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By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)
It was Upset City in Week 1 of the NFL season (apologies to Dick Vitale for stealing his catchphrase). Sixteen teams were favored to win (according to the point spread), but only seven out of them actually won. The upsets included the Texans thumping the Jaguars by a score of 37-21 and the Saints thrashing the Packers on a neutral field in Jacksonville with a 38-3 score. We also had two overtime upsets with the Bengals defeating the Vikings 27-24 on a FG in overtime and the Raiders upsetting the Ravens on Monday Night Football by a 33-27 score on an overtime TD pass from Derek Carr to Zay Jones.
In Dynasty Owner, there were plenty of upsets as well, including a shocking loss in our Matchup of the Week by defending Chase for the Ring Champion Viktor Kilgore by his Ring winning Barbee Kilgore team in League #35395. This upset could have only happened in Dynasty Owner because of the 3-point clutch scoring bonus that Dan’s Dynasty got to secure the victory.
In terms of individual player performances, there wasn’t an upset in the competition to be the first Dynasty Owner Player of the Week for 2021 as one of the top players in the NFL took the honor. We did have five players who did better than projected, which is an upset of sorts, and should have been in your Starting lineup, along with five players who upset their Dynasty Owners with their poor performances in Week 1 and should have been on the Bench or Practice Squad.
All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the updated Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.
Standard Dynasty Owner scoring for kickers gives you 1 point for every extra point, while a missed extra point will cost you 1 point. It’s 2 points for a field goal of between 0 and 39 yards, 4 points for a field goal between 40 and 49 yards and 5 points for a field goal of 50 yards or longer. A missed field goal of between 0 and 39 yards will cost you 3 points, while a miss of 40 yards or more is a loss of 2 points.
For the purposes of this article, ADP and Dynasty Owner rostered percentage statistics were current as of the morning of September 14th.
Dynasty Owner Player of the Week
Our first Dynasty Owner Player of the Week for 2021 is: Patrick Mahomes
This is the fourth Dynasty Owner Player of the Week honor for Mahomes, putting him ahead of Aaron Rodgers for the most honors. His 43.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance (337 passing yards, 3 passing TDs, 18 rushing yards, 1 rushing TD) was the lowest amount of points that he has scored for his Dynasty Owners in a Player of the Week winning effort. He edged out another QB (Kyler Murray) by a mere 0.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to take the honor. Most of Mahomes’ points came in the second half when he threw for 168 yards and all three of his passing TDs plus added 13 rushing yards (27.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). His 5-yard rushing TD came in the first half. As the highest paid player in the NFL and Dynasty Owner, he’s never going to be a value, but performances like this one are why people drafted him as highly as they did this year (ADP 37.1). Still, it’s the first time that a Player of the Week award winner had a cost per point of over $1 million.
Week 1 Points: 43.6
2021 Salary: $45,000,000
Cost per Point: $1,032,110
Congratulations Patrick on winning the first Dynasty Owner Player of the Week honor of the 2021 season and your record setting fourth one overall!
Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week
Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. The first Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week for the 2021 season is: Ty’Son Williams
In the space of less than three weeks, Williams went from fourth string RB fighting for a spot on the Ravens’ 53-man roster to their starter at RB on Monday Night Football. That’s what happens when the three RBs ahead of you on the depth chart (J.K. Dobbins, Gus Edwards and Justice Hill) all go down with season ending injuries. Since Dobbins’ injury, Williams has gone from being rostered in 6% of Dynasty Owner leagues to being rostered in 97.6% of leagues. All of the Dynasty Owners in the 2.4% of leagues that saw nobody draft or pick up a starting RB making only $660,000 in salary must be reading too much from the fantasy website that published this six days ago:
Ty’Son Williams is not worth drafting in his rookie year
On Monday Night Football, Williams showed that analysis was dead wrong as he scored 18.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (65 rushing yards, 1 rushing TD, 3 receptions, 29 receiving yards) on just 12 touches. The 18.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points are the lowest by any Value Player of the Week award winner and his cost per point is the second highest (behind $37,566 for Cooper Kupp in Week 11 of last season). Most of the really big point scorers from Week 1 make over $1 million in salary and it’s very difficult for anyone making that much to win this award.
Week 1 Points: 18.4
2021 Salary: $660,000
Cost per Point: $35,870
Congratulations Ty’Son on your first Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week honor. Don’t be surprised if he wins another one this season.
Players Who Should Have Been Starters This Week
Next, we look at those players who should have been one of your Starters based on their performance in Week 1. We aren’t going to write that you should have started Patrick Mahomes or Travis Kelce because barring injury or bye week, both of them should always be in your Starting lineup. Instead, these are players who might normally be on your Bench or Practice Squad, but likely weren’t Starters in Week 1 when they should have been.
QB: Jameis Winston (NO) – 41.1 points
If you missed the entire 2020 NFL season, you’re probably wondering why Winston is on this list. The overall #5 point scorer in 2019 was a backup for New Orleans last season and scored only 3.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for the entire season. Flash forward to 2021 and Winston is the starter in New Orleans and doing very un-Jameis Winston things like throwing the ball only 20 times, completing 70% of his passes and not throwing an interception. Back in 2019, he only completed 70% of more of his pass attempts once in 16 games played, threw the ball more than 20 times in every game and only went three games without an interception. The LASIK surgery and strange training methods seem to have paid off as he scored 41.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (148 passing yards, 5 passing TDs, 37 rushing yards). Winston was the 22nd QB off the board in 2021 Dynasty Owner startup drafts (ADP 122.2) and projected as QB26 for the 2021 season, so his Dynasty Owners likely had plans for him to sit on the Bench and see how he’d play after pretty much a year off. If they had just missed the 2020 season, they would have done the right thing and had him in their Starting lineup.
Honorable mention to Jared Goff who had 38.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (338 passing yards, 3 passing TDs, 1 INT, 14 rushing yards, 1 2-pt conversion). Goff is rostered in very, very few Dynasty Owner leagues (1.8%) and that’s not very likely to go higher because of his $33.5 million contract for four more years. He hadn’t scored that many Dynasty Owner fantasy points in a game since Dynasty Owner started in 2019, so even the few Dynasty Owners with Goff on their roster likely didn’t have him as a Starter against the 49ers.
RB: Jamaal Williams (DET) – 25.0 points
Everybody who had two Detroit Lions RBs with more than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 1 against the San Francisco 49ers defense raise their hands. Sorry, but nobody should have their hands up because nobody thought that would happen. Once D’Andre Swift was deemed ready to play in Week 1, some Dynasty Owners may have thought that he could score that many points, but not Jamaal Williams. Williams was the starter for the Lions, but Swift played almost twice as many snaps (63 for Swift versus 32 for Williams). However, Williams was just as productive as Swift in fewer snaps with 25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (54 rushing yards, 1 rushing TD, 8 receptions, 56 receiving yards). Swift had 24.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. As the 48th RB off the board in 2021 Dynasty Owner startup draft (ADP 133.6), Williams projected as a Bench RB. Hopefully the pre-game news from the Lions that he was going to be the starter caused some of his Dynasty Owners to move him into their Starting lineups.
WR: Christian Kirk (ARI) – 24.0 points
With rookie second round draft pick Rondale Moore and veteran free agent signee A.J. Green pressing Kirk for the WR2 spot on the Arizona Cardinals, it wasn’t a huge surprise that Kirk was being drafted in the middle rounds of 2021 Dynasty Owner startup drafts (ADP 174.2). He was drafted around the same time last year (ADP 172.8) and finished as overall WR52 for the season. For just $1,473,717, he seemed like a good player to have on your Bench or as a Practice Squad guy who you could elevate if he held off Moore and Green, and grabbed some of the targets that went Larry Fitzgerald’s way in 2020. That’s what appeared to happen in Week 1 as Kirk had the same number of TD receptions as DeAndre Hopkins (2) and almost as many Dynasty Owner fantasy points (24.0 for Kirk versus 26.3 for Hopkins). Kirk had 5 receptions for 70 receiving yards and 2 receiving TDs, which would have looked nice in the Starting lineup for your Dynasty Owner team.
Honorable mention to Sterling Shepard who had more Dynasty Owner fantasy points than Kirk (24.3 versus 24.0 for Kirk), but is rostered in only 23.7% of Dynasty Owner leagues, so fewer Dynasty Owners could have made the decision to have him in their Starting lineup. Shepard scored his 24.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points by catching 7 passes for 113 receiving yards and a receiving TD. If not for the $10.25 million salary, he’d probably be a trendy Free Agent Auction target. If you believed in Shepard and his role in the Giants’ offense in 2021 enough to keep or draft him at that salary, then hopefully you believed enough to put him in your Starting lineup.
TE: Juwan Johnson (NO) – 17.1 points
That name should be familiar to readers. He’s been touted by Jay Pounds as the #4 target in his Week 1 Free Agent Auction article and as a late round flyer in my Roster Turnover Madness article published right after the final set of roster cutdowns. It was mainly for the potential that he offered for only $695,000 in salary, not because we expected him to score 17.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (3 receptions, 21 yards, 2 receiving TDs) for the Saints in Week 1. I didn’t expect it, but maybe Jay did (you’ll have to ask him yourself). This performance was good enough to rank him as the TE5 in Week 1 behind four pretty good players you may have heard of before (Rob Gronkowski, Darren Waller, T.J. Hockenson and Travis Kelce). Hopefully, you picked him up based off of my (or Jay’s) recommendation and felt bold enough to put him in your Starting lineup this week because that’s where he belonged.
K: Joey Slye (HOU) – 12.0 points
There are a couple of reasons why Dynasty Owners wouldn’t have started Joey Slye this week. First, he kicks for the Houston Texans who were expected to have one of the worst offenses in the NFL. Second, he’s only on the Texans because of an injury to their regular kicker (Ka’imi Fairbairn) that landed Fairbairn on Injured Reserve. Slye is only a short term option for Dynasty Owners, as Fairbairn is only expected to miss three games. The fact that Slye was even rostered in half (51.5%) of Dynasty Owners was likely because his salary is very low ($850,000) and people drafted him before he was released by the Carolina Panthers in late August. Dynasty Owners with Slye on their roster should have started him since he produced 12.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. He made all four of his PAT attempts along with FGs of 25, 26 and 40 yards. Even though he was sent back to the Texans’ practice squad after the game, he is likely to be promoted before their Week 2 game against Cleveland so if he’s on your roster, hang on to and maybe use him this week.
Players Who Should Have Been on the Bench or Practice Squad
For every player who should have been in your Starting lineup but wasn’t, we have at least one high drafted or high ranked player who probably was in your Starting lineup, but would have been better left on your Bench or Practice Squad. Here are some likely Starters who scored few or no Dynasty Owner fantasy points this week, so they should have spent Week 1 riding your Dynasty Owner Bench or hanging out on the Practice Squad.
QB: Aaron Rodgers (GB) – 0.6 points
In 2020, Rodgers was the QB2 in Dynasty Owner. After the first game of 2021, he is QB34, even behind Raiders backup Marcus Mariota who outscored him on one play (3.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on a 31 yard run). The only starting QB who was worse than Rodgers was Ryan Fitzpatrick of the Washington Football Team who had -0.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. However, Fitzpatrick was injured in the second quarter of his Week 1 game and didn’t return to play. Rodgers was just bad with just 133 passing yards and 2 INTs in a little over three quarters of football. The only positive news for Rodgers is that Packers backup QB Jordan Love didn’t light up TIAA Bank Field in Jacksonville with his play in relief with 68 passing yards and a lost fumble for 0.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. In Rodgers’ last dance for the Packers (and possibly your Dynasty Owner squad), he should have been cooling his dance shoes on the Practice Squad.
RB: Saquon Barkley (NYG) – 3.7 points
This was kind of predictable. While saying Barkley wasn’t on a “snap count limit” because of his injury in Week 2 of the 2020 season and the prospect of playing another game on Thursday night, the Giants only used Barkley on half of their offensive plays in Week 1 (29 out of 58). He ended up touching the ball on 11 of those plays (10 rushing attempts and 1 reception) for just 27 total yards. He scored just 3.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (26 rushing yards, 1 reception, 1 receiving yard) and should have been nowhere near your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup in Week 1 despite his ADP of 11.8. If you’re wondering why Raheem Mostert isn’t the pick here after all of the hype during the week, it’s because he got injured early in the 49ers game. That’s why he only scored 2.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Injured players generally aren’t selected for this “award”.
A special dishonorable mention to both Trey Sermon and Zack Moss even though neither RB played in Week 1. That’s the problem as both of them were surprise inactives on Sunday. Hopefully Dynasty Owners were able to get them out of their lineups and avoid the zero points from them.
WR: Brandon Aiyuk (SF) – 0.2 points
Everybody who drafted Brandon Aiyuk in Dynasty Owner (ADP 57.6) likely didn’t think he’d score only 0.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (7 return yards) in a game that the 49ers scored 41 points. Instead of Aiyuk lining up at WR for the 49ers, it was Trent Sherfield (1 year/$920,000) who is rostered in only 3.6% of Dynasty Owner leagues who started in his place. If Dynasty Owners had known pre-game that Aiyuk wasn’t going to be playing much, they would have had time to pull him out of their Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and avoid his 0.2 point performance. There’s not much else to say other than Aiyuk should have been on your Practice Squad this week.
TE: Mike Gesicki (MIA) – 0.0 points
The dreaded Blutarsky, also known as 0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. It’s what no Dynasty Owner wants to see next to a player on their roster’s name. Especially not someone who was around the tenth TE off Dynasty Owner draft boards this year and usually taken in the eighth or ninth round (ADP 100.7). Those guys are supposed to be in your Starting lineup most weeks. Not this week for Gesicki, though. While Dolphins’ QB Tua Tagovailoa threw the ball 27 times this week, only four of those passes were targeted to TEs and just two were thrown Gesicki’s way. This is Gesicki’s first Blutarsky since October 18th of last year. Dynasty Owners with Gesicki on their roster should have left him on the Practice Squad this week.
K: Rodrigo Blankenship (IND) – 3.0 points
Blankenship didn’t have an awful day as he made both of his kicks in Week 1 (PAT and a 21 yard FG), it’s just that those kicks only gave him 3.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for the first week of the season. In fact, six kickers had fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points, including Michael Badgley of Tennessee who scored -2.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 out of 2 on PATs plus a missed 46 yard FG attempt). However, Badgley is only rostered in 47.9% of Dynasty Owner leagues after being released by the Chargers and signed to the Titans’ practice squad. In contrast, Blankenship was one of the first kickers drafted in 2021 Dynasty Owner startup drafts (ADP 163.0 to rank fourth), so Dynasty Owners with Blankenship on their rosters likely were using him as their Starter in Week 1. That was a mistake as he should have been on the Bench.
Dynasty Owner Match-up of the Week Recap – Barbee Kilgore vs. Dan’s Dynasty
In an incredible upset of epic proportions, Dan’s Dynasty defeated Barbee Kilgore by a score of 130.6 to 127.8. If you recall in the Week 1 preview article, Barbee Kilgore was favored to win by 37.5 points, but Dan’s Dynasty fought back and overtook Viktor on Monday night. Dan used high scoring performances from Kyler Murray (43.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Adam Thielen (30.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), plus 13.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points from their Starting kicker Daniel Carlson of the Las Vegas Raiders. It was Carlson’s 55-yard FG to tie the game in regulation that earned Dan’s Dynasty a 3-point clutch scoring bonus and the points that they needed to win the Match-up of the Week.
Nobody else in Dan’s Starting lineup had 20.0 or more points and he got just 3.6 points combined from his Starting RBs (Darrel Williams and Giovani Bernard).
Viktor was hurt by underperformances by Ben Roethlisberger, Davante Adams and Tyler Boyd plus the dreaded Blutarsky (0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) from three players on his Bench (Chris Evans, Russell Gage and Matt Ammendola). Weep not for Viktor as he’s in four Dynasty Owner leagues this season and went 2-2. He also has the Ring, won a trip to Canton, Ohio to visit the Pro Football Hall of Fame and met Tim, Paul and Seth. Despite the shocking loss, not a bad 2021 for Viktor.
Chase for the Ring Leaderboard
Congrats to Neezy453 from League #53959 who is the leader in the Chase for the Ring after the first week of the 2021 Dynasty Owner season. All you have to do is keep scoring more points than anyone else and win your Dynasty Owner league and the Ring is yours.
Similar to our 2020 winner Barbee Kilgore, this is the only Dynasty Owner league for Neezy453. Also similar is that Neezy453 has a stack of Patrick Mahomes (43.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Tyreek Hill (37.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Neezy453 also got good performances out of Joe Mixon (27.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), CeeDee Lamb (23.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Marquise Brown (19.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) in their Starting lineup and the Giants QB-WR stack of Daniel Jones (25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Sterling Shepard (24.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) plus Ty’Son Williams (18.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) on their Bench.
Will Neezy453 go wire-to-wire and win the Ring? Probably not and that’s no offense to the team, it’s just not easy to do. The Swamp Donkeys had a 35.5 point lead after Week 1 in 2020 and by Week 3, they weren’t even in the Top 10. They did go on to finish 11th overall last year, so Neezy453 might still finish in the Top 25, but don’t go finding out your ring size just yet.
If you aren’t in the Top 10 (or even Top 25), don’t be disheartened and start rebuilding. Our 2020 Ring winner Viktor didn’t crack the Top 10 until Week 8 when he suddenly showed up in 2nd place. There’s no reason to overreact based on one week of games.
Conclusions
We made it through the first week of the NFL and Dynasty Owner season. Every NFL team is on a pace to finish 17-0 or 0-17 and all Dynasty Owner teams are either projected to go 14-0 right now, or 0-14. Hopefully none of your teams got upset so they are on pace to go undefeated and you’re checking to see how far you are out of appearing on the Chase for the Ring leaderboard. Remember upsets happen in both the NFL and Dynasty Owner.
Dynasty Owner has plenty of other great content to help you win your League Championship and maybe the Chase for the Ring coming this week. Later today (Tuesday), Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl) is back with an article and video to help you figure out what players you need to target in the Free Agent Auction. Matt Morrison – The Jerk has an article and video dropping on Wednesday, then his Thursday Night Football preview on Thursday afternoon. Finally on Friday, I’m back with an article and video that will preview the Week 2 Sunday games. I’ll also have another Dynasty Owner Match-up of the Week and see how my Week 1 recommendations fared.
Please read all of our articles, watch our videos on YouTube or listen to them wherever you get your podcasts. Don’t forget follow all three of us plus Dynasty Owner on Twitter as well. Thanks, and have a great day!
Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner
Follow us on Twitter: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner