Quote:2. Tell us about your draft class. Is there anything that makes it special in comparison to other classes? Where did your fellow draftees land, how are they doing? Did anyone turn out to be an unexpected steal of that draft based on what you know today? Do you think anyone in your draft class will become a hall of famer? If you’re new to the league, how do you think your class will do? Where do you think people will get drafted to?
With the Season 25 ISFL draft class entering regression this offseason, it seems like a great time to do a retrospective on our class at this point. The S25 class is up there alongside some of the all-time greatest classes of the ISFL with such storied classes as S22 and maybe some other ones that I don’t really know about because they’re all geezers, and by the looks of things it may end up being one of the last truly outstanding classes for quite a while as recruiting numbers trend down. There were originally 141 players who created as part of the class and were entered into the DSFL draft, the second largest class of all time after only the gargantuan S22 class. With so many great users and players to come out of the class, I wanted to take a look at how this class has situated itself in league history (strictly looking at on-field performances) as it reaches its peak.
Of these 141 initial creates, a newly passed rule during the previous season before the S25 ISFL draft meant that only 115 players who met the >57 TPE cutoff criterion were entered into the eligible ISFL draft pool. While it resulted in the tragic loss of some great player names like Lugolor Gulogor, D’Brickashaw Minshew Sr., and Regius Goliathus, it was certainly a good change to preserve the sanity of the ISFL general managers. With the two newly added expansion teams in New York and Berlin, this resulted in a 9 round draft (8 full rounds + 3 picks in the 9th round).
Working backwards from the end of the draft, only one player taken in the 7th, 8th, or 9th rounds ended up making an ISFL roster at any point - King Tutankhamun (taken 109th overall) ended up playing for Baltimore during their winless S27 season and amassed a grand total of 9 yards on 4 carries.
Aside from one short stint on a bad team, the first major contributors can be found in the 6th round. There were in fact several hits this late in the draft, demonstrating the tremendous depth of the draft. CB-turned-RB Elijah Torres (82nd overall) amassed 350 total yards for New York in S28 in backup work to Captain Rogers. Anders Christiansen (74th overall) has spent 5 seasons serving as part of RB committees on Colorado and Philadelphia has amassed almost 3000 rushing yards and 28 TDs. Another 4 players (!) in the 6th round have made at least one Pro Bowl during their careers - Marlon Alexander (80th), Owen Isaac (76th), Brent Silva (73rd), and Buster Bawlls (71st). Bawlls and Alexander have had incredibly successful careers, with Bawlls definitively the best fullback in the league for most of his career and Marlon Alexander, who has sadly finished out his career, amassing 3 selections to All-Pro teams in his short career. New York definitely excelled at getting talent from the later portions of the S25 draft.
Moving into the 5th round, finding unsuccessful picks becomes more difficult than finding successful ones. 8 of 14 picks in the 5th round ended up reaching at least one Pro Bowl with additional strong careers put up by Terry Yaki, Adam Spencer, and Jeeeeroy Lenkins surely making for one of the highest performing 5th rounds of all time. The 4th round was a bit of a low point for the class, with “only” 4 Pro Bowlers. The 3rd round once again had 8 Pro Bowlers, the second round 5, and finally 11 of the first 14 picks of the draft having reached at least one Pro Bowl. A huge portion of picks in the draft even all the way down to the 5th and 6th rounds have wound up having their impact felt in the ISFL.
For those keeping track, that’s 40 players from the draft who have made at least one ISFL Pro Bowl. Looking at the SFWG All-Pro Teams, which started after the S28 season, we see that 31 players have made it onto these even more selective rosters a total of 50 times across the 4 seasons they’ve existed. Looking at the players who have made it, we can see that the class stands out especially at particular positions - FB (Buster Bawlls and Ben Alexander-Arnold have taken 7 of the 8 possible FB slots across all the teams), OL (7 players with 11 total appearances), DT (3 players with 6 total appearances including 3 1st team appearances by Honky-Tonk Haywood), and CB (8 different players with 13 total appearances).
Moving on from the high-level statistics, I want to make some early predictions at who from the class might end up having the best shots at Hall of Fame careers. These are always difficult to predict even sometimes with the hindsight of a player’s entire career behind them, but I think there are some cases that are more likely than others.
My pick for the best shot in the entire class is Yellowknife wide receiver Mark Walker (user @deadlunatic ). After an immediate callus, the first 7 seasons of his career have resulted in 5 consecutive 1,000 yard seasons (plus a in-hindsight-tragic 962 yard season in S26), amassing 8,224 total receiving yards and 55 total TDs, both in the top 40 all time. Not only that but he has 2 Ultimus trophies to his name. With several seasons remaining ahead of him, he has a great shot at attaining some very impressive career numbers even at a competitive position like WR, especially considering how recent seasons have been his best with an astonishing S31 almost certainly ensuring him his first WRotY award.
There are a few more players who I think are more likely than not to make it if their career trajectories continue to be kind. CB Rich Triplet (user @Kotasa ) currently ranks 5th all time in passes defensed with 186 and has averaged 35 per season since the sim transfer. With his plans for a long career ahead of him, he has the potential to continue to increase that number substantially, but relatively low turnover and TD numbers, a lack of playoff success, failure to win positional awards, and increased PD numbers across the board provide just enough uncertainty for me to avoid calling it yet. OL Adam Mellott (user @GuitarMaster116 ) appeared to be a lock with 2 OLotY awards and 2 unanimous 1st team all-pro selections, but his selfless abdication of the coveted LT position and reduced pancakes might reduce his all-time career stats at the end of his career.
Finally there are a few outstanding players who face a difficult road because they play at less-than-flashy positions. Honky-Tonk Haywood (user @jzajenius36 ), as mentioned before, has 3 1st-team All Pro teams to his name as well as the S30 DTotY award, yet his career stats don’t flash off the page due to the difficulties of playing at DT - only 26 sacks and 25 TFL at this point is hard to envision as a HOF candidate. Looking at his contemporaries in the post-sim-transfer era makes him look better but that depends on the committee considering those softer accomplishments. Finally, I have to mention the GOAT Buster Bawlls (user @ryd029aird13 or something). FBs don’t have a positional award, but he’s been the 1st team All-Pro FB selection 3 of 4 seasons that’s been possible and the 2nd team selection the other season. Bawlls has had a truly excellent career at potentially the least important position in football, and it will be really interesting to see how the HOF committee evaluates that.
TL;DR S25 GOATED
Code:
1,266 words...