Quik

Wait... @TheLastOlympian07, where does this get posted?!? I knew the answer to 2 of these questions lol

BasedKora

Meh, I fully understand why people don't want to go to Cologne. Hell, I could have used the Americans as my example, considering they have over $10M in cap space while paying Balders and Kachur $7M each, plus Styles $4M. That's nearly $29M they could have spend on FAs, and they could have given someone $20M to play one season on their team. Even if the rebuilding teams don't use the exceptional status, contending teams could, which would create the trickle down effect I talked about, where they could trade players to the New Yorks/Colognes of the league. With Cologne, re-branding would probably help. Idk how many people would flat out not play for the team if drafted by them, but if they can improve their drafting and then sign an FA or 2, it might go a long way in improving their image.

Let's talk contracts and how to entice players to use FA (Wall of text incoming, prize for those of you who make it to the end) So, I saw Anderson's pinned thread about VHL Parity, and it got me thinking. I was going to post a reply in there about an idea that might help, but it got to over 200 words before I did any kind of looking into things, so I figured I'd just piggy-back off of it to work as my MS for the week. If you haven't seen it, he essentially talks about it being hard to retain draftees when most players aren't very good during their ELCs, so it's hard for rebuilding clubs to break the cycle without key FAs or trades. The problem there being that, just like young players leaving a team, no FA is going to want to join a rebuilding team if they have no support for them. It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation which is compounded by contract limitations, and the lack of incentive to even go after big money. Right now, all teams are limited by the same standards, $20M Cap Floor, $32M Cap Ceiling, and at its most, a $7M Player Cap. There is no real money, so teams have no incentive not to use all $32M of their available cap. Anderson proposed adding incentives in the Player Store, which would mean chasing the $7M max would be more valuable for players entering their prim. Personally, I don't think that's enough. Even if you offer 25 TPE for $10M (as he suggested), that wouldn't be enough to entice a player to sign on a lesser team, at least in my opinion, as they'd still need to use most of two seasons' salary to pay for it. It's definitely a start, but adding things to the Player Store to entice movement has been done before, to little avail. Most players in the VHL care mostly about winning, and that means they will still take lesser contracts to go to a powerhouse vs. taking more and adding 25TPE to their player if it results in a 8-64 season. My solution is a two-pronged take on giving rebuilding teams some power. It has nothing to do with standings, or draft picks, and could be used by contenders as well, depending on how they structure their cap. I think Anderson had a good start, like I said, adding incentive to actually spend money is never a bad thing. Right now, I think the most incentive is to hoard as much of your earnings until the twilight of your career, to spend on the career extenders, rather than the ticky tacky things like 2 TPE earlier on. However, I would also propose that a rule be added to the contract structures that is somewhat similar to the exceptional player status of the MLS. Obviously, you can't just allow teams to offer any imaginary contract to players, or you'll have teams offering $100M for one season to get a player to sign. No, it would basically be a single player status, where you can sign one player to a contract above and beyond the $7M cap. This exceptional status player contract would still count against the team's cap, which means you won't have teams offering anything outrageous like $20Mx5, but you could definitely have teams offering players over $10M. Not only would this allow rebuilding teams to target, and gain an increased chance at signing higher end FAs, it would also increase the need to keep your cap in order. Contending teams could also utilize the exceptional contract, but they would likely need to move out players in order to do so, which means even if the big FAs go to contenders, rebuilding teams would likely still benefit by receiving mid-tier players through trade. For example, Cologne currently has 2 players combining for under 215 TPE making the league max $7M each. If, instead of signing these crappy inactives, they had $17M in cap space, it's very possible that a pending FA might have made it to FA knowing there's teams with the space to hand out giant contracts, and maybe they would have signed a contract paying them $15M per season, and probably for 2-3 seasons. To make $30M for 2 seasons would be very difficult to turn down, considering it's more than what players can currently make in 4. For Cologne, it wouldn't make them a contender, but having a star player eating that cap space vs. 2 inactives might add a few more wins to their team, and might make them a desirable place for another star player to sign a $7M contract next off-season, which would in-turn lead to draftees sticking around after their ELCs expire. Obviously, you'll never be able to stop players from taking discounts to contend, it'll happen no matter what. But if you can add more ways to entice players to sign big deals, whether they are with contenders or rebuilders, it would mean more talent being spread around, and place a bigger emphasis on managing your cap correctly in order to compete with exceptional player offers. Either way, rebuilding teams would win by either adding stars, or receiving mid-tier players (whose contracts would be more manageable on the cap anyway) from contenders trying to make a big push for a FA. Something for everyone

Another won

Bah

Yukon, CANADA - It has been a long and mostly tumultuous first half of the season for the Yukon Rush. Sitting in last place among VHLM teams, with a measly 23 points in 33 games, the team has failed to put together a win streak of 3+ games, and has only 3 pairs of back-to-back wins, while sporting a miserable -45 goal differential, 13 worse than second last Oslo. However, there might be some cause for optimism in the Canadian Territory, as the team has managed to amass more than half of their points on the season in the last 12 games, sporting a winning 6-5-1 record over that span. Another encouraging note in that span is that they have only suffered 2 multi-goal losses in that time, and have been receiving offensive output from more of the team's depth players. This recent stretch is something the team hopes to build, and improve on, if they wish to play themselves into a guaranteed 7-game playoff series.

Lynx Rush Aces

4-2 Yukon

Yes, I know that. But it still provides options. Or storylines. Either way, still not going to sign a multi season deal

Yukon, Canada- With mock drafts starting to come out for the S57 VHL Entry Draft, fans and players alike are taking notice as to what directions their favourite teams and players will go come draft time. Along with that, media has already started approaching players and asking what ideas they have about their futures, as the season passed the 1/3 mark recently. Reporters asked the Yukon Rush's 2 top prospects, Chase Keller and Mats Johnsson, about their ideas of the draft, and got some interesting replies. Reporter: Chase, where would you like to play when you move on to the next level? CK: Obviously, making the VHL will be a dream come true. I obviously have my preferences, but will play at least my rookie contract with whichever team takes me. R: It's been said you might not report if Cologne drafts you? CK: That's technically not a question. But Like I said, if they take me, I'll play my standard rookie years with them. R: Mats, what about you, do you care what spot you are chosen? MJ: Not really, if I go high, that's cool, if not, that means I'm probably going to a contender, right? R: What about preferences? Any ideas on where you want to play? MJ: My agent and I have some ideas. There's only one team I don't want to play for, but I won't say which that is. If they contact me, I'll definitely let them know. R: And if that team does pick you? MJ: I will sign a 1-year ELC with whichever team drafts me. If they're the team that picks me, that's fine, but no matter who picks me I won't be signing for longer than 1 season to start my VHL career.

sucks to lose, but 6 straight games with either a win or 1-goal loss #progress

9 shots and still couldn't score a fucking goal haha

Nah...you won

PLUS/MINUS: VHLM Edition! Welcome to the segment we here at Fake News Magazine like to call Plus/Minus! In this week's edition, we look at the hockey league known as the VHLM (Victory Hockey League Minors), where the storylines are abundant. With only 5 teams in the league, it is difficult to believe that you can come up with enough words to create an article, but, boy, do we try! The league contracted from 10 teams (or was it 8, I don't know if the VHLM expanded when the VHL expanded, and don't really care to look) to the current format a few seasons ago now (again, don't care to find specifics lol). But who cares about that type of information, let's get to the current events and how they fare on our Plus/Minus report! First up, we have: PLUS: VHLM Defencemen! This season, scoring is up in the VHLM, and it is in large part due to the fact that there is a very strong crop of defencemen leading the charge! Currently, there are 11 defencemen at, or above, a point per game pace, headlined by Saskatoon star Keaton Louth, who is 2nd in league scoring with 17 goals and 29 assists for a whopping 46 points in only 27 games. Considering only 2 defencemen finished above the point per game barrier last season, that is an incredible improvement on the league's back end, and bodes well for the parent league in the future! However, this also leads us to the following: MINUS: VHLM Forwards! Among forwards in the VHLM this season, there are only 10 who have managed to tread above the point per game watermark, and that number drops to 9 when you remove The Process, who was caught using performance enhancing drugs before being called up to the VHL. Considering that forwards are traditionally the ones who carry the load offensively, the fact that there are less forwards than defencemen in the top 20 of league scoring is an interesting, and also sad, note! The league will need to breath some new life up front if it wants to supply any talented forwards to the VHL any time soon! PLUS: Simming -- Maybe? As a lot of people will attest to, the VHLM is not nearly as well regarded as its parent league, the VHL. So, while the fact that offense is generally up (largely due to a bevy of offensive defencemen leading the way), there's generally not much to be up on. The simming has been done fairly consistently, which, while it should be a given, could be considered a plus, as new members especially like to see their players making appearances in games. However, this - - - you know what... MINUS: Simming While the sims have been done and uploaded consistently, there have been issues with updating rosters, dating back to last season's post-deadline playoff rosters. There has consistently been issues with rosters, ranging from rosters not being updated often enough, to The Process illegally being left on Saskatoon's roster, to players being left off of rosters, as well as players being added to the wrong teams and not moved in a timely fashion. There are always reasons for why things don't happen, but given that they are happening more frequently than they should, something needs to change. PLUS: Active VHLM GMs One positive in the VHLM is that there seems to be a mostly active GM group, with GMs acting quickly to snap up new recruits, which leads to new members joining the sim shortly after joining up. This is easily a huge positive for the league in keeping activity of new recruits up, and could lead to a very strong S57 Draft class! And that concludes what was not intended to, but kind of ended up being, a VHLM slam-piece. The VHLM is cool and all, but I'm just here for the TPE until I get drafted!

Disapprove of the Risto picture ? Good article tho. I'd bet on a solid #2 for Johnsson...if he stays as a dman anyways

88 Yukon Rush 89 Ottawa Lynx 90 Oslo Storm

4-1 Aces

Why are you even replying in a vhlm fa thread?

Nah, Ottawa's got 10 forwards already, @Marko won't get nearly as much playing time as he'd get on Yukon.