This article is part of our NFL Observations series.
Be forewarned: My Week 13 columns are likely to be shaped by hubris and epistemic overreach. That's because Week 12 was one of my best ever.
For starters, I went 10-3 ATS, and my two best bets, the Seahawks and Titans, covered easily. My best NFFC squad has 167 points and is in 24th place out of 3,204, pending Mark Andrews and Justin Tucker tonight.
I have a chance to go 5-0 in fantasy overall (each team individually is a favorite), but perhaps the best outcome was my 14-team superflex league where I had Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Hunter Henry on bye, and Matthew Stafford and Juju Smith-Schuster injured. I was 6-5 and barely hanging onto the sixth seed.
I made the call to leave Smith-Schuster in my lineup rather than dropping him for the thin gruel on the waiver wire, taking the zero up front. I also got a zero from rental TE Cameron Brate. My only QB was Ryan Fitzpatrick, and my opponent had both his usual QBs going and already gotten 21 points from Will Fuller on Thursday night, while I had 2.8 from Duke Johnson.
But Fitzpatrick balled out. And though the Titans were up 28-3, A.J. Brown (picked up this week), caught a 65-yard TD pass. My opponent's QBs happened to be Derek Carr and Dak Prescott. Barring a miracle for him -- he's down 70 with Brandin Cooks and Willie Snead -- I'll be 7-5, and getting all my Chiefs back (including Mecole Hardman who could be big if Tyreek Hill misses time.)
Normally, I complain in this space about what went wrong, and I'm still expecting to wake up from this dream on Sunday morning. But assuming this is real, it doesn't get much better. The one game that turned on me was the Cowboys-Patriots -- cowardly Jason Garrett settled for the covering FG to seal the loss -- but that's okay. It reminds me of a parable about a Buddhist monk who raked all the leaves in his garden, and when he was done, pushed a few messily back onto the path.
• What a dominant performance by the 49ers in every phase. They're the best team in the NFL -- at least as of Week 12. George Kittle is a faster version of peak Rob Gronkowski. Whether he's the greatest TE of all time will depend mostly on health.
• Still waiting for retractions from the Packers mob that descended when I said Davante Adams was a mediocre talent for a first-round fantasy pick. Luckily for me, he scored his first TD of the year in Week 12, but 12 targets for 43 yards is light centuries away from the league's dynamic talents. The Packers are a good team, but Aaron Jones is the only offensive skill player capable of a big play, and unless you're the 2000 Ravens it's not enough.
• The Patriots can't run the table with this style, can they? The Cowboys coached by Garrett are one thing, but they'll need more against the Ravens and whoever makes it out of the NFC.
• I saw a rumor the Giants might hire Garrett in 2020 should Jerry Jones fire his yes-man, and the Giants part ways with Pat Shurmur. I'm dubious in part because Ian Rapoport so often reports empty click bait, but also because neither coach is certain to lose his job. But it makes me ever-so-slightly nervous because John Mara and the Giants front office is dumb enough to do it. And Mara (who was pushing a moldy Eli five years beyond his consume-by date) is a sucker for the "class act" type.
• Garrett's FG to cut the lead to four with six minutes left on 4th-and-7 from the 12 was bad, but even worse, the Cowboys played the series like it was three-down territory all the way, throwing it on second and third downs and not trying to set up a 4th and short. It was especially bad given how strong the Patriots are at pass defense and how good the Dallas run game is.
Moreover, the Cowboys had trouble moving the ball all day, especially through the air. The odds they'd get back to that area of the field again, let alone get into the end zone quickly against that pass defense were long. As usual Garrett was playing to postpone the loss, while his counterpart was playing to win.
• What if Ryan Tannehill was always good, but just playing in a terrible situation the first seven years of his career? It looks like he's more than a stopgap right now, both in fantasy and for the Titans.
• Derrick Henry is such a monster. On his 74-yard TD run, he shoved the DB out of the way like he was swatting a gnat.
• The other miracle (assuming I get there tonight) was Leonard Fournette, who had only one TD all year heading into Week 12 and saw his team down 35-3. Somehow he scored twice on the ground and caught nine passes, giving me a chance in my other NFFC league.
• Nick Foles is okay, but he's not the future, so the Jaguars might want to let Gardner Minshew have a final audition down the stretch.
• Apparently it was Chris Godwin day again in Tampa. For some reason Jameis Winston gives all the production to one or the other and rarely shares between them in a given game. It doesn't matter to me because in the only league I have either, I have both. Godwin's on pace for 102 catches, 1,558 receiving yards and 13 TDs, Evans: 90-1,517-10.
• So much for the Falcons new defense.
• It was sad to see Frank Gore pass an actual great (Barry Sanders) on the all-time rushing list. Nothing against Gore, he belongs in the Hall of the Very Good And Surprisingly Durable. And no doubt he's already been elected to the Hall of the Class Act, along with Manning and Garrett. But he's to Sanders what Davante Adams is to Sterling Sharpe.
• The QB Josh Allen reminds me most of is Cam Newton. Great runner with a more bruising style than other QBs and steals a lot of TDs from his running backs.
• John Brown finally failed to crack 50 receiving yards 12 weeks into the year.
• Daniel Jones had a tough game in Chicago, but the TD throw on 4th and 18 was an amazing play that got them the cover too. A perfect outcome, as the Giants are currently in line for the No. 2 pick.
• Saquon Barkley looked healthy to me, though he went out of bounds to avoid contact a couple times and dropped an easy catch with lots of green in front of him.
• Darius Slayton looks like the team's No. 1 receiver for 2020.
• Piling on Mitchell Trusbisky is as useful at this point as piling on the Redskins QB. Both are Haskins cases.
• Speaking of which, I didn't watch much of Redskins-Lions, but I was informed Haskins missed Terry McLaurin twice for easy scores. Given I have McLaurin everywhere, I'm not planning to go back and watch.
• Myles Garrett should have gloat-tweeted when Mason Rudolph got benched.
• The Bengals offense isn't any better, but somehow Joe Mixon's been decent the last few weeks. He made an incredible run when he was dead to rights five yards behind the line and turned it into a positive gain.
• No doubt Kallen Ballage has the goods on someone in the Dolphins organization. Otherwise, he'd have been cut weeks ago.
• Nick Chubb had an encouraging game. It's not the TD -- against Miami that was expected -- or the 20 carries, but the three catches for 58 yards. Kareem Hunt vultured a TD and saw his season-high in carries (eight), but Chubb can still be a monster if he stays relevant in the passing game.
• Baker Mayfield had a great first half, looked en route to a monster game, but did nothing the last 30 minutes. You can only expect so much from a Freddie Kitchens team.
• Christian McCaffrey had only 64 yards rushing, but had a ton of opportunities inside the five, scored twice and had nine more catches. There's nothing left to say.
• As long as Michael Thomas is healthy, no way the Saints won't get him the all-time receptions record.
• Joey Slye extinguished any remote hope the Panthers had of making the playoffs.
• As a Giants fan, I shudder to think, what if Sam Darnold is actually good?
• The Raiders showed up flat to an early body-clock east-coast game. I wouldn't read too much into it.
• Carson Wentz has been missing his best receivers for most of the year, but he's not doing the Eagles any favors, missing easy throws and turning the ball over. How the Seahawks were actually getting points in that game boggles my mind.
• Russell Wilson missed a wide open TD to Jacob Hollister, a rare gaffe for a top-five all-time QB. The Seahawks still won easily, Wilson got 8.0 YPA and could have had more had D.K. Metcalf held onto a couple deep throws.
