CCB Power Rankings, Week 12: The Playoff Race is Heating Up

I thought I’d start this week’s power rankings with some interesting content. Do we have too many bench spots? Are the waivers too bare? I went back and looked at all the waiver adds this season and here are some notable names:

1. JD McKissic
2. Drew Sample
3. PJ Walker
4. Justin Jackson
5. Jake Luton
6. Salvon Ahmed
7. James Robinson
8. Kalen Ballage
9. Alex Smith
10. Gabriel Davis
11. Darnell Mooney
12. Robert Tonyan
13. Myles Gaskin
14. Dalton Schultz
15. Keelan Cole
16. Mo Alie-Cox
17. Mike Davis
18. Kyle Allen
19. Jakobi Meyers
20. Olamide Zaccheaus
21. Nelson Agholor
22. Tim Patrick
23. Joe Flacco
24. Travis Fulgham
25. Rashard Higgins
26. Devonate Booker

Surprised? I think I was. Most of these guys aren’t league winners, but if you were able to find gems such as James Robinson, Travis Fulgham, or Mike Davis they very well could be. This data tells me that the bench spots in our league (including taxi) are at the perfect equilibrium. There are enough impact players on waivers that savvy owners will be able to benefit from them, but not too many of these types of players that it causes trading to be hindered.

For example, Jalen Reagor for Gardner Minshew & Jamaal Williams is a trade that this set-up promotes. Ishan’s need for an RB forced his hand for a trade so that he could have a shot at title contention while Abhi’s rebuild hinges on obtaining young developable players. With bench spots at the number they are now, it’s not easy to find Jamaal Williams level players on the waivers, thus making this trade a win win for both parties.

Anyways, enough talk about league bench spots. Let’s get into this week’s power rankings!

1. Tuahanagins (leoxia@): 9–2 (-)

Are the Tuahanagins a lock for the 1st seed? Team emwang44 is creeping up on overall record, but with a 1 game lead and a +318 points for lead, all that’s left is for the team to finish 1–1 in the following weeks to secure the seed. It’s possible that Vaibhav and Brandly catch-up for the 1st seed, but this requires two Tuahanagins losses which seems unlikely. While the Tuahanagins sorely missed their projections this week, we expect a bounce back match-up against a boom/bust ‘What’s Dalvin Cooking?’

2. Shanahanigans 2.0 (vaibhav@): 7–4 (-)

With a close finish on Monday evening, the Shanahanigans just barely edged out the Neverloseagains, giving Vaibhav the opportunity to jump Brandly for a top seed. Our predictions for last week *kinda* came true.

1. ✅ Vaibhav’s TE’s throw up duds
2. ✅ Vaibhav’s WR’s carry his team
3. ✅ His match-up against Carson Wentz was crucially important

With Zeke’s return to form and Antonio Gibson continuing to make a name for himself, the Shanahanigans could find their way to the top of this list next week. It’s funny though — if Vaibhav were in the Milk Based division, he’d be ranked 4th in that division. It’s possibly a sign that we should re-evaluate division set-up, but it’s really a testament to his team’s willpower for overcoming the adversity of previous close losses

3. Neverloseagains (ryanvasquez@): 7–4 (-)

Ryan better change his team name this week after a brutal loss to the Shanahanigans. That Tom Brady pick in the last 2 minutes sealed the win for Vaibhav as Mike Evans and Rob Gronkowski sat on the sidelines and watched Jared Goff secure another prime time thriller. It’s sad really that the Neverloseagains can have great outings from Kyler, Robinson, Clyde, Evans, McLaurin, and Andrews and still lose the match-up. Is this a sign that the Neverloseagains have reached their ceiling on these weekly power rankings?

4. 📈Team emwang44 (emwang44@): 8–3 (+3)

Some people say “fake it till you make it” and honestly it seems like it’s working?? How can we discount Team emwang44 from title contention when the squad sees success each week? With a decisive victory against a Josh Allen-less Albatross’, Emma has cemented her team as a threat to all contenders. From 1 startable QB to 4 quality options, this team is coming into its final form and all contenders should be scared

5. 📈What’s Dalvin cooking? (ishanshah@): 7–4 (+1)

The high’s are so high, but the lows are so low. It’s really hard to predict the Dalvin’s successes from week to week because of how volatile the players are. We personally weren’t that excited with the Jamaal Williams trade, but he’s worked out as a great filler for Ishan, scoring around 7–8 points a week. Not a ton, but enough to inch himself past close wins. While this week’s match-up against Read wasn’t particular exciting, the Dalvin’s keep showing us what they’re capable of in a playoff setting

6. 📉 Wandering Albatross’ (papa_brandly@): 7–4 (-1)

If Emma’s team is coming into December form, the Albatross’ are the antithesis to that. This week showed us that the Albatross’ are really hurting for more depth at RB and QB. The perfect example of this is starting Adrian Peterson in a superflex spot after AD said that D’Andre Swift should have been the starter weeks ago. With a Shanahanagins leap for the top seed, we’re curious to see if the Albatross’ end up playing them in the first round of the playoffs

7. 📉Team dhttn (dhttn@): 6–5 (-3)

Absolutely killer loss this week to Team heysteven. Team dhttn is a team that still has playoff aspirations, but at this point should be focused on winning the Toilet Bowl. We were really sad to see Burrow’s injury on Sunday and we’re hoping that Team dhttn will recover from the loss, but his match-ups in the next two weeks against a red hot Emwang44 and a top tier What’s Dalvin Cooking put him in a bad position. With no 1st round picks for the next two years (courtesy of the Alvin Kamara trade), we’re interested to see which direction Dustin takes his team in to finish the season

8. 📈Team heysteven (heysteven@): 4–7 (+1)

Did we not absolutely predict this win in our week 10 power rankings?

“Emma, Dustin, and Brandly should be careful against heysteven if they’re hoping to make a playoff push”

A close loss to Emma, a close win against Dustin, and now on to face a hobbled Brandly team led by Josh Allen. Team heysteven’s roster shows how drafting for value and optimizing certain position groups works to your benefit. We couldn’t have written a more exciting ending to the regular season than this

9. 📈 Sugma jeffys (vikingsrcool@): 5–6 (+1)

We wrote them off for the year, but the jeffy’s have one last trick up their sleeves. Sure this win hurts their draft position, but it’s not like it matters to the jeffy’s anyways. Remember how he picked up Justin Jefferson with the 1.08 pick? It was kinda dissapointing that Jameis Winston (aka Ligma crabs) didn’t get the start this week, but his team didn’t need him anyways. Fantastic performances by Melvin Gordon, Adam Thielen, and Dallas Goedert helped secure an easy win against Abhi to improve his week 12 power ranking

10. 📉Team akashanavarathan (akashanavarathan@): 5–6 (-2)

We laughed at the Hanigan Footbirds in Week 9 for only putting up 37 points, but maybe we should be directing our ridicule at Team akashanavarathan instead. When Curtis Samuel (17.40) is putting up nearly 40% of your points (45.70), you deserve a drop in the power rankings. Despite this, we don’t expect Akash’s squad to stay down here for too long. With the return of Aiyuk and Swift, we could easily see him competing for the Toilet Bowl

11. 📈Gimme the Damn L (AbhiG15@): 1–10 (+1)

We’re not putting too much stock into Jonathan Taylor’s performance against a miserable Green Bay Packers run defense this week. While his prospects are looking up, we’d rather be focusing on this insane Ceedee catch for a TD. There’s not many redeeming factors on this squad, but Ceedee is definitely one of them and we’re exciting to see his growth next year. The only reason this team is not ranked 12th is because..

12. 📉The Hanigan Footbirds (read@): 0–11 (-1)

..the Hanigan Footbirds exist. Yes, they’re a real team. Yes, JK Dobbins looked like the real deal this week, but both him and Mark Ingram have been put on the COV list which means..

..Duke Johnson is his only startable running back. Honestly pretty ridiculous when you think about it. The Hanigan Footbirds are a team that doesn’t have a startable QB (we don’t consider Baker putting up 5 points a week as startable), doesn’t have a startable RB, and doesn’t have a startable TE. They really are the fantasy equivalent of the NY Jets