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By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)
It only took until Week 8 before the final NFL team (Arizona Cardinals) dropped from the ranks of the undefeated. Arizona was the only undefeated team for three weeks. Heading into Week 4, there were five undefeated teams (Arizona, Carolina, Denver, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles Rams), but four of them lost to go 3-1. Once Arizona lost, the only undefeated team in NFL history (the 1972 Miami Dolphins) got to do their traditional champagne pop for the year.
Even though Arizona was the last undefeated team in the NFL, it doesn’t make them the favorites to win the Super Bowl. The last team to win the Super Bowl and be the final team to lose their undefeated season were the Indianapolis Colts back in 2006. Since then, six other teams have made it to the Super Bowl but lost after being the final undefeated team of the season.
In Dynasty Owner, our first Chase for the Ring winner in 2019 (New York’s Strongest) went undefeated, but they remain the only undefeated team in Dynasty Owner history. The 2020 Ring winner (Barbee Kilgore) lost their first game in Week 5. They followed that up with another loss in Week 6 and even suffered a third loss in the regular season.
Last year, there were four undefeated teams (Here for the beers in League #28289, Baby Got Dak in League #34661, Backstage Bums in League #36362 and My Corona in League #30539) heading into Week 10 and all four of them ended up losing.
We are in a similar spot right now as Dynasty Owner has five undefeated teams. By winning their first ten games, all five have gone undefeated longer than anyone did last year. The five undefeated teams are:
| Team Name | League | Chase Position |
| DynastyTradeSchool (Mad Minshew) | 27458 | 3rd |
| Thee Camel Toe Jockey | 66645 | 4th |
| Detroit’s Finest | 74733 | 10th |
| Miami Crypt Keepers | 59074 | 44th |
| The HipHopOpatomus | 70068 | 110th |
Do these five teams have anything (besides being undefeated) in common? Not surprisingly, all of them are favored to win their match-ups this week by margins ranging from just 3.13 points to almost 80 points (78.84). All of them have also appeared in the Top 10 of the Chase for the Ring at some point during this season, even if they aren’t there now. None of them have a full compliment of 30 players on their roster right now either.
There are some differences as well. By looking at the league numbers, we can see that four of the teams drafted this season with only DynastyTradeSchool (Mad Minshew) being a second year team. They won their league in 2020 and finished sixth in the Chase for the Ring. In addition, four teams are in cash leagues, two can also pocket $300 while two other ones will earn themselves $600 if they can win their League.
In terms of players, I expected that all five teams would share a player (or two) in common and was correct in that assumption, but incorrect on the particular player. Because Cooper Kupp is so far ahead of his competition at WR (48.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points ahead of Tyreek Hill), I speculated that all five teams likely had him on their roster. However, only three of them do. There is only one top player who is on all of the undefeated teams right now.
The top player that all five teams share is Travis Kelce. That’s right, the same Travis Kelce who was one of the most drafted players by 2020 Dynasty Owner league winners according to an off-season analysis that I did. Kelce was drafted by 20% of 2020 league winners, tied with Alvin Kamara, and behind only Jonnu Smith who was drafted by 21.1%.
The only remaining questions are:
- Can any of these teams stay undefeated for the rest of the Dynasty Owner regular season?
- How many will win their League title?
- Will one of them win the Chase for the Ring?
We’ll see what happens over the next seven weeks. That’s right, it’s Week 11 of the 14-game Dynasty Owner regular season and there are only seven weeks left (four regular season weeks and the three week playoffs). Only seven more weeks left for me to give Dynasty Owners a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) to have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. Only seven more weeks for me to name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad.
In keeping with this week’s theme, one of the five undefeated teams will be featured in our Match-up of the Week. Keep reading and find out which team it is. Don’t forget that suggestions are welcomed for the remaining Match-ups of the Week. If you want your team or a team in your League to appear in the future, then send me a tweet (@SteveVT33).
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.
For the purposes of this article, ADP and Dynasty Owner rostered percentage statistics were current as of the morning of November 19th.
These Guys Should be Starters This Week
First, let’s look at how my Week 10 recommendations fared (Good, Bad or Just Ok). I predicted performances worthy of being in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup for these four players last week. I’ve yet to have an “undefeated” perfect week with four Good recommendation, or even a week without at least one Bad recommendation. Let’s see if that changed.
QB: Teddy Bridgewater – 11.3 (Bad recommendation)
RB: Devin Singletary – 10.9 (Just Ok recommendation)
WR: Marvin Jones – 5.5 (Bad recommendation)
TE: Tyler Conklin – 16.1 (Good recommendation)
It did not. My TE recommendations continue to be the best of the bunch as while Tyler Conklin was held to only three receptions for 11 yards, he had two TDs. That makes five Good Starting TE recommendations on the season. At the opposite end of the spectrum, I nearly had my first Good RB recommendation as Devin Singletary was on the edge of being a RB2 for the week, so that recommendation was Just Ok. Neither Teddy Bridgewater nor Marvin Jones came through and both of those recommendations were Bad. I’m going to try and have my first “undefeated” week by naming the following four players as ones who should be in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup this week.
Ryan Tannehill (QB – TEN): Over his past two seasons with Tennessee, Ryan Tannehill has averaged 32.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against Houston, which is higher than his overall average of 28.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. He has thrown for nine TDs and run for three more against them in those four games. That’s an average of three TDs per game. The Titans are on a roll coming into this week’s game against the Texans having won six games in a row, even as Tannehill has averaged only 20.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. Overall, Tannehill is QB15 for the season scoring an average of 20.55 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game with a low game of 14.1 points in Week 6 against Buffalo. All of that makes him a solid Bench QB. However, with Derrick Henry still missing from the Titans’ lineup, Tannehill is going to have to pass more to the 11 players who caught a pass for Tennessee last week against New Orleans. Because of his history against Houston, Tannehill should do well, score more points than average, be a Top 12 QB this week and worthy of a spot in your Starting lineup.
Jeffery Wilson (RB – SF): With Elijah Mitchell doubtful to play this week, it’s time for another RB to take charge of the San Francisco backfield. Although he just got back off Injured Reserve last week and only scored 2.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (28 rushing yards), it appears that Jeffery Wilson is the next man up. Wilson played in 12 games for the 49ers in 2020 and finished as RB31 with 144.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (12.0 points per game). However, when given the chance to be the featured RB and get more than 15 touches, he did really well with four games of more than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. While Jacksonville is a middle of the pack defense against RBs, they have allowed double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points to eight different RBs, including 26.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to Jonathan Taylor last week. While Wilson isn’t quite on Taylor’s level, the 49ers have been an above average rushing team with two rookies (Elijah Mitchell and Trey Sermon) leading the way. Even in only his second game of the year, Wilson should be worth having in your Starting lineup in Week 11.
Keelan Cole (WR – NYJ): While undefeated DynastyTradeSchool (Mad Minshew) owner Rudy Valentine believes that Cole will catch a TD pass from Joe Flacco, I don’t have the same confidence. However, I wanted to put this here in case it happens to give Rudy his props for believing in this and wagering $5 million Dynasty Dollars on Keelan Cole and Joe Flacco. The best of all possible worlds is that Cole gets the TD, but only has one or two catches plus 12 receiving yards, so he falls short of 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup. That way, Rudy will be correct and so will I for not listing Cole here. We shall see what happens!
Rashod Bateman (WR – BAL): My choice for this spot is really Rashod Bateman. Bateman missed the first five games of his rookie season with a groin injury. Dynasty Owners may have missed this injury with all of the injuries to Baltimore RBs in the pre-season, but it happened, he had surgery, was on Injured Reserve and is now back. He did miss practice on Thursday but was back on Friday, so hopefully he’s good to go on Sunday against the Bears. In the four games that Bateman has played this season, he has scored 42.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (10.5 points per game) without a TD. He is being targeted an average of seven times per game. The Bears did well against the Steelers’ WRs two weeks ago before their bye week, but allowed plenty of Dynasty Owner fantasy points in the two previous weeks to Deebo Samuel (23.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), Chris Godwin (25.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Mike Evans (31.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). While Bateman is probably not as good as those three WRs, he’s good enough to keep up his current pace and probably exceed it, so he should be good to add to your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup.
Adam Trautman (TE – NO): Trautman might be one of the few people who would prefer New Orleans stick with Trevor Siemian at QB instead of changing to Taysom Hill. That’s because in the two games Siemian has started at QB, Trautman has probably had the best two game stretch of his short NFL career with 9 receptions for 79 receiving yards (16.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). He had only 18.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in the first seven games of the season (2.6 points per game) with 11 receptions for 104 receiving yards and a lost fumble. He has only needed a TD to be a Top 12 TE in each of the past two weeks. Good for him that the Saints are travelling to Philadelphia this week to play the Eagles who are the worst team in the NFL at stopping TEs. The Eagles are allowing the most receptions per game to TEs (7.5), the most yards per game (73.3) and have given up the most TD receptions as well (8). Over the past five games, eight different TEs have scored 10.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points when facing the Eagles defense and only two of them (T.J. Hockenson and Noah Fant) are ranked in the Top 12 TEs in Dynasty Owner. He’s been a disappointment for his Dynasty Owners so far this season, but they should look past that and put Trautman in their Starting lineup.
These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week
After a perfect Week 1 with four Good Bench recommendations, my Bench recommendations have been up and down. Usually, they are better than the Starting lineup recommendations, so let’s find out if that was true in Week 10.
QB: Aaron Rodgers – 11.4 (Good recommendation)
RB: Antonio Gibson – 21.8 (Bad recommendation)
WR: Courtland Sutton – 4.9 (Good recommendation)
TE: Zach Ertz – 8.6 (Just Ok recommendation)
While Aaron Rodgers had a better game than the other QB in his game (Russell Wilson), he still didn’t score enough Dynasty Owner fantasy points to be worthy of a spot in your Starting lineup, so that recommendation was Good. The recommendation to Bench Courtland Sutton was also a Good one. Zach Ertz was TE13 for the week, so technically he shouldn’t have been in your Starting lineup, but it’s so close that I have to call that recommendation Just Ok. Finally, Antonio Gibson had a very solid game with 21.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. He helped me win a non-Dynasty Owner league game (Alvin Kamara and Damien Harris were both out injured so I had little choice), so I’m not too unhappy that he ended up being a Bad recommendation. Since 11 is just two 1s, maybe I can duplicate my Week 1 predictions with these four players to leave on your Dynasty Owner Bench.
Kirk Cousins (QB – MIN): Cousins is the QB9 through Week 10 with four games of 30.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points. However, three of those games came in the first three weeks of the season when he scored an average of 32.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. Since then, he has scored less than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in three games and averaged 23.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. This week, Cousins gets to face the Green Bay Packers and except for his first year in Minnesota back in 2018, he hasn’t played very well in a Vikings uniform against Green Bay. Over the past two years, he is averaging only 14.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game against them. In the past two games this season, the Green Bay defense has allowed just seven points in total. Patrick Mahomes only scored 14.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against them two weeks ago and they held Russell Wilson to a career low 5.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week. I think the Packers defense plays well for the third week in a row and holds down the Minnesota offense and Cousins. Keep Cousins on your Dynasty Owner Bench.
J.D. McKissic (RB – WAS): The Carolina-Washington game this week is unlikely to turn into a shootout with the over/under currently sitting at 43 points. In games in which the Football Team’s opponents scores over 24 points, McKissic is averaging 11.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. In games in which their opponents score 24 or fewer points, his average drops to 9.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. Carolina is averaging only 20.5 points per game and has scored 24 or fewer points in six out of ten games. A close game likely means less passing by Washington and McKissic scores 80% of his Dynasty Owner fantasy points from receiving (79.7 out of 99.3 points). In addition, Carolina has only allowed RBs to catch 36 passes for 244 receiving yards and 1 receiving TD in ten games. That’s the fewest receptions and receiving yards on a per game basis in the NFL. Since it’s likely to be a low-scoring game, McKissic doesn’t run the ball much and Carolina is so good at stopping RBs from making an impact in the passing game, it’s hard to see how he gets many Dynasty Owner fantasy points this week. Leave him on your Bench.
D.J. Moore (WR – CAR): For the entire 2021 season, D.J. Moore is the WR14 and has scored 146.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (14.6 points per game). However, it’s really been two separate seasons for Moore as he had 89.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in the first four weeks (22.5 points per game) and just 56.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in the last six weeks (9.4 points per game). Carolina QB Sam Darnold played well in the first four games, then not so good after that until he got hurt, followed by P.J. Walker (plus a little bit of Cam Newton) for one week. Now, Cam will be the Panthers QB in Week 11 and that’s bad news for Moore’s Dynasty Owners. In 2020, Cam played 15 games for New England. In those 15 games, he had only 8 TD passes, 11 games in which he completed less than 20 passes, 10 games with less than 200 yards passing and four with less than 100 yards passing. While it’s true that Moore is better than any of the New England receivers last year, it won’t matter much if Cam doesn’t throw the football better than he did last year. For all of the great things he did for Carolina last week, he was still just 3 out of 4 passing for 8 yards and a TD. Cam actually had more rushing yards than passing yards (14 rushing vs. 8 passing). I know that this prediction isn’t going to go over well with Tim, the President of the D.J. Moore Fan Club, but I’m going to say it anyway. Leave D.J. Moore on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week.
T.J. Hockenson (TE – DET): Tim Boyle is scheduled to be the Detroit Lions starting QB this week. Boyle is in his fourth season in the NFL and has thrown only four career passes (completing three for 15 yards). While Hockenson is TE7 for the Dynasty Owner season, he is not immune to bad games. He’s had three of them so far this season (3.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against Baltimore in Week 3, 4.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against Minnesota in Week 5 and 0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against Pittsburgh in Week 10). Minnesota and Pittsburgh are ranked around the same place as Cleveland in fantasy points allowed to TEs and with Boyle at QB and coming off thumb surgery, I don’t expect Hockenson to do well at all. It’s not Hockenson’s fault, but unless Boyle turns into Week 8 Mike White 2.0, he’ll struggle so put Hockenson on your Bench.
Dynasty Owner Match-up of the Week – Detroit’s Finest vs. Maple Bandits
For our eleventh Dynasty Owner Match-up of the Week, we have one of the few undefeated teams left in Dynasty Owner. It’s Detroit’s Finest, the tenth place team in the Chase for the Ring, facing off against Maple Bandits in League #74733, also known as the Dynasty Dorks Pros vs. Joes (Lobos FF Den) league. While Detroit’s Finest is undefeated, Maple Bandits aren’t far behind with an 8-2 record that has them sitting in second place in the League. However, they have been fairly fortunate to be in that position as they are sixth in total points scored in their League.
Even though Detroit’s Finest are projected to score a few points less than their season-long average, they are still a 24.5 point favorite. With the Rams on bye, Detroit’s Finest is missing both Matthew Stafford and Cooper Kupp, leaving them with Baker Mayfield as their Starting QB and newly picked up Cam Newton as their Bench QB. Detroit’s Finest is really trying to stay undefeated and win the Ring as they dropped six players to pick up Newton. Ironically, they will be rooting for Baker against the winless Detroit Lions this week. The loss of Kupp is easier for Detroit’s Finest to deal with as they have Justin Jefferson and D.J. Moore as their Starting WRs plus Marquise Brown in their FLEX position. Of course, they have Travis Kelce at TE, as all of our current undefeated teams do.
Maple Bandits will need to lean on the combination of Patrick Mahomes and Christian McCaffrey to have a chance to win as none of the remaining players in their Starting lineup are projected to score more than the players in Detroit’s Finest Starting lineup. If they can somehow pull of the upset, Maple Bandits will clinch a playoff berth as the sixth place team in their league is currently 5-5 so nine wins will be enough to make it.
Conclusion
Detroit’s Finest are the clear favorite to stay undefeated as are four out of the five undefeated teams. However, having multiple undefeated teams lose at once is not unprecedented. With some of the lopsided match-ups, it’s unlikely to happen this year, but I’m sure there was an upset or two (or maybe four) last year.
That doesn’t their Chase for the Ring and League Championship dreams are over. Viktor lost two games in a row last year and three overall, but still won the Ring. One of the last undefeated team in 2020 was My Corona (League #30539) who was in tenth place in the Chase for the Ring before falling to The Fresh Prince of Helaire by an extremely close score of 144.34 to 142.95 in Week 10. Ironically, they moved up in the Chase for the Ring standings into sixth place after the loss.
Maybe one of these final five undefeated teams will stay undefeated for the entire regular season. More importantly, maybe they win the Chase for the Ring. It’s possible that one of them could do both.
Please read my weekly preview article each and every week to see who should be in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and who should be on your Bench. While some Dynasty Owners may heed my advice, others might disagree, or not have a better option for their Starting lineup and choose to ignore a Bench recommendation. Other Dynasty Owners may not need Starting lineup help as they have a stud player at a position who isn’t moving to the Bench unless he’s injured or on bye. Hopefully, the choices for your Starting lineup and Bench are solid, your team wins its game and doesn’t suffer any injuries, and you stay in contention for the playoffs and even the Chase for the Ring.
In addition to this weekly preview article, Dynasty Owner has plenty of other great content to help you go undefeated for the rest of the season so your team can win your League Championship and maybe the Chase for the Ring. On Monday, Jay Pounds will preview the Monday Night Football matchup from the Dynasty Owner perspective. Tuesday has a double shot of Dynasty Owner content with my Week 11 recap article and Jay’s Free Agent Auction targets article and video. Wednesdays is when Matt Morrison – The Jerk will dive into a topic of his choosing with an article and a video. Currently, he is doing a series about Opportunities by position. Because of Thanksgiving, he’ll have an article previewing the three Thanksgiving Day games earlier than normal that will start Week 12 of the Dynasty Owner regular season and give everyone something to read before Thanksgiving dinner.
Don’t forget about the weekly Dynasty Owner livestream on Wednesday with myself, Tim Peffer, and Dr. Cousin Justin. If there is a particular injured player who you are interested in learning more about during the livestream, drop me a line on Twitter (@SteveVT33) and I’ll put it on the list for Cousin Justin to research. Set the timer on YouTube so you don’t miss it live, or make sure to watch it afterwards. Either way, don’t forget to smash the Like button.
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 the Dynasty Owner team of writers 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