13) Take a step back and predict what the league will look like three seasons from now. Who do you predict will be the dominant teams? Which young players do you think will have morphed into superstars? Will the league have expanded again in the next three seasons, and where would these new franchises be? Don’t be afraid to be creative, but don’t be entirely outlandish either.
To start from a more general and meta perspective, I think that the league will be quite different three seasons from now. From a technical point of view there are big changes coming if the sim is changed to the newer 2021 version. Changing the sim will be good for the health of the league long-term assuming that the sim is reliable. By “reliable” I don’t necessarily mean in-game. I think this league has shown that folks will overlook fundamental in-game issues with player performance or statistics in favor of an engaging community. I’m referring more to the efficiency of the sim as a tool to use on a daily basis. Assuming that the sim has reasonably easy ways to run games and update rosters, I think that everything should be okay. If the sim were to have problems with crashing often or losing data we would have a larger issue.
Changing sim engines will have huge effects on the in-game league and individual players. I think that many players who aren’t necessarily having the careers that they expected would consider retiring in favor of starting fresh with a new player on a new sim. I also think that a sim change would cause former users who went inactive due to frustrations with the 2016 sim would consider coming back to give the league another chance.
I expect that the metas that were considered for player attributes will change drastically with the introduction of new software. Assuming that Wolverine made tweaks to their code for how attributes impact player performance, I could see metas like the 79 speed quarterback being lost to time in favor of other more effective strategies. As this will be very early on in the introduction of a new sim, I anticipate that end of year performance for players will be quite volatile as issues are ironed out by head office and the sim team. The first year or two will be the best opportunity for records set at the inception of this league to be broken. Records like “most sacks in a season”, which is currently impossible to surpass post- attribute modifications could possibly be broken if some attribute configurations are overlooked.
This also brings up another topic of moderating individual team playbooks. While I haven’t seen anything too wild in the current 2016 iteration of our sim, I have heard that in the past rules were created around which plays a head coach is and isn’t allowed to run. In particular, auto-sack plays like a cornerback blitz could exist in the new sim and would need to be found and removed from use as soon as possible.
14) Greatness emerges through trial by fire. Recount the story of a team who came back from adversity, whether it’s a single miracle game or an entire season or multi-season comeback. How was this team‘s challenge significant, and how did they engineer a recovery? What key moves or plays were the lynchpin to victory?
As surprising as the season 24 Ultimus run of the Sabercats was, in my opinion the story of the season 25 San Jose team resulted in an even more unlikely conclusion. The main differentiator between these two seasons from the perspective of the Sabercats was the performance of the teams around them. The S24 ‘Cats arrived to the playoffs in truly chaotic circumstances, with a four way tie in records deciding their eventual placement as a first place team that would secure a bye week and home field advantage for their conference championship. Meanwhile, the path to the playoffs was much easier to determine, with their playoff journey being confirmed two games prior to the end of the regular season. The differences here would be the inclusion of a divisional road matchup that they would have to win at Arizona, as well as another road game in Orange County for the conference title.
The chaos of the S25 playoffs can be summarized well by the divisional matchup of the Sabercats at the Outlaws. The Outlaws would start the game red-hot, amassing a 21-6 lead at the end of the half. The Sabercats would not go down without a fight though, and their defense would step up to only allow 6 more points during the second half sending the game into overtime. Overtime would showcase peak chaos, with 6 series between the two teams. During the Sabercats’ second possession quarterback Monty Jack would be picked off by star linebacker Galf Wilf just as San Jose was about to enter the red zone. This appeared to be the end of San Jose’s season, but two more stops by the defense capped off with a pick 6 by veteran San Jose linebacker would end the game with the Sabercats emerging victorious.
Looking at the end game statistics for this Sabercat victory truly showcases the chaos of San Jose throughout the season. For the majority of the statistical categories, the Sabercats and the Outlaws were pretty evenly matched. Both teams had nearly the same offensive efficiency with the Sabercats barely surpassing Arizona 21 to 19 in first downs and 466 yards of total offense vs. the Outlaws’ 425. The real story lies in the 4th down efficiency of San Jose. The ‘Cats have always been known to play a bit risky, but they were able to convert all 3 of their 4th down attempts during this game. Even more wild was their field position when they chose to go for it on 4th down. Two of the three attempts were made when the Sabercats when they were in their own territory, with the first attempt happening in the second quarter at San Jose’s own 46 yard line. While some fans might say that this is unnecessarily risky behavior, most would agree that this risk-taking was essential to the Sabercats being able to hoist their second consecutive trophy.
To start from a more general and meta perspective, I think that the league will be quite different three seasons from now. From a technical point of view there are big changes coming if the sim is changed to the newer 2021 version. Changing the sim will be good for the health of the league long-term assuming that the sim is reliable. By “reliable” I don’t necessarily mean in-game. I think this league has shown that folks will overlook fundamental in-game issues with player performance or statistics in favor of an engaging community. I’m referring more to the efficiency of the sim as a tool to use on a daily basis. Assuming that the sim has reasonably easy ways to run games and update rosters, I think that everything should be okay. If the sim were to have problems with crashing often or losing data we would have a larger issue.
Changing sim engines will have huge effects on the in-game league and individual players. I think that many players who aren’t necessarily having the careers that they expected would consider retiring in favor of starting fresh with a new player on a new sim. I also think that a sim change would cause former users who went inactive due to frustrations with the 2016 sim would consider coming back to give the league another chance.
I expect that the metas that were considered for player attributes will change drastically with the introduction of new software. Assuming that Wolverine made tweaks to their code for how attributes impact player performance, I could see metas like the 79 speed quarterback being lost to time in favor of other more effective strategies. As this will be very early on in the introduction of a new sim, I anticipate that end of year performance for players will be quite volatile as issues are ironed out by head office and the sim team. The first year or two will be the best opportunity for records set at the inception of this league to be broken. Records like “most sacks in a season”, which is currently impossible to surpass post- attribute modifications could possibly be broken if some attribute configurations are overlooked.
This also brings up another topic of moderating individual team playbooks. While I haven’t seen anything too wild in the current 2016 iteration of our sim, I have heard that in the past rules were created around which plays a head coach is and isn’t allowed to run. In particular, auto-sack plays like a cornerback blitz could exist in the new sim and would need to be found and removed from use as soon as possible.
14) Greatness emerges through trial by fire. Recount the story of a team who came back from adversity, whether it’s a single miracle game or an entire season or multi-season comeback. How was this team‘s challenge significant, and how did they engineer a recovery? What key moves or plays were the lynchpin to victory?
As surprising as the season 24 Ultimus run of the Sabercats was, in my opinion the story of the season 25 San Jose team resulted in an even more unlikely conclusion. The main differentiator between these two seasons from the perspective of the Sabercats was the performance of the teams around them. The S24 ‘Cats arrived to the playoffs in truly chaotic circumstances, with a four way tie in records deciding their eventual placement as a first place team that would secure a bye week and home field advantage for their conference championship. Meanwhile, the path to the playoffs was much easier to determine, with their playoff journey being confirmed two games prior to the end of the regular season. The differences here would be the inclusion of a divisional road matchup that they would have to win at Arizona, as well as another road game in Orange County for the conference title.
The chaos of the S25 playoffs can be summarized well by the divisional matchup of the Sabercats at the Outlaws. The Outlaws would start the game red-hot, amassing a 21-6 lead at the end of the half. The Sabercats would not go down without a fight though, and their defense would step up to only allow 6 more points during the second half sending the game into overtime. Overtime would showcase peak chaos, with 6 series between the two teams. During the Sabercats’ second possession quarterback Monty Jack would be picked off by star linebacker Galf Wilf just as San Jose was about to enter the red zone. This appeared to be the end of San Jose’s season, but two more stops by the defense capped off with a pick 6 by veteran San Jose linebacker would end the game with the Sabercats emerging victorious.
Looking at the end game statistics for this Sabercat victory truly showcases the chaos of San Jose throughout the season. For the majority of the statistical categories, the Sabercats and the Outlaws were pretty evenly matched. Both teams had nearly the same offensive efficiency with the Sabercats barely surpassing Arizona 21 to 19 in first downs and 466 yards of total offense vs. the Outlaws’ 425. The real story lies in the 4th down efficiency of San Jose. The ‘Cats have always been known to play a bit risky, but they were able to convert all 3 of their 4th down attempts during this game. Even more wild was their field position when they chose to go for it on 4th down. Two of the three attempts were made when the Sabercats when they were in their own territory, with the first attempt happening in the second quarter at San Jose’s own 46 yard line. While some fans might say that this is unnecessarily risky behavior, most would agree that this risk-taking was essential to the Sabercats being able to hoist their second consecutive trophy.