Offseason Predictions & Bonus Content (Don't Hate Me)
by Austin_97890 | 4 years ago | 1 Comments
With the offseason around the corner, why not get the trade talk juices flowing. I think there are a few teams that will get very proactive this season both due to trying to get over the hump or because they joined the league with rosters that needed drastic changes/improvements. Also, I didn't really spell check/grammar check... so spare me.
Predicted Most Active Franchises This Offseason
1.) New York Jets
2.) Carolina Panthers
3.) Dallas Cowboys
Jets: This may come as no surprise as there has been continuous talk of the New York Jets needing a starting caliber running back and overall roster improvement in a lot of areas. Potential trade targets include Ezekiel Elliot, Derrius Guice, Philip Lindsay, Derrick Henry, and Edwards-Heliare. My prediction is a deal is struck for Elliot or Guice. Both 91+ speed HB’s with some legs left in their careers. Question becomes what is the market on some starting running backs with SS/XF development. I'd expect their first round pick to also be on the block to get a proven player to at least compete for the final seasons of M21.
Panthers: The ownership in Carolina has never been shy to make some bold moves. With their trade block being posted before the Wild Card round even really got going I believe this is a great indicator. My belief is they will be heavy in the market for a QB, HB, SS/XF WR. The defense in Carolina has stars all over and thus after two underwhelming finishes to the past two seasons they will make a bold move to get back in playoff contention. Completely capable of doing so may I add. Potential trade targets include Russell Wilson (shocker), Justin Herbert, and perhaps the comeback of Cole McDonald? My guarantee of the offseason is Jerry Jeudy will be in Carolina shortly after the SB. Steel has the defensive pieces to acquire a WR who had an underwhelming season and these two franchises have history working together.
Cowboys: This should come as no surprise, Taint/DealingDebts/Mateo is always making moves on the trade market. Season one run heavy Taint is long gone and for good reason after putting together an offense with THREE 95+ speed WR’s. I believe there has been some solid results from defensive minded teams this cycle and the Cowboys will look to improve even more on that side of the ball with a trade package that includes SS WR Gallup and Ezekiel Elliot. Perhaps this is enough to swing an impact player on the defensive line where the Cowboys have not ONE blinker. Shame.
Separate bonus content… First and foremost, let me start out with saying what a pleasure it is to be apart of the Better League. A group of guys with a passion for playing some virtual football. Big props to the admin team & content creators for keeping this league moving in the right direction continuously. This is by no means meant to take that away. All love.
Now, cue the Sanders Show Ryan remark. These sliders are DOG _ _ _ _! I kind of just wanted to put together a well thought out explanation for why we should move towards a slider adjustment sooner rather than later. Why wait until Madden 22 as previously? This article was sparked by just another absurdly 10-15 yard inaccurate pass by an 80+ overall QB.
We incorporated Reddit sliders after season one I believe and I think from the jump there was a good amount of opposition to the move mixed with a good amount of “Well let’s just give it a shot”. Few seasons have gone by and the chat is sporadically filled with slider talk. Quite honestly, I think most of us are tired of talking about it which made me second-guess writing this. But I felt it was necessary.
Here’s where I have a very passionate stance on why stock sliders are better suited for an already “sim mode” league. We incorporated sliders that way back when were tested by some analytic fella that may have achieved a better “real life/sim version of Madden”. If my research is correct, this set of sliders we started to utilize have since been adjusted with multiple versions based on patches, etc. That is truly where the problem lies. The analysis and research for this set of sliders was done at least 3 seasons ago and a number of EA/Madden patches ago. What does that imply? Well, our sliders were not necessarily built for adjustments that the devs were making but rather for the gameplay they disseminated with the game back in season one. Now of course, not everyone will agree with a change mid cycle… but I pose the question “Why the hell not?.
A hill I would be willing to die on every single time sliders are discussed, no video game is perfect. There is never going to be a perfect balance. There will always be the cheese plays/issues within gameplay. BUT, at the very least we could be playing on sliders that the developers are making adjustments to and move in the right direction as opposed to backwards because we aren’t making significant adjustments to our sliders. Even if we were to do so, we probably would just be taking a shot in the dark.
Here is what we get moving back to stock sliders SEASON FIVE… (my opinion at least)
1.) Consistent gameplay with H2H, other leagues, etc. (Sim may have some variation in animation, got it.)
2.) Gameplay updates in keeping with developer’s adjustments/patches.
3.) Ability to lab more effectively as opposed to playing an unique version of gameplay for just Better League.
4.) Records will be broken. This is natural in a CFM, because as much as you want to create SIM stats historical data would suggest records are consistently broken.