Shaka

I'd love an opportunity to coach one of these teams. Feels like the perfect way to get my feet wet GMing before applying for a future VHLM or VHL head job.

As some of you may know, this is yet another attempt by me to stay active in the VHL, but this time I fee it's working. I'm earning usually around 8 or 9 TPE a week and I'm staying up to date on most things VHL. A lot of that is due to being active with the Toronto Legion, which I greatly appreciate. It's also been a blessing to be part of the Saskatoon Wild, who are incredibly active in their discord and very informative. With Conway, it's been a "constant dripping hollows a stone" approach. Earn some TPE here and there, raise him up. Try and be a useful backup. I think I could have had a shot to be a starter in the M this year, but I appreciated the chance to backup in Ottawa to continue to learn the ropes and not feel the pressure. My goal for Conway, as he's just a side-attraction to my goal to become a VHL GM one day, is to build him into a Team Captain backup G. Someone who can help a locker room, has high leadership lol and can win a game in backup duty when needed. It's all narrative with Conway and, so far, it's been holding my interest. So here's to several more months of this lol.

I enjoy Discord, but I have certainly noticed that some of the VHL discords are almost overwhelming. The VHL Discord absolutely is. It's non-stop activity. My VHLM Discord is also incredibly busy, so it's impossible to keep up with. For some, I'm sure that's awesome. For me, I enjoy more the locker rooms that have a moderate amount of activity and where team-oriented information can be shared and not buried in walls of text within minutes. For that, I think there is still value in using an on-site locker room. I had success while GMing in the SBA using the Club feature on the forum to operate as an on-site headquarters for team updates and what not and that allowed the discord to function as a true locker room, where you just shoot the shit. I do wish that was more of a thing, but to each their own. Also couldn't agree more @Peace lol

Toronto Legion Press Conference The VHL season is underway and with it another season of Toronto Legion Hockey! We caught up with some of the Legion's players to ask them a few questions about the state of the locker room and the team's performance so far. The Legion have started the season 3-4-0. How do you feel about the start of the season? What do you believe will be the team's strength this season? What do you believe will be the team's weakness this season? What are your goals for this season? The team just announced it's captains last week. What are your thoughts in the picks? There are a lot of new faces in the locker room. How has that experience been so far? Thanks for taking the time today, everyone! @Anthony Matthews @11 Eleven @Corco @Laflamme @Viperxhawks19 @Sixersfan549 @ng1291 @DaftRaincloud @Gwdjohnson @nethi99 @ROOKIE745 @Kachur @goldenglutes @NyQuil @joeg @JDGraves @LastOneUp @ngine4

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+6 SBA

Ay! My Birthday was on Saturday! May birthdays are the best. Happy Cinco Birthday-O!

Oh, good. I don't need the pay. So, I stick by what I said. If you don't even have to pay the guy to be your AGM, why would you decide not to have one as a way to drive the culture? To each their own.

Well, I didn't even know AGM's get paid in this league ? and I am one! To play devil's advocate here, I'd say it makes perfect sense from a league standpoint. To my point, Activity >. Does the league not need new blood every year? Is it not important to retain players? Anyone can set lines, talk trades and be in gameplan mode all the time. That may impact the engine, but the engine itself doesn't keep people coming back to the site. Engagement does. Without engagement, and without those members, it doesn't matter how many people know to submit a lineup or what trade to take. So there's reasonable cause to say there is absolutely value in paying a person on the team, not only to engage in GM duties, but SPECIFICALLY to engage with the new members and drive the culture. To your point, ya, obviously a GM should be teaching his AGM about the league and how to function as an AGM for their eventual step up in the league. If you're not, you're doing a disservice to the league. It's just my opinion that those who say they don't need one could probably use one for the sake of improving the culture of their team. At least, as the VHLM level. You can never have too much positive culture in a LR.

Yesterday, I saw a conversation regarding the value of Assistant GM's, specifically in the VHLM. While many of the replies were in support of assistants, a few were not. A few of the replies made comments like "VHL AGMs are fairly pointless" and " the AGM role serves one purpose and one purpose only: to learn from the GM so that you can one day step into an official GM role." I find it interesting how different everyone's opinion is on the roles, value and usage of an Assistant GM and it seems as good a reason as any to get my 2 TPE in today. In my experience, the team's with the highest culture have the highest success rate. At the Professional level, the sheer TPE count of a team comes more into play. At the development level, it couldn't be any more important. In every locker room I have ran, I've shared in one iteration or another, this wall of text: “Activity breeds updates. Updates improve players. Players win championships. Thus, activity wins championships. All you have to do, all we have to do, is bleed [Insert Team Colors] and the rest will take care of itself. Show up, shoot the shit in this locker room, watch the games, talk builds, write your PT's, do your graphics, have a great time and if you do all of that, success comes naturally. Winning is a byproduct of activity. So there are two golden rules in [Insert City]. Love this organization and love this league.” An Assistant GM isn't necessary from a functionality standpoint, but I don't see why anyone wouldn't want a second leader in the clubhouse to raise activity, keep players engaged and drive retention. My theory is the more the merrier. Team Captains, Assistant GMs, Alumni. Anyone and everyone who can help our locker room stay engaging and attentive is who I want on my team. I don't care what I call them, because in the end of the day, the activity they drive in my locker room drives the activity in their update threads and update threads ultimately win championships.

Toronto Legion Press Conference The Legion finished the season 30-29-13 with 73 points, falling 7 points shy of New York for a last place finish in the North American Conference. How do you feel about how the end of the season transpired? Looking at Season 71 through a positive lens, what would you say was your favorite moment from the season was? What is something you look forward to in Season 72? If you could get one thing in Season 72, other that a championship, what would it be for the Legion or your player? The playoffs are still going on. How do you think the rest of the post-season plays out? Lastly, who do you think has the best logo in the VHL? As always, thanks for taking the time today, guys! @Peace @solas @Corco @DaftRaincloud @Viperxhawks19 @Gwdjohnson @ROOKIE745

Assistant GM's are exactly as valuable as each General Manager makes them. If you don't need one, cool. If you do, cool. If you want one, have one. I've been ran teams where I had like 4 people acting in one capacity or another for me. I've ran teams where I was the only guy. That's the funny thing about sim leagues....

SBA +6

17 Calgary Wranglers @ Vancouver Wolves 18 D.C. Dragons @ Seattle Bears 19 Malmo Nighthawks @ Moscow Menace 20 Riga Reign @ Prague Phantoms

DC 3-2

Toronto Legion Press Conference As the VHL season passes the half-way mark of the season and the playoff picture begins to form, the Toronto Legion sit in ninth place with a 24-20-10 record. We caught up with some of the Legion's players to ask them a few questions about the state of the locker room and the team's focus moving forward. With 5 games remaining in the regular season, the Legion trail by a single point to the New York Americans in a fight to avoid a last place finish in the North American Conference. All but one of those games are against a playoff contender. How do you expect the end of the season to pan out? Zeno Miniti, Erik Killinger and Bjorn Scoringson have shared the lead scoring duties all season, each scoring between 26-28 goals this season, compared to last year when the team was lead primarily by Nethila Dissanayake, who saw a drop to 21. Do you feel the more balanced approach has been a reason the team has improved so much from last season? Rookie Jaxx Hextal has been one of the more promising showings this season, starting 57 games this year and actually improving his save % from his 61-win campaign in the VHLM last year. How has Hextall's performance impacted this team this year? How important is his improvement over the next few seasons to the steady rise everyone in Toronto expects the Legions to make? With the playoffs out of reach, what improvements do you expect the team to make over the off-season? What improvements do you intend to make over the summer in preparation for Season 72? As always, thanks for taking the time today, guys! @Peace @solas @Corco @DaftRaincloud @Viperxhawks19 @Gwdjohnson @ROOKIE745

I wrote this off the top of my head and I just knew there was someone I was going to miss. You may be the VHL member I remember the most, as you have been involved in the other leagues with me as much as anyone on that list(maybe Bushito). Had I thought of it another 30 seconds, I'd have come up you. Shit, I feel bad ?

Why I Keep Returning To The VHL For almost a decade, my relationship with the VHL has been a back and forth love affair. It's been no secret that my interest in the sport impacts my interest in participating, at length, in the VHL. While I've maintained a membership in the SBA and EFL over the years, as well as many other start up leagues that are no longer with us today, I've never managed to stick with y player in the VHL. That makes my opinion on the VHL, it's recruitment and it's retention, a unique one. I very well may be the only member in the VHL today, or ever, with the experience I have had regarding the Victory Hockey League. So, in the spirit of Theme Week, I'm going to bypass my weekly Welfare post and explain why I continue to come back to the VHL. For me, the VHL stands for one thing more than anything else. Community. I think a lot of people have, and will, say that Longevity is the first thing they think of when they think of the VHL. While I believe that to be obviously true, I don't believe any sim league stands the test of time and rests it's name on Longevity without the power of a strong and dedicated community. In the decade that I have been engaged in sim leagues, I never never quite seen a sim league take as many lumps, get back up and keep pushing forward than the VHL has. From it's humble beginnings, fighting for memberships with the SHL and every start up league you can think of, to it's server hack and loss of a mass number of members, to bouts of inactivity that other leagues may have folded through, the VHL has fought it's way to 71 seasons and counting and a lot of that is due to it's membership and leadership. Now, with an ugly disagreement between leadership at the VHL and the SBA lingering over the past year, the VHL encounters yet another bump in the road. Does anyone expect that this loss of affiliation spell the eventual decline of the league? Hardly. It's because those who have been here longest know that nothing has gotten in the way of the VHL reaching what we all know it will one day reach. The historic 100th season. In addition to my understanding that this community is a strong one, with quality leadership, I can't write about my experience and constant interest to partake in the VHL without mentioning a handful of members who I will forever member as staples of both here and several leagues I have been a part of. Guys like Jardy, Street, Bushito, Diamond_Ace, CowboyinAmerica, STZ and several others I could earn 6 TPE for just naming in a row. One, however, had stood above the rest. He helped me create the framework for what has become the SBA. He helped me create an unheard of project, at the time, in the SSN. He's taken over the leadership role over the VHL in the time that I have mostly been away. Beketov. Beketov and I go way back and it's my hope that we'll go way forward, if that's a thing, for years to come. It was Beketov who first introduced me to the VHL and it was Beketov who relentlessly tagged me in an SBDL Discord server to return again. It's our conversations that has led me to take the challenge of assistant GMing, and hopefully eventually GMing, and it's because of him I get to write this Point Task and add them to yet another attempt in a VHL Player. I can't guarantee that I will make it to the VHL with Cal Conway, or my next player. I can't guarantee that something won't come up in my real life and I'll vanish from the forum as quickly as I arrive every 2 years. What I can guarantee, however, is that the VHL will be here all the same. And the stable of guys I've grown to have, at the very least, internet friendships with will be here to catch up with and shoot the shit with. It's them, as much as anything, that get me excited to return to the VHL and engage the community. And it's them that I believe is ode a debt of gratitude for 71 seasons of success, and many more seasons to come.

Ya these are fire.

Damn. That's so sad. I had quite a handful of interactions a with 701, across a few leagues, but can only consider him an acquaintance. I'm sad to hear of any passing, but especially of someone so young and connected to the community. My prayers go out to his family, friends and any of you who knew him closely.

Toronto Legion Press Conference As the VHL season passes the half-way mark of the season and the playoff picture begins to form, the Toronto Legion sit in ninth place with a 24-20-10 record. We caught up with some of the Legion's players to ask them a few questions about the state of the locker room and the team's focus moving forward. The Legion are currently sitting in ninth place with 58 points through 54 games. How do you feel about the first half of the season? The legion are next to last in point differential at the moment, a downward trend since the start of the year, how can the team become more competitive to end the year? With that said, you also lead the league in overtime losses, suggesting no team has lost more close games than the Legion. How are those close losses impacting the locker room? Rylan Peace is still relatively new to his position as President and General Manager. How would you describe his demeanor in the clubhouse, through this building process? To piggy back off of that last question, how would you describe the culture in Toronto right now? Part of the rebuild, and culture drive occurring inToronto, has been a youth movement. Both Kristopher McDagg and Erik Killinger are among the top point-earning rookies this season. How do you grade their development so far? Thanks for taking the time today, guys! @Peace @solas @Corco @DaftRaincloud @Viperxhawks19 @Gwdjohnson @ROOKIE745

I think this may come to a surprise to many, as I've long joked about my activity in the VHL, but I am more excited about this next stage in my overall sim league experience than any I can remember. While I may have never been drawn to go all-in with a VHL player, I have extensive experience general managing in sim leagues and I'm ecstatic at the opportunity to pour myself into this challenge. Thank you @Peace for giving me that opportunity!

Thanks for the love, Solas.

Holy hell that's a lot of content.