Falcons Forum

A lot to talk about for the Falcons in 2026. To start, let's start at the beginning of the year at the draft: We brought on three new members who immediately made huge contributions to the team. In addition to adding Kevin (better than Steve, says Steve) as our ringer, we got really lucky adding great ball players in Matt and John. Kevin's pairing with Steve in the middle outfield established the Falcons as near, if not at the top of the league's outfield defences. Matt anchors the left side of the infield, hits the ball all over the place and brought the loudest fans; and John cemented himself at the top of the batting order, his arrival time be damned. We've had some collar-tightening drafts in the past and this was at the opposite end of the spectrum. Also: Barry just couldn't quit us. Anyone who saw him leave the parking lot after the playoffs last year could have predicted this.

That draft led directly to the season's results. We started the year with free beer! We didn't do that AT ALL in 2025! But we started with six straight wins, slept through a Sunday doubleheader then fired off eight more wins in a row. That's free beer twice before it was even summer! Exciting times. That was it for the free beer, but we did also have a 7-0-1 run from mid-July to the beginning of August. All told, we finished with a winning percentage over .700 (.711 to be precise) for the first time in 12 years. We only had a losing record against one team (Triple Play, at 0-4), didn't lose to The Crew, and swept the season series against Broadway, the Expos, Hanet and Glorious Dan's Inglorious Batters. That's only good enough for the 3-seed going into the playoffs thanks to Storm being perpetually Storm, and the Triple Play Revenge Tour '26. More on that later.

Moving to sixteen players was also supposed to eliminate our activity in the league's "WE NEED A PLAYER" panic room of a WhatsApp chat. Spoiler alert: it didn't. We still had TEN games where we took the field with nine Falcons at most. A league rule change to allow sons as young as 22 to join the league would help. Right?

Even though we barely got a player squeezed onto the league's home run leaderboard (Beatty at 13, good for 13th), we had NINE Falcons hit a ball over the fence over the course of the year, the most of any team. That doesn't even include legit inside the park home runs by Steve (SIX), Chad and Arbour. There are no holes in our lineup.

DC's 99 RBI team (and probably league) record is safe. No one hit two dingers in one inning, nor hit two triples in the same inning. No one hit for the cycle. We didn't even score 30 runs in any games. That's not to say we didn't score. At 640 runs scored, we had the second most prolific offence in the league. And for the second year in a row, the third-best defence. Just a good, solid, consistent team top to bottom: This is proven in a record low of only $315 in pizza fines assessed in 2026.

All said and done, we finished third overall, and that placed us in the pool with the Isotopes and Greenthumb. It also earned us a Friday "bye" so we can be "rested" when we play at 9am on Saturday. Bring Caesars, Bill.

AWARDS SECTION

Here are your Falcons Regular Season statistical leaders:

ATTENDANCE AWARD: No perfect attendance this year. Bill came closest, only missing two games. Second year in a row Bill missed two games, and he's earned the right to come and go as he pleases.

Only Miner Leaguer and Handsome Jer missed more than half the games.

RUNS SCORED: Despite moving down the order part way through the season, Speed Bump still led the team with 61 runs scored, though new leadoff man Three-League was only 3 behind him.

1B: MILLION DOLLAR BILL! Billy leads the team in singles at 67, more than 10% more than second place Shohei.

2B: Time Out hit 25 doubles to take the crown this year, hitting a double every 4th time he came to the plate.

3B: Speed Bump's nickname clearly only applies at the poker table, as he wrestled the three-bagger crown back from Dunner, hitting nine this year. Also of note: we set a team record for triples this season, hitting 46, all completely legit.

HR: Schneids, as previously mentioned, led the team with 13 round-trippers.

BB: A three-way tie saw Shohei, Speed Bump and Taxman lead the team with 10 walks each. Pitching to us must be annoying as hell.

TOTAL BASES: Speed Bump wins here at 134, but the race for 2nd place was only a base different between the two rookies Three-League and Time Out.

BATTING AVERAGE: MLB demands 3.1 PA per team game played to qualify for the batting title. Since we only play 7 innings instead of 9, the number is 2.41 PA (3.1 x 7/9) per game. That makes the threshold 92 PA (2.41 x 38) over the course of the season the minimum. I'm writing this here for my own memory as much as anyone else's curiosity because that number seems to have bounced around A LOT over the years.

Time Out takes it here, batting .745 in his rookie season.

ON BASE PERCENTAGE: Time Out again, getting on 74.8% of the time

SLUGGING PERCENTAGE: As expected, the team leader in dingers leads in slugging. Schneids slugged 1.352.

ON BASE + SLUGGING (OPS): Schneids again, leading at 2.091

RUNS BATTED IN: Schneids. AGAIN! 66 RBI.

ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN IN THE PLAYOFFS

For the first time since 2010, the Falcons didn't play on Sunday last year. Time to start a new streak. Expectations are high this season, vibes are off the charts.

League wide, Triple Play is obviously the favourite to win it all, having only lost three times this season, 50% more losses than Storm in that one season we don't talk about. But as anyone will tell you, the winner of the President's division rarely wins the playoff tournament, and when it does happen, it's Storm. They did it in 2024, 2017, and 2016. The last time a non-Storm team won both was 2006. So history isn't on Triple Play's side here, but ALL of the pressure is. They steamrolled the league, finishing with the best offence and best defence and obviously the best run differential. All the eyes will be on them all weekend to see if they can keep it going.

Hanet won the VP division, and a ticket to the President's division in 2027. The Isotopes move up again after a year in exile. Broadway and the Expos move down. Triple Play lost to Hanet twice and the Expos. Two of their games against Greenthumb were only decided by a run each. They were also played tough by Storm and Broadway. The bug that's actually a feature of a playoff tournament format like this is the chaos it provides. One wedding can ruin a team's chances pulling a pivotal player away for Saturday. It's a great weekend and a great way to end a great season.

My playoff prediction here is that Triple Play gets to Sunday morning but no further, and a VP team is in the final game. I'm also never right.

FALCONS' MOST VALUABLE PLAYER

In a very tight race, Speed Bump's stats at the plate, rock solid defence, and leadership on the team put him over the top as the team's most valuable player.

FALCONS' MOST SPORTSMANLIKE PLAYER

For the seventh time in the last eight years, it's Billy. Billy, now and forever.

Congratulations to both our award winners, and good luck at the banquet!