Do you remember the days before rosters that automatically updated on your favorite football video games? You would go out and buy the latest version of a game, and the game would be outdated a week later.

Teams waive players all the time, players get injured, an undrafted free agent makes the team or, more recently, players get suspended and are all of a sudden out of the league. Often, players don’t perform as well as they were projected at the beginning of the season, while others over-perform but are still rated as benchwarmers.

In the past, those of us who wanted to play the game they right way had few options:

·         Play with an outdated version of the game and suck it up.

·         Attempt to correct the rosters by creating players, editing names or signing and releasing players.

Any time that I would try and create a player, I would inevitably make them too good (especially if I liked the player) or too weak. I’m not very good at removing my bias.

But now, that has all changed through updated rosters.

I’m sure you’ve been following the case of former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice, who has been suspended indefinitely by the NFL. On Friday, Madden 15 released a roster update that removed Ray Rice from the video game. Rice went from being one of the top running backs on Madden 15 to becoming a virtual afterthought – all in three days.

That’s the power of the roster update.

Rice isn’t the first former Pro Bowl player to be removed from Madden completely. Aaron Hernandez was removed from Madden 25 after he was charged with murder.

Roster updates aren’t only about removing troubled players. It also celebrates performance and penalizes for not hitting expectations. Take a look at the players that had some of the biggest jumps in their ratings after Week 1:

Biggest lifts:

Allen Hurns, WR, Jacksonville Jaguars (+7). Hurns, an undrafted rookie, caught two touchdowns and definitely outplayed his 66 overall rating.

Julius Thomas, TE, Denver Broncos (+3). After Thomas wasn’t ranked as a top-five tight end when the season started, despite a strong 2013, people were surprised. This most recent update puts Thomas into that elite category.

Le’Veon Bell, RB, Pittsburgh Steelers (+3). Madden creators (and football fans) weren’t sure what to expect from Bell after an injury-plagued season last year. Bell showed enough to in Week 1 to make the game’s creators make an adjustment.

Biggest 5umbles

Osi Umenyiora, OLB, Atlanta Falcons (-6). Umenyiora hasn’t shown the magic he had several seasons ago while with the Giants, and people are starting to take notice.

Tony Romo, QB, Dallas Cowboys (-3). Romo’s three interceptions and one fumble from Week 1 were sure to catch up with him, and it did.

Larry Fitzgerald, WR, Arizona Cardinals (-2). Fitzgerald’s father wasn’t pleased with his son’s lack of targets in Week 1. Unfortunately for Fitz, that has resulted in a drop in his overall Madden rating.

Nick Ragsdale is a football-loving, blog-writing contributor to USA Football, an Indianapolis Colts season ticket holder and parent. He likes tacos, movies and short walks on the beach (the sand can get hot).