The only difference between the right call and the wrong one is whether it worked or not. It sounds obvious, but it's also one of the maddening things about fantasy football. You can pour over data all week, seek advice from multiple sources, trust your gut, and still start the wrong guy. You can also pay no attention to the matchups, use old information, make a silly decision and have it pay off. The latter is always a genius and the former is always a fool. And we have plenty of chances to be both every weekend.
It's not just us, of course. Ron Rivera went for two at the end of Washington's epic battle against New York in the NFC East, and it didn't pay off. So the Giants won, leaving both teams in the hunt for the illustrious division crown at 1-5.
Had they made it, Washington would not only have emerged as a division juggernaut at 2-4, but Rivera would have been praised for his bold coaching. Instead, they're the only team the Giants have beaten. Houston's Romeo Crennel also went for two in their contest, and success would have basically put the game away for the Texans. But they failed, and Tennessee eventually got the tying touchdown and extra point before winning in overtime. Another big risk with no reward for a hard-luck team.
We can debate whether they were good decisions or not, but fate has already weighed in. They were bad calls because they didn't work. The casual fan won't dissect the mechanics behind each decision. The ends either justify the means, or they indict them. And we do the same thing in our game.
If you started Julio Jones this past weekend, congratulations. You're a genius. If you sat him for an inferior option, you're a moron. That's what the numbers show, anyway. But is that the whole story? Shouldn't we include Jones' injury history, the winless Falcons, their other options and his barely-there practices? Who could fault you for sitting him for another receiver?
And suppose that receiver was someone like Laviska Shenault? He only out-gained you (not your team, you personally) by 10 yards. So that was a dumb start, right? Well, not when you look at his opponent, his recent trend as a playmaker and DJ Chark's injury. You'd expect that he'd be pretty involved in the passing game. More than, say, Keelan Cole, whose last 100-yard game was back in September. That's September of 2018 (when Shenault was still a teenager).
But that's not how it turned out. Shenault was a bust and Jones was a beast. And since we're judged on points, it's crystal clear when we've made a bad decision, right?
No. That's not true at all. You might have made the wrong decision, but that doesn't make it a bad decision. Sometimes you can make a well-informed choice that simply doesn't pan out. A player gets hurt, gets vultured out of a couple scores, gets written out of the gameplan or gets in the doghouse for some reason. Who knows?
The point is, you can't second-guess yourself. We're almost halfway through the fantasy regular season. Some decisions won't work out even when they make sense, and others will work out even when they shouldn't. Many times it doesn't matter; we would have won or lost anyway. But when it does affect an outcome, we notice it more when our margins for error shrink. If you're in danger of slipping out of contention already, you might really feel the weight of each decision, which can then affect those decisions. And when it feels like you always make the wrong ones, it can be even more frustrating.
That's also not true, by the way. We just tend to remember the wrong calls more than the right ones. "If only" is the easiest way to obsess over a loss, and a loss like that can be the difference between making the postseason and having nothing to do in week 15.
But the truth is that we make those calls every week of every season we play. Many of them go our way, and set us up for the close calls that we imagine determined our season. Some will go against us, even if we do everything right. Don't let it ruin the fun of the game. And definitely don't let it affect the next week, or the week after. Win enough of the remaining games, and one decision won't matter, anyway. Or lose enough and a great decision won't matter. That's how unimportant it really is.
You're not snakebit. You're not cursed. You're not destined for failure (I'm assuming your last name isn't Gase). All you can do is prepare and make an informed decision. You don't control what your opponent does. You can't control the outcomes of the games. You don't even control your own players. You can only control how you approach the game, and how you deal with things not working out. When it feels like you're doing everything wrong, think about how many things you get right in a game, or a draft, or a season. After all, you can't choose the "wrong" guy unless you put two starter-worthy players on your team in the first place.
Don't lose focus at this stretch of the season. If a decision doesn't go your way, act like a goalie in the NHL: Grab your water bottle, shake it off and get back in the game. There's a lot more time in the period, and you'll have plenty of decisions to get right in the future. Good luck this week.
How do you deal with making the wrong call between players? Do you tend to make the right decision? What's your normal process in deciding? Share your thoughts below.