Jubis

Similar to last week's but was asked to do them in this style ?
 

Or 21, depending on how you see it. (1260?(75600?))
 
 
The World Juniors first of two round robin... rounds, are well underway, and the first round robin is almost finished. After seven, Canada is 3-4-0, tied for third place with Team World, however, team world has one less win (but two overtime losses), so have a lower regulation win%. Anyways, let us analyze the games, and along the way i'll try to mention some interesting (and at times, frankly insane) statistics.
 
 
Game 1: World @ Canada  
Final Score: 3-4 SO, Canada wins. 
 
Through 20 minutes, Team World was up 2-0. It wasn't looking good for Canada, and world was outshooting Canada 13-6. However, after World scored a 3rd goal to 'strengthen' their lead in the third period, Canada, a nation famous for being the 'Comeback kids', did its thing. After two goals fueled by the playmaking ability of winger Kris Rice to finish off the second, Nate Telker tied it with a minute and a half left in the 3rd.  Finally, in the shootout after a goalless overtime, Canada's... D1 scored the winning shootout goal. Oops. 
 
Game 2: Canada @ World
Final Score: 1-4, World wins. 
 
Although Canada took the early lead, three horribly timed penalties later Canada was down 3-1, and Worlds solid defense availed them as Canada went goalless after their first goal, in the first period. 
 
Game 3: United States @ Canada
Final Score: 2-4, Canada wins.  
 
After an early goal five minutes into the game by the United States' team, they managed to hold their single tally lead until the third period (Including an insane second period where a total of five shots were registered between the two teams). However, quickly into the third, just two minutes by, Canada had their own single goal lead, fueled by two assists from RJ Jubis. The United States' managed to tie it, but with 50 seconds left Daldo, and a later empty net goal, Canada came out on top. In the third period, Canada had a 50% shooting percentage.
 
Game 4: Asia @ Canada
Final Score: 3-1, Asia wins. 
 
This was a fast paced, high energy game with low goal totals to show for it. The shot total's tell an interesting story, however. Canada managed to outshoot Asia in every period, but their goaltender Jimmy Spyro, who Canada passed on, was a brick wall. So it was, despite Canada's noble effort, with high possession level's, Asia came out on top holding the lead throughout the game, thanks to superior goal tending. 
 
Game 5: Canada @ Asia
Final Score: 3-5, Asia wins. 
 
A somewhat similar story to the previous game in Canada, while Canada had a decent amount of shots, Asias superior goal-tending and ability to cache in more often on their (high quantity of) chances won them the game. At it's closest point, Canada had it tied 9 minutes into the second. It was not to be, however, as Jerry Wang scored two goals within the span of 8 seconds, both goals assisted by the same faceoff: man Hiroshi Okada. 
 
Game 6: Canada @ Europe 
Final Score: 3-2, Canada wins. 
 
Another game in which Canada boasts a higher shooting percentage than its opponent, Canada held the lead all game. Although almost letting go of their lead letting Europe score two goals in the last eight minutes, Flashback managed to hold on and the team. Canada won noticeably less faceoffs and was less physical than Europe in this game, but capitalized more often, which lead to the win.
 
Game 7: Canada @ United Sates
Final Score: 0-4, United States win. 
 
This was a downright ugly game for Team Canada, because the game was nowhere near 'close'. Obviously, Canada was shutout, and at the end of the day that loss is what matters the most, but it goes deeper than that. Canada was outclassed by the United States on the shot chart by a whopping (USA) 40-21 (CAN). This was felt particularly hard in the first period, where Canada was outshot nearly five to one. Flashbacks respectable-ish 900% save percentage was not enough to save Canada, though. The next area Canada was outclassed in was Faceoffs, as the United States won 13 more faceoffs than Canada. While this particular statistic can be hard to interpret, since you may 'lose' a faceoff and gain the puck immediately afterwords, it's still telling of Canada's shortcomings at center. Canada was also outhit 22-13, and out shotblocked 12-9, which is highly impressive on the United States part considering Canada's lower amount of shots attempted, or so it would seem. The only area where Canada succeeded was discipline, only registering two penalty minutes the whole game. The United States' 3 penalties were never capitalized upon, however. 
 
 
Canada needs to win their final game, but not to make it to the second round.
While Canada is almost certainly going to make the second round of the round robin, Canada still needs to win that last game. Proving the haters wrong, and keeping morale high within the team will be important for Canada, since the second round is looking scary. Secondly, if team world leapfrogs Canada by some miracle, Canada will be stuck facing team Asia, which is almost certainly a death sentence, where Canada won't win a medal. Of course, it's not elimination, but every win counts a helluvalot. Canada is slated to face team Europe when the second round starts, atleast for now. These final four games, one of which Canada play's in will be a determining factor for the medal round. 
 
 
 
Although not as important, I'll also quickly touch on individual stats within Team Canada. Unsurprisingly, though interestingly, RJ Jubis leads the team with 7 points, Daldo leading - but tied with Telker - with 3 goals. Secondarily is Guy Sasakamoose, who has 6 pts. What is a surprise, however, is first line center Nate Telker. He's tied for goal lead with Daldo, but hasn't registered a single assist throughout the tourney. Canada is playing well all things considered, so it will be seen as to whether or not Telker will be demoted in favor of Rice. 
 
 
Obligatory team Canada tags @Jubis @Telkster @Krice13 @Viperxhawks19 @jared @Laflamme @Adil @Harpskii @InciteHysteria @Cxsquared @Jayden Zelinsky @uphillmoss @SlapshotDragon
 
 
1,030 words. Claiming for the weeks ending on the 15th and 29th of December, 2019. 
 
 
 

1. What is your birthday ?
 March 9, ????  
 
2. What starsign does that make you? 
 A Pisces  
3. What is your favourite colour?
Blue!! Always blue. As a kid in any 2 player games it's always red vs blue. I always picked blue. To this day blue is still my favourite colour.
 
4. Do you have a lucky number ? 
# 22 
 
9. If you were a super hero, what super powers would you have? 
Super strength and ability to fly 
 
12. Can you juggle? 
oh hell nah!!  Maybe once or twice but it would not look very gracefull. 
 
 

O'Quinn, McDagg, Telker, Jubis, Wolfe and Lafontaine - a very nice mix of current and former Houston and Saskatoon players.

@JohnOQuinn @Viperxhawks19 @Telkster @Jubis @Laflamme @SlapshotDragon

Oh my god I thought you'd never offer! 

Yes, yes, absolutely! Accepted! 

My dream team. I bleed Saskatoon! 

Prepare for total domination

*Canada wins in shootout* 
Nobody: 
Literally nobody on the planet Earth: 
Jubis: Prepare for total domination

Hello there everyone and welcome back to VSN content! This time we will be looking at WJC, teams and how they stack up to each other. Let's not waste much more time and get straight to question at hand - who are the strongest teams this season!
 
1. Europe

Lacking true star talent usually required to win such a tournament, the European roster boasts such an incredible depth that should allow them the come at their opponents in waves for the entirety of each game. The question is, will their goal-tending (leagues worst) get them the saves they need should their offence sputter?
 
Strength - Forward Talent
The clear strength of this European roster is its forward strength. With zero holes in their forward group, this team will be a machine that keeps on churning.  If Balentine Kidd (302 TPE), Mac Hooper (290) and Guy Lesieur (288) can find chemistry, the trio should be able to match any other lines production this tournament.   Combining that with the secondary scoring of guys like Tallinder (261), Stava, Roadkill Steve among others it’s hard not to choose them as the tournament favourites.
 
Weakness - Goal-tending
Boris Boris is not a high calibre goaltender. With just 141 TPE to his name, Boris will be tasked with just stopping enough pucks for the offence to outscore. Unfortunately for Boris, his defence group is lacking star power so unless Europe plays with the philosophy of the best defence is a good offence, Boris may find himself under attack. That’s a lot of pressure for a young goaltender.
 
2. World

Outside of Europe, the next three rosters are quite interchangeable and good team chemistry may end up being the difference. Placing our bets though one of them to be the best of the rest, the World’s roster holds enough promise to be challenging for a top spot. 
 
Strength - Defence
While the worlds forwards should be able to match most teams enough, and their depth up front should overcome other teams like Canada and Asia, it’s their team defence that holds the most promise. Led by Charles Drumm (310) and Khalabib Stiopic (286), this defence will be counted on to provide stability for a team hoping to contend. 
 
Weakness - Forwards
Unfortunately for the World roster, their Achilles heel, which might be too big to overcome, is their top talent upfront.  With Killey Foilen (258) as their best forward, and Storm (228), Ritchie (221), and McGirr (221) as their only other forwards above 200 TPE, the offence may be hard to come by. In a tournament where the offence is important, this may be the reason we’ve placed them too high.
 
3. Canada

Usually counted on as a staple atop this tournament, Canada has faltered a bit leaving itself much too vulnerable for team and fans alike. Although they have a few very good players still, Canada’s depth is sorely lacking. It will be the reason they won’t win this tournament and is definitely the reason we have them ranked in the middle of the pack.
 
Strength - Top Talent
With forwards Jubis (295), Telker (287), Rice (260), defenceman Saskamoose (336), and goaltender Fang Flashback (254), Canada has the top talent to remain a threat in this tournament. If they hold hope that they can compete here, they will lean heavily on this core group of players.  They will be required to grind out these victories but expect Canada to be in many close games. Their ability to win the close ones will be the deciding factor of their fortunes.
 
Weakness - Forward Depth
For what Canada has in top talent, the drop off after them is significant. With the best second-line player at 179 TPE and the best third liner at just 66, Canada has some serious depth issues. These secondary lines upfront will be tasked with just hanging in there against their opponents as they allow their top linemates some rest between shifts. Clearly, this may prove too much for them and is the reason we have them sitting as just the third-best team in the tournament.
 
4. USA

Another staple atop the hockey world, this USA roster has too many holes in their roster that will be increasingly difficult to overcome. While they have a few very talented players they lack any sort of offence to score enough for success.
 
Strength - Defense/Goal-tending
Though they might struggle to score, the USA has put together a decent defence that will be leaned on heavily along with potential goaltender of the tournament Virgil Ligric (348) to keep the puck out of their net.  With Shawn Glade Jr (199) being their “worst” defenceman, this defence corps should be among the tournaments best and possibly be enough to keep them in close games.
 
Weakness - Forward Depth
For how much depth USA has on the back end, their forward lines are in shambles. Outside star Koda Adok (346) and possibly Jaxon Walker (236) they have no one else that will contribute any offence. Though their drop off isn’t as significant here as Canada’s, USA is a spot lower on the rankings because they own the tournaments worst top line. If they aren’t shut out in multiple games this tournament, consider it to be a success.

5. Asia

No team in this tournament has a roster as polarizing as Asia’s.  With a star-studded top line of Roy Yamazuki II (328), Hiroshi Okada (324) and Jerry Wang (313), Asia’s roster is made up of eleven skaters sub 176 TPE and a poor goaltender (198). 
 
Strength - Top Line
With arguably the best line in this tournament, Asia could always be a surprise team should that line score its team out of trouble. Having three forwards above 300 TPE is a luxury no other team enjoys and so when they are on the ice, this team should at least be fun to watch. Will they be able to carry their team to some success this tournament?
 
Weakness - Everything else
Outside the big three, Asia has just one hole in its roster and it’s a big one. That’s because that one hole is the entirety of the rest of the roster.  Expect many goals to be scored in games Asia is playing in and unfortunately, most of those goals will end up in the back of the Asia net. Opposing teams should be able to walk all over the Asia defence and bury goal after goal in the back of their net. This is the reason Asia sits at the bottom of the rankings for this tournament. 
 
And that will be it for this one, tell us your thoughts in the comments and lets get ready for the championship!  
 
VSN Writer VanCanWin
 
(Posting this on his behalf)
 
People mentioned: @trevmi, @ShawnGlade, @TukTukTheGreat, @MacH, @KC15, @Patrik Tallinder, @Edustava, @stevo, @Walter Fizz, @Jubis, @Telkster, @Krice13, @frescoelmo, @Aye my name jeff, @BigBallerFromDownUnder, @DangerGolding, @cartoes, @Cxsquared, @uphillmoss, @MMFLEX, @hewasajazzman, @enigmatic, @ColeMrtz @Donno100, @SweetMike666

Last night, the GM of Team Canada @ the WJC's held the teams first practice in the leadup to the WJC Round Robin. The following lines are that which were observed by me, myself, and I. 
 
 
Offense
 
Line 1 - Kristopher McDagg - Nate Telker - RJ Jubis
 
Line 2 - Kris Rice - JaredN - Daldo
 
Line 3 - Damien Wolfe - Owen Kaitanaq - Adil Mahmood
 
 
Defense
 
Pair 1 - Guy Sasakamoose - David O'Quinn
 
Pair 2 - Jayden Zelinsky - Alyksander Hunter
 
 
Goaltending
 
Starter - Fang Flashback
 
Backup - Jacques Lafontaine
 
 
The most remarkable thing about this lineup is the inclusion of Kristopher McDagg on the first line instead of the second. Kris Rice is by all means better, but I would speculate that this decision was made to 'balance' the lines, as is often seen in the sport. While team Canada, this year, lacks the overwhelming top-end talent some of the other countries hold, Canada has depth, with not a horrible player anywhere on the team. Predictions have Canada winning a medal of some sort, but it remains to be seen whether or not depth will be enough for them to win anything, or just not be enough to stop the larger-in-scope Europe and World teams. Canada is powerful in the sport of hockey, but against all of Europe, one has to temper their expectations.
 
-Reporter Roger Pennies

Gold = CANADA
Silver= WORLD
Bronze= EUROPE 
MVP= Guy Saskamoose

Oh fuck ya

In association with the VHL, the VHLM, and the WJC Commissioners, I am proud to announce...
 
 
Youuuuuuuuuuur World Junior Championships Season 69
? Team Canada! ?
 
Forwards
RJ Jubis @Jubis
Nate Telker @Telkster
Kris Rice @Krice13
Kristopher McDagg @Viperxhawks19
JaredN @jared
Damien Wolf @Laflamme
Adil Mahmood @Adil
Daldo @Harpskii
Owen Kaitanaq @InciteHysteria
 
Defensemen
Guy Sasakamoose @Cxsquared
David O'Quinn @JohnOQuinn
Jayden Zelinsky @Jayden Zelinsky
Alyksander Hunter @Jaku
 
Goalkeepers
Fang Flashback @uphillmoss
Jacques Lafontaine @SlapshotDragon
 
All aformentioned member's have been PM'd with the LR invite. For the rest of you plebs, https://discord.gg/7BAMTpG
 

Ok so I'm on vacation this friday for the next 9 days. I am headed down to florida for some time in the sun. I do not want to lose out on any tpe so I will try and submit all my tasks this week and then just claim next week while on vacation. Let's dive into the topic I'd like to discuss.
 
Timing player creation or re-creation
Took me long enough to realize the advantages of the timing in which you decide to create your player. I joined the league August 31st or something. Which put me at the almost very end of the s69 draft class. Had I waited just 3 or 4 weeks I would have been bunched into the s70 class. I ended up entering the s69 draft at 212 TPE. If my math is correct had I waited for the s70 class. I would've been at 350-400 tpe for the s70 draft. Now I'm forever behind the top dogs of my draft class. No matter how consistent I stay. This extra TPE would have also allowed me to be more effective in my VHL rookie season.
 
This obviously is something I could just ask in Discord but then I can't claim 2 tpe for it. I have heard experienced members retiring their player mid season and re-creating during the trade deadline. I have 7 more seasons after this one before I will retire. Im not in a rush to retire anytime soon. RJ Jubis's  career is just beginning. I'm Just curious what is the best strategy for re-creating a new player after retiring an old one? 
Appreciate any tips or feedback! Thanks, 
Cheers,
 
 
 
 
 

I definitely feel that.  I think my player is the youngest member of the S69 draft class.  i created a few days before the deadline I think.  It was recommended to me in the discord to recreate since I wouldn't have done much yet.  For better or worse I decided to stick with the guy I had made.  Not knowing much about the league or if I would even stick with it, I didn't really know what kind of effect that would have.  I figured even if I don't end up a superstar that doesn't mean you can't contribute to the team.  We'll see how that works out I suppose.

Ok so I'm on vacation this friday for the next 9 days. I am headed down to florida for some time in the sun. I do not want to lose out on any tpe so I will try and submit all my tasks this week and then just claim next week while on vacation. Let's dive into the topic I'd like to discuss.
 
Timing player creation or re-creation
Took me long enough to realize the advantages of the timing in which you decide to create your player. I joined the league August 31st or something. Which put me at the almost very end of the s69 draft class. Had I waited just 3 or 4 weeks I would have been bunched into the s70 class. I ended up entering the s69 draft at 212 TPE. If my math is correct had I waited for the s70 class. I would've been at 350-400 tpe for the s70 draft. Now I'm forever behind the top dogs of my draft class. No matter how consistent I stay. This extra TPE would have also allowed me to be more effective in my VHL rookie season.
 
This obviously is something I could just ask in Discord but then I can't claim 2 tpe for it. I have heard experienced members retiring their player mid season and re-creating during the trade deadline. I have 7 more seasons after this one before I will retire. Im not in a rush to retire anytime soon. RJ Jubis's  career is just beginning. I'm Just curious what is the best strategy for re-creating a new player after retiring an old one? 
Appreciate any tips or feedback! Thanks, 
Cheers,
 
 
 
 
 

This guy has it right. While TPE numbers aren’t the be all end all that people treat them as if you absolutely want the most bang for your buck retiring and re-creating right at the deadline is the best strategy. You lose out on a few weeks at the end of your career for carryover but even if you aren’t capped out on that (requires 1250 TPE for the max carryover if I recall) the amount you’ll make between then and pre-season more than makes up for it. A deadline re-create gives you a couple of weeks worth of earning in the VHLM and an extra off-season (a small one mind you) before you even start your actual draft season. If your goal is absolute max TPE (again, not always the most important thing) then there’s no other strategy.
 
With that said, if you don’t go all 8 you need to consider what you are potentially doing to your team with a deadline retirement. Retiring in pre-season means your player stays in the roster for the season and they can use him as an asset. Retiring at the deadline precious to that off-season he’s retired at the end of the season and they can’t use him. Obviously an 8th season retirement doesn’t need to factor this in.

Always retire, and then immediately recreate, at the trade deadline. That's when you'll be a member of the next draft class.

It's been a longer term goal of mine to figure out what makes a line perform well. This is a pretty broad topic and one that I will probably have to do many write ups on to get a satisfactory answer, but to start I have to understand how lines are used in the VHL. 
 
Most teams have 2 lines worth of non-bot players. A few teams run with 3 lines like New York (who now are back to running 2 lines the past couple of games). Despite this, the STHS sim runs with 4 "normal" lineups and 2 lineups of each special teams type. This means some players will inevitably play on many lines and the VHL compensates for this by giving every player a 99 endurance rating. Or so I thought.
 
In my scrounging through STHS docs trying to figure out what all the little bells and whistles do in the sim, the first thing I needed to do was to understand the different versions of the simulation engine. There are four versions: 1.1, 1.5, 2.0, and 2.1. The gist of it is that 1.1 came first and is the O.G sim. 2.0 came next with a whole bunch of new features but the output was so random and gross that no one could use it. Then came 1.5 which took a few of the nice 2.0 features and added them to the 1.1 engine. 2.1 is essentially a bug fixed 2.0. As you can read here (and confirm here), one of the things added to 1.5 that is NOT present in 1.1 is the ability to control line strategies/time on ice. This is a feature that GM’s appear to be able to control and configure already due to the STHS client we use (check out our index) BUT in fact does not even impact the sim because we sim on the 1.1 engine (thank you to devise for confirming). If you continue reading that STHS forum post, some player stat categories from the 2.0 engine were added to 1.5 but not to 1.1, most notably EN (but also PS, which confirms the generally accepted idea around the forums that PS was a useless stat). All this being said, I’m not trying to say that it’s a bad thing to use the 1.1 engine. What it does mean is that we are at the mercy of STHS when it comes to how often each line gets used and when players become fatigued.
 

 
This begged the question: how are lines actually used in the VHL? The chart above shows the amount of "shifts" for each line across all teams in S69 so far (as of game 155). Here I've counted a "shift" as a line change parsed from the full play by play of the game logs where some event occurred in between. For example something like:
 
Normal Lineup #1 is on the ice for home team. Normal Lineup #1 is on the ice for away team. Player A shoots the puck. ... Normal Lineup #4 is on the ice for home team. Player B shoots the puck. Normal Lineup #2 is on the ice for away team. ... would be counted as one shift for home line #1 vs away line #1, one shift for home line #4 vs away line #1, and one shift for home line #4 vs away line #2. In particular, there is no time component being measured here (the first shift is almost certainly longer than the second shift in my example) which is a limitation, but my hope was that this type of thing would even-out in the long run.
 
As for the chart, the biggest thing that stands out is the higher amount of shifts for normal line 3 vs normal line 2. At first I thought there were bugs in my code, then I thought that this was one of those discrepancies between shifts and time played, but then I looked at SHTS which tracks minutes played for each player and separates out speciality teams minutes played (PP + PK). from even strength minutes. So I went to look for differences in even strength TOI between 3rd line players AND 2nd line players. This was not as easy as it sounds because almost every team has mixed their lines a bunch to this point. Fortunately for me, Toronto hasn’t. Legion LW Koda Adok has played all 26 games on the 3rd line and racked up 293 even strength minutes. Legion RW Matthew Kai has played all 26 games on the 2nd line and racked up 298 EV minutes. This might seem a bit cherry picked and anecdotal I guess, but the general pattern is pervasive; 3rd line players play pretty much the same amount of minutes as 2nd line players.
 
So the third line matters. I’d even go as far to say as it matters as much as the second line. Traditionally in hockey, this isn’t that unusual. But given the VHL’s limited amount of skilled players to put on lines I ask myself: “is it better to re-use your top guys on the third line or to play different, less skilled guys?”. I won’t attempt to answer that in this media spot because I don’t think I have the supporting data to answer it just yet. But it is something to keep in mind and would be curious if anyone else has any thoughts on the matter.
 
Ok, we now have a better idea about which lines are used and how often they are used on aggregate. What about their matchups? If you were trying to build the perfect “first line”, would you only have to worry about beating the other teams first line? Or would you have to account for matchups all over. The answer is that all lines eventually will play against all opposing lines, but some are much more frequent than others. Take a look at the charts below, the first showing even strength matchups and the second special teams matchups.
 

 
Some quick observations from these: 2nd lines do not regularly match up against other 2nd lines. I have no idea why this is, and perhaps most of these “off-line” matchups are short-shift ones but it still shows that a team will get many chances against your second line with their 1st and 3rd lines in a game, and it’s something worth accounting when building these lines. Even more interesting is how the third lines are used; just under two thirds of the time they are facing a higher line. If you're not going to stack the third line with your top guys, you better make sure they can at least defend well against them.
 
Looking at special teams matchups, the matchup differences become more subtle. Each #1 line plays a pretty fair share of time against the opposing #1 or #2 lines. One little insight I gained from this is that your 4v4 lines become your 4 on 3 power play lines when that situation arises (~7% of the time they play). Not sure if that warrants trying to make those lines a little more offensive or not.
 
I’ve well surpassed 1000 words now. Time to stop writing.
 
 
will claim for 12/1 and 12/8