The Top Five Individual Performances In Swoops (So Far)

In celebration of the two month anniversary of Swoops launching, we look at the top five individual performances so far!

The Top Five Individual Performances In Swoops (So Far)

It is officially the two month anniversary of Swoops launching and we could not be more proud of where we're at and thankful for those of you who have helped to get here. We felt we had something special on our hands as we geared up for launch, something we were excited to show people, something we felt that even in these early stages there would be a group of people who loved as much as we do, but we couldn't have anticipated the kind of response Swoops has gotten.

Since our early January launch there have been 182 unique teams formed by owners who have played over 77,000 games! That is an incredible amount of matches that far surpassed even our boldest of predictions. We really could not be any more grateful for the dedicated Swoops community that is growing every day and cannot wait for you all to see what we have in store.

In celebration of two months of games, we wanted to have some fun and highlight the five best individual performances in Swoops so far. To assess which ones are "the best" we will be using game score which is calculated via this equation. It's not perfect, but it's better than us getting together and becoming gridlocked in a debate about why such-and-such had a better night than so-and-so. Come to think of it, not the worst names for a pair of Swoopsters!

Speaking of names, this is going to be focused on the top performances from named players, as we really want to highlight the team owners creativity and start to build this universe out even more. So make sure you're naming your Swoopsters and, for those who have Swoopster that would like to start a new life with a new identity, there may be something on the horizon to help with that.

Without further ado here are the top five individual performances of Swoops Season 0 so far!

1. Airdrop Jordan - 53.8

January 9th, 2023: Roundball Punks - 118 vs. Swoops There It Is - 92

Airdrop Jordan's dominant opening week performance comes in at #1 on the list of highest game scores in Swoops history. Who better to top our list than a Swoopster named after the player with the highest game score in NBA history? I mean shoot, if I wasn't looking at a list of 780,000 individual game scores I'd think it's too perfect to be true.

On that fateful January 9th night, the Roundball Punks trotted out a roster of Spud Webthree, Airdrop Jordan, and three free agents and put up one of the highest scoring games in Swoops history against the extremely good Swoops There It Is team. An very unlikely event catalyzed by a true outlier performance, the Roundball Pumps would put up 118 points and blast past the otherwise excellent 92 of their opponent.

Airdrop Jordan would score over half of his team's points and finish with a line of 60 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists (the most assists of any 60-point game), 3 steals, and only a single turnover. Airdrop's 22/31 from the field (8/13 from three) and 6/7 from the free throw line resulted in a true shooting percentage of 88.08%, good the second highest mark of any 60 point game in Swoops history. At the time it would have been the highest in NBA history, until Damian Lillard's 60 points on 89.8% true shooting on January 25th of this year. I like to think that Dame lurks among us and was inspired; at the very least it had me running to 24 Hour Fitness to get yelled at for shooting too much.

Remarkably, this was Airdrop's second 60 point game in a 24 hour time span. His January 9th 60-ball just missed the cut and would be good for 6th place on the list, which is absolutely absurd considering there have only been nine 60+ point games from players so far.

The five-star swingman is averaging a stat-stuffing 24.5/4.5/6/3/1.5/1 on 44/38/76 shooting splits this year and I suspect has an even better game still in him.

2. Machine Jordan - 53

January 9, 2023: Killer Bytes - 109 vs. Goon Squad - 91

No, you are not reading that wrong. On January 9th of 2023, three days after launch, the top two games by game score were both logged by players named after Michael Jordan. I promise that the Swoops Simulator does not have an implicit bias in that respect, this is simply an outrageous coincidence. I'll give it a good push like it was Byron Russell just to make sure though.

Despite an excellent performance from Lambda Odom and the Good Squad, Jordan took it straight to the teeth of their defense and scored at will over JeBron Lames and Hustle Westbrook from the opening tip. The Good Squad tried their best to limit him from getting into the paint, but that resulted in their perimeter players racking up an astounding 20 fouls - the majority of which were spent trying to go Bad Boy Pistons on Jordan.

Supported by Pistol (Pete, perhaps?) and Robot Covington on his sides, Machine Jordan scored at will from every spot on the floor, putting up a 59 point, 8 rebound, 6 assist, 4 steal masterpiece for the Killer Bytes to give them the win. Mr. Machine went 7/11 from three and 17/27 overall from the field, with a Dirk-in-the-Finals-esque 18/19 from the line, which is good for a 82.43% true shooting night.

Interestingly enough, the Killer Bytes quickly traded Machine Jordan after his breakout game in order to widen out their roster. Since then, the four-star guard has gone on to put up 23/8/5/1.5/1 averages with a record of 733-491. That's a fine piece of business.

3. Dream - 52.2

February 23rd, 2023: Swoops Dreams - 109 vs. Goon Squad - 80

The poor Goon Squad make their second appearance on this list, as Dream and Swoops Dream team throttled them by 29 points near the end of last month. Swoops Dreams went full Harlem Globetrotters vs. the Goons, who may be the Swoops Washington Generals for right now. But hey, any publicity is good publicity!

Dream had the kind of shooting night that players can only, well, dream of. He shot 9/11 from three, 14/17 from the field overall, and 17/19 from the charity stripe en route to 54 points and a Swoops leading 106.47% true shooting (!!!) for all 50 point games. This would also smash the NBA's TS% record for games where a player has scored 50 or more which was set by Kyrie Irving last year.

This was some sort of Klay Thompson style fugue state that Dream had entered, as he snagged only two rebounds, dished out only one assists, and didn't turn the ball over a single time. Just running around screens, pulling up on the break, and draining shot after shot.

While Dream may not have got his teammates going but he was an absolute menace on the defensive end, picking up six steals and helping to hold the Goon Squad backcourt to a combined 8/22 shooting and 1/5 from three. Get you a Swoopster who can do both!

Through this inaugural Season 0, the five-star dreamboat is averaging 21/3/3/1.5/.7 on 44/37/88 shooting splits.

4. Jim Halbot - 52.2

March 5th, 2023: Dunker Mifflin - 110 vs. Process City - 94

Cue the theme song!

Just before this article was due to come out, Dunker Mifflin's superstar scorer added his name to the list of greatest games, tying Swoops Dreams's Dream for the third highest game score among named players.

Halbot put up 50 points on 11/15 from distance, 16/20 from the field overall, and 7/11 from the line, good for a 100.65% true shooting spectacle. It wasn't just the scoring though, as the potent three-star swing did absolutely everything for Dunker Mifflin. Halbot chipped in 5 rebounds and dished out a Swoops leading 14 assists for games of 50 or more points, while chipping in a block, a steal, only turning it over twice, and committing just a single foul at the end of the game.

Overall, he contributed to 86 of Dunker Mifflin's 110 points (36/59 from the field, 16/27 from three, 20/28 from the line) as they sent Process City back to the drawing board.

Not since his namesakes breakout game against the warehouse guys has there been a better performance from a Jim.

Jim Halbot has established himself as one of the preeminent players in all of Swoops, averaging 26/5/7/1.2/.7 with barely a turnover a game on 44/37/79 shooting splits. Very much looking forward to future seasons from him and the rest of the Mifflin crew.

5. Ice - 51.3

March 6th, 2023: North Side 416ers - 114 vs. Unnamed - 110

This was the game that caused an emergency edit to this article, and wow what a game it was. Down 86-84 entering at the end of the third, Ice scored 13 of his game high 60 in the final quarter to carry the 416ers to victory over this mysterious and potent unnamed adversary.

Ice is the lone big man on this guard-heavy list, and comes in swinging cold, heavy, gigantic fists as he breaks into the top five games in dominant fashion. While these other performances have resulted in dominating victories for their teams, the other Kings of the North needed every single point out of Ice to get this win. Ice made 23 of his 28 field goal attempts, going a perfect 5/5 from downtown, and a nearly flawless 9/10 from the line. That puts this 60 point explosion at a 92.59 TS%, the best among all 60 point games in Swoops history, the best in NBA history, and you know what? Probably the best in all of history.

Ice's final line was a bone-chilling 60/8/3/2, making 23 of the North Side's 38 total shots, and snatching a victory away from a team that had an absolutely incredible performance themselves.

For one of the most prominent teams in all of Swoops, the three-star marauder is averaging a hyper-efficient 22/8/4/1.5/1 on 59/44/66 shooting splits, is going to be a real pain for opposing teams come tournament time, and the perfect player to cap off our two-month retrospect on the top single game performances so far.

Who will be next to break onto the list? Did your player have an incredible game and you want to know where they stack up? Drop us a line on Twitter or Discord and we'll let you know.

Once again, thank you to the Swoops team owners for all their help and dedication. It sounds trite, but seriously, your input is invaluable and we truly love interacting with all of you every day. We have so much in store so get ready for Swoops to put up a big performance of our own!

For those of you who haven't jumped into the Swoops Universe yet, what are you waiting for?! Come be a part of the deepest sports ownership experience that any game and any community has to offer. We're waitin' for you.

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