Playoff Preview/Quarterfinal Recap: McLicker Lites (#1) vs Fitz a Kind of Magic (#4)

(This article was originally written by Zachary McVicker and has been republished with his permission)

An exciting week of playoffs is in the books. When the dust had settled, the bracket ended up being pure chalk, but as discussed in write-ups last week, that wasn’t a foregone conclusion heading into the weekend. Berg had a 19-pt projected lead over McVick heading into the 1 vs. 8 battle, and it took a few ill-timed turds from Dez Bryant, Jimmy Graham and Phillip Rivers for the McLicker Lites to pull out a 96.1–81.6 victory.

How did it happen? And more importantly, how does it continue to happen? Whispers of a symptom known as “McLicked” are beginning to circulate in fantasy circles. The definition, according to sources:

• McLicked (v) — when an opponent faces the McLicker Lites and mysteriously scores way fewer points than they thought they were going to
• Used in a sentence — “I totally thought I was going to beat Zach this week, but then I got McLicked. My team shit the bed and scored below their projections basically at every position.”

In fact, 10 out of 13 McLicker Lite opponents this season have scored below their season average, most notably Youngstown Gangstas (87.5 vs. 121 average), Feed the Zeke (84.3 vs 115) and Dak Pics (103.9 vs 119). And even when a team scored above average, there was a chance that the McLicker Lites eek-ed them out in a stroke of good fortune, as Succulent Crabsky found out in a heartbreaking 130.3–128.5 loss in Week 7 thanks to -2 points from the Titans defense.

The negative point bug also hit Berg in Week 14, with Giants CB Janoris Jenkins eating Dez Bryant alive in a -0.5 tragedy. When Berg reflected on the unfortunate turn of events, he remarked “Of course Dez would get me NEGATIVE points. Of course. Because why not?” He didn’t yet understand he was part of a wider phenomenon.

The next team with a chance of being McLicked? 4 seed Fitz a kind of magic in a Week 15 semifinal to decide who is headed to the TBD Bowl. And although Fitz technically got McLicked in its first meeting in Week 9 (121.4 vs 125), the output still was more than enough as the McLicker Lites mistakenly feared the Broncos D enough to leave 34 points from Latavius Murray on the bench. It was the third win in a string of seven straight for Fitz, which shook off a 1–5 start to ascend to one of the most feared teams in the league.

The reason for the turnaround? Look no further than Le’Veon Bell dusting off the cobwebs and laying off the bong. Combined with Aaron Rodgers doing Aaron Rodgers-things again and Frank Gore giving Father Time the finger and you have a truly dangerous squad.

Will it be enough to prevent manager Robert Yegiazaryan from being McLicked? He’ll be monitoring the status of Matt Forte closely this week, but Rodgers and Jordy Nelson have a delicious matchup against Chicago that could make the uncertainly a little more Bear-able (*author high-fives self for pun*). As always, may the best man win.