wole posted on June 17, 2019 15:24
You’ve got to hand it to the guy.
When Nightmare started his Power Rankings before the season started and pledged to continue them each week throughout the season, I’m sure many of us (most notably: me) scoffed. We assumed that he would eventually find better things to do and occupy his time with more rewarding endeavors than placating the egos of HRLers who clamor to find their names on the internet anywhere other than the comments section of the latest City Pages article on the metro’s most caloric donuts (I’m being facetious of course, but if that article actually existed it’d be Angel Food and totally worth it, by the way. Effin’ delicious.).
Nine weeks later, we’ve been proven wrong. Nightmare is still at it, for some reason. Week after week, he has provided consistent content for the website that could be best described as so-so, but yet we all still read it. Nobody can really explain why.
Anyhoo, let’s take a look back at his weekly half-assery and rank the best of the average “Nightmare’s Power Rankings” through a full half of the season:
1. The Pre-Season. Talk about a hot start! The sense of Nightmare’s pent-up desperation to get out of the damn house and start playing some ball after a long winter of being cooped-up playing with action figures was palpable. So many words (Lettercount.com says 11,066 characters). So much almost reputable analysis of 22 teams full of players he’s never bothered to meet in his 13-year career. He almost made you feel like he knew what he was talking about! Even though he lacked a quality intro for this one, he left the reader feeling that more great content would be coming each week.
2. Week 5. An absolute stunning piece of American literature. One of our nation’s finest ever penned. Comparable to Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Steinbeck, and Donald Trump’s Twitter account, the word “Vlade” appeared in this treasure 31 times! The only real flaw in this masterpiece is that it has clearly unearthed what must be a coding error in our website’s rating system as it has only received a 3-star rating. Dee, please correct this to it’s rightful 5-star rating post haste!
3. Opening Day Edition. Lotsa nerd stuff here. I didn’t understand a word of this crap, but I checked in with Truck to have it translated for me, and he tells me the writing was creative AF, so I’ll go along with it. For some reason, this is the only Power Ranking that counts from the bottom up. An unexpected Dick Clark turnaround here. I did not see that coming. Nor did I see the death of Iron Man coming… oops… ***SPOILER ALERT***
4. Week 6. I didn’t actually read this one, but #NeutGif.
5. Week 3. Here we start to feel Nightmare’s grind (no, not that grind). He started the Pre-Season ranking all gung-ho, determined to see them through until the end of the year. By Week 3, he’d had enough. The extent of his intro became “”by Nightmare (obviously)”, which, while basic, still quite wordy from what his intros became as we progress farther down this list. For the Twins, he provided only a schedule update (honestly, I find it hard to deduct him for this, as it’s still more than that squad really deserves).
6. Week 8. A reinvigorated Nightmare can be seen here. No more are we seeing three word intros. No siree! Now, we have full length intros explaining that he’s rapidly running out of gas when it comes to caring about writing these things. I don’t blame you, my man. Did you know I once played wiffleball with Eddie Bauer for TEN STRAIGHT YEARS?! I was burned out after ten games, let alone ten years. I can relate, Nightmare. Your courage to carry on with this inane exercise is to be commended.
7. Week 2. The shelf life on this one seems a bit limited as I have no idea what he means by “If I were there, they would have scored 100”. I referenced the Fish schedule as I assumed this was in regard to a beating they took in his absence, but they played a pair of close ones against the Kards that week and he was there for them. WTF is he talking about?! You need more timeless references in these, Nightmare. More Vlade going forward will do the trick.
8. Week 4. Just another Twins’ schedule update… Wait a sec… I see what’s happening here… and Vlade likey! Go get ‘em Nightmare!
9. Week 7. Nightmare flip-flopped about 8 times as to whether or not Sanchez would hit HR #500 that week. He didn’t. He still hasn’t. Have some conviction, fella. Pick a specific date that he’ll hit it, and stick with it so we can mercilessly ridicule you when you’re wrong. Sheesh.
10. Week 9. Just give up.