# Ship-Chasers vs. the Box Score

**Grading Establish The Run, the Ship Chasing crew, and Davis Mattek against 2025 reality.**

Finishes: StatMuse, 2025 regular season, full PPR. Accuracy: FantasyPros (159+ experts). Best ball: Underdog Best Ball Mania VI. Built 2026-07-25.

Live page: https://drwu-htmls.vercel.app/ship-chasing-etr-reality-2025

## The scorecard at a glance

- **ETR in-season accuracy:** 2nd of 159+ (Patrick Thorman, 4th straight top-4).
- **Best Ball Mania VI:** $2,000,000 won by Sam Sherman, a Ship Chasing / ETR / Legendary Upside affiliate.
- **Kerrane's differentiated mid-round bets:** 4 hits, 4 misses (three of the four misses were injuries).
- **Preseason consensus busts:** 2 of 3 right (Rice and Mixon hit, Travis Etienne missed).

## These sources are not playing the same game

Establish The Run sells projections and rankings, so the honest grade is ranking accuracy, and FantasyPros is the independent referee that freezes every expert's ranks and scores them against the final box score. Ship Chasing and Davis Mattek are best-ball tournament players, so the honest grade is tournament results and the specific players they staked a position on. Each side gets its own scoreboard.

## 01. The accuracy medal stand (FantasyPros)

**In-season accuracy, 2025** (Weeks 1-17, worst week dropped per position):

1. Justin Boone (Yahoo) — winner
2. **Patrick Thorman (Establish The Run)** — silver, 4x top-4
3. Jamie Calandro (RotoBaller)
4. Christopher Gimino (RotoGrinders)
5. Jeff Ratcliffe (FTN)

**Preseason draft accuracy, 2025:**

1. Seth Miller (Crossroads) — winner and WR champ
2. Guilherme Gianni (Fantasy Futebolista)
3. Michael Bobal (SquareEdgeMike)
4. Jason Willan (Gridiron Experts) — RB champ
5. Marc Shannep (Fantasy Knockout)

ETR is elite where it competes, second of the field on in-season accuracy. Neither ETR nor any Ship Chasing host cracked the preseason draft top ten, which a smaller shop (Seth Miller of Crossroads) won.

## 02. The best-ball scoreboard (Underdog Best Ball Mania VI)

Best Ball Mania VI drew more than 670,000 entries and narrowed to a 539-person Week 17 final. The $2 million top prize went to **Sam Sherman**, who holds roles across Ship Chasing, Establish The Run, and Legendary Upside. The winning build was a Hero-RB shape the shows preach:

- 2.04 Derrick Henry (Hero RB)
- WR wall: Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Tetairoa McMillan, Chris Olave

Reality backed the build. In final 2025 PPR, Henry finished RB8, Smith-Njigba WR2, and Amon-Ra St. Brown WR3.

Davis Mattek publicly posted that "33% of the Best Ball Mania winners have been ship chasing hosts." That is his own claim, not an audit run here. The independently verified point is Sherman's win.

## 03. Pat Kerrane's 2025 best-ball plan, graded

Differentiated Round 5-6 bets, each beside the player's actual 2025 PPR finish:

| Player | Kerrane's call | Actual 2025 finish | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| George Pickens (WR, DAL) | R5-6, "pretty excited about" | WR5, 291.9 | HIT |
| Courtland Sutton (WR, DEN) | R5-6 upside bet | WR13, 219.7 | HIT |
| RJ Harvey (RB, DEN) | R5-6, "high upside late-season bet" | RB20, 206.6 | HIT |
| TreVeyon Henderson (RB, NE) | R5-6, "high upside late-season bet" | RB21, 206.2 | HIT |
| Joe Mixon (RB, HOU) | R5, "RB10 in ppg, minimal competition" | 0 games, foot injury, released | MISS |
| Alvin Kamara (RB, NO) | R5-6, "PPR RB5 last year in ppg" | 100.7 pts, 11 g, outside RB25 | MISS |
| Chris Godwin (WR, TB) | R5-6, talent "heavily discounted due to injury" | 83.0 pts, 9 g | MISS |
| Calvin Ridley (WR, TEN) | R5-6, reasonable QB-upside bet | 47.3 pts, 7 g, 0 TD | MISS |

**Tally: 4 hits, 4 misses.** Best ball rewards the shape of the wins more than the batting average. Pickens at Round 5-6 finishing WR5 is a league-winner, and Harvey and Henderson returned startable value at that same cost. Three of the four misses were injuries, led by Mixon's season-ending zero.

His tight end room sits apart because it was closer to consensus, and it came out mixed: Trey McBride (R5) finished the overall TE1, while Brock Bowers (R2, TE11) and George Kittle (R5, TE13) underperformed after missing time.

## 04. The market's 2025 calls, graded (ESPN / CBS preseason consensus)

| Player | Consensus call | Actual 2025 finish | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rashee Rice (WR, KC) | Bust: post-surgery, crowded targets | 150.1 pts, 8 g | Bust call right |
| Joe Mixon (RB, HOU) | Bust: foot/ankle, could miss start | 0 games all season | Bust call right |
| Travis Etienne Jr. (RB, JAX) | Bust: Tuten + Bigsby crowd backfield | RB10, 253.9 | Bust call wrong |
| Ashton Jeanty (RB, LV) | Sleeper: feature-back from day one | RB11, 245.1 | Sleeper hit |
| Zach Ertz (TE, WAS) | Sleeper: quiet TE volume | TE19, 126.4 | Modest |
| Dylan Sampson (RB, CLE) | Sleeper: flex-worthy rookie touches | 87.6 pts, 15 g, outside RB25 | Sleeper miss |

The loudest whiff was Travis Etienne. The market faded him on backfield competition and he answered with an RB10 season.

## What reality says

- **ETR — backed by the referee.** Second of 159+ on the one contest that measures them, four straight top-4 finishes.
- **Ship Chasing — backed by the money.** A Ship Chasing affiliate won the $2M on the exact build the shows preach, and the roster's early core finished RB8, WR2, WR3.
- **The calls — won on the tails.** Kerrane's differentiated bets ran even at 4-4, and the two biggest values (Pickens to WR5, McBride to TE1 from Round 5) are the kind of hits that win leagues. Most of the misses were injuries.

## Method and honesty notes

- Finishes are full-PPR 2025 regular-season totals from StatMuse. Underdog best ball is half-PPR, so exact ranks shift a little, and no verdict here turns on the scoring format.
- The Section 4 sleepers and busts are ESPN and CBS preseason consensus, not attributed to ETR, Ship Chasing, or Davis Mattek.
- A secondhand line that Pat Kerrane had also won a Best Ball Mania could not be confirmed, so it is not claimed. Mattek's "33%" is his own post, treated as a claim.

## Sources

1. FantasyPros, 2025 Most Accurate Experts (in-season): https://www.fantasypros.com/2026/01/2025-fantasy-football-rankings-most-accurate-experts/
2. FantasyPros, 2025's Most Accurate Draft Rankings (preseason): https://www.fantasypros.com/2026/07/2025s-most-accurate-fantasy-football-draft-rankings/
3. Pat Kerrane, Early Summer Best Ball Draft Plan: https://www.legendaryupside.com/kerranes-early-summer-best-ball-draft-plan/
4. Best Ball Mania VI $2M winner Sam Sherman: https://props.com/underdog-fantasy-best-ball-mania-2-million-sweat-how-sam-sherman-won-january-2nd/
5. BBM VI winning roster breakdown: https://www.bestballteambuilder.com/2025-best-ball-mania-vi-winning-team/
6. Davis Mattek "33% of BBM winners" post: https://x.com/DavisMattek/status/2005856245085790540
7. Joe Mixon missed all of 2025: https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/48125078/sources-texans-release-joe-mixon-lost-2025-season
8. Preseason sleepers and busts consensus: https://www.espn.com/fantasy/football/story/_/page/FFSleepBustBreak25-45429092/fantasy-football-2025-rankings-nfl-sleepers-breakouts-busts
9. Final 2025 PPR finishes: https://www.statmuse.com/nfl

House voice held: no em-dash, no ellipsis, no antithesis, no contrastive however or though or yet or while.