Fantasy Football Has Zero Great Players in NFL Week 16 Gauntlet

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The skill is gone and the great players left with it. Fantasy Football is all gambling in 2023, with injuries defining the game and zero ways for managers to actually manage.

Prepare for the intense sports debate that only sibling rivalry can conjure. Seesaw Sports, where Dan Salem and Todd Salem throw down on the NFL, MLB, NBA and more. Only on BuzzChomp. Two brothers from New York yell, scream and debate sports.

 

In most fantasy football leagues around the country, NFL Week 16 is the start of the playoffs. After months of consternation and worry, managers have made or missed the postseason thanks to moves they’ve made along the way and the roster they cleared the draft with. Just as you planned, right guys?

Everyone who plays fantasy football feels constant anxiety and distress no matter how successful their teams are. That is because we all know how stupid of a game it is. It is so incredibly fluky and random as to infuriate. It is so swayed by injury luck and point clustering as to drive one insane. This was always true. Is it just us though, or is it more true now? Like 1000 times more true!

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Obviously, the 2023 season was wild, throwing everything for a loop. Thanks to the endless slew of quarterback injuries, not a single team can claim to have survived unscathed. But that isn’t even what we’re hinting towards. The fact is that there is no such thing as a good fantasy football player anymore. I know, controversial. Let us explain.

 

NFL Week 16: Fantasy Football Greatness Is Dead

 

Todd Salem: Experts Are Kidding Themselves

It used to be that running backs dominated the entirety of fantasy drafts and pickups. They were fantasy football. The devaluing of the position was slow and steady in real life, but it was very sudden in fantasy. As recently as 2019, running backs still dominated. 2020 was the Covid year, and then it was all different from that point forward.

After 2020, the top quarterbacks became invogue as top picks. After all, they scored so much more than every other position, nailing down one of the top five guys could be vital. That line of thinking lasted all of one season before we realized it was damn hard to nail down one of the top five guys. 2023 has reiterated that thinking with a sledgehammer.

The league was an entirely passing league, which made sense that fantasy then turned to the top wide receivers as the true elite assets. They were better bets to perform as first-round values compared with running backs. They were safer bets to stay healthy and perform week after week. Justin Jefferson, Jamarr Chase, Cooper Kupp, and Travis Kelce (TE), among a few others, dominated draft boards. It made sense…until it backfired.

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Fantasy reliability of the top WRs blew up in our collective faces this season. Tyreek Hill was the lone bright spot, until he too went down right before the fantasy playoffs. Where does that leave us? We can’t rely on running backs; it is stupid to try to dart throw the top quarterbacks; we can’t rely on pass catchers. So….what are we doing here?

I guess my conclusion is that the draft portion of fantasy football is more worthless than it’s ever been. First-round picks rarely return that value, regardless of what position they play. Maybe this makes it a better game; a true test of managerial skills throughout the length of the season. But it sure makes it a depressing experience along the way to know that a large percentage of the best guys will go down and/or return no value. The “best” managers are just the ones who guess correctly.

 

 

Dan Salem: I’m Boycotting Prep Work

The bonafide facts of fantasy football are definitely MORE true now than ever before, with NFL Week 16 being the pinnacle moment of our manufactured glory or demise. This particular fantasy football season has proven everything you said and more. A game of statistics and knowledge-based skill has devolved into pure gambling, be it bidding wars on the waiver wire for a top free agent on a given week, or rolling the roulette wheel on a player in the draft or a trade.

My personal experience over this horrid season embodies just how futile this game can be. I entered the season with two top quarterbacks, two top wide receivers, and two top running backs. I even managed to pick up a top running back and receiver during the year. Inconsistency and injuries doomed me to last place with all of Justin Herbert (IR), Jared Goff, Garret Wilson (QB on IR), Mike Williams (IR), Breece Hall (QB on IR), Saquon Barkley (QB on IR), De’Von Achane (IR stint), and Nico Collins (IR). With three losses of fewer than two points during the season, my story is unfortunately not all that special. It’s down right common place!

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No amount of pre-season prep would have helped, meaning there is literally zero point in doing prep work for fantasy football. I’m not even sure it matters whether you participate in your draft, or let it go auto. One team in our league allowed the auto-draft to select several tight ends and multiple kickers. He did significantly better than my team. All this to say, what the heck has happened to fantasy football?

I’m not sure anyone planned it this way, but fantasy football is about as skill-based as gambling on sports. No skill required. Too much skill will hurt you. Don’t bet too much money, because you’ll probably lose it. Want to use your skills? Play fantasy baseball, because no type of football required much skill this season. I’m great on the waiver wire and at grabbing players, but it didn’t help my team this season. Yet if we learned anything from the last few years, things will be completely different in 2024. We had running backs dominate in 2019, Covid complications in 2020, quarterbacks dominate in 2021, wide receivers dominate in 2022, then injuries dominate in 2023. Perhaps defense will take over 2024, or maybe tight ends? Kickers? Back to running backs? Don’t try to prepare, because you won’t know until its over.

 

Meet our Writers:

Dan Salem is Lead Editor, Writer, and Co-owner of BuzzChomp. He’s a published author, as well as an award winning Actor, Director and Producer. Visit M Square Productions for his film work, or get lost in his old-school comedy on Pillow Talk TV. You can follow him on X and Instagram.

Todd Salem is a Staff Writer and Contributing Editor at BuzzChomp. He’s also a fantasy football and fantasy baseball Staff Writer for RotoBaller. Follow him on X or comment below for his unfiltered opinions.

NFL Week 16 Fantasy Football Photo Credits: sicscore.com and nbcsportsbayarea.com via Getty Images

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