Renomitsu

1. After a tough loss in game 7 to Malmo, how do you feel about our performance throughout these playoffs? I don't feel that badly about it. We took Malmo to 7 and lost in a coin-flip, then they went on to crush the finals. That lets us know we were that close to a championship - and yes, that hurts a little, but we have a lot to be proud of. 2. What could we have done differently to advance to the Finals? It's best not to perseverate on the 'what ifs,' as that stops everyone involved from moving forward. 3. Between Malmo and Seattle, who will take home the Continental Cup this season? (Malmo is up 3-1) This one's been in the books a little while now. Congrats to Malmo! 4. What are your player's plans for this offseason? I'm still trying to figure out this Free Agent thing, to be honest. 5. Overall what are your thoughts on Warsaw's and your player's S79? Expectations were a bit lower than the previous season and we finished just about where I expected to - a sliver away from a championship. 6. The NFL's week 1 just started, have you been watching all the games this weekend? I did! I'm not excited for the Ravens/Chiefs game later today since I think we're gonna get crushed, but it is what it is.

Transaction ID: 20766799541055706 5 Uncapped - Week Ending 19 Sep Doubles Week - Week Ending 19 Sep $1M Player Store Cash

Review I never know how to feel about goalies with high numbers of wins over the course of a season! There's significant variance between goalies producing that many wins in terms of TPE, as well as huge differences in the supporting cast (and GAA) between them, to say nothing of the fact that Bana's somehow managed to get another Bears team to the Finals. As far as some learning points for this article, I noticed a couple of instances of noun/# agreement, e.g. Punctuation wise, there are a couple of unnecessary commas: Another way to construct this portion of the sentence is as follows: In this case, you have a multi-word 'object'; in putting Tretiak's name between the commas, you equate "first goalie and wins leader" with that player. Think of commas as a really brief pause - here, you introduce his 'title,' then name him (the commas kind of serve the purpose of "is" in the first version of the sentence). Another way to construct the sentence is using the "is" and "who" you put in the original version of the sentence without the commas: Otherwise there aren't a ton of comments for me to make. Nice work As an aside, it's weird to see your username without your active player being a goalie! It's even been a few seasons since Eagles retired and I'm still confused by it.

Another season in the books, another good amount of regular season success followed by a series win in the playoffs. Obviously, Warsaw didn't have the level of playoff success I wanted - but it was clear from the get-go, even after our excellent upturn following our change in goalie - that this season wasn't going to be as straight-forward a path to the championship as the last. And although there were some aspects of this season to be happy about, Aloe's team ultimately came up short. So what's the next move? With plenty of aging players on Warsaw and Aloe likely to continue to be a top-15ish player in the league next season (her 7th), I'm going to explore free agency. At this point, I wouldn't expect most teams to take another swipe at Dear, provided I've had two attempts at free agency without actually leaving the Predators. But with Warsaw's goalie situation even more fraught than before and my player not getting any younger, I think it's time for a change of scenery. My intention, of course, is to get Dear on a team that can contend next season. What the market looks like for Dear after this contract expires is yet to be seen - after all, I don't think Dear will be quite as high in applied TPE next season (at least at the start) as she was this time around. Fingers crossed there's some interest (when it's time to start those discussions)?

(using last week's questions, oops!) 1. How do you feel our first series as a team against Riga went? We almost swept them taking it 4 games to 1. Went well enough, but I don't think that's enough to make it all the way (it wasn't!). We would've needed some luck to beat Malmo. 2. How did your player play through the first round? Aloe is pretty consistent in the playoffs. We knew we were better than our first round team, so it was as expected. 3. Warsaw is in the Conference Finals!! We play Malmo. What are your thoughts on our opponents? I guess we don't need to talk about this anymore. I'm sad we lost 4. What are our strengths and weaknesses so far through these playoffs? We're really good at generating shots, as we always have. Our weakness is a tragically-low conversion percentage for said shots. 5. Who is the stronger team in your opinion in the North American Conference? Los Angeles or Seattle? Can't really ever bet against Seattle in the post-season. That continues to be the case this season. 6. Summer is coming to an end, how did yours go? Busy. Way, way, way too busy in the hospital - no time off for us in medicine, that's for sure.

A little stream-of-consciousness here as I struggle to put some thoughts together for this week! Does anyone else feel a little disconnected from the VHL right now? I've been in the pediatric emergency department all week, and I've only now caught up to the fact that Warsaw is in the EU Conference finals, which is wonderfully exciting! Despite their loss in the divisional round, I was thoroughly impressed by Davos's performance this post-season; for some reason, I was under the impression that they'd had a rather difficult season again and weren't supposed to be contenders -- but here they were, bringing Malmo out to six games with an excellent showing and a promising future ahead. I also think I've lost track of some of the personnel and management changes across the major league, to say nothing of all of the congratulations that go out to our (kinda) new VHLE GMs. I'm a bit disappointed that I haven't had more time to familiarize myself with all of the cool new members in the league, but sometimes that's just the way the cookie crumbles. On the other hand, is anyone surprised at all that Seattle's back in yet another NA Conference final series? I feel like Bana's had a remarkable, sustained period of success that's spanned multiple player careers' worth of seasons, and that certainly deserves some recognition. Since I've gotten more than my fair share of 200 words out of the way: I hope you're all doing well. Please, please, please take some time to focus on your wellness, be it with some relaxing free-time activities or just a few minutes to meditate and reflect on the last week. There's a lot going on in the world, and I think it's very easy to get worked up and fail to see the forest for the trees. Thanks for reading.

1. Ranked 3rd in the league (2nd in division), how are our chances looking for a Continental Cup? Honestly? Malmo, Seattle, and LA are all good enough to stop us; it's really a matter of luck and who wants it more. 2. What are your first round playoff predictions? DC vs Calgary and Prague vs Davos. Whoops! This already passed. I would have said DC and Prague, though I would have been wrong on the Prague vs. Davos series - that's for sure. 3. What are your predictions for us going up against Riga in the Conference Semi Finals? I was optimistic about it. Riga has some excellent players, but their regular season results just didn't match favorably to ours. 4. What is your player's mentality for these playoffs? Get wins. I don't care about stats, I mostly just want a positive impact on the ice whenever I'm on and a great chance to get a Continental Cup. Like I've said before, other people can have the award if it means Warsaw can get some Ws. 5. How do you feel your player performed this season? Any new milestones? Underachieved? Overachieved? I think I placed exactly where I expected to. New career highs in points and assists, but I felt like I didn't overshadow anyone who was on my line. That's the ideal for me: everyone eats and we get a lot of wins. 6. Last and most important question, what is your favourite restaurant? There's a little Chinese restaurant not too far from the team training facility that serves some of the most immaculate food I've ever had. How was I supposed to expect that in Poland?

Claim 1 of 1, week ending 9/5/21 (9/4/21 on EFL)

That's right friends - the title's all about awards drama. In reality I have trust in the BOG to make the right decisions in the end, so uh, sorry about the title. There's no drama to be found here. Do I wish I had another dozen points to make the awards races a little more interesting? Yeah, but then again, who doesn't? Is anyone maybe a little sadder than they thought they'd be at @Esso2264 stepping down from his station as the New York Americans GM? I'm very excited for @MexicanCow123 to show us what he's got and my impression of him over the last several seasons is he's clearly got the qualifications for the job and a wonderful reputation on the site. He's shown absurd amounts of activity as an updater alone (seriously, check my update history), to say nothing of all of his other work. But Esso's been around since about six months prior to my most recent return. He's like, all I've known, man. I know he'll be just as active in the VHL and playing League of Legends with the guys in the Discord, but there's something a little bittersweet about him taking a step back from his league responsibilities. That's enough rambling for now. Thanks for reading, and I hope you're well.

can confirm, fresco has an A+ bio

1. Who has been the best offensive player on the team this season? I think you could argue our offense runs through our centers, but in that case I certainly defer to our captain and 1C, Dakota Lamb. He's done a fantastic job against the league's best and has been our flagship player as long as I've been in the league, more or less. 2. Who has been the best defensive player on the team this season? I don't think I really could name a single one. We have excellent defensive depth and our change at goalie gave us a huge boost - but I'm not sure that would have been possible without an excellent defense complementing him. 3. Does anyone on Warsaw deserve any individual awards this season? I don't know. I think Chris (Hylands) deserves some mention in the conversation, but offensive defenseman probably belongs to Letang this season. 4. How do you feel about the team's performance this season so far? (Warsaw is 2nd in the league after 57 games played). I think we ended on a pretty sour note, but I can't complain really after seeing how we improved following the first 20-30 games. 5. How has your player been doing this season? Okay. There are still definitely some games where I feel I (Aloe Dear) disappear, but I don't think there are any truly game-breaking players in the league -- just consistently excellent ones. 6. How has life been treating you? Anything new going on? Work/school has been okay? Heh, I work in a hospital and the U.S. is going through a crazy COVID surge. Let me get back to you on that one.

Claim 4 of 4 for Week Ending 8/29/21 (8/28/21 in EFL)

Through today's sims, teams generally range from 59-61 games played (with Moscow as an exception, as they've completed 63 games so far this season). And as we glance through the points, goals, and assists totals, it's clear: Los Angeles, Malmo, and Warsaw dominate the tops of most lists. As a matter of fact, Malmo has two players (#1 and #2) in points and Los Angeles has another three entries (#3, #4, and #6); Warsaw has two of the remaining five (#5, #10), with single entries for New York (Red Lite), Vancouver (Jivere Zolnek) and Chicago (Julian Nousiainen) rounding out the top ten in points. Malmo's duo in particular have a pretty solid lead on the others, as they're also the league's goal leaders (Odinsson has 51, Telker 49). And while that's great for establishing candidates for most outstanding player and a goal lead -- as #3 is a solid 4 goals from Telker -- that doesn't help us determine who's most valuable to their team. Were the season to end today, would Odinsson's and Telker's successes throughout the season damage their respective claims to MVP? Similarly, would Letang, Merrick, and Stamen get in each others' ways -- and would the same apply to Dear and Lamb? Would our shortlist include Lite, Zolnek, and Nousiainen, who are each over a dozen points away from Odinsson's 112-point tally but without another top ten point player to share the spotlight? Or alternatively, would Letang as the lone defenseman in the top ten, #3 overall, and #1 among his scoring-happy team take the lead for a possible MVP? Is there a two-way player you'd take over the lot discussed here? Does maybe Zamboni Driver's 0.924 SV% (#1 among goalies with 40+ games) and 2.67 goals against per game (#1 among goalies with 40+ games) take the cake instead? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

1. As others have said, I think a tweak to the update scale could make the league a little more interesting. Everyone rushes 99 defense and 99 scoring, then usually hits 90+ puck handling before branching out to checking, passing, etc. This may be difficult to implement, but some build diversity would be nice. Heck, you could even make scoring twice as expensive as the other attributes and still have plenty of people rush it to 99. 2. I wrote an article about an idea (that still needs plenty of refining) to help bring a spotlight to different point tasks. There's probably a better way to implement it, but I'd love to see more eyes on the hard work that users put in, be it graphics, podcasts, or media spots. 3. I'd love to see some kind of change to the salary cap and/or store options to make free agency as a money-making endeavor worthwhile. Players currently only tend to change teams if they hate their GM or have a horrible timeline mismatch (and even then, you can still win awards collecting garbage-time stats on bad teams). Make it harder to fight regression at the highest level and have a (small) separate salary cap dedicated to attracting free agents, I dunno. I just hate to see maybe one big free agent, if that, per season and a bunch of 500 TPE inactives taking up the FA pool.

1. Warsaw is 3rd in the league! How are you feeling?!?!?! Okay. I don't feel strongly about 3rd, 2nd, or what have you unless we're able to win a championship; I get the most enjoyment out of actually being in the playoffs. 2. Can we bring home the Victory Cup? (Best Regular Season Record) We've done it twice before, so I think we can do it again -- but as stated previously, I strongly prefer the playoff success over strict regular season dominance (it'd be nice to have both, too!). We have a good amount of ground to make up to Malmo though. 3. What has been the key success to our winning stretch? New goalie, probably some line matchups that work well. Lamb continues to do work. 4. The NHL does not start for another two weeks, have you been watching any other sports while you wait? Sure! I keep track of football in my spare time and am pleased with how the Ravens look in the preseason; I actually don't follow hockey whatsoever crazily enough. 5. Out of all of the individual VHL awards there are, which one would you love for your player to win? I would choose the Daisuke Kanou Trophy for Playoffs MVP. Playoffs MVP would be cool for someone on our team - that'd mean that we've won the Finals, so I'm not picky as to who on the team gets the award. 6. Anything interesting going on in your life right now? Anything exciting? Uhh... I work in a hospital and COVID is exploding. That's exciting, though not necessarily in a positive way.

Thanks for the feedback, friends! This was an article I felt very strongly about writing now with a huge shift in priorities in my life, but it's still incredibly important to me to be a part of this community. Claim 3 of 4 for Week Ending 8/22/21 (8/21/21 in EFL) [Note my article from this week is just being used for the Theme Week bonus; I'll claim it as a point task later]

With the recent report of decreased forum activity, I felt I could combine this theme week with the S79 Deadline Suggestion Drive idea and devise some new awards specifically related to bringing attention to entries on the site. Any attempt to describe all of the factors leading to a decline in forum activity is impossible at worst and exceptionally tedious at best. Based solely on post count, it's unlikely that recognizing many Into the Stands or Create a Player threads (as examples) would generate more forum engagement without a significant overhaul – and that would likely lead me away from talking about awards. Instead, we'll look at the majority of user-generated content – media spots, graphics, and podcasts. I think it'd be pretty straightforward to create an award for the best of each of these over the course of a season, though it'd likely have to be done through a committee of some sort to limit bias, or possibly be split in two awards (one for popularity that's put to a vote and one for critical acclaim that's evaluated by a committee). There's currently no true incentive for producing quality media spots – not even so much as a nod outside of reviewing TPE if someone forgets to do trivia in a given week. Even I'm rarely reading more than a few entries in the Media Spot forum per season, for example, and those that I do read are typically from users I already know. Some of that is from extenuating circumstances (I have little free time), but there's also been a general decline in quality of media spots and I'm not terribly interested in reading more than a couple per season as a result. I'll also regularly listen to 3PPAO, but that's particularly because it's a combination of users I'm familiar with and interesting content; were either of those aspects no longer holding true I might not listen to podcasts posted on VHL at all. So, how do we make media spots, podcasts, and graphics more engaging without making it seem stilted or artificial? Recognize a user with a great entry once per week per medium over the course of a season. Heck, you could even take an 'expert' or two from each type of point task and make each division a job. Users like @enigmatic for graphics and @fromtheinside for media come to mind almost immediately, for example. It'd be their duty to review entries on a weekly basis and pick one or two to nominate for weekly (and end-of-the-season) recognition, with no user selected able to have more than one entry entered into the end-of-season poll (or critic's award eligibility, or what have you). Does it have to be a weekly award? No – I think it'd be far more important to let a user know they're being recognized for their hard work. EFL used to have a "point task of the week" highlighting a quality graphic or article on a scrolling header – and if that could be implemented here, it'd give the community a good 'focus' on a quality point task. Give the top 1-3 media spots, graphics, and podcasts each season an award and start giving TPE for a job well-done. "What about TPE inflation?," you might ask. And that's a fair point. If the same user is winning a media, graphic, or podcast award every season, that'd be a few extra TPE to their player. Better yet, if they're talented enough to win a seasonal award in multiple point tasks domains each season that'd be up to 30 TPE per career (though I'd expect multiple award wins for this in any season to have vanishingly small probability). Limit these award wins to once per 2-3 seasons, which is easy enough to keep track of with a spreadsheet. That lets plenty of users rotate in for recognition, it's still worth striving for even if the reward is small, and maybe users start paying attention to those that produce quality content as guides for how to improve.

It's probably no secret that I have had less time to follow the VHL. But every once in a long while I'll scan through some teams' rosters and... when the heck did Riga start looking like a behemoth? Sure, the European Conference is decently competitive at the top and the standings are wont to change on a dime, and we could debate the top-heaviness vs. depth of each conference til we're blue in the face. That's not what I'm talking about, though - four of Riga's six forwards are 700+ TPE, with their lowest just under 500. Not only that, they've got four defensemen over 600 TPE (led by none other than Jolly Greene Giant @DoktorFunk), and on top of that are finishing up Zamboni Driver's career (the guy's a career 0.919 sv%!). When did they get all of these high earners, and how did I not catch on to this earlier? Needless to day, I've been thoroughly impressed with my old boss @hedgehog337's ability to throw together yet another talented team - and I'm looking forward to seeing how they finish out the season and playoffs. With plenty of contributions from the Season 75 class it looks like they'll also be a roster that'll rapidly transition over the next 2-3 seasons, but I'm positive it'll be handled well.

1. This past week we added a new goaltender, what are your thoughts on Vsevolod Askarov? I think the change in our record speaks for itself. Needless to say, I'm quite happy. 2. Moscow and London are less than 8 points away from knocking us out of a wild card spot, how can we keep our playoff spot secured? Whatever we've been doing over the last 4-5 days' worth of sims. I don't know exactly what that is, but yeah. Whatever voodoo magic we've done over the last 10 games or so. 3. Has your player been performing well this past week compared to the rest of the season? I think I've been performing pretty similarly, with the exception of the plus-minus. Our production as a second line has been pretty consistent. 4. We are 5-1-1 with our new goaltender Askarov, have they been the difference when it comes to winning? Kinda, yeah. I think even a tiny improvement in goaltender play is a world of difference: rebounds are better placed, defenders can position more aggressively, and obviously fewer shots make it into the net. 5. How have you been lately, anything new in your life? Busy as heck. Wish I could elaborate more, but work is a huge time sink for me. 6. If you could anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Nowhere right now. COVID is rearing its ugly head and I'm not about to go anywhere with how few people around here use masks. :[

Review Player's Tribune-style articles are some of my favorite in the league; they're always helpful in demonstrating how invested some players are in a situation where there's no real obligation to be truly engaged in a story. At times, the informal nature of sim league LRs and posting of box scores without the emotions of winning or losing a game in real-time can make pieces like this more difficult to compose, so I applaud you for writing in a heartfelt and genuine manner. This makes me want to believe you were thoughtful and deliberate in your choice to leave Toronto, which is hard to communicate in a league run via text! On the more nitpicky side of things, there are a couple of random double spaces that CIA has already mentioned and a missing t (unfortunately); it's otherwise a lovely read.

Review Y'know, if you wanted to be really spicy you could grade the GMs based on how much you expect them to succeed. Just kidding, that'd be a nightmare for just about everyone involved, I think. This is a nice little primer on some of the users selected as GMs. There are a number of familiar names (including two former Malmo GMs!) and I think you've done a good job describing your interactions with them. The only edits I might make is in your fifth-to-last sentence, where you could probably afford to put a period in place of the first comma, and two sentences later ("Kaleeb I have never really heard of the name Kaleeb to be honest...") for the sake of flow. Thanks for the read!

This vhl.com article is essentially stream-of-consciousness, as I haven't planned terribly far ahead. Sorry. One question I've been trying to answer over the last several weeks – how much longer am I going to stick with sim leagues? I released an article a couple of weeks ago where I put some thoughts on paper regarding how to stay active in sim leagues with overall minimal free time. I've tried to avoid acknowledging it, but re-creating, even with carryover, is a bit of a task in and of itself. Aloe Dear is in her sixth season, and my players over in EFL (CMC and Renata Gonçalves) are in their seventh and fifth seasons, respectively – each either starting or heading towards regression. My intention in EFL is to give CMC and Renata long careers – 10 seasons for my offensive player and probably 11 or 12 for my defensive one, all max-earning (I try to avoid anything below that). But Dear's career is a bit more harshly defined, capped at eight seasons before guaranteed requirement. And it's unlikely she'll end her career with Warsaw, as I made a promise to a few different users to at least try free agency before it's all said and done (I've never been active and made the choice to change teams as a player at the same time, to be clear). My job is very taxing on my time currently. I wish I had a good answer to this question; as time goes on, it's seeming more and more likely I'll have to make some tough choices in the coming months.

1. Warsaw is at an even record (9-9-2). What does the team need to do to start winning more games? The addition of our new goalie was a good start. I don't know what would be needed beyond that to win more games without uprooting the roster in its entirety. 2. Are there any surprises in the league this season? Teams that are doing well that shouldn't be? Teams that aren't doing well that should be doing better? My agent doesn't seem to be particularly upset that Davos and Riga are doing well this season. It's still early, so I will not make any judgments on the league as a whole because I'm not inclined to buy into the standings as they are in the first half of the season. 3. Who is Warsaw's biggest threat this season if we have one? I think there are quite a few big threats because we're not as dominant as we were last season. Anyone above us in the standings is a substantial threat and we can't afford to dismiss the others. 4. What upgrades are you planning towards your player's attributes? If you bank for depreciation, which attribute do you wish could be maxed (99 overall) at all times if you could pick one? I'm going to sit tight where I am right now since I've started regression. My intention is just to ensure I can be a top player going forward. 5. What are your hobbies besides the VHL? I'm a physician in real life, so I don't have much time for hobbies. But I mainly try to solve puzzles and play some music (piano, uke, cello, guitar) when I'm not trying to explore the city I live in; I'm a recent transplant. 6. Choose one: Filming a comedy movie with Adam Sandler, Playing 1v1 basketball with Barrack Obama, or Weightlifting with Dwayne Johnson. (I'm a 20 year old dude so these are the coolest things I could think of). Hmm, I think it'd be best to play 1v1 basketball with Barack. I'd get crushed as I'm not athletic by any means and probably am 6-8 inches shorter than the former President, but I'd love to hear some insight from him after the game on some social and political issues of the last decade.

Claim 2 of 4 for Week Ending 8/8/21 (8/7/21 in EFL)

Review I have to be honest, any time I see a "list of phrases/words that can theoretically be very short" I get a little nervous as a reviewer, because sometimes these articles can be low-effort. But I was pleasantly surprised by the level of research you put into scouring the lists of each recent draft class. I'm not sure how I feel about Poopy Peepants being the best name of the last three seasons, but it's definitely an eye-catcher (no, I don't mean the poo. Or the pee, for that matter.). Despite all of the weird names, this article was relatively free of spelling errors. Some of the entries could benefit from varying the first word(s) of each sentence (e.g. That Dude's entry), but I don't have any big complaints.