Our league constantly changes as ISFL General Managers constantly look for new ways to win. An abnormally large or small draft class or one with a relatively high or low quantity of players at a certain position can reshape rosters and force GMs to find new strategies for success. This article will outline a few trends that are already happening, and some that I foresee happening in the near future.
Trend #1. Regressing Quarterback Play
Quarterbacks are getting worse. That is clear. Perhaps the first sign is that a running back, Mathias Hanyadi, won the MVP award this season, an award won almost exclusively by quarterbacks in the past. This downturn in QB play can likely be attributed to the age of many of the starting QBs in the league. Last season S14 QBs Corvo Havran, Cooter Bigsby, and Stan Francisco were three years into regression, S15 QB Franklin Armstrong was two years into regression, and S16 QBs Wolfie McDummy and Easton Cole were one year into regression. Dexter Banks was the only QB in his peak TPE season, but he was a converted WR with low QB stats. Quarterbacks were worse in S23 than in S22 across the board. Taking only the quarterbacks who played every game (to omit the beautiful disaster that was Franky LaFleur) here is the average stat line of quarterbacks in S22 and S23:
S22 Average Quarterback in a thirteen game season: 238/422, 56.3%, 11.82 YPC, 2809 yds, 216.1 YPG, 17 TDs, 8 INTs, 81.7 rating, 32 sacks.
S23 Average Quarterback in a sixteen game season: 291/520, 56.1%, 11.76 YPC, 3426 yds, 214.1 YPG, 19 TDs, 12 INTs, 78.1 rating, 45 sacks.
These stats are not drastically different, though there is a slight downturn in yards per completion, yards per game, completion percentage and passer rating. However, when we look at advanced stats, we notice that quarterbacks were much worse in S23 than in S22.
S22 Average Quarterback: TD%-3.96%, INT%-2.00%, TD/INT-1.98, Y/A-6.65, AY/A-6.54, NY/A-5.72, ANY/A-5.62, Sack%-7.12%
S23 Average Quarterback: TD%-3.66%, INT%-2.36%, TD/INT-1.55, Y/A-6.59, AY/A-6.26, NY/A-5.55, ANY/A-5.25, Sack%-7.96%
That's right. Quarterbacks got worse in every single efficiency stat. Most startling of all is the rise in negative plays by quarterbacks. Sack percentage rose 11.8% from season 22 to season 23. Pass rushers really started to turn up the heat and the old guys had a difficult time avoiding them. Even more incredibly, interception percentage rose 18% percent! This is likely due in part to the large influx of talented defensive backs recently, but the quarterbacks themselves are certainly partially to blame.
Season 24 is looking bleak again for quarterbacks. The S14 crew has retired, but Armstrong, Cole, McDummy, and Banks all regressed. Additionally, half the league's quarterbacks are either S22 or S21 players, and are two to four years from peaking. Only Arizona's Jay Cue and Philly's Brock Phoenix are in their prime, though McDummy still has an impressive 1031 TPE despite being hit twice with regression. Therefore, I predict that quarterbacks will suffer again this season.
What are offenses doing to compensate for poor quarterback play?
Trend #2. Running Back by Committee
Run the ball more and compensate for the increase in carries by using more RBBC strategies. Recent insights into the sim by Maglubiyet have noted that running backs receive a speed penalty in games after reaching certain milestone numbers of carries (25, 30, and 35 carries). In order to combat this and maintain efficiency with higher run percentages, GMs have started using a running back by committee approach at much higher levels in recent years. Here is a five year sample of this trend.
In S19, only two teams had two running backs with at least ten carries a game: Yellowknife and New Orleans. In S20, Baltimore joined YKW and NOLA at the RBBC party. In S21, San Jose, Orange County, and Chicago jumped on board. In S22, the first season with twelve teams, nine teams had two running backs with at least ten carries, even Philly who had ridden Torensen for 300 carries every year. Sarasota, Arizona, and Chicago were the only exceptions, but likely only due to roster limitations, not strategy. S23 again saw nine teams with two running backs with at least ten carries. The only exceptions were OCO with Nakamura, the only player to break 20 carries per game last season, Arizona, who only had Baby Yoda on the roster, and Colorado, who took the running back by committee even further, splitting carries between three backs in addition to a mobile QB.
With Arizona losing Baby Yoda to Chicago and calling up two RBs from the DSFL, and OCO also calling up a running back, we could finally see every team in the league commit to a RBBC strategy in S24 after ten teams doing so last season.
Trend #3. Human Offensive Linemen
Human Offensive Linemen are starting to become more popular, but they aren't taking over the league, yet, right? Wrong! If we travel back in time to just three seasons ago, we notice in S21 there were only three human offensive linemen and really only one max earner at the position. I don't know when the last time you checked in the TPE tracker, but go ahead and guess how many human offensive linemen are on rosters going into S24 next year before moving on...
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Did you guess 17? I just pulled up the tracker and was shocked to find that 6 teams have two offensive linemen on their roster for next season and ten out of twelve (looking at you Honolulu and San Jose) have at least one human lineman. And these linemen are not all semi-active players with low TPE totals. These are fantastic earners such as Butchers GM Benson Bayley Jr. and newly switched S22 first round selection Mo "Mamba" Magic. As teams look to run the ball more and combat the sharp rise in sack percentage league-wide, great athletes are flocking to the offensive line positions. By the way, for those of you who are not DSFL GMs like I am and are not aware of the details about the incoming S25 class: 19 out of the 141 DSFL rookies this year are offensive linemen.
How will defenses try to combat the increased emphasis on running the football?
Trend #4. The 3-4 Defense
I have not been around many seasons but it seems that for many seasons Nickel was viewed as the only viable defense in the ISFL. With ten teams using a RBBC last season we began to see this finally change. Teams started running the 3-4 defense in certain situations rather than Nickel 35 across the board. This allowed teams to replace the fifth defensive back with a larger defender (another linebacker) to help stop the run in some cases. In many cases, however, teams had to run a 3-4 with sub-optimal personnel. Given that Nickel was the only formation used for many seasons, several teams only carried eleven defenders on their roster: 5 DBs, 2 LBs, and 4 DL. This meant that cornerbacks and defensive ends were lining up at linebacker since safeties are ineligible to play linebacker and defensive tackles are too slow. Look for the linebacker position to be highly sought after in the draft in the coming seasons as teams look to add a third and maybe even a fourth linebacker to their roster to run 3-4 more effectively.
Trend #5. Better Defensive Linemen
Just like the 3-4 trend, this one is still developing. It has been common knowledge that defensive linemen can thrive at lower TPE levels compared to other positions, so much so that projected slow earners are counseled to become defensive linemen. If the rise of human offensive linemen continues (which seems quite likely to me) then eventually lower TPE players will lose their effectiveness along the defensive line. Given that our league continues to grow and teams are loading up on talent across the board, it is only a matter of time before teams cannot upgrade much at other positions and look to draft better defensive linemen.
This article was not my longest piece of media, nor my most researched. However, it was very enjoyable to write and, I hope, to read. It is exciting to see the changes happening in our league and to speculate about where our league is headed. Do you disagree with any of these assessments? Are there any other trends that I missed or that you predict over the next couple seasons?
Trend #1. Regressing Quarterback Play
Quarterbacks are getting worse. That is clear. Perhaps the first sign is that a running back, Mathias Hanyadi, won the MVP award this season, an award won almost exclusively by quarterbacks in the past. This downturn in QB play can likely be attributed to the age of many of the starting QBs in the league. Last season S14 QBs Corvo Havran, Cooter Bigsby, and Stan Francisco were three years into regression, S15 QB Franklin Armstrong was two years into regression, and S16 QBs Wolfie McDummy and Easton Cole were one year into regression. Dexter Banks was the only QB in his peak TPE season, but he was a converted WR with low QB stats. Quarterbacks were worse in S23 than in S22 across the board. Taking only the quarterbacks who played every game (to omit the beautiful disaster that was Franky LaFleur) here is the average stat line of quarterbacks in S22 and S23:
S22 Average Quarterback in a thirteen game season: 238/422, 56.3%, 11.82 YPC, 2809 yds, 216.1 YPG, 17 TDs, 8 INTs, 81.7 rating, 32 sacks.
S23 Average Quarterback in a sixteen game season: 291/520, 56.1%, 11.76 YPC, 3426 yds, 214.1 YPG, 19 TDs, 12 INTs, 78.1 rating, 45 sacks.
These stats are not drastically different, though there is a slight downturn in yards per completion, yards per game, completion percentage and passer rating. However, when we look at advanced stats, we notice that quarterbacks were much worse in S23 than in S22.
S22 Average Quarterback: TD%-3.96%, INT%-2.00%, TD/INT-1.98, Y/A-6.65, AY/A-6.54, NY/A-5.72, ANY/A-5.62, Sack%-7.12%
S23 Average Quarterback: TD%-3.66%, INT%-2.36%, TD/INT-1.55, Y/A-6.59, AY/A-6.26, NY/A-5.55, ANY/A-5.25, Sack%-7.96%
That's right. Quarterbacks got worse in every single efficiency stat. Most startling of all is the rise in negative plays by quarterbacks. Sack percentage rose 11.8% from season 22 to season 23. Pass rushers really started to turn up the heat and the old guys had a difficult time avoiding them. Even more incredibly, interception percentage rose 18% percent! This is likely due in part to the large influx of talented defensive backs recently, but the quarterbacks themselves are certainly partially to blame.
Season 24 is looking bleak again for quarterbacks. The S14 crew has retired, but Armstrong, Cole, McDummy, and Banks all regressed. Additionally, half the league's quarterbacks are either S22 or S21 players, and are two to four years from peaking. Only Arizona's Jay Cue and Philly's Brock Phoenix are in their prime, though McDummy still has an impressive 1031 TPE despite being hit twice with regression. Therefore, I predict that quarterbacks will suffer again this season.
What are offenses doing to compensate for poor quarterback play?
Trend #2. Running Back by Committee
Run the ball more and compensate for the increase in carries by using more RBBC strategies. Recent insights into the sim by Maglubiyet have noted that running backs receive a speed penalty in games after reaching certain milestone numbers of carries (25, 30, and 35 carries). In order to combat this and maintain efficiency with higher run percentages, GMs have started using a running back by committee approach at much higher levels in recent years. Here is a five year sample of this trend.
In S19, only two teams had two running backs with at least ten carries a game: Yellowknife and New Orleans. In S20, Baltimore joined YKW and NOLA at the RBBC party. In S21, San Jose, Orange County, and Chicago jumped on board. In S22, the first season with twelve teams, nine teams had two running backs with at least ten carries, even Philly who had ridden Torensen for 300 carries every year. Sarasota, Arizona, and Chicago were the only exceptions, but likely only due to roster limitations, not strategy. S23 again saw nine teams with two running backs with at least ten carries. The only exceptions were OCO with Nakamura, the only player to break 20 carries per game last season, Arizona, who only had Baby Yoda on the roster, and Colorado, who took the running back by committee even further, splitting carries between three backs in addition to a mobile QB.
With Arizona losing Baby Yoda to Chicago and calling up two RBs from the DSFL, and OCO also calling up a running back, we could finally see every team in the league commit to a RBBC strategy in S24 after ten teams doing so last season.
Trend #3. Human Offensive Linemen
Human Offensive Linemen are starting to become more popular, but they aren't taking over the league, yet, right? Wrong! If we travel back in time to just three seasons ago, we notice in S21 there were only three human offensive linemen and really only one max earner at the position. I don't know when the last time you checked in the TPE tracker, but go ahead and guess how many human offensive linemen are on rosters going into S24 next year before moving on...
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Did you guess 17? I just pulled up the tracker and was shocked to find that 6 teams have two offensive linemen on their roster for next season and ten out of twelve (looking at you Honolulu and San Jose) have at least one human lineman. And these linemen are not all semi-active players with low TPE totals. These are fantastic earners such as Butchers GM Benson Bayley Jr. and newly switched S22 first round selection Mo "Mamba" Magic. As teams look to run the ball more and combat the sharp rise in sack percentage league-wide, great athletes are flocking to the offensive line positions. By the way, for those of you who are not DSFL GMs like I am and are not aware of the details about the incoming S25 class: 19 out of the 141 DSFL rookies this year are offensive linemen.
How will defenses try to combat the increased emphasis on running the football?
Trend #4. The 3-4 Defense
I have not been around many seasons but it seems that for many seasons Nickel was viewed as the only viable defense in the ISFL. With ten teams using a RBBC last season we began to see this finally change. Teams started running the 3-4 defense in certain situations rather than Nickel 35 across the board. This allowed teams to replace the fifth defensive back with a larger defender (another linebacker) to help stop the run in some cases. In many cases, however, teams had to run a 3-4 with sub-optimal personnel. Given that Nickel was the only formation used for many seasons, several teams only carried eleven defenders on their roster: 5 DBs, 2 LBs, and 4 DL. This meant that cornerbacks and defensive ends were lining up at linebacker since safeties are ineligible to play linebacker and defensive tackles are too slow. Look for the linebacker position to be highly sought after in the draft in the coming seasons as teams look to add a third and maybe even a fourth linebacker to their roster to run 3-4 more effectively.
Trend #5. Better Defensive Linemen
Just like the 3-4 trend, this one is still developing. It has been common knowledge that defensive linemen can thrive at lower TPE levels compared to other positions, so much so that projected slow earners are counseled to become defensive linemen. If the rise of human offensive linemen continues (which seems quite likely to me) then eventually lower TPE players will lose their effectiveness along the defensive line. Given that our league continues to grow and teams are loading up on talent across the board, it is only a matter of time before teams cannot upgrade much at other positions and look to draft better defensive linemen.
This article was not my longest piece of media, nor my most researched. However, it was very enjoyable to write and, I hope, to read. It is exciting to see the changes happening in our league and to speculate about where our league is headed. Do you disagree with any of these assessments? Are there any other trends that I missed or that you predict over the next couple seasons?