Week 6 Recap

Ladies and gentlemen, MARK SHANKCHEZ is officially in the business of making other teams look small — and this week, Gadsden my Johnston was the unlucky client.

One hundred forty-three sixty-eight to one seventeen thirty-four. Twenty-six points. For a team that survived The Burrenaissance by four-point-nine in Week 1 and Allen my ass by eight last week, MARK SHANKCHEZ has quietly evolved from a team that wins ugly to a team that wins however it needs to — and this week it needed to win big. They obliged. The irony, of course, is that Gadsden my Johnston came into this game with the highest total points in the entire league — six hundred eighty-eight and change — a number that has been quietly screaming from the bottom half of the standings all season. They score like a runaway locomotive and are now two-and-four. MARK SHANKCHEZ moves to four-and-two on a two-game win streak, having apparently decided that a second act is more interesting than a first.

While that was happening, Sun God Welcome Committee kept its own party going, dispatching World's Most Overrated by twenty points — one fifteen forty to ninety-five thirty-six — and extending a three-game win streak that has them sitting alone at the top of the standings at four-and-two. World's Most Overrated, however, has now dropped four consecutive games, which at this point is less of a skid and more of a lifestyle. Six hundred fifty-two points on the season. Two-and-four. The name was a confession and nobody read it in time.

Over on the other side of the bracket, Taylor made handled All of the Sutton by twenty-three — one ten twenty-four to eighty-seven fourteen — and climbs to four-and-two on a two-game streak of their own. All of the Sutton, sitting at three-and-three, has now lost two straight after briefly looking like a team with somewhere to be. The three-and-three crowd is getting crowded and the oxygen is thinning.

Goat Mode is absolutely refusing to stop. One oh five oh eight over ImAStroudPenix by nearly nine — four consecutive wins for a team that posted the season's lowest score back in Week 2. We acknowledged the streak last week. We noted it was becoming a personality. Consider it now a full-on identity crisis for everyone they've faced. ImAStroudPenix, meanwhile, drops to one-and-five and three straight losses deep, with a quarterback situation baked right into the team name that has not exactly delivered on its promise.

Multiple Scoregasms edged Allen my ass by less than ten — one eleven oh eight to one oh one thirty — which is the kind of game that's decided by a receiver who catches one garbage-time target on fourth-and-forever. Multiple Scoregasms rides a two-game win streak to three-and-three, while Allen my ass slides to three-and-three with two straight losses. They are now mirror images of each other in the standings, separated only by vibes and situational awareness.

The Burrenaissance survived kuppmylifetopieces ninety-six sixty-eight to eighty-one twenty-two, which is exactly the kind of win the Burrenaissance needed before the history books sealed on them permanently. Whether this is the actual renaissance or just a guest appearance remains the central dramatic question of this season. kuppmylifetopieces drops to four-and-two on a two-game skid — the schedule stopped being polite weeks ago, and kuppmylifetopieces has been staring at it like it owes them something.

At four-and-two, five teams are knotted together near the top with very different heartbeats. One of them is about to separate. The others are about to find out the hard way that being tied for first and actually being first are two completely different sports.

Next week, Goat Mode gets to find out if five is a streak or a destiny — and Gadsden my Johnston gets to find out if all those points ever add up to something, or just look good on paper.