When Season 57 started only few in the organization expected that the team would end up there, but this time finally came true what the fans were waiting for: The HAMBURG SEA LIONS advanced to the Elite postseason and played their first playoff game at this level ever.

The season started pretty good, despite losing the home opener to the Mustangs 17:18. We went on to win 6 of the next 8 games, but then hit a though stretch of games against RZA royalty. The squad was able to win 4 games on the back end of the schedule, though, so we managed to get to a great record of 10–6 at the end of the season. It took a loss of the Ravens in week 17 for us to sneak into the postseason tournament, but we also had to win the last game, which we did, 16:13 against the Olivos Borrachos. And thus we made the first playoff appearance in the Elite league happen.

There we met the Space Kraken, the #1 team in all of RZA. We kept it close, but ultimately lost because of an ill advised interception in the redzone in the second quarter. That was one of few opportunities to score in the game at all, so in the end we had to go for the TD instead of kicking a FG to win, and failed to convert 4th Down with 5 minutes to go. We lost 10:14.

We take pride in the fact that the game we played was by far the closest one in the Wildcard round, with all the other games ending on a spread of at least 30 points. But losing on such a situation is annoying, as it again shows that it’s the small situations that will decide a game at this level.

The Supercup this season was far less successful than our play in the league. We missed the playoffs for the first time since S50, mostly thanks to the fact that that we played the back-ups to gather experience and get the new QB up to speed. The latter must take over right from the start of next season, as starter Nicolò Stanzetti will retire, along with starting FB Roberto Mora and veteran TE Sherman Schmidt.

The new season will likely be an uphill battle for us. Both lines improved last season, but especially on the Tackle position of the O-Line there’s still a lot of room to grow. It will take all the speed and agility the new QB has to buy enough time to get the ball down the field. The OC is already working hard on solutions to lessen the load for the trigger man by developing a playbook more predicated on the ground game.

It is tough to play the Rush successful in the Elite league, though. So it will be no surprise if the SEA LIONS will struggle mightily in season 58. We will celebrate the games nonetheless, as we’re going into our first 10-year-anniversary-season. We’ve come a long way in these past seasons, and the postseason appearance in this last one was a nice confirmation of all the hard work we put into the game.

Hopefully we’ll be able to start the next 10 seasons with some success, too.

The HAMBURG SEA LIONS are happy to welcome their next inductee into their Hall of Fame, and it’s a player whose presence was felt right away, but so was his absence when he retired at the end of Season 55. He mainly played on the defensive end and was a sure tackler that put fear into the opposing quarterbacks: Pairat Vanich.

He was drafted by Quack Attack in Season 45 and played 6 games in his Rookie season. After only having played one game in Season 46 he returned with a vengeance in Season 47, playing 13 games, in which he collected 3 Sacks and forced 3 fumbles. He could not quite repeat this success in Season 48 and was put on the transfer market, where he was acquainted and signed up by the HAMBURG SEA LIONS for a bargain of $1.52 Mio.

From the start he was a force to be reckoned with, caused fumbles and/or sacked the opposing passer multiple times in every season that he’s played for this franchise. He was a staple on the defensive line for all of the 7 seasons that he wore the uniform of the SEA LIONS, helped them to win their first championship in Season 52.

And in the Elite seasons that followed he put up even better numbers than before. It seemed as if the higher competition made him even better, and with him as the anchor the defensive line helped to get better each season, even sniffing at the playoffs of the Elite league in his final season. It was not meant to be, but overall his last season with the SEA LIONS was one of the best he ever played.

He retired at 30 after 282 games, over 1.000 tackles made with an astounding success rate of 82 %, and nearly half of them were tackles for loss. He accumulated 42 sacks and forced 19 fumbles along the way. He was an MVP all along.

Welcome to the Hall of Fame, Pairat Vanich

Another exciting season has ended these days, and it might have been the most exhilarating one this franchise has gone through to date. The HAMBURG SEA LIONS have been in the discussion for playing in the postseason until the very last week of the regular season, and it came down to a questionable game management decision on the second to last game day that denied us the first playoff appearance since we entered the Elite league.

Other than the first 3 seasons at the highest level of RZA football we started the season with a record that could not have been any worse: We lost the first 3 and were 3–5 after half of the games were played. At this point no one truly believed that we would return to the Elite after S56. But thanks to being in a close division and a stretch of 5 wins on the back-end of the schedule we had the chance to make a playoff push.

A bad decision in week 17, when we had our last home game against the mystics, made it fall apart, though. Due to a brainfart the manager was convinced that they only needed to win against the opponent from the NC East to secure first place in the division... and he used MOTY. That resulted in a spectacular match, which they won. But their position against their division opponent Chelt Nam Bobbers was not made better with that win, and on the last game day the mightiest Dragon won against a depleted SEA LIONS team, using MOTY himself, taking the #1 spot in the West and leaving them in tears on the outside looking in.

It was a tough lesson learned for the SEA LIONS about proper evaluation of the schedule and how to navigate through the games to get where they want to be. And it feels like the window in which the team was good enough to compete for a postseason spot has closed. Crucial members of the squad get up there in age or have already signaled that they will retire at the end of this season. And although there are a lot of promising young players to fill the open spots they still might be not good enough to pose problems for the teams they’ll be up against.

S57 will be an uphill battle for the SEA LIONS once again, no one should be all too surprised if they start 0–3 again. We have multiple retirees on crucial positions, as RB1 Jefferson Micombero will end his playing career after this season, as will longtime contributors Offensive Guard Zahit Rahuma and Strong Safety Lazar Ognyanov. All three of them will be sorely missed, as the last game of the season, a friendly visit at the FJB-Field of Dark Matter, showed convincingly.

Chances even aren’t that bad that they won’t be able to come around to play for another season in the Elite again this time. It’ll be all about developing a new core of players for the seasons to come… and enjoying the ride while it lasts.

It’s Tuesday before season rollover, and that’s, as always, Bowl game Tuesday.

The SEA LIONS are not playing in one, mind you, as they could not make the jump from regular season to the postseason. But they celebrate nonetheless, as they had their season-ending encounter with the visiting All Stars today, which they won 34:21. And later in the day they’ll visit the KMN Mandalorians from the Elite division NC East to play a friendly game while following the Bowl game between the Space Kraken and the Sunrise City Prairie Dogs. It is quite a happy ending to S55, and it does, if you put all these little annoyances aside, fit.

In the league the SEA LIONS managed to score a record of 10–6, which was another step forward after being 9–7 and 8–8 in the seasons prior. They began hot and won 8 of the first 11 games. But then they hit a stretch of games where experience and preparedness ultimately made the difference. So in the end they were on the outside looking into the playoffs. But they managed to secure another season in the Elite league through winning some tough games, also, so S55 is celebrated as a success, nonetheless.

The team also had quite a successful run in the Supercup this season, where they were able to get to the fourth round for the first time in franchise history.

One player that has a big part in why the SEA LIONS are that successful, sadly, will be retiring at the end of the season, and this one will have a lasting impact as he’ll not be replaced so easily: DE Pariat Vanich decided that this would be his last season playing football. Right from the start when he joined the SEA LIONS he was a dominant force on the defensive line. In this final season he finished second in the league in Tackles for Loss, had a tackling success rate of 88.5 % and even two sacks. His presence will be sorely missed. Also retiring will be assistant coat Vaidotas Stankevicius, who has been in charge of the DL, as well as AC Bisujaksha Jana, who had been overseeing the development of the WR-corps.

Nonetheless: Especially on the defensive side above the ball the coming season will be a challenging one. Offensively the front office was able to keep together the dominant OL for another season, but there are retirements looming on various positions, too. The starting QB, our best TE, possibly 3 OL-players, maybe even our leading rusher… this coming season may be the last one in which the Offense of the SEA LIONS is able to compete at this level.

So we’ll try to make the best of it, no?

[Editorial note: As the beat writer for the HAMBURG SEA LIONS has been incredibly lazy these days due to „nothing really going on, no?“, we decided to let the fans have their voice and chime in through short messaging]

+ + + „Another season in the Elite: AWESOME! Congrats to the squad, keep up the good work. You rock!!!“ + + + „More difference makers to help Nico Stanzetti! We can’t rely on the old mans arm 2 much! Who knows how long he wants to play like that!!!“ + + + „Winning another World Bowl FC was cool, but we lost too much after that. Wished ‘twas the other way, some of these losses damn hurt :/„ + + + „Would have preferred if you’d kept Chad Cannon and sold Jeffe Micombero instead! Dude’s WAY to slow and has no hip movement anymore XoX“ + + + „2nd year on a row that the team couldn’t finish the season properly. It’s a shame! The OC should come up with something, do your job, man!“ + + + „IDK how people think this season SUCKED??? We still 1 of the best 16 teams in RZA, so chill, y’all *facepalm*“ + + +