Victor

Hello there, happy end of S71! Today I would like to share with you all some random bits of information neither of which is worthy of an article on its own. Shawn Glade got a lot of shit as Davos GM. For various things, like constantly trading himself to contenders when Davos was trying to compete. But, Shawn Glade the player benefited from this. 4 finals, 3 cups in just 6 seasons, and it turns out a VHL record. With 25 career playoff goals, Glade scored more times in the playoffs than any other defenceman ever, beating the great Sterling Labatte by one goal (in five fewer games to boot). So there's that. @ShawnGlade The opposite of Shawn Glade in the playoffs was Diljodh Starload. You'd be better served putting a jersey on an actual pylon than rely on Dil in a Game 7. But, Starload did manage to complete what must be a unique VHL achievement – he won every VHL or VHLM award named after an Alexander. That's the Chershenko (VHLM most goals), Beketov (VHL most assists), and Valiq (VHL best offensive defenceman). He also chose to not win any other awards to preserve the purity of that achievement. @Dil As of S71, there are 3 VHL GMs born in Latvia – myself, @hedgehog337, @FrostBeard . I think that's the same as the US ( @diamond_ace and I think @GustavMattias and @Enorama ?) with 6 Canadians ( @Peace, @Bushito, @Beaviss, @Banackock, @Esso2264, @Jubo07 ). Speaking of Latvia, Riga is now on a 10-season playoff streak, 1 off the all-time record of 11 set by New York in S34. Speaking of New York, they are now on the fifth longest cup drought of all-time. Oh and as of today for the first time ever the top scorer award is shared. With 88 points as well smh.

Helsinki Titans, Kronos Bailey - Goal! @Quik securing Moscow 1st place with his final ever shot. Farewell friend.

We are actual trash but still the best trash in Europe.

We probably would have lost this yesterday tbh.

Extreme disparity in a league on the verge of contraction. See Exhibits A, B, and C for some of the other teams in the league that season. He didn't even have the lowest GAA or most shutouts that season (sv% is insane though). You don't need those stats to be MVP, just clearly the best player on your team and I think Wahl is that without a doubt (HM to Block).

One of the big topics worrying current VHLers is how the apparent fall in offensive production due to highly increased league parity will impact the Hall of Fame chances of today's VHL stars. It's a very valid point as it's very difficult to compare career stats of players currently in their prime with those in the past, even the likes of Podrick Cast and Matt Thompson, let alone Scotty Campbell and his contemporaries. There is a very real possibility that the top scorer in S71, be it Hunter Hearst Helmsley or Ambrose Stark, will not score 90 points, a continued downward trend after S69 became the first season of a sub-100 top scorer. The 40-goal mark, hitherto achieved by every single Kevin Brooks Trophy winner in VHL history, including Julius Freeman and Randoms (44 goals each) in the past 2 seasons, is also very much up in the air. Goaltending has also not hugely benefited from the lower scoring in the league, although the overarching theory there is that goals haven't actually dried up across the league, they're just evenly distributed across a larger pool of skaters than before. Brick Wahl is having a fine career-ending season and will be a front-runner in the post-season MVP conversation but marks of .929 save % and 1.97 GAA will fall short of the superb season by Kallis Kriketers in S69, who in turn was some way off the single season performance of the past – DeGrath, the Cleganes, Wingate, Tukio, Labatte, and so on. Wahl and the rest of the S64 goalie cohort (Finn Davison and JB Rift) are also hurt by two other factors – the drop in all teams' and goalies' win columns and splitting their success. The all-time regular season win record of 364 set by Greg Clegane requires an average of 45 wins per season across an 8-season career whereas most goalies on contending teams average 30-40 per season currently. Most importantly, the fact that each of Wahl, Davison, and Rift have had one big trophy winning season each and also limited playoff success, Rift's championship win as a backup notwithstanding, is the primary reason their Hall of Fame chances are limited. This brings us to the crux of the issue; is there a dearth of active future Hall of Famers in the league? S71 is an interesting case study because we have just seen the retirement of 3 likely Hall of Famers – Kriketers, Julian Borwinn, and Joseph McWolf – and with no one standing out in the S64 class, there is a lack of shoe-ins at the moment. This does not mean that there are none. For one, we have Smitty Werbenjagermanjensen, a 3-time Labatte Trophy winner and, until this season, the dominant force in a crowded pool of elite defencemen (what impact that will have on the rest of those defencemen's HOF chances remains to be seen). Then, Rayz Funk, who has been just slightly above average in the regular season, but remains the likeliest goalie to break out in his final seasons with a Kriketers/Wahl-like performance. More important for Funk is his playoff success to date, as his 3 playoff appearances so far with Seattle have earned him two Kanou Trophies and put him within reach of the all-time playoff wins record (51, held by Hans Wingate). Finally, the forwards. We have to assume now that for this generation a point-per-game pace is Hall of Fame worthy and this also correlates with the guys who have been in the top scorer/goalscorer races recently – HHH, Freeman, and Jet Jaguar. The fourth active player with a career PPG pace is Kronos Bailey, but he still played in a higher scoring league earlier in his career and is less likely to benefit from a lowered bar. That gives us 5 likely active candidates for the Hall of Fame – Smitty, Funk, Freeman, HHH, and Jaguar. Naturally, I put these into a spreadsheet and then a graph: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aYeYopb7_lkwbzLode1i5sUiHJDUy9FApaJ11pilWSE/edit?usp=sharing According to this, S70 and S71 would have the lowest amount of active Hall of Famers, but of course I haven't taken anyone younger than Funk into consideration at all. It's highly unlikely no one from the S68-S71 classes makes it in, it's just too early to tell, but based on draft class averages in the past, it's probably safe to estimate at least another 5 currently active HOFers. That would put us into double digits, which is more or less par for the course, albeit a bit off the most HOFer-heavy seasons of the past. However, it's important to note most of those seasons approaching the 20 HOFer mark were outliers. You have S5 through S7, when the S1 class of Campbell, Stolzschweiger, Labatte combined with the slightly younger generation of Brooks, Gegeny, Walser, Szatkowski. Then the S18 draft came around which produced 6 Hall of Famers of its own – naturally this would result in a spike when it overlapped with older (in S21) and younger (in S24 and S25) generations. Finally, the early 30s had the second wave of S18 recreates in their prime playing at the same time as the stars of the S30, S31 classes who would go on to dominate that decade. Therefore, it's not all that bad. For the time being, some older records will remain untouchable but eras are often bestowed with greater importance than the actual stats of ballot members. So rest assured, if you are a star today, your Hall of Fame chances will not be jeopardised by the “dead puck era” that the VHL is currently in. Member tag because it's the done thing: @Beaviss @Banackock @rjfryman @gorlab @Rayzor_7 @flyersfan1453 @BladeMaiden @Poptart @Devise @Quik @hedgehog337 @McWolf @Jubo07

wait I knew your name sounded familiar. Are you one of the missing names on this list perhaps: https://vhlforum.com/topic/81312-founders-cups-by-player-and-by-member/ Or who were your players? Jog my memory. For some reason Franz Lindemann comes to mind but I might be making that up.

Ground rules: - No revealing of answers in this thread - Head over to #trivia-hunt on Discord to learn how to find the answers. No revealing of answers there either. - No corrections allowed. First submission is locked in. Fill out the form linked below. 2 correct answers = 2 capped TPE 1 correct answer = 1 capped TPE https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScSZRpj0KpQjGbQbLiZti9jt1VSi0FK0Hr1SyZGsyuswAOjcA/viewform?usp=sf_link I am always taking question suggestions via PM, with 1 uncapped TPE going your way for each question that ends up getting used.

we were cursed overnight

good thing we're gonna choke away 1st place so we don't have to face the monster that is Dan Baillie

Poll results still disgraceful smh

?

1. Since S50, which player has had the most hat tricks in a single season? (Credit and 1 uncapped TPE to @DMaximus) This something even the portal can cope with as it tracks stats back to S50. https://vhlportal.com/hof/records Matt Thompson is the correct answer as he notched 9 hat-tricks in the madness that was S62 (still not enough to take the goal-scoring lead ), at least 2 more than anyone else in the past 20 seasons. It's not quite the record though, tying Scotty Campbell for 3rd place - Campbell himself beats it in S5 with 11, while Mike Szatkowski scored 10 in S8. https://vhlforum.com/topic/253-hat-tricks-in-one-regular-season/ 2. TRUE/FALSE: No VHL goalie has ever surpassed a 300 minute shutout streak (Credit and 1 uncapped TPE to @Beketov) From Beketov being the answer to Beketov giving the question and support - one of the few instances of a spreadsheet not made by me. 300 minutes without allowing a goal requires a shutout streak of 5 games at least, which has been achieved by 2 goalies ever - Jakab Holik and Astrid Moon in S54 and S55 respectively. https://vhlforum.com/topic/59818-most-consecutive-shutouts/ Bek has covered all the interesting tidbits there - I highly doubt too many streaks have registered since the list was updated in S64, certainly none to challenge Holik and Moon. 2 capped TPE goes to: Beketov @Beketov philliefan @Philliefan I'll change this later @I'll change this later Poptart @Poptart Garsh @Garsh Enorama @Enorama Barzalgoat @BarzalGoat Spence King @Spence King flatl99 @flatl99 Jacobaa19 @jacobaa19 rory @rory Motzaburger @Motzaburger BigTittySmitty @BigTittySmitty McWolf @McWolf TTtheT @TTtheT MattyIce @MattyIce Jubo07 @Jubo07 Jbeezy76 @Jbeezy76 enigmatic @enigmatic .sniffuM @.sniffuM rjfryman @rjfryman DoktorFunk @DoktorFunk Tbeez99 @Tbeez99 Proto @Proto Hulk hogan @Hulk Hogan OrbitingDeath @OrbitingDeath bluesfan55 @bluesfan55 biggreen10 @Biggreen10 Lastoneup @LastOneUp a_Ferk @a_Ferk Snussu @Snussu Zyrok @Zyrok Ricer13 @Ricer13 Erik Summers @Erik Summers destroyyourbrain @destroyyourbrain efiug @efiug Zetterberg @Zetterberg Brewins15 @Brewins15 Alex Bridges @Alex Bridges Acydburn @Acydburn ng1291 @ng1291 PadStack @PadStack DangerGolding @DangerGolding Joe Exotic @Joe Exotic sjs88speed @Speed Spartan @Spartan Da_Berr @Da_Berr CrlineDijohn14 @CrlineDijohn14 JBrew42 @JBrew42 turkey2349 @turkey2349 AndrewWarren13 @AW13 Jared Willis @Jared Willis Legend0985 @Legend0985 Vin Calia @VinCal twists @twists Peace @Peace BladeMaiden @BladeMaiden MMFLEX @MMFLEX SweatyBeaver @SweatyBeaver MexicanCow123 @MexicanCow123 Gwdjohnson @Gwdjohnson TheFlash @TheFlash Pengu @Pengu Sebster03 @Sebster03 Kekzkrieg @Kekzkrieg Sonnet @Sonnet Turner @Turner Ferda @Ferda pennypenny @pennypenny Advantage @Advantage Mike @Mike okochastar @okochastar Cornholio @Cornholio KC15 @KC15 Boragina @Boragina DarkSpyro @DarkSpyro gorlab @gorlab aye my name jeff @Aye my name jeff STZ @STZ joeg @joeg wcats @wcats Mr_Hatter @Mr_Hatter Bob Helminen @Bob Helminen Doomsday @Doomsday Midnite @Midnite DMaximus @DMaximus HearnNation67 @HearnNation67 Ocho11 @Ocho11 jRuutu @jRuutu Hylands33 @Hylands33 frescoelmo @frescoelmo Tape-To-Tape @Tape-to-Tape dasboot @dasboot animal74 @animal74 nyko @Nykonax Jtv123 @Jtv123 GRZ @GRZ diacope @diacope DollarAndADream @DollarAndADream Tate @Tate Telkster @Telkster studentized @studentized Kendrick @Kendrick leafsman @leafsman Berocka @Berocka Greg_Di @Greg_Di jared @jared Grape @Grape Cusemode @Cusemode Anthony Matthews @Anthony Matthews Velevra @Velevra ROOKIE745 @ROOKIE745 Sonnet @Sonnet Sigard Gunnar @Big Mac SlapshotDragon @SlapshotDragon Jubis @Jubis Bushito @Bushito RStar @RStar Renomitsu @Renomitsu CowboyinAmerica @CowboyinAmerica Tagger @Tagger David O'Quinn @David O'Quinn fever95 @fever95 flyersfan1453 @flyersfan1453 Gooningitup @Gooningitup SDCore @SDCore JeffD @JeffD Rayzor_7 @Rayzor_7 Garrett @Garrett Zepheter @zepheter 1 capped TPE goes to: ShadowSoulYT @ShadowSoulYT .cLassic @.cLassic Matt_O @Matt_O Kachur @Kachur GustavMattias @GustavMattias Corco @Corco

Nah I was the last believer, it's time to pack up.

Lemieux next presumably.

The sim in which New York's dreams died.

Davison 2 shutouts, it's a good sim for Menace alumni everywhere.

Wahl is pretty much a lock for MVP right now, surely.

smh Rift I don't want to face Baillie.

Appreciate it Seattle.

S68 boys coming up big. @Mr_Hatter @Telkster @Aye my name jeff

I think Cast would be the party that stands to lose the most. ?

It's actually just a bonus - Triple Gold Club is Founder's Cup, World Cup, and Continental Cup.

fishing for it though, smh

@gorlab get us a t-shirt