Week 11 Recap

It has been a strange NFL season so far. All we have to do is look back at consensus power rankings from the preseason to see how weird everything has gotten. Neither of the second, fourth, or sixth ranked teams (The Chiefs, Ravens, and Commanders, respectively) has a winning record. The Broncos (9-2) were ranked 11th and the Patriots (9-2) were 23rd.

So how should we feel about GM Mason Bautch and the Sugar Skulls right now? Is their success the result of diligent preparation and laser-like execution? Are they outsmarting, outmaneuvering, and outflanking their opponents at every turn? Or are we existing in some kind of football Bizarro World where up is down and down is up? Is the fact that they are doing so well actually proof that they are bad? (Don't get mad at me, Mason, I'm just asking questions...)

Sure to agree with the Bizarro World theory is GM Dave Nguyen. Not necessarily because it is correct but because in this alternate universe, he and the Vegas Knight Hawks aren't ass. But just to be very clear... in this universe, they are indeed ass, buns, cheeks, whatever you want to call it.

What Boston did to Vegas wasn't merely a win...it was downright disrespectful. But let's be honest, I think we all were expecting to see GM Dave Nguyen & the Knight Hawks be humiliated like this. When you incessantly whine and trash talk in the groupchat, nobody's gonna be upset when you get Wemby'd™. Great bouncebad for Boston this week.

What happened to the Titans this week? Gotta get this thing turned around and going in the right direction. I was able to obtain exclusive footage of their current trajectory this season:

To the Miami Inferno and their incompetent GM -- if I may, a word of advice: the only way to be at peace with your current predicament is to embrace the Dabo Delusion. Don't let anyone talk about your team. Accept your team and all its faults. Love your team unconditionally. Love yourself unconditionally. You are enough. Your team is enough. I mean, not enough to have a snowball's chance in hell of making the playoffs, but you get the sentiment.

"That's the freakin' heart of a champion right there. The record don't define you. How you respond is what defines you. Our record ain't what we want it to be but we got a hell of a great group of young people right there."

It is now the second week of my Mario Party Algorithm predictions. For those of you that are new to the newsletter, I like to predict who will win the league every week as the playoffs draw nearer. Is it based on anything scientific? Sort of. I use the same algorithm that Toad uses in Mario Party to predict their winner. And will I continue to pick winners as the season goes on? Of course. That increases my chances of correctly predicting the winner..

Toad is wrong! It's not anyone's game! I am one hundred percent confident that the winner of Big 12 will be Michael Bautch!

Each week we track Lucky and Unlucky outcomes — because nothing brings a league together like complaining. A lucky win means you scored in the bottom half of the league but still walked away smiling. An unlucky loss means you scored in the top half and still got punched in the mouth by the schedule. In short: if you’re calling yourself “unlucky” but didn’t make this list… relax, you’re not special.

The Survivor Simulator has officially come to an end, and we have our champion — the Tucson Sugar Skulls! In a perfect bit of cosmic timing, they also took down the other finalist, the Cedar Rapids Titans, in their real matchup this week. Congrats to Tucson for outlasting the entire league and surviving the season (there’s still no money… with ya broke ass).

Now that Survivor is wrapped, stay tuned for next week’s brand-new feature: a schedule comparison breakdown showing what every team’s record would be if they had each other’s schedule. It's another tool that you can use to throw it in peoples faces on how good or bad you are, it’s about to get spicy..

Finally, I will leave you with this clip of Cam Skattebo on Monday Night Raw. I am shocked that Cam would be so reckless just a few weeks after his devastating ankle injury. I thought that he would have a quiet recovery -- get into gardening, do some jigsaw puzzles, and finally get around to reading some Tolstoy.

Thanks for reading this week!