A note from Gazette management: Gordon Applewhite is no longer with the Gazette. We thank him for his service and for the many paragraphs about freight, shutters and duffel bags that left readers to work out for themselves who had actually won the game. Several of you wrote in about it. One of you wrote in twice. Dale Brennan takes the column from here, and he has agreed in writing that a bench point will be called a bench point.

Every Greek story is the same story. A man climbs higher than anybody, the gods notice, and down he comes with the wax running off his arms. Nate was 4-1 and untouchable in this league. Then he started Tyler Shough, who gave him -0.16 against a 22.95 average, and the whole thing hit the water at 74.74.

Let's be honest about how bad that is. It's the lowest score Nate has put up in 88 games on record. Not his worst week of the year — his worst week, period. He paid forty-three dollars for Jonathan Taylor and got 9.7. His second-best starter was the Vikings defence at 14.5, a unit he didn't draft. And he had 42.56 points on his bench while it was happening, which is how you take the belt off a man who'd been wearing it two weeks. He is 0-9 against the field this week. Zero for nine. Everybody beats that score.

The man who did beat it was Bill, by 48.18, with 122.92 — the seventh-best score of the week. Bill is 3-6 against the field, he's running 84.26 percent efficiency, the worst in the league by a distance, and he is 4-1 and second in the standings. I've watched this act for weeks now. He keeps losing the argument and winning the game. I'm calling it now: that stops before the playoffs, and when it does it'll stop all at once.

Bolek, meanwhile, actually played football. 175.78, high score of the week, eighteenth-highest score on record — only seventeen have ever beaten it — and 9-0 against the field. The beautiful part is the receipts. Bucky Irving at fourteen dollars went for 34. Goff at ten gave him 28.94. Stroud at four gave him 21.94. Justin Jefferson, his thirty-one dollar man, turned in 13.8 and was the fourth-most useful guy on the roster. That's a team built by somebody who was paying attention at the auction.

Jack was on the other end of it, 86.4 the wrong way with 89.38. Jaxon Smith-Njigba cost thirty-six dollars and scored 21.3; Jalen Hurts cost thirty and scored 13. In week 5 of 2023 Gabes dropped 206.16 on this man and Jack answered with 96.12, and I thought that was his floor. It was not his floor.

And then there's Justin, who I'm starting to feel genuinely bad for, which is not a sensation I enjoy. 144.98, fifth-best score in the league, Jayden Daniels at thirty-three dollars going for 35.26, and he lost by 9.08 to Mario. He's 0-5. He's 5-4 against the field. He has ninety-seven career wins going back to 2011 and he has been three short for weeks now. Here's the knife: in week 5 of 2025, this week, he beat Nate 174.9 to 122, a 52.9 point beating. This year Nate posts the worst score of his life and Justin still can't get a win out of the week. Somebody buy the man a drink.

Quick ones. Daniel got 41.46 from Drake Maye against a 13.44 average and 28.74 from Jameis Winston, a guy he didn't draft, while his forty-two dollar Lamar Jackson sat on the bench with nothing — 171.9 and 8-1 against the field, and he's still 2-3 and ninth in the power rankings. Eric/Blakey started every point he owned, zero on the bench, and still lost by 54.84; 534.56 for the season is the least anybody has scored. Gabes benched Mike Evans and his 23.8 to start CeeDee Lamb and his 0.9, which is a 22.9 point decision, and then watched a six-dollar Jaylen Warren score 34.3 while forty-five dollars of Bijan Robinson managed 13.8. He has 713.22 points and a 2-3 record and I'd be furious too.

Props where they're owed: Bryan finally caught a break. 158.34, third-best of the week, 7-2 against the field, best efficiency in the league at 92.86, and a seven-dollar Parker Washington putting up 26.9. In week 5 of 2022 this man scored 60.84 against Jack's 152.46. He's a different manager now. And Mario's forty-nine dollar Jahmyr Gibbs went for 39.2 while a one-dollar Aaron Rodgers added 22 — two wins in a row, 3-2, and nobody's talking about him. They will.

The league scored 1342.24 this week against a 1241.01 average. Everybody ate. Nate starved.*

*In my league I won two titles and never once scored 74.74. Admittedly my league folded, so you'll have to take my word for it.

1. Bolek — 175.78 and 9-0 against the field; the best team and now the best record on merit.

2. Nate — still first at 4-1 on points he banked in September, holding a belt he fully deserves.

3. Gabes — 713.22 scored, 2-3 to show for it, and he keeps benching the wrong receiver.

4. Mario — two straight, Gibbs finally justifying forty-nine dollars, nobody paying attention.

5. Bill — 4-1 with 84.26 percent efficiency. I don't believe a word of it.

6. Jack — 3-2 and 1-8 against the field; the schedule is doing the heavy lifting.

7. Bryan — 92.86 efficiency and a 2-3 record, which is just rotten luck.

8. Justin — 0-5, 5-4 against the field, three wins from a hundred. Grim.

9. Daniel — 171.9 with forty-two dollars of quarterback on the bench. Progress, sort of.

10. Eric/Blakey — 9-36 against the field all season. The standings are lying to him.