***ANNOUNCEMENT: A New Beginning For Madden 25 ***

To My Fellow 12th Man Members (Past & Present),

First I would like to confirm, for those that are unaware, that Doug has decided to stick to his original intent and step down as commissioner of 12th Man Football. While we had discussed working together to continue to run the league in a 16 user format, we have now decided against that possibility. I would be remiss if I didn't take this opportunity to thank Doug for not only being a great commissioner, but also for trusting in me and teaching me a thing or two along the way. Your sacrifices did not go unnoticed from this end, and I admire how you brought such a drive and professionalism to such a thankless job. You leave some big shoes to fill Doug.

With that being said, I want to thank you all for your participation in 12th Man Football this past season (with many even further prior to that). This was a year where we faced many issues and even attempted multiple reformats as the league year wore on. While we were able to have success in many ways, for instance we added some great new members, it also became clear that change was going to be needed for the betterment of the league.

Decision Time

As a result of these circumstances, I had to make a decision about my future as it pertained to M25. Now the reasons for Doug’s decision to resign were very clear to me, and I shared in the same frustrations this past year. Simply put, the league let him down. As much as was given from the leadership of this league, in time and effort spent, it was not reciprocated by what I would say was the majority of the league. When you only have a small portion of the league contributing, and from some there just seems to be a blatant lack of effort and respect, it makes the league less enjoyable and makes it hard to justify the time investment required to run the league. It is not easy to run a league full of 32 different personalities to begin with; but it makes it even more difficult when so many are not holding up their end of the bargain and we are forced to play babysitter for grown men. I hope that my words here help you understand that this was not a decision I came to lightly.

Ultimately I have decided that I will be stepping up to the role of commissioner for M25, but not for 12th Man Football…

The Future

My vision as commissioner is to rebrand and essentially re-launch our league, to basically give it a fresh start. The first course of action I took, upon deciding to take on this mission, was to seek out a solid partner to assist me with the task at hand. One thing that stood out to me during the M13 cycle, was how one of our 1st year members was also one of our most active and diligent members. He also has years of experience as a commissioner of Madden leagues and shares the same vision of how a sim league should be run. Upon my approaching him, he agreed to assist me as my co-commissioner. With that I would like to announce my co-commissioner as Michael Overman!

As I said, we are looking for a fresh start and felt that a new name would best help us usher in a new era for our group. We thought long and hard about what we wanted our name to represent; we wanted it to be catchy, but also straightforward. We finally came to a decision, and I present to you…

The QSF – Quality Simulation Football – aka “The Q”​

A Madden Franchise League​

The Vision

As I said, this will be considered a fresh start for our league. While we value the history and tradition of The UMFL, The PMFL, and 12th Man Football; our intention is to have The QSF stand on its own merits. If The Q is going to be successful, we need to ensure that we have the right owners that we feel give us the best opportunity to be a success.

The selection process for The Q will not be an easy one. While there are many from 12th Man that I would like to have transition to The Q, there will be some that may not be accepted. For those individuals, it is not a personal decision, but simply our determination of what is best for the league. When considering former league-mates who are interested in joining The Q, we will take all things into consideration. While length of history with the group will be a consideration, it will be far from the determining factor. Ultimately we want those guys that have a history of pulling their weight, following the rules, and showing respect; whether they have been part of our group for a few months or many years.

For those that do make the transition from 12th Man, we want to make one thing perfectly clear. While we would like to see you use your knowledge and experience to assist newer members, we will not tolerate the disrespect or belittling of others simply because you are a “vet”. We expect everyone in our community to be treated and respected equally.

To be perfectly clear: Being in The QSF will be a privilege, not a right!

This will be a common theme as we move forward; and we expect long time members of our group to work just as hard to keep their spot, as we expect out of our new prospects.

That brings me to my next point…

Expectations

RESPECT – This is huge! We expect all members (new and old alike) to show respect to their fellow members. We are not just talking about during direct communication, but in all facets of league operation (scheduling, game play, and living up to your responsibilities). Plain and simple; disrespect will not be tolerated!

SCHEDULING – Scheduling in the forums with your opponent will be an absolute must. Communicating through other mediums is all well and good, but you will be required to use the forums for scheduling/updating and everyone will be held accountable. We will lay out exact parameters of our expectations at a later time, but just know that scheduling in the forums will be required.

FORUM ACTIVITY:

PARTICIPATION – If you want to be a member of The Q, you will be expected to be active on the forums. We are all adults with lives outside of the league; but if you cannot pop onto the site for 5 minutes to check on league activities on a nearly daily basis, this is probably not the league for you. This is not a league where you show up to play your games and nothing more. We want members who enjoy being part of the community and prove that with their activity on the boards.

These expectations are not limited to The Q forums, but to the TSO community as a whole. We are lucky to be part of a great and diverse gaming community here at TSO, and we want to encourage our members to branch out and be part of that community. There is a lot of content out there and a lot of great personalities to interact with, so have a look around if you haven’t already.

If being an active member of the community isn't your thing, then again this probably isn't the league for you.

GAME RECAPS - Game recaps will be a requirement for divisional and postseason games once again (and welcomed & appreciated for any other games). We expect a little effort to be put into the recaps that are required. We don’t want a simple rehash of the stats that anyone can see; we want to know what happened in the game (key plays, momentum shifts, etc). Of course video highlights/recaps are a welcome substitute for a written recap. While we don’t expect everyone to take an hour or more to write up a Sport Illustrated worthy piece, we do expect you to take a few minutes to put a little thought into your recaps. If you need assistance in any way with putting out a quality recap, just ask for some pointers. Michael and I both would be happy to help, as would other members of the community I’m sure.

CONTENT –We expect to see content from all members of our community from time to time. That doesn't mean we expect to see a weekly team update from every team, but we expect to see guys contribute. This can be in the form of team news (season recaps/previews, injury reports, trade/FA news, etc) or league news (power rankings, predictions, hot seat, etc). Also, if one of your fellow league members took the time to produce something, be sure to let them know what you thought of it. There is nothing more frustrating than spending your own free time to work on something for the league, to only have a small handful of people give you any feedback.

The Process

With all this being said, I would like to say that I hope to see many of our former 12th Man brethren join us in The QSF. If you feel like you are ready, willing, and able to meet our expectations as a member of The Q, then I invite you to apply.

We will be accepting applications from former 12th Man members initially, before opening up the application process to the general community. If you are a former member who would like to apply, we would like you to do so via private message. Please include myself (LtJustice) and Michael (Michael Overman) in the conversation when you start the PM. While we won’t have an official application for former 12th Man members, we would like you answer a couple of questions in your PM:

• 1) Why do you feel that you would be a good choice to join The Q?
• 2) Do you anticipate any issues in being active on the forums and contributing to the league?
• 3) Do you feel like there is anything you personally need to improve on from your most recent time in 12th Man?
• 4) Do you feel that those with seniority should be held to a higher, lower, or equal standard as newer guys (explain)?
• 5) (OPTIONAL) Please list former 12th Man members that you feel are most deserving of a spot in The Q (feel free to list reasons):

The purpose of the last question is to get an idea of how members of the community are respected by their fellow members. It is optional, but if you answer that question, feel free to list as many or as few as you would like. All applications and responses will be kept private.

We are very excited to get the ball rolling for M25 and I hope to see a lot of familiar faces apply.

Feel free to reply to this thread with any thoughts, concerns, or questions (you are also welcome to contact me directly as well).

Thanks,

~Jim
Commissioner – The Q

(As a general FYI: I believe I have tagged everyone that was a part of 12th man Football in Madden 13)
Hulk_hagen_55
AveryB
Casino
CSteud
thafuture3886
CaptMoe
saintsdave75
CHUNKNESS
pittrocks43
Eazy E
cry_havoc
Phenom
LtJustice
Warhawk AKA dreadman
Juan Valencia
lboogie
ThaBayouChef
hoodiii
Michael Overman
dablakpope
Gutcheck64
PepperNY
redlishus
Broncos218
coachmimz20
Coopdog
ferocious
Jaged
javy0472
Miki1369
Merenguito
PAPER R1VAL
Scikotic
TwoTONS04
WilsT24
thoov08
NeuroticTruth
CTfromDC
DJDunn6

Just to be clear; the above application process via PM is not just for those that finished the M13 cycle with us. The aforementioned application process is for anyone who was previously a member of our league.

Im digging this.

u would Loren... ur a Noles fan?

Nah man, lol. My NCAA team.

Ahhh bummer...im taking you off my list lol

I like James Wilder though and Winston! Wilders a fool. Went to school about 15 minutes from me.

We have a few Noles fans here myself included. I go to a few games every year as I live about 3 hours from Tallahassee. Michael Overman is also a Noles fan if I remember right

Better than Gator fans, at least.

Haha!! Good stuff!

Is Overman a Noles fan? I knew you were Rob. Wish i could make 3 games a year. Its going to be a fun season.

The new digs (2 sub-forums below) is pretty empty and needs some furnishing. Perhaps a few flat screen tvs in the mancave will do the trick.

Madden 25 is right around the corner and with it a slew of excitement, and rightly so. As we saw in M13 the online franchise experience is finally starting to get on the right track. With the hope and belief that EA has progressed even further in this season’s edition of Madden…we can expect impressive and big things with Madden 25. Connected Career which is now Connected Franchise mode in M25, will include many of the great features in M13, but also adds more to the online franchise to enhance the experience.​

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I am excited to be an integral part of a Madden 25 league. When Jim approached me about helping him with an active 32 man league for M25, I was flattered. I had to think it over, not b/c I didn’t want to or wasn’t interested…far from it. With such a successful run with M13, I knew I wanted to be in a 32 man PS3 Sim Madden League. I wanted to make sure I could accurately offer up my time, and I wanted to be sure that Jim and I saw eye to eye on pertinent league issues. Jim and I agreed that the league would need clear and decisive direction with a focus on sim-play, activity, and accountability. I am very excited that the QSF was created. The Q ~ Quality Simulation Football. Jim has been a great leader and I’ve experienced that first hand in the 12th man. I have been around many leagues and Doug and Jim’s leadership is top notch. I was always impressed with their leadership, activity, attentiveness, and a plethora of other positive attributes. I’m sorry to lose Doug, but I’m happy to have befriended them both. I have a strong belief that Jim has the leadership qualities to lead this new league THE Q into the future for M25 and beyond.​

I wanted to briefly tell a little bit more about myself as well. My name is Michael…I’m from Atlanta…went to school at FSU…and now live in Orlando, FL. I have played sports and video games my whole life it seems. I have experience in Madden leagues and running them. I was a part of the NSFL (National Sim Football League) for the Xbox and then into the Xbox 360. I was a member for a couple of years, and eventually transitioned into the commissioner of the NSFL for about 5-6 years. This was a 32 man sim league with owners all over the USA/Canada from ages 21-50’s. I was very happy to meet so many great and wonderful people. I can assure that in five years of running the league, I dealt with everything under the sun. I’m familiar with what works for a 32 man league, and conversely I’m familiar with what doesn’t.​

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I’m proud to be a part of this league… Much More Info To Come…​

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liking the new digs, and really liking the possibility of a 32 team league again. Sim games are the bomb diggity and simulations are just bombs.

Can we apply for this league at the moment?

We are finalizing our application for new members and it should be posted shortly. Thanks again for your interest.

Heath comes at the recommendation of Randy (Randiesel75).

Absolutely! I look forward to the opportunity to play in these leagues! I will stay glued to the forums, sounds like you guys have it under control.

You definitely want to get involved with this league if/when the opportunity presents itself. The leadership will be stellar.

looking forward to it! I cant wait (but I have to; because madden has come out yet! lol)

LOL

LtJustice if you need anything in the form of feedback on heathh, feel free to shoot me a PM.

I have nothing but kind words on the guy.

We need to get THIS fixed to keep you more glued