Rudy and Jaymo's Madden CCM experience

[Rudy]

I played a couple exhibition games to get my All-Madden sliders fine-tuned better. Very close now although I will probably make small tweaks here and there. Had some fun games and also realized how much I missed playing with a 3-4 defense. The day Wake leaves my roster is the day I switch back to a 3-4. I really wish we could edit positions, at least in the offseason. I should explore if I could switch to a 3-4 still somehow. I've got big DEs although my roster is probably more suited to a 4-3 look at the moment. It also sucks that I can only change my playbook at the game start screen. If you forget you have to restart.

I beat the Jaguars in OT in a fun game. So far this year I have rarely done any practices. They are pretty boring and I have only done them to buy packages for my coach. The biggy was getting the scouting points. I've also got a lot of the boost packages (QB, WR, RB, TE and a lot of defensive positions). I still need more boost packages but I no longer care. I'm not sure how much they really help and practice is a boring time waster. I didn't get any free agent help or retirement help. Kind of a waste to me and you really don't need help in signing guys. Money talks. Pay the man and he will stay.

Looking at my roster I had 7 WRs. No NFL team carries more than 6 so I cut Mohommad Massouqui. I've got 4 young WRs and two with good talent. He's done nothing all year and I probably shouldn't have signed him two years ago.

[Rudy]

I'm 9-5 now after having won 5 games in a row. My division stinks and the Jets are second at 7-7. Looking at my roster I don't have any major issues or needs. I will try to trade Chris Clemons at FS (81 overall) for a nice pick. He's just a backup right now. I could use another OLB, some youth at DT but it's not pressing at all and a good CB. My top 3 CBS are 86, 85 and 80 so I don't need a CB but Sean Smith's salary jumps to $9 million in a year or two and he may not be worth that price. I'd love to get a good second TE, especially with Kellen Winslow getting older. That is a top priority. A stud QB is something I'm definitely looking for as Tannehill is OK but hasn't really shown great upside and isn't so great with the deep ball. A stud RB would be fun as well. The OL is solid although I have no youth waiting in the wings.

I haven't done any scouting up until this point as some guys like to wait until right before the draft after their free agency needs are solved before spending their scouting points. Plus draft grades change over time (especially the kids featured in the draft stories although many change). I think that's a little dishonest and unrealistic but not a big deal to me. Even after your final scouting session the grades change at the draft. I've got a ton of points so I decided to finally spend a bunch to scout players. Maybe I'm lucky in who I decided to scout and the positions I need but this draft looks loaded.

I started scouting TEs. I do spend some points on the speed rating but nothing else at the moment. A C rating (70s) will kill my interest in them. The #2 and #3 TE are both Cs so I don't scout overall. I do like scouting into round 4 as there could be gems and holy cow is there a beauty. The top TE (rated 16 overall) has B speed and B overall. That's a great talent. But the kid in the 4th round has A speed and B overall! His blocking probably stinks but what a steal. Don't know if he'll keep those grades or if his draft ranking goes up making him more costly.



I scouted the top 3 QBs. I figure if there isn't an elite one I won't bother and just hope Tannehill keeps getting better. He's an 81 or 82 but I want more. The #2 QB ranked #10 overall is a freaking stud. I have never seen an A overall grade before. That's 90+ folks! His accuracy ratings are a B in every category and he has an A for arm strength. I will mortgage the farm for this kid if he stays ranked #10. If he shoots up to #1 I probably won't be able to get him. The other two kids aren't bad either.



I thought I took a pic of a RB and I think I scouted a couple of them. I think there was at least one B grade there. But I did scout OLB. I won't bother scouting a first or second round kid since I have no intention of drafting one early. It's a future pick and I don't believe in spending high picks on OLBs in a 4-3. Just principle. But the two kids I did scout at the end of round 3 and early round 4 have a C and B overall. Another 4th round steal if it stays this way.



Last season I scouted 30 kids in the first four rounds. By the time the draft rolled around only 3 had B grades, 4 had D grades and 23 C grades. I've already found an A grade (never seen before) and more Bs than that! Crazy good. I've seen high picks get D grades and I know there have been kids in a Madden class with 2nd round grades and F overall! If you draft kids in Madden I don't think you can draft a kid blind in the first two rounds. You need to have a general idea of what position you plan on taking in each round and scout those kids accordingly. Move up and down to get kids you know and like. Don't pick a kid blind, at least not early. I still have a lot of points left but I will save some for later.

[jaymo76]

I think the development team said that some classes would be duds and others would be amazing. That's very true of the NFL draft right now. Knowing this makes the game feel a little more real (in ONE respect anyways). Rudy, as to the 4-3 or 3-4 did one of the patches make it possible to switch? On season pass you could not. I hope that was fixed.

[Rudy]

You can change your scheme now (that was patched) but you still can't permanently change your play book. You can change it before the game starts but you can't put some guys at certain positions on the depth chart.

[Rudy]

I did scout two RBs yesterday and both were B overall. The #1 RB also has A speed. The other RB I scouted is B speed. I swear I'm not cheating by getting lucky in picking the right guys! These two RBs both fit the mold I like - a RB between 200 and 225 pounds. The #2 RB is under 200 and the #4 and #5 backs are huge (over 230 with one being over 240 I think).



Also, I scouted the run blocking on my two B TEs and the #1 guy has a C grade which is really good. The 4th rounder is still a D which I am fine with. The value is in the 4th round TE.

Won my second straight game in OT, this time against Seattle. I'm now 10-5 and have won my division. A lot of my OL are on hot streaks. The right side of my line was mauling the Seahawks.

[Rudy]

Finished the season 11-5 and just beat the awful Jags 20-7 in the wild card game. For the third time in three years I will face the Broncos in the playoffs. This time it's in Denver and Peyton is still there, rated 89. Their lines aren't so good but the skill guys are good and so are the LBs.

I lost Kellen Winslow in the last game of the year and Braylon Edwards busted his ribs in my playoff game. Going to be tough.

[Rudy]

My season stats are decent but certainly off in spots. I threw too many picks this year but scored just under 23 points a game. My defence is solid though. Both lines are strong and that resulted in an inflated yards per carry for Lamar Miller. Part of that is Daniel Thomas gets the short yardage carries. I'm also hoping my slider tweaks will improve this. My receiving stats are decent and my third down conversion at 40% is good.

Defensively my team is strong against the run (talent wise) and mediocre against the pass. But the stats show I'm absolutely dominant in defensive passing yards and total sacks. I changed difficulty levels and sliders a lot this year but this has been a consistent problem. Part of it is the cpu QB takes a bit too long but I need to boost the CPU pass protection more. Cpu pass protection is probably the biggest factor in how well they pass. Can't throw for yards when you are on your back. Will do that before my next playoff game.

The three young studs I drafted this year?
1st round WR - Spears had 68 grabs and led the team in receiving yards but only 1 TD. Big target that can make the spectacular catch but slow.
1st round MLB - Wilson started on the strong side of the defense and did not play in the nickle and defense although did fill in at MLB when Dansby went down for 3 weeks. Third on the team in tackles with 60. Two sacks and 11 tackles for loss.
2nd round SS - Ford started at FS from day one and has the skills to play there. Finished with 51 tackles and 2 INTs.

All three will be great players although the ceiling is lower on Spears due to his 84 speed.

[Rudy]

Standings



Offence









Defence

[Rudy]

The cpu roster management just isn't that good. I saw one team that had Doug Baldwin as their #1 WR and he was rated a 75. Every other WR on the roster was rated in the 60s. That's inexcusable. There is no reason to have a starter rated under 75 in the game with the guys on the free agent list. Good backups are cheap as well. Unless a kid is in his first or second year I wouldn't keep any kid rated much below 70 at any spot on my roster either.

[Rudy]

The sim stat engine isn't very good but it hurts when I play the lousy Jags in the playoffs and mediocre Bengals. I also beat the Broncos in wierd game that required a restart (twice in my last 3 games by checking the depth chart in game the game has frozen on me, won't try that again I guess). After I beat the Broncos in the 2nd round John Fox got fired because of it! A little harsh cpu!

I am playing the Bears in the Superbowl. Unfortunately they aren't that great. They have great skill players on offense and not much after that. Tony Romo (88) starts at QB over Jay Cutler (86) who is on the bench. Never mind that Cutler has the highest cap figure (2014 - $16.6 million) and is clogging their cap. They still have $11.83M available but don't spend it wisely. They also signed Anquan Boldin to a $50M 5 year deal in the offseason to be the #2 WR behind Marshall. Crazy money. Shiancoe and Dallas Clark are their TEs. The OL couldn't be put together any worse than what they currently have. I don't get it. What is going on with the cpu logic? (see screenshots below) They have their tackles both playing on the wrong side and same with the guards. They lose points on their overall for all 4 players as a result. Their starting center is only a 70. What gives? Is this a player scheme overall issue? Just doesn't make sense. In free agency you can sign the top OL at any position from $680,000 to $910,000 and they are decent (LT 77, RT 74, LG 74, RG 77, C 73). So if they just reshuffled their OL correctly and signed a Center they would be better. Just like the team that had Doug Baldwin as their #1 WR and only 60s after him, there are at least 5 free agent WRs rated 76 to 78. Why not sign some of those guys? Most street free agents under 80 can be signed to one year deals for under $1M.

At this point I am contemplating switching teams. Maybe the challenge of taking over a crappy team will be more fun if the cpu can't manage their cap and roster correctly but switching teams won't change this. I did sign an extension before this year so not sure this is possible. The real problem is that mid tier free agents (77-82) do not command much money at all. They all ask for less than $2M a year and the cpu seems to ignore them while you can sign them in free agency to be solid backups or low end starters. Both of my backup DEs are rated 80 and 82 and I'm paying them $1M and $1.3 million respectively. My starting RG is actually an 85 now. I signed him as an 80 as my starter to a $5M total, 4 year deal. That's way too cheap! I feel like I'm cheating by simply playing by the rules and signing guys for good deals while the cpu wildly overspends on 85+ rated players and ignore the middle tier guys. They end up being top heavy in spots and bad in too many areas. Maybe I just need to develop house rules for myself but I hate house rules in this area.

[Rudy]

I'm annoyed. I won the Superbowl 36-10 but it was way too easy. The game says its set on All Madden and it tweets that it's on All-Madden but there is no way it's on All-Madden. I didn't earn this at all. Something happened in the playoffs and I know I'm playing on All-Pro. Ugh. This game is too stupid that way. I just played an exhibition game against the Bills and lost 29-24. That game felt a lot better. The cpu QBs on All-Madden get the ball out quicker and in rhythm. They aren't stupid like All-Pro. To top it off the Bears wore orange pants and #54 is now Barrett Ruud after Urlacher retired earlier.

Saw a couple firsts. One my QB actually got hurt and left the game. I've never had my QB get knocked out of a game in 3 years. Also so Boldin make a nice catch and then suffer a concussion. The doctors were moving their fingers in front of him on the bench to test him. He was later ruled out by concussion. Heck, I saw the cpu commit a defensive pass interference as well - also rare!

Anyways, I took some screenshots from the Superbowl where BOTH of my RBs ended up with over 100 yards. John Elway presented the Lombardi trophy and it did not resemble John Elway.

Two video highlights (my one young WR dropped four balls including this TD right before the half).
http://www.easports.com/media/play/video/146302654
http://www.easports.com/media/play/video/146302875

Pre-Game







Game




Half time



Post Game











Post Game Stats

[steelerfan]

In the first screen, it says Super Bowl XLII. That's 42.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

[jaymo76]

That out of position glitch is a real killer. It was an issue in season pass as well. For whatever reason the depth chart glitch has not been fixed after all of the patches.

[jaymo76]

By the way great pics... Rudy you need to use controller two to switch those Bears orange jerseys... Yikes!

[Rudy]

In the first screen, it says Super Bowl XLII. That's 42.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

I didn't even realize that lol.

That out of position glitch is a real killer. It was an issue in season pass as well. For whatever reason the depth chart glitch has not been fixed after all of the patches.

That position thing just doesn't make sense at all. I don't get it.

By the way great pics... Rudy you need to use controller two to switch those Bears orange jerseys... Yikes!

I suppose I should have for a couple reasons. One was the uniforms and two was the playbooks. For some reason the team specific playbooks work a lot better now. I don't see the constant run, run, pass patterns. I can't key on them all the time. Furthermore, the generic playbooks pass too much and run too much shotgun (this can change but overall it's too much) so I've grown to dislike them. A lot of the rush attempts are out of the shotgun and I don't see nearly enough run plays out of traditional formations. The Bears coach was a generated coach so I don't know what playbook they were using.

[Rudy]

Free agency has been completed! I signed one free agent and it was a big one. AJ Green! Got him for $38M over 5 years. He was the #1 WR so I don't know why Roddy White (both 90 overall but White older) went for $44 over 5. Bengals let both Green and Dalton go. Don't understand that one. Kurt Warner tried to make a comeback. Jay Cutler ends up back in Denver lol! I only had $4 million going into free agency but that's $4M to spend. The game already subtracts the draft pool from your cap number so I have less than $1M left. I have a ton of picks though. Traded away C.Clemons for a 3rd, Braylon for a 4th and James Jones for a 5th. Some draft day deals gave me a couple extra picks in the 4th and 6th. Not sure exactly how I got all those picks.

One stud at TE I found with a 5th round grade went to an A overall but he just showed up in a draft story. That means his grade has probably been bumped up to first round. I will try and trade 3 first round picks to move up and get that A QB if I can. They do have a free agency recap and I took a few screenshots of this so you can see what guys wanted. Ryan Matthews was the #1 RB and was asking for less than $5 million initially but the bidding went up obviously. I put a near max big on AJ Green, boosted it a tiny bit in week 2 and then selected wait it out the next week and he took it. I only have two questionable contracts on my team - LG Britton and ROLB Levy. But cutting them provided very little relief. It's cool to see the cap savings/hit listed before you cut a guy. Some guys it's a negative because of the accelerated bonus.

There appears to be some problems with the images (7). Will try to fix later. Kids now up and ready for Christmas!

[Rudy]

Chris Clemons was too good (and pricey at over $2M a year to be a backup at FS) so he was traded for a 3rd rounder. Braylon Edwards was moved for a 4th rounder and James Jones for a 5th rounder. Combined with previous draft day deals I had a ton of draft picks in this draft. A first rounder, 2nd rounder, two 3rds, four 4ths, two 5ths, two 6ths and two 7ths.

There are a lot of really good prospects in this draft class. The A rated QB and A rated TE (he showed up A once in one of the scouting weeks as a later round pick) ended up being B overalls which is still great. I scouted 32 overall grades and 7 were Bs. 1 (11th overall in round) QB and the one I really want, 1-12 RB (ended up going 23 in the draft to Lions), 2-22 RB, 2-30 TE, 4-10 LOLB, 4-21 CB and 5-5 TE. Seeing a B grade on a fifth rounder is unbelievable.

There were 8 Cs but only three that I'm interested in at this point. 3-20 WR, 3-23 CB and 5-21 FS. I have no free safeties on my roster right now and only one TE so I definitely need to hit those two spots. There were also 17 Ds and I don't care about them.

My gameplan is to do whatever it takes to get that stud QB who is only rated 11th best in this draft. I'm picking 32 and you can trade draft picks in one future year as well. Ryan Tannehill is getting very little interest on the trade market so my best offer is my 1st and 2nd rounders from this year and a future 1st rounder. After that I want the three B grades rated in the 4th and 5th rounds. I also want the FS in the 5th round with a C grade. I have a bunch of picks and I panic. I can't risk a team taking them early (some will go a bit early or slide). So I tend to trade up heavy to make sure I get them.

[Rudy]

So the draft begins. I probably spent about 45 minutes on it. When a kid in a draft story gets picked Trey Wingo has some decent stories he talks about. I like the twitter feeds and the teams moving up and down. I tried to trade up for the 1st pick but rejected. My 1st, 2nd and future 1st aren't good enough. Eventually the 5th team took the deal and I got my guy!





Skip disses a draft pick of the Panthers.



Moving up for my TE.


I almost screwed up when I was moving up (rarely down) to get my guys. I skipped a pick that was actually mine at the top of round 4 and the cpu took a RB for me! I only had a 5th and 7th rounder left and wanted that late 5th round FS. I was able to move the 5th and 7th for a late 4th rounder to make sure it happened. I was pissed about the RB but he ended up a great pick anyways. An incredible draft!

1) QB 84
3) LOLB 80
3) TE 80
3) CB 79
3) WR 75
4) RB 79
4) FS 73

[Rudy]

Matt Ryan is the village bicycle now, everyone wants a ride. Signed a one year deal with the Bengals who lost Dalton in the offseason and only signed Matt Cassell. Kurt Warner was ignored during free agency but the Jets signed him to a 1 year, $8M deal. NOBODY wants to trade for Ryan Tannehill lol. He's a 79 in my scheme and up to 83 in others but not a single offer. They will offer me trades for backups not even on the trade block like Richie Incognito but I put Tannehill on the block and not a single freaking offer. Lance Briggs got dumped by the Eagles at the end of camp (big money guy) and the Giants signed him to a 1 year, $3M deal.

My starting QB is better than Tannehill in pretty much every way other than athleticism. First game to start the year is against the Pats. It better be on All-Madden because if I start killing them I'm re-booting.

[jaymo76]

That Ryan thing is perplexing. One would guess that salary cap hit is the biggest concern of the cpu???