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Asked Madden · 04-05-2021, 10:50 AM

SHL S59 ISFL 1st round review

The last couple of seasons in the SHL and the ISFL has seen a lot of users cross the divide and create a player in the other respective sim.
This usually goes one of 2 ways. Either the person uses the secondary league as just that - a secondary league. Using the affiliate PT to avoid having to do any PTs but not really going beyond that and earning a great deal of money for the career beyond that. I assume it used to be quite easy to spot these kinds as after their rookie contract ran out they would likely stop buying training/Coaching and start to rely on AC and PT for their weekly TPE gains. Whilst fine for the junior league, this method of earning is unlikely to ever see that player make the jump to the big leagues (see scarecrows recent players from Frostbite and iStegosaurus). With the inclusion of rookie tasks adding to rookie contract it has become a lot easier for players to turn into 1 year "max earners" as if you complete the rookie tasks and just do a bit of twitter you'll have a very healthy bank account.
The second kind of player is the person who can hold up a max earning career across more than one sim league which is what teams are looking for in the ISFL players being drafted this season. Some good examples of what GMs will be looking for are people like JKortesi and CKRoyal. Both of whom have created max earning players in multiple leagues (I believe they're both in PBE as well as ISFL and SHL). If you can hit on (and keep in free agency) these kinds of players your team can be set up excellently for years to come.
Bearing that in mind we'll have a look at the first round of the S59 SHL draft analysing some of the picks. I'll go into more detail on those I have shared a locker room with. Hopefully nobody will take any offense to anything written in this article.
A couple of teams last season started a trend of really targeting these ISFL players heavily in the draft with NOLA spending a large amount of draft capital to acquire 3 first round picks and using them to select myself Zayn and Amidships. Whilst Winnipeg Aurora brought in Inverted and Rev to add to the two players in Kyamprac and Enigmatic whom they already held.
This continued this season with NOLA adding in Mooty in a later round and we'll see how Winnipeg went below.
Out of 18 players at least 10 of them have some form of cross sim league experience. That's a huge number, as mentioned in the draft stream it's almost reducing the value of the big reddit recruitment drafts as the quality of first rounders coming across is huge.
So without further ado. Let's get into the draft.

1. Memento Mori
Toronto were in a great spot here having traded for a couple of first rounders over the last season or two seasons they ended up with the first 2 picks of this draft. There was a lot of chatter pre draft that they would take the orange County otter GM duo of Mori and Blasoon. The draft certainly started that way with Mori going off the board 1OA.
Mori's time in the ISFL seems to have been an interesting one. I've not really spent much if any time chatting to him but from what I can see he started off as part of a huge S22 reddit class (the biggest in the leagues history of I'm not mistaken) where he was selected by Myrtle Beach in the development league and then subsequently by Philadelphia Liberty in the big draft. He has since moved to Orange county where he is 1 part of the GM duo with Blasoon. In isfl his media was through the roof when he first joined and he has since supplemented that with income through jobs. I believe he is now at a stage where taking up a second league won't leave him struggling for cash in the first.

2. Gucci
Gucci was a difficult one to mock all the way up until a few Toronto War room members all but announced this pick a few hours pre draft. People had him going anywhere from 1OA all the way up to 14OA.
Gucci is someone I've spent a lot of time with in the ISFL, both of us being members of the Developmental war room as part of the Dallas Birddogs (more from them later) as well as playing with him on the line in St Louis where it took us both over 50 shots to score our first goals this season.
Gucci is a total maverick in the ISFL. He has done it all, from starting up an expansion team in the Birddogs to GMing another in the big leagues with Honolulu. He is a divisive headstrong character though which may divide some opinions of those who haven't actually spent the time to talk to him.
He wrote a 95 theses piece of media which whilst largely tongue in cheek definitely had some scathing remarks on the running of Head Office in the league. This rubbed more than a few people up the wrong way but at the same time shone a light on a number of issues which still arise with the head office group. He has also since become an intern of the DSFL HO team, whether he is trying to take them down from the inside or if he is starting to become a part of the machine we'll maybe never know. Just don't ask him to explain his position on the auditing team which he seems to have a very large hate boner over.
Gucci though is a fantastic locker room presence and Toronto couldn't have asked for a better second overall pick. It'll be very interesting to see who they pair this duo with when it comes to pick number 6.

5. Blasoon
Pick number 5 in the draft was giving a lot of people headaches - nobody knew who was going to be taken and mock drafters the world over were starting to tear their hair out trying to guess who was going to be taken in this position.
Step up Blasoon.
"Seattle are going to trade up to 5 to take me". A few hours later the trade goes through and the land of mock drafts rejoices. Blasoon at 5 is a great pick.
Blasoon is someone I've never had the pleasure of sharing a locker room with but have only had good interactions with and heard great things about.
The only bad words I can say against him come from his taste in users. Helping Norfolk Seawolves select 2 known reprobates in Lanced Jack and ConnorM123. (One of whom recruited me to the ISFL and 1 of whom I recruited to the ISFL) taking one or the other would be fine but taking both is just asking for bother with one very much grating on the other.
Either way Blasoon decided to take the high road when he joined the ISFL deciding on creating as a quarterback. He had early success in the development league helping his team to an ultimini in S23 and a runner up spot in S24 (if I'm not mistaken). He was also the chosen successor to Orange Counties franchise legend and HoF bound Franklin Armstrong (Sim league legend Moonlight). Talk about Big shoes to fill! Unfortunately he is yet to win the big one and was a part of the first ever OCO team to miss out on playoffs. What do you expect though when you draft Rev to your team.
Blasoon is a regular on draft streams, indulging the league with his dulcet tones. He has definitely cemented himself as a fan favourite maybe only behind WhatAmUs in the voice category. (as an aside, Blasoon, did you sign off on Connor joining the last draft stream? I'm Scottish and barely understood him. I feel sorry for anyone from across the pond listening in.)

6. Raven
With Torontos 3rd pick in the draft as opposed to teaming up the OCO gm pair, with Blasoon going the previous pick, they decided instead to pair up Honolulus ex GM partnership deciding instead on selecting Raven who used to GM alongside Gucci.
Raven is a well known prospect in both the SHL and the ISFL and was the early frontrunner for 1OA when mock drafting started.
Raven has definitely been around the block in both leagues and this is our first true recreate who also plays in ISFL.
The reason I believe Raven fell here is due to his all or nothing status with new players. Either he max earns as can be seen by his first player, the excellently named Raven Silverwang. Or he flames out like his second player Rafe Ulrich.
Now I've got no idea why the second player didn't go as well but for all I know it could be personal circumstances and I'll never hold that against somebody.
I've never had any personal conversations with raven (that I remember) but all of the Birddogs drafted to honolulu have lovely things to say about him.
Raven actually recreated during my first season in the ISFL when he was still honolulu GM. He went 1st OA in the DSFL draft due to his excellent locker room presence and probably would have gone in the same position in the big draft if he wasn't a GM autodraft.
Raven at 6 rounds out probably the strongest opening round since NOLA picked up their birddog trio last season. Congratulations Toronto and congratulations Raven!

7. ZootTX
Oh, wicked, bad, naughty, evil Zoot! Oh, he is a bad person, and he must pay the penalty!
Is not something you will ever hear about our Zoot. Everyone's favourite fireman has one of my favourite storylines in all of the ISFL. Picked in round 21 of the S22 draft Zoot was picked up amongst the inactives and was himself inactive at the time from what I understand.
He managed to move up over 50 spaces for the ISFL draft going to the Yellowknife Wraiths to be their tght end of the future.
At the same time he started to become more and more active in the birddog locker room, helping new starts with builds and finding PTs as well as cracking many a good joke.
All of this culminated in Zoot getting invited to the war room and into a Co gm position shortly after. He now (like myself) has won an ultimus championship, helping his team turnover NOLA in the final. He was also a viable fantasy pick last season though that may have changed now.
On a personal level Zoot is awesome. He'll really help to pick up your locker room and is one of the most helpful people you can find, willing to scout large amounts of people to help out the war room. He enjoys a dad joke and loves an innuendo. I hope to one day suit up alongside him in at least one league.

8. Kenitoh Menara
Next up was the first of two Winnipeg pigs, and as I said earlier on in this media - they have been one of the teams selecting a lot of ISFL players. No exception here as the first pick for them in the S59 draft goes on Kenitoh Menara. Kenitoh, if I'm not mistaken, was one of the first ever Dallas Birddogs and has had a couple of players both in ISFL and SHL. From my understanding (and again I could be wrong) Menara has had history of leaving his players fairly early on. But once again this may very well be down to personal circumstances and I'm not going to hold that against them.
I've never spoken to Kenitoh at all as he was out of the team by the time I joined Dallas but for all intents and purposes he seems to be very passionate and love his sim leagues. He was very much into the mock draft and did an awful lot of digging to try and find out who was going where.

9. Yongarius
This was my favourite and least favourite moment of the draft. My least favourite part came from this being the pick to ruin my mock Damn you Lim! *Shakes fist* Lim was widely expected to go in the second by people not paying enough attention.
Lim was a really late sign up at the start of the season going behind a lot of controversial figures in the J draft. He has since started fights with nearly every person he's come across in the junior league really making a name for himself. Not that he needs his fighting to make a name for himself as he already has a great name. "Robot Sunfish"
This is where my favourite part of the draft comes in. Lims draft card was a thing of beauty. A huge sunfish, with a red cyborg eye. How does it put on skates? Who knows. Not me. But it definitely won render of the draft for me.
Lim is yet another Dallas Birddog making his way across to the SHL and yet another one making his way to the Winnipeg lights. Lim actually (I think) was one of the GMs who drafted me in the development league all those seasons back in the ISFL. Every single time I speak to Lim I leave with a smile, it makes me sad that we are in the completely wrong timezones to get even better acquainted. Me living in Scotland and him living South Korea means there's only a couple of hours overlap. Winnipeg got a great one here though.

12. GoonerBear
GoonerBear is someone I've shared a locker room with for the past three ISFL season. We are both a part of the San Jose Sabercats across there in the ISFL. GoonerBear makes up one half of the thunder and lightning running back partnership alongside Jamar Lackson (who is actually going into this seasons J draft). This partnership lead the Sabercats to two huge surprise championships in S24 & S25. Unfortunately for GoonerBear he definitely sees the ISFL as a secondary league compared to shl meaning he has played second fiddle to Jamar after falling behind him in TPE.
GoonerBear isn't the chattiest person in SJS so he isn't someone I've gotten to know hugely well but that's not a knock on him at all. Another great pick at 12 and another person who has already proven they can close to max earn in multiple leagues. Very safe pick here.

13. Fever
Okay so this is a rather cheeky one to fill some extra word count in. Fever has literally just joined and been drafted in the ISFL when a large amount of St Louis Scarecrows decided to all join the league at the same time.
Its my understanding though that fever has already had 2 (maybe more) max earning players here alongside a couple of players in PBE.
I've spent this past season with Fever and he has been a delight. Fever wears his heart on his sleave and gets fully invested in every conversation he gets into.
It was a shame to see fever slide as far as he did. Initially we expected him to go to his old team at 3, then we expected him to go to Winnipeg at 8 before he slipped past them as well (breaking the mock in the process). At 13 Fever is a total steal and a proven commodity. Great pick.

15. LB3737
LB3737 joined the ISFL a season or 2 after me and I haven't had a huge amount of time speaking to him but every time I have he's been excellent.
LB has though been seen a s a completely controversial figure after knowingly and disgustingly trying to tamper someone to come to his DSFL team in a targeted and heinous flaunting of the rules.
You'll be glad to know though, Head office threw the book at him and the FBI (or equivalent wherever he's from) came and interrogated him to ensure they'd cut off the root of the problem. It was very close to us having to shut the whole league down following his flagrant cheating.
Obviously I'm being completely facetious here. LB had the book thrown at him for a harmless comment which someone took as tampering. The punishment lead to a social media outcry and a denouncing of head office (one it the many times it happened recently).
Aside from that, great pick at 15 although of all the people I've just listed he may be the most likely to bust, only because he's the newest to sim leagues.

All in all I see 10 very good prospects showing a very healthy relationship between the SHL and ISFL. Hopefully this relationship can continue to flourish and the two leagues can continue to share players like keys at a swingers party.

If this article has piqued anyones interest in ISFL my username is the same across there tell 'em I sent you.

Madden out.

gucci · 04-05-2021, 11:04 AM

Quote:He has also since become an intern of the DSFL HO team, whether he is trying to take them down from the inside or if he is starting to become a part of the machine we'll maybe never know.

Apes together strong, Madden. Stars

Asked Madden · 04-05-2021, 11:19 AM

I respect that!

Raven · 04-05-2021, 11:35 AM

Thanks for the kind words! Ulrich had a combination of things that ended up with me going ia. It was a combination between the forum move, general forum atmosphere and I guess most importantly a bank account that was empty an no drive to work it up.

SInce rejoining I have been making use of 2x media to build up a nice bank, I feel refreshed from the forum and so much changes in the years I was gone. Kawashima will be a player who will be chasing Silverwing in player success and even beyond that.