Looking Ahead; The Next 4.5 Weeks

So, believe it or not, Tim is not actually eliminated from playoff contention yet. I mean, it’s a real longshot, but he is technically still alive at 0-9. If he wins out, and scores huge, he could finish 5-9 and might be able to take some tie-breakers if he can really rack up the points. Not probable, but possible.

The flip side of that coin, Matt hasn’t actually clinched a playoff birth yet at 8-1. If he loses out, he’d finish 8-6, and there are enough teams that could still hit 8 wins and shove him down the standings. Again, not probable, but possible.

In all likelihood, Tim will miss out and Matt will be in, and the mystery lies in the 10 teams between. Should Trigger lose out, he’d be 7-7, and open the door to all the current 3-6 teams that could make a run. So of the teams in that grouping, who has the best shot to make a run? Who is mostly likely to hit a skid? All that and more, just ahead!

Easiest Remaining Schedules

KYLE – So no team has an easier-looking end run than The Tim Bradys, even though Kyle is playing Matt this week. After Week 10, Kyle’s remaining opponents are Mark, Kronner, and Tim – twice. That gives his opponents a .195 winning percentage and they have a combined scoring average of 1685 ppg. That’s shitty enough to make Kyle’s ppg average of 1746 look respectable. Additional good news for Team Brady is that not only are these games all winnable, but Kaiser and Kronner are two of the main teams he’s competing with for one of those low-seed playoff spots.

KAISER – The next easiest projected schedule belongs to the other 3-6 team. On the surface, it doesn’t look as forgiving as Kyle’s, with games coming up against Trigger and Jones, but Jon hasn’t been the luckiest of managers this year, and his other three games are against Timmy (this week) and Kyle, before ending the year against the mediocre Mallrats of Red Bank. That’s an opponent-winning percentage of .388 and an average ppg of 1812, matched against Mark’s own 1884 ppg.

TOUGHEST REMAINING SCHEDULE

JOSH – While there a couple of teams close, no one has quite as dreadful a slate of upcoming games as the Mattress Man himself. The 5-4, 6th place Sentinels face the 5th place (also 5-4) Buritto Warrior Revival this week, in a very evenly-matched contest and then run the gauntlet of Tigger, Matt, Jones, and Sanchez to close things out. Those are the four of the top five offenses in the league. And while Josh averages a respectable 1879 ppg, his opponents are at 1981. And much like Kyle’s chances skew in his favor even more after week 10, Josh’s do the reverse. If you take Ryan out of his, his Weeks 11-14 opponents average jumps to 2006 ppg. Oof.

RYAN & DAVE – Right behind Josh, are Craig Ryan and Dave, who are both facing opponent averages of 1945 and 1944 respectively. Dave’s opposition W% is a bit higher (.490 v .469), but the schedules are pretty on par statistically. They both play Steve, Chris, and Jones – who are all top four in scoring, and they also play each other. The change comes this week, as Dave is facing the 5-4 Mallrats, and Ryan the 5-4 Sentinels. Meaning the only reason Dave’s schedule is slightly harder – he has to face Ryan the same week that Ryan gets to play Dave. And Ryan’s pgg outranks Dave’s by about 105 points.

This is the chart including your Week 10 opponent, I’ll update the chart after this weekend.

MANAGER	W%	vs W%	PPG	vs PPG
Josh	0.556	0.592	1879.7	1981.3
Dave	0.444	0.490	1775.8	1945.4
Ryan	0.556	0.469	1880.7	1944.7
Chris	0.556	0.551	2090.0	1892.5
Trigger	0.778	0.408	1944.8	1891.5
Tim	0.000	0.490	1537.8	1884.6
Kronner	0.556	0.408	1778.3	1884.1
Steve	0.556	0.490	1925.0	1880.9
Jones	0.444	0.510	2053.2	1873.0
Matt	0.889	0.408	2102.8	1839.6
Mark	0.333	0.388	1884.1	1812.0
Kyle	0.333	0.327	1745.8	1768.2

Next week we should have a slightly clearer playoff picture as Matt could possibly clinch, especially since teams 2-9 are all playing each other, so 4 of them are about to lose a game. At that point we can start going through preliminary scenarios and playoff odds.