12-03-2022, 07:56 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-04-2022, 03:47 AM by Aneeqs. Edited 1 time in total.)
As I'm sure everyone who cares enough about the ISFL to read the media forum knows, the Honolulu Hahalua took S38 as their year to kick off one of the most clear reset and rebuild seasons in some time. They're entering the S39 with 3 first round picks and extra 2nd, 3rd, and 4th round picks in S40. With that in mind, what would a hopefully next championship window look like for Honolulu?
First, taking a bit of a step back - what does a star player look like with regards to TPE and season (and ignoring sim luck)? Right now (November 19th update), the average ISFL TPE by position ranges from a low of 485 for kickers to a high of 1008 for QBs. For the purposes of simplicity, I'm going to declare that 700+ TPE is what teams are looking for from their core to be competitive. Of the 708 players on the TPE tracker, 143 have 700+ TPE. Those players come from seasons 29-36:
S29 - 6
S30 - 11
S31 - 20
S32 - 19
S33 - 16
S34 - 20
S35 - 21
S36 - 30
Players over 700 TPE being mostly those in their first season of regression makes intuitive sense since regression is truly cruel. The more interesting stat for the team trying to build is seeing the third-year players there - that translates to Honolulu's first rounders in the S39 draft breaking the 700 TPE threshold in S41. And at that point, they will at best have their S32 players still around. However, the current team doesn't have any S32-34 players at 700 TPE now (the top is S32 RB Riggins at 467). So, I think it's unlikely the team is hoping for the fast rebuild and instead are probably looking at S42 (if they get a bunch of top-earning stars out of the S40 draft) or S43 (if they need a bit more depth). Those seasons should allow for their S35 ans S36 stars to be in the defined star TPE range, so long as the players are willing to stick it out until then.
On sticking it out - Honolulu was clearly the worst team in the league by record this year with the offense scoring the fewest points and the defense giving up the most. Despite that, they still scored nearly 20 points a game (and if there's one thing we've seen in the NFL this year, some teams would kill to have an offense that could score 20/game). With a bunch of regressing and inactive older players and the demonstrated trade actions the team clearly doesn't look like like one that might try to make a push earlier until the future pieces are in place. If the stars they do have on the team now want to go to a more contending team, though, I could see some flexibility where the team either picks up enough depth to have a chance at a playoff run a year earlier, or actually goes the other direction and pushes it out even further to S44 if they're going to lose the S35/36 players to free agency anyway. Still, that leaves the S39 players in the current draft with the possibility of being on a team that isn't going to be seriously looking at the playoffs until after their rookies contracts are over. Will Honolulu be able to keep their draft picks around and engaged? I assume questions along those lines will be factoring highly in their scouting conversations. And with a huge hoard of picks in S40 and the expectation of a reddit recruiting class, I could see the team managing to forge an engaged culture centered around the shared experience of working to improve around the same time. That being said, I think from the outside that it looks like it will be hard. Also, I don't believe I've really spoken much with either GM so I have no experience with their abilities in the area. They do seem to be sticking to the plan themselves, though - with their players being an S39 CB and an S40 OL, they clearly are aiming to be part of the team's star peak.
So, with a clear plan in place, how likely does the plan seem to be to work out in practice? In the S39/40 drafts the team currently (December 2nd) has 12 picks in rounds 1-3. If they convert 8 (2/3rds) of those picks into stars, is that enough? This year's Ultimus finalist teams had 12 (Arizona) and 8 (Berlin) players over 700 TPE. Arizona in particular is a very top-heavy TPE team with 8 over 1000 TPE, so that might be a bit of a lofty goal for a team deep in the rebuilding depths. Berlin, though, looks on paper to be a lot more like what Honolulu will hope to be at the start of their window - the Fire Salamanders' top player is only 1100 TPE and they have a core of 5 S36 players in the 700-800 range with another at 611. Berlin does also have one S30 DE at 916 TPE, but is otherwise very young in their top players at each position. To me, the success that Berlin had this season is definitely a good sign for Honolulu and it might be useful for the team's leadership to closely study what Berlin has been doing and how they manage the next couple seasons. I, having no time to consider being a GM, haven't really done personal planning out of contracts and figuring out how to balance the salary cap vs. player age/retention, so it is possible that Berlin isn't doing anything that the Hahalua GMs don't already know - I'll let them figure that out themselves since I don't know.
Getting back to the original question after all this investigation: I expect the Honolulu GMs to be aiming for a championship window starting around S42 if their drafts and player retention go well or S43 if they run into issues or are planning with more caution. S35 WR Mai-Heinous and S36 RB Delphine Jr. may be valuable veteran players, but I wouldn't expect any older players currently on the team to still be in critical positions. A core of star S39 players will be able to remain over 700 through S48 (though they can still be important players for another season or two).
First, taking a bit of a step back - what does a star player look like with regards to TPE and season (and ignoring sim luck)? Right now (November 19th update), the average ISFL TPE by position ranges from a low of 485 for kickers to a high of 1008 for QBs. For the purposes of simplicity, I'm going to declare that 700+ TPE is what teams are looking for from their core to be competitive. Of the 708 players on the TPE tracker, 143 have 700+ TPE. Those players come from seasons 29-36:
S29 - 6
S30 - 11
S31 - 20
S32 - 19
S33 - 16
S34 - 20
S35 - 21
S36 - 30
Players over 700 TPE being mostly those in their first season of regression makes intuitive sense since regression is truly cruel. The more interesting stat for the team trying to build is seeing the third-year players there - that translates to Honolulu's first rounders in the S39 draft breaking the 700 TPE threshold in S41. And at that point, they will at best have their S32 players still around. However, the current team doesn't have any S32-34 players at 700 TPE now (the top is S32 RB Riggins at 467). So, I think it's unlikely the team is hoping for the fast rebuild and instead are probably looking at S42 (if they get a bunch of top-earning stars out of the S40 draft) or S43 (if they need a bit more depth). Those seasons should allow for their S35 ans S36 stars to be in the defined star TPE range, so long as the players are willing to stick it out until then.
On sticking it out - Honolulu was clearly the worst team in the league by record this year with the offense scoring the fewest points and the defense giving up the most. Despite that, they still scored nearly 20 points a game (and if there's one thing we've seen in the NFL this year, some teams would kill to have an offense that could score 20/game). With a bunch of regressing and inactive older players and the demonstrated trade actions the team clearly doesn't look like like one that might try to make a push earlier until the future pieces are in place. If the stars they do have on the team now want to go to a more contending team, though, I could see some flexibility where the team either picks up enough depth to have a chance at a playoff run a year earlier, or actually goes the other direction and pushes it out even further to S44 if they're going to lose the S35/36 players to free agency anyway. Still, that leaves the S39 players in the current draft with the possibility of being on a team that isn't going to be seriously looking at the playoffs until after their rookies contracts are over. Will Honolulu be able to keep their draft picks around and engaged? I assume questions along those lines will be factoring highly in their scouting conversations. And with a huge hoard of picks in S40 and the expectation of a reddit recruiting class, I could see the team managing to forge an engaged culture centered around the shared experience of working to improve around the same time. That being said, I think from the outside that it looks like it will be hard. Also, I don't believe I've really spoken much with either GM so I have no experience with their abilities in the area. They do seem to be sticking to the plan themselves, though - with their players being an S39 CB and an S40 OL, they clearly are aiming to be part of the team's star peak.
So, with a clear plan in place, how likely does the plan seem to be to work out in practice? In the S39/40 drafts the team currently (December 2nd) has 12 picks in rounds 1-3. If they convert 8 (2/3rds) of those picks into stars, is that enough? This year's Ultimus finalist teams had 12 (Arizona) and 8 (Berlin) players over 700 TPE. Arizona in particular is a very top-heavy TPE team with 8 over 1000 TPE, so that might be a bit of a lofty goal for a team deep in the rebuilding depths. Berlin, though, looks on paper to be a lot more like what Honolulu will hope to be at the start of their window - the Fire Salamanders' top player is only 1100 TPE and they have a core of 5 S36 players in the 700-800 range with another at 611. Berlin does also have one S30 DE at 916 TPE, but is otherwise very young in their top players at each position. To me, the success that Berlin had this season is definitely a good sign for Honolulu and it might be useful for the team's leadership to closely study what Berlin has been doing and how they manage the next couple seasons. I, having no time to consider being a GM, haven't really done personal planning out of contracts and figuring out how to balance the salary cap vs. player age/retention, so it is possible that Berlin isn't doing anything that the Hahalua GMs don't already know - I'll let them figure that out themselves since I don't know.
Getting back to the original question after all this investigation: I expect the Honolulu GMs to be aiming for a championship window starting around S42 if their drafts and player retention go well or S43 if they run into issues or are planning with more caution. S35 WR Mai-Heinous and S36 RB Delphine Jr. may be valuable veteran players, but I wouldn't expect any older players currently on the team to still be in critical positions. A core of star S39 players will be able to remain over 700 through S48 (though they can still be important players for another season or two).
Draft Steal (retired S35 CB) - Profile/Update | Wiki
Troen Egghands (retired S22 DE) - Profile | Update | Wiki