(S40) Offseason Task

[JMoney762]

From day 1 the ISFL has been a pretty good simulation league just to confirm I’ve never been a part of a so versatile sim league like the ISFL. What makes the ISFL so exciting is that they have a development which is called the DSFL don’t mistake me, it still takes talent to play in the DSFL.

The main thing that interest me in the ISFL league is that u get brides for performance when it comes to stats, records, coaching, etc because the web there’s a index for ski the information you need starting from the DSFL, in general the league is very structured and properly ran By a good amount of staff members. 2nd the money system is very cool, I like that you have jobs and can earn a crazy amount of money by putting your time and effort into developing the league to get your player to be as good as possible even though this method has pros and cons it’s still a fantastic method to help other and/or yourself develope a great player, in my opinion it makes the league fair. Now we go into the cons of the league, the league itself is very great as I stated my main concern with the league is that the TPE u literally have to take a time lapse in reverse back to the school days and complete task just for a little amount of TPE when TPE gets more expensive as your upgrade, all the links and different pages is probably the hardest most difficult thing I’ve dealt with in a league because it’s like it had to be precise and exact and you have to know exactly where to find this, another thing that’s makes it difficult is that we have no clue at all where to start when we make a player cause we have no way to access the game or even know  what game is being played or how our player is even generated into the game unless I/we ask an admin/ moderator of the league. Overall I’ll give the league a 9/10 based on my opinion and a 10/10 recommendation. I have difficulty but I’ve been walking through the whole process and even coached up on how to do everything so I will recommend this league over any other no doubt about it. Sim leagues are my favorite because it’s like in living a dream make a player and watch him succeed through time of a game against other online players, even though some hate playing the nine skill positions it’s still fun and cool because it’s like you just made history, just like me coming in being drafted to Tijuana (DSFL) now being drafted to Baltimore (ISFL) it’s give you a feel for the game and actually make you want to play and achieve something within the league it’s like making a name for yourself to have in file. I love college leagues so the move up draft here was a +10 being a sleeper was a +10 cause now I have the urge to earn as much as possible to be the best I can  be used I was slept on, it’s like Brady on draft day falling to the 6th round just to become the world's greatest American football player who everyone wished they had chosen on draft night, that’s who I look at y self to be someday in Baltimore. Experiencing my team they are very loyal, very encouraging, and verging brave ya we aren’t the best but it’s never a time where we can’t believe we ain’t win and our Gm has a super plan for the future that’s had already started for us to be a  top team if not the best, and hopefully we can win a chip… #GOBALTIMORE

[KenitohMenara]

Task 7 - Write 600 words or more on something about anything in the league that interests you. It could be related to statistics, a league issue that you take seriously, or a niche part of history that doesn’t fit neatly into either of the above categories. This must be directly related to the league, so don’t wax 600 words about your team’s participation on a Werewolf server or something.

To me, one of the best things about sim leagues like this is the media potential. I am sure we can all agree that the storylines are one of the biggest reasons we all follow sports. The instant stories and all time classics it tells us are better than anything we can get from movies or books or games. I would like share with you all a personal example from this league. About my players first season with the Minnesota Grey Ducks:

It had been a rough road for Minnesota. The last 3 seasons had not resulted in trips to the postseason and more often than not straddling the .500 record line. For a franchise that once was the cream of the crop in the DSFL, winning back to back Ultimini titles, they desperately wanted to make it back to the grand stage.

They entered into the draft needing offensive help, looking for a true number one receiver. There were a lot of good options out there, Squidward Tentacles, Jason Waterfalls and Vincent Sharpei Jr (who the Grey Ducks ended up drafting in the second round). But as the combine went on, the Grey Ducks eyes quickly turned their attention to an… unlikely candidate.

Mason Malone, the Quarterback out of USC.

Now an inquiring mind might wonder why their attention would be in his direction. Malone was a great quarterback at USC for sure and he would go high in this draft but Minnesota would not be one of those teams. They already had Kazimir Oles Jr on the roster and he was likely their QB for the upcoming season so why look at Malone?

He had just posted a 4.53 second 40 yard dash.

That turned the heads of every single coach and GM in the room. That was the fastest time not just for a Quarterback but also was exceptionally even for the skill positions. Not to mention the fact that this was coming from a Quarterback that was not seen as a mobile threat or a scrambler, but a set foot on the ground field general passer. As the combine went on, Malone just continued to impress the Minnesota brass. He was quick from side to side, he was agile, he was strong and from what they heard from his coaches, he was a fine leader in the locker room. After Minnesota interviewed him, Russ Cayhill told the other Minnesota front office members:

“He’s the one”

***

As for Mason himself, he felt the combine had gone exceptionally well. He had earned the attention of several teams and there was a general sense in the combine that he would go high. His performances at USC, his general attitude and combine results had turned heads and his whole home town of McCall, Idaho was anxiously holding its breath, wondering where their favourite son would go. While everyone was sure he would go high, there was one question that everyone was wondering:

“Would Malone still play Quarterback?”


A lot of teams had asked him about his positional flexibility and if he had ever had experience in playing other positions. While Mason had never played any other position but QB, he had trained often with the skill positions players, running backs and wide receivers. The only thing was that Mason had never played those positions in an official game, either in high school or college. But his training with them, day after day in both McCall and at USC had increased his physical attributes exponentially so theoretically speaking, he could play one of the skill positions. That being said, doing so would be a massive gamble for any team to take on, a decision that may cause many teams to flinch away from drafting Malone at all. Then as draft day approached and the world watched on with interest, one team decided that Malone’s attributes and sky high potential was enough to take the risk. The Commissioner walked to the podium and announced the pick:

“With the 4th overall pick in the Season 29 DSFL Entry Draft, The Minnesota Grey Ducks Select… Mason Malone, Quarterback, USC.”

The entire town of McCall celebrated as if they had just won the Superbowl. Mason himself could only sit there as the tears started flowing. He had done it. He had made it to the DSFL. He was inching closer and closer to his dream of making it to the ISFL. After a weekend of partying with his hometown and his family, Mason packed up his bags and headed for Minneapolis for training camp. It was there where he would get the answer to his burning question.

Based on his combine results and raw attributes, they wanted to convert Mason to Wide Receiver. Mason had said if a team can redirect his training to the role he would more than likely accept the position change and throughout camp, the Grey Ducks brass would begin his retraining into his new skill role. This wouldn’t be easy and any slips up in this training camp could result in him getting cut and being only remembered as a draft bust. As he had done many times before, he put his nose to the grindstone and began working again. With the help of his new coaches, the raw athleticism of Malone began to shine and he started to develop a good rapport with his new QB, Kazimir Oles Jr, who had first thought of himself as a mentor to the young QB as he was heading off to the ISFL soon but now was working with the young athlete to turn him into a deadly wide receiver. Malone’s hard work and determination to succeed did not go unnoticed by the higher ups of Minnesota or the media as reports began to flood in of how impressive his camp had been and how he would make for a great 2nd wide receiver for the team and how with him on the team, Minnesota could potentially look to once again make the playoffs for the first time in 3 seasons. That’s when the announcement dropped.

The coaches of Minnesota had decided that not only would Mason be joining their receiver core but he would also be the number 1 receiver. A huge task for any player but this was near impossible task for a QB convert to wide receiver. The media was abuzz with questions and predictions that this was another sign of Minnesota tanking for another miracle talent in the next draft, that is until the head coach of the team, Gregory Ragg, stepped up and let his thoughts be known:

“We are putting Malone at WR1 because we believe in his talents and we believe in the skills he has shown us at this camp. You can laugh at us and mock us all you please, but this decision was not made in haste or made by mistake. We will rally around Mason Malone and we will play good football.”

This not only stunned the media in question but also Mason who was watching from afar. This team believed in him. For the first time in his life a team actually believed he could be the star player right off the bat. The Minnesota Grey Duck brass had no idea how much that meant to the young talent and once he heard it he made a silent vow, that he would do everything in his power to make sure that Minnesota never once regretted making that decision.


Stuff like this you can't find elsewhere and that's what makes this league and indeed sim leagues in general so much fun for me

[hotdog]

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11. Write a short biography or story about your player. This could include background about how they came to the ISFL and how they’ve done so far, a story about their role in an exciting game, or anything else related to their experience in the league.

Outlaw Mode Sicko has been refining his methods since first getting drafted into the International Simulation Football League by the Arizona Outlaws, and his continuing pregame routine is an essential part of this. Outlaw Mode Sicko's ideal day would look something like this - It begins with an 8 am wakeup followed by thirty minutes of scrolling twitter and texting back all his partners and friends and buddies and side pieces. A shower is followed by a strict breakfast of a pack of sour skittles. He then drives over to the stadium and goes through some day-of film session with the defensive backs group like Spottie O'Dopaliscious and Mark Goodhead, and goes over the gameplan with the whole defense. The defensive coaches (retired players who have stuck around in an official capacity - Rich Triplet and Tayshaun Crunk) are wise old men at this point and the game hasn't evolved much so they're certainly still at the top of their game. Outlaw Mode Sicko knows he still has much to learn here so he pays close attention to the advice and the gameplan. After film session, OMS heads to the kitchen to eat lunch - lunch consists of a whole bag of baby carrots and that's it. an hour before kick off he goes to his private room in the team facility and has some intimate alone time. everyone respects Outlaw Mode Sicko and they don't think it's weird or anything they just let him do this and they actually think it's pretty cool. Now feeling relieved in a way, he's ready to go kick some ass on the field. He is not an especially superstitious player once the game starts, he's super locked in on shutting down the receiver across the line from him, but following this pregame routine closely has proven to be a key to individual success on the field.

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29. What team do you think has the best branding in the league? Why?

I've talked about ISFL team brandings here before so I'll talk about the DSFL this time - i think the best overall branding here is probably london or portland (RIP). I think there are some teams with great colors, like the dallas birddogs and the kansas city coyotes, but the rest of the branding just doesn't pop for me. minnesota is cool and i like the unique team name too but there's something about it that just doesn't quite hit fully for me. same goes for Bondi Beach, don't really love the logo and the team location doesn't do much for me (being from not australia). Tijuana is a great concept just don't love the colors. Anyway, what i like about london is the simple yet robust design that feels space-filling in a way the others are not. oops i forgot to mention Norfolk here, don't feel too strongly any way about that but i'm not a huge military guy so i guess the naval theme is lost on me.

[Ephenssta]

10.
I think I would make a rather significant, potentially unpopular change to the DSFL that I think might help with some of the concern around the decline in new users joining the league that has lead to us having to potentially face contraction. The DSFL, I think, could potentially benefit from having a structure to that similar to the development league in the old SCSFL. Basically, rookies join and still go through a draft, but it was more similar to our prospect bowl and the GMs are more similar to the rookie mentors. I think making a change like this accomplishes several things. I believe it would drive more talk into the rookie chat, which I think is the perfect place to house the team spaces for this tournament. Additionally, I think it removes some of the factionalism from the DSFL by making it less about long standing rivalries like we have in the big leagues and more about making sure new users are truly getting oriented to the league and set up for success in the long run. We have had several instances in the DSFL during my time of toxic or anti-competitive behavior that I think some kind of rolling tournament helps alleviate. Additionally, it would let new users get more shots at GMing for a season or two through these tournaments in lower pressure environments than the DSFL generally creates. Such a system would also be far more flexible to the ebb and flow of DSFL users, since you could just make the number of teams you think you would need for that season and adjust on a season-by-season basis. The drawback, I think, is that such a system would be less friendly to send-downs, so lower earners or people playing at positions that don’t have a ton of openings in the ISFL might have a bit of a hard time with this. It needs a bit of massaging, but I think this system would work fairly well.

14.
The league should definitely not expand, but that does not mean we are unable to have a conversation about branding. My suggestion is this: make the Yeti more yellow. I like the branding of the Colorado Yeti, although my understanding is that Yeti is a more European thing while Sasquatch or Bigfoot is the American equivalent. Our war room in Colorado is already the Denver-bigfeet, so I think making a slight tweak to the name to be sasquatch or bigfoot based would help connect the team to the city of Denver…but that’s not the main point of all this. I get that the current logo is going for something based on the Colorado flag, which I think is neat, but it could use more yellow. As penguins know, yellow is the sexiest color by far. And Colorado is quite famous for aspen trees, which in turn are famous for turning golden yellow during the fall and creating BEAUTIFUL views in the mountains where you have this lovely patch of yellow in the middle of all the evergreens. Also did you know that each grove of aspen trees is likely to be a single organism? Aspen trees are pretty heckin neat and Colorado is famous for them. So I think the team should consider a slight rebranding to be the Colorado Sasquatch and the new logo should be primarily yellow. It would almost certainly become a hot spot for prospects and free agents due to the hot new look and the fact that pretty much everyone loves Colorado in general. It’s a great state to live with a lot of sportsball culture and maybe Bigfoot will actually show up to some of our games? It’s obviously no guarantee, but I suppose we can all hope. And if/when bigfoot doesn’t show up to any of the games, you can always take a trip up into the mountains for a chance at a sighting and a visit to the dedicated Bigfoot museum up in Bailey, just a few hours away from Denver. Having been there once myself, it’s definitely a place worth a visit if you get the chance.

[Beta]

11.

Iosefa Fuamatu-Ma'afala , born in Samoa, is a professional football player who has made a name for himself in the sport as a dominant Defensive End within the ISFL. Iosefa's journey to becoming a pro football player began when he moved to the United States from American Samoa, with his family as a child.

Growing up, Iosefa had a love for the game of football and would often play with his friends. He was a standout athlete in high school, being a multisport athlete, he was an All American in Baseball and Football with solid Track times as well. His talent was recognized by several college coaches during his schools run in the Colorodo State Championship.. Iosefa received a scholarship to play football at the University of Notre Dame, where he quickly made a name for himself as a dominant defensive end.

After a successful college career, Iosefa was drafted to the DSFL by the Norfolk Seawolves. He spent a couple months planning on his stardom, writing down how he would be the true heel of the league, however in his first game he was injured on a bad tackle where he ended up with a broken pinkie finger.

Despite the setback, Iosefa did not give up on his dream of playing in the ISFL. He continued to train and work on his skills, and his hard work paid off when he was drafted by the Orange County Otters in the draft in the second round.

Iosefa's determination and work ethic are what have made him a successful football player. He is known for his powerful running style and ability to break blocks. Off the field, Iosefa is actively involved in his community and has used his platform to give back to his homeland of Samoa. Where a memorial school was built for him, many young Samoan's look up to his perservearnce through pain.

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14.

Although I think that the ISFL is one of the few sim leagues out there that is very diverse with it's teams, I do feel there are some obvious rebranding/relocation movements we could make to allow the league to be more inclusive and a better place for the fanbase. When looking at the current teams in different continents we see a good spread, with teams in North America, Europe, Africa, and Australia, that only leaves 3 Continents untouched with teams. Here are some of my ideas for teams for the following continents: Asia, Antarctica, and South America.

South America: I'm honestly quite shocked that we haven't seen any team based in South Africa in the league's past or present. When thinking of big cities the obvious are Buenos Aries, Rio de Janeiro, and Sao Paulo. However when it comes to the ISFL's unique choice of team's in locations, I think the best choice would be a more obscure part of South Africa that doesn't get much love. So that's why the Andes Mountineers would be the best. One of the most famous Mountain Ranges would surley get people talking. An issue I could see with this however would be the lack of oxygen so high up making it difficult to play.

Asia: For Asia I'm going basic and simple. Tokyo would be the best city to get press and in my opinion would be the best to get the attention of most players within ISFL. I imagine many players that would love to play within the vibrant night life that Tokyo contains. So for the name I'm going Tokyo Dragons, with Japan being known for it's vibrant photos and depictions of the majestic beast.

Antartica: Instead of a City for Antarctica I think we just use the whole continent. So Antarctic Penguins would be best in my humble opinion due to Antarctica being known for it's horde of Penguins.

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[JoshiePoo]

Prompt #1
It’s coming Northwest Territories! S39 Ultimus Champions Yellowknife Wraiths baby! What a result for the team, what a result for the players, what a result for the front office. Just unbelievable. When I first entered the league, I had a dream to win an Ultimus one day, and frankly, I thought it was a longshot. There are many different variables that need to go right, and I suppose it just played out perfectly in the end. But enough about me, let’s examine how the champions summited the proverbial mountain in Season 39.

I want to first start by looking at the roster, how each piece got to its individual place. We’ll start all the way back in Season 3. 7 years before eventually winning it all, Yellowknife selected a QB in the S32 ISFL draft by the name of Bernd D. Brot at Pick 14 in the first round. One month later, Brot would move roles to WR, and become a cornerstone of the Wraiths franchise for years to come. After his rookie season in 2047 where Brot had 887 receiving yards, the youngster put together a string of 7 consecutive 1000+ yard seasons, never actually bringing in less that 1100 yards in a season during this stretch. An instrumental piece in their regular season pushes, Brot was a crucial WR1 in 2054, and hauled in 3 crucial touchdowns in Yellowknife’s clinical NFCCG victory over Chicago.

Additionally in the S32 draft, Yellowknife looked to retool their defense. They added two crucial pieces in LB Zephyr Greywolf and LB turned CB Kalam Mekhar. Much like Brot, Greywolf put together a streak of 7 seasons with 100+ tackles after his rookie season, and in their Ultimus season recorded a league leading, monstrous 19 sacks. The LB was instrumental in their dismantling of Arizona in the S39 Ultimus, recording a team leading 12 tackles, 2 TFLs, 1 FF, and 2 sacks in a dominating performance. His draft classmate Kalam Mekhar has been a steady presence at CB for Yellowknife over the years, always recording double digit PBs, with a 6 year streak above 20. But in 2054 the wily corner led the league in INTs with 9 on the season. In the Ultimus, Mekhar had 5 PBs to go along with 6 tackles in a fabulous display by the veteran.

In Season 33, Yellowknife would further solidify their defense with an outstanding draft class, bringing in household names such as LB Kahn Cussion and DE Daron Arnold. Both veterans dominated in their 7 years in a Wraiths jersey, Cussion having a 5 year streak of 10+ sacks, and never delivering below 8 sacks. Arnold locking down the run game, and delivering 40+ tackles for 5 years from the interior of the defensive line. Cussion, the captain of the defense during their Ultimus run, was a huge presence in the locker room and a great role model for the younger players on the unit. On special teams, Yellowknife brought in their reliable kicker Double Doink in the S33 draft as well, putting the finishing touches on a spectacular draft class.

As the Season 34 draft got underway, the Wraiths would cement their dominant defense with CB Simon The Frog and S Sam Sung. As the opposite to Mekhar in the Ultimus, Simon The Frog locked down the other side of the field against Arizona to the tune of 6 tackles, 3 PBs, and an INT in Yellowknife’s blowout win. Sam Sung from the safety position recorded 5 tackles, and a sack in a respectable showing from the 5 year player.

At the start of the 2050 season, in Season 35 the Wraiths had a super massive blackhole of a draft, where they hoovered seemingly all the talent on the board. They brought in WR Calvin Spiff, who would go on to become a crucial WR2 in the Yellowknife offense. Additionally, RBs Adebayo Akinfenwa and Kumquat Archipelago entered the mix, adding a fearsome dual threat backfield to the Wraith’s attack. They also further solidified the LB core with a dominant prospect in LB Jack McPherson.

Akinfenwa and Archipelago dominated out of the backfield in the Ultimus, with Archipelago bringing in two receiving touchdowns, while the duo combining for 242 yards from scrimmage. McPherson had a great game in support of Greywolf, bringing down 7 tackles, 1 TFL, and a PD. Lastly Spiff added his own receiving touchdown whilst creating plenty of space for Brot and the rest of the offense.

But the cherry on top of it all, was the Yellowknife front office inking a deal with Honolulu for the services of standout rookie QB Adrian St. Christmas in exchange for a 2nd round pick. After two disappointing NFCCG exits in 2052 and 2053, the Wraiths front office made the difficult decision of moving on from the aging fan favorite QB Dustin Parmelee. In doing so they hung their hopes on the unproven 2nd year player, and it paid off in spades. St. Christmas limited mistakes, and let his skill players win games for him. In the end, Adrian crushed the Outlaws in the Ultimus with 18/30 on 60% comp, 237 yards, and 4 TDs.


So with this savvy drafting and dealing by the front office, Yellowknife has cemented themselves as a force to be reckoned with for seasons to come. Plus they come home with some hardware.
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[Tiktaalik]

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[sakrosankt]

Tier 1: 7.

I think the sim engine is one of the essential parts of this league. Of course it is, as somehow we have to make our players play the game, but the sim engine is more than that. There are so many aspects to it that are worth a discussion.
The first one I want to discuss here, is the worst time management I have ever seen. It is not even on the level of Mike McCarthy, it is so much worse. I really hate it. It is so bad, it is horrible and atrocious. I don't understand how you could develop a game like Wolverine Studios did, and still never get to fix the timeout debacle at the end of almost every half. Taking timeouts at the worst times ever, at times spiking the ball although it is not necessary at all and putting yourself in really bad situations. So many times that they take a field goal way too early and let the opponent score again. The timeouts and spikes can't be that hard to program into a sim engine as they did I would think. There are some rules you can or have to stick to, and by that, you can fix the issue with 2 minute behavior by the sim. 
It could be possible that this isn't really an issue for Wolverine Studios, as they have a different target group. They developed the game for players that are the general manager and coach of the team. By that, players can make their own decision of when to take timeouts or when to spike the ball. But that doesn't help us at all. Moreover you have kind of bad game experience as a standard player, if your opponents always make so bad decisions and mess up their two minute offense. Of course, you get lucky a lot if you encounter situations like that, but in the long term it becomes annoying to always get lucky in situations like that. So I can't really understand this never really came up for Wolverine Studios to fix. It is really annoying to lose games because of situations like that.

Another aspect of the sim is more related to the builds we are using. First I want to say, that I really am impressed of the work the sim balance team does and also really like what they came up with. Really good work by them, it is not easy to get such a balanced state of the sim engine for the whole league. One thing I want to discuss here though is the current state of maximum builds in the league. The TPE level rises from season to season it seems. It is normal that it does that. But it would be nice to give max earning players some kind of benefit of their hard earned TPE. Think about it, if you are currently max earning in this league, you are maxed out at least 1 season before going into regression. For those players, it would be nice to have something rewarding for the season you are already just banking your TPE.
It would be cool if every position or every build has some kind of possibility of what to do with your TPE once you are maxed out. It could be something like open spending of your maxed build for double the cost of the standard update scale, or just some attributes you can invest in further. Anyways, this kind of build overspending must be regressed immediately, before you take any TPE out of any other maxed out attribute. This would mean, you have about 1 season where you are over the top of the league, in a way that is really rewarding for max earning players. Of course there are drawbacks to this method, as records (especially single season but also career records) are in danger of a system like that. But it would be really cool to have something to do with all the banked TPE you gather when being maxed out.

[Exilizer]

10. Through a random lottery drawing, you have been named the league's new commissioner for a day. Congrats! What improvements would you make to the league if you had the power to do whatever you wanted?

This time round, if by miracle I was chosen for 3 seasons by random lottery in a row to be the commissioner of the league, I would focus on the SIM, but not in the way you think (and which I have previously discussed at length). I would look at what we can do as a league to increase the engagement on the live streams, and further up the incredible production value.
Sure some of that may not be able to be changed without the SIM engine, but I think in terms of presentation we can do even more, for example like adding a bit of commentary (maybe not during the games as it moves to fast, but maybe in between). Maybe we could also have trailers/hype videos for selected headline games or the playoffs to make it even more entertaining, and up the stakes even further. The SIM and Stream departments are doing an incredible job given some of the obvious limitations they are facing which wont go away until we have a 3d engine, which might be never. But we can give it a try.

The other thing I would like to see change is how we earn TPE via point tasks, such as the Ultimus task. Quite frankly it is not exactly fun having to write forced prompts every week that hardly anyone other than the graders ever reads. It's a shame because there are some real gems in the every week, that might be worth to showcase in special featurettes. It would be great to have other tasks that players can complete weekly instead of the point tasks. Obviously we would need to consider the impacts on the relative effort to earn TPE, as we introduce more tools this has already become easier than ever, but the point tasks really do feel tedious at times and not engaging.

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11. Write a short biography or story about your player. This could include background about how they came to the ISFL and how they’ve done so far, a story about their role in an exciting game, or anything else related to their experience in the league.

Cruella de Ville was destined to step into her father's footsteps and join the ISFL ever since she was born. Being the daughter of an ISFL legend, a Hall of Famer and Ultimus champion definitely had its advantages and disadvantages growing up. On one hand it was incredibly cool to have such an awesome dad, at the same time it was also often tedious due to the high expectations everyone had for Cruella growing up. This put a lot of pressure on her, but thankfully she was more than able to rise to the challenge. One of the inherent advantages for her was to learn about the beautiful game of simulation football from one of the best to ever do it on the defensive side of the ball, her father, Derred de Ville. He taught her everything he knew about being the quarterback of the defense, and soon recognised that she was even more talented and more importantly, even more dedicated and disciplined as well. Cruella would be up every morning at 5am before school, running laps, doing her workout and running drill after drill at the excellent home facilities at the de Ville mansion. And then after school & homework, she would do nothing but practice ball hawking, tackling, and learning the best pass rush moves from her father. To say that football was and still is her life would be an incredible understatement. She made a lot of friends playing as well, and honed her early skills as a leader and somebody who can really rally the team and the defense in tough situation. Growing up she learned so many valuable lessons about resilience, independence, working together, taking calculated risks and being able to estimate one's on abilities, and having fun when it mattered. Her father also imbued a competitive mindset in her early on, but honestly that was something she had in heaps already. All of these qualities meant that Cruella was able to make it to the big leagues and have an immediate impact to the extent that she already has. We are all excited to see how her journey will continue.

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[JaytheGreat]

Tier 1: Long Form Tasks (Must be 600+ words)
Choose ONE for 10 TPE.

1. The Season 39 Ultimus and Ultimini have officially come to an end. Congratulations to the the Kansas City Coyotes and Yellowknife Wraiths for each winning their respective championships. How did each of the finalists in either the Ultimus or Ultimini arrive at the playoffs? Were there any teams that surprised or disappointed during the playoffs? Did the outcome of either championship game surprise you at all?


Starting with the Wraiths, just like the last couple of seasons Yellowknife's defense really showed. The last two seasons has statistically been two of the best defensive seasons of all time. The Wraiths allowed 221 points this season which for reference the next closest team was the Austin Copperheads with 319, almost 100 points more. Led by All Pro LBs Zephyr "Tater" GreyWolf and Jack McPherson and All Pro DE Dan Arnold, the Wraiths defense was the definition of and unmovable force, leading the league in sacks (63) and forced fumbles (24) while also being top 5 in INTs (17) and Passes Defended (104). The dominating play didn't stop in the playoffs either, averaging 18 points against during the 3 games of the playoffs, 3.6 sacks and 2.3 turnovers. The icing on this stifling defensive masterpiece was giving up only 6 points in the Ultimus game against the Austin Outlaws. The defense wasn't the only reason the Wraiths won the Ulitmus, its offense was second in the league in points scored with 510. The offense was led by All Pro's WR Bernd Brot, OL J.T Kurbis, and RB Kumquat Archipelago along with new 2nd year QB Adrian St. Christmas. While St. Christmas' stats were about middle of the league he kept the turnovers low while being able to put the ball in the endzone. Archipelago lead the league in rushing TDs (19) and was 5th in rushing yards. While the offense was very good in the regular season, they took it to another level in the playoffs averaging a staggering 42 points per game during the game. You don't need a historic defense when you have an offense that can outscore anyone but they have both. While Archipelago had a really good postseason, it was St. Christmas that drove the offense throwing for 11 TDs over the 3-game playoff run while only throwing one INT. Last but not least was our All Pro Kicker and Punter Double Doink who only missed 3 FGs all season with a long of 58 while downing 31 of their punts inside the 20. All of that combined into one of the most dominating seasons of all time by the Yellowknife Wraiths. 

Down in the DSFL the Kansas City Coyotes won this season's Ultimini, and how they did it was pretty close to the Wraiths. They had the best defense in the DSFL only allowing 279 points which 11 less than the next closest team, while having the second-best offense in the league. However, unlike the Wraiths who had the best record in the league the Coyotes were tied for the 2nd best record because somehow Minnesota somehow managed to tie twice. The defense was anchored by two GM LBs Big Bad Wolf and Jimmy Crystal who were both top 5 in the league in tackles and Crystal being top 4 in tackles for loss. Rookie DE Alex Armstrong made an instant impact with 14 sacks (which was good enough for 3rd in the league) and 3 Forced Fumbles. Fellow rookie DE Ryan Lawrence also made an impact with 7 sacks 3 forced fumbles and 3 fumble recoveries. Just like the Wraiths, the Coyotes are top 4 in all defensive categories except tackles and tackles for loss. The parallels between these two teams atleast defensively are very interesting. In the playoffs the defense could best be described as very solid but not flashy, limiting opponents to just over 20 points per game but only forcing 3 turnovers which all came during the Ultimini game and 5 sacks. Offensively Kansas City was built around the run game with RBs Sherwin Blue Jr and Blippy Shpoppy accounting 1894 rushing yards and 16 rushing TDs with Blue Jr accounting for most of them. Also have to give credit to QB Creg Jerrith IV while not eye-popping passing yards the 25 passing TDs to 8 INTS sure are. The 25 TDs were good enough for 3rd in the league and the 8 INTS is tied for 2nd lowest. He did a great job taking care of the ball and flinging TDs. The offense was a little more impressive than the defense during the playoffs scoring 31 and 44 points respectively. Surprisingly it was Shpoopy the backup RB who lead the team in TDs with 3 during the playoffs. There was no real standout during their Championship run just a rock-solid all-around team that kept up their really good play throughout the season. 

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