Victor

5 hours to submit?? This is ludicrous

Clarke was the glue

Can you throw vapes in the same place as batteries

in the 3x list. two of them didn't make it

thought the title was your new player name

very clearly a separate name "the sole criterion being that the players made it to the VHL"

brothers from different mothers I think it's fair to say

Hello and welcome to one of my most unhinged projects yet. I have scoured through the VHL archives to identify every single instance of a repeated last name in history, the sole criterion being that the players made it to the VHL (i.e. VHLM and/or VHLE lifers are excluded). This also means that whilst the list includes all active VHL players as of S92, it doesn't include anyone who is about to come up to the big leagues or has announced their draft eligibility. 268 repeat last names were identified throughout VHL history and then sorted to identify the most common last name in the VHL's storied past. But since the work was done to identify each name, I will make it a countdown from names used twice all the way to the all-time leader at 12. Behold. Names used 2x in VHL history 188 names have appeared twice in the past and whilst the list is copied in below, I won't dwell on it for too long. This section contains Hall of Famers and completely forgotten journeymen, it has brothers, fathers and sons, and even families separated by multiple generations. Most frequently, it contains completely random and coincidental repeats, separated by as many as 90 seasons. There are two facts of most interest in this category: Two names have a 100% Hall of Fame success rate – Sterling (father) and Alexander (son) Labatte, as well as the Clegane brothers There has twice been a pair of Mario and Luigi in the VHL – the Linguinis and the De Rossis Names used 3x in VHL history 55 more names added to the list in this category which doesn't really have any fun tidbits to pull out – seems to be a higher proportion of recognisable names than in the first section. What this exercise has been actually helpful in is identifying some duplicates I had in the all-time stats spreadsheet from the 60s. Not sure how those happened but they're gone now. Perhaps one other thing worth mentioning is that in addition to the two Ryans in the above 2x list, there was also a man simply named Ryan in the VHL at one point. Unfortunately that Ryan counts as someone with a last name so the Ryans do not manage to make the cut for the 3x list. The Top 24 We are now in the top end of the ranking, as at 4 appearances each, the pool dwindles considerably. There are 13 names which show up exactly 4 times: The Bakers (Abel, Joseph, Patrick, and Shane) The Carters (Alex, Donny, Jared and Jared the 2st (sic)) The Clarkes (Daniel, Dean, Jon, and Will) – two of whom, Dean and Will, are unrelated but were both of the cup-winning S70 Moscow squad The Downeys (Bahr, Jeff (both the S1 and much more successful S68 incarnation) and the original Jeff's brother Ryan) The Eagles (two Gregs, Henry, and Tom) – brought to us exclusively by @Greg_Di. Greg Eagleowski sadly doesn't make the cut. The Funks (brothers and Builders Dust'n and Raymond and decades later playoff hero Rayz and the less notable Frank Jr) The Kings (Kevin, Markus, Roctrion, and Thomas) The Komarovs (Evgeni, Pavel, Sergei, and Vladamir) – also the sole work of one man, @Gooningitup The Matthews (Anthony, Luke, Mitchell, and Wesley) The Millers (Alec, Jackson, MF Percy, and Nicholas) The Syndergaards (two Aksels, Thomas, and Tomas) The Williams (AJ, Justin, Robinson, and Tyrone) and the Youngs (Alex, Christopher, Naomi, and Zachary) 5 names then, fittingly, show up 5 times over the years: Davis (David, Finn, Jake, Jasper, and Roque) – almost entirely hauled up the list by @Josh's obsession with the name Hamilton (brothers Phil, Jeff, and David (Phil and Jeff making the Hall) and also the lesser-known Drew and Josh) Knight (Blake, David, Jordan, Ricky, Steven) – remarkably only once used by either @Phil or David @Knight – the actual Knight brothers choosing to be Hamilton brothers in the VHL instead Reinhart (Asher, Jerome, Reylynn, Tobias, and Tyler all being prominent in the 80s) Tremblay (Dan, Danny, Pierre-Marc, Steve and the man himself (not really), Simon Tremblay) Then in joint fifth place... 6 Hunters (Alyksander, Blade, Braxton, JaKobe, Jeff, and Kurtis) 6 Jokinens (Alvaro, David, Diego, Erlantz, Fabio, and Fernando) – courtesy of the Finnish fiends @Ahma and @jRuutu 6 Smiths (Cody, Jacob, Josh, Lucas, Steve, and Trevor) – all extremely forgettable just like the name In joint third place we have the Wilsons (Aaron, Al, Connor, Dusty, Jesse, Josh, and Wade), 7 completely unrelated and largely irrelevant players, and the Gow brothers (@Fire Tortorella and @eaglesfan036) who have brought 7 Gows (Austin, Bernie, Jeff, Jim, Robert III, Robin, and Shayne) to the VHL before branching off into more creative names. Jones is the second most popular last name in VHL history with 9 players (Bob, Casey, Dallas, Dan, Davey, Jay, Kered, Mason, and Ty) over the years. Davey Jones as part of the 30s Dynamo and Casey Jones who had a Labatte-winning rookie season in S57 and then was part of the USA's most prolific World Cup years are easily the most successful of the Joneses. Clear at the top it's the Johnsons though – 12 of them specifically. We've had Bossman, Brent, Gabrial, Gabriel, Kobe, Leroy, Michael, Miles, Phil “The Rock”, Regie, Reid, and Ricky. Yes I was also hoping for a more impressive list but Michael and Phil have definitely elevated the Johnsons' profile in more recent season and Kobe is active in the VHL as we speak. Will anyone catch them? Only time will tell.

We're in trouble only when we run out of words, not ideas Yeah usually have no issue with blabbering on in them and going off on a tangent but my GM wasn't accommodating this week

that's not writer's block, that's a skill issue

Surely D.C. vs Moscow would be the real cold war

I hate it when I don't have a good idea for a 2 TPE article at the start of the week – just means I need to hope something comes into my head throughout the week that I can ramble on about for a bit. Alas, that has not happened. I've already spoken about the potential draft destinations in S93. There's not much to say about San Diego or Del Rocco – we're all doing OK as the regular season winds down. Nothing interesting has captured my eye in the HOF or this season's HOF discussions, there's no juicy drama around the league. Of course in weeks like this I could easily say some nonsense in the team press conference which somehow is the same amount of TPE despite a lot fewer words being needed. Sadly one of the six questions in this week's PC asks me what I thought about San Diego's trade deadline moves and I genuinely have no idea what we did other than there's a bunch of people I don't know in the locker room now. Writing this light complaint is a lot easier than actually looking into that any further. Fear not, I don't actually have writer's block when it comes to the more important stuff. I just drafted my new 4-week Media Spot to drop tomorrow – it's possibly one of the dumbest things I've put in a Media Spot so watch out for that. Anyway, that should do it for now, bring on the playoffs and some storylines to latch onto!

4 point game

Week 4 of 4

Nice

San Diego Marlins, Gianfranco Del Rocco - Stopped by Marc-Andre Fleury They've got Fleury? How is that fair?

no just ramble incoherently. Grading is long gone.

Oh go on it takes like 30 minutes. Go dig out an old ASG roster or something from when you were active and reminisce over old names under the guise of being ASG theme-related Kids with too much time on their hands is the common factor

Damn we are not having a good time in San Diego

Not again

1. 1 more week has gone by and we have basically done a complete 180°. What are your thoughts? - 'Cause I've waited a while to respond to these, we have actually done another 90 degree turn haha, now going .500 it feels like. It was good to go on a nice streak to build some momentum and confidence, you can't win them all and I think this means we can peak again later at the right time. 2. Player update, how has your player been performing. - Better than earlier! But perhaps at the expense of the team. Good to be point per game now and hopefully results will match my personal improvement. 3. Devote and Del Rocco got into an argument after the game against Halifax because Del Rocco got 3 points and Devote only got 1. Do you think it was a valid reason to start an argument and why? - What can I say, I needed a multi-point game. No memory of this one so clearly water under the bridge. We clearly just need enough goals for each of us to get 3 points per game. 4. Waffles or Pancakes and why? - Depends on the type but if you're talking about the best of each food, I feel like getting a good pancake is more of challenge so gonna go with them for the sense of achievement. 5. What do you think our weakest position is to this point? - Gotta be defence. It's not the most important position in the VHLM but if someone matches us in goal and up front then we might be in trouble. 6. If you could make 2 new teams for each league what would the teams be called? - I think I used up all my team-naming juices on Moscow way back when but when we were expanding the most recent time I was suggesting one in Milan with something simple and European like HC Milano. Either for the VHL or for the E I would add another German team although I always struggle with city and name there for some reason. I did like the Paris Revolution which nearly made it in the E. For the M, would just bring back the Yukon Rush and one of the defunct European teams in a NA city, like the Scorpions or Outlaws.

We wipe the floor with you I'm afraid.