2017 Pre-FA Draft Power Rankins — 8th-5th

As our tour moves on it’s important to keep in mind that this next group of teams are often the saddest of the league — unable to really be competitive and yet lacking the self-awareness to kick off a rebuild. Please don’t feed the animals.
#8— Billy

2014 Finish: 8th
2015 Finish: 10th
2016 Finish: 11th
Strengths:

Still no top 4?!
Weaknesses:
- Billy might not have a single RB on an actual NFL roster by the end of the season (seriously, go check. I’ll wait.)
Noteworthy:
- Apparently Galante handed off a real shit-sandwich, because this team has the lowest league average finish of 9.7
- Billy gets to join the elite group of teams who have never seen the playoffs
Comments:
This is Billy. Billy was always a good boy. He ate his vegetables, studied real hard, and one day hoped to be a Civil Engineer and do exciting stuff like study traffic patterns to improve peoples commute times by 24 seconds.
You’ve gotta give it to him, he has been very enthusiastic about getting his hands on his own team. But something tells me in a few weeks he’s going to come down harder than Billy Mays halfway through a cocaine-fueled Oxi-Clean commercial.

According to FantasyPros, Billy doesn’t have a “starting” lineup. But if we were forced to pretend something startable existed on this roster, it would look something like this:
- The 5th QB
- The 12th RB1
- …and the 12th RB2
- The 7th WR1
- The 8th WR2
- The 6th WR3
- The 9th TE
- The 10th FLEX1
- The 12th FLEX2
There isn’t a lot of hope on the roster, but maybe Billy is spiteful enough to keep this ship just afloat long enough to steal another top pick from Falcone.
#7 — Dan Marino

2014 Finish: 4th
2015 Finish: 5th
2016 Finish: 9th
Strengths:

- Dan has a pretty solid FLEX with guys like Abdullah and Peterson having the potential for strong seasons.
Weaknesses:
- QB — Stafford has struggled without Calvin Johnson and with an OC who refused to use Tate appropriately until late last year
- TE — Eric Ebron has made Head look like a genius so far, performing exactly how you’d think a guy who was spontaneously traded for a 5th round pick should
Noteworthy:
- Dan missed the playoffs for the first time in 2016
- It’s entirely possible Dan has never interacted with two owners in the league
Comments:
Mirror Mirror, on the Wall, Who’s The “Meh-est” of…?

DAN MARINO.
…ok, but I didn’t finish. I was going to ask…

ITS DAN MARINO.
Dan has the most boring team in the league. It isn’t even fun to make fun of. It’s just good enough for me to not have much of anything to say, which is weird for a team that’s made 21 moves over the past 4 years. He has a “deep” team in the sense that there isn’t a big drop off when you get to his FLEX thats often seen — they’re as average as the rest of his squad. That’s a lot of work for such “meh” returns. It’s like eating a fucking crawfish, where you go through all that work for barely any meat and are just left wondering why you didn’t get the crabs instead of these stupid mud bugs.
According to FantasyPros, Dans starting lineup looks like so:
- The 11th QB
- The 7th RB1
- The 6th RB2
- The 8th WR1
- The 6th WR2
- The 8th WR3
- The 8th TE
- The 5th FLEX1
- The 4th FLEX2

Right? Like, what is there to even say about this team?
“Good job, you really earned 7th place this year!”

“I like the effort, 4th-6th place always did suit you”

“Getting the Saints and Lions offenses years after they were relevant was a real bold move”

#6— Sarlo and Hark

2014 Finish: 6th
2015 Finish: 4th
2016 Finish: 12th
Strengths:
- WR
Weaknesses:
- Any time you’re counting on Coby Fleener to lead your team you’re gonna have a bad time
Noteworthy:
- Missed the playoffs for the first time last year in spectacular fashion, giving new meaning to the phrase “if you’re not first, you’re last”
Comments:
“Man, our team is bad Nick…” -Hark after the first 4 games of 2016

This is that time of year I tried to convince Hark and everyone else that my team isn’t as bad as everyone thinks; that I am actually sitting on gems, and that this is the year it call comes together.

So maybe this isn’t a “3rd place” year for team Sharklo.
According to FantasyPros, Sarlo and Hark’s roster has this outlook:
- The 7th QB
- The 8th RB1
- The 6th RB2
- The 4th WR1
- The 4th WR2
- The 3rd WR3
- The 10th TE
- The 6th FLEX1
- The 6th FLEX2
I’m sure there are plenty of people who will argue otherwise, and most of them are probably sitting at home right now convincing themselves Adam Thiela-what-the-fuck-was-my-name-again was going to tickle relevancy this season.
Of course, we’ve heard it all before. After all I wrote an 800 word essay about why my the team was the greatest to ever grace the earth a little over 3 years ago, and we all know how that ended.

#5 — Calhoun

2014 Finish: 10th
2015 Finish: 3rd
2016 Finish: 6th
Strengths:
- FLEX
- WR
- RB
Weaknesses:
None glaring besides literally not having a kicker
Noteworthy:
- Has remained one of the best teams in the league after a successful rebuild following the inaugural season
- Was a heavy favorite to win it all last year before injuries and having terribly overrated players caught up with him.
- Somehow people delude themselves Lamar Miller, CJ Anderson, and Carlos Hyde are going to be good this year despite underwhelming virtually every time when given the opportunity…
- …but it might work for Calhoun this time.
Comments:
I have to admit, I was a bit surprised to see Calhoun having the 4th strongest RB group. After Freeman they are pretty much the stereotypical “this is their year” flop-fest leaders, and yet FantasyPros is still pretty confident in their ability in 2017.
Obviously Calhoun’s team isn’t bad, it’s just they lack that certain special “something” they had last year when they were my distant favorites to win it all, and the entire team outside of OBJ and AJ Green feels like they’re teetering on the cliff of irrelevancy.
- Carlos Hyde just came out as a potential cut
- Lamar Miller blew his opportunity in spectacular fashion after years of people claiming all he needed was more volume
- The Broncos just came out saying they planned to go RBBC this year
- Greg Olsen is old and already started losing it last year before his contract disputes
It doesn’t even stop there. And like I said, none of these things risk making him a bottom 6 team, but he just doesn’t have that same sex appeal like he did going into 2016. He’s like that guy riding around on “hoverboards”, doing the Running Man Challenge, and wearing“Keep Calm and…” shirts . It was probably cool at one point, but we’ve all moved on to fidget spinners bro.

To Be Continued

