HELLO EVERYONE, and welcome back for another week of Unpacking the NFL. If you are new here, I will be posting a stat/takeaway dump every Monday, unpacking different players and situations around the league. This article was inspired by JJ Zachariason's Monday Dumps on BlueSky, so shout out to him and make sure to check him

Welcome to the AFC North version of Optimus Fantasy's Team Previews! Today, we're looking at the Baltimore Ravens. In order to best know where we're going, we often need to study where we've been. With that in mind, I will cover what the team looked like in 2024, fantasy significant changes to philosophy and personnel,

Get ready to dominate with this fantasy football best ball stacking strategy guide, here to lead you to optimal roster construction, from Kacey Kasem. Best ball = chef's kiss. You get to draft a team, close your laptop, and (hopefully) win some money. It's fantasy football without the weekly lineup stress. No start/sit decisions, no

I know, I know, I hear it too. "Even for dynasty, drafts before the NFL draft are bonkers," right? You're so super valid with that thought. So why do we do this?

First off, it provides us with feedback. Did you know that dynasty start-up drafts and redraft drafts are remarkably similar? What better way to get a leg up on redraft season than to do a dynasty startup with a bunch of friends? You get to hang out with and start talking some crap to friends, you get to see how other people value specific players, and you get to know who you like a bit more or less than everyone else. This brings us to our second point; it allows us to plan.

Sometimes, life is stressful. It isn't always tailgating parties and Daisy Dukes like Morgan Wallen sings about. Most of the time, going through a day makes me realize a lot of music is just pandering bull crap. It feels more like Hank Williams Sr. and his crushing, heartache-laced blues. Bills are piling up, and my

“Dirty Ernie” finally kicked the bucket. Ernest Hubbard was my mom’s dad and had one hell of a biography to tell. Ernie lived to the ripe age of 87 and filled those years from Shawnee, Oklahoma, to Northern California with every story and trinket imaginable.  He was the ultimate girl dad, though his four daughters

Being a fantasy manager this season has tested patience and maneuverability. I have always, and will always, preach fluidity as a fantasy football team owner, and these first four weeks of football highlight why. You're dead in the water if you refuse to move and shift gears in a landscape like this. Don’t be that guy.

Football is known to be a game of inches. As we inch closer to NFL Week 3 action and the end of the season, we learn more about these teams and how we need to alter our expectations for certain fantasy football players in 2024. Is Jaxon-Smith Njigba's Week 2 performance just a fluke? Could

Believing in New York to pull off the unlikely victory in Week 1 was most definitely not my finest moment of the week, but I did also advise others to be cautious about the small likelihood of that. I can't beat myself too much over believing in the Giants, as Wan'Dale Robinson did deliver in Week 1's predictions via "Storyline, Storytime."

Should I give out bad advice, I’m not really the sentimental type. Being apologetic for failing to predict the future seems disingenuous, anyway. The fine folks at Optimus want me to contribute the stuff that spills from my eyes, ears, and nose, so this column will put just that at your fingertips. Should it aid you in a redraft or dynasty league victory, or even a DFS lineup, that’s cool beans. I aim to win in an entertaining way, so they don’t ever sack me for being boring. Bring on the rush, I’ll stand tall (or scramble) the only way I know: with pizzazz.