*The Rockiest Road II - Printable Version

*The Rockiest Road II - Printable Version

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*The Rockiest Road II - Baron1898 - 08-20-2023

The Rockiest Road
Colorado’s Years in the Wilderness

Quote:I’m calling it right now: in the next couple of years, you’re going to see the Yeti play some competitive football, and the naysayers are going to be surprised. Wait for it. The Yeti are coming.

When TheMemeMaestro blew up the Colorado roster after Season 2, the expectation wasn't to compete right away. Him and Daybe were adamant that while it would take a few years, the Yeti rebuild would soon yield profits and postseason success.

But there were plenty of questions after the Season 3 campaign. Had the Yeti traded away too many valuable pieces for what they got in return? Was Pierno the future at quarterback? Should they build around stars like Boss Tweed and Johnathon Saint or would they be better served dealing them away for better draft capital? And were these GMs capable of leading Colorado back into contention?

Volume II: Into the Abyss

Season 4

"Still, someone has to be at the bottom, and right now, it’s us."

What can be seen clearly in this roster are the ramifications of league-wide change. With the offensive line opened up for robot employment, players across the league took advantage and switched to more helpful positions For the Yeti, who had only one active lineman in the first place, the rest of their inactive starters from Season 3 gradually dropped off the team as their contracts expired.

Running Back: The uncontested bell-cow of the backfield remained Tweed, with Newman putting up unremarkable numbers by his side. A midseason trade sent over a San Jose S5 third to Baltimore to acquire Darlane Farlane (@Gwdaja), who sent Newman to the sidelines and even out-snapped Tweed at running back on one occasion.

Wide Receiver: Your eyes are not deceiving you. Suiting up at the third wide receiver slot was none other than Brice Boggs, the team's starting cornerback, in lieu of the team's other options like Jaquan Young or DSFL send-down Tommy Brown. This is a rare example of two-way players being used before their eventual ban, likely because Boggs performed better than Young or Brown even with reduced endurance.

Defensive Line: Here was the destination of Antonio Sandoval, GM player and offensive line veteran. Sandoval replacing the inactive Bisquiteen Crocker helped form a more formidable front and relieve some pressure from Wozy.

Linebacker: Given a full season in the system, Hampshireton leapfrogged Steve Austin and denied him space in the linebacking corps. Both Hampshireton and Krimlaw, however, were themselves bumped down the depth chart by the arrival of the first-round rookie Ishigawa.

Secondary: Erikson and Novel were both listed as free safeties on the Colorado roster, but both took the vast majority of snaps at safety, with Mike McNoodle receiving limited playtime. Which one between Erikson and Novel filled the strong safety role is a question I currently don't have the answer to.

Special Teams: Colorado returned more kicks, and less punts, than any other team in the league in Season 4. The task of fielding these was once again shuffled, with Alex Hayden now as the primary kick returner and Tweed as his backup. Tweed's monopoly on punt returns carried over from the previous season.

There were not high expectations for Colorado this season, and they didn't do much to convince otherwise. The first week of the season, the Yeti traveled to San Jose to enjoy getting blown out 49-20. Pierno picked up right where he left off and threw four interceptions to the Sabercats defense; the offense moved up and down the field, but the aforementioned picks and two field goals inside the red zone killed any possible momentum for a comeback.

The first true test arrived the next week in the Yeti home debut. Their opponents were the pitiful Legion, comrades in misery over the past season. Colorado gained eight more first downs than Las Vegas, outgained them in yards 385 to 254, and rode Tweed to an excellent performance of 146 rushing yards on 30 carries and a score. Colorado also lost 27-13 and went scoreless in the second half. Pierno was the familiar culprit. In a two-score game, Pierno threw three interceptions, one of which was a pick-six and another of which turned a Colorado red zone possession into a Las Vegas red zone possession.

This ignominious start to the season cast quite a pall on the Yeti. Yes, they were a rebuilding team; was losing to the Legion, by two scores, at home, too far? And the most troubling sign was that Pierno didn't seem to be improving much at all. A power rankings article after Week 2 wrote:

Quote:I don’t think Pierno is a bad QB, and he’s definitely improving, But at what point does the project fall apart? The Yeti just look deflated on the field and can’t seem to get anything. The defense can’t stop, and so they turn to the still raw prospect to lead comeback drives and insurmountable odds. Would they take Logan Noble when he returns? Maybe.

It would soon come out that league observers were not the only ones thinking this. Pierno's user, ralz9, was an active and beloved presence in the Colorado locker room, and Maestro backed him wholeheartedly. But Daybe and the rest of the Yeti front office felt differently. Against the recommendations of his GMs, his teammates, and essentially every person in the league, ralz9 simply wasn't investing his TPE into the right attributes, choosing to boost speed and hands instead of accuracy, intelligence, or arm strength. Dissatisfied with his performance, Colorado management began considering a potential position switch where Fuego Wozy would take over as quarterback and Pierno moved to receiver.

According to Maestro's telling, PigSnout was going to run some tests with these switches and then the GMs would discuss the possibility with ralz9. But Maestro forgot to give PigSnout the necessary sim file, and although ralz9 had been approached with the idea, he was blindsided when Wozy submitted the position switch on November 9. Ralz9 reached out to team leadership for confirmation; receiving none, he posted an article and presser the next day discussing the switch and his desire to change teams.

This was a bad look for Colorado. Ralz9's article prompted a quick response and apology from Maestro about the handling and communication of the issue, and the former soon retracted his desire to move on to a new team. However, just a few days later on November 14, Daybe announced his intention to step down from the co-GM role, citing personal issues. In his place, Maestro hired @sapp2013, a promising rookie in the forthcoming Season 5 draft.

Hiring sapp also came with some shenanigans involved. Sapp was the highest earner in his draft class and widely expected to go to the Yeti, who were on pace to hold both the highest (their own) and second highest (the Legion's) first round picks. But seeing as GM players were required to be taken with the team's highest second rounder, sapp and Maestro could essentially get another first round talent for free by taking him a round later. This subversion of the system was not viewed kindly by other GMs and by HO, and Colorado was forced to use their highest available pick on his player, Andre Bly Jr.

Changing leadership did not change the team's fortunes on the field. In a run of three consecutive road games, the Yeti lost 48-17, 30-14 (to the Legion!), and 26-14. The last of these, and the closest, was against Philadelphia. Despite a terrible 40-yard day from Tweed, a Hayden pick six and Pierno touchdown put the Yeti up 14-13 through three quarters. But Colorado's defense – aided by atrocious punting and a missed field goal from Kicksit – couldn't stop Philly from finding the endzone twice.

Helpfully, Pierno was beginning to play with a positive turnover differential. He threw no interceptions in the Philadelphia game and paired one with two touchdown throws in the Week 6 37-23 home loss to Orange County. But again, despite outgaining the Otters and sustaining a number of long drives, Colorado just couldn't put the pieces together. Two red zone trips ended in field goals, with fumbles, sacks, and the aforementioned interception giving the opponent great field position.

The Yeti locker room conveyed none of the doom and gloom permeating the team's football. In Maestro's view, the atmosphere had improved significantly from when he had taken over as GM after Season 2. The core group of actives – Pierno, Tweed, Sebastian Joyce, Sandoval, Ishigawa, Saint, Brice Boggs, and Hayden – was talkative, energetic, and excited to be part of the team. There was a sense that within a few years, Colorado would be primed to win it all.

Which was good, because they were having a hard enough time at the moment winning a game. Week 7 marked the halfway point of the season and yet another loss to the tune of a 33-14 final score. Great efforts by defensive players like Saint were not enough to stem the bleeding of Pierno, who reverted back to a one touchdown, four interception mindset. The Yeti now had a -135-point differential on the season, ranked dead last in the standings, and began to confront the uncomfortable possibility of a winless season.

There was plenty of time left in the season to avoid such infamy. Less time after a 46-9 slaughter on the road against the Outlaws; less still after a 27-10 home defeat to the Wraiths. Colorado had five opponents left, only one of which had a record under .500. First on the pecking order was Baltimore.

The sun shone on the Rocky Mountain State that day. Turk Turkleton, the most accurate kicker in the league, missed an opening drive field goal and later missed an extra point. Colorado got eight sacks on Avon Blocksdale from six different players. The Yeti scored a touchdown in the dying seconds of the first half to pull ahead 10-9, a lead they bolstered in the third quarter when Arby Krimlaw took one to the house. The Hawks comeback drive stalled, and the Yeti won their first game of the season 20-12.

History was not made, and Colorado took a sigh of relief. They followed up the victory with a 40-0 drubbing courtesy of the Otters. Saint and Krimlaw had good days, which could not be said of a single player on the other side of the ball. Ditto for the week after. In a 32-9 loss to Philly, Nicholas Pierno went seven of eighteen for 74 yards, two interceptions, and a clean 12.0 passer rating good for the ninth worst game of all time.

Colorado clearly had their eyes on the offseason. The two final games of the season were, surprisingly, also complete blowouts. At home, Arizona mopped the floor with them 44-12, and at Yellowknife, the visitors were shut out 31-0. Colorado officially became the first team in league history to post only a single win over an entire season.

Maestro and sapp had set out to double the wins every season, starting from one win in S4 to two in S5, four in S6, eight and the playoffs in S7, and then hopefully the Ultimus in S8. In this grand plan, the one-win Season 4 was an expected result, if still dismal. Only four Yeti players received Pro Bowls: Boss Tweed, Fuego Wozy, Johnathan Saint, and Alex Hayden. The team understood, however, that this would be a long rebuild and that success was a few seasons away. They handed Boggs a three-year, $27 million deal and extended a few inactives on one-year contracts.

The first major news of the offseason was a seismic event that shook the whole league: the Las Vegas Mass Retirement. On December 8, 2017, most of the key players of the Legion and a GM all retired in one mass post, including former Yeti Wyatt Fulton and Philippe Carter. The exodus was motivated by many factors: a toxic league community, a loss of interest, and the endless barrage of scandals and drama (ironically only a week before the largest NSFL scandal of all time broke) were all listed as contributors.

The mass retirement unleashed a firestorm of controversy and discussion, but one of the largest ramifications was the massive imbalance it created in parity. The Legion, already one of the worst teams in the league, had just lost almost all of their few active players to sudden retirement and couldn't even use them as inactive corpses to put on the field. Head Office scrambled to find a new GM to steady the ship in Las Vegas and avoid possible contraction.

Sapp applied in HO chat to take over as the GM of the Legion, but Maestro tried to sway HO against his application because he was already contributing in Colorado and moving him might create imbalance for two teams. Instead, league leadership went with @cosbornballboy, Maestro's real-life brother. Only a few days later, cosborn resigned from his position due to feeling he needed more experience, and @bovovovo took his place.

The most immediate impact was a three-way trade between Colorado, Las Vegas, and Arizona. The Yeti gained three new players from this exchange: defensive tackle Ricardo Sandoval (cosborn) and receiver Brian Wheat (@Wheaties) from the Legion, and defensive end Eidur Gustavsson (@Kris) from the Outlaws. In return, Colorado sent three of their own to Arizona: Alex Hayden, Fuego Wozy, and Damian West. The new Sandoval signed on for a three-year extension through Season 8.

A subsequent trade with Las Vegas ended two seasons of uncertainty by finally flipping Logan Noble for the price of a S6 third. It was a somewhat anticlimactic end to the Noble saga; besides the inactive signings of defensive end Arjen De Ligt (@Ducks) and defensive tackle Luke Pierce (@Ramadeus) and the one-year extension of Pierno, it was the last move of the offseason before the upcoming draft.

This was the first draft with Maestro and sapp as a GM pair. Given the draft capital at their disposal, with both of the top two picks, it was important to nail the continuing rebuild. They took:

Pick 1 – Carlito Crush, TE @JKortesi81
Pick 2 – Andre Bly Jr., CB @sapp2013
Pick 9 – Michael Tillman, S @mmfootball
Pick 17 – Isaac Brown, QB @datboi
Pick 25 – Luke Kraken, LB @Bgreene21
Pick 33 – Thomas Mango, RB @x 23 o
Pick 36 – Lamarcus Mills, CB @ajyoungmark
Pick 39 – John Mueller, K @Hamesthegreat

Since Colorado held both the first and second picks, they were allowed to draft Bly Jr. in the second spot so that Crush could get drafted first overall. Sapp preferred drafting receiver John Wachter over Crush, but JKortesi paid dividends as a very active league presence and weapon for Pierno to throw to. Unfortunately, Tillman was the only other active user in this draft haul. Shortly after being drafted, Isaac Brown told the GMs that he didn't want to play on the team and asked to be traded away.

He got his wish a few days later. Another trade with the Legion gave them Brown and Lamarcus Mills with an S6 fourth round pick to get cornerback Tyler Grant (@gth66897), kicker Peg Leg (@hockeyis66), and running back Shawn Ariel (@Luminous). With this business out of the way, the rest of the Yeti rookies signed their contracts.

Two final player transactions before the season started shaped how Colorado's future played out. First, Daybe retired Brice Boggs. Boggs played one final season before Daybe recreated to a new position beneficial to the Yeti since he wasn't enjoying playing cornerback. Second, Pierno was signed to a much larger deal, extending through Season 8 on a deal worth $17 million in total. The team was fully committed to the Pierno project for the foreseeable future, despite his subpar earnings and TPE distribution. Whether this was a wise decision remained up in the air.

Season 5

"It's been good for our guys to know that there's a plan, and that we're not just going out there to earn a paycheck."

In many ways, the season was shaping up to be a repeat of the year prior. One key difference compared to Season 4? The number of personnel changes, including some roster spots that had not changed hands since the league began.

Wide Receiver: Inactive WR1 Hendrix continued to pace the team in touchdowns and yards, although in a year when every other team's top option eclipsed 1500 receiving yards, his 483 yard tally was considerably worse than nearly every other team's WR3. He had a new surrounding cast yet again; former Las Vegas wideout Brian Wheat took the second spot and led the team in catches, while former S1 first overall pick J.J. Reigns wasn't far behind either. Reigns joined the roster a day after the season started courtesy of a one-for-one player swap with Orange County that saw the departure of rookie running back Thomas Mango.

Tight End: As expected, first overall rookie Carlito Crush relegated Joyce to limited snaps. Crush himself went for only 306 yards on the year, seventh in the league for tight ends in a year where only seven teams played a tight end at all.

Defensive Line: With the stalwart Wozy off the edge, the entire makeup of the line was shaken up. For the first time since Season 1, Colorado went back to a 4-3 front with two defensive tackles. Shi'terrick Skidmarks' contract expired, so DSFL call-up Luke Pierce suited up beside trade acquisition Ricardo Sandoval. His brother, Antonio, was now the primary threat on the edge, flanked by former Outlaw Eidur Gustavsson.

Secondary: Rookie Michael Tillman assumed the role of strong safety, booting Novel back down to the nickelback position. Meanwhile, another staple of the Colorado roster since Season 1, Alex Hayden, left with Wozy through trade and saw his old spot at corner taken by the GM rookie Andre Bly Jr.

Special Teams: Peg Leg became only the second person in team history to kick field goals for the Yeti since Kicksit left the team in free agency. Kick returning split almost evenly between Boggs and Bly Jr., and though Boggs had a higher average and more yards, both returners scored two touchdowns apiece. They also shared punt returning, with Bly Jr. taking the lead in touches there.

Quote:Well the trimmed fat has made this team look great. The Yeti have to have pierno make a leap if they plan to make this a 4 win season, but they’re starting to look good. There’s a lot to love about this team, they’re not getting blown out and they’re playing games close. Pierno making the leap is going to be key, he’s shown flashes in the preseason, now he just needs to keep his foot on the gas.

Offseason improvements lent the Yeti some credence of positive thinking across the league community. Everyone knew they'd be bad, but it was up for debate how bad they'd end up being. It still wasn't much of a surprise when, playing an Outlaws team reeling from the Er multi scandal on the road, the Yeti still managed to lose 34-9, throw three interceptions, and amass only 80 yards through the air.

But the stretch of season after the opener proved that the positivity from Colorado wasn't unfounded. The team kept it close in a 20-17 loss on the road to Orange County and might have taken the game to overtime if they had tried a 55 yard field goal instead of going for a fourth-and-ten. They led the Sabercats 14-10 after three quarters at home in Week 3 and came close to tying the 21-14 game if not for some awful clock management. The 31-16 Week 4 loss to Philadelphia was more typical, but the Yeti followed it with a 19-12 victory on the road in Las Vegas. In all but the Philadelphia game, Pierno threw no interceptions and even came close to his first career game with a three-digit passer rating.

In Week 6, Colorado hosted the Baltimore Hawks. Pierno again threw no interceptions and finished 16/24 for 204 yards and a 93.1 rating. Despite the decent showing, Colorado got blown out 34-3, partly because Avon Blocksdale lit the defense on fire and partly because Tweed posted a revolting 26 yards on seventeen carries. The magic ended the next week against Yellowknife; Colorado opened the game 14-0 after 75 seconds from a Bly Jr. kickoff return and a Vash Erikson pick six, then lost the game 56-20 in part because Pierno threw three interceptions himself – two pick sixes and a third one yard short.

At the midway point of the season, the Yeti stood with a 1-6 record, tied with the Legion for the league worst. Community consensus saw them as a better team than the Legion, though that was probably as much as they would be able to muster. Quoting a power rankings article:

Quote:Dont expect the Yeti to end the season with any more than 2 wins. They aren't good enough right now to upset any teams, and it tells you what the league thinks of them when they were surprised they beat the Legion. You do you though Yeti. You do you.

Such prognostications could not dampen the spirits of the team. The locker room remained a high-flying source of energy and positive in the direction of the team. One interaction from the time directly referenced the power rankings mentioned above.

[Image: dW9Lc6t.png]

The Arizona game in question was in Week 8. After falling behind 21-7 early in the third, the Yeti rallied back to tie the game at 21 with two touchdown runs from Pierno and Farlane. Then, after receiving the ball again in excellent field position, Pierno threw an interception that sparked an Outlaws touchdown drive. The Yeti got the ball back and were knocking on the door of the Arizona red zone as time dwindled… until Pierno ended the game with a second pick.

He hadn't thrown a touchdown since the first game against the Legion, and he didn't throw another until the second Legion game. In the meantime, the Yeti lost in Week 9 29-10, in Week 10 24-20, and in Week 11 34-0. It cannot be overstated how putrid the offense was in this stretch. All three touchdowns were scored by the defense or special teams. Opposing teams practically doubled Colorado's yardage in each game, no receiver eclipsed 50 yards, and even Tweed struggled to get anything moving. Stars like Saint and Bly Jr. tried their hardest to keep games close, but when the offense failed to score on drive after drive, the defense could only do so much.

The best remedy for any team's woes in the early NSFL was to play the Legion at home, and Colorado got their second win of the season in such a fashion. Pierno finally threw another touchdown, this one to Hendrix, and Tweed exploded for 171 yards, while the defense held Las Vegas to a 1/15 third down conversion rate and picked off former Yeti quarterback Logan Noble. They may have both come from facing the Legion, but Colorado had earned the two wins set out for in the GMs' grand plan.

There, their wins would cap out for the year. In two final games, Colorado lost 30-6 to the Hawks and 44-3 to the Wraiths. Only the Legion finished the year with fewer wins than the 2-12 Yeti. Pierno's season ended with a 55.0 passer rating, which ranks ninth all-time for the lowest mark, but in fairness it was still an improvement over his prior two campaigns, which rank second and fifth worst respectively. One more year of improvement like this and Pierno might actually escape the bottom ten.

Tweed, Ricardo Sandoval, Saint, and Bly Jr. were Pro Bowl selections, while Tweed won the first award for a Yeti since Season 1 with Performance of the Year, honoring his Week 12 performance against the Legion with 171 yards on 34 rushes. Despite the season's outcome, the Yeti could feel a distinct upwards momentum to the team. They had won only two games, right on track with internal goals, but had been on the cusp of stealing victories in a number of close games throughout the year. Pierno was improving, somewhat, and the top three rookies of the draft class were still active and engaged, even if Crush's performance on the field was hampered by his quarterback.

The team started the offseason with a bevy of re-signings. GM Sandoval extended himself through Season 8 on a minimum contract and extended backup tight end Sebastian Joyce for the same time span, as well as renewing the one-year contracts for a handful of inactive contributors. Receiver Brian Wheat also signed for $6 million through Season 8, ensuring Pierno would have an active weapon for the next few years as the rebuild chugged along.

A different league rebuild now had a new face: the Las Vegas Legion were relocating and rebranding as the New Orleans Second Line. They held the first overall pick and signaled very early on that linebacker Brian Mills would be their target. This helped the Yeti zero in on their preferred pick, receiver Dwayne Aaron (@Supersquare04), who would be a massive addition to the offense and provide an active target for Pierno besides Wheat and Crush.

On the day of the draft, Philadelphia asked Colorado about the possibility of trading back to Philly's pick at fourth overall, since the Liberty coveted defensive lineman Cordell Joshua and were afraid he would go before them to San Jose. But sapp, running the draft process, was concerned that if the Yeti dropped to fourth, the Sabercats at pick three would steal Aaron. He communicated with both San Jose and Philadelphia, telling them both that the other party was driving up the price for a trade-up to take Joshua. Enough time elapsed that Head Office prompted Colorado to stop stalling and make a selection, at which point sapp proposed one final offer to San Jose, threatening that they would need to relinquish both their S6 first and their S7 first to move up to Colorado's spot and take Joshua before the Liberty took the same offer.

This did the trick. Colorado swapped down one pick to the third overall spot, took the player they would have taken regardless, and gained San Jose's S7 first rounder in the process.

Pick 3 – Dwayne Aaron, WR @Supersquare04
Pick 10 – Bobby Ruckus, S @ghostfacethrilla
Pick 18 – Micycle McCormick, K @infinitempg
Pick 21 – Storm Woods, CB @Sopath
Pick 26 – Grey Slax, WR @Jonstradamus

Bobby Ruckus was a favored pick of Maestro and filled a positional need given the retirement of safety Levon Novel, but unfortunately went inactive almost immediately after the draft. In similar veins, Storm Woods and Grey Slax were depth pieces at positions of need but weren't exactly expected to set the league on fire.

The other pick in this draft merits special mention. Forfeit was nearly universally considered the best kicker in the draft as a sim league veteran and had even on occasion been mocked as going in the third round. But when the Yeti selected a kicker in the third round to replace the talents of Peg Leg, they went with a new user who had impressed sapp with a few good sigs. Forfeit, who went the next pick, had a pretty good career. But McCormick's user, infinitempg, almost instantly became one of the most active users in the league. The benefits to Colorado's long-term health went far beyond McCormick's value as a player; in drafting infinite, the franchise gained an eventual three-time winner of Most Dedicated User, a member of the User Hall of Fame, and possibly the most vocal cheerleader of the Yeti in franchise history.

One piece of discussion over the offseason was prompted by Tyler Oles, a cornerback for the Liberty, position switching to quarterback when their previous starter went inactive. Ralz9 made a discussion post complaining about the league's arbitrary position switches, stating that there was no point of even drafting a quarterback when high TPE starters at any position could simply switch over. This started an interesting, and incomplete, discussion around possible solutions to the problem, one which remained a subject of debate for years.

It also reflected a position held by the Yeti GMs and many players against the practice. Some critics of the Yeti rebuild, notably including @tlk742, saw this position less as a moral stand and more as resentment that their homegrown quarterback was continuing to perform worse than every other starter in the league. In a thunderdome post, tlk wrote:

Quote:If a team losing a QB must require a rebuild rather than switch is sour grapes. Here’s why. Pierno is a sucky QB…. take it from an expert, TPE means squat if you build shitty. I’m going to put my money where my mouth is, @bovo will have a better season this season than Pierno, a QB who took 8 games to record a TD. It’s not going to be close.

The final major change for the Yeti this offseason was the free agent signing of linebacker AC Hackett (@Deusolis). A veteran of three teams over the past five seasons, Hackett would provide a major boost in the linebacking corps beside Saint and Ishigawa for the price of $13.5 million over two seasons.

So now Colorado looked forward to Season 6 with continued positivity. They had upgraded on both sides of the ball and planned on utilizing Pierno's mobility in a run-heavy two back system. They were primed to shoot for the four wins promised in the GM regime's outline. The worst of the rebuild was finally over; here would start Colorado's upwards ascent.

Season 6

"How the hell did this happen man? How did we become even more of a joke in this league?"

Colorado had the pieces they needed across the board. Sure, Pierno was still funneling TPE into speed and hands, but with his supporting cast and with the activity and enthusiasm of the locker room, four wins was still on the table.

Running Back: Soon after the season started, backup tight end Sebastian Joyce switched position to running back and unseated Darlane Farlane. In practice, Joyce essentially served as the backfield's third option after Tweed and quarterback Pierno, and the three combined for 1917 yards on the ground, most of any team in the league.

Wide Receiver: After five seasons as the top wideout, Hendrix's production fell behind not only the receivers in front of him but Crush and Tweed as well. The new WR1 in town was rookie Dwayne Aaron with 596 yards, still well short of the next lowest WR1's yardage, Yellowknife's Bailey Cook with 1130.

Linebacker: Free agent signing AC Hackett rocketed into the linebacking corps, forming a largely three-headed monster with Saint and Ishigawa also having excellent statistical campaigns. Krimlaw moved down to the fourth roster spot but still posted solid numbers.

Secondary: This season saw a complete reshuffling of the secondary. Brice Boggs’ retirement elevated Bly Jr. into the starting cornerback position, where he worked alongside third-round rookie Storm Woods. Fellow draftee Bobby Ruckus, meanwhile, assumed the role of strong safety. In a bit of musical chairs, the former strong safety Tillman moved to free safety and booted Erikson to the nickel back slot.

Special Teams: Peg Leg’s stint as the Yeti specialist was over with the drafting of McCormick, who took over all kicking duties and assumed the punter position as well when Leg got traded mid-season back to New Orleans. Bly Jr. continued sharing kick returning snaps, not with Boggs but with returning stalwart Boss Tweed, but returned all available punts.

Since Maestro didn’t have the sim, sapp was the GM in charge of testing. Colorado split the preseason set of games in the leadup to the season opener, a home bout against the Hawks. It began promisingly enough; two fumbles recovered by Ishigawa helped set up Yeti scoring drives, McCormick kicked three field goals, and the team led 16-6 at halftime. Then, on the second play of the second half, Pierno threw an interception deep in his own territory that turned into a Baltimore score. Later, tied 16-16 and after Hawks QB Avon Blocksdale turned the ball over, Pierno responded with his own pick-six. The match ended on a 30-23 loss.

Pierno rushed seventeen times in Week 1, tied with Tweed for the lead, and had double-digit rushes again the next week facing the Wraiths, leading the team with 59 rushing yards. Unfortunately, he also led the team in picks, tossing another pass the direction of the other team. McCormick was the only player to score in a suffocating 23-9 defeat. Against Philly in Week 3, Pierno notched his first two touchdowns of the season, one in the air and one on the ground, but Colorado was already down 24-0 before they found paydirt and lost 41-14.

Criticism of the Yeti, and of Pierno in particular, carried over from the offseason with aplomb. In his power rankings following Week 3, tlk fired another shot in his blurb for the team, who were unsurprisingly ranked last:

Quote:Some things are constant, Death, Taxes, and Pierno holding the Yeti back. Let’s zoom in deeper and I’ll explain why. The defense for the Yeti has been one of the best in the league. You heard that right. They have a league high 20 passes deflected as well as having nine total turnovers generated. Yet the team is still winless. The team has scored a total of 4, rushing and passing touchdowns this season so far. That’s not a great record for success. Doesn’t help when your QB has a 2:4 TD:INT total rate and a 1:4 in the air.

Ralz9 remained undaunted and dismissive of tlk’s criticisms, stating in-character that he would let his performance on the field speak for him. And his contributions to the spirit of the locker room were unparalleled. But his incorrigibility and stubbornness are still puzzling. There was a wealth of evidence that building a quarterback his way simply wasn’t working. He was in his fourth season and getting outplayed by rookies. Why did he refuse, after endless discussions, to put TPE into accuracy instead of speed or intelligence instead of hands?

No one could peer into ralz9’s mind, and the Colorado GMs, with their staunch opposition to pushing builds onto players, weren’t going to force his hand. If his performance on the field was meant to speak for him, then his case looked ever flimsier. Colorado was blown out on the road once again in Week 4, this time 31-7 to San Jose. The defense continued trying their best, with Hackett, Saint, and Bly Jr. posting some solid stats. Their efforts remained in vain.

Improvement could be seen in Week 5. Pierno threw two touchdowns to only one pick. The defense snagged three turnovers, one of them a pick-six by Michael Tillman. Carlito Crush caught a touchdown for the first time in his career. All of these were irrelevant. The Outlaws gained 569 total yards to 240 for the Yeti and outscored them 37-24. The chief culprit was the running game – Pierno again hogged touches but did zilch with them, rushing fifteen times for only eight yards and two fumbles.

True embarrassment came the next game. Vash Erikson caught a pick-six and Boss Tweed scored a kickoff return touchdown, the only silver linings in a 69-17 thrashing at the hands of Orange County. Colorado completed fewer passes (five) than the Otters threw touchdowns (eight, still tied for the league record). 69 points, by the way, is tied for the second highest score in league history. The Week 7 loss to New Orleans was much less high scoring, only a 23-7 slow cooking, but truly reflected the ineptitude of the franchise. It was only the season prior that these two teams shared the gutter. One team’s rebuild was taking off, and Colorado was being left behind.

This was the context for an incendiary article posted by JKortesi. He issued damning rebukes of Pierno’s terrible quarterbacking, Crush’s subpar usage, and the lack of a winning atmosphere, whose principal cause could be traced to the team’s GM, Maestro. This article was written in-character, but it contained many kernels of truth. Maestro did state in the locker room, as alleged, that the Yeti was around 6th on his “List of Important Things to Do”; whether this was in jest or firing back at critics of his activity is unclear.

It wasn’t a one-off criticism. Increasingly, Maestro’s leadership (or lack thereof) was becoming an issue in Colorado. Sapp handled the large majority of GMing tasks, from simming and depth charts to posting transactions on the forums. Maestro’s activity in the Yeti locker room was spotty and in GM chat was practically nonexistent, with sapp responsible for the bulk of communication. The article may have been posted in-character, but most responses were not, and the general direction of the team under current management came under fire:

Quote:The call out is needed. Yeti have had enough opportunities to turn the franchise around and there isn't enough of an excuse to still be playing at this level for this long. This is a game that people play to have a good time and when the people responsible to help their players succeed cannot deliver it invalidates the work of their players and turns something fun into something frustrating.

JKortesi propositioned the team GMs for some potentially better usages of his player, from position switching to receiver or quarterback to trading him for draft value. These were turned down, in part because the team remained firmly anti-position switching for need and in part because the upcoming draft was full of top-level talent at receiver. Besides, Pierno was still committed as the starter at quarterback.

The day after JKortesi posted his tirade, tlk added to the conversation by posting a number of “Shadow GM” suggestions in media. He believed that to turn the ship around, Colorado needed to get value by trading away two of Tweed, Crush, Ishigawa, and Saint, replace Pierno with a new quarterback, make it clear that the rebuild would last a few more seasons to foster a better community, and hit on every draft pick possible.

Sapp responded to these suggestions in great detail. First, he said that the Yeti scouting messages from prior drafts had been very clear about the rebuilding status of the team and timetable for contention: competitive by Season 7, contending for the Ultimus in Season 8. This had not changed despite the rough start to the season. And in regard to building a strong community, the Yeti were actually one of the most active teams in the league despite their low TPE totals and some questionably updating players.

[Image: xxSzVwI.png?2]

Second, he wasn’t keen on trading away premium veteran players; in fact, all of the four listed besides Crush signed extensions between JKortesi’s article and tlk’s. The team frequently gauged the desires of its players and their thoughts on the season’s outcome. He also didn’t give up on Pierno, even though he acknowledged that the quarterback’s tenure thus far was “a failure”. Multiple times throughout the season, sim testing gave Colorado better than a coin flip’s odds of winning. Luck had simply not on their side.

The losses didn’t abate after the season’s halfway point. Colorado fell at home 44-20 to San Jose, with Tweed scoring twice and also fumbling the ball away twice on the Yeti side of the field. Then came another home loss, 38-14 to the Otters. Tweed and Pierno each took home a rushing touchdown to go up 14-7 early in the second, then despite three defensive turnovers refused to generate any more offense and let the Otters score 31 unanswered points.

Colorado was now 0-9. Ishigawa pledged to wear fox ears and a tail until the team won a game. They had a home date with the 1-7-1 Second Line, their last best chance to get into the win column and avoid the increasingly uncomfortable possibility of the league’s first winless season.

It was a game for the ages. Pierno finally had an outing with a passer rating over 100 and his first game this season with multiple touchdowns and no turnovers. He also added 98 yards on the ground. The Yeti started off hot by going up 14-0, New Orleans tied it by halftime, and the teams exchanged touchdowns in the third. Peg Leg kicked a field goal early in the fourth, but McCormick missed a 57-yarder that would have answered back. Two other Yeti drives stalled out on short third downs, and they couldn’t stop the Second Line from running out the clock. The final score was 24-21.

Four games left to prevent calamity. The first three were all on the road, and all ended badly. 35-10 against the Outlaws. 45-10 against the Hawks. 66-6 against the Wraiths. There have been a grand total of four games in league history with a larger margin of victory than that Week 13 loss in Yellowknife. Only hosting the conference-leading Liberty held possibility of staving off eternal ignominy.

It was not to be. The Colorado Yeti finished the season by suffering a 35-15 beatdown, scoring entirely through two field goals, a 78-yard interception return, and a safety. Philadelphia earned home field advantage; Colorado earned the infamy of an 0-14 record. Absolutely nothing had gone right for the Yeti this season.

When is loyalty earned? Colorado won three games in three seasons. The clock on the rebuild was winding perilously down. Yet loyalty to this sorry franchise continued to influence the actions of many of the team’s key players over a tumultuous offseason.

ExemplaryChad, the user behind linebacker Haruki Ishigawa, felt obligated to give the team his loyalty. He loved the culture of the locker room, the welcoming nature of his GMs and teammates, and the captaincy system that allowed veteran players like himself to directly communicate with team leadership over the team’s direction. He believed, ever so stubbornly, that the fortunes of the Yeti would turn around.

Quote:I want the excitement of sticking it out through a rebuild. We’re not winning right now; that much is obvious. But at some point over the course of my (hopefully long) career, we will start winning. And it’s going to be that much sweeter when we do.

Not all star players were in it for the long haul. Linebacker AC Hackett, the free agent acquisition from an offseason prior, was traded to the Outlaws for linebacker Rob Anderson (@Robigo_) and a few mid-round draft picks. Then, the next day, franchise superstar Boss Tweed packed his bags for a trade to the Wraiths. In return for him and a couple draft picks, the Yeti garnered two firsts and a second in the upcoming S7 Draft as well as replacement rusher Bubba Nuck (@NUCK).

Tweed had been with the Yeti since the very first season, and he wanted to remain a Yeti for life. Time, however, was not on his side. Facing regression and staring down a team that was very clearly still a few seasons away from success, he was approached by the team GMs about a possible trade and agreed to the mutual parting. He left on good terms, and the return value was even sweeter – Colorado now owned half of the entire S7 first round.

There was, however, an even bigger shakeup yet to come. Ralz9, the user behind Pierno, decided at the end of Season 6 that he was finished with sim leagues. The controversial quarterback would not be hanging up the cleats entirely; as a favor to the Yeti, Pierno switched positions to defensive tackle so that the team could keep some value. Given the staunch opposition to unnatural position switches preached by practically every Yeti, including ralz9 himself and team leaders, moving from mobile quarterback to the interior defensive line was far from ideal. But at long last, the Yeti were free to reset at signal caller.

There were plenty of choices up ahead in the draft, and a draft day trade would send two seconds over to Philly for a fifth first-rounder at pick 7. Colorado had many, many holes to fill to meet the goal of immediate contention. These would not be filled, however, by linebacker prospect Mason Brown (@Toasty). Toasty made it very clear prior to the draft that he would not play for any team run by Maestro. Having been under him once before in the SBA, Toasty saw Maestro as an inactive mess of a GM who only remained on the Yeti to claim credit for turning the team around. In his words:

Quote:I have nothing against the Yeti, I will continue to cheer for them when I don’t play them, but I will be more than happy to play for them if Mememastero is not running the show. I respect the hell out of the organization, but not the General Manager Mememastero. I respect him a person, but a Generla Manager I dispise the hell out of him.

Maestro defended himself in the comments, but the team wasn't terribly plussed about missing out on Toasty. They had lots of capital, especially with the Liberty trade, and many promising prospects to choose from. They chose:

Pick 1 – Howard Miller, WR @dropbear
Pick 4 – Mark Grau, WR @keanex
Pick 5 – Ryan Lefevre, LB @feve10
Pick 6 – Desta Danger, CB @DestaDanger
Pick 7 – Ryan Applehort, QB @Daybe
Pick 13 – Alvin Chipmunk, TE @andybj
Pick 17 – Bubba Beau-Boucher, S @Angels_Otani
Pick 21 – DeAndre Green, WR @GridironGang

Howard Miller, and fellow prospect Verso L'Alto, were the near consensus top two selections, and the draft played to chalk. Baltimore balked at Colorado's attempts to trade up to the second pick and take L'Alto. At the third pick, meanwhile, Orange County managed to snag the next best prospect, cornerback Vladimir Fyodorovich, by taking advantage of Toasty's very public feud with Colorado. They gambled correctly that they would be able to get him with their other first rounder at pick 8.

Now the Yeti had four picks in a row. Mark Grau was another young weapon at wideout, while Ryan Lefevre and Desta Danger were both friends in real life and came as a package deal. But the obvious key selection in this run was Ryan Applehort, new franchise quarterback and the return of Daybe to the Yeti after he retired Brice Boggs. His development would be key to any hope of Colorado contention in the near future.

His wasn't the Colorado pick that took the most attention on draft night. Keanex, the user of Mark Grau, realized soon after being drafted that his goal of being a WR1/2 was essentially impossible on a team with Dwayne Aaron, Carlito Crush, and Howard Miller all young and earning. He blew up during the draft stream and declared his intent to hold out from the Yeti.

Thankfully for the Yeti, the situation was smoothed over after a lengthy conversation between keanex and sapp. The two discussed expectations for his player, keanex renounced his intention to hold out, and Mark Grau spent the next season down in the DSFL. The Yeti also signed inactive receiver Victor Ball (@jcfbey01) and sent him to the DSFL as well, coaxing him into joining the locker room and updating his player. Unfortunately, this reclamation project never bore fruit for Colorado and Ball went inactive again within a few weeks.

Season 7

"Year after year the team says they are built for the future, yet nothing really changes."

Expectations for the Yeti in Season 7 depended on who you spoke to.

Quote:The goal is five from me. Five wins. We've got a solid defense… I believe that I can bring this team to five wins at quarterback, something Pierno wasn't able to do. I'm very confident in our abilities.

Quote:I mean, any player on the Yeti that expects to compete this year is pretty foolish. But this squad is looking nice for the future.

Quote:If yeti go winless two years in a row I’ll post a video of me using a plunger on my bum hole

Across the league, the sentiment was similar. This squad was almost certainly one of, if not the worst, teams in the league. But with such youth across the offensive board, and some key pieces on defense reaching their apex, Colorado had the potential to become incredibly dangerous in no time.

Quarterback: Out with the old, in with the new. At long last, the Colorado Yeti had a quarterback behind center committed to building attributes relevant to his performance. Playing against the high expectations for Applehort was the unforgiving nature of the sim towards rookie quarterbacks, and the latter won out. He finished bottom of the league in every conceivable metric – except interceptions, where he lapped the competition with 21 – and posted a 47.6 passer rating, which at the time was sandwiched between two Pierno seasons as the three worst season passer ratings in ISFL history and still ranks fourth. But still, at least he wasn't pouring TPE into speed. Progress at last.

He also, ironically enough, holds an ISFL record for rushing... albeit an inglorious one. His -38 rushing yards ranks all alone in the record books as the fewest yards on the ground by any player in any season. Somehow, despite averaging more than a yard lost on every attempt, Applehort scored a rushing touchdown.

Running Back: Replacing the production of Tweed was a two man job. Stepping into the primary role was Bubba Nuck, acquired in the trade with the Wraiths that sent Tweed away. He enjoyed a near-equal split in carries with holdover Sebastian Joyce, although Nuck scored three touchdowns to Joyce's one. As previously mentioned, Applehort also contributed to the rushing game in his own way.

Wide Receiver: The hierarchy of power in the Yeti receiving corps was about to change. Rookie Howard Miller just barely edged out the sophomore Dwayne Aaron in catches and yards, although Aaron still led him in scores. In what was becoming a Yeti tradition, neither wideout even came close to breaking 1000 receiving yards, which every other team's primary option was able to accomplish. Veteran Brian Wheat wasn't too far behind the young duo in numbers.

Tight End: Applehort was the star of the offseason, but the most impactful roster news of Season 7 came when Carlito Crush was traded away to the Orange County Otters. Steven O'Sullivan (@StevenOSullivan) took his place in turn and finished out the year as the Yeti's new weapon at the position.

Defensive Line: After suffering a motorcycle accident and healing with cybernetic implants that conveniently changed his body's physique, Nicholas Pierno switched sides of the ball and found a new home at defensive tackle. The other new faces on the line, and the absence of Ricardo Sandoval, can be attributed once again to midseason trades – Dan Miller (@7hawk77) came over when Sandoval was sent away to San Jose, while Dental Dam (@Foompin) was another piece of compensation for the Carlito Crush deal.

Linebacker: Colorado now primarily used a 4-3 front, with Saint staying put as the primary linebacker and the loyal Ishigawa by his side. The new face in the group was rookie Ryan LeFevre, and he had an unspectacular output stuck behind the two other stars at the position. This was the least of Colorado's worries. The true heartbreak came when both LeFevre and his friend Desta Danger essentially disappeared not long after draft day, going inactive and never returning. Just like that, two prime first round picks had gone down the drain.

Secondary: Only one new face joined the Yeti secondary this season, that being the rookie Danger. His arrival on the field was soured by the previously mentioned plunge into inactivity, although he stuck around for a slighter longer duration than his linebacker friend.

Special Teams: The return situation resembled to a large degree that of the season before; Bly Jr. returned all punts and split kick duties almost evenly with a teammate. But since Tweed was out the door, Bly's new return partner was the rookie phenom Howard Miller.

It was a disappointing effort out the gate for this crew. Ryan Applehort had a rude introduction to the league in the home opener against Yellowknife, completing only fourteen passes on 40 attempts and throwing two interceptions against one touchdown. Despite the lack of production through the air or ground game, Colorado led 15-10 after three quarters due to defense and special teams. Then the Wraiths turned on the jets and scored thrice in the fourth, winning the bout 26-15. Coming off an 0-16 season, this exercise in misery felt awfully familiar.

The next few games were more of the same. On the road against Philly and Orange County, they were outscored 46-13 and 59-16 respectively. Applehort threw three picks in each game, and aside from a score apiece from the running back committee, all the Yeti's points came off of McCormick's leg. That didn't change in Week 4 at home when the Yeti hosted the Sabercats and lost 33-9. The defense tried their best to keep the score close, racking up eight sacks, but many of these came when the game was already out of hand, and they simply could not keep San Jose out of the endzone for long when the offense proved incapable of getting points.

One particularly frustrated piece of the puzzle was Carlito Crush. Disgruntled with having caught a grand total of eight catches over four games, and with having won two games in over two seasons, JKortesi expressed his disappointment once again in the media. But this time he took a different tack. He praised Colorado's recent draft picks and the removal of Pierno from the quarterback room. His issue stemmed from the timing, and more specifically his place within the rebuilt roster.

Quote:But the more I look at it, the more I’m realizing that I don’t really have a place here anymore. I feel almost like an outsider on my own team now. Those guys are the new Yeti. They represent the rebuild that will take the team to the level this franchise has been waiting for. I represent the failed rebuild. The one that had so much hope, but in reality just wasted everyone’s time.

Perhaps his words had an effect, because Crush led the team with seven catches in the Week 5 game with the Hawks. The overall product did not much improve elsewhere. Despite Applehort contributing his first touchdown pass since Week 1, the Yeti fell 31-16, unable to keep pace with Baltimore's scoring and countering touchdowns with field goals. Hopes were higher in the next bout, when Colorado took its first lead in a while on the road at San Jose. This 10-7 edge did not survive long past halftime, and the visitors only scraped a respectable 23-20 loss with a last-second endzone trip. This was the lone game of the season where Applehort threw a touchdown and no interception.

The Yeti locker room remained a pretty active and energetic place, and Colorado's number of active users was right around league average. Sim results did not reflect their attempts to improve the situation. The halfway point of the season was marked by the team's worst offensive effort yet; in a 43-3 walloping at home at the hands of the Otters, Colorado had five total turnovers and was outgained 455 yards to 219. Nothing went much better in Week 8 against a pretty bad Second Line squad, and Colorado lost that bout by a very similar 38-3 margin.

There are only so many ways to describe a string of blowout losses. Colorado's 0-8 record improved to 0-10 before the trade deadline courtesy of 31-14 and 30-3 losses to the Outlaws and Liberty. Seven of those seventeen points came via a pick six by Bly Jr. Otherwise, the Yeti defense was generally unable to stop opponents from running up the score, and the offense rarely mustered more than a field goal or two in response.

Now the team had choices to make. Key among them was the still-agitated Carlito Crush, who wanted to play for greener pastures and, even more crucially, wanted to position switch to wide receiver. With his and the Yeti's futures looking more and more incompatible, JKortesi asked for a trade. Since he was a rookie on the last year of his contract and almost certain to test free agency regardless, a trade would net the team some return rather than none at all.

The buyer ended up being the Orange County Otters. Crush and Otters tight end Steven O'Sullivan switched places, with O'Sullivan accompanied by Dental Dam, an S9 third, an S8 first conditional on Crush signing with the Otters long term, and an S9 second conditional on winning the Ultimus. It was a hefty trade, certainly not fair value for such an active earner and user unless his impending free agency was accounted for.

Much of the value also never came Colorado's way. JKortesi went into free agency after Season 7 concluded, and despite serious offers from the Yeti and other teams, he happened to return to Orange County on a one-year contract, which denied the S8 first from changing hands. The S9 second also stayed in the Otters' possession courtesy of two playoff losses, one in the S7 Ultimus. He did entertain the possibility of returning after a few seasons of chasing rings with the Otters; but despite considering it many offseasons, Crush's career had become unimaginably successful on the league's best dynasty, and he (mostly) stayed in Orange County until retirement.

The other major trade for Colorado was an interesting one that saw Maestro's brother cosborn get traded away for Dan Miller, a slightly older semi-active player at the same position and a friend of ExemplaryChad. The Yeti also sent the Sabercats two seconds in S8 and S9, which turned into thirds should Miller slip into inactivity. This exchange didn't reap much benefit for San Jose since Sandoval retired not long afterwards.

With only four games left to play before the Yeti repeated historical embarrassment, and with the league on full Plunger Watch, despondency was setting in for the team leadership, particularly sapp. His stated goals for improvement from a few seasons ago had long been trampled, and he was severely burnt out by the task at hand. He gave up on game planning and working on the sim, and mulled retiring from the co-GM position having been unable to turn around the team.

Sapp was also incredibly frustrated. For more than a season, he had been the GM of the Yeti in all but name – the only one of the pair responding in HO chat, performing the large share of team responsibilities, working on the sim, and keeping the locker room active and engaged. Maestro was the rubber stamp for all decisions, but sapp ran the Yeti, and the disparity between their workloads became noticed by players on the team, other GMs, and eventually Head Office, who began a preliminary investigation. In response, Maestro admitted that he had been neglectful of his job but promised not to resign until Colorado won the Ultimus. It was at this point that sapp pulled the trigger and stepped down.

He stayed on nominally in team leadership until May 9, near the end of the regular season, in order to help find and prepare his replacement – Supersquare, the user of Dwayne Aaron. In the meantime, Colorado continued getting bullied on the field. In Week 11, it was the Outlaws' turn to grab an easy win, 30-13. New addition Steven O'Sullivan had more receptions than the rest of his team combined with ten, but his efforts made little difference on the scoreboard. This was even more clear in Week 12 when visiting Yellowknife, a game where the hapless Yeti got shut out 37-0 and mustered only eight first downs.

Would they find a way to stave off infamy in their final two tries? Not a chance. In successive blowouts, Colorado lost 26-7 and 48-5 to the Second Line and Hawks. There were no words to describe the encompassing gulf of misery. The first two winless seasons in ISFL history were also the first two back-to-back winless seasons. Colorado's spot in league history was forever secured, a reputation of failure that haunted the franchise for endless seasons to come.

Was there anything positive to build off of? Precious little from the sim; only five Yeti players earned Pro Bowls, all on defense, with Miller, Pierno, Saint, Ishigawa, and Bly Jr. taking home the honors. Ishigawa also won Breakout POTY. But in regard to culture, Colorado remained deathly positive. The young core of the team was excited for the rebuild and certain that their performances could only improve from this point. The #yetinoises were loud and ever-present. To quote dropbear:

Quote:With the young pieces we have in place on offence, the core group we've accumulated on defence surrounded by some amazing veterans and the new young contributors, not the mention the great culture we've established, the Colorado Yeti are shaping up as one of the frontrunners for success in the next period of the NSFL's history.

The first step was surviving the free agency period. A few key players were reaching free agency, most notably Bly Jr. Along with resigning a number of inactives, the key acquisition of the early offseason for the new GM duo was bringing back safety Tillman on a three-year extension through Season 10. Sapp, on the other hand, was taking his time in the free agency process, and Colorado courted him extensively to keep him from leaving.

In the meantime, another star player was doing the rounds in free agency: Darren Smallwood, the player of tlk. A running back close to the prime of his career and on the hunt for a new destination, tlk wrote frequently in media about his prospects. But he received no interest whatsoever from the Yeti. Tlk certainly had a history with the Yeti; his previous media articles and power rankings had incited plenty of scorn from the organization before. Not reaching out to a running back over 1000 TPE still seemed a strange decision.

Maestro was there in the comments to respond for the whole league to witness.

Quote:We didn't reach out because we didn't want you. We have a young RB we like, and we don't wanna waste cap on a guy that is a year away from regression at that TPE level. I felt like it would be a waste of time for both of us if I just sent a message saying "Hey you're a FA, we don't want you though." So idk how this means that "no outreach doesn't bode well for future FA talks either, and so I worry long term if you have a plan actually." We do have a plan for the future. And you are not a part of it.

That young back mentioned in the tirade was actually Mark Grau, who had announced midway through the previous season that he was switching to running back. After a season back with the Pythons, Grau was getting called up to the big leagues and wouldn't have to fight with Aaron and Miller for targets. He would be joined by a new crop of draftees from the fast-approaching S8 Draft, albeit not a large one:

Pick 1 – Rickey Ramero, LB @'rocketrickey'
Pick 17 – Nick Sharper, S @JaPetFlo
Pick 25 – Harry Balzac, S @Blazer

Arguably the biggest grab of draft night came when sapp signed back on a new deal with the Yeti for three years and $9 million. With Bly Jr. back in the secondary, a couple more key contracts flew off the shelves: for McCormick, for the GM players, for the rookies, and for a couple more inactives. In essence, the offseason had halted the bleeding of talent from a Yeti roster damaged to varying degrees by the absences of Hackett, Tweed, Sandoval, and Crush.

Maestro and Supersquare had their work cut out for them. Maestro's first plan for the rebuild had ended up with the franchise at its lowest conceivable point. A number of critical errors had set back the team years, most notably the damage done by Pierno's disastrous tenure as quarterback. But in the midst of a 30-game losing streak, and with youth at many key positions, there was nowhere for the Yeti to go but up. How long it would take them to reach the summit was still unclear.

Continued in Volume III

Section Contributors:
@iStegosauruz
@JKortesi81
@sapp2013

Sources and Further Reading

RE: The Rockiest Road II - zaynzk - 08-20-2023

“Ralz9 remained undaunted and dismissive of tlk’s criticisms, stating in-character that he would let his performance on the field speak for him.“

[Image: IMG_3345.png]

I can’t stop laughing at this interaction

RE: The Rockiest Road II - WildfireMicro - 08-21-2023

(08-20-2023, 03:19 PM)zaynzk Wrote: “Ralz9 remained undaunted and dismissive of tlk’s criticisms, stating in-character that he would let his performance on the field speak for him.“

I can’t stop laughing at this interaction

@negs I take back what I said about your QB performance when I played for Philly holy shit