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Written by Cory Puffett
Published December 21, 2022
The playoffs are here! Our four-team field is set, as are the consolation brackets.
With the regular season in the rear-view, it’s time to look ahead to the final weeks of the fantasy season. We have our semi-final matchups this week, pitting Cory Puffett against Brandon Saunders and Sean Kennedy against William Battle, then Sabol Bowl X next week between the two winners, followed by the first ever AFL Pro Bowl between Cory and Sean in Week 18.
Before we check out the first-round playoff matchups, let’s quickly break down the two consolation brackets. We’ll look at who is playing and what they are playing for or playing to avoid.
Butkus Bracket
Named for arguable the greatest playing in NFL history to never appear in a playoff game, the winner of the Butkus Bracket will earn the first selection in our Draft Pick Draft.
Last year’s Butkus Award winner was Cory Puffett, who turned the selection into the first overall pick, with which he selected Christian McCaffrey. He’s now the top seed entering this weekend’s playoff matchups.
This year, the Butkus bracket features Evan Ash (9-6), Alex Mayo (8-7), Alex Kincaid (7-8), and Stephen April (7-8).
Evan and Alex Kincaid faced off in Sabol Bowl IX just a season ago while Alex Mayo and Stephen join Alex Kincaid as the three newest members of the AFL. Stephen already has an AFL title under his belt while Alex Mayo had hoped his 5-0 start would make him the third straight manager to make it to the title game in his third season, but his team collapsed down the stretch.
Evan will face Stephen this week while the two Alexes face off. Evan and Alex Mayo open as favorites in their matchups.
Snyder Bracket
Named for the NFL owner who drove our commissioners away from rooting for his team, the Snyder bracket officially decides the last place team in our league for the year. The worst four managers from the regular season face off with the last place team having to wait until all 11 other managers make their picks in the Draft Pick Draft to find out where he’ll be picking the following fall.
Additionally, this year for the first time we will have a league punishment. The winner of our Week 18 Pro Bowl between Cory and Sean will pick the punishment, which must be approved by the commissioners. The loser of the Snyder bracket will have to complete that punishment before draft day in 2023 or he’ll lose a quarter of his FAAB for the season and the Pro Bowl winner will get to rename his team for Week 1.
This year, the Snyder bracket features Will Massimini (6-9), Anthony Battle (6-9), Andrew Perez (4-11), and Eric Meyer (4-11).
Neither Anthony nor Eric have ever ‘won’ a Snyder in our league’s history. Will Massimini won it in 2022 and Andrew won it in both 2015 and 2019. He’s one of two managers with multiple Snyder Awards in our league’s history, the other being Nolan Soter who only played for three seasons.
Eric faces Will this week in what will be their third meeting of the season. They weren’t in the same division, but our 15-game schedule means each manager faces one non-divisional team twice and they were matched up this season.
Eric got the better of Will in Week 5 by a margin just shy of 21 points, but Will beat Eric in Week 1 by 21.55 points.
That Week 1 matchup essentially started Eric down this path. While Joe Burrow did turn things around and wound up being the QB4 in our league’s scoring, Eric had an historically awful start to that game against Will.
On the Bengals first offensive play of the game, Joe Burrow took a 5-yard sack, giving him negative points and Will’s defense, the Pittsburgh Steelers, half a point. Then, on the second play, Joe Burrow threw a pick-6, giving him -6 points while giving Will 6 points plus some bonus points for the interception return yardage.
We’ll see how the Snyder bracket turns out in a couple weeks’ time. Next week we’ll discuss the two managers vying for the Butkus and the two vying for the Snyder.
For now, let’s get on to our playoff previews!
#4 Brandon Saunders vs #1 Cory Puffett (-9)
#4 Brandon Saunders vs #1 Cory Puffett (-9)
Cory leads all-time series 6-4
Like Eric and Will, these two managers began the year with a head-to-head matchup. Cory (12-3) was among the top half of the league in scoring that week, but he still lost by more than 30 points as Brandon took the first Tom Brady Award of the season.
In nine previous AFL seasons, Cory made the playoffs four times and Brandon (8-7) made it three times. This is the first time they’ve both made the playoffs in the same season.
Brandon will be hoping for big games out of Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce. Several times this year, they’ve brought him back from late-game deficits. This week, though, he won’t have the luxury of knowing exactly how many points he needs from them. They play at 1pm on Saturday.
Christian Kirk and Greg Zuerlein figure to start the scoring for Brandon on Thursday night while Cory currently has Travis Etienne slotted into his starting lineup.
Cory expects to be without Jalen Hurts this week. The Eagles have a two-game lead on the rest of the NFC, a three-game lead in their division race, and Hurts is nursing a shoulder injury, so it doesn’t appear likely they’ll rush him back, even for a somewhat consequential matchup with Dallas. Cory will have to hope that Tom Brady can put together just his third 20-point game of the season and get him to the Sabol Bowl, which Hurts figures to be ready for.
The good news for Cory is he has the AFL’s RB2 and RB3 in Derrick Henry and Christian McCaffrey. Henry gets to face the Houston Texans, which he has owned recently. In five straight matchups with the Texans, Henry has rushed for more than 200 yards and multiple touchdowns. Cory will hope for more of the same.
Meanwhile Brandon will need some of his skill players to step up this week. D’Onta Foreman is coming off a terrible week, in which he carried the ball 10 times for just 9 yards and had a fumble. A bounce-back for him, would be nice, but more importantly Brandon will need Dalvin Cook and CeeDee Lamb to be what he traded with Eric to get.
Brandon gave up a total of three rounds of draft capital to acquire the two players, and they’ve been solid. Cook is the RB8 and Lamb is the WR6 in the AFL this season. But they’ve been inconsistent on a week-to-week basis.
#3 William Battle vs #2 Sean Kennedy (-20.5)
#3 William Battle vs #2 Sean Kennedy (-20.5)
Sean leads all-time series 7-6
Like Cory and Brandon, this will be the first time these two managers face off in the playoffs. Sean previously made the playoffs in 2014 and in 2019 while William’s two previous berths came in 2015 and 2018.
Sean (10-5) won Sabol Bowl VII in 2019 against Brandon Saunders.
William (9-6) has never lost in the first round of the AFL playoffs. In 2015 he beat Eric Meyer before losing Sabol Bowl III to Cory Puffett, then in 2018 he beat Brandon Saunders in the first round before winning Sabol Bowl VI against his brother, Anthony Battle.
This week William opens as a significant underdog against Sean, but he has a number of players who have outperformed expectations on a fairly consistent basis this season. Amari Cooper has been one of the year’s biggest surprises. He’s the WR11 in our league’s scoring. Austin Ekeler has failed to score at least 15 points in a game just once since Week 4.
Two of the big question marks this week for William will be at defense and at quarterback. The New England Patriots lead all defenses in scoring with our league’s settings, but they have to face the Cincinnati Bengals. Some sacks may be in their future, but they may also give up a lot of yards and a lot of points.
Justin Fields will start at quarterback for William. He’ll face a touch Bears defense in some weather that doesn’t figure to be very conducive to throwing the football. The good news for Williams, though, is that Fields should have a field day running the ball.
Fields has said he wants to go for the single-season rushing record among quarterbacks, currently held by Lamar Jackson with 1,206 yards in 2019. Fields is at exactly 1,000 yards, the third quarterback in NFL history to reach that mark. He needs 207 yards over the next three games, and he just might try to get a big chunk of that this week.
Sean, meanwhile, has some injuries to monitor in the coming days. Lamar Jackson has not practiced in about two weeks since suffering an injury early in the Broncos game, after just one carry and four passes. If he can’t play this week, Jared Goff figured to make his third straight start for Sean, unless he mixes it up with Danny Pennies.
Rhamondre Stevenson has been limited in practice this week with an ankle injury. If he sits, another start for Gus Edwards could be coming up. It’s a big drop-off, though. Stevenson is the AFL’s RB11 while Edwards is RB57.
Sean might be the favorite to win the whole thing right now. Despite finishing two games behind Cory in the regular season standings, all nine players in Sean’s starting lineup, unless Stevenson has to sit, were among the Top 12 at their positions in 2022. Cory, meanwhile, will have at least three and likely four players in his lineup who were outside of the Top 12 at their positions.
Good luck to everyone in Week 16 and Merry Christmas to all our managers!
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