Friends in football,

Survivor #3 - the artist formerly known as "BRANDO! Third Chance Survivor", because Brandon "Brando" Weeden was the QB king of "wait that dude is playing AGAIN?!" - starts THIS WEEK.

It's truly the Wild West of survivor picking. If you're not yelling "YOLO" while wearing Wilfork overalls and crushing your second Bud Light Lime while making Survivor #3 picks, you're not doing it right.

Picks per week: 1 (Week 9), 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 5 (Week 17), 3

I told you it was the Wild West!

RESULTS SUMMARY

Up next: Week 9
Pick deadline: 10am PT Sun
Make your picks >>

The BIG Survivor (BFIG) results

Survival record: 1,785-137

Worst loss: Texans (3%) to Panthers

Best Squad(s): 51 squads left with 3+ survivors (and thus the max score of 24 wins)

Survivor #2 results

Survival record: 2,071-756

Worst loss: Chiefs (6%) to Broncos

Best Squad(s): After our first 2-pick week, 73 squads have 15 wins (3+ survivors)Golden Spreadsheet

Weekly Pick'em (WeeWoo) results

Weekly winner(s): Logjam week! With a bunch of favorites winning but one HUGE favorite losing (KC), we had 18 people tie at 15-1. They'll split the weekly haul

Best Squad(s): Another new leader! Enjoy the throne while it lasts, Team Thompson (246 wins)

Overall leader(s): @Jricci1491 and @Nuttyguy123 held onto the lead by going 12-4

QB One-and-Done results

Top passer: Sammy Howell did numbers AGAIN (397 yards; 33 picks)

Weekly average: 248 yards per pick (5 yards above the average QB performance)

Best Squad(s): "BLOODGATE" still doing work. Their lead is now 154 yards over "Tommy's Teasers"

Overall leader(s): @pbucktax has been hovering, and now they have the throne after picking Hurts (319 yards)

Loser Survivor Brought to You by The OddsBreakers results

Survival record: 172-19

Worst win: Broncos (7%) beat Chiefs

Best Squad(s): And we're down to one. Ironically (and tragically), "Church of Kirk Cousins" is alone on the throne at 24 wins (3 survivors)

"All 32" One-and-Done results

W/L record: 3,598-1,059

Overall leader(s): We went from 44 undefeateds to 30. Another 1,744 of us are within 4 wins of the lead

Best Squad(s): "Stonemarkers" is alone on the throne with 33 wins (out of a possible 36)

COMMISH COMMENTARY

A HUGE shout-out to our first-ever back-to-back Moxie Award winner, who has now become our first-ever - and maybe ONLY ever - back-to-back SUCCESSFUL PICK Moxie Award winner.

@MayTheFavrthBeWithYou was already in the SZN username Hall of Fame. With Broncos and Panthers picks (a combined ONE win between them at the time of picking) in the last two weeks, they now have a shot at the overall SZN Hall of Fame.

Look at their BIG picks so far. They've rung up wins on the Panthers (1 win), Giants (2 wins), Commanders (3 wins), Broncos (3 wins), and Jets (4 wins).
MOXIE PAYS, people!

It's shaping up to be a disastrous QB year, and that fact is shaping our pools.

As I wrote in the Week 8 PICKS email, only three quarterbacks have meaningfully outperformed in our QB One-and-Done pool - Mahomes, Tua, and Kirky - and now our boy Kirk is out for the year after tearing his Achilles.

(Name another year where two top 10 QBs have torn their Achilles. I'll wait.)

On top of that, as of kickoff this week, a full 13 teams will have seen a QB who isn't their No. 1 guy play significant minutes.

So what's the upshot of this for our pools?

Commish's read is that it'll benefit people who are at/near the top of leaderboards, and could extend our survivor pools longer than we typically see.

Reason being many of our top people have blown through a lot of the "best" picks already. But if a third of the entire league is in flux because of QB issues, that'll create opportunities to successfully pick "meh" teams when you normally wouldn't.

Case in point: Atlanta is now a 5-point favorite over Minnesota in Week 9. Were Cousins starting, the Vikings would likely be 3-point favorites.

The Raiders, who have generally been awful, are also 3-point favorites over the Giants, because the Giants set all sorts of records you never want to set by throwing for SEVEN TOTAL YARDS last week.

And in the QB One-and-Done, if you hadn't picked Cousins yet, his injury is a brutal blow. Most of our leaders are leaders BECAUSE of how Kirk performed the one time they picked him. You're likely not gonna get that performance from Josh Dobbs.

So does this mean you should always blow through your sure bets early? ABSOLUTELY NOT! But this year it just might work out for some folks.

Yours in football,
The Commish