Time to Write (About Anything)

Six returning members and two newcomers look to start the 2025 fantasy football season off with a bang to capture the league championship. And it all starts with the draft.

Another fantasy draft is in the books and another year where any mock draft you might run and any strategy you might have developed gets thrown right out the window. Last year’s draft surprised with CeeDee Lamb and Amon-Ra St. Brown going one-two with McCaffrey falling to number three.  In hindsight, this turned out to be a good decision, sorry Nick. Additionally, we didn’t see a QB drafted until the third round in 2024, and it was Jordan Love!? This broke the seal and was followed by Hurts, Mahomes, and Allen being drafted in the fourth round.

Where 2024 saw rounds one and two dominated by RBs and WRs, 2025 was all about QBs in the Philly Special league.  Jacque’s Lion Den made a shocking decision to jump way down the draft board and use the number one overall pick on Josh Allen!  Round one also saw Jackson and Hurts go at six and seven overall followed by Burrow, Daniels, and Mahomes at 9, 14, and 15 – is it 2025 or 2023 up in here? More than any previous year of fantasy drafting, team owners showed why mock drafts are mostly a waste of time in this league as none of the top four QBs were drafted by anyone earlier than round four in ANY of the mock drafts I ran! And I ran a lot… too many, let’s just not talk about that anymore.  Early QBs continued into rounds five and six, where owners again jumped way down the draft board to get Goff, Nix, and Mayfield! Stroud and Murray went in eight and Mayfield in nine. In fact, by round eleven every team had drafted both a starting and backup QB before I drafted (got stuck with?) Herbert as my QB1.

I wasn’t sure how to ride the chaos of this year’s draft as it was happening. I wasn’t sure what to do as my roster was looking nothing like any I had prepared before tonight! I certainly waited too long to draft a QB. But I felt better after getting the draft recap from ESPN:

Good job by Uncle Cunningham on his first draft with the league. I know your dad didn’t help you or that might have brought your grade down! I can’t wait to see how far Hurts Donut and Uncle Cunningham can ride that stellar draft performance. Jawns, despite no preparation and not really knowing what was happening (think boomer with technology) turned in a respectable draft performance. Will we have a new last place finisher in the Philly Special League this year? The reigning (can’t believe I have to type this) back-to-back league champ put in a mediocre draft performance (I guess C is passing). Jacque’s Lion Den earned the lowest grade of the draft with some questionable picks. In all my years of playing fantasy football, I’ve never seen a team draft two defenses and two kickers. Even though the Lion Den beat my Fat Batman team last year in week one on the strength of 19 points by the Dallas D/ST and 21 points by Brandon Aubrey, two of each might be overkill.

The decisions made in round one had significant impact on how the remainder of the draft fell out.  Allen, Jackson, and Hurts are going to need to put up consistently high numbers to justify the decision to draft them 3-4 rounds too early and those owners will have to hope for enough points from the rest of their position players after missing out on the skilled WRs and RBs they passed up.  Uncle Cunningham gave us back some normalcy by drafting Chase third overall. That’s not to say Jawns made a bad decision by drafting Barkley at number two, but I would have taken Chase over Barkley. In fact, I went into this draft knowing that one of the Eagles fans ahead of me was taking Saquon and I had no shot of getting him this year. Jefferson selected by FFF and Gibbs by OKC also were solid round one picks that I thought put us back on track.

Then… Burrow?  Yes, Burrow was drafted to start round two. The next four picks of Lamb, Brown, and Jeanty tracked with expectations but I am still shocked that St. Brown fell to me in round two at pick 13. I had wondered who would take a chance on McCaffrey this year after he destroyed the Krakhawkiners season in 2024, sorry Nick. Will he help the Lion Den make it to the playoffs or will he make Jacque question all of her draft choices for the next five months? Time will tell.

Rounds three and four – oh thank goodness no QBs drafted. I had planned on taking Bowers in round three, and even though there were other players ranked ahead of him, I chose to stick with my plan for stability at TE. Derrick Henry at pick 21 was a steal by FFF, making Jeanty and Henry a dangerous RB duo for his team. However, I can sleep well knowing we didn’t allow Henry and Barkley to go to the same team again this year. Way to ride them to a .500 record Cheeseheads!

Rounds seven through ten saw more jumping down to grab up those QBs, while I decided to keep drafting WRs and RBs. I knew if I didn’t get one of the big four (Hurts, Daniels, Jackson, Allen) in round four, I was going to wait until at least rounds eight or nine, but by then all the QBs I had on my board were long gone. Round ten also saw the first kicker to be drafted – way too early, followed by two more in round 11. Then the Defense/Special Teams started going in round 12 – way too early. I don’t think Philly’s defense is going to be that good for anyone’s fantasy team, Juliano Joneses.

Week one is going to show us a lot and has some fun matchups to start the season. In a rematch of the title game, Hurts Donut plays against their (my) playoff nemesis, the Juliano Joneses. Joneses have an edge at QB, big surprise, while I have the edge just about everywhere else. Newcomer FFF faces off against last year’s last place Jawns who look to rebound. Very close matchup on paper right now and too close to call. Cheeseheads clash with OKC, both looking to improve on last year’s disappointing finishes. Cheeseheads have the edge at QB and WR while OKC have the better RB room. Lastly, Lion Den will welcome our second expansion team to the league, Uncle Cunningham. Jacque’s Lion Den look to start off the season strong yet again but also hope to keep that momentum going through the playoffs after a disappointing exit last year while Uncle Cunningham look to make their presence known to the league after a successful first year draft.

What is your preferred draft strategy? What would you have done differently?

Welcome to the 2025 Philly Special League season!

If I lose to Juliano Joneses in the playoffs again this year, I’m shutting down the league.