Nichols nixes Nick Chubb after five drafts of him

At pick 23 Nichols took Trey McBride while Josh Allen and his 370.0 points sat on the board, unclaimed, for another five picks. The logic is defensible: McBride is the only 201.0-point tight end in this league, 1st of 16, and every other manager in the Koopa Troopas' path starts somebody who is not him. The invoice arrived at pick 106, where the quarterback slot was filled by the autodraft machine, which coughed up Brock Purdy and his 310.8 points, 9th of 16 among starters. Passing on the best quarterback in the league is a choice. Outsourcing the replacement to a computer eighty-three picks later is a commitment. The other self-inflicted wound came in Pittsburgh: Nichols drafted Jaylen Warren at 74, then at 87 declined Rico Dowdle and his 172.6 points — Dowdle being the back Pittsburgh imported specifically to take touches off Jaylen Warren — in favor of Josh Jacobs, 130.8 points, Day To Day, with a suspension flag on his own ESPN write-up. Dowdle went at 91 to somebody paying attention.

What it adds up to is 1606.7 points, 4 of 16, which is a real team with two soft spots. The tight end is the best in the league and Ka'imi Fairbairn at 157.8 points is 4th of 16 among kickers, so the margins are covered. The receiving corps is the worry: Zay Flowers leads it at 210.3 points, 10th of 16 among WR1s, against a league best of 291.0, and he was listed Questionable on draft day when Nichols took him in the third round. Then there is the defense. Nichols starts the Buccaneers every week at 104.0 points, 13th of 16, in a league where the best defense is worth 130.8. ESPN's advice on Tampa Bay was to wait and see whether the new linebackers jell. Nichols did not wait. Meanwhile the most productive player he owns who is not in the lineup is his backup quarterback, Sam Darnold, at 267.3 points, which is a sentence that should not exist about a roster this good.

Two autodrafted picks out of fourteen is a light touch by the standards of this league — somebody else gave the robot ten this year — and both of Nichols' machine picks landed cleaner than the Jacobs one he made himself. It is also, for the record, the same ratio he ran in 2020, the year he drafted from overall 1 and beat Dang for the title as CMC off the Trade Block. Whether the omen holds from pick 10 is another matter. The genuinely historic item is absence: Nick Chubb, drafted by this manager in 2018, 2019, 2021, 2024 and 2025, is not on the roster. Fifteen years in, Nichols has finally let go.