power rankings week 8/playoffs (Dark Beyond)

introduction

PLAYOFFS?! YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT PLAYOFFS?! Outside of Legacy, all of our series will only be featuring players/teams that made the playoffs. This will be the final Power Rankings for this season with all of our series. We will still be releasing them for just Legacy until Legacy enters the playoffs. As a reminder, we use internal data calculated into a formula called PAR to create these rankings. PAR calculates data such as win/loss, game win rates, and strength of schedule. If you would like to read more about how this is calculated, read the blog that Marty wrote explaining how it all works! Each week we will be updating you on how these players and teams shift throughout their respective series, as well as highlighting individuals and their journeys. Let’s finish our venture out into the Dark Beyond.

legacy​

Hello THL, it’s time for the penultimate (one of my favorite words) Legacy PPR! We’ll talk through the significant shakeups in our player and team rankings — the most lopsided so far — as well as my odds and predictions for our upcoming playoff finalists. 
Let’s start off with the Gold Conference! After going five for five in their cross-conference endeavors this past week, we see Gold teams make up a massive chunk of the top 10. Strictly Business shot into 8th place for their first top 10 appearance, as well as ET C’Thun remaining in 9th. Towards the top of our rankings, Do A Barrel Roll moved into 4th place with their victory and Anomaly Perplexed Me? found their way onto the podium for the first time. APM? is in a dominant position going into the final week, with an 18 point lead over 3rd place. Only needing 5 points to clinch a playoff birth, I give APM? A 99% chance of moving on (yes, these odds are completely arbitrary - there is no actual math going behind them). As for the second playoff spot, we see Do A Barrel Roll presently in 2nd place with an 11 point lead (and tiebreakers) over Strictly Business and a 14 point lead over ET C’Thun. While these numbers are technically possible to allow Strictly Business or ET C’Thun to move into 2nd, it’s difficult due to them needing an extremely strong week and for Do A Barrel Roll to flop. I give Do A Barrel Roll a 94% chance to advance, Strictly Business a 5% chance, and ET C’Thun a 2% chance. 
Let’s move on to the Silver Conference. Despite being the conference that suffered all 5 losses to the Gold teams, we still see three different Silver teams represented in the top 10, though they all dropped several spots. Los Justin Hermanos had the biggest shift, dropping from an impressive 2nd all the way down to 7th, while 7 Mile Spanking Machine and The Ceaseless Expanse Ate Our Team dropping 3 places each. This conference is much clearer as to who our playoff teams will be. Los Justin Hermanos needs only 2 points to clinch their spot, so I’ll give them a 99.9% chance, and 7 Mile Spanking Machine only needs 3, so I’ll also give them a 99.9% chance. Yes, this leaves The Ceaseless Expanse Ate Our Team with only a measly 0.2% chance, but honestly, that’s probably higher then their actual odds. 
Next, our penultimate (I’m gonna use the word whenever I want, nobody is stopping me heheh) conference - Red! We are back to the “average” (don’t @ me with the math please) number of top 10 teams from this conference in 2. Defias, in fact, is our number 1 team! With a 6-1 record (the best in the league) and an entire 125 points or 17.86 PPW (also the best in the league), Defias is a force to be reckoned with. While they didn’t have their playoff spot clinched at the start of the week, an early week win has brought them to 23 points over the third place team, Standard THL Degenerates, making them the first team to secure themselves into playoffs. Congratulations to Defias and their 100% odds to move on! As for the second spot, DaSTUBBS (who also jumped up 3 places in the Power Rankings) has a 13 point lead over STD without any tiebreaks, meaning that they need 11 points to move on. While it is once again possible for STD to break into second with a sweep and a loss from DaSTUBBS (they are facing the leader of Blue Conference and our 3rd place team, DadLegend), I still find it highly unlikely to happen. I give DaSTUBBS a 94% chance to continue and STD a 4% chance. 
Ok, just one more conference to go (and thank you for bearing with me so far!). Blue Conference is probably our closest playoff race yet, despite them only having 1 team in the top 10, the aforementioned DadLegend. Speaking of this powerful team, they have the easiest job to clinch playoffs yet (besides Defias who already made it). With only 1 point, DadLegend’s tiebreaker over 8 Handed Death Chop clinches their spot in playoffs, so I’ll give them a 99.9999% chance to make it. As for our 2nd spot, Anaconda’s Preferred Meal, sat 9 points above 8 Handed Death Chop at the beginning of the week. With APM’s tiebreaks, they only need 14 points to make it to playoffs. While this is our closest race in the league, it still isn’t very close, so I give APM a 92% chance to move on. 8 Handed Death Chop needs an incredible week against the current strongest team, Defias, so they get an 8.0001% chance to advance to playoffs. 
Finally, let’s take a quick look at our players. We see even more shifts around, with winning and losing players moving several spots each. We also see 3 new players in the top 10 - CalebEM (go APM?), Ozmonaut, and aharmlessdog. Only Do A Barrel Roll’s LtCavalry and Defias’ grumpyninja remain undefeated as we move into our final week. Grumpyninja has a significantly better game score, going 21-6 across the season (congrats!), while LtCavalry is 21-10. If grumpyninja pulls out a final win, they will be our future MVP, but a loss could leave it in LtCavalry’s hands. 
Thanks for making it all the way through this upcoming playoff rant. I’m looking forward to our final writeup next week, highlighting our 8 playoff teams and the top players featured on each. Good luck to all THL’ers in the final week of the Legacy regular season!
-EPICat

​hero

Playoffs are here and only 6 teams remain. First let's look at who made it out alive from each conference. In the Teal conference we have Defias and A Poulderfist Mountain. From the Purple Conference we have Defy Us along with F2L Black. Finally, from the Orange conference we have Wraiths of the Beyond and Just Three Adjourning Crewmates. A huge round of applause to the 6 teams that were able to make it this time around. May the best of them win the playoffs.
I love a good underdog story and Defy Us had a good one this season. They did not get their first week win until the 4th week of the season. However, they kept their spirits up and were able to dominate weeks 4-6 with no issue. On the flip side, Defias was able to have a great season not losing a single week going into our playoffs. Another major congratulations to all the teams that made the playoffs this season. 
3 of the top 10 players were able to have an undefeated run into the playoffs. Congrats to Classy, NotBamity, and Ozmanaut for not losing a single match this season. We will see if any of them can continue this streak all the way to the final round. 
Finally lets look a little bit into our matchups for week 1 of the playoffs. For matchups we have Defias and Wraiths of the Beyond with a bye, APM vs. F2L Black, and  Defy us Vs. Just Three Adjourning Crewmates. 
Looks like some pretty interesting matchups for the week and we will see which teams remain on top with us in the next week.
​-amazingoo

​pro

Congratulations to the Top 6 teams that made the cut.  I'm going to give my "famous" Baseless Educated Wishes as the team reviews in a moment.  So, let's jump into a review of the Dark Beyond Pro Series undefeated players:
Maxiebon1234 (WashedUp) 7-0
End of list.
Petition to have Blizzard change 'The Year of Pegasus' to 'Year of Maxiebon1234'.  Maxie ended undefeated in Pro Series and Wild series and both teams are entering playoffs, and his Legacy team is still in the hunt for playoffs.  Note for any Pro teams that will be matched against Washed Up this playoffs:  Win with seeds 2 through 5, because your 1 seed needs help!
Alright, enough Maxie-Stanning.  Congratulations also to Pyrollama (Cheese Mongers United) 6-1 and rebobson (F2L) 5-2.  Incredible seasons that would have been first place performances in many prior seasons.
Now for the playoff matchups:
F2L (4th Place) VERSUS Ada's Litter (5th Place)
On paper, these two teams are nearly mirror images of one another.  Player match wins are identical, player match losses are identical. Ada's Litter got beat up on by Washed Up last week, while F2L defeated last year's Pro champs in BrushyTuna.  With the momentum going in F2L's favor, I give them a SLIGHT advantage this week.
WHODACK'S BASELESS EDUCATED WISH: F2L 15, Ada's 13
Washed Up (3rd Place) VERSUS ET Yogg-Saron (6th Place)
ET Yogg-Saron squeaked into the playoffs due to their solid play in the first half of the season.  The last few weeks has been pretty tough.  And, they're up against Washed Up led by my GOAT vote, Maxiebon1234.  I expect Maxie to do Maxie things, can the rest of the team pull out the upset?  I'm leaning no, but prove me wrong!
WHODACK'S BASELESS EDUCATED WISH: Washed Up 17, ETYS 11
Good luck to all!
​-Whodack

wild

Welcome to playoffs!  Anxious Puckin' Mess went nearly-undefeated, losing only to my own team, Wild THL Fanatics, and as such have earned their spot at the top of the power rankings.  In second is another strong team returning from last season, the Staff of the Five Dubs.  Hawk 2's 3-3 record may not seem elite but they've kept it up against the best teams and dominated everybody else, granting them the final spot on the podium.  WTF rounds out our playoff teams off the podium but by no means out of contention.  Any one of these four teams have the chance to go all the way.
As for the players, the story is once again the incredible depth and consistency of the Staff.  From the 1 to the 5, every player is one to be feared.  In fact, one-seed Copa is ranked "only" fifth after getting swept by maxie last week.  He'll be looking for a bounce-back week against WTF 1 seed Devalion, commonly referred to as the "handsomest man in THL", whose greatness knows no bounds and whose skill is unmatched.  Oh, sorry, you mean we have to talk about the players who've actually been winning?  *Ahem*, anyways.  Copa is joined by wild newcomer Filtrophobe and longtime performer NJO (Nice Jewish Owl) in the top five.  The three of them form a combined effort that makes getting through the Staff a challenge each and every week.
Of course, maxiebon1234, the Aussie sensation, grandmaster, and recent world championship competitor, has been tearing up the competition to the tune of 6-0.  In fact, his thirteen match wins spread out across Wild and Pro are somehow more than his total of twelve GAME losses between the series.  Any time he plays, you can pencil it in for an APM lead, and his dominance is the key reason why APM earned that one seed in the Dark Beyond.
But I'd be remiss not to mention THL veteran OTZaixia, who took the dissolution of F2L in stride and has made a home for himself at the front of free agent team Hawk 2.  With wins over players as good as SchmoopieDady and Sinferno, you can never count the combo king out of a match.  I'm excited to see the OTZ vs Maxie match this week - it should be one of the best on the docket!
Unfortunately, with playoffs starting this does mean this will be the last Wild power rankings until the next season.  I hope you guys have enjoyed reading these as much as I've enjoyed writing them!  See you in the playoffs and, as always, happy hunting lions.
-Devalion