Review of week 10 games:
A lot of very interesting results so I'm doing a special write-up:
Hostile Royal Takeover vs. Great JPEGs: 16-17
JPEGs: as dominating as JPEGs can be some games, they have shown a tendency in some other games to underperform. Evidence of this is their 2 losses and the most recent game against HRT. This is a small weakness but certainly they don't want to have one of their underperformances once the playoffs roll around.
HRT: Despite their poor record, HRT has the best pass defense in their Conference, and very good run defense to compliment it. HRT has shown an ability to come very close to beating some of the better teams. In addition to this latest example, week 7 HRT has a close loss to Houston ultimately falling 9-13. Week 5 they stayed in the hunt against Brazilian ultimately falling 10-20. HRT is a team that the better teams would be wise not to overlook.
Vienna Ritterbrüder vs. Houston Gamblers: 37-30
Vienna: last season, Vienna won both the League and Tournament Championship. Jericho was their closest rival. As I pointed out in the off-season, both Vienna and Jericho have very low roster values which normally indicates short-term build approaches, that can help teams win the minors but will cause teams to fall behind around the time the teams are in Semi-Pro or Regional-Pro (and sometimes even sooner). But, while Jericho has shown a sharp regression, Vienna has seemed almost immune to any regression, with the exception of their matches with JPEGs. This latest game is the first sign of any team besides JPEGs able to do much better against Vienna than those teams were able to do in prior seasons. The game was actually in doubt till very late, as Houston took the lead with less than 3 minutes to go in the game. But is this really a sign that Vienna may finally be showing some signs of regression, or is it just a really good game by Houston? It will take additional games to prove which of these theories is true, and in the meantime I'll be keeping a close eye on the answer. One thing to note is that once regression hits a team it can get much worse very quickly. Jericho, for instance, went from being a dominant, top team last season and was still playing at that high level when this season started on 7/15, then by 7/21 they lost to a very good team (Houston) and by 8/2 they lost to a 1-8 team (CCIA) - all of this movement in just over a 2 week period.
Houston: a lot of things I said above about Vienna are opposite with Houston. Houston has a very high value roster that is improving their advantage against many other teams as the season progresses, but has only a good not great AI. This combination makes them able to beat a lot of teams in the league but not be one of the best teams. Importantly, Houston was the first team able to expose Jericho's starting to decline, and this latest game may have been the same for Vienna. Or maybe Houston is improving to the point where going forward they will be able to match up with the best teams, so I'll keep an eye out to see which theory is proven true over the next few games.
Corpus Christi Illegal Aliens vs. Jericho Walls: 34-20
Jericho: I already said a lot about Jericho in what I wrote about Vienna. This is the first time a team that was in the pre-season top 5 has dropped a game to any team outside the preseason top 5. Obviously, it seems to confirm Jericho's continuing decline, although CCIA is also improving.
CCIA: after 8 straight losses, CCIA becomes the first team in the League that was not ranked in the preseason top 5 to beat a preseason top 5 team. CCIA has struggled because most of their players don't have lvl 64 equipment, and their average level is still only 63 so that is still true, but more of their players have lvl 64 equipment now and they will continue to add it as players level. CCIA also has a very high roster value so every game that advantage grows relative to most other teams in the League and especially ones with low roster values. Is CCIA finally becoming the rising star that was predicted in preseason? Or is this just an anomaly and CCIA will return to another string of losses? It's going to take a few more games to prove which one is true.
A lot of very interesting results so I'm doing a special write-up:
Hostile Royal Takeover vs. Great JPEGs: 16-17
JPEGs: as dominating as JPEGs can be some games, they have shown a tendency in some other games to underperform. Evidence of this is their 2 losses and the most recent game against HRT. This is a small weakness but certainly they don't want to have one of their underperformances once the playoffs roll around.
HRT: Despite their poor record, HRT has the best pass defense in their Conference, and very good run defense to compliment it. HRT has shown an ability to come very close to beating some of the better teams. In addition to this latest example, week 7 HRT has a close loss to Houston ultimately falling 9-13. Week 5 they stayed in the hunt against Brazilian ultimately falling 10-20. HRT is a team that the better teams would be wise not to overlook.
Vienna Ritterbrüder vs. Houston Gamblers: 37-30
Vienna: last season, Vienna won both the League and Tournament Championship. Jericho was their closest rival. As I pointed out in the off-season, both Vienna and Jericho have very low roster values which normally indicates short-term build approaches, that can help teams win the minors but will cause teams to fall behind around the time the teams are in Semi-Pro or Regional-Pro (and sometimes even sooner). But, while Jericho has shown a sharp regression, Vienna has seemed almost immune to any regression, with the exception of their matches with JPEGs. This latest game is the first sign of any team besides JPEGs able to do much better against Vienna than those teams were able to do in prior seasons. The game was actually in doubt till very late, as Houston took the lead with less than 3 minutes to go in the game. But is this really a sign that Vienna may finally be showing some signs of regression, or is it just a really good game by Houston? It will take additional games to prove which of these theories is true, and in the meantime I'll be keeping a close eye on the answer. One thing to note is that once regression hits a team it can get much worse very quickly. Jericho, for instance, went from being a dominant, top team last season and was still playing at that high level when this season started on 7/15, then by 7/21 they lost to a very good team (Houston) and by 8/2 they lost to a 1-8 team (CCIA) - all of this movement in just over a 2 week period.
Houston: a lot of things I said above about Vienna are opposite with Houston. Houston has a very high value roster that is improving their advantage against many other teams as the season progresses, but has only a good not great AI. This combination makes them able to beat a lot of teams in the league but not be one of the best teams. Importantly, Houston was the first team able to expose Jericho's starting to decline, and this latest game may have been the same for Vienna. Or maybe Houston is improving to the point where going forward they will be able to match up with the best teams, so I'll keep an eye out to see which theory is proven true over the next few games.
Corpus Christi Illegal Aliens vs. Jericho Walls: 34-20
Jericho: I already said a lot about Jericho in what I wrote about Vienna. This is the first time a team that was in the pre-season top 5 has dropped a game to any team outside the preseason top 5. Obviously, it seems to confirm Jericho's continuing decline, although CCIA is also improving.
CCIA: after 8 straight losses, CCIA becomes the first team in the League that was not ranked in the preseason top 5 to beat a preseason top 5 team. CCIA has struggled because most of their players don't have lvl 64 equipment, and their average level is still only 63 so that is still true, but more of their players have lvl 64 equipment now and they will continue to add it as players level. CCIA also has a very high roster value so every game that advantage grows relative to most other teams in the League and especially ones with low roster values. Is CCIA finally becoming the rising star that was predicted in preseason? Or is this just an anomaly and CCIA will return to another string of losses? It's going to take a few more games to prove which one is true.
some guys are buying CE and AEQ. Couple teams have smoked us though.
