starting lineup despite being on the Falcons IR with no other tight end on his roster available to plug in.

William (7-4) may have a tough decision on his hands this week at the quarterback position. Part of his opening line is built on the expectation that he will plug DK Metcalf back into his lineup coming off Seattle’s bye week, but with Justin Fields questionable with a shoulder injury and Kyler Murray reportedly making progress with his hamstring injury, we’ve got a QB controversy on our hands.

Despite missing the last two games, Murray is the AFL’s QB10. Meanwhile, Field is the QB5 even after scoring just 22.5 points between Weeks 2 and 4.

Current Coaching Risks

William currently has Joshua Palmer starting over Metcalf. Additionally, FleaFlicker currently prefers Murray over Fields and at kicker the platform thinks he should go with Younghoe Koo this week instead of Harrison Butker.

Alex has a lot of coaching risks as of now. In addition to the risk of not putting Pitts on his IR so he could hold on to McBride as his starting TE (FleaFlicker now suggests making a claim for Logan Thomas, by the way), he added Demarcus Robinson and seems set to start him even though Rondale Moore, who he dropped in the move, has a higher projection and he also has Adam Thielen’s higher projection on his bench. He also has Brian Robinson slated to start over Latavius Murray and he picked up the Carolina Panthers to start at defense instead of the Miami Dolphins.

Eric Meyer vs Brandon Saunders (-21)

Eric leads all-time series 8-5

With the exception of Eric’s tight end situation, both these teams are pretty much at full strength this week. A couple weeks ago they made a couple of big trades and Eric (3-8) will now have to face both Dalvin Cook and CeeDee Lamb, who had combined to score 214.10 points in 15 starts (almost 14.3 ppg) for him.

Leonard Fournette’s status for Eric will be the biggest question mark of the week as Brandon (7-4) has virtually all of his pieces available to him. After suffering through the worst season we’ve ever seen in the AFL, including five straight 0-11 breakdowns to end 2021 (the only time in AFL history we’ve had manager go more than two straight weeks with the lowest score), Brandon appears to be back and has a chance to put his division on lock between this week and, if he needs it, next week.

Current Coaching Risks

Brandon is advised by FleaFlicker to start D’Onta Foreman at FLEX instead of Jakobi Meyers.

Eric currently has AJ Dillon slated to start for Leonard Fournette. To be fair, Fournette is questionable, but if he is inactive and current projections hold, FleaFlicker projections say Isiah Pacheco would be the better pivot.

Evan Ash vs Will Massimini (-8.5)

Evan leads all-time series 6-5

There’s probably not a manager in the AFL on the playoff bubble who has been more disrupted by injury at this point in the season.

Cooper Kupp and Dallas Goedert are both on IR and it’s left Evan (6-5) scrambling. He already had some running back issues that needed to be addressed, but to also have to deal with wide receiver and tight end holes may prove to be what sinks the 2021 AFL champion.

Will (4-7) is the only manager in the AFL this week to be favored against an opponent with a better record than his. He should feel pretty good about his chances to pull out a victory, keep the hope of a winning season alive, and, more importantly, help steer his team clear of the Snyder bracket.

Current Coaching Risks

Will has no coaching risks based on his current lineup and current FleaFlicker projections.

Evan has Kenyan Drake slotted into a FLEX spot, but Allen Lazard should be in his lineup instead, according to FleaFlicker.

Andrew Perez vs Stephen April (-10.5)

Stephen leads all-time series 3-2

Depending on Ezekiel Elliott’s health for Thanksgiving and Joe Mixon’s status for Sunday as he recovers from a concussion, this line could certainly close down by the end of the week.

As it stands now, though, Stephen (4-7) projects to get a pretty easy victory over Andrew (3-8) largely on the strength of his three starting running backs, Kenneth Walker, Jonathan Taylor and Najee Harris.

Stephen is doing all he can to overcome some rotten luck. He only ranks sixth in points against, but he’s lost four games as a Top 6 scorer without a win in the Bottom 6 to balance any of them out. Now he’s faced with the very real possibility of playing in the Snyder bracket along with Andrew, who appears to be a virtual lock to appear in that bottom bracket of the consolation ladder for the fifth year in a row.

Current Coaching Risks

Stephen has no coaching risks based on his current lineup and current FleaFlicker projections.

Andrew currently has James Robinson in his starting lineup instead of Joe Mixon and Ezekiel Elliott slated to start over Mike Evans. If Mixon is inactive, FleaFlicker would recommend keeping Elliott and replacing Robinson with Evans.

Be sure to check those lineups before the food coma hits tomorrow. There are three games over the course of the day and lots of fantasy implications. Good luck to everyone in Week 12 and HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

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