Seabass

Alright it's opening week of Season 80 and every VHL team has gotten around 8 or 9 games under their respective belts. The Malmo Nighthawks and the D.C. Dragons were expected to both be strong teams this year and it seems like both teams have made good on those expectations by starting out the year with the early lead of their respective conferences. The Dragons (6-2-0) are currently leading the North American Conference with 12 points and the defending champion Nighthawk team (8-1-0) is currently the top team in the league and are leading the European Conference with 16 points.
 
Some team's like the Toronto Legion and the Helsinki Titans however have only recorded a single win so far are showing early signs that they're going to have to go through a rough times this season. The Seattle Bears who lost in last year's finals against the Nighthawks haven't been much better than the Legion/Titans and have had quite the fall from grace since making the finals and are struggling out of the gate and have only managed to pick up a couple of wins so far this season. 
 
Then there's the Menace. After being a VHL bottom feeder for years the Menace have come flying out of the gate with a 7-1 record and a suddenly explosive offense. They are currently trailing the Nighthawks by only two points for top team in the league standings. This is such a drastic transformation has got the league talking and the Menace bringing on a bunch of new bandwagon fans.
 
The Menace team went through quite a few changes during the last offseason and were hoping to make more of a impact this year as they are chasing their first ever playoff berth in 4 seasons. Their GM, Spartan made a lot of moves to pick up core pieces for his team during the last few years and I bet he's really hoping that those moves start paying off for him, now. Today I'll be highlighting Spartan's offseason changes to his Menace squad and I'll be touching base with him to gain some insight on some of these moves straight from the source.
 
Trading Kyle Glass for Kevin King
@Tbeez99 @IamMOOSE
Yeah yeah I know this wasn't a offseason move, but I felt I should talk about this trade deadline acquisition anyways since it did affect a future move made by the team. The Menace acquired veteran centerman Kevin King from the London United as well as a third round selection in S81 in return for a younger winger in Kyle Glass. Glass was drafted in 22nd Overall by Moscow in the S77 draft and wasn't getting much ice time with the Menace and was having a poor year scoring only 20 points in 62 games and going -10. He was given a change of scenery and has since broke out with the United team scoring 23 points in 21 games. King at the time of the trade was already a PPG player scoring 67 points in 59 games for London. Moscow's chances to make the playoffs were on the verge of being over and King who only had another season left to his career was a last ditch effort by the Moscow GM to make a cinderella run to a playoff berth. That obviously didn't work out as King only scored a single point for the Menace and went -3 to close off the year. At this point you just gotta hope that King still has enough left in the tank to return to form for his last season in the VHL.
 
Acquiring Tyler Walker
@Advantage
Spartan didn't fuck around and the day the trade freeze was lifted he made his first move of the off season and acquired veteran defender Tyler Walker in return for a third round selection in the S80 draft. Walker is a veteran of 7 VHL seasons and spent his last two years playing for the Calgary Wranglers before the trade. The Menace will be the fourth and last team he will play on as this will be his last season before retirement as he's been in the league a while and Walker will soon find himself needing a walker himself cus he's old as shit. Walker showed last season that he can still play at a elite level and is coming off a 62 point season playing on a mediocre Wrangler's team. Walker definitely improves this team as Moscow is still for the most part a younger team and veterans like Walker might be needed to push this team to the next level. Also, for the last few seasons the Menace has been pretty thin on the blueline and adding Walker to the group of Bob Tristan, Hard Markinson and Aurelien Moreau might now make this one of the best bluelines in the league.
 
Trading away King for Lexi Glass
@AW13
Remember that King guy I talked about earlier? Well turns out he didn't end up staying in Moscow after that 9 game trial run at the end of S79. Shortly after the Walker trade went down, King along with a 3rd rounder was traded to Warsaw in return for winger, Lexi Glass who is a year younger than King. A good thing to note is that Glass is a player that  has already played a total 67 career playoff games and has won the Continental Cup in S78 so Moscow is getting a boat load of playoff experience in this trade. Also this is a player that was just a single point shy from reaching the 100 point milestone last year. What Moscow is getting here is a prime time elite winger that knows how to win games and they only gave up a player that just wasn't gelling with the Menace's style of game for some odd reason. Hopefully Glass can experience a hell of a season here in Moscow and I hope we can convince her to stay here for another year after this one. 
 
Trading away captain Tristan for Johansson:
@N0HBDY @Gwdjohnson
All of a sudden, out from left field the Menace decided to surprise all their fans by continuing the habit of trading away their captains by trading Bob Tristan to Los Angeles in exchange for a cheaper defender in Arvid Johansson. This left people scratching their heads as Tristan was a vocal member of the team's locker room atmosphere. Spartan assured his team to have patience and that more moves were in the works and a drop in salary was necessary for future plans. Still Tristan will be missed as he was a steadying presence on a rather poor blueline for a few years while the team was going through their hard rebuild years. Still Johansson is no slouch he plays a very responsible game and already has the composure level of a VHL pro despite being a young defender. Johansson just finished out a solid rookie campaign with the L-A Stars scoring 29 points and going +24. Johansson still has time to grow as a player where Tristan was pretty much at his peak so this wasn't a bad trade to make at all. Yeah it's a slight downgrade but it might be a good move for the team long term and who knows Johansson with hard work can always end up becoming a better defender than Tristan ever was. After seeing how Moscow has the tendency to trade their captains I'm convinced the captain's seat in Moscow is in fact cursed and if that's the case new captain Philip Stein should be looking to sell his home in Moscow soon enough. 
 
When asked about the Menace Captaincy curse:
 
"I've joked around a bit that the captain role is a curse on this team, and I suppose there is some merit to it. The last time I named a defenseman, Fat Palloon, as team captain in S76, he was traded to Prague mid-season in exchange for cap relief and future assets. The captaincy in Moscow generally works in a simple way, where one of the longest tenured, active members of the team receives the C. It's been that way since before I even took over this team. It also sort of works in a negative way, since older players with a lot of tread on their tires end up as prime candidates for trades to acquire more draft picks, and to free up cap space."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
Trading away Bowman and Lemiuex to Toronto:
@BrutalBoost @hockeyis66
This big trade didn't involve the acquisition of anybody really it was more of a move to get rid of a few contracts to free up some cash to make a gamble on some other moves and maybe acquire a UFA or two. The contracts the team decided to part with was Andrew Bowman and Jaromir Lemiuex and this trade must've hurt to make as Bowman is the AGM here in Moscow and this move must've tugged at some of Spartan's heart strings. But it ain't all bad. With S79 1st Overall pick, Papa Emeritus surpassing Bowman in TPE , Bowman was going to be relegated from the team's starting role to that of the backup. This trade gives Bowman a chance to continue being a starting netminder in the VHL. Jaromir Lemiuex who was also given up in the deal was a rookie coming off a spectacular rookie season in which he was third in rookie scoring with 50 points and was a contender for the Stolzschweiger trophy which is awarded to the league's rookie of the year. Unfortunately Lemiuex has vanished from the VHL hockey scene and is currently considered an inactive player, hence why Moscow could all of sudden want to part ways with him. 
 
When asked about how hard it was to trade Bowman away:
 
"It's usually quite difficult to trade away any active player, let alone someone who I rely on as my AGM and have a good relationship with. However, trading Bowman away in this instance was actually easier than you might imagine. We'd actually spoken about this quite a while ago, where he even brought up the idea of sending Bowman to another team for assets, or some cap help. Toronto was a great fit since they had no starting goaltender at all, so he'd get quite a large number of minutes which would be good for his development" 
-Spartan, Menace GM

 
The Acquisition of Rara Rasputin
@Victor
Once the UFA season came about it finally all made sense why the Menace was dropping all that salary. They were planning all along to make a free agency pitch to bring back goaltender Rara Rasputin who the Menace drafted 16th Overall back in Season 75 before trading him after his rookie season to Seattle in return for an older and more experienced netminder at the time Jacob Tonn. Rasputin of course then went on to have a pretty successful 4 seasons in Seattle and has won a Continental Cup and a Daisuke Kanou trophy with the Bears in S77 and has backstopped his team to three straight finals appearances. Rasputin like Glass is bringing in tons of playoff experience to a team who hasn't made the playoffs let alone play in them in a long time. This of course relegates Papa Emeritus to the backup role once again but @Beketov sees what's best for the team has been nothing but professional and accepting to his backup role.
 
When discussing the Rasputin trade the GM had this to add:
 
"We had our eyes on signing Rara Rasputin to the team from the time we knew he planned to leave Seattle. He was a former top pick by our organization years ago, and bringing him back in his prime was an opportunity we couldn't pass up. Unfortunately, we were in quite the cap bind, and our plan was to trade just Bowman and Lemieux away to make room for Rasputin. However, that would have left us with 5 forwards, 4 defensemen and 2 goalies, and we really wanted to run a proper 6-4-2. That meant that we had to send away Tristan and his $3 milllion cap hit and bring in two players on rookie contracts who would combine for $3 million - Johansson and Markov. A difficult decision to make, but one that was necessary for our organization, and also sets us up nicely for the future with two young players coming in to replace some veterans."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
All this playoff experience will be highly valuable to this young team and I think the odds of this team making the playoffs this season has greatly improved with this years additions. The Menace just didn't have much when it came to experience and our team was consistently cracking under pressure last year and moves were made to address the problem. Now it's up to the younger players on the team to take in as much as they can from these veteran leaders while they're here and apply the new found wealth of knowledge to their own games. If that happens this year, the Menace might finally be a real Menace to the VHL standings in S80.
 
@Spartan

Alright it's opening week of Season 80 and every VHL team has gotten around 8 or 9 games under their respective belts. The Malmo Nighthawks and the D.C. Dragons were expected to both be strong teams this year and it seems like both teams have made good on those expectations by starting out the year with the early lead of their respective conferences. The Dragons (6-2-0) are currently leading the North American Conference with 12 points and the defending champion Nighthawk team (8-1-0) is currently the top team in the league and are leading the European Conference with 16 points.
 
Some team's like the Toronto Legion and the Helsinki Titans however have only recorded a single win so far are showing early signs that they're going to have to go through a rough times this season. The Seattle Bears who lost in last year's finals against the Nighthawks haven't been much better than the Legion/Titans and have had quite the fall from grace since making the finals and are struggling out of the gate and have only managed to pick up a couple of wins so far this season. 
 
Then there's the Menace. After being a VHL bottom feeder for years the Menace have come flying out of the gate with a 7-1 record and a suddenly explosive offense. They are currently trailing the Nighthawks by only two points for top team in the league standings. This is such a drastic transformation has got the league talking and the Menace bringing on a bunch of new bandwagon fans.
 
The Menace team went through quite a few changes during the last offseason and were hoping to make more of a impact this year as they are chasing their first ever playoff berth in 4 seasons. Their GM, Spartan made a lot of moves to pick up core pieces for his team during the last few years and I bet he's really hoping that those moves start paying off for him, now. Today I'll be highlighting Spartan's offseason changes to his Menace squad and I'll be touching base with him to gain some insight on some of these moves straight from the source.
 
Trading Kyle Glass for Kevin King
@Tbeez99 @IamMOOSE
Yeah yeah I know this wasn't a offseason move, but I felt I should talk about this trade deadline acquisition anyways since it did affect a future move made by the team. The Menace acquired veteran centerman Kevin King from the London United as well as a third round selection in S81 in return for a younger winger in Kyle Glass. Glass was drafted in 22nd Overall by Moscow in the S77 draft and wasn't getting much ice time with the Menace and was having a poor year scoring only 20 points in 62 games and going -10. He was given a change of scenery and has since broke out with the United team scoring 23 points in 21 games. King at the time of the trade was already a PPG player scoring 67 points in 59 games for London. Moscow's chances to make the playoffs were on the verge of being over and King who only had another season left to his career was a last ditch effort by the Moscow GM to make a cinderella run to a playoff berth. That obviously didn't work out as King only scored a single point for the Menace and went -3 to close off the year. At this point you just gotta hope that King still has enough left in the tank to return to form for his last season in the VHL.
 
Acquiring Tyler Walker
@Advantage
Spartan didn't fuck around and the day the trade freeze was lifted he made his first move of the off season and acquired veteran defender Tyler Walker in return for a third round selection in the S80 draft. Walker is a veteran of 7 VHL seasons and spent his last two years playing for the Calgary Wranglers before the trade. The Menace will be the fourth and last team he will play on as this will be his last season before retirement as he's been in the league a while and Walker will soon find himself needing a walker himself cus he's old as shit. Walker showed last season that he can still play at a elite level and is coming off a 62 point season playing on a mediocre Wrangler's team. Walker definitely improves this team as Moscow is still for the most part a younger team and veterans like Walker might be needed to push this team to the next level. Also, for the last few seasons the Menace has been pretty thin on the blueline and adding Walker to the group of Bob Tristan, Hard Markinson and Aurelien Moreau might now make this one of the best bluelines in the league.
 
Trading away King for Lexi Glass
@AW13
Remember that King guy I talked about earlier? Well turns out he didn't end up staying in Moscow after that 9 game trial run at the end of S79. Shortly after the Walker trade went down, King along with a 3rd rounder was traded to Warsaw in return for winger, Lexi Glass who is a year younger than King. A good thing to note is that Glass is a player that  has already played a total 67 career playoff games and has won the Continental Cup in S78 so Moscow is getting a boat load of playoff experience in this trade. Also this is a player that was just a single point shy from reaching the 100 point milestone last year. What Moscow is getting here is a prime time elite winger that knows how to win games and they only gave up a player that just wasn't gelling with the Menace's style of game for some odd reason. Hopefully Glass can experience a hell of a season here in Moscow and I hope we can convince her to stay here for another year after this one. 
 
Trading away captain Tristan for Johansson:
@N0HBDY @Gwdjohnson
All of a sudden, out from left field the Menace decided to surprise all their fans by continuing the habit of trading away their captains by trading Bob Tristan to Los Angeles in exchange for a cheaper defender in Arvid Johansson. This left people scratching their heads as Tristan was a vocal member of the team's locker room atmosphere. Spartan assured his team to have patience and that more moves were in the works and a drop in salary was necessary for future plans. Still Tristan will be missed as he was a steadying presence on a rather poor blueline for a few years while the team was going through their hard rebuild years. Still Johansson is no slouch he plays a very responsible game and already has the composure level of a VHL pro despite being a young defender. Johansson just finished out a solid rookie campaign with the L-A Stars scoring 29 points and going +24. Johansson still has time to grow as a player where Tristan was pretty much at his peak so this wasn't a bad trade to make at all. Yeah it's a slight downgrade but it might be a good move for the team long term and who knows Johansson with hard work can always end up becoming a better defender than Tristan ever was. After seeing how Moscow has the tendency to trade their captains I'm convinced the captain's seat in Moscow is in fact cursed and if that's the case new captain Philip Stein should be looking to sell his home in Moscow soon enough. 
 
When asked about the Menace Captaincy curse:
 
"I've joked around a bit that the captain role is a curse on this team, and I suppose there is some merit to it. The last time I named a defenseman, Fat Palloon, as team captain in S76, he was traded to Prague mid-season in exchange for cap relief and future assets. The captaincy in Moscow generally works in a simple way, where one of the longest tenured, active members of the team receives the C. It's been that way since before I even took over this team. It also sort of works in a negative way, since older players with a lot of tread on their tires end up as prime candidates for trades to acquire more draft picks, and to free up cap space."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
Trading away Bowman and Lemiuex to Toronto:
@BrutalBoost @hockeyis66
This big trade didn't involve the acquisition of anybody really it was more of a move to get rid of a few contracts to free up some cash to make a gamble on some other moves and maybe acquire a UFA or two. The contracts the team decided to part with was Andrew Bowman and Jaromir Lemiuex and this trade must've hurt to make as Bowman is the AGM here in Moscow and this move must've tugged at some of Spartan's heart strings. But it ain't all bad. With S79 1st Overall pick, Papa Emeritus surpassing Bowman in TPE , Bowman was going to be relegated from the team's starting role to that of the backup. This trade gives Bowman a chance to continue being a starting netminder in the VHL. Jaromir Lemiuex who was also given up in the deal was a rookie coming off a spectacular rookie season in which he was third in rookie scoring with 50 points and was a contender for the Stolzschweiger trophy which is awarded to the league's rookie of the year. Unfortunately Lemiuex has vanished from the VHL hockey scene and is currently considered an inactive player, hence why Moscow could all of sudden want to part ways with him. 
 
When asked about how hard it was to trade Bowman away:
 
"It's usually quite difficult to trade away any active player, let alone someone who I rely on as my AGM and have a good relationship with. However, trading Bowman away in this instance was actually easier than you might imagine. We'd actually spoken about this quite a while ago, where he even brought up the idea of sending Bowman to another team for assets, or some cap help. Toronto was a great fit since they had no starting goaltender at all, so he'd get quite a large number of minutes which would be good for his development" 
-Spartan, Menace GM

 
The Acquisition of Rara Rasputin
@Victor
Once the UFA season came about it finally all made sense why the Menace was dropping all that salary. They were planning all along to make a free agency pitch to bring back goaltender Rara Rasputin who the Menace drafted 16th Overall back in Season 75 before trading him after his rookie season to Seattle in return for an older and more experienced netminder at the time Jacob Tonn. Rasputin of course then went on to have a pretty successful 4 seasons in Seattle and has won a Continental Cup and a Daisuke Kanou trophy with the Bears in S77 and has backstopped his team to three straight finals appearances. Rasputin like Glass is bringing in tons of playoff experience to a team who hasn't made the playoffs let alone play in them in a long time. This of course relegates Papa Emeritus to the backup role once again but @Beketov sees what's best for the team has been nothing but professional and accepting to his backup role.
 
When discussing the Rasputin trade the GM had this to add:
 
"We had our eyes on signing Rara Rasputin to the team from the time we knew he planned to leave Seattle. He was a former top pick by our organization years ago, and bringing him back in his prime was an opportunity we couldn't pass up. Unfortunately, we were in quite the cap bind, and our plan was to trade just Bowman and Lemieux away to make room for Rasputin. However, that would have left us with 5 forwards, 4 defensemen and 2 goalies, and we really wanted to run a proper 6-4-2. That meant that we had to send away Tristan and his $3 milllion cap hit and bring in two players on rookie contracts who would combine for $3 million - Johansson and Markov. A difficult decision to make, but one that was necessary for our organization, and also sets us up nicely for the future with two young players coming in to replace some veterans."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
All this playoff experience will be highly valuable to this young team and I think the odds of this team making the playoffs this season has greatly improved with this years additions. The Menace just didn't have much when it came to experience and our team was consistently cracking under pressure last year and moves were made to address the problem. Now it's up to the younger players on the team to take in as much as they can from these veteran leaders while they're here and apply the new found wealth of knowledge to their own games. If that happens this year, the Menace might finally be a real Menace to the VHL standings in S80.
 
@Spartan

Alright it's opening week of Season 80 and every VHL team has gotten around 8 or 9 games under their respective belts. The Malmo Nighthawks and the D.C. Dragons were expected to both be strong teams this year and it seems like both teams have made good on those expectations by starting out the year with the early lead of their respective conferences. The Dragons (6-2-0) are currently leading the North American Conference with 12 points and the defending champion Nighthawk team (8-1-0) is currently the top team in the league and are leading the European Conference with 16 points.
 
Some team's like the Toronto Legion and the Helsinki Titans however have only recorded a single win so far are showing early signs that they're going to have to go through a rough times this season. The Seattle Bears who lost in last year's finals against the Nighthawks haven't been much better than the Legion/Titans and have had quite the fall from grace since making the finals and are struggling out of the gate and have only managed to pick up a couple of wins so far this season. 
 
Then there's the Menace. After being a VHL bottom feeder for years the Menace have come flying out of the gate with a 7-1 record and a suddenly explosive offense. They are currently trailing the Nighthawks by only two points for top team in the league standings. This is such a drastic transformation has got the league talking and the Menace bringing on a bunch of new bandwagon fans.
 
The Menace team went through quite a few changes during the last offseason and were hoping to make more of a impact this year as they are chasing their first ever playoff berth in 4 seasons. Their GM, Spartan made a lot of moves to pick up core pieces for his team during the last few years and I bet he's really hoping that those moves start paying off for him, now. Today I'll be highlighting Spartan's offseason changes to his Menace squad and I'll be touching base with him to gain some insight on some of these moves straight from the source.
 
Trading Kyle Glass for Kevin King
@Tbeez99 @IamMOOSE
Yeah yeah I know this wasn't a offseason move, but I felt I should talk about this trade deadline acquisition anyways since it did affect a future move made by the team. The Menace acquired veteran centerman Kevin King from the London United as well as a third round selection in S81 in return for a younger winger in Kyle Glass. Glass was drafted in 22nd Overall by Moscow in the S77 draft and wasn't getting much ice time with the Menace and was having a poor year scoring only 20 points in 62 games and going -10. He was given a change of scenery and has since broke out with the United team scoring 23 points in 21 games. King at the time of the trade was already a PPG player scoring 67 points in 59 games for London. Moscow's chances to make the playoffs were on the verge of being over and King who only had another season left to his career was a last ditch effort by the Moscow GM to make a cinderella run to a playoff berth. That obviously didn't work out as King only scored a single point for the Menace and went -3 to close off the year. At this point you just gotta hope that King still has enough left in the tank to return to form for his last season in the VHL.
 
Acquiring Tyler Walker
@Advantage
Spartan didn't fuck around and the day the trade freeze was lifted he made his first move of the off season and acquired veteran defender Tyler Walker in return for a third round selection in the S80 draft. Walker is a veteran of 7 VHL seasons and spent his last two years playing for the Calgary Wranglers before the trade. The Menace will be the fourth and last team he will play on as this will be his last season before retirement as he's been in the league a while and Walker will soon find himself needing a walker himself cus he's old as shit. Walker showed last season that he can still play at a elite level and is coming off a 62 point season playing on a mediocre Wrangler's team. Walker definitely improves this team as Moscow is still for the most part a younger team and veterans like Walker might be needed to push this team to the next level. Also, for the last few seasons the Menace has been pretty thin on the blueline and adding Walker to the group of Bob Tristan, Hard Markinson and Aurelien Moreau might now make this one of the best bluelines in the league.
 
Trading away King for Lexi Glass
@AW13
Remember that King guy I talked about earlier? Well turns out he didn't end up staying in Moscow after that 9 game trial run at the end of S79. Shortly after the Walker trade went down, King along with a 3rd rounder was traded to Warsaw in return for winger, Lexi Glass who is a year younger than King. A good thing to note is that Glass is a player that  has already played a total 67 career playoff games and has won the Continental Cup in S78 so Moscow is getting a boat load of playoff experience in this trade. Also this is a player that was just a single point shy from reaching the 100 point milestone last year. What Moscow is getting here is a prime time elite winger that knows how to win games and they only gave up a player that just wasn't gelling with the Menace's style of game for some odd reason. Hopefully Glass can experience a hell of a season here in Moscow and I hope we can convince her to stay here for another year after this one. 
 
Trading away captain Tristan for Johansson:
@N0HBDY @Gwdjohnson
All of a sudden, out from left field the Menace decided to surprise all their fans by continuing the habit of trading away their captains by trading Bob Tristan to Los Angeles in exchange for a cheaper defender in Arvid Johansson. This left people scratching their heads as Tristan was a vocal member of the team's locker room atmosphere. Spartan assured his team to have patience and that more moves were in the works and a drop in salary was necessary for future plans. Still Tristan will be missed as he was a steadying presence on a rather poor blueline for a few years while the team was going through their hard rebuild years. Still Johansson is no slouch he plays a very responsible game and already has the composure level of a VHL pro despite being a young defender. Johansson just finished out a solid rookie campaign with the L-A Stars scoring 29 points and going +24. Johansson still has time to grow as a player where Tristan was pretty much at his peak so this wasn't a bad trade to make at all. Yeah it's a slight downgrade but it might be a good move for the team long term and who knows Johansson with hard work can always end up becoming a better defender than Tristan ever was. After seeing how Moscow has the tendency to trade their captains I'm convinced the captain's seat in Moscow is in fact cursed and if that's the case new captain Philip Stein should be looking to sell his home in Moscow soon enough. 
 
When asked about the Menace Captaincy curse:
 
"I've joked around a bit that the captain role is a curse on this team, and I suppose there is some merit to it. The last time I named a defenseman, Fat Palloon, as team captain in S76, he was traded to Prague mid-season in exchange for cap relief and future assets. The captaincy in Moscow generally works in a simple way, where one of the longest tenured, active members of the team receives the C. It's been that way since before I even took over this team. It also sort of works in a negative way, since older players with a lot of tread on their tires end up as prime candidates for trades to acquire more draft picks, and to free up cap space."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
Trading away Bowman and Lemiuex to Toronto:
@BrutalBoost @hockeyis66
This big trade didn't involve the acquisition of anybody really it was more of a move to get rid of a few contracts to free up some cash to make a gamble on some other moves and maybe acquire a UFA or two. The contracts the team decided to part with was Andrew Bowman and Jaromir Lemiuex and this trade must've hurt to make as Bowman is the AGM here in Moscow and this move must've tugged at some of Spartan's heart strings. But it ain't all bad. With S79 1st Overall pick, Papa Emeritus surpassing Bowman in TPE , Bowman was going to be relegated from the team's starting role to that of the backup. This trade gives Bowman a chance to continue being a starting netminder in the VHL. Jaromir Lemiuex who was also given up in the deal was a rookie coming off a spectacular rookie season in which he was third in rookie scoring with 50 points and was a contender for the Stolzschweiger trophy which is awarded to the league's rookie of the year. Unfortunately Lemiuex has vanished from the VHL hockey scene and is currently considered an inactive player, hence why Moscow could all of sudden want to part ways with him. 
 
When asked about how hard it was to trade Bowman away:
 
"It's usually quite difficult to trade away any active player, let alone someone who I rely on as my AGM and have a good relationship with. However, trading Bowman away in this instance was actually easier than you might imagine. We'd actually spoken about this quite a while ago, where he even brought up the idea of sending Bowman to another team for assets, or some cap help. Toronto was a great fit since they had no starting goaltender at all, so he'd get quite a large number of minutes which would be good for his development" 
-Spartan, Menace GM

 
The Acquisition of Rara Rasputin
@Victor
Once the UFA season came about it finally all made sense why the Menace was dropping all that salary. They were planning all along to make a free agency pitch to bring back goaltender Rara Rasputin who the Menace drafted 16th Overall back in Season 75 before trading him after his rookie season to Seattle in return for an older and more experienced netminder at the time Jacob Tonn. Rasputin of course then went on to have a pretty successful 4 seasons in Seattle and has won a Continental Cup and a Daisuke Kanou trophy with the Bears in S77 and has backstopped his team to three straight finals appearances. Rasputin like Glass is bringing in tons of playoff experience to a team who hasn't made the playoffs let alone play in them in a long time. This of course relegates Papa Emeritus to the backup role once again but @Beketov sees what's best for the team has been nothing but professional and accepting to his backup role.
 
When discussing the Rasputin trade the GM had this to add:
 
"We had our eyes on signing Rara Rasputin to the team from the time we knew he planned to leave Seattle. He was a former top pick by our organization years ago, and bringing him back in his prime was an opportunity we couldn't pass up. Unfortunately, we were in quite the cap bind, and our plan was to trade just Bowman and Lemieux away to make room for Rasputin. However, that would have left us with 5 forwards, 4 defensemen and 2 goalies, and we really wanted to run a proper 6-4-2. That meant that we had to send away Tristan and his $3 milllion cap hit and bring in two players on rookie contracts who would combine for $3 million - Johansson and Markov. A difficult decision to make, but one that was necessary for our organization, and also sets us up nicely for the future with two young players coming in to replace some veterans."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
All this playoff experience will be highly valuable to this young team and I think the odds of this team making the playoffs this season has greatly improved with this years additions. The Menace just didn't have much when it came to experience and our team was consistently cracking under pressure last year and moves were made to address the problem. Now it's up to the younger players on the team to take in as much as they can from these veteran leaders while they're here and apply the new found wealth of knowledge to their own games. If that happens this year, the Menace might finally be a real Menace to the VHL standings in S80.
 
@Spartan

Alright it's opening week of Season 80 and every VHL team has gotten around 8 or 9 games under their respective belts. The Malmo Nighthawks and the D.C. Dragons were expected to both be strong teams this year and it seems like both teams have made good on those expectations by starting out the year with the early lead of their respective conferences. The Dragons (6-2-0) are currently leading the North American Conference with 12 points and the defending champion Nighthawk team (8-1-0) is currently the top team in the league and are leading the European Conference with 16 points.
 
Some team's like the Toronto Legion and the Helsinki Titans however have only recorded a single win so far are showing early signs that they're going to have to go through a rough times this season. The Seattle Bears who lost in last year's finals against the Nighthawks haven't been much better than the Legion/Titans and have had quite the fall from grace since making the finals and are struggling out of the gate and have only managed to pick up a couple of wins so far this season. 
 
Then there's the Menace. After being a VHL bottom feeder for years the Menace have come flying out of the gate with a 7-1 record and a suddenly explosive offense. They are currently trailing the Nighthawks by only two points for top team in the league standings. This is such a drastic transformation has got the league talking and the Menace bringing on a bunch of new bandwagon fans.
 
The Menace team went through quite a few changes during the last offseason and were hoping to make more of a impact this year as they are chasing their first ever playoff berth in 4 seasons. Their GM, Spartan made a lot of moves to pick up core pieces for his team during the last few years and I bet he's really hoping that those moves start paying off for him, now. Today I'll be highlighting Spartan's offseason changes to his Menace squad and I'll be touching base with him to gain some insight on some of these moves straight from the source.
 
Trading Kyle Glass for Kevin King
@Tbeez99 @IamMOOSE
Yeah yeah I know this wasn't a offseason move, but I felt I should talk about this trade deadline acquisition anyways since it did affect a future move made by the team. The Menace acquired veteran centerman Kevin King from the London United as well as a third round selection in S81 in return for a younger winger in Kyle Glass. Glass was drafted in 22nd Overall by Moscow in the S77 draft and wasn't getting much ice time with the Menace and was having a poor year scoring only 20 points in 62 games and going -10. He was given a change of scenery and has since broke out with the United team scoring 23 points in 21 games. King at the time of the trade was already a PPG player scoring 67 points in 59 games for London. Moscow's chances to make the playoffs were on the verge of being over and King who only had another season left to his career was a last ditch effort by the Moscow GM to make a cinderella run to a playoff berth. That obviously didn't work out as King only scored a single point for the Menace and went -3 to close off the year. At this point you just gotta hope that King still has enough left in the tank to return to form for his last season in the VHL.
 
Acquiring Tyler Walker
@Advantage
Spartan didn't fuck around and the day the trade freeze was lifted he made his first move of the off season and acquired veteran defender Tyler Walker in return for a third round selection in the S80 draft. Walker is a veteran of 7 VHL seasons and spent his last two years playing for the Calgary Wranglers before the trade. The Menace will be the fourth and last team he will play on as this will be his last season before retirement as he's been in the league a while and Walker will soon find himself needing a walker himself cus he's old as shit. Walker showed last season that he can still play at a elite level and is coming off a 62 point season playing on a mediocre Wrangler's team. Walker definitely improves this team as Moscow is still for the most part a younger team and veterans like Walker might be needed to push this team to the next level. Also, for the last few seasons the Menace has been pretty thin on the blueline and adding Walker to the group of Bob Tristan, Hard Markinson and Aurelien Moreau might now make this one of the best bluelines in the league.
 
Trading away King for Lexi Glass
@AW13
Remember that King guy I talked about earlier? Well turns out he didn't end up staying in Moscow after that 9 game trial run at the end of S79. Shortly after the Walker trade went down, King along with a 3rd rounder was traded to Warsaw in return for winger, Lexi Glass who is a year younger than King. A good thing to note is that Glass is a player that  has already played a total 67 career playoff games and has won the Continental Cup in S78 so Moscow is getting a boat load of playoff experience in this trade. Also this is a player that was just a single point shy from reaching the 100 point milestone last year. What Moscow is getting here is a prime time elite winger that knows how to win games and they only gave up a player that just wasn't gelling with the Menace's style of game for some odd reason. Hopefully Glass can experience a hell of a season here in Moscow and I hope we can convince her to stay here for another year after this one. 
 
Trading away captain Tristan for Johansson:
@N0HBDY @Gwdjohnson
All of a sudden, out from left field the Menace decided to surprise all their fans by continuing the habit of trading away their captains by trading Bob Tristan to Los Angeles in exchange for a cheaper defender in Arvid Johansson. This left people scratching their heads as Tristan was a vocal member of the team's locker room atmosphere. Spartan assured his team to have patience and that more moves were in the works and a drop in salary was necessary for future plans. Still Tristan will be missed as he was a steadying presence on a rather poor blueline for a few years while the team was going through their hard rebuild years. Still Johansson is no slouch he plays a very responsible game and already has the composure level of a VHL pro despite being a young defender. Johansson just finished out a solid rookie campaign with the L-A Stars scoring 29 points and going +24. Johansson still has time to grow as a player where Tristan was pretty much at his peak so this wasn't a bad trade to make at all. Yeah it's a slight downgrade but it might be a good move for the team long term and who knows Johansson with hard work can always end up becoming a better defender than Tristan ever was. After seeing how Moscow has the tendency to trade their captains I'm convinced the captain's seat in Moscow is in fact cursed and if that's the case new captain Philip Stein should be looking to sell his home in Moscow soon enough. 
 
When asked about the Menace Captaincy curse:
 
"I've joked around a bit that the captain role is a curse on this team, and I suppose there is some merit to it. The last time I named a defenseman, Fat Palloon, as team captain in S76, he was traded to Prague mid-season in exchange for cap relief and future assets. The captaincy in Moscow generally works in a simple way, where one of the longest tenured, active members of the team receives the C. It's been that way since before I even took over this team. It also sort of works in a negative way, since older players with a lot of tread on their tires end up as prime candidates for trades to acquire more draft picks, and to free up cap space."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
Trading away Bowman and Lemiuex to Toronto:
@BrutalBoost @hockeyis66
This big trade didn't involve the acquisition of anybody really it was more of a move to get rid of a few contracts to free up some cash to make a gamble on some other moves and maybe acquire a UFA or two. The contracts the team decided to part with was Andrew Bowman and Jaromir Lemiuex and this trade must've hurt to make as Bowman is the AGM here in Moscow and this move must've tugged at some of Spartan's heart strings. But it ain't all bad. With S79 1st Overall pick, Papa Emeritus surpassing Bowman in TPE , Bowman was going to be relegated from the team's starting role to that of the backup. This trade gives Bowman a chance to continue being a starting netminder in the VHL. Jaromir Lemiuex who was also given up in the deal was a rookie coming off a spectacular rookie season in which he was third in rookie scoring with 50 points and was a contender for the Stolzschweiger trophy which is awarded to the league's rookie of the year. Unfortunately Lemiuex has vanished from the VHL hockey scene and is currently considered an inactive player, hence why Moscow could all of sudden want to part ways with him. 
 
When asked about how hard it was to trade Bowman away:
 
"It's usually quite difficult to trade away any active player, let alone someone who I rely on as my AGM and have a good relationship with. However, trading Bowman away in this instance was actually easier than you might imagine. We'd actually spoken about this quite a while ago, where he even brought up the idea of sending Bowman to another team for assets, or some cap help. Toronto was a great fit since they had no starting goaltender at all, so he'd get quite a large number of minutes which would be good for his development" 
-Spartan, Menace GM

 
The Acquisition of Rara Rasputin
@Victor
Once the UFA season came about it finally all made sense why the Menace was dropping all that salary. They were planning all along to make a free agency pitch to bring back goaltender Rara Rasputin who the Menace drafted 16th Overall back in Season 75 before trading him after his rookie season to Seattle in return for an older and more experienced netminder at the time Jacob Tonn. Rasputin of course then went on to have a pretty successful 4 seasons in Seattle and has won a Continental Cup and a Daisuke Kanou trophy with the Bears in S77 and has backstopped his team to three straight finals appearances. Rasputin like Glass is bringing in tons of playoff experience to a team who hasn't made the playoffs let alone play in them in a long time. This of course relegates Papa Emeritus to the backup role once again but @Beketov sees what's best for the team has been nothing but professional and accepting to his backup role.
 
When discussing the Rasputin trade the GM had this to add:
 
"We had our eyes on signing Rara Rasputin to the team from the time we knew he planned to leave Seattle. He was a former top pick by our organization years ago, and bringing him back in his prime was an opportunity we couldn't pass up. Unfortunately, we were in quite the cap bind, and our plan was to trade just Bowman and Lemieux away to make room for Rasputin. However, that would have left us with 5 forwards, 4 defensemen and 2 goalies, and we really wanted to run a proper 6-4-2. That meant that we had to send away Tristan and his $3 milllion cap hit and bring in two players on rookie contracts who would combine for $3 million - Johansson and Markov. A difficult decision to make, but one that was necessary for our organization, and also sets us up nicely for the future with two young players coming in to replace some veterans."
-Spartan, Menace GM
 
All this playoff experience will be highly valuable to this young team and I think the odds of this team making the playoffs this season has greatly improved with this years additions. The Menace just didn't have much when it came to experience and our team was consistently cracking under pressure last year and moves were made to address the problem. Now it's up to the younger players on the team to take in as much as they can from these veteran leaders while they're here and apply the new found wealth of knowledge to their own games. If that happens this year, the Menace might finally be a real Menace to the VHL standings in S80.
 
@Spartan

Oh shit that's right. Never been first or last before this is new.  Kassper kankhonen

I'll keep this short and sweet. This really was a tough decision though, I'd give so many people on this team letters if I could.
 
First Alternate - The Seabasstard - @Seabass
 
Frankly, being in a 2C role isn't glorious, but yet Seabass continues to be a vocal presence in the LR and remains committed to a shared team goal. As a veteran of the league and a steady voice in the locker room, I find him crucial to the team and someone ideal to be an Alternate Captain!
 
Second Alternate - Duncan Idaho - @OrbitingDeath
 
No surprises here, an alternate last season continues to be an alternate this season. Easily the best player on the team right now, and someone we'll be counting on to lead our offense on the ice this season and keep spirits high. Maybe we'll buy him a lego set he wants if we win a cup this season 👀.
 
Captain - Phillip Stein - @IHateBobNutting
 
Probably the easiest choice I'll ever make. Not the best earner, not the most active forum user, or the most involved around the league, but easily someone who leads the team in passion, drive and team spirit. He's always asking about the state of the team and keeping me honest, and performs superbly on the ice with literally anyone I line him up with. it's like STHS recognizes his leadership capability and shows it in his consistent statistical output. Sometimes, the most passionate guy is the right one for the job over the most qualified. It's certainly the case here. Congrats Phil!!!!!!!
 
Honorable Mention: I would have named @N0HBDY captain over the weekend but I knew he was getting traded on Monday. Appreciate everything you've done for the team as a player, and looking forward to all your contributions in the future as an advisor!

https://youtu.be/sTmkYlblSfc

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for a player to excise him/herself from a team, and in doing so create a hole in the back of the leadership of said team approximately the size of a Wusthof 6 inch hollow edge chef's knife, a decent respect to the interests of the league requires the recently-stabbed to declare the causes which impel them to the separation. 
 
I should know, it's happened to me twice.
 
The first is well-documented: I was GM of the Calgary Wranglers from S26 to S41. For much of the league's history, this was the record for longest GMing tenure - a fact that is laughable at the moment given how readily @hedgehog337 and @Banackock have turned such a run into child's play, but nonetheless it was true. I had a defenseman on my team by the name of Ryan Sullivan, @Advantage's player, and a GM spot became open in New York that he was a logical candidate for, so I traded him there for Skylar Rift, @Devise's player and someone I assumed would be my franchise goalie for the rest of his career. Goalies simply didn't move at the time barring complete shifts in team direction, or so it seemed. Not too long after that, however, I was not entirely on top of things contract-wise during the season and despite my efforts after the season ended, he left in FA (along with several other players from other teams to form somewhat of a powerhouse in Quebec, although some questioned the methods by which that team was built). I didn't know it at the time, but apparently he'd been planning to leave partway through the season, which would have been nice to know but he kept it close to the vest. 

Obviously that wound has long since healed as Devise remains one of my closest friends on the site to this day (and as was made clear in the ensuing decades, I was partially to blame for the whole thing in that particular case). It's in a 40 for 40, which for the most part has closed the book on that chapter, and it's now simply just another moment in history. I only bring it up here as it has relevance to another situation that just occurred hours ago. 
 
Apparently, I'm just a very stabbable person. 
 
This particular GMing run, as the inaugural GM of the Prague Phantoms, began in S68 when the team was created. As an expansion, we were terrible for some time, then got mediocre, then had a few promising years (one of which we deserved better from the sim, and were led in goal by a certain Brick Wahl, which will become important in the ensuing paragraphs). Nonetheless, it has not been a particularly successful go around, sim-wise anyway, but it's been much more fun because I've taken the success of the team with a grain of salt and instead have focused more on generating a good team atmosphere and a place people want to play, especially if they've already done so once before and liked it at the time. There have been a lot of people I've gotten to know well over this run, from the only member I've now GMed on both teams @Doomsday, to multi-league veterans such as @Sharkstrong, @omgitshim and @Cornholio, to guys that have been around in this league for varying lengths of time such as @animal74, @Seabass, @Fire Vigneault, and @wcats. Many of you know, however, that I have a tendency toward promising first gens. It's why I've ultimately always been more at home in the VHLM in some capacity, whether as GM or as a commissioner. I've played a proud role in bringing a lot of guys their first experience with the league - for example, one of the guys I GMed in Ottawa before taking Prague is now sitting beside me in the other commissioner seat ( @McWolf ) and it's always a pleasure to work with him. For Prague itself, it's been a lineup of guys that in many cases have gone on to do quite a bit for themselves here, the most prominent current example being @Domg5, but along with that there's @Gaikoku-hito, @JB123, @Baby Boomer, @Mistxh J and many more. Apologies if your name's not here, I don't think anyone wants to just read off a list of names. My point is that I've gotten to know a lot of people, most of whom I consider friends in some capacity.

Then there's @BladeMaiden.  Someone who started off as a bit of a thorn in my side during her run as GM of the Philadelphia Reapers, but whatever you thought of her methods, she had a passion for that team that was unmatched and I was always grateful for that, whatever the result. Yes, there were times where that passion may have resulted in a few questionable methods, but ultimately the M is about getting people interested and then letting them blossom into good solid members in the bigs, and she was always reliable for that. She's polarizing as hell, probably one of my biggest opposites in that sense (it took me some time to decide to sit down and write this because I fear for the blowback, but ultimately decided I should get something out of the situation in any case) and a lot of people are not entirely fans of hers or weren't early on especially. I've never been in that group. I respected the hustle in the Philly years while not always encouraging the things that happened, and since then, I've developed a friendship enough that I've always wanted to have her around in some capacity, even more so if she's on my team. @rjfryman may have had the winning bid in EFL to get her to come back here and create Thightrap, but it was not for lack of trying on my part (and I could have gone higher, had RJ not had the same goal as I did, which was to bring her back here in particular). She obviously has her group of close friends here, but I count myself among that number. 
 
When the S74 draft came, I had the 4th pick. I was a bit tunnel visioning at the time, I'd convinced myself I was going to draft Blade come hell or high water. As talks wore on ahead of the draft, it became clear 4th would not in fact be high enough, and so I began to try to move up. Ultimately this was futile, no teams were budging, and in fact I had an offer from Warsaw to move to 1st overall that was ridiculous and would have broken my team ( @.sniffuM had already committed to who he wanted with that pick and did not want to go back on his word, which is certainly respectable - the offer was something in the neighborhood of 2 1sts and 2 2nds to move up 3 spots). The fact that I actually thought about the offer for more than 10 seconds tells you all you need to know about how badly I wanted this to work. Ultimately I traded down instead, managed to land Flyers' player at 8th, and certainly came out of that draft looking much better than I would have without all those extra picks I could have given away. When a former commissioner coming off of a hall of fame player falls in your lap, it makes it much easier to accept not getting the player you wanted. 
 
Several seasons later, I'd managed to acquire Thightrap via a trade with Seattle (and anyone who's been in the league for more than half a season knows the type of price that involves) for what at the time seemed like it would be the rest of her career. Three seasons, admittedly marred a bit by the fact that they'd be seasons of depreciation, but this was a good enough player to take the hit just fine. She was only signed for one more at the time of the trade, but surely securing an extension would not be a problem for a friend? Especially when early on she'd asked if 2 seasons would be enough value rather than 3 intending at that time to retire early, but basically just assuming as though things would be with Prague. This would be fine, right? Not remotely an issue? Right? Bueller? Bueller?
 
When the blade slipped in, somewhere between the 6th and 7th thoracic vertebrae, it felt numbing at first. Like a slight tickle. Once the shock wore off, there was much screaming, many tears, and a long hard talk of reconciliation, but it happened nonetheless. I was backstabbed a second time. This time, however, I'm convinced none of the blame was my own - she would tell you the same, frankly. Extension talks began plenty early, I'd sent an offer weeks ago, an offer which she says she never saw (I'm not sure if that was a glitch in the site, or if she did see it and just didn't take it, or what have you). As things got closer, a slight doubt crept into the back of my mind, but I never actually doubted this would get done. Then it didn't. She went right back to Seattle, taking my picks with her. 

Then, like the first stab wasn't enough... she wanted to be removed from the discord. The claim was something about the team needing space to vent and it would be easier to be mad about it if she wasn't there. Sure, that sounds reasonable enough, but not if you know my discord. We're the type of environment where once you're a part of us, you're a part of us for good, as long as you remain in the league (unless you specifically indicate wanting to be removed, but even then that's generally been for people who have been there for a season or so). The term is not for everyone, and I don't really remember who coined it, but there's a reason people have called us the "Phamily" - you don't just stop being a Phantom just because your player has. This request, to me anyway, hurt as much if not more than her player leaving in FA. It also didn't last long. I'd initially compromised and moved her to Alumni (where she would not see the team section, where much of the chat is) but had already been talking to her in discord PM for some time at that point, and once I'd expressed just how not ok I was with that decision, she's back in. It lasted a whole 15 minutes. A body is a whole thing - you can't just cut off your arm, leave it sit out for a while, and then reattach it (unless under very specific circumstances, including a lot of ice, before @Renomitsu the doctor comes in here and corrects me). In any case, this time the fallout has actually gone much quicker, and while I'm still feeling a bit of a fresh wound, Blade and I are already back on good terms, and things are perfectly fine on that end. I'm not willing to lose a friend over a hockey sim, even if it would be easy to do so right now. Blade is a firecracker, far more impulsive than I'd ever be, but that's also a good thing. The world needs some people like that. If everyone was like me, quiet and unassuming, we'd never make any progress. 

However, there is one thing that has come of this. It's arguably been some time coming now, and has been somewhat in the back of my mind, but this has, shall we say... accelerated the timeline. I will not be stabbed a third time. I like to keep my friends as friends, and not think poorly of them, even if only for an afternoon. Therefore, the current plan is that season 80 will be my final season as GM of Prague. I will remain VHLM Commissioner, the role that enables me to do more good for a wider array of people and to help fuel the league with new members who enjoy this strange and wild trip we call a league. Obviously the decision as to my replacement  will come primarily from the blue team, as it has always been, but my recommendation as of this moment (and assuming I'm not talked out of the decision, which I don't see as likely) would be @Acydburn - prior to McWolf, he stood by my side as my fellow VHLM Commissioner and has now taken the same role in the VHLE. He's been Prague's "unofficially official" since day 1, and would have been my inaugural AGM instead of Zoiderberg had he not already been GM of Ottawa (coincidentally the team I'd GMed up to that point). There is no one here I'd rather see get a spot, and frankly it's been a long time coming, if the blues do in fact decide to give him the position. 

2,172 words. 4 weeks of claim. 

Good luck in L-A @N0HBDY best of luck to ya

News has come out that Moscow Menace player, The Seabasstard has decided that he won't be taking a COVID-19 vaccine prior to the VHL's 79th Season. You would think that decision would put his season in jeopardy but the VHL has yet to implement it's own Covid protocol policies so it'll be more like business as usual and the Seabasstard will report to training camp. Now why on earth would he not take the vaccine in order to protect himself and his team mates? The Seabasstard's answer was just a simple "I just don't feel like it and that's my right. My body my choice."
 
The Seabasstard's choice is a selfish one considering he's not protecting himself against a virus that could completely derail his team's season if ever a infection on the team would occur. Some of the VHL's host countries are also implementing some sort of Covid passport system, will The Seabasstard even be able to travel with the team? His decision is a dumb one and the Menace are hoping they can get the Seabasstard to reconsider his decision for his team's and his career's sake. 

Depends I guess. I just recently got into Warhammer. Spend a lot of time painting, building, playing.

It's always been a meme that I would do my own draft streams, but I think last night I showed that I'm able to do actually do streams. After the 3rd round last night the stream was reduced to silence, as eno would rather go play league instead of doing the stream he said he'd do. I'll learn how to stream and do it all myself with guests next season.

Welcome to the team @AW13 lets go kill it out there

Moscow receives:
Lexi Glass

Warsaw receives:
Kevin King
S80 LDN 3rd


This trade has been accepted by all parties and is pending league approval.

Calgary receives:
S80 MOS 3rd

Moscow receives:
Tyler Walker


This trade has been accepted by all parties and is pending league approval.

Hey Everyone!
 
So, this will probably come as a shock to most of you, but I haven't really been around much lately. I touched a bit on this when we announced Al as the newest Commissioner, which was 2 months ago, that I was going through some changes in my personal life that meant less time for the league. Initially, this was meant to be temporary, as I settled into a new phase in my career, hoping to return to full activity as a part of the Commissioner team in this great community that I've devoted thousands of hours to over the past decade and a half. However, after a couple of months, it's become clear that I will no longer be able to put in the time necessary to be a contributing member of the Commish team.
 
It's been a wild ride, and I'll be forever grateful for the opportunity to be a part of the leadership in the VHL. Thank you to everyone I've interacted with for being part of the journey, and if I haven't interacted with you, thank you, as well, if for nothing other than being part of the league.
 

In all honesty, much respect to the Bears. You guys made the adjustments and had us worried. You guys had a great season and I'm sure you'll be back for more.
 
Valtteri Vaakanainen @Jubo from one captain to another, you played a hell of a series and led your team by example with heart and grit. We fought twice this series and it was an honor to drop the gloves with you. I respect you and admire your career and leadership and enjoyed our battles over the last few seasons. Enjoy retirement. 

Hi! I'm new here and i'm loking for a club and some friends to help me to be better at the game!

Well here's to another long offseason. My team didn't make the playoffs this year so I'm just here waiting for the next season to begin and I haven't really been paying much attention to the VHL this past couple weeks. Don't worry i'm still active and claiming tpe, I'm just a little bored of always missing the playoffs. I mostly missed the playoffs with my last player's career and it appears like I'm on track to do much of the same with The Seabasstard. 
 
In my last week's VHL.com article I was hoping that my player would be ejected from every game in the VHL Lottery Tournament as we didn't own our first pick and I didn't want to be doing Toronto no favors. However my player had a different idea and finally decided to actually play good hockey for the first time in his career and lead the Menace in the tournament with 13 points in 10 games. The fuck dude why now? Why can't you do that in the regular season?
 
The Seabasstard should've been called The Seabassturd because he's a fucken turd. 

I have been away for a bit to go on a week long backpacking trip and I returned to find out that my team's season is now over as they didn't make the playoffs. I also didn't have as good of a finish to the season as I would've hoped only picking up 44 points for the year.  For a top 6 forward I'm sure that my GM @Spartan expects more than 40 points out of me. Truth is I don't really know what I'm doing wrong with my player build wise and I have the odd feeling that The Seabasstard's career may forever be doomed to mediocrity. Maybe I added too much tpe to strength for it to be useful for a 5'10" player and I probably should've used that tpe to improve my puck handling some more instead. Maybe it's a lack of chemistry with my team mates? Who knows but it just ain't working out for me or my team mates at the moment and what makes missing the playoffs even worse is that we don't own our first this year and it's going to be a lottery selection.

1.More like what didn't go wrong? We didn't get to meet expectations this year and failed to improve over last season, if we knew exactly what went wrong we probably wouldn't be in this situation.
 
2. He's another veteran forward that should bring experience to our young team. 
 
3.I'll just go get myself ejected from every game not worth playing to give another team a better selection.
 
4. I wouldn't mind seeing the Wranglers do some damage this year. 
 
5. I'm not too sure, probably my puck handling as it needs to be refined a bit. Else than that i'm not sure what i'm doing wrong with my player. 
 
6. Idaho hands down. 

Player Information
Username: Beaviss
Player Name: Maximus Decimus Meridius
Recruited From: Returning
Age: 42
Position: RW
Height: 71 in.
Weight: 175 lbs.
Birthplace: Spain

Player Page
@VHLM GM

Late to this but I also played with all four of you and there are none more deserving to be enshrined in the rafters forever Phantoms. You were all fantastic players, fantastic teammates, and the epitome of the Prague #Phamily. Much love to all four of you and a hearty congratulations @Doomsday, @omgitshim, @Cornholio, & @Seabass! 💜

The banners have all been added to Prague's Retired Numbers. Congratulations to all of the players.

I very much appreciated my time in Prague and I consider it an honor to have my player's jersey retired by the franchise. I got drafted by the Phantoms during their inaugural year and have got the pleasure of seeing this expansion franchise grow into what it is today. Just wish I could've helped bring more success to the team during my stay.
 
  I also got to play with every name retired today during my 7 year stay in Prague and that's what made the team special in my mind, it was the teammates I got to play with. I loved my team, we had a good locker room going there and a lot of us got to play together for a real long time. 
 
Congratulations to my other Phamily members who also was also fortunate enough to get their jerseys retired.  @Cornholio  @omgitshim  @Doomsday