Victor

between vacation and Mingle, do you even remember what the playoffs are?

Formatting, WORD Here's a fact that may surprise you – the last GM to win the Continental Cup with less than 10 seasons of VHL GMing experience was Keaton Louth in S67 – his 8th season in charge of the Quebec/Vancouver franchise. Before that, it was actually Benjamin Zeptenbergs aka hedgehog, who won his first two cups with Riga (S57 and S58) in his fifth and sixth season in the job. Since then it's been a roll call of some of the longest-tenured GMs in VHL history – Tyler Barabash, Tyler Owens, Matt Bailey, Ryan Power, Victor Alfredsson, Mitch Higgins, Blake Campbell (5 times), and Louth and Zeptenbergs again. That's 176 seasons worth of GMing between them, accounting for 6 of the top 10 GMs in terms of longevity – 2 of the others haven't GMed since the early 50s, while another is Jason Glasser of Prague. The fourth is Chris Miller, who made the finals with Malmo in S68. <picture to illustrate point> Now we all know experience matters and when it comes to VHL GMing that may be more true than in other jobs – it takes a while to grasp the dynamics of trade negotiations, drafting, the VHL salary cap and the planning involved in locating and grasping the window of opportunity to compete. There's probably something to say about the inner workings of the sim engine as well and knowing that tiny bit more about them to gain an edge in the playoffs. Although, it's not a massively different picture in the regular season – since S60, the only additional name not mentioned above to win the Victory Cup is Ryan Jubis with Calgary in S72, the season he officially took over from Barabash. He also made the finals last season, a feat achieved only by him and now Julian Borwinn among relatively new GMs in recent memory (Borwinn has just finished his sixth season in charge of Helsinki). So, what does that mean for the GMs who haven't been around the VHL since time immemorial. Is the recent rise of Jubis and Borwinn a sign of fresh faces on the horizon or is the VHL GMing elite a closed shop? Only 5 of the current 16 VHL GMs are veterans (defined as tenure over 10 seasons), but 3 of these own the current longest playoff streaks (Riga's record-setting 13 seasons as well as Seattle's 7 and Moscow's 6 straight). Louth's Vancouver made the playoffs for 6 straight seasons themselves recently and he has only missed the postseason twice since S60. It does make you wonder if it is easier to maintain the status quo in the modern VHL, where contenders can pick late or even trade their first-rounders and still replenish the cupboards enough to compete perennially. The Reign and the Wolves are certainly shining examples of this method (until Riga's implosion this off-season), with the Menace, Bears, and Titans also joining the retool rather than rebuild train in recent seasons. It is telling that since the 2nd set of expansion (Prague and DC in S68), these are 5 of the 7 teams to make the finals – alongside the aforementioned Wranglers and Malmo's surprising run that first season. Finally, to hammer the point home, the franchises who have struggled the most through what is now most of the current VHL's population's lifetime – New York and Davos – have spent these nearly 15 seasons without an experienced hand to guide them and with little transition from previous management. Both of the last two GM changes in New York happened due to inactivity, while Shawn Glade's exit in Davos to make way for Gustav Mattias was a very acrimonious affair. That is not to say that those two in Davos or the Americans' Colton Rayne and now Esso Drunkmann were not strong candidates when they took over their respective teams, but they were thrown to the wolves in a league with some heavyweights swirling around them with years of experience. Perhaps it is just a phase and maybe even one we're on the way out of – but maybe this new, subtle form of disparity is the new VHL normal. ---Comment section---

All in all, we had a great season last season so no need to reshuffle things too much. It is time to give a letter to our MVP from last season and perhaps the most feared forward in the league. C - Nate Telker @Telkster A - Alex Letang @Spartan A - Mikko Lahtinen @Beketov With it being the last season for our captain as well as our franchise goaltender, the stakes are high! #DoItForTelker #DoItForBernard

tcookie gives me hope the HOF won't die with me

F - Benny Graves @animal74

F - RJ Jubis @TheFlash

go for it!

Adrienne - Pavlov would have been unfair.

It was 13 seasons btw. I was afraid hedge's inability to count would spread lol.

D - Jeff Downey @animal74

There are loads I'm sure I could think of but https://vhlforum.com/forum/121-vhl-history/ will always be a good place to start.

PALLOON PALLOON PALLOON

Strong Victor energy emanating from this post, 10/10 would read the Rasputin paragraph again.

Jericho vs Boubabi what year is it

That player was technically a Jardy creation, I can't take credit.

Give it a day to give someone else a chance to claim and then go for it.

Thanks for the kind words @BOOM™, this was a very enjoyable podcast to make, @Berocka runs it very smoothly. And to the hope of hearing me again - my diary is pretty empty in this new UK lockdown so *hint hint nudge nudge* Berocka... or @Spartan, I've never been a particularly loyal podcast guest.

Just realised Canmore and Kriketers are still available if you want one.

This - surprised there was only 1 vote in it. Miami's forwards definitely carried us for most of the playoffs (with a few steals by me here and there).

Probably - some impressive firepower with Max Molholt and Aleksi Koponen but no great goalie by the looks of it.

Nordic first gold since S48! working on it

No Triple Gold additions then, but Canada did break their duck and woo Nordic!

Thank you to the team for the MVM votes and Ricer for building the team and also giving me the leadership trophy - lots of great candidates for that one though! What a season - I'll be sure to check in on future Marauders' progress in the future and of course on how the class of S74 get on in the VHL.

smh kids

Will Nordic finally get better than a silver?? Canada breaking the medal drought though.