How a ‘Madden’ star won a major tournament without throwing a single pass

‘Joke’ lined up a punter at the quarterback position and still won the Madden Bowl championship.

Raidel “Joke” Brito, a 26-year-old native of New Jersey, won this year’s Madden Bowl … plus a $65,000 purse and title belt made in part of solid gold. And he did it without throwing a single pass.

To understand how that worked, you have to understand the format of the tournament: To start, the players had to build their rosters using a salary cap structure.

Joke figured if he didn’t spend big on a quarterback, that would free up a ton of money to build his roster elsewhere. He was so committed to the idea, he didn’t spend at all on a quarterback: Washington Redskins punter Tress Way lined up under center for him in the game.

With the freed up salary space, he was able to build an incredibly stout defense and potent offensive line. Then he started running. And kept doing it, right to a title, which he won with a 17-0 shutout over Daniel “Dcroft” Mycroft.

The win solidified Joke’s place in Madden history.

Via ESPN:

“We had three major events during the season that led to this tournament,” said Tyler “TDAVIS” Davis, a Madden competitor and commentator. “Joke finished fifth, third and third in those tournaments en route to winning the final tournament of the year. He was the best player by far in Madden 20. Going into this, he was arguably in the top 10 of all-time greats, and now he has to be considered in the top 5 ever.”

Congrats to Joke for his … serious win. I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself.