WEEK 2 POWER RANKINGS

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Category: TSL QB Power Rankings

Created: Thursday, 05 September 2024 18:55

Published: Thursday, 05 September 2024 18:55

Written by Jeff Krol

Hits: 206

Welcome back to the TSL Quarterback Power Rankings!  

We have TWO WEEKS in the books now and every single team in the League has played at least one game.  Untouchaballs, GUCCI, Freeballers and Scared Hitless have yet to win a game.  Practice Squad, Day by Day and PowerPuff Girls are all on top of the standings.  It's a crazy, upside down world, but it'll start to make more sense as the season progresses and we figure out who's REALLY good/improved from last season, and who has benefited from attendance/schedule issues to start the season

 

For now though, here are your TOP FIFTEEN Quarterbacks in the TSL (and, one might argue, the world):

 

 

#1 Mike Thomas - Sticky Bandits

Last Week:  Beat the Malones 49-42

When was the last time the reigning D1 champions played the reigning D3 champions?? Mike dropped 49 on his crossover opponents to ensure that the TSL's longest winning streak came to an end.  When does Sticky Nation face off against Wet Bandits or Eyes Downtown??

 

#2 Joey Batts - Wet Bandits / Cunning Stunts

Last Week:  Beat Frodo Swaggins 50-31 (Wet Bandits), beat Creekers 45-20 and Vaspian 52-27

Last week we wrote "a win over their greatest rival plus two 50+ point games (both wins) is the start we expected from Joey Batts".  Frodo isn't their greatest rival, and 45 points isn't quite 50+, but otherwise it kind of felt like Week One, with Battaglia smashing three teams for easy wins.

 

#3 Bobby McConnell - Eyes Downtown

Last Week:  Beat Scared Hitless 30-29

There's something a bit off about Eyes Downtown lately, for all the talent on this roster.  Shouldn't they be crushing people like the Wet Bandits are?  Bobby survived by the skin of his teeth this week with a hard fought win against Scared Hitless.  Close wins can be character building for a team though, so maybe this is a good thing.

 

#4 Andy Strug - The Malones

Last Week:  Beat Grey Hair - Don't Care 52-14, lost to Sticky Bandits 49-42

The long winning streak is over, but the Malones were one good half away from knocking off the defending D1 champions.  Plus Andy scored 94 points in a day!  We think the Malones are going to be just fine, as they've already gotten started on their next winning streak.

 

#5 Garrett Beesing - Frodo Swaggins

Last Week:  Beat Untouchaballs 36-7

Untouchaballs may not have been at full strength, but frankly neither was Frodo.  Last year Garrett's team went 1-7, and through two weeks this year they've already surpassed that win total.  Seems like at least SOMEBODY is enjoying the D1/D2 crossover games.

 

#6 Jordan Lawson - Mavericks

Last Week:  Beat Can't Touch This 47-31

Is it true that this was the Mavericks first win over Can't Touch This?  (The website poll implies it is.)  Mavericks were the D2 favorite last session until Freeballers shocked them in the playoffs, but they're picking up right where they left off this Fall.

 

#7 Ryan Dougherty - Can't Touch This

Last Week:  Lost to Mavericks 47-31

A win this past weekend would have showed that Can't Touch This are among the top teams in D2 and ready to contend for the championship.  A statement win will have to wait another week unfortunately (they get the D1 champs this week!) as Ryan couldn't keep up with Jordan and the well oiled Mavericks machine.

 

#8 Jeremy Olson - Freeballers

Last Week:  Lost to Grey Hair - Don't Care 45-26

Hogan is BACK!  He hasn't won a game yet, sure, but that's coming soon.  It's tough to take almost a year off and come right back against elite talent.  We think Freeballers will start winning games again as soon as... well, maybe this week against Scared Hitless.

 

#9 Frank Laudico - Wanderers

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No game for the Wanderers on Saturday.  We'll see Team Tie Dye in action next week.

 

 #10 Dylan Day - Scared Hitless

Last Week:  Did Not Play

Scared Hitless lost to Eyes Downtown on Saturday, but it looked like Travis was throwing?  It's too bad, a game against Bobby would have been a great measuring stick for Dylan.

 

#11 Jeremy Burr - Untouchaballs

Last Week:  Did Not Play

Are the rumors true that Burr is not QBing for Untouchaballs this season?? We'll find out next week, but we're told that they lost to Frodo 36-7 without him.  Could be a long season for Untouchaballs without their loudmouth superstar.

 

#12 David Eickhoff - Grey Hair Don't Care

Last Week:  Lost to the Malones 52-14, beat Freeballers 45-26

Weird to have such a convincing win against a D1 team, and then on the same day have such a convincing loss against a D2 team (especially one that was just a D3 team!) but that was Grey Hair Don't Care's day.  Are they good?  Are they bad?  We're not sure!

 

#13 Brandon "B" Ford - Practice Squad

Last Week:  Beat Buffalo Vice 38-35

Practice Squad has just looked so much more at home since dropping down to D3 this Spring.  They start this season 2-0 with wins over the last two D4 champions, PWI and Buffalo Vice.  It'll be interesting to see how they fare against Wanderers (who they eliminated from the playoffs last session), Let's Get Reccked and Jabronies.  

 

#14 Alex Buchlis - Let's Get Reccked

Last Week:  Beat Straw Hats 54-36

Maybe Straw Hats, struggling with the loss of half their team, isn't the best measuring stick for how good Let's Get Reccked will be this season, but they can only play the team that lines up against them.  And they played well, in their first game of the season.

 

#15 Buddy Lee - Passing While Intoxicated / Big Daddy Jason & the ILFers

Last Week:  Beat Straw Hats 41-30 (Passing While Intoxicated), beat Select 44-39 and The Herd 45-22 (Big Daddy Jason & the ILFers)

Buddy played three games, and scored 40+ points three times.  PWI attendance aside the first week of the season, he's off to a pretty great start.  Why haven't more D2 teams tried to poach him yet??

 

 

Fancy Statistics Section

Yeah, right.  You're not getting any fancy statistics out of us until at LEAST Week Four, and even then we'll tell you the sample size is too small to be meaningful (yes, we're going to copy/paste this line next week too, so get used to it)

 

That's it for the TSL Power Rankings this week!  As we said above, we don't currently have our own email address anymore, so if you have any thoughts about QB rankings, or you want to make sure we know who's throwing for your team, please feel free to contact our good friend This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..  You tell him, he'll tell us.  

 

What's YOUR ranking?

WEEK 8 POWER RANKINGS

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Category: TSL QB Power Rankings

Created: Wednesday, 19 June 2024 15:38

Published: Wednesday, 19 June 2024 15:38

Written by Jeff Krol

Hits: 778

 

 

***

 

Division by Division Review of the TSL

 

For our final analysis of the season, we're going to show you the following:

• The breakdown of best offenses, defenses and net point differentials per division.  For the first time ever, we had zero forfeits this season to adjust for, so a nice, clean data set.  Then we tried to color each team's data by their official jersey colors, but half of this league apparently uses the same colors so it's not perfect (sorry Cunning Stunts for your sexist pink coloring!)
• A graph of average point differentials per game for each division with a similar "Favorites, Contenders, Pretenders" logic we've used in previous seasons (if you're winning games by an average of 6+ PPG, you're a Favorite in green; if you're losing by an average of 6+ PPG, you're a Pretender in red; all other teams are yellow in the middle; these are not OUR judgments on who falls into each category, it's strictly based on the math of your team's point differentials).  For what it's worth, in the last six seasons that we've been showing these graphs, we've had 24 eventual division champions classified as "Favorites", 18 as "Contenders", and exactly zero as "Pretenders".
• A quick twitter sized (or "X sized") recap of the division heading into playoffs, and then identifying which teams are "overrated" and "underrated" in each group.  Note that these last two categories are based purely on what we see in the scores and stats, NOT our own personal feelings of players on each team (we might personally think Scared Hitless are overrated, but if the underlying numbers say their team is underrated, that's where we'll include them below) so TRY not to be offended thinking the "website is being mean".  We're just reading numbers off a website, man.  Relax.

 

And away we go!

 

Division 1

 

 

The Headline:  TSL's smallest division battles it out with one favorite, a couple real contenders, and also Frodo Swaggins are here.

 

Underrated:  Eyes Downtown are tied with Sticky Bandits for the second best point differential in D1, and they actually would have won a head-to-head tiebreaker this season based on point differentials in their two games (which they split).  If not for a slip up vs Frodo earlier this season, they would have gone into the playoffs as the #2 seed.  Plus how much playoff pressure can there really be for a team that has won the last two TSL championships (including Winter)?  It may not quite be accurate to call them "underrated" (does anything think they don't have a decent chance to win again?) but they may be the MOST underrated team in a division where teams generally finished in the order they should have.

 

Overrated:  Frodo Swaggins played two close games against the Sticky Bandits, and actually BEAT Eyes Downtown earlier this season.  Unfortunately, they'll play neither of those teams on Saturday.  Against Eyes Uptown, they were outscored 75-23 in a pair of losses this season.  Frodo also used the sublist more than any other team in D1 this season, which they won't be able to do for the playoffs, so this will be a huge hill to climb for Garrett and team to steal two games against the best in the League.

 

 

Division 2

 

 

The Headline: The Mavericks are the clear leader of the pack, but this is a division full of teams capable of pulling off playoff upsets.

 

Underrated:  It has to be Can't Touch This, right?  CTT were an afterthought in this division when they started out 0-3.  Since then they are 4-0-1, and although they're fourth in the standings, they actually have the second best point differential in D2.  They are also the only D2 team that can say that they've beaten the Mavericks this session.  If you're looking to bet on a champion that isn't the top seeded team in their division, this might be the one.

 

Overrated:  The Untouchaballs almost took the #2 seed and a first round bye for the playoffs... but they still have a negative point differential on the season, which is odd for a team that many consider one of the favorites to win the whole thing.  They were crushed by the Mavericks in their first game of the season by a score of 62-30, and there are two ways to look at that game: 1) an outlier that would make the Untouchaballs season stats look all the more impressive if we threw it out; or 2) a sign that they don't match up well against the Mavericks (whom they tied a week later... but still couldn't beat).  We're not sure which way to view it.  Either way, teams that gave up more points than they scored throughout the season rarely win championships, so we'll take Untouchaballs as the most "overrated" team in D2.

 

 

Division 3

 

 

The Headline:  The Malones vs everyone else.

 

Underrated:  The Jabronies were a .500 team but they sport the second best point differential in their division.  So we WANT to pick them as the most Underrated team... but we still feel like it's the Malones.  Teams just don't normally win games by more than 20+ PPG.  The Malones are lapping the field, and clearly should be playing in a higher division.  Just look at the graph above... one of those bars stands out the most, and we're not talking about Practice Squad...

 

Overrated:  The Wanderers are 6-2 and the second best team in the division both in the standings and (probably) conventional wisdom.  They're a GREAT team.  But they just lost by 30 to the Malones, and their point differential on the year is +0.88 points per game.  That's a number we'd usually see from a .500 team, not D3's last hope of toppling the Malones.  Can it be done?  Sure.  This is football, Wanderers only need to be the better team for 50 minutes.  But the numbers suggest it will be a huge uphill battle for the #2 seed (let alone the other 7 teams in this division!)

 

 

Division 4

 

 

The Headline:  The Cunning Stunts are destroying everyone, while a handful of other good teams hope for an upset.  It won't be Vaspian, Cobblestone or the Roaring 20's.

 

Underrated:  Can we even suggest that Cobblestone are underrated because "what would happen if all of their players showed up on a given week?"  Nahhh... it doesn't work that way.  If they were going to show up by now, they would have, so we're going to say they ARE who they ARE.  The TRULY most underrated team in this division then has to be Passing While Intoxicated, who are averaging a +9.5 PPG margin of victory.  Every single team (above D6) that is averaging +9.5 PPG is in first place in their division, except for PWI, who are somehow THIRD.  This is a very good team, and more importantly in a division with the Stunts, it's one that knows how to score gender TDs.

 

Overrated:  The Tater Tots are in fourth place out of nine teams, and they have a 4-4 record.  That's not bad.  The problem is, three of their four wins came against the worst three teams in the division (Cobblestone, Roaring 20s, Vaspian) and their only "quality" win this season was way back in Week 1 against a Creekers team which has since gotten better.  They've also lost their last two games by 18 and 24 points, so momentum's not exactly on their side either.  Could they win their first round game against Creekers?  Absolutely.  But their numbers against better teams make us think they won't have much of a shot in the big games.  

 

 

Division 5

 

 

The Headline:  Four teams could win this, a fifth could make it very interesting, and the other three don't have a chance.

 

Underrated:  Did you know before looking at the graph above that the second best team in the division on point differential was PowerPuff Girls?  We didn't either.  We're tempted to pick them as the most underrated team in the division simply because their whole "record isn't as good as their point differential suggests it should be" thing is RIGHT up our alley... but we still think the answer is Travis Henry's Kids.  Look, we get the skepticism.  This team was exposed a bit in the past two weeks of doubleheaders, as they were outscored 83-140 in a 1-3 stretch without Pete Walbrandt.  But that's the thing... it was without Pete.  Their record WITH Pete (who we assume is available for playoffs) was 4-0 while outscoring opponents by a combined score of 165-86.  Has a team ever been so reliant on one superstar?  Judge them all you want for that, but if you think you saw the "real" THK the last couple of weeks without him, then you are SEVERELY underrating this team.

 

Overrated:  Stir the Sauce have some great athletes on their team, with both speed and size.  They were one win away from .500, and they finished with a positive point differential.  They're a solid team!  But raise your hand if you think TMA or Two Tuddies are going to win D5 in a couple weeks.  No one?  Okay... did you know that all three of STS's wins were against those two teams this season, and by kind of a LOT?  Take away their games against two teams that no one expects to win the championship, and what's their record?  0-5, and outscored by a combined 139-206 (or losing by an average of 13.4 PPG).  If you think they're in the middle of the pack because they're a 3-5 team and +12 on the season, well, that's true in a sense.  But the "pack" they want to be in the middle of is the pack of contenders, and they're not quite there yet.

 

 

Division 6

 

 

The Headline:  TSL's "wild west" where anything can happen.

 

Underrated:  Sausage McMuffins are fifth in their division yet they have the best point differential of any D6 team at +11.1 PPG.  Here is the full list of teams in the League with +11 or more points per game: the Malones (1st place), Cunning Stunts (1st place), GUCCI (1st place), Eyes Uptown (1st place), Sausage McMuffins (FIFTH PLACE).  This is a potential #1 seed masquerading as a #5 seed.  One of the most underrated teams not just in their division, but all of the TSL!

 

Overrated:  This was another easy choice: no disrespect to our friends on Balls Deep, but how do you lock up the #2 seed in your nine team division with a negative point differential?? Sausage McMuffins have 96 more "net points" on the season than Balls Deep, and are somehow three spots BELOW them in the standings!  There's something to be said for winning close games against good teams for tiebreakers, and Balls Deep started the season with wins against Back That Pass Up, Blitzkrieg and Pit Harade, which gave them incredible tie-breaking leverage.  But we said for Untouchaballs above and we'll say it again: teams that gave up more points than they scored throughout the season rarely win championships.

 

***

 

Top Ten Best and Worst Lists for the 2024 Spring Season

 

The division analysis above is the real meat and potatoes of this article, but in case you're curious how you stack up against teams in OTHER divisions, here are the top ten (and bottom ten) teams in the entire TSL for offensive points per game, defensive points per game, and average point differential per game:

 

 

What did we learn from this??  The magic numbers for us are always 20 and 40.  Nearly every team in this League averages between 20-40 PPG both offensively and defensively.  If you're higher than 40 offensively or lower than 20 defensively, you're doing an amazing job.  If you're lower than 20 offensively or higher than 40 defensively... you're probably not winning too many games.  This season we had two teams crack the 40 point mark, and one of those also cracked the 50 point mark.  Congrats to the Malones, our Spring 2024 scoring champs.  In fact, we've been tracking scoring champions since the beginning of our article (Fall 2019) and the Malones have the highest scoring offense in recent history:  The Stunts were the only other team to crack 40+ PPG, and if not for the Malones, they would have had their fourth scoring title in the last five seasons!

 

So if The Malones were the BEST offense, who were the worst?  This season we had six teams fail to make it to 20 PPG on offense.  Those teams (Dogg Pound, TMA, Cobblestone, Frodo Swaggins, Sticky Laces and Two Tuddies) unsurprisingly went a combined 6-41 this season.  

 

Then if we look at defenses, there were two teams (GUCCI and Pit Harade) that held opponents to under 20 PPG this session.  Last session we had none, but that's likely attributable at least in part to the weather, as we had beautiful Saturdays last Fall and some rough/rainy Saturdays this Spring  That would ALSO explain why we had no teams this session that allowed 40+ points per game defensively, when we had five such teams last season.

 

Besides the "40/20 Clubs", what else do we see from the best and worst units in the League?  Eyes Uptown and Sausage McMuffins were the only two teams in the League to make all three "Ten Best" lists for offense, defense and point differentials.  There were five teams to make all three "Ten Worst" lists, including The Roaring 20s (new team, they get a pass), Vaspian (completely rebuilt team, they get a pass), Two Tuddies (moved up a division, they get a pass), Cobblestone (never had enough players; Darryl needs to recruit better) and TMA.  Didn't TMA used to be awesome???

 

***

 

All-Time Championship Statistics

 

A couple years ago we compiled a list of every TSL champion in League history and devised a ranking system to see who the "best teams of all time" were.  This was exhausting to research and put together, but it's now very simple to update once a session, so that's what we've done here.  The timing feels right to update you all on this now JUST before playoffs so we can remind you what you're chasing here... co-ed football immortality.  Here are the current immortals:

 

 

THAT part is objective - the champs are the champs, and we'd like to think history will remember their achievements for 1,000 years to come (history classes will likely debate what exactly the "Tommy Hughes Experience" was).  This next part though is subjective:  we then attempted to compare the relative strength of each division's championships to come up with a ranking system (a D2 title is harder to win than a D4 title) and this is what we landed on:

• A D1 championship is our baseline since it's the best a team can do.  Let's make that worth 100 points.  
• A D2 title is worth, at BEST, 49% of that, since two D2 titles don't quite equal a D1 title (you can argue it should be LESS than 49%, but we've made the choice to weight lower divisions as heavily as reasonably possible here).  49 points for a D2 title.
• A D3 title should be worth 49% of THAT, so about 24 points for each D3 championship.
• Every subsequent division is worth 49% of the previous one, so D4 is worth 11 points, D5 is worth 5 points, and D6 is worth 2 points.
• Indoor championships aren't currently worth a point (though we may revise this in the future).  With apologies to DILFS, Jelly Beans, Sticky Bandits, Eyes Downtown and Friendship Club, Winter sessions are often used to make new teams and play with new people.  No team should be penalized in the rankings for doing that instead of entering their usual squad.

 

It's an arbitrary system of course, but it's the one we chose.  So here is the updated list of your "greatest champions of all time" going into the Spring 2024 playoffs (active teams are highlighted below; split into two segments side-by-side to make font size more easily readable):

 

 

We always debate making a change to the math above so that subsequent championships in the same division would be worth less the second time around.  After all, was it fair that Puckett kept improving their standings by winning D4 over and over?  Shouldn't they have moved up before this session?  But for now we decided to leave it as is.

 

So where does that leave us today?  Eyes Uptown (Legends) has tied Green & Associates by winning their third D1 championship, and two more would tie Public Enemy as the greatest team in TSL history.  Eyes Downtown could jump from 5th to 2nd with another win, and Sticky Bandits from 13th to 9th.

 

Puckett All-Stars is tied with Public Enemy for the most TSL Championships of all-time with five.  If they win again this season, they'll be the most decorated champions in TSL history.  

 

Bottom line, people remember champions, not the teams who come in second place, so immortality can only be found by winning it all.  Good luck!

 

 

***

 

That's it for the TSL Power Rankings this season!  We can't possibly make any other charts for you at this point (this was exhausting) and we doubt anyone has read this start-to-finish anyway.  

 

We don't currently have our own email address anymore, so if you have any thoughts on any of the above, please feel free to contact our good friend This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..  You tell him, he'll tell us.  Good luck in the playoffs.

 

What's YOUR ranking?

WEEK 1 POWER RANKINGS

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Category: TSL QB Power Rankings

Created: Wednesday, 28 August 2024 17:17

Published: Wednesday, 28 August 2024 17:17

Written by Jeff Krol

Hits: 264

Welcome back to the TSL Quarterback Power Rankings!  If you've read our article in the past (if for no other reason than to complain about how wrong we are) then you’re familiar with the concept – every week we share our rankings for the Top QBs in the League and discuss who’s trending up and who's trending down.  We on the QB Power Rankings Committee are not what you'd call "great writers" (or even "very good" writers... check out the Godfather if you want better writing) so we typically lean heavily on graphs and stats instead... at least, we do after a few weeks, when there's significant enough data to bother sharing.  In our season opening articles we also make a few predictions for the session and re-print an explanation of how these Power Rankings work, which we've copied and pasted almost verbatim from previous articles.

 

So a little Q&A to refresh your memories:

 

“There are 51 teams in the TSL this season!  Are you going to show rankings for all 51 starting QB’s every week?”

Not even close.  At minimum, the Top Ten will be shown EVERY week.  We always expand as the season goes on, so you'll see a Top 15, Top 20... last season we got to a Top 30, so we do try to be inclusive.

 

“Is this going to be heavily biased towards the higher divisions?”

In a word: yes.  The purpose of a Power Ranking is to highlight the absolute best in the League, and for the most part the best are competing AGAINST the best.  We will absolutely be acknowledging the performances (good and bad) of Quarterbacks in the lower divisions as well, but it's rare that a lower division QB will crack the Top Ten or Fifteen, and that's the way it should be.  Generally speaking if you don't like your ranking, our advice is to try moving up a division next session.  The better your competition, the more credibility you earn for beating it.

 

"Are gender team QBs treated differently in the Rankings?"

Not really.  A team's a team, and although gender team scores tend to be a little higher (every TD = minimum 8 points) we don't see much difference.  It takes skill to win with men; it takes skill to win with women.  The biggest knock on gender teams is that they tend to play in lower divisions and as we said above, we do factor THAT into our rankings.

 

"How are you ranking backup QBs if they come in and play better than some other team's starter?"

Generally we're only ranking one QB per team, even if you've got a player on your bench that you think could be a successful starter elsewhere.  And for teams with unreliable QBs who don't show up often enough for us to even KNOW who the starter is, we often leave them out of our rankings entirely... as they say, the best "ability" is "availability".  If you want to get ranked, show up and play as often as you can.  

 

"I'm new to this League and people don't know me yet!  How do I get ranked when I'm still an unknown?"

For starters, you should play really well.  If you're scoring a lot of points, we WILL notice you.  There are several new teams this session, so we probably DON'T know who you all are yet.  We no longer have our own email address due to some legal restructuring stuff, so if you want to tell us about your QB, why not email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and introduce yourself?  And please, please be patient.  If you're the highest scoring team in the League in Week 2, that doesn't mean we're anointing you as the next Mike Thomas just yet.  Keep at it, play well, and we promise eventually we will recognize you.

 

"What about Breakfast Club QBs?"

Breakfast Club is for fun, not crushing your opponents, so if you're running up the score to try to get noticed... well, that only makes you an asshole!  We don't put a lot of stock in the stats from Breakfast Club and don't factor that into our Rankings.

 

“So you’re only ranking QB’s… what about the rest of us?”

Oh, we didn’t forget about the rest of you.  In addition to the QB Rankings, we will do our best to put out other rankings that the rest of you can enjoy – best team offenses, best team defenses, best referees, best male receivers, best female receivers, best at bar …  ranking anything is always fun.  Unless we rank you last, of course.  

 

“You keep saying ‘we’.  Who is writing this?  Who determines these rankings?”

Don’t worry about who’s writing this.  Let’s be honest: If you knew who was on our Committee (there's a few of us), you would incessantly whine to them about why you or your QB should be ranked higher every week.  Anonymity is key for journalism THIS important.  

 

And that's how the Power Rankings work.  We expect it's going to be an incredible season, with fifty-ish teams battling for TSL supremacy.  Our official predictions for this year (with the benefit of one week already being in the books, of course): 

 

• PowerPuff Girls take the #1 seed in the D5 regular season... but they don't win the D5 Championship game
• Bullet Club and Toppers All-Stars & Todd repeat this session as needing play-in games to make the D3 playoffs (and this time, Topper doesn't forfeit!)
• Joey Batts wins exactly one championship this Fall session
• The Malones play in, but lose, the D2 Championship game
• Day by Day will win the D6 Championship this Fall.  You heard it here first.
• Cobblestone will forfeit at least one OTHER game this season (besides the one they forfeited on Saturday)

 

But what do we know?  We went 2 out of 6 on last year's predictions:

• Wanderers win their first ever TSL championship, and we'll even guess the score is 30 something to 30 something in the D3 Finals [They didn't make it past the first round...  Playoff B saw to that.]
• Whoever wins D2 will buck the trend and actually jump to D1 in the Fall... stranger things have happened! [God bless America and God bless the fearless Freeballers! We got this one right]
• At least one brand new team will make it to their division's Finals game [Does Stir the Sauce count as a "brand new team"?  Probably not, they have a very Woodpeckerish feel to them.  No new teams made the finals last session]
• GUCCI finally shake off their underperforming in the playoffs and take home the D5 championship [Wrong again, as they were eliminated in controversial fashion in the semi-finals last Spring]
• The Rose Garden WILL begin construction before the end of the Spring session! [They put the stakes in the ground, right?  Alright, that's not enough to count]
• No D6 team will finish with more than 6 wins in the regular season [D6 was an excellent division last Spring, and we got this right.  Pit Harade finished with six wins, no one else had more than five]

 

So there you go.  Let's get to the first QB Power Rankings of the Fall 2024 Season.  

 

As always, we do NOT overreact to one week's worth of games in our first Power Rankings of the season.  Bobby McConnell lost on Saturday - you think he's going to fall very far in the Rankings?  Not a chance.  You also might not see many new people yet because we need a larger sample size to see how some of these changes play out.  Sorry if you don't like it, but if people are good enough, their stock will rise quickly and we'll get them Ranked over the next few weeks.  

 

Here are your Top Ten starting QBs in the TSL:

 

#1 Mike Thomas - Sticky Bandits

Last Week:  Beat Freeballers 37-29

Last season's D1 champion earned the right to start the QB Power Rankings on the top, and Thomas did not disappoint.  The Sticky Bandits scored on every drive except a kneel down at the end, and while they still may not be considered "the team to beat in D1" by many, Mike is clearly the best quarterback in the League (for now).

 

#2 Joey Batts - Wet Bandits / Cunning Stunts

Last Week:  Beat Eyes Downtown 39-34, beat Grey Hair - Don't Care 57-22 (Wet Bandits), beat The Herd 52-24

A win over their greatest rival plus two 50+ point games (both wins) is the start we expected from Joey Batts.  Wet Bandits (always trolling the champs, lately) and Cunning Stunts are both considered heavy favorites with Battaglia taking snaps.

 

#3 Bobby McConnell - Eyes Downtown

Last Week:  Lost to Wet Bandits 39-34

Why must these Eyes Downtown and Wet Bandits always play each other in Week One?  This season with all the D2 crossover games we won't see a rematch until possibly playoffs, so bragging rights elude Bobby for now.  We suspect they'll do better next week.

 

#4 Andy Strug - The Malones

Last Week:  Beat Scared Hitless 43-28

Literally the only knock on Andy to date has been that the Malones aren't playing against the best teams in the League.  Now they are, and they're 1-0 in the D1/D2 Super Crossover Division... and STILL scoring points like crazy.  It's been hard to imagine anyone cracking the Thomas/Battaglia/McConnell top three for a while now, but Andy has a shot.

 

#5 Garrett Beesing - Frodo Swaggins

Last Week:  Beat Can't Touch This 34-29

It's tough to show exactly how great you are at QBing when the only other teams in your division are stacked beyond belief.  Frodo may have finished with a disappointing record last season, but they're still among the best in the League, and now they'll get to showcase that more in some D2 crossover games.  Frodo held on to beat Can't Touch This, and Garrett is 1-0 for the first time in a long time.

 

#6 Jordan Lawson - Mavericks

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No games for Mavericks.  What's the over/under on the number of D1 teams they beat this session in Crossover games?

 

#7 Jeremy Burr - Untouchaballs

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No game for the Untouchaballs this week.  Don't they usually start with byes and horrible losses, just to finish strong anyway?

 

#8 Ryan Dougherty - Can't Touch This

Last Week:  Lost to Frodo Swaggins 34-29

Ryan might have been undefeated against D1 teams until this past weekend (did they go 1-0 against Frodo last session?) and he almost made it 2-0.  Can't Touch This will be fine this season.  They may not have the big names of a Wet Bandits roster, but they have the best pure passer in the League.

 

#9 Frank Laudico - Wanderers

Last Week:  Beat Jabronies 28-24, beat Bullet Club 53-29

A 2-0 start (including a big tiebreaker win over Jabronies) and no Malones in their division?  Sounds like a formula for a D3 championship to us.  We've bet on the Wanderers every season so far (what? there are no rules against betting) and they've fallen short in the playoffs three times.  But if Frank and Sal can keep their momentum going all season, maybe they'll escape the playoff jinx this year.

 

 #10 Dylan Day - Scared Hitless

Last Week:  Lost to The Malones 43-28

Scared Hitless lost to the Malones.  So has everyone else who has played them this year.  Probably not a big deal, we're thinking.  Dylan and team will be fine against D2 teams, although we're not sure we'd bet on them to beat the top D1 teams this session.

 

 

Fancy Statistics Section

Yeah, right.  You're not getting any fancy statistics out of us until at LEAST Week Four, and even then we'll tell you the sample size is too small to be meaningful (yes, we're going to copy/paste this line next week too, so get used to it)

 

 

That's it for the TSL Power Rankings this week!  As we said above, we don't currently have our own email address anymore, so if you have any thoughts about QB rankings, or you want to make sure we know who's throwing for your team, please feel free to contact our good friend This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..  You tell him, he'll tell us.  

 

What's YOUR ranking?

WEEK 7 POWER RANKINGS

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Category: TSL QB Power Rankings

Created: Wednesday, 12 June 2024 19:39

Published: Wednesday, 12 June 2024 19:39

Written by Jeff Krol

Hits: 778

Welcome back to the TSL Quarterback Power Rankings!

 

 

#1 Joey Batts - Eyes Uptown / Cunning Stunts

Last Week:  Beat Mavericks 40-24 (Eyes Uptown), beat Creekers 51-15 (Cunning Stunts)

The Stunts have already locked up the #1 seed with two games to go, and Eyes Uptown can do the same with a win this week or a Sticky Bandits loss.  Also: should Joey Batts be playing defense full-time for Eyes Uptown??

 

#2 Mike Thomas - Sticky Bandits

Last Week:  Beat Freeballers 33-8

The other QBs in D1 were either beaten or seriously tested last weekend in their D2 crossover games.  The Sticky Bandits destroyed a short handed Freeballers team.  Did we learn anything new about Mike as a QB?  Not really.  A Bandits win and an Eyes Uptown loss this week would give Sticky Nation the #1 seed in the D1 playoffs.

 

#3 Bobby McConnell - Eyes Downtown

Last Week:  Lost to The Untouchaballs 30-26

Eyes Downtown have faced four opponents this season, and they have losses to all four of them.  Strange to say about the defending D1 champs, right?  Maybe it's tough to take the regular season seriously (especially in a crossover game) when you're only measuring success by championships at this point.

 

#4 Jeremy Burr - The Untouchaballs

Last Week:  Beat Eyes Downtown 30-26

They woke up the beast!  Burr led Untouchaballs to an improbable win against the reigning D1 champs in the biggest (regular season) game of his career.  Was that enough to jump Bobby in the Power Rankings?  Not quite... Untouchaballs should have jumped to D1 if Burr wanted to be at the top of these rankings... but he definitely showed he belongs in the conversation of best QBs in this League.

 

#5 Jordan Lawson - Mavericks

Last Week:  Lost to Eyes Uptown 40-24

Mavericks played Eyes Uptown as competitively as possible for most of their game on Saturday, until a couple of late picks doomed them.  They can clearly hang with any D1 team at this point though, which gives more credence to "we should combine D1 and D2" chatter around the League.

 

#6 Garrett Beesing - Frodo Swaggins

Last Week:  Lost to Scared Hitless 43-16

Frodo was painfully short handed last week against Scared Hitless, so we hesitate to even view their loss to Scared Hitless as an "upset" (if anything it means Scared Hitless could be playing D1 teams!).  Garrett drops in the Power Rankings not because he lost, but because Burr won.

 

#7 Andy Strug - The Malones

Last Week:  Beat Jabronies 50-44, beat Toppers All-Stars & Todd 38-29

Stop the presses: The Malones scored only 38 points in a game!  They won (of course) and they scored 50 right before that, so the wheels haven't exactly fallen off this offense yet.  What a consistently excellent team.  Andy does an incredible job throwing against some very good defenders.

 

#8 Dylan Day - Scared Hitless

Last Week:  Did Not Play

Travis "the TSL's greatest backup QB" Cleavenger threw for Scared Hitless this week in their win over Frodo.

 

#9 Ryan Dougherty - Can't Touch This

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No game for the Pillsbury Dough-boy this week (not a great nickname for someone who's obviously not fat... we'll come up with something better).

 

#10 David Eickhoff - Freeballers

Last Week:  Lost to Sticky Bandits 33-8

Missing half your roster is never good.  Missing half your roster against a team from a higher division in a crossover game is a recipe for disaster.  We aren't judging Eickhoff too harshly for this one -- it would have been a different game with a few other guys there.

 

#11 Frank Laudico - Wanderers

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No games for Wanderers last week.  They still have a chance at the #1 seed in D3 if they can top the Malones this week (which no one else has this season).

 

#12 Theo Russell - Puckett All-Stars

Last Week:  Did Not Play

No game for Puckett, they'll play a double on June 15th to make it up.

 

#13 Joe Miano - Jabronies

Last Week:  Lost to The Malones 50-44

We've got to blame the defense for this one.  If you score 44 points in this League, you're expected to win the game.  Joe did a great job against a great team, but Jabronies will have to find a little something extra if they're going to win a playoff rematch against the Malones.

 

#14 Alex Buchlis - Let's Get Reccked

Last Week:  Beat Buffalo Vice 36-28

Let's Get Reccked have never finished with a winning record in their team's history, and they won't this season either.  But after beating Buffalo Vice last weekend, they can at least finish .500 if they get one more win against Toppers All Stars & Todd.  With a full strength Garrett back at receiver for playoffs, this is a team that could upset anyone in D3.

 

#15 Damien Keller - Keller Whales

Last Week:  Tied Bullet Club 30-30

Ties are boring.  Ties suck.  What if we had some kind of in-game tiebreaker that wasn't overtime (which puts the fields behind schedule), like "most gender TDs" or "most successful two point conversions" etc?  Keller Whales are 3-3-1 heading into the last game of the season.  Will they go into the playoffs as winners or losers?  Or will they tie again???

 

#16 Andy Clark - Buffalo Vice

Last Week:  Beat Practice Squad 44-41, lost to Let's Get Reccked 36-28

Buffalo Vice's regular season is over with a 3-5 record.  You know what?  That's not too bad for a first season after jumping up from years in D4.  Three more points in Week One against the Wanderers, and they could have been at .500 already.  These guys will be alright as long as Andy's arm doesn't fall off.

 

#17 Buddy Lee - Passing While Intoxicated, Back That Pass Up

Last Week:  Beat Vaspian 49-16 (PWI), beat Just Joshing 52-34 (BTPU)

Buddy is 7-1 in the last month, with his only loss coming against Pit Harade a few weeks ago (we're assuming he QBed that, we don't actually remember).  PWI is one of a few real contenders in D4 as they have the rare ability to keep up with the Stunts for gender TDs; plus BTPU has gone from "can't win a game" to "feels like they can't lose".

 

#18 Brandon "B" Ford - Practice Squad / Tater Tots

Last Week:  Lost to Buffalo Vice 44-41 (Practice Squad)

B's teams are a combined 7-7 coming into the last week of the season.  Nothing wrong with that, it means they're right in the mix for each division.  Tots probably have the better chance of taking home a championship in our opinion, but we're not counting out Practice Squad either.

 

#19 Dylan Jaloza - Bullet Club

Last Week:  Tied Keller Whales 30-30

Is it true that Bullet Club was ahead before Dylan had to leave for New York, and then they settled for a tie?  For all the adversity Bullet Club has endured this session, this is a team that still believes in themselves and believes in their QB.  If you're looking for an #8 seed to bet on for playoffs, this is the one.

 

#20 Brandt Dubey - Toppers All-Stars & Todd

Last Week:  Lost to The Malones 38-29

We weren't sure who to rank for a while between Topper and Dubey, so we didn't rank either.  Looks like it's Dubey at this point, which means Topper's arm has officially run out of juice (R.I.P.).  Dubey is playing well considering he was a late add and he'd never played with many of these people before.  Can TAS&T win a playoff game?  If they do, they'll likely get a rematch against Malones in the next round.

 

#21 Ethan Herbold - Interdimensional Lightning Falcons

Last Week:  Beat Cobblestone 42-1

42-0 would have looked SO much better.  Way to throw a pick-one, Ethan!  We're not sure how many people Cobblestone had on Saturday (they average about 5 players per week) so this could either be an impressive win against great athletes, or a beat-down against short handed opponents.  Tough to rank that.

 

#22 Kyle Conniff - PowerPuff Girls

Last Week:  Beat TMA 53-0

53-0 is pretty impressive any way you cut it.  Of course, PowerPuff Girls scored 44 points with their backup QB an hour later, so maybe it's just the girls who deserve the credit?  Kyle wouldn't argue with that we're sure, but either way, this should be a tough out for any team in the D5 playoffs.

 

#23 Mitchell Bennett - Creekers

Last Week:  Lost to Cunning Stunts 51-15

The Stunts are just killing everyone, and it's crazy to see how hard it has been for teams to score against defenses with five girls. We'd knock Mitch down more for this loss, but should we really hold it against him if NO one can beat this team?

 

#24 Kelly Kane - GUCCI

Last Week:  Beat Travis Henry's Kids 42-8

We thought GUCCI vs THK would be the game of the year in D5 with two heavyweights slugging it out.  We were wrong.  GUCCI murdered the Kids, and finished their regular season undefeated (with one tie).  Of course they've had great regular seasons before and still lost early in the playoffs.  Does Kelly and team have a plan to make sure they last longer this time?

 

#25 Paul LoVullo - Come From Behind

Last Week:  Did Not Play

We're PRETTY sure it wasn't Paul throwing for CFB this week.

 

#26 John Langley - Travis Henry's Kids

Last Week:  Lost to Not So Sticky 38-16, lost to GUCCI 42-8

Is this what John Langley looks like without Pete Walbrandt to bail him out?  Yikes.  Buy him dinner, buy him flowers, hang on to him however you can John.  Life without him is not pretty.  GUCCI we get... but Not So Sticky??

 

#27 Derek Pew - Vaspian

Last Week:  Lost to PWI 49-16

Vaspian's two wins are against last place teams that are currently a combined 2-12.  Their two opponents on Saturday are a combined 11-2.  We don't bet on sports... but if we did, we PROBABLY wouldn't bet our houses on a Vaspian win this week.  Maybe Derek and company will prove us wrong.

 

#28 Raghavan Nagarajan - Not So Sticky

Last Week:  Beat Travis Henry's Kids 38-16

"Not So Sticky just destroyed Travis Henry's Kids" was not a sentence we ever planned to type, but Rags has been the difference maker this year as Not So Sticky no longer looks like the punching bag it has in the past.  Last regular season NSS lost all nine games.  This regular season NSS lost only two.  

 

#29 Carson Wright - Roaring 20's

Last Week:  Lost to Reset Warriors 38-26

The Roaring 20s could be one of the best teams in the League in a couple years.  They're young and wildly athletic.  But a huge part of this League is learning what works and what doesn't, and all the best teams have what the '20s don't: experience.  Keep an eye on Carson!

 

#30 Darryl Carr - Cobblestone

Last Week:  Lost to ILF 42-1

Cobblestone has been plagued by poor attendance all season.  Can you imagine how good these guys could be if Darryl convinced Garrett to come back and play for them?  It's brutal watching five-on-six or four-on-six football so often.  Cobblestone scored one point on Saturday... and it didn't come from Darryl.

 

 

Fancy Statistics Section

 

"That team is too good for their division".

 

"They don't belong in D3, that's definitely a D2 team"

 

Hang out at the bar long enough and listen to people talk about their games, and you're bound to hear someone complaining that a team shouldn't be in their division because they're "too good".  

 

But what does that even mean?  

 

There's always one team in first place, so there's nothing wrong with having a better record than your opponents.  It only becomes a "problem" if teams feel like they don't have a chance at a championship because that one team is truly unbeatable.  So we thought it would be interesting to look at which teams stand out (for better OR for worse) in their divisions, and see which teams really ARE "too good" (or "too bad") for their divisions.

 

Let's start with the obvious: wins and losses.  There are three unbeaten teams in the League between The Malones (D3), Cunning Stunts (D4) and GUCCI (D5), although GUCCI does have a tie on their record.  Then there is, surprisingly, only ONE team in the League with a single loss, and that is the Wanderers (D3).  Every other team has at LEAST two losses*, and if you've lost two games in your division, you're clearly not "too good" to play in it.

 

*Mavericks' second loss was against a D1 team, but they have a loss and a tie within their own division too, so we think that logic holds up here too.

 

So that leaves Malones, Stunts and GUCCI as teams that can make a case for being "too good" for their division.  But are they really crushing everybody, or just the recipients of a few lucky bounces?  As always, we turned to math for an answer.

 

Below is a graph of each division's League leader in point differential per game (margin of victory) minus the NEXT best team in their division's point differential per game.  In other words, how much bigger is their margin of victory than the next best teams?  Here's what we found:

 

 

The Malones and Cunning Stunts, it turns out, probably ARE too good for their divisions.  Both teams are undefeated, and both teams are winning games by 12+ points per game more than the second best team in their division.  It feels like they could both be playing a division up, without any issue.  GUCCI is, of course, better than the rest of their division, but not by more than D2 Mavericks, or much more than D1 Eyes Uptown.  They probably belong in D5 (for now).

 

So if the Malones and Cunning Stunts are the two teams that we can say are "too good" for their divisions, are there any teams on the other end of the spectrum that should move down?

 

Every team in the TSL has at least one win except for Two Tuddies, but even the Tuddies have a tie... against a team that ALSO tied GUCCI (seems impossible for one team to tie an unbeaten and a winless team, but it happened).  And then there are seven teams in the TSL with exactly one loss.  Let's run the same type of graph for margin of defeat for the worst team in each division, vs the second worst:

 

 

Maybe you're not a "graph person" so we'll explain to you why this one is actually super interesting!  

 

Four of the six divisions (D2, D3, D4, D6) have almost NO difference between the worst team and the second worst, which means every team in those divisions should at least have SOME competitive games in the division they're assigned.

 

D5 has a slightly bigger gap between "worst team" TMA and "second worst team" Two Tuddies... but TMA actually BEAT the Tuddies, so clearly you can't say TMA "isn't good enough" to be in the same division as Tuddies.

 

The only division that really stands out is D1 with Frodo Swaggins.  Frodo is losing by an average of 13.9 points per game, which is 15.7 points worse than the next worst team in their division (Eyes Downtown, who are actually WINNING by 1.9 points per game).  Frodo Swaggins is a VERY good team... but they play in a division with only three other VERY good teams.  If you want to look at records and point differentials to see if any teams should move DOWN a division, the answer is Frodo Swaggins... and yet, they beat the reigning D1 champions this season.  So why wouldn't they want to play the best teams, if they've shown they're capable of beating them?

 

TL;DR: Most teams are in the right division, and even those who probably should move up or down a division can still win or lose on any given Saturday.

 

**

 

That's it for the TSL Power Rankings this week!  As we said above, we don't currently have our own email address anymore, so if you have any thoughts about QB rankings, or you want to make sure we know who's throwing for your team, please feel free to contact our good friend This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..  You tell him, he'll tell us.  

 

What's YOUR ranking?