CommishBot went rogue or something… use your imagination! I have a meager offering below the standings updates as an apology.
While the recaps have been lacking, the league has continued apace. There has been some minor shuffling at the top of the standings with Tony, Sam, RosieBot, and Will all making pushes over the past few weeks.
Most notable of all has been Stefan’s meteoric rise since Week 5. After being banished to last place for the start of the season, he battled back and has gained 2 then 3 positions in the past two weeks to crack the top five for the first time this season. At this rate he’ll be a top team entering the back half of season and a force to fear.
On the other hand, Joey’s frankly astonishing season of humiliation continues as the wins evade him. Lest he be slandered as a slacker, it should be noted that he has the fourth most points scored so far this season. Unfortunately, he also has hands down the most points scored against him at this point as well, and by no small margin, a full 120 points. Joey has basically had to compete against a full extra week of scoring. It seems that everyone plays their best in the HouseOfDaDragIcon.
In other news, the Slurs have finally woken up, just in time to claim victory in the Sibling Bowl and avoid the inevitable humiliation that would have followed with the alternative. Can they keep it up? I wouldn’t bet on it…
RosieBot has embarrassingly continued to rack up wins and is currently tied for the best record in the league. A frankly impressive bit of injury dodging and consistently high scoring from skill positions, though there have been several close calls.
Week 5 Recap
RosieBot, Tony, Will. Sam, Stefan & Emma are the Week 5 winners 🥳
Alec, Joey, George, Kate, Sydney & Sadie are the Week 5 losers ❌
Some monumental scoring occurred in Week 5 with only two teams failing to clear the 100 point benchmark. The other ten teams cleared 110 points, most over 120, and three teams in the 150 point ballpark.
Ultimately it was Stefan who rose to the top of the pile with a monstrous 171.88 points thanks to a bevy of solid performances. That score is also good enough to take the team scoring record for the season and set the bar high enough that we very well may not see it broken. Sadie retains the individual player scoring record, with Cape Canaveral Challengers spreading the love around amongst their record-taking roster.
With all the scoring we didn’t have any close matchups this week. Appropriately the closest was Tony’s 7 point victory over Joey to continue the punishment.
Week 6 Recap
Alec, Stefan, Emma, George, Tony, & Sam are the Week 6 winners 🥳
Kate, Joey, Will, Sadie, Sydney, & RosieBot are the Week 6 losers ❌
A bit of a hungover week after a high-flying Week 5. Only 5 teams cleared 100 and only two cleared 120. That’s compared to five teams which failed to clear 80 points. Needless to say there was no record breaking this week with most teams limping their way to a win.
Sam and Stefan are the notable exceptions this week, with 148.5 and 128.84 points respectively. While Sam has been a staple of the top ranks to this point in the season, this performance launched Stefan ever farther from the rankings dregs where he started.
Also notable was a complete collapse from RosieBot, though coming from fewer byes/injuries than one might expect with that score. And we should maybe not expect this type of showing to last long, at least not yet…
Week 7 Recap
Alec, Kate, Stefan, Emma, Tony & RosieBot are the Week 7 winners 🥳
Sam, Joey, Will, George, Sadie & Sydney are the Week 7 losers ❌
Back to a bit of normal football this week, some folks did good, some folks did bad, no outrageous scoring in any direction.
Which means our records hold for another week Stefan with the team scoring record and Sadie with the individual player record. Kinda cute.
In much more important news, the Slurs have emerged victorious in the Sibling Bowl. In what was shaping up to be their most crucial matchup of the season, the Slurs found the extra gear to push past one of the top teams in the league, though they did get the assist from a lackluster back half of the roster on The Better Munhall’s side.
Most of our matchups this season have been pretty definitive, and our closest matchup this week was between Sydney and RosieBot, who squeaked out a win by 3.2 points. It was enough to maintain one of the top spot in the league, but the cracks are starting to show.
Week 5 Standings
The Official Week 5 Power Rankings.
The Better Munhall
Smooth Criminals
Denver Buckos
blackstone valley staybehinders
josie schapolitano oyster heads
spooky poops
Lets Go Brandos
clinton crime family
Cape Canaveral Challengers
Glizzy Guzzler
The Daytona Slurs
HouseOfDaDragIcon
Week 6 Standings
The Official Week 6 Power Rankings.
The Better Munhall
blackstone valley staybehinders
Smooth Criminals
Denver Buckos
josie schapolitano oyster heads
spooky poops
Cape Canaveral Challengers
Glizzy Guzzler
Lets Go Brandos
clinton crime family
The Daytona Slurs
HouseOfDaDragIcon
Week 7 Standings
And of course, the most important part, the Official Week 7 Power Rankings.
blackstone valley staybehinders
The Better Munhall
josie schapolitano oyster heads
Cape Canaveral Challengers
Smooth Criminals
Denver Buckos
Glizzy Guzzler
clinton crime family
spooky poops
The Daytona Slurs
Lets Go Brandos
HouseOfDaDragIcon
Standings Chart
Oooooh, aaahhh
Yes, yes. Very impressive. I’ve constructed this barely legible chart to graph the standings changes throughout the season. The standings position are on the Y-axis. The weeks are on the X-axis. And YOU are one of those little lines ricocheting around, desperately grasping towards the upper bound, frantically scrabbling to avoid the lower bound.
Now we can all gawk and jeer at how far some of us (me) have fallen from our start of the season expectations. And I suppose also celebrate the accomplishments of those of us who have climbed the standings? Where is the fun in that…
China managed to get a hold of parts from an F-35 stealth fighter jet after a United Parcel Service Inc. employee missed an email warning not to route the shipment through Hong Kong, according to a person briefed on the incident.
…the shipment was late leaving Australia and was mistakenly routed via Hong Kong in an effort to speed up delivery, the person said, declining to be named because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
Quick follow-up on a story from our previous roundup. Be thankful you’re not getting emails that you can fuck up this badly…
A computer simulation developed by Chinese researchers suggests that a missile-borne system with the latest light detection and ranging system, or lidar, could detect and track an F-35 stealth fighter at up to 61.5km (38 miles) at night.
The theoretical model developed by a leading Chinese air force missile supplier says that under ideal conditions, the claimed range could have implications for the F-35’s ability to survive while facing China’s stealth fighters.
As one internet commenter astutely asked, “I wonder how they figured that out…”
Now, stocks have officially entered a bear market as investors abandon hope — and some of the biggest losers are high-profile tech companies, the avatars of Xi’s “new productive forces” that are supposed to replace real estate as the country’s main economic engine.
So, right on cue as the Communist Party’s top echelons gather in Beijing this week, the “national team” — huge state funds — has stepped in to rescue free-falling indexes.
China’s casino-like stock markets have always been a poor barometer of the country’s economic health. But they drive sentiment, and a run of losses is further eroding morale…
The bounce is unlikely to last. Increasingly, Xi’s starry vision of an AI-enabled economy is colliding head-on with structural realities — a shrinking workforce, rising debt, mounting geopolitical tensions.
A much ballyhooed collapse in the Chinese stock market has Western China-hawks and AI Doomers taking a victory lap, though as noted in the Semafor piece quoted above, the Chinese stock market is not necessarily reflective of the general economic conditions of the country and does not behave in the same way that the US market does.
That said, economic concerns are mounting and the present slide could be a canary in the coal mine indicating that broader issues (weak domestic consumption, anemic real estate market, export overreliance) are coming to a head.
French football star Kylian Mbappé (姆巴佩), also famous for Internet memes portraying him as a dictator, found himself in a massive struggle session after a clip of him saying a few months ago that his favorite variant of that meme was the one of him as a “Chinese dictator” was surfaced on PRC social media:
He did not mention Mao, but the outrage was immediate and overwhelming… Several PRC brands announced they were terminating their endorsement deals with him, CCTV halted broadcasts of matches involving LaLiga and Mbappé, and social media platforms froze his accounts.
LaLiga is in a panic given how much money the league makes from the PRC, perhaps nearly €100 million per season, and they too quickly issued an apology.
My favorite official post is from Guangming Daily (光明日报):
“Insults to China’s late great leader will not be tolerated! Eating China’s food while smashing China’s cooking pot? Mbappé, you’re unworthy!”
