06-15-2023, 12:22 PM
(This post was last modified: 06-15-2023, 02:09 PM by Jacky. Edited 1 time in total.)
S11 Second Line
Record: 11-3
1st seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
33.1 ppg
24.3 pag
+8.8
Playoff Path:
40-13 over 10-4 OCO
42-36 (OT) over 9-5 BAL
Notable Awards:
Borkus Maximus III wins QBotY, William H Harrison wins DBotY
S11 marks a turning point in a few ways; perhaps most importantly for this series, far more than its fair share of worst teams ever are in the 1st decade of league history, including 4/5ths of the worst 5 teams ever. As such, there weren't as many teams for the best to run up the score on this decade. Take the 1 win Sabercats from this season for example; they're one of the better 1 win teams ever and thus were nowhere near as much of a punching bag for the teams with the highest point differential; the Second Line beat them in 2 games by a combined 40 points, which would drop their point differential to 7 exactly, but that's less influence on its point differential proportionally than many champions had with 1 or 0 win teams in the last decade. As such I think I'd put them above the bottom 3. But this is still not an exceptionally good champion; they led the league in point differential, but it's the lowest lead since S1, and lower than all but 2 teams in the last decade. They did blow out the Otters, but had to go to OT to beat Baltimore in the Ultimus. And this is also one of the worst award cabinets among champions so far, only competing with the S7 Liberty and S8 Wraiths. I'd put them at 8th in the master list so far.
S12 Otters
Record: 11-31st seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
27.4 ppg
19.1 pag
+8.3
Playoff Path:
35-10 over 10-4 SJS
48-24 over 8-6 BAL
Notable Awards:
Ricky Adams wins MVP, Mason Brown wins DPOY
Mason Brown wins LBotY
Quick note on the MVP not winning a positional excellency award: Ricky Adams was a Fullback who split time both catching passes and rushing the ball. He was not considered the best at either, though I'd actually vote for him as RBotY over the guy who actually won it. Besides that, this is the first time an Ultimus champion, as well as I believe the first time in league history, that one team won the MVP and a side of the ball player of the year award with different people. There's one other thing to point out; this team was not the best team by point differential, not even close. That would go to the Hawks with a +11.2 point differential; this is in large part due to the fact that the Hawks had an average margin of defeat of 4. Not quite the probable record in the S3 Outlaws at 3, but this team lost 6 times in the regular season to that team's one. The Hawks arguably should have had a better record than the Otters had this year, much less the 8-6 record they ended up with. With that in mind, this might be the most impressive playoff run the league has seen thus far, at least in terms of beating similarly strong teams by a lot. I think only the S1 Outlaws compare in that specific category. Two blowouts of at least 3 possessions over a slightly weaker team and a team that's arguably even stronger than you is very impressive. This team really only had 2 standout players, who would at max have gotten 4 awards, but due to both of them getting major awards the trophy total feels a lot better than the 3 it actually is. Still, this team on its face wasn't that exceptional; it has the 2nd worst point differential so far and arguably wasn't the best team during the regular season despite having the top seed. Probably worse than the Second Line, but that's probably exactly where they end up, 9th.
S13 Otters
Record: 9-5
2nd seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
2nd seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
25.9 ppg
23.5 pag
+2.4
Playoff Path:
31-21 over 12-2 SJS
24-21 over 8-6 COL
Notable Awards:
Absolutely none, whatsoever
You know, sometimes there are teams who I question why they had as many or as little awards as they did, if they played really well but someone else got more votes than them due to bad, possibly biased reasons. An Ultimus winner with 0 awards seems like the perfect candidate for a team like that.
This team is anything but. It is by far, bar none, the worst team to win an Ultimus up through now. This team was not merely a team that was barely above average, it was the 4th best team by point differential in the playoffs that year. Unlike the previous year, where a team without the best point differential but the best record put their stamp on the title by dominating the playoffs, this team did not do that. San Jose in particular was a game within one possession for basically the entirety of the 2nd half, and while Colorado was actually more comfortable despite the worse scoreline, they didn't put them away. This team didn't even get the GMotY award. I feel like I'd hear a lot more about how bad of an Ultimus winner this team was if not for 2 reasons: being surrounded by actually good OCO teams who also won the Ultimus, and because there is another, both funnier and worse, team who managed to win the Ultimus around the time I joined the league and they have not been dethroned since. As is, I'm preemptively penciling this team in as the 3rd worst team to ever win the Ultimus, behind the obvious 2. That being said, it could totally be undercut in the next 25+ seasons.
One final note, the Sabercats if they won the Ultimus they probably should have would have ranked 5th in the master list so far, below the S2 and S3 Outlaws, the S9 Second Line, and the S10 Hawks.
S14 Sabercats
Record: 9-52nd seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
28.0 ppg
16.6 pag
+11.4
Playoff Path:
24-17 over 11-3 OCO
36-24 over 9-5 PHI
Notable Awards:
Joilet Christ wins OPOY
On the other hand, this is one where I feel like someone on the Sabercats should have gotten DBotY. The fact that this defense went without awards feels sad to me, unlike the team above. Because this team actually had the 2nd best point differential this season, literally 1 point behind the league leading Otters. It doesn't even show up as 1/10th of a point per game. Other than that, only one thought really comes to mind: Justice. This is a team on the same level as the S4 and S5 Otters, well above last season's Otters, though despite the higher point differential the lack of awards and worse record has me put them below where the S13 Sabercats would have been. This season also features a seemingly average playoff run for a team without home field advantage in round 1, a 1 possession victory away and then a more comfortable victory once they had home field. Not so here, the Sabercats were actually less comfortable in the Ultimus, a late touchdown makes the final score look a lot more comfortable than it actually was. This is a period of time that I wasn't in the league, featuring a team that I've never been on and have spent a lot of time criticizing, but this championship still feels like a karmic balance being restored. As for where I'm placing them, they're going right above the S11 Second Line and the S12 Otters.
S15 Hawks
Record: 12-21st seed in NSFC, Home Field in Ultimus
37.1 ppg
21.2 pag
+15.9
Playoff Path:
34-13 over 8-6 PHI
49-0 over 11-3 SJS
Notable Awards:
Childish Gambino wins MVP, Arbin Asipi III wins DPOY
Childish Gambino wins QBotY, Marquise Brown wins RBotY, Verso L'Alto wins TEotY, Arbin Asipi III wins DBotY
Not only is this the best team so far from S11-S15, this takes an easy 3rd place in the Best Ultimus Winner Ever category. There are only 2 teams with as comparable an awards cabinet, and those same two teams have much better point differentials. Where this team makes its mark, and truly separates themselves from their S10 counterpart and the S6 Otters, is their playoff performance. Sure, there was no truly top tier team to match up to them, with the Sabercats taking the 2nd best point differential at 4.4 per game. The other slight niggle is that most of the top tier teams were best in the league on both offense and defense points-wise, and this Hawks team didn't manage to be the best defense. But even then, this team had a +70 point differential in 2 playoff games. I think this is nowhere near the best team ever, considering I believe almost 3 points of point differential (or 8 in the Second Line's case) is better than the difference between blowing out your playoff opponents and pulling a 1940 NFL Championship game on them. Still, pretty sure no team will match 35 points as an average playoff margin of victory, and I would also not be surprised if 49-0 is the biggest Ultimus win in league history.
S16 Outlaws
Record: 7-62nd seed in ASFC, Home Field in Ultimus
22.8 ppg
21.0 pag
+1.8
Playoff Path:
41-21 over 7-6 SJS
31-3 over 10-3 OCO
34-30 over 7-6 PHI
Notable Awards:
Raymond Vans wins DPOY
Raymond Vans wins LBotY
On first glance, this team looks to be an even worse and more undeserving version of the S13 Otters. Just like the Otters, among their playoff opponents was the team that was actually the best in the league, and every other game involved them getting home field advantage vs an opponent with a better point differential. This is even a season where they faced a 1 win team once and a winless team twice! But the Outlaws didn't really take advantage of that opportunity, winning the 3 games by a combined 36 points. This would flip their point differential to -0.1 if we took them out, though. But there's an altogether different reason why this team is going right above the S13 Otters as the 2nd worst team to win an Ultimus so far. Actually, a pair of them. First off, while winning DPOY this year meant that you were merely the 2nd best defensive player as we had a rare defensive MVP, Raymond Vans still got that along with a positional award. Second, unlike that S13 Otters team who had to scrape out victories in both their playoff games, Arizona only had to do that once, during the Ultimus. And outside of that Ultimus, this 7-6 team with the worst point differential of the 6 teams in the playoffs absolutely dominated. Neither of their ASFC opponents were within double digits after the first quarter, and while it's definitely not better than the Hawks last season, it's arguably more impressive that this mediocre Outlaws team managed to win by 48 points against 2 superior teams, one by a long shot. This is just salvaging a bad Ultimus winner up to 15th of 16 ranked so far, though. This team definitely shouldn't have won the Ultimus, but when comparing to the S13 Otters, I'd argue that this team was better through 16 games compared to that one. And the point differential bears that out, with a +47 total point differential for the Otters combining the playoff games and the regular season, to a +76 point differential for the Outlaws when doing the same thing.
Of note, if this team's best point differential team won with an average playoff run, the Otters, they'd come in between their own S5 season and the S2 Outlaws.
S17 Otters
Record: 7-62nd seed in ASFC, No Home Field in Ultimus
27.8 ppg
21.2 pag
+6.6
Playoff Path:
20-13 over 6-7 SJS
37-20 over 9-4 AZ
28-17 over 8-5 BAL
Notable Awards:
Dan Schneider wins DBotY, Alex Dasistwirklichseinachname wins PotY
GMs win GMotY
Question, was there a period of time where DPOYs, OPOYs, and MVPs could not win their own positional award? Because this is the 2nd time in a few seasons where that has happened; this time Schneider won the DBotY despite a different DB winning DPOY. The competition could totally have been fierce enough for this to naturally happen to be fair. These Otters are a greater version of their S13 counterpart. They were a much better team who managed to be 3rd in point differential this season, out of 6 playoff teams (as opposed to S13's 4th of 4). They did much better in the playoffs as well, keeping their lead to double digits for the entire second half over Arizona, the best team in the league by point differential and record, and while the Ultimus was kept a little closer, the team still had a double digit lead for the last 9 minutes of the game. And the technically 1 possession San Jose game involved the Sabercats scoring a TD with the last time they'd touch the ball with just over 3 minutes left in the game. All in all, I'd put this team below the S1 Outlaws but above the S8 Wraiths, which would be 14th of the 17 teams ranked thus far. If the Outlaws had won, by the way, they'd go between the S4 Otters and the S11 Second Line.
S18 Otters
Record: 10-31st in ASFC, No Home Field in Ultimus
27.9 ppg
17.9 pag
+10.0
Playoff Path:
21-16 over 9-4 AZ
16-10 over 11-2 YKW
Notable Awards:
Johnny Blaze wins TEotY
It feels kinda weird for a team this good to both not win basically any awards, not be the best team over the course of the season, and also end up winning the Ultimus. The Otters, a team with a record better than 12-4 over a 16 game season, were only second, both in record and point differential, to the team they beat in the Ultimus, Yellowknife. The Otters in the playoffs conflict me on how to rank them; their opponents are pretty high up in quality, with a +4.9 rating for the Outlaws and a +11.8 rating for the Wraiths. However, they won both games by an average of 5.5 points per game. They could have lost both games with a touchdown, and indeed were losing for over half of the 4th quarter in their game against the Outlaws. There wasn't a late touchdown in either game to make the score look better or worse, this was just a mediocre team for a champion grinding out two playoff victories. Add that to the second worst award cabinet so far behind only the S13 version and I think this team ends up around the S12 Otters and the S11 Second Line, despite having a decently better point differential than both. It's hard to overcome the dual problems of that not being the best for the season, and the only even average stat for this team being its point differential.
S19 Otters
Record: 9-4
1st in ASFC, No Home Field for Ultimus27.5 ppg
18.7 pag
+8.8
Playoff Path:
28-13 over 8-5 NOLA
30-27 over 9-4 YKW
Notable Awards:
Franklin Armstrong wins MVP
Franklin Armstrong wins QBotY (tied with one other), Johnny Blaze wins TEotY, Lanzer Greivous wins LBotY, Alex Dasistwirklichseinachname wins KotY
So, what happens if we flip the script from last year in a couple ways? This time, the Otters have a worse point differential and a worse record, but they are the best team in the league. They don't have trouble against their 1st round opponent this time, but they do have trouble in the Ultimus again, more trouble even as it takes a late touchdown to win the day, and this is a really poor Ultimus opponent this time: the S19 Wraiths have a +4.0 point differential, less than NOLA did in the first round. These stats with the S18 award cabinet would have me put debating about whether to put them below the S1 Outlaws. But in that year's weakness, we find this year's strength: an awards cabinet we haven't seen on an Ultimus winner this decade outside of the S15 Hawks.
I could logically construct a reason to have this team below the S7 Liberty, with a worse record, the same point differential, and worse playoff victories on an easier playoff path. I could logically construct a reason to put this team above their S5 version, with a close point differential in a harder league and a much, much better award haul. I think splitting the difference and putting them in the dogfight with the S12 and S18 versions of themselves, alongside the S11 Second Line, is where I end up. That makes a 4 team logjam between 9th and 12th.
S20 Copperheads
Record: 8-51st in ASFC, No Home Field in Ultimus
26.9 ppg
20.0 pag
+6.9
Playoff Path:
26-17 over 7-6 NOLA
37-20 over 9-4 YKW
Notable Awards:
Alfredo Crisco wins KotY, PotY
GMs win GMotY
This is a weird season to judge. Starting from the top, we have a bad record and a bad point differential, neither of which were the best mark in the league. However, diving into point differential reveals some interesting tidbits: those Wraiths, the team with the better record, actually had a worse point differential. There were 2 different ASFC teams at about the same point differential as each other: the Copperheads at 6.9 and the Otters at 7.1, but due to the ASFC having more good teams they beat up on each other and left the Otters as the 3rd seed. From that position, they went on to lose before facing the Copperheads, leaving them with a really easy path to the championship. While they didn't exactly take advantage of the +1.6 Second Line, being up by 2 points for most of the 4th and requiring a missed sub 40 yard field goal in order to not be losing with 5 minutes to play, they definitely took advantage of it against a Yellowknife team who for the 3rd time in a row had home field, and for the 2nd time in a row was facing a better performing team over the course of the season. That 37-20 final score is better for the Copperheads than it looks considering the last minute touchdown it took to reach a score that was still 3 possessions down. This team is technically the best of the year, or at least near it, but the team that had a claim to be better took a dive beforehand. So what we're left with is a team with a point differential that matches the S8 Wraiths when they weren't playing the worst defense of all time, had about the same level of difficulty in its playoff games, and has a similarly poor awards cabinet. That team had one guy get his positional excellency award and the DPOY, this team had a kicker sweep his awards and the GMs take home the title. I think there would be a legitimate debate as to which was better, but this team has a leg up in my eyes; due to not having the best record, their regular season performance did not have anywhere near as good of a chance to get awards as those S8 Wraiths did. So I think this team ends up going right above them, but below the S1 Outlaws and the S17 Otters who had an easier time in the playoffs comparatively.
At this point, we seem to be having tiers, so I'm going to separate the teams as such in the list below.
How the (Insert Expletives of your Choice) Did This Team Win the Ultimus Tier:
20. S13 Otters
19. S16 Outlaws
Best Team in a Weak Year Tier:
18. S8 Wraiths
17. S20 Copperheads
16. S17 Otters
15. S1 Outlaws
Good Teams who Upset Greats in the Playoffs Tier:
14. S7 Liberty
13. S4 Otters
Mediocre Champions That I Keep Moving In My Head Tier:
12. S18 Otters
11. S11 Second Line
10. S12 Otters
9. S19 Otters
Great But Short of All Time Status Tier:
8. S14 Sabercats
7. S5 Otters
6. (Space Intentionally left blank for S2 Outlaws)
5. S10 Hawks
4. S6 Otters
The 3 Greatest Teams Ever (so far):
3. S15 Hawks
2. (Space Intentionally left blank for S3 Outlaws)
1. S9 Second Line