Why Your Team Sucks: Volume Two
After a long delay caused by GM responsibilities and a constant influx of new baffling moves being made by the subject of this article, I can finally present the second installation of the WYTS series. After ruffling some feathers with the first article, I’ve decided to take Teyon’s advice and include the following disclaimer:
*All of the contents of this media piece are intended as satirical humor, except of course those which aren’t. Please forgive me for what will be said, I promise that I bear no ill will towards any team mentioned in below*
Once again, as this was intended to be a Podcast originally, I will include the intro tune I think best fits the team. This one was intended to capture both the grittiness of the windy city natives as well as the soft and gentle nature of the team in question.
Intro Song
What can I say about the Chicago Butchers that you haven’t already seen spouted all over the forums or in Discord. They have a reputation as an absolute trainwreck of a franchise, so my goal for this piece will be to convince you that they absolutely deserve that reputation. Before jumping into the history of the team I wanted to introduce you to the first team to play in Chicago, the Chicago Blues, as well as the tragic hero and protagonist of this story, Jiggly. Say what you want about Jiggly, but he has inserted himself into Chicago’s sim league history like no other has or will ever again attempt to.
For those of you who don’t know, the Chicago Blues were inaugural members of the DSFL in season 3 and from the get-go, their history was a tumultuous one. Jiggly was the first GM of the Blues and chose Muf as his co-GM. In Jiggly’s own words, “neither of us were ready for the first draft. He (Muf) gave me suggestions and we ended up with essentially one active: me.” Then apparently, just after the draft, Muf was poached by the San Jose Sabercats, and RedCydranth was hired as his replacement. Lots of people in the league were big fans of Red’s but according to Jiggly, “He was an amazing guy, but both of us were way too lax about running the team. I was the main GM, so if one of us had to go, it had to be him.” So, from the very offset the team was underprepared to compete in the much easier of the two leagues with management turmoil and a largely inactive roster, or so you’d think. Jiggly and his team of inactives went 10-4 before losing to the Norfolk Seawolves in the first round of the playoffs. I was given investigatory temporary access to the ghost town that was the Chicago Blues Locker Room on Discord as well. In there I developed a deep sympathy for Jiggly and what he was dealing with emotionally while running this team. While Jiggly told me the sad tale of the Chicago Blues in my DMs, I sifted through Jiggly’s sparse and often unreturned greetings to the new members of his team as well as anime gifs posted to anybody who might happen to see it and respond, with the odd message from a member of the team. Entire months went by in 2017 without a message in the server. This must’ve been a very difficult time for Jiggly who was admittedly unprepared for the responsibilities of being a GM and receiving nothing but harsh criticism and bullying for his efforts. In season 4, the Blues struggled to a 5-9 record and missed the playoffs. The mockery only worsened as other GMs began to call for Jiggly’s inactive team to be retracted to bot status. At the end of S4, Jiggly, admittedly obsessed with keeping power agreed to allow the Blues to be contracted and given to Booter, but only on the condition that HO would allow him to take control of the Kansas City Coyotes and relocate them to Chicago as the Chicago Coyotes. Some of you may have seen the concept art for this on discord, but alas the league rejected the plan as a whole and HO member iamslm22 contacted Jiggly to let him know that he’d been voted out and would be forced to hand in a resignation.
*An additional note on this era is that Jiggly may or may not have been involved with a trade offer of a draft pick for Daisy Ridley nudes. That will remain an unconfirmed part of the early lore of the sim league.
Booter would take over the Blues and immediately move them to the fictional town of Palm Beach to become the Solar Bears. After doing so, Booter immediately went inactive and the Solar Bears became timeconsumer’s plaything for testing out strats. That S5 bot team championship is the reason why most of the league’s position and weight restrictions on players exist to this do, as every exploit in the sim was used faster than HO could ban them. This is also the reason that bot teams now have AI management rather than players being in charge.
While some of this is hard to read and you definitely feel for Jiggly at times seeing the pain this brief DSFL GM job caused him, this is the foundation of football in Chicago, and it’s a major reason why the decision to bring the Butchers to Chicago in S16 was a sucky one. Chicago is a cursed football town in the sim league, and I believe the ghost of Alexandra Jones still haunts the town like a poltergeist does an Indian burial ground. Sometimes the best solution is to pack it up and move before it’s too late…
Now that you’re all good and sad, let’s get y’all bored as well. It’s time for a Butchers specific history class. However, with the Butchers only being around for 5 seasons and change, I will keep it someone brief. Before there were the Butchers, there was an unnamed expansion team that had been awarded to experienced sim league vet Oles and his trusty sidekick Muford, another grizzled vet. One of Oles’ first ideas as GM was to gauge the league’s reaction to his top choice team ideas. Which I have to say was a horrible idea. To provide a little context, the balance of the league had just shifted dramatically with the addition of the largest draft class they had seen since S1 after the March 2019 Reddit class. While we got many great additions to the league, we also got many redditors, famed for their terrible judgement and overall worthless opinions. So Oles created a poll which included the options of: Louisville Pedigree, Louisville Butchers, and the obvious winner Chicago Butchers. Although Oles had a great idea in the Louisville Pedigree, which referenced the horse breeding that the state of Kentucky is notoriously famed for as well as a unique color scheme of pastel blue and pink, the league reacted maturely and decided on a name that sounds like it was meant for a team of monster trucks at a rally. To make things worse, the branding idea was black and red. While it matched the hometown team Chicago Bulls, it also was identical to the Arizona Outlaws color scheme at the time. Always remember this rule, when doing an online poll, the worst possible answer is always guaranteed to win. I hope Oles has learned this lesson after watching his beautiful team idea snatched away from him by the uninformed masses.
The next step for this team was the S15 NSFL Draft, which they would receive picks in to help build a future for this team, despite not making their on-field debut until S16. I’ll always remember this draft fondly, as my player, WR Brock Landers, took the NSFL universe by surprise after being selected first overall by the Arizona Outlaws. I doubt Chicago looks back on this draft as fondly…
It started out well enough as Chicago took one of the NSFL’s leading superstars in safety Lightsout Lewis. However, he would play out only his rookie deal with the team before jumping ship to the greener tundra of Yellowknife. Their second-round pick was spent on an elite CB prospect, Xerxes Ridley, who earned consistently for a few seasons before falling off and going inactive with less than 600 TPE. The next pick was LB Guy Nikko who got into the 400s in TPE before going IA and subsequently bouncing around the league for the past few seasons. The next pick was arguably their best of the draft, as they landed S Jack Rambo in the fourth round who has been consistently active, earning, and on their roster his whole career. Their final 9 picks were spent on players who would never make it out of the DSFL. This was the foundation draft on which the Chicago Butchers were laid.
The next step came a little while later, after another full season, the S16 Expansion Draft had finally rolled around. Not a lot of top talent available, but Chicago managed to land a few good pieces including DEs Kwame Abayomi Mbanefo and Marc Spector, DT Curtis Saul, K Kulture Fulture, and RBs Aksel Danielsson and Seer Zephyrous. Spector and Zephyrous were traded to Arizona along with their season 17 second round pick for versatile RB Ricky Adams and unsettled LB Gekyume Stokely and it became clear that Chicago was in win now mode.
The underwhelming S16 draft had rolled around and the Butchers had managed to get the first and second picks in the draft in a move that would cost them 2 future firsts (S17/18) and a future second (S18) and effectively screw the franchise before it really had a chance in an all out push for a S16 title. They now had no picks in the first two rounds of the next two drafts, but 3 picks in a relatively weak, but loaded at the top draft. With the first overall pick they took legit NSFL superstar Sam Torenson at RB to lead the franchise into the future. Great pick. With the second overall pick they took linebacker Blake Faux who would position change and develop into one of the league’s best defensive tackles. With their third pick (11OA) they took an active offensive lineman. Bold choice, but good value for the pick in that draft class.
The Butchers were ready now to begin their first season. However, they still needed a Quarterback. Ironically, there was a free agent QB that had never gotten a chance to see the field in San Jose who really wanted to play in Chicago. This player was QB Rose Jenkins aka Jiggly. So, football was back in Chicago, and so was Jiggly. It was a natural fit. In that first season, the Chicago team impressed everyone. Particularly on defense, where they boasted the league’s best scoring, passing, and total defense. They managed to amass an impressive 10 wins en route to claiming the top spot in the NSFC and a bye to the conference championship game. Despite the game being played in Chicago, the Philadelphia Liberty were too much for Chicago to handle. They marched into the Butchers stadium and hung 47 points on that top ranked defense. Jenkins looked to be a little overmatched despite the offense putting up 34, as she was intercepted 3 times by Philly safety Lennox Garnett. Philly would go on to lose in dramatic fashion to my Arizona Outlaws on a last-minute touchdown. To this day, I’m still glad we didn’t have to play that Butchers team for the Ultimus. They were very good.
The next season, Oles and Muford reloaded without being able to bring in any talent in the draft as they’d traded away their first two picks. They were still competitive as they finished in a three-way tie for first in the conference (unfortunately getting the 3 seed) and earned a shot to go on the road to Baltimore in the playoffs. During that season they’d had the top ranked rushing offense and another very good defense. However, in that playoff game they got walloped 40-6 and so ended the golden era of Chicago Butchers football. 18-8 regular season record, but no playoff wins to show for it.
After the season the team underwent a management change that wasn’t the smoothest of transitions and it became clear that the team needed a full rebuild. Once again, they had no picks in the first three rounds of the next loaded reddit draft class. A theme that will become more and more common in the history of the Butchers as we continue. This draft will also come up in more detail later in the article as it’s a doozy. They’d go 5-8 that season. With no real prospects to successfully rebuild, they underwent another management change before the next season.
By this point the team had made some moves including acquiring DT Ryan Leaf Jr. (for more picks), traded the S20 first two picks (would include 1OA) for a S19 first, and trading a borderline HoF caliber DL for win-now Baltimore’s S19 conditional first and a S20 third. The team now had two firsts and Ryan Leaf Jr. in exchange for a lot of picks and former GM Muford aka D’Pez Poopsie. In that draft, Chicago would go receiver twice in the first. One they hit on with Sean O’Leary who continues and took the vile racist caricature of Sweet James Jones with their second pick (he’s no longer associated with this league). They wouldn’t do much else in that draft and proceeded to go 3-10 in S19.
Almost caught up on these guys. At this point Jiggly was out of Chicago and hated the league as a whole again, so management change time again and rather unbelievably Valor was hired as the GM of Chicago proving that sometimes it pays off to be in the wrong place at the right time. Star WR Ahri Espeeyeeseetee would sign with the Butchers in free agency with the promise of big-time stats and a #1 receiver spot. During the season Toasty would step down and leave the league as well. Steelsound, the man behind, Ahri would step up and take his spot. While Chicago’s on field play was once again forgettable, they fired up the ole trade machine again and started dumping picks. Honestly at this point I’m tired of writing about Chicago trading away picks for inactives and I want to get to the reasons why they suck. I’ll wrap this up.
S21 so far Chicago has been surprisingly potent on offense and sits at 2-3. However, steel dumped another first and second in the greatest draft class ever for 2 more inactives.
Finally, I can stop writing about that team’s depressing and confusing history and get to the good stuff, why do the Butchers suck?
It wouldn’t be a proper WYTS article if I didn’t lead off with their dumbass branding. Let me start by saying that I’m biased as I wanted the Trix Yogurt Cotton Candy colors of the Louisville Pedigree in the first place, that being said Chicago probably has the second worst brand in the NSFL with only Baltimore eclipsing it with it’s stupid yellow eagle logo for a team called the Hawks. First off as far as unique brands go, choosing the city of Chicago is just about as basic as it gets. If you’re gonna go basic, it generally helps to not go even more basic with a team name like the Butchers. Then the logo came out as some sort of weird cross between an Evil Dead (2013 remake) poster and a circa 2003 Green Day American Idiot concert t-shirt. Next, we get to the colors. In my last article I wrote about the pain that comes with looking at the Myrtle Beach colors. The Butchers color scheme doesn’t incite pain so much as just overwhelming disappointment. Red and Black? Really? The most basic ass colors applied to the most basic ass team name in the most basic ass city in the NSFL. Disappointing. I know the people involved with this brand and they’re capable of so much more. Especially with so much time to make the brand before going live with it.
Now we must deal with the downward spiral of management changes which current GM’s Valor and steelsound are attempting to put an end to by using the same blueprint as the guys who got them there. To follow my train of thought (as well as an anonymous former Butcher’s), Oles and Muford got bored when it became clear their efforts to come into the league in win now mode had left the team in a bad position to sustain their success and in a bad position to rebuild properly. They jumped ship, hiring a good replacement in their wake in flyeaglesfly29. He then invited the wolf back into the hen house. He likely hired Jiggly because he knew that he had GM experience (not sure if he knew he details of that experience or not). Jiggly gave me a quote describing his GM experience with the Blues, “After only a season, season and a half, I decided that I'd step down at the end of that season. I wasn't cut out for GM-ing.” Yet he tried again, and the antics ensued in Chicago. I don’t know the specifics of how this all went down, but fly was out not only of the GM role in Chicago but left them team for Yellowknife after just one year of being co-GM with Jiggly. Toasty was hired by Jiggly as fly’s replacement. Toasty had experience GMing with the Orange County Otters and was generally considered to be a good hire. However, with him and Jiggly at the reigns of the team they continued to make mind baffling decisions mainly with trades and free agency offers (including clearing $20m in cap space for a Bex mega-offer that was swiftly turned down in favor of the a near-minimum offer from NOLA). Once Jiggly was once again done with the league, he left and went on a brief sabbatical from the league, and Valor was chosen to be the new co-GM almost by default as the most willing man for the job. Before long Toasty had gotten sick of the abuse that comes with being the GM of the Butchers and he left the team, and briefly went on a short sabbatical of his own. Then steelsound was brought on to replace him and the current relationship seems like Valor worries about the pressing matters like possible relocation locations, uniforms, and alternate logos while steel manages the mundane everyday operations of the team. One thing I can say is that I believe they have a plan. Is it crazy? Hell yes. Will it work? Almost certainly not, but you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.
Now on to some of the infamously bad trades made by the Chicago brass over the past few seasons. Let’s start early in the team’s history. This article so far seems overly critical on the GM’s from Jiggly onward, but let’s not forget that it was Oles and Muford who sold out the team’s future for 2 shots at the Ultimus. First off, the trade for Ricky Adams. Giving up a 2nd round pick a good DL player and an RB who was still producing to make it happen. Stokely was a good LB prospect they got back in the deal, but at the time that defense had nothing but LBs and they were taking on a mercurial personality that had expressed an interest in testing free agency in the future. Ricky Adams was also in regression. The two players sent to Arizona were crucial cogs in the championship run they made that year, and there ended up being a clear winner of that trade. AdamS also robbed them blind as they traded the farm for 1OA. I think they likely could’ve had Torenson at 2, but who knows. I do know Torenson was shipped away for a RB multiple seasons into regression and a fifth-round pick after less than three full seasons on the team. Also, former 2OA Blake Faux was traded along with picks for a second and a fifth as well. So it didn’t make sense at all to sell the farm in the end. Wow this is hard to write tbh, it’s insane looking at how many times one team can repeat the same mistakes. Next, it’s time for the Jiggly era and the trade offer that made Jiggly famous amongst a whole new generation of sim leaguers. Four first rounders for the right to take Marcela Toriki at 5th overall. A trade that SJS would still be collecting on if they had accepted, but I’ve heard them described as “decent human beings” for turning down an offer like that from Jiggly for Bex. I’ve gotta agree there, that’s the level of overzealousness that skips right past creepy and borders on potentially dangerous. As Dermot has said “I’d trade my mother and sister for four firsts.” Oh, we’re still only on the Jiggly era so we’re unfortunately not close to being done. Next up is the Toasty trades. Including the one he made for a first round pick he’d eventually spend on a teenager in virtual blackface who would eventually harass him into briefly leaving the league before being banned himself. Next Toasty unloaded Xerxes Ridley, leaving them without a top CB. Then dumped future HoF top receiver Kazimir Oles for a notoriously cursed player and a first. Then came the future first and second for Austin’s first in a weak class. Then traded a first for a player who had a mutual option, which he did in fact activate to leave. Giving away a first for nothing. Then came the acquisition of Leaf which wasn’t a bad deal at all and has worked out pretty well all things considered. We’re on to the Valor era trades now… Chicago acquired Waldo as a QB of the future who already wants out and gave a few picks away for cap space. Now steelsound is involved in the craziness as well. Traded cap space for a deep regression corpse from OCO. Traded 2 future picks and swapped third rounders in two strong classes for a IA LB who enters regression next season. Traded the first overall pick away to swap inactive DTs deep into regression. Shuffled around some IAs with other teams. Traded a second and fifth in two very strong draft classes for the retiring corpse of LB Leighton Lee. Gave up another pick in the same mega class for Xerxes Ridley the CB they had previously dumped on NOLA for cap space or something. Traded another pick in the mega draft for an IA DT. Traded their top two picks in the same mega class for a IA DT, an IA RB about to enter regression, and a third rounder. Then they said screw it and traded four more picks in the mega class for IA/retiring players about to enter regression.
Thank god that’s over. Those were only the major trades. Wtf Chicago. For some reason this team that has been in a rebuild for like 4-5 seasons thinks they’re in win now mode and hates drafting players. This is honestly some of the most bizarre shit I’ve ever seen. If you need more proof of how ludicrous these damn trades are.
Now we can finally get to the big one. The culture of losing and inactivity that has become synonymous with the Chicago Butchers. One thing I can say is that I believe Valor and steelsound are doing a good job to turn this around. They’ve made move to get guys who are updating and remove guys who aren’t (get bent Fulture). However, since making the massive mistake of hiring Jiggly, the inactivity and losing has set in as the team’s well-deserved reputation. Currently, the Chicago Butchers have 16 active players (not counting those of retirement corpses). My Dallas Birddogs expansion DSFL team had more players update last week than that. If they continue to undervalue to draft in a quick bid to make themselves look more better on the TPE tracker the losing will continue and the culture will be set in stone. I played for a team that rebuilt the correct way in Arizona, and the way to do that was to value new players and grow them into your team. To do this you need picks. Playing with other rookies they are familiar with is something that excites your early career players. You will never be attractive to teams as free agents if they don’t know anybody on your team and you’re always losing. This is the key to keeping players active. Give them a spot to engage with their teammates as much or as little as they want. Don’t go after a guy who played his whole career on one team and is going for the most stats possible in a bid for HoF. He doesn’t give a shit about winning, losing, or staying engaged. From what I can see this is the type of player Chicago values, that and inactives. Look, Jiggly happened, you can’t change that. However, there’s been numerous chances to blow it all up and start again with a real rebuild, and this on the fly shit isn’t working. Invest in the draft and build your culture right Chicago.
Not gonna lie. I sit here 4300 words into this article wondering if this seemed like satire at all or not. It was sad to write unlike the Myrtle Beach one. They are a good team, poking fun at them is fun. Chicago is the exact opposite and I tried to inject as much humor as I could, but this team is just a depressing as hell research case and even more depressing to analyze and write about.
That being said. I’ve gotta shout out (and apologize to) my people on the Butchers.
@ValorX77 and @`steelsound` I know you’re giving it your all. I don’t agree with the current plan, but I hope it works out for you. Keep doing your thing.
@Jiggly_333, thank you for being as open and honest about your experiences with the Blues and the Bex trade. Sorry if it got a bit to focused on you at some points, you were just way more forthcoming than anybody else.
@oz3700 from our shared time in Norfolk. Great teammate and right up there with Jenkins as the most loyal Butcher of them all.
And I honestly think that’s all of the Butchers players I know at all so those were some very short acknowledgements.
Next up the much lighter mood story of the Philadelphia Liberty…
After a long delay caused by GM responsibilities and a constant influx of new baffling moves being made by the subject of this article, I can finally present the second installation of the WYTS series. After ruffling some feathers with the first article, I’ve decided to take Teyon’s advice and include the following disclaimer:
*All of the contents of this media piece are intended as satirical humor, except of course those which aren’t. Please forgive me for what will be said, I promise that I bear no ill will towards any team mentioned in below*
Once again, as this was intended to be a Podcast originally, I will include the intro tune I think best fits the team. This one was intended to capture both the grittiness of the windy city natives as well as the soft and gentle nature of the team in question.
Intro Song
What can I say about the Chicago Butchers that you haven’t already seen spouted all over the forums or in Discord. They have a reputation as an absolute trainwreck of a franchise, so my goal for this piece will be to convince you that they absolutely deserve that reputation. Before jumping into the history of the team I wanted to introduce you to the first team to play in Chicago, the Chicago Blues, as well as the tragic hero and protagonist of this story, Jiggly. Say what you want about Jiggly, but he has inserted himself into Chicago’s sim league history like no other has or will ever again attempt to.
For those of you who don’t know, the Chicago Blues were inaugural members of the DSFL in season 3 and from the get-go, their history was a tumultuous one. Jiggly was the first GM of the Blues and chose Muf as his co-GM. In Jiggly’s own words, “neither of us were ready for the first draft. He (Muf) gave me suggestions and we ended up with essentially one active: me.” Then apparently, just after the draft, Muf was poached by the San Jose Sabercats, and RedCydranth was hired as his replacement. Lots of people in the league were big fans of Red’s but according to Jiggly, “He was an amazing guy, but both of us were way too lax about running the team. I was the main GM, so if one of us had to go, it had to be him.” So, from the very offset the team was underprepared to compete in the much easier of the two leagues with management turmoil and a largely inactive roster, or so you’d think. Jiggly and his team of inactives went 10-4 before losing to the Norfolk Seawolves in the first round of the playoffs. I was given investigatory temporary access to the ghost town that was the Chicago Blues Locker Room on Discord as well. In there I developed a deep sympathy for Jiggly and what he was dealing with emotionally while running this team. While Jiggly told me the sad tale of the Chicago Blues in my DMs, I sifted through Jiggly’s sparse and often unreturned greetings to the new members of his team as well as anime gifs posted to anybody who might happen to see it and respond, with the odd message from a member of the team. Entire months went by in 2017 without a message in the server. This must’ve been a very difficult time for Jiggly who was admittedly unprepared for the responsibilities of being a GM and receiving nothing but harsh criticism and bullying for his efforts. In season 4, the Blues struggled to a 5-9 record and missed the playoffs. The mockery only worsened as other GMs began to call for Jiggly’s inactive team to be retracted to bot status. At the end of S4, Jiggly, admittedly obsessed with keeping power agreed to allow the Blues to be contracted and given to Booter, but only on the condition that HO would allow him to take control of the Kansas City Coyotes and relocate them to Chicago as the Chicago Coyotes. Some of you may have seen the concept art for this on discord, but alas the league rejected the plan as a whole and HO member iamslm22 contacted Jiggly to let him know that he’d been voted out and would be forced to hand in a resignation.
*An additional note on this era is that Jiggly may or may not have been involved with a trade offer of a draft pick for Daisy Ridley nudes. That will remain an unconfirmed part of the early lore of the sim league.
Booter would take over the Blues and immediately move them to the fictional town of Palm Beach to become the Solar Bears. After doing so, Booter immediately went inactive and the Solar Bears became timeconsumer’s plaything for testing out strats. That S5 bot team championship is the reason why most of the league’s position and weight restrictions on players exist to this do, as every exploit in the sim was used faster than HO could ban them. This is also the reason that bot teams now have AI management rather than players being in charge.
While some of this is hard to read and you definitely feel for Jiggly at times seeing the pain this brief DSFL GM job caused him, this is the foundation of football in Chicago, and it’s a major reason why the decision to bring the Butchers to Chicago in S16 was a sucky one. Chicago is a cursed football town in the sim league, and I believe the ghost of Alexandra Jones still haunts the town like a poltergeist does an Indian burial ground. Sometimes the best solution is to pack it up and move before it’s too late…
Now that you’re all good and sad, let’s get y’all bored as well. It’s time for a Butchers specific history class. However, with the Butchers only being around for 5 seasons and change, I will keep it someone brief. Before there were the Butchers, there was an unnamed expansion team that had been awarded to experienced sim league vet Oles and his trusty sidekick Muford, another grizzled vet. One of Oles’ first ideas as GM was to gauge the league’s reaction to his top choice team ideas. Which I have to say was a horrible idea. To provide a little context, the balance of the league had just shifted dramatically with the addition of the largest draft class they had seen since S1 after the March 2019 Reddit class. While we got many great additions to the league, we also got many redditors, famed for their terrible judgement and overall worthless opinions. So Oles created a poll which included the options of: Louisville Pedigree, Louisville Butchers, and the obvious winner Chicago Butchers. Although Oles had a great idea in the Louisville Pedigree, which referenced the horse breeding that the state of Kentucky is notoriously famed for as well as a unique color scheme of pastel blue and pink, the league reacted maturely and decided on a name that sounds like it was meant for a team of monster trucks at a rally. To make things worse, the branding idea was black and red. While it matched the hometown team Chicago Bulls, it also was identical to the Arizona Outlaws color scheme at the time. Always remember this rule, when doing an online poll, the worst possible answer is always guaranteed to win. I hope Oles has learned this lesson after watching his beautiful team idea snatched away from him by the uninformed masses.
The next step for this team was the S15 NSFL Draft, which they would receive picks in to help build a future for this team, despite not making their on-field debut until S16. I’ll always remember this draft fondly, as my player, WR Brock Landers, took the NSFL universe by surprise after being selected first overall by the Arizona Outlaws. I doubt Chicago looks back on this draft as fondly…
It started out well enough as Chicago took one of the NSFL’s leading superstars in safety Lightsout Lewis. However, he would play out only his rookie deal with the team before jumping ship to the greener tundra of Yellowknife. Their second-round pick was spent on an elite CB prospect, Xerxes Ridley, who earned consistently for a few seasons before falling off and going inactive with less than 600 TPE. The next pick was LB Guy Nikko who got into the 400s in TPE before going IA and subsequently bouncing around the league for the past few seasons. The next pick was arguably their best of the draft, as they landed S Jack Rambo in the fourth round who has been consistently active, earning, and on their roster his whole career. Their final 9 picks were spent on players who would never make it out of the DSFL. This was the foundation draft on which the Chicago Butchers were laid.
The next step came a little while later, after another full season, the S16 Expansion Draft had finally rolled around. Not a lot of top talent available, but Chicago managed to land a few good pieces including DEs Kwame Abayomi Mbanefo and Marc Spector, DT Curtis Saul, K Kulture Fulture, and RBs Aksel Danielsson and Seer Zephyrous. Spector and Zephyrous were traded to Arizona along with their season 17 second round pick for versatile RB Ricky Adams and unsettled LB Gekyume Stokely and it became clear that Chicago was in win now mode.
The underwhelming S16 draft had rolled around and the Butchers had managed to get the first and second picks in the draft in a move that would cost them 2 future firsts (S17/18) and a future second (S18) and effectively screw the franchise before it really had a chance in an all out push for a S16 title. They now had no picks in the first two rounds of the next two drafts, but 3 picks in a relatively weak, but loaded at the top draft. With the first overall pick they took legit NSFL superstar Sam Torenson at RB to lead the franchise into the future. Great pick. With the second overall pick they took linebacker Blake Faux who would position change and develop into one of the league’s best defensive tackles. With their third pick (11OA) they took an active offensive lineman. Bold choice, but good value for the pick in that draft class.
The Butchers were ready now to begin their first season. However, they still needed a Quarterback. Ironically, there was a free agent QB that had never gotten a chance to see the field in San Jose who really wanted to play in Chicago. This player was QB Rose Jenkins aka Jiggly. So, football was back in Chicago, and so was Jiggly. It was a natural fit. In that first season, the Chicago team impressed everyone. Particularly on defense, where they boasted the league’s best scoring, passing, and total defense. They managed to amass an impressive 10 wins en route to claiming the top spot in the NSFC and a bye to the conference championship game. Despite the game being played in Chicago, the Philadelphia Liberty were too much for Chicago to handle. They marched into the Butchers stadium and hung 47 points on that top ranked defense. Jenkins looked to be a little overmatched despite the offense putting up 34, as she was intercepted 3 times by Philly safety Lennox Garnett. Philly would go on to lose in dramatic fashion to my Arizona Outlaws on a last-minute touchdown. To this day, I’m still glad we didn’t have to play that Butchers team for the Ultimus. They were very good.
The next season, Oles and Muford reloaded without being able to bring in any talent in the draft as they’d traded away their first two picks. They were still competitive as they finished in a three-way tie for first in the conference (unfortunately getting the 3 seed) and earned a shot to go on the road to Baltimore in the playoffs. During that season they’d had the top ranked rushing offense and another very good defense. However, in that playoff game they got walloped 40-6 and so ended the golden era of Chicago Butchers football. 18-8 regular season record, but no playoff wins to show for it.
After the season the team underwent a management change that wasn’t the smoothest of transitions and it became clear that the team needed a full rebuild. Once again, they had no picks in the first three rounds of the next loaded reddit draft class. A theme that will become more and more common in the history of the Butchers as we continue. This draft will also come up in more detail later in the article as it’s a doozy. They’d go 5-8 that season. With no real prospects to successfully rebuild, they underwent another management change before the next season.
By this point the team had made some moves including acquiring DT Ryan Leaf Jr. (for more picks), traded the S20 first two picks (would include 1OA) for a S19 first, and trading a borderline HoF caliber DL for win-now Baltimore’s S19 conditional first and a S20 third. The team now had two firsts and Ryan Leaf Jr. in exchange for a lot of picks and former GM Muford aka D’Pez Poopsie. In that draft, Chicago would go receiver twice in the first. One they hit on with Sean O’Leary who continues and took the vile racist caricature of Sweet James Jones with their second pick (he’s no longer associated with this league). They wouldn’t do much else in that draft and proceeded to go 3-10 in S19.
Almost caught up on these guys. At this point Jiggly was out of Chicago and hated the league as a whole again, so management change time again and rather unbelievably Valor was hired as the GM of Chicago proving that sometimes it pays off to be in the wrong place at the right time. Star WR Ahri Espeeyeeseetee would sign with the Butchers in free agency with the promise of big-time stats and a #1 receiver spot. During the season Toasty would step down and leave the league as well. Steelsound, the man behind, Ahri would step up and take his spot. While Chicago’s on field play was once again forgettable, they fired up the ole trade machine again and started dumping picks. Honestly at this point I’m tired of writing about Chicago trading away picks for inactives and I want to get to the reasons why they suck. I’ll wrap this up.
S21 so far Chicago has been surprisingly potent on offense and sits at 2-3. However, steel dumped another first and second in the greatest draft class ever for 2 more inactives.
Finally, I can stop writing about that team’s depressing and confusing history and get to the good stuff, why do the Butchers suck?
It wouldn’t be a proper WYTS article if I didn’t lead off with their dumbass branding. Let me start by saying that I’m biased as I wanted the Trix Yogurt Cotton Candy colors of the Louisville Pedigree in the first place, that being said Chicago probably has the second worst brand in the NSFL with only Baltimore eclipsing it with it’s stupid yellow eagle logo for a team called the Hawks. First off as far as unique brands go, choosing the city of Chicago is just about as basic as it gets. If you’re gonna go basic, it generally helps to not go even more basic with a team name like the Butchers. Then the logo came out as some sort of weird cross between an Evil Dead (2013 remake) poster and a circa 2003 Green Day American Idiot concert t-shirt. Next, we get to the colors. In my last article I wrote about the pain that comes with looking at the Myrtle Beach colors. The Butchers color scheme doesn’t incite pain so much as just overwhelming disappointment. Red and Black? Really? The most basic ass colors applied to the most basic ass team name in the most basic ass city in the NSFL. Disappointing. I know the people involved with this brand and they’re capable of so much more. Especially with so much time to make the brand before going live with it.
Now we must deal with the downward spiral of management changes which current GM’s Valor and steelsound are attempting to put an end to by using the same blueprint as the guys who got them there. To follow my train of thought (as well as an anonymous former Butcher’s), Oles and Muford got bored when it became clear their efforts to come into the league in win now mode had left the team in a bad position to sustain their success and in a bad position to rebuild properly. They jumped ship, hiring a good replacement in their wake in flyeaglesfly29. He then invited the wolf back into the hen house. He likely hired Jiggly because he knew that he had GM experience (not sure if he knew he details of that experience or not). Jiggly gave me a quote describing his GM experience with the Blues, “After only a season, season and a half, I decided that I'd step down at the end of that season. I wasn't cut out for GM-ing.” Yet he tried again, and the antics ensued in Chicago. I don’t know the specifics of how this all went down, but fly was out not only of the GM role in Chicago but left them team for Yellowknife after just one year of being co-GM with Jiggly. Toasty was hired by Jiggly as fly’s replacement. Toasty had experience GMing with the Orange County Otters and was generally considered to be a good hire. However, with him and Jiggly at the reigns of the team they continued to make mind baffling decisions mainly with trades and free agency offers (including clearing $20m in cap space for a Bex mega-offer that was swiftly turned down in favor of the a near-minimum offer from NOLA). Once Jiggly was once again done with the league, he left and went on a brief sabbatical from the league, and Valor was chosen to be the new co-GM almost by default as the most willing man for the job. Before long Toasty had gotten sick of the abuse that comes with being the GM of the Butchers and he left the team, and briefly went on a short sabbatical of his own. Then steelsound was brought on to replace him and the current relationship seems like Valor worries about the pressing matters like possible relocation locations, uniforms, and alternate logos while steel manages the mundane everyday operations of the team. One thing I can say is that I believe they have a plan. Is it crazy? Hell yes. Will it work? Almost certainly not, but you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.
Now on to some of the infamously bad trades made by the Chicago brass over the past few seasons. Let’s start early in the team’s history. This article so far seems overly critical on the GM’s from Jiggly onward, but let’s not forget that it was Oles and Muford who sold out the team’s future for 2 shots at the Ultimus. First off, the trade for Ricky Adams. Giving up a 2nd round pick a good DL player and an RB who was still producing to make it happen. Stokely was a good LB prospect they got back in the deal, but at the time that defense had nothing but LBs and they were taking on a mercurial personality that had expressed an interest in testing free agency in the future. Ricky Adams was also in regression. The two players sent to Arizona were crucial cogs in the championship run they made that year, and there ended up being a clear winner of that trade. AdamS also robbed them blind as they traded the farm for 1OA. I think they likely could’ve had Torenson at 2, but who knows. I do know Torenson was shipped away for a RB multiple seasons into regression and a fifth-round pick after less than three full seasons on the team. Also, former 2OA Blake Faux was traded along with picks for a second and a fifth as well. So it didn’t make sense at all to sell the farm in the end. Wow this is hard to write tbh, it’s insane looking at how many times one team can repeat the same mistakes. Next, it’s time for the Jiggly era and the trade offer that made Jiggly famous amongst a whole new generation of sim leaguers. Four first rounders for the right to take Marcela Toriki at 5th overall. A trade that SJS would still be collecting on if they had accepted, but I’ve heard them described as “decent human beings” for turning down an offer like that from Jiggly for Bex. I’ve gotta agree there, that’s the level of overzealousness that skips right past creepy and borders on potentially dangerous. As Dermot has said “I’d trade my mother and sister for four firsts.” Oh, we’re still only on the Jiggly era so we’re unfortunately not close to being done. Next up is the Toasty trades. Including the one he made for a first round pick he’d eventually spend on a teenager in virtual blackface who would eventually harass him into briefly leaving the league before being banned himself. Next Toasty unloaded Xerxes Ridley, leaving them without a top CB. Then dumped future HoF top receiver Kazimir Oles for a notoriously cursed player and a first. Then came the future first and second for Austin’s first in a weak class. Then traded a first for a player who had a mutual option, which he did in fact activate to leave. Giving away a first for nothing. Then came the acquisition of Leaf which wasn’t a bad deal at all and has worked out pretty well all things considered. We’re on to the Valor era trades now… Chicago acquired Waldo as a QB of the future who already wants out and gave a few picks away for cap space. Now steelsound is involved in the craziness as well. Traded cap space for a deep regression corpse from OCO. Traded 2 future picks and swapped third rounders in two strong classes for a IA LB who enters regression next season. Traded the first overall pick away to swap inactive DTs deep into regression. Shuffled around some IAs with other teams. Traded a second and fifth in two very strong draft classes for the retiring corpse of LB Leighton Lee. Gave up another pick in the same mega class for Xerxes Ridley the CB they had previously dumped on NOLA for cap space or something. Traded another pick in the mega draft for an IA DT. Traded their top two picks in the same mega class for a IA DT, an IA RB about to enter regression, and a third rounder. Then they said screw it and traded four more picks in the mega class for IA/retiring players about to enter regression.
Thank god that’s over. Those were only the major trades. Wtf Chicago. For some reason this team that has been in a rebuild for like 4-5 seasons thinks they’re in win now mode and hates drafting players. This is honestly some of the most bizarre shit I’ve ever seen. If you need more proof of how ludicrous these damn trades are.
Now we can finally get to the big one. The culture of losing and inactivity that has become synonymous with the Chicago Butchers. One thing I can say is that I believe Valor and steelsound are doing a good job to turn this around. They’ve made move to get guys who are updating and remove guys who aren’t (get bent Fulture). However, since making the massive mistake of hiring Jiggly, the inactivity and losing has set in as the team’s well-deserved reputation. Currently, the Chicago Butchers have 16 active players (not counting those of retirement corpses). My Dallas Birddogs expansion DSFL team had more players update last week than that. If they continue to undervalue to draft in a quick bid to make themselves look more better on the TPE tracker the losing will continue and the culture will be set in stone. I played for a team that rebuilt the correct way in Arizona, and the way to do that was to value new players and grow them into your team. To do this you need picks. Playing with other rookies they are familiar with is something that excites your early career players. You will never be attractive to teams as free agents if they don’t know anybody on your team and you’re always losing. This is the key to keeping players active. Give them a spot to engage with their teammates as much or as little as they want. Don’t go after a guy who played his whole career on one team and is going for the most stats possible in a bid for HoF. He doesn’t give a shit about winning, losing, or staying engaged. From what I can see this is the type of player Chicago values, that and inactives. Look, Jiggly happened, you can’t change that. However, there’s been numerous chances to blow it all up and start again with a real rebuild, and this on the fly shit isn’t working. Invest in the draft and build your culture right Chicago.
Not gonna lie. I sit here 4300 words into this article wondering if this seemed like satire at all or not. It was sad to write unlike the Myrtle Beach one. They are a good team, poking fun at them is fun. Chicago is the exact opposite and I tried to inject as much humor as I could, but this team is just a depressing as hell research case and even more depressing to analyze and write about.
That being said. I’ve gotta shout out (and apologize to) my people on the Butchers.
@ValorX77 and @`steelsound` I know you’re giving it your all. I don’t agree with the current plan, but I hope it works out for you. Keep doing your thing.
@Jiggly_333, thank you for being as open and honest about your experiences with the Blues and the Bex trade. Sorry if it got a bit to focused on you at some points, you were just way more forthcoming than anybody else.
@oz3700 from our shared time in Norfolk. Great teammate and right up there with Jenkins as the most loyal Butcher of them all.
And I honestly think that’s all of the Butchers players I know at all so those were some very short acknowledgements.
Next up the much lighter mood story of the Philadelphia Liberty…
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