New Orleans Second Line
| New Orleans Second Line | |||
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 Current season | |||
First season: 2017 Play in and headquartered in The Meme Coliseum New Orleans, Louisiana | |||
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| League/conference affiliations | |||
Current uniform
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| Team colors | Purple, Teal, Gold[1] | ||
| Mascot | Max | ||
| Personnel | |||
| General manager | Tyler Swift (BayleyIsland) | ||
| Head coach | Bovosexual Kiwi | ||
| Team history | |||
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| Championships | |||
| League championships (2) | |||
Conference championships (4)
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Division championships (3)
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| Playoff appearances (4) | |||
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| Home fields | |||
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The New Orleans Second Line is a professional American football franchise based in New Orleans, Louisiana. The Second Line currently compete in the National Simulation Football League (NSFL) as a member club of the league's American Simulation Football Conference (ASFC) which currently only has one division. The franchise was established in 2017 (S2) in the league's first expansion as the Las Vegas Legion before relocating for 2021 (S6).
After a mass retirement scandal led to the team's relocation and a change in management, New Orleans has acquired some exciting young talent and looks to begin a new chapter in their history while expanding their reputation as the league's "meme team". For the first 6 seasons of the franchise's existence (4 of Legion and 2 of Second Line), they were fairly noncompetitive only managing to win a maximum of four games. 2023 (S8), however, marked the turning point for the franchise as they were able to acquire some good talent and open a window of winning, rattling off four straight seasons of at least nine wins.
In the history of the Las Vegas Legion/New Orleans Second Line, the team has made four playoff appearances, won three ASFC Championship titles, and hoisted two Ultimas titles.
Contents
History of the New Orleans Second Line
After being awarded an expansion team after the league's inaugural season, Las Vegas GM RFFO saw an opportunity to be a playoff competitor immediately. He dealt most of the team's draft picks and pursued free agents aggressively, highlighted by signing quarterback Josh Bercovici to a 5-year, $33 million contract. This bold strategy backfired quickly and the franchise has been bad ever since. A few weeks before the 2019 NSFL Draft the GM notified the head office that he would be stepping down effective immediately, tapping his co-GM Ben to replace him, which the league agreed to. Ben hired Keygan as his co-GM just in time for the 2019 Offseason to begin.
The new duo dedicated the team to build through the draft but unfortunately, the timing could not have been any worse. With the establishment of the Developmental Simulation Football League for new prospects, the 2019 draft was the smallest and worst in league history. The Legion went into the draft with 5 of the 8 first round picks, the first 5 picks in the franchise's history and just the second time the franchise would pick in the top 40. In particular, Ben and Keygan targeted well-known and reliable-earning players from the SHL to create a cohesive, active locker room and discord. The actually worked out pretty well. Even though the NSFL was, at best, second priority for most of the team the discord was very active and Keygan spent the entire season pointing out how Las Vegas had more users online in the main NSFL discord than any other team.[2] After that season, though, a culmination of events led to many of those SHL users getting fed up with the league which eventually led to Keygan posting a retirement thread for 7 players on the team, including himself.[3] Only 6 of those players actually retired - Wallace Stone did not intend on retiring[4] - but 2 other players posted separate topics. This mass retirement sent shockwaves through the league and the head office scrambled to deal with the fallout since Ben, the head GM, was on vacation in Europe at the time and while aware of the developments, in general, he was in no position to take action.
However, as the head office found during their deliberations, this wasn't as bad as it appeared initially. Only one of the retiring players had updated regularly that season and by waiting to post the topic after the offseason began, this gave Las Vegas a bunch of expiring contract that they could trade for assets to build the team. A few days after the topic the head office announced the cosbornballboy would take over as GM of the team. In one of his first acts as GM, he traded for a quarterback without consulting the team's current quarterback, Wallace Stone, about a position change which caused a falling-out between the two. After a couple days of similar missteps that grew from that initial mistake, Cosborn stepped down as GM and was replaced by Bovo.
Bovo oversaw the selling-off of the assets that hadn't yet been traded and soon hired tbone as his co-GM. The team headed into the 2020 NSFL Draft with a decent amount of mid-round picks to start the rebuild anew. To complete the fresh start they desired for the team they also began exploring relocation options and the following offseason the team, after much consulting with the team, announced it would become the New Orleans Second Line starting in 2021 (S6). Like Ben and Keygan, Bovo and tbone put an emphasis on building through the draft and strove to have the best scouting in the league by targeting DSFL GMs. As a testament to this strategy the franchise has seen its players win 3 consecutive rookies of the year. In last year as Las Vegas Legion, they won one game, against San Jose SaberCats in Week 7 with a score of 37-19.
The single most important event in franchise turnaround was the 2021 NSFL Draft, where General Managers were able to draft three franchise calibre players: Brian Mills with 1st Overall Pick, Jaylon Broxton with 5th Overall Pick (via Outlaws, acquired in the trade for Wyatt Fulton and Andreas Waiters[5]) and their Quarterback ever since Borkus Maximus III. In the first season as Second Line, they achieved the 2-11-1 record, with both wins coming against winless in the 2021 (S6) Colorado Yeti team. With the team still far away from contention the priority was set on developing young players and acquiring further assets using the vast cap space team head.
Ahead of the 2022 NSFL Draft mentality changed and GM Bovo decided to start trading for established players - starting with Julian O'Sullivan [6]. Due to overall lack of quality picks (they sent away their 1st rounder in O'Sullivan trade) and shallowness of the talent pool of the draft New Orleans didn't gain any memorable players in the 2022 (S7) draft. Team visibly improved to a 4-10, but still was placed last in the very competitive ASFC.
2023 (S8) marked possibly single biggest positive franchise turnarounds in NSFL history. To make it possible two big deals were made before the season start. First they traded for established star linebacker Vincent Sharpei[7] to create most dangerous defensive trio alongside drafted in 2021 (S6) Brian Mills and acquired a season before Julian O'Sullivan. Just before 2022 NSFL Draft, their young star demanded trade to the Orange County Otters that resulted in a defensive backs swap of Jaylen Broxton and Vladimir Fyodorovich[8]. In the draft with the second overall pick, Second Line Management was able to solidify their secondary picking Safety William Harrison. This year for the first time franchise in franchise history team was able to qualify for the playoffs and played in the ASFC Championship Game winning against Orange County Otters 20-17 on 46 yard field goal by Peg Leg with 0:10 remaining on the clock. Next, they travelled to the Ultimus Bowl VIII game to the Yellownife, where they lost 24-13 to the Wraiths.
With team clearly being ready to contend further moves were made to strengthen both secondary - trade for franchise Cornerback Benson Bayley[9] - and offensive firepower acquiring multiple NSFL Tight End of the Year award winner Paul Di Mirio[10]. These acquisitions combined with the internal growth was enough to secure best record, 12-2, in the league. In the playoffs they defeated Otter County Otters 39-21 and Baltimore Hawks 37-24 en-route to their first Ultimus title in the 2024 (S9).
Following their Ultimas victory, the 2025 (S10) season was going to prove a challenge with star receiver Dustin Evans retiring along with Vincent Sharpei and Fuego Wozy, and running back Smallwood on his last leg. In an effort to minimize the falloff from losing Evans, the Second Line would make a move and sign Alexander LeClair, who was a reliable second option in Baltimore. Despite seemingly getting older the Second Line would manage to put together one of the best offenses the NSFL has seen with Maximus III throwing for over 5K yards and 40 TDs, while Smallwood would rush for over 1200 yards and 15 touchdowns himself. Despite being well on their way to the top spot in the ASFC, New Orleans wanted to get every advantage they could going into the playoffs and such as the trade deadline was drawing near they managed to pull off a trade for Carlito Crush. WIth their high powered offense the Second Line cruised to an 11-3 record, however, struggled in the first round against the Orange County Otters, barely escaping 10-3. They would go on to face the Baltimore Hawks for the second straight year in the Ultimas, however, this time they would not come out on top losing 29-23.
After two straight Ultimas appearances, Bork Borkington decided it was time to take a step back and resigned as general manager of the Second Line. It would later be announced that Tyler Swift would be the new general manager starting in 2026 (S11). Coming off an impressive season, but seeing the end was near, Darren Smallwood would come out during the offseason and announce that 2026 (S11) would be his final year playing, which came after Ardie Savea announced his retirement. More changes would come as Crush would go back to Orange County and Vladimir Fyodorovich would convert to a wide receiver, but also still play on defense. With losing many offensive weapons, Maximus III would drop greatly in his production over the previous season, but Smallwood would still be as dominant as ever gaining over 1600 total yards and 21 touchdowns. Despite losing players the Second Line would match their previous season's record at 11-3, handle the otters mightily to a tune of 40-13, and setup New Orleans v Baltimore part 3. This would be a heavyweight bout for the ages as both teams went back and forth and Turk Turkleton would tie the game up with 1:47 left in regulation. The game would go into overtime and like a story book finish, Darren Smallwood would catch a 6 yard pass from Maximus III to earn New Orleans another Ultimas title.
With the 2027 (S12) offseason barely getting started, the writing was already on the walls for New Orleans as Darren Smallwood, Alexander LeClair, Charlie Law, and Joseph Askins all retiring, there was only a shell of last season's Ultimas team. With it so clearly being a rebuilding year the Second Line shipped Benson Bayley off to San Jose and hoped to find their next core in the draft. Two of those future pieces were found with Axel Hornbacher and [Thjalfi Halvorsen]] each looking to help either side of the ball. The final pieces to the puzzle were set once Borro Gore was brought in to take the reigns of the running back room. New Orleans would do just as expected through preseason although winning a game against Yellowknife was a bit surprising to some. Maximus and Gore seemed to make an unlikely duo as well on offense as Gore early on was near the top of the league in rushing, while Maximus still found yards for Fyodorovich through the air. Through the first six games the Second Line actually managed to win every other game leading to a surprising 3-3 record. Despite trading off Blackford Oakes during the season and having a hollowed out roster, New Orleans made an odd end to the season as even though they lost their last five games, all were done so by only one possession, meaning they could have actually gone 9-5, instead they would be 4-10 with a much better draft pick.
Season-by-season records
Players and Personnel
Current roster
 | This article is pending review by an Approver on the wiki team. Do not award TPE yet. |
Select Team
New Orleans Second Line roster
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| Quarterbacks
Running backs
Wide receivers
Tight ends
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Offensive linemen
Defensive linemen
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Linebackers
Defensive backs
Special teams
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Reserve lists
DSFL Send-downs
Rookies in italics
Roster updated January 25th, 2024 | ||||||
Current staff
New Orleans Second Line staff
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References
- ↑ "New Orleans Second Line Team Info". Official New Orleans Second Line Info Page. National Simulation Football League. February 10, 2018. Retrieved May 4, 2018.
- ↑ "Discord". Discord. National Simulation Football League. November 3, 2017. Retrieved May 4, 2018.
- ↑ "Legion retires many!". Legion retires many!. National Simulation Football League. December 8, 2017. Retrieved May 4, 2018.
- ↑ "Legion retires many!". Legion retires many!. National Simulation Football League. December 8, 2017. Retrieved May 4, 2018.
- ↑ "AIR/LVL Trade". AIR/LVL Trade. National Simulation Football League. December 16, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
- ↑ "NOLA/OCO". NOLA/OCO. National Simulation Football League. March 26, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
- ↑ "NOLA/SJS". NOLA/SJS. National Simulation Football League. May 2, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
- ↑ "NOLA / OCO, big boy trade". NOLA / OCO, big boy trade. National Simulation Football League. May 17, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
- ↑ "SJS/NOLA". SJS/NOLA. National Simulation Football League. June 9, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
- ↑ "PHI/NOLA". PHI/NOLA. National Simulation Football League. June 13, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2018.
