(S22) - Ultimus Week

[Troen]

6) It’s always important to look forward to the future. Examine your team, and in 400 words or more, talk about how they can improve themselves to get a stab at trophy contention next year. Are you loaded with draft capital for the next draft? Do you have plenty of cap space to sign free agents? Go through the roster and note the different strengths and weaknesses, and how you think those will change over the next few seasons. How should your team adapt?

Looking at stats for season 22, the Copperheads did what we expected to do going in at the start, scoring the most points in the ASFC and second in the NSFL after only the Wraiths. Also as expected, our defense wasn't quite as good. I tried to help as a new member of the defensive line, but I wasn't enough to turn the tide on my own. That flaw showed itself in the conference finals where the offense scored a respectable 38 points but we on the defense gave up 50 and we lost. Looking at the team going into next year, we're going to be losing at least S15 RB Leaf Jr. and S12 DE Kuusela. There's a couple other players who I don't know if they have said or not said anything about retirement, but I think the clear strength is the offense rather than the defense. After the season was over, we did make a trade for S22 DE Claxton in exchange for our S24 2nd and 4th pick plus an additional swap of seconds in S23 (HON for ARI where we hold HON after last season's trade). That will help out a lot to reinforce our defensive line with what I'd like to think is a trio of great ends. We also have a great player at each of LB, CB, and Safety, but we don't exactly have a lot of depth beyond those players who were up last year. Looking down to the DSFL, S22 CB Mendoza seems like basically a lock to be called up. S22 RB Jones seems like a reasonably likely callup to replace the retiring Leaf Jr., but as a rookie we can't reasonably expect to fully replace the vet. With those callups I don't think we have any major gaps for S23 assuming no other S15 and 16 players retire, but replacing the players at those positions is going to be a clear priority going towards the future. Assuming my callup predictions are correct, that leaves not a ton of cap room - we'd need to cut down on the OL bots or hope to draft another human OL who we could pay less than $7m to. Either way, I think it's looking unlikely to see a huge contract in FA unless there's an offensive lineman out there.
For the draft, I think that gives us a first pick around the 4th pick of round 2, which should definitely give us a good prospect. Our next picks, though, are Yeti's R3 and Chicago's R4, which I {i]think[/i] will be back-to-back picks. I'm counting about 93 S23 players, so picks 36 and 37 should be pretty solid options though maybe not starters until after another year down in the DSFL. So, for those picks, I think we'll need to be looking to replacing the future retirees of the S15-16 players. I'm not in our draft war room or anything, though, so I don't know if that's actually the plan - my analysis is just based on looking at the roster and contracts pages.

7) Selflessness is one thing, but ultimately everyone wants to hear their own player’s name mentioned among the greats. Take some time, in 400 words or more, and discuss how your player’s (or past player’s) career is going so far. Are you matching any expectations you set out for yourself? Do you see yourself on a potentially award winning or Hall of Fame career trajectory? If your player is just starting out, what goals and visions do you have for yourself?

For my first year in the NSFL, I definitely didn't have the best year from a raw stats perspective. I was down in every statistical category as compared to last year in the DSFL, but I think that's to be expected when you join a league with people who have been earning TPE for much longer than you. I guess I could say that it's in line with my logical expectations of what would happen, but I was hoping that I'd be lucky or have my practices pay off or whatever and outperform my expectations. I also had a couple penalties including one I still to this day don't understand where I got a defensive pass interference on a running play. That's logically impossible, right? I would demand to talk to the league about it, but the refs are hiding or something. Anyway.
So with this year's season as the starting point, I can't say that I look like I'm going to be on an amazing trajectory based on just stats. I did pick up the pace some as the season progressed - but given that we won 8 games in a row, our stats would have to be better or else we'd have lost instead. As a rookie DE who wasn't at the DSFL max at the end of last year, I think I performed to the level that is expected of me. I wasn't the best lineman on the team and don't think I'm in the running for any awards - maybe if there was a defensive lineman rookie of the year, but I haven't checked to see if I'm actually one of the better players in that category. The key point with 'performing to the level expected' though - just because it's what expected doesn't mean I'm satisfied with it. There are still attributes to raise in an effort to perform better in the future, and getting those numbers up is going to be a big focus through the offseason, naturally. I also was a bit busier this season than the last couple which meant I didn't do any media beyond the PTs since the draft - I'm at a pretty good bank account size right now, but if I only ever spend then I'll need to work on getting it back up at some point given that I took basically a minimum contract. I have enough for about 3 years of max spending last I looked, though, so I'm not in a specific hurry to fix that.
Looking towards where I'll be by the start of next season, I think there's a decent chance I'll have maxxed out all my important stats other than endurance. On the one hand, that's good, since I should then be able to be playing at maximum effectiveness. On the other hand, that's not the best since it means earning more TPE doesn't do much other than maybe giving me one extra year of high level play if I try to fight regression for longer. I don't really know what that means for my future - are there any other goals I should have in mind? I guess I could try and help work with other D-line players on the team? Food for though, at least.

[tMuse]

Task 4)
I would like to talk about the DSFL expansion team and their first appearance in the playoffs and even in the ultimini - the London Royals! The London Royals had a pretty close conference the whole season and in the end they did pull through to the playoffs. I want to talk about the game that brought the London Royals into the playoffs.

A bit more than halfway through the season the London Royals had a Co-GM switch and Highhaschdi stepped up to the task.

The final standings of the NFC North were
1. Minnesota Grey Ducks 8W - 6L
2. London Royals 6W - 8L
3. Portland Pythons 5W - 9L
4. Kansas City Coyotes 5W - 9L

all in all a super close finish. There are many factors that came together for the London Royals to make the playoffs. The Portland Pythonst lost their last two games (against the Dallas Birddogs and the Minnesota Grey Ducks) keeping them at 5-9. The Kansas City Coyotes winning only one of their two last games (They won against the Tijuana Luchadores and lost against the Dallas Birddogs) bringing them up to only 5-9.
And one of the most important things - the London Royals won against the Dallas Birddogs in Week 13 11-8. It was an intense low score game.

In that game we saw 0 points in the first quarter played.

9 points in the second quarter played
6 points for the Dallas Birddogs with a 2 yd run by Kichwa Jones and a missed kick by Zoe Watts.
3 points for the London Royals with a 49 yd field goal by Datsum PhastBawl, the new K/P for the London Royals.

again - 0 points in the 3rd quarter played

and 10 points in the 4th quarter played.
2 points for the Dallas Birddogs with a safety tackle against Colby Jack by Yuuto Kira Cloudera
8 points for the London Royals with a 25 yd pass touchdown to Nick Kaepercolin and a successful 2 point conversion.

this brings us to the final score of
Dallas Birddogs 8 - 11 London Royals.

This win brought the London Royals to a standing of 6W - 8L and secured their second place.

All in all it was a pretty tough fight for every team in the NFC North and every team had a pretty good chance to make the playoffs. As i said earlier, many factors played a key role in securing that playoff spot for the London Royals but talking about every single one of them would be way too much for this task.

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Task 7)
I have started as a waiver pick in the middle of S21. With some banter on twitter between me and Heath Evans I got the attention of some teams - in the end the Myrtle Beach Buccanneers picked me of that waiver list and I've played right away, right next to Heath Evans who also played for the Myrtle Beach Buccaneers. As I trained more and gained more TPE my stats also got better. We had a solid S21 as the Myrtle Beach Buccaneers and even won the ultimini. In the end I played 12 games in S21 and got 20 receptions and made 122 yards. I also scored a touchdown - which felt super awesome! - and I made 15 pancakes. Those stats are not the best but I think as someone who joined in the middle of S21 it's okay though and I am pretty satisfied with my work in S21.

Then it was time for the draft. To this day even, I have completed every single TPE task available since I joined the league. So I gained pretty quickly and rose in the rankings. I thought I would be picked in round 6-7 and to my surprise the Sarasota Sailfish selected me in round 5 and made me overall pick number 50 in the draft - super happy with that! At the time of the draft I had 172 TPE and after the talk with Frostbite, the GM of the Sarasota Sailfish - Ex GM of the Myrtle Beach Buccaneers - we came to a pretty fast aggreement on a contract which included sending me down for one more season before I come up in the NSFL and replace Johnny Blaze, the current Tight End for the Sarasota Sailfish.

In S22 I had way better stats. I played 14 games in S22 and got 47 receptions and made 441 yards. I scored 3 touchdowns and made 19 pancakes. I also made 2 rushing attempts with a total of 1 yard - MVP material right here!.

So in the end I only played 2 more games compared to S21 but I've got 27 more receptions and made 319 more yards. Scored 2 more touchdowns and made 4 more pancakes. I think thats a pretty solid development and I am more than satisfied with my personal stats.

Sadly, even though the Myrtle Beach Buccaneers were one of the strongest DSFL Teams, we didn't made the playoffs this season. And all I can say about that is - heck the sim.

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[Jangorhino]

Tier 2: Short Form Tasks (400+ words)

Mario VonPebbles is off to a pretty good start so far in his career. His sack total went up considerably from season 21 to season 22. In season 22 Mario VonPebbles had 6 total sacks. The expectations coming into season 22 for Mario VonPebbles were very high and he did not live up to those expectations. Mario was essentially TPE capped coming into season 22 and hopes were very high for a double digit sack total. Into the season I quickly realized that wouldn’t be the case. Mario got off to a great start with a sack and safety in weeks one and two. After the great start the stats pretty much dried up. Mario would only wind up with six total sacks for the year. Meanwhile the rookie defensive lineman, Water Chestnut III went on to a much more statistically productive season. My favored interpretation of what was a tough pill to swallow is Mario was drawing all the double teams and additional blocking schemes. All the increased attention to Mario from offensive coordinators throughout the season after his explosive start, freed up Water Chestnut III for great one on one matchups against the less able lineman of the opponents.
Moving forward, Mario’s focus is to max earn throughout every season until he’s max endurance, speed and strength. Mario already has max speed and strength and endurance rating of 90. At the pointof max endurance, if the drive to max is earn is still there, the focus will shift to intelligence, agility and tackling. To get to max endurance I’l l need another 150 TPE. That will get Mario into the 550 TPE range. My goal is to reach the 550 TPE threshold to start season 24. So that will put Mario at 550 TPE going into his fourth season. So Mario will be a max endurance, speed, and strength Speed Rush Defensive End for four seasons before reaching regression. While Mario spent two seasons in the DSFL, it’s unlikely he’ll make a push for the HOF in those four years. Hopefully in the four seasons after Mario is max endurance, speed, and strength he’ll be able to make the push for some season award nods. It would be nice to be nominated for Defensive Linemen of the Year and even Defensive Player of the Year. NSFL sack numbers are down considerably since the early days of the league due to blitz ratio limitations and OL bots. Hopefully Mario’s unique combination of speed, size, and endurance he’ll be able to do his part to start the league sack totals trending in an upward trajectory again. Mario VonPebbles wants to be a generational player but he’s learned to temper expectations after a very tough statistical season. (460 WORDS)

11) Create a championship banner for your team, including relevant players and iconography. Graphics only.



13) Create a billboard, magazine cover, or video game cover depicting a superstar of the league. Graphics only.

[Forty Jordy]

Task 6
The Orange County Otters have a long track record of success. In fact the Orange County Otters have made it to all 22 NSFL playoff competitions and as of late the Otters will be contending for this season’s Ultimus bowl to make it their ninth Ultimus bowl championship and tenth Ultimus bowl appearance. In fact Orange County’s longest drought between appearances was 4 from S8 to S11. It was a gloom era indeed.

Back to the point. The reason I mention the history of Orange County success is that we have high expectations to fill, not even the Brady-Belicheck era of the New England Patriots can relate. Let’s first look through the roster and see what positions may need to be filled for next season.

We all know that success revolves around a star quarterback or at least it is easy to fail if you do not have a top tier quarterback. Franklin Armstrong will be entering his second season of regression next season. Armstrong previously lost 277 TPE and will probably end up with 50 less TPE than his peak before he regresses again next season where he will lose about 320 TPE. I suspect Armstrong has about 2 decent seasons left with about 1 season of mediocrity. Orange County may be able to put off a Quarterback by one season if they want to remain as playoff contenders past the next 3 seasons as there is really only one viable candidate in this season’s draft.

The Otters look to be in good shape for the rest of their skill positions. Hugh Mongo will be hitting regression this upcoming season, but the Otters have lots of young S21 and S22 talent that will be dominating in the next season or two.

On the defensive side of the ball, the Otters are in a great position to have a top-tier secondary next season and will only need to look to improve their front seven. Grievous will be hitting his second season of regression this upcoming season and drafting an LB will help immediately in the Otter’s 4-3 base set and will be able to take a starting job in the S24 season.
On the front line, the Otters only need to fill in two slots on the both edges. Otters have 3 Defensive tackles where one is currently being used as a defensive end. Skarsgard is one of these DT but is an S12 players and he may be retiring this year. The one defensive end that the Otters have in their possession is Gary Lazer-Eyes who has gone IA and is stuck at 296 TPE.

Therefore the Otters should first concentrate on drafting a Defensive end followed by a linebacker.

Task 15


Final Task
PBE Affiliate PT

[Evok]

https://simulationhockey.com/showthread.php...2304#pid2842304

[KoltClassic]

Tier 1: Long Form Tasks (800+ words)

3) Write 800 words or more on something that interests you. It could be related to statistics, to a league issue you take seriously, or a niche part of history that doesn’t fit neatly into either of the above categories. This must be directly related to the league, so don’t wax 800 words about your team’s Werewolf server. Be warned that freedom comes with risk, and this category will be judged especially stringently for anyone trying to spew complete nonsense.

Although I’ve tried to be involved in the league in various ways through media, graphics, and development, I’d say that graphics is of highest interest to me as an outlet. Creating photo manipulations and banner-type graphics has always been of interest to me. As a kid I’d spend hours watching tutorials and tweaking settings to learn the ins and outs of all of the different tools that programs like GIMP and Photoshop had to offer. Coupled with an interest in photography, I was able to self-teach fundamentals to a reasonably good level. Graphics as a hobby allowed me to be hired for a graphics position during my college years, where I spent my working hours doing background research on subject matter and composing hundreds of different standardized graphics. It has been quite a few years since that time, and for a while I’d completely forgotten about how interesting I’d always found making graphics, but in finding this league I’ve rediscovered a hobby that I’ve been able to merge with other hobbies in a way I hadn’t been able to previously.

This is the first sig that I’d ever made for sim sports. I like to think that I’ve grown a lot in many different facets of my work in the last six or so months that I’ve been making graphics in the league, but that opinion would probably vary person to person. In the time between then and now I’ve done a lot of research around similar sig and graphic formats in both forums and on social media sites like Instagram. I keep a personal Pinterest board specifically dedicated to sports graphics for inspiration that I use as a “mood board” of sorts. This has been one of the most useful things I’ve found for sig inspiration. If I’m ever in a creative rut around a style or composition I’d like to use, I end up going back to that board to borrow aspects of graphics that I like. There are also a lot of great resources in other sim leagues that I’ve found useful. While I don’t participate in other leagues, their graphics boards all have fundamental similarities that I have learned from techniques that I have borrowed.
At some point a couple seasons ago I was convinced to become a graphics grader. I think that being a grader is a good opportunity for anybody who is interested in a particular facet of the league. Being on the other side of the table so to speak is a great learning opportunity that allows you to see the larger picture of things like media or graphics. I don’t think that a good graphics creator is necessarily a good graphics grader, though. Creating graphics and judging graphics are two very different skill sets. It is true that a good graphics judge should be able to recognize quality and effort in a signature, but in my opinion providing a structured and informative critique is one of the best differentiators between an average and a great grader. Although most people who submit graphics are purely looking for the money that comes out of it, it is nice to know that some folks are truly more interested in getting better with the software that they are using and developing useful skills ( okay, maybe this is a pipe dream but let a guy dream for a second ). It has been nice to be able to provide detailed feedback to users to both help them make more money in the league and to provide them resources for learning better fundamentals for creating graphics. An interesting thing to note here is that most, if not all of the feedback that we give as graders isn’t sig-specific by any means. The feedback is applicable to pictures in general; this knowledge could be useful for other artistic mediums like photography, drawing, painting, etc. Understanding things like the composition of a picture and fundamental layout approaches are important skills for more than just signatures, and understanding those will help you to have a better eye for creating and viewing art.
Although I don’t currently do much development work for the league, I think that merging my skills as a developer with my skills as a graphics creator would be something I’d like to pursue inside the context of this league in the future. In particular, there are projects like an “ultimate team” game where users buy card packs and maintain collections of player cards that I would like to contribute graphics to. I enjoy making player cards just as much as I enjoy making sigs, so I think working on something like that could be a good time. Additionally, there are development-related tasks like programmatically generating overlays for cards that would align with things like rarity that I think would be neat to figure out. This project is a pretty large undertaking, but I think that it would be a cool concept to increase community engagement.

[AW13]

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3) Write 800 words or more on something that interests you. It could be related to statistics, to a league issue you take seriously, or a niche part of history that doesn’t fit neatly into either of the above categories. This must be directly related to the league, so don’t wax 800 words about your team’s Werewolf server. Be warned that freedom comes with risk, and this category will be judged especially stringently for anyone trying to spew complete nonsense.

One thing that I enjoy about this league is the locker room experiences that I have encountered so far and although I have only been in a few of them in my many years here, it is always a good time and the feel can change so many times depending on the status of your team. Like, I am sure it is cool and all, but I imagine Orange County locker room gets pretty boring when the team is just expected to win and make the playoffs. There is no hunger, there is no drive until playoff time.

During my career in the NSFL, I have been able to be part of a few locker rooms with different scenarios and it definitely makes you appreciate them for the bonding experiences you can get. When I first started back in like Season 9 or whenever it was, I created my QB Joliet L. Christ and was picked up off of waivers by the Portland Pythons and was given a chance to actually play a decent amount with our QB being pretty trash at the time, McCoy or something if I am remembering correctly. The DSFL back then was I think less competitive than now and with BOT teams and such, user teams were usually finding themselves in the playoffs. I remember at the time that the main goal for everyone pretty much was to beat Tijuana at all costs and unfortunately we fell short. The locker room was great and I got to meet some great people during my time in Portland especially as I was drafted there the following season after the brief stint as a waiver pickup which was cool to keep that continuity. The locker room was supportive and we had a dominant team and made the Ultimini in my 2nd year I believe where we were beat pretty badly if I remember correctly. Christ had a rough game in his last DSFL game but the locker room was upbeat and supportive as I made the jump to being a future NSFL hall of famer. I was actually invited to be co-GM of Portland and I was hired on, for one day as I got the co-GM spot of San Jose the next day.

My time in San Jose was great as I played with a lot of different people that I knew or at least got to know really well. I made a lot of good friends such as CK, TO, Muford, Aenir, and many many more. It was a great team and we were a team with an underdog story. A team that never won the championship and never even won a playoff game. We were essentially a joke franchise but we loaded up in Season 10 with many draft picks to go along with the already promising core. People were starting to notice the changes in both the play on the field and our outlook off the field as well. The locker room embraced being an underdog and after a few seasons, kept battling and won the first playoff games and first Ultimus in San Jose history. I will always remember this as after we had won the title, there was a huge party in the San Jose voice chat and everyone was extremely happy to have come out on top in such a big game with a victory over the Liberty. We were champions and no one would take that away from us. The focus was then shifted to being the hunted and we embraced that too as our team was still the team to beat, unfortunately we could not get back to back Ultimus wins and would never see a title again and as people aged out and left for GM positions, the team went into the next era. There was a slow period as we rebuilt up again, we had me be SJS GM for a few weeks and then things kind of reset back to a hungry cat team.

I see a lot of the hunger in our locker room and just being able to analyze the locker rooms from my long time here, I see a great group and a determined one. I see more brightness in our future as we bring up a new QB with a budding top tier defense and run game. I see a lot of the Ultimus winning champion Sabercats in this group. We will win again, and I predict that it will be soon.

We have a very active locker room again with people talking every day whether it be in the regular locker room or the war room or in any other channel. We have a lot of people that believe in the final product and the direction we are taking even as we shocked a few people last season with a winning record and came a tiebreaker short of the playoffs. The locker room is aware of how tough it will be breaking in a new rookie quarterback and while the team expects that there will be some struggles, this locker room is ready to rock and mostly because of our stacked defense. We have a future top of the league defense and it definitely helps the league run. Sure, we can lose some people to random retirements or leaving to play on a subpar squad in free agency but we are a resilient group and you can tell that just from the locker room. Something I always enjoyed and I enjoy the one we have in San Jose.

[Tylus]

I did two tier 2's.

5. In my opinion, Jamar Lackson is the player who deserves the Most Valuable Player award the most. Lackson started this season being considered the best running back in the developmental simulation football league, and being capped has only added to that. While he may have had some carries taken away by our running back by committee style of ground attack, and a high volume passing attack through our quarterback Sim Snowbow. Jamar Lackson started the season incredibly strong, considering the low tpe of the Grey Ducks wide receivers, we definitely leaned on Lackson’s powerful running style to keep our offense on the field for the first half of the season. Jamar would run for over 100 yards in his first three games, and although we went 1-2 during those games, it was not due to Jamar Lacksons ability to move us downfield. Jamar’s production would slip a little during week four, only racking up 67 yards, but he would soon be back to his high numbers in week five, with a 126 yard game. The next three weeks would be a little lower on the production side of things for Lackson, the main reason being a trade by the Grey Ducks for running back Zed Keppler, who came in firing on all cylinders, having a 100 yard game himself. Jamar would find himself losing some touches to the new running back, but would still put on a decent show for us. For the rest of the season, Jamar would find himself only going over 100 yards another game or two, but considering the split carries, still had solid performances at worst. The reason I have Jamar Lackson as Most Valuable Player is due to the fact that without him on the team, there is no way the Grey Ducks do as well as they did this season. Jamar likes to be coy and act like he had a bad or mediocre season, but in my eyes he IS the most valuable player on the team. Without teams having to fear his rushing attack, there is no way Sim Snowbow would have been able to throw down field the way he did this season. Not only was he our heart and soul on offense on the field, but he also worked just as hard off the field working to help make gameplans that would carry over to wins on the field. Jamar is one of my favorite people in Minnesota, and is an awesome creative locker room presence. San Jose has the best running back in the class of season 22 and it isn’t even close. With all of that in mind, over 1400 yards rushing and 9 touchdowns, as well as being the leader for the Grey Ducks and being a major reason why we crushed our division during the regular season is more than enough of a reason for Jamar Lackson to win the MVP award in my opinion.

8. My first experience with the NSFL was really great. The amount of people who reached out and helped me get my player set up was a really great way to come into a league like this. People like Dwyer, who has been such a great friend and mentor, and has to be one of my favorite people in this league, and made this league so much fun. Honolulu is one of my favorite destinations just based on Dwyer being their general manager, and Raven is a great person too, and was very friendly and understanding during our interview. To be honest, there isn’t a GM I wouldn’t want to play for(for the most part). GMs like Bayley, Flyeaglsfly, and Issastarcrossed are awesome, and you can’t really go wrong. I wouldn’t be where I am without my general managers from the Grey Ducks. Being drafted by them was one of the most awesome things that has happened since I joined the league. Being in their locker room pre-draft I knew that I belonged in Minnesota. Dewalt and CLG Rampage have been amazing mentors, and have helped to give me opportunities to learn more and become a better player, by adding me to the sim team, and eventually accepting my application as an intern. CLG Rampage is the kind of guy you want as a GM, knowledgeable when asked about nearly anything, a firm leader who isn’t afraid to tell you the truth, and can be one of the boys when he wants to as well. Rampage is going to be an amazing NSFL GM some day, and you can take that to the bank. Dewalt was one of the first scouts to reach out to me when I first started, and I knew from our first conversation that he would be someone I’d love to learn from. Nobody knows the amount of times Dewalt has given advice, or helped someone. You know what you are getting from these guys, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen Dewalt say or do something to help a teammate or even just talk to someone who is upset or not having a great day. If anyone deserves the GMOTY award, it is Dewalt. Nobody takes the team more seriously, yet is able to create a relaxed fun locker room at the same time. Moving past that, I would say my player has exceeded my expectations by a mile. Having more than 800 yards and 7 touchdowns is a blessing, and I have nobody but my teammates and GMs to thank for such an awesome accomplishment. Go Grey Ducks!

[Ry_]

PBE Championship Week

7) Selflessness is one thing, but ultimately everyone wants to hear their own player’s name mentioned among the greats. Take some time, in 400 words or more, and discuss how your player’s (or past player’s) career is going so far. Are you matching any expectations you set out for yourself? Do you see yourself on a potentially award winning or Hall of Fame career trajectory? If your player is just starting out, what goals and visions do you have for yourself?

My career so far has been an interesting one. Starting out, I joined one of the smaller NSFL classes in recent memory, as S20 was super small compared to S21, S22, S23, etc. We only had about thirty players I think in total and less actives than that too. I was one of four players who joined the league as a waiver create, and that started me off to become the highest earner in the class(a title I still hold to this day, but likely not for much longer unless I can actually get the motivation to writing more media and buying high tier equipment). When I created, I was claimed by the Myrtle Beach Buccaneers, who now are a thriving DSFL team but then was a cesspool of inactivity and failure, as we went 2-12 in my sole season there. I only played two games, but I was quickly on the map for the rest of the DSFL and teams were lining up quickly to scout me and I was highly touted by most. As I gained and gained more TPE, it seemed fairly likely that I was going to be selected first overall in the DSFL Draft, and I was. The Minnesota Grey Ducks(recently relocated from San Antonio and rebranded entirely) chose me to be the lead back with the team, and I was replacing two high caliber players who both moved on to the NSFL. Right away in Week 1, I dominated the league and the bot team we were facing, running for 192 yards, two touchdowns, all on only twenty carries. It was that performance that showed the league that I was going to run this team, and it would only go as far as I could take it. I very literally carried the Minnesota Grey Ducks throughout the entire season, and every win and loss depended on how well I could play. Our quarterback, while solid, was getting very much used to handing me the ball play after play. Darrel Williams quickly turned from the nobody from the PBE to the best running back in the DSFL. No one could match my gaudy numbers, and while they weren't the best usage-wise, by pure numerical strength I was dominating the rest of the league. The Grey Ducks finished that season strong, won the first playoff game, and we faced our perennial rival Tijuana. In the biggest Ultimini upset in recent memory, the stacked Luchadores lost to us and I became an Ultimini champ.

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421 words

16) Make a comparison between your own team and a playoff team, if your team failed to make the postseason, showing why your squad was better. Written option available for 200 words or more.

The Baltimore Hawks did not make the postseason, and we were not that close. Finishing 3-11 was rough, but we were arguably better than the Sarasota Sailfish, who did make the playoffs with a 6-7 record as an expansion team. The main argument why our team was significantly better than the Sailfish was our incredible rushing attack. While the Sailfish relied more on the pass, our running attack(our strength) was better than their strength, which was their passing game. As well, the two teams were very close in PPG and opponent's PPG, meaning if a few more games went our way(Baltimore played a ton of close games and easily could've eeked out a few more victories), the Sailfish could've missed the playoffs entirely. The Sailfish also only barely had a better defense than us, and overall player-by-player our team was arguably better. Sure, we weren't able to actually make it count, but these two teams were very, very close in a lot of team statistics and with a few more updates and better bounces of the football, the Hawks will once again return to contention and the Sailfish could just as easily fall out of it. Only time will tell which team will come out on top in the NSFC in the future.

Code:

219 words

[MrStennett]

Tier 2, #5

I'm going to make my argument here for why Chicago Butchers wide receiver Sean O'Leary should be the Receiver of the Year award winner this season. Here's the argument opening disclaimer: I know that if you just look at O'Leary's numbers and stack them up against some of the other top talent at his position this season, it's not going to appear like it's even close. Yes, I know he only scored two touchdowns and I also know that he played for a team that only won one game. Neither of those facts are lost on me. Here's where it starts to get interesting. Playing on a bottom dwelling team that scored a league low 111 points (83 points less than the next lowest scoring team) of course he wasn't going to have touchdowns. I've never been overly crazy about using touchdowns as a metric to evaluate any offensive player anyways. You can be horrible in almost all aspects of your game but get lucky near the redzone a handful of times and all of a sudden you're a touchdown king. Therefore, I wouldn't even be overly concerned that he has nine less touchdowns than all of Deandre Thomas-Fox, Rod Tidwell, and Nate Swift. They're all on teams that were playoff contenders and therefore played on more capable offenses. As the number one option for each of their respective teams, they should be getting a lot of the scoring opportunities. Where O'Leary does stack up in his stats is in both the number of receptions he made and also in his receiving yards. He's tied for fifth with Swift for his reception total, and is one of only five receivers this season that topped 1000 yards. That is highly significant, and here's why. O'Leary played most of his season with Rose Jenkins at quarterback, who was heavily into regression and indeed retired at the end of the season. However, that's not as bad as it would get for O'Leary's prospects. After trading Jenkins to Sarasota for draft help, the Butchers signed 50 TPE quarterback Franky LeFluer. 50 TPE! He wouldn't even be a decent starter in the DSFL! This ridiculousness happened because Chicago quarterback prospect George O'Donnell requested to stay down and finish out his season with the Portland Pythons. Anyways, with LeFleur at the helm for five games (in which he threw ZERO touchdowns) O'Leary still managed to top 1000 yards, and exploded in the last game of the season for over one hundred yards. I don't have any evidence of this, but I have a feeling he may be the only receiver in NSFL history to have a hundred yard day with a 50 TPE quarterback. If that isn't worth an award, I'm not sure what is. Don't fall into the flashy number trap. Most of that is meaningless. Sean O'Leary is the REAL Wide Receiver of the Year.

Code:

481 words

Tier 3, #17

I'm going to make the argument that this year's playoff MVP is Colorado Yeti wide receiver James Bishop. Boy that hurts to type. *Cries in Otters* Anyways, James may not have had super flashy numbers, but he may have been the difference in not only the Yeti making it out of the first round of the playoffs, but also in them winning their franchise's first Ultimus trophy. Let's take a look at his stats from the three playoff games the Yeti competed in. In the wildcard game, the Yeti destroyed the Sailfish 36-14. While he didn't contribute to the scoring for the Yeti in a game where four different players (including a safety) had a touchdown, he led the team in both receptions and receiving yards, making big play after big play to move the Yeti downfield. Now, the second game against the Wraiths is kind of an anomaly, it was an incredibly defensive game where no Yeti player had more than 57 yards. It's the Ultimus game against the Otters where Bishop ultimately proved his worth. He once again led his team in receptions and receiving yardage, but his crowning moment came late in the fourth quarter when he caught the game winning touchdown pass from Wolfie McDummy that would end up giving the Yeti a one point victory in one of the most competitive Ultimus games in recent memory.

Code:

228 words

SHL PT Affiliation