CowboyinAmerica

Hans Wingate Takes a Bow The veteran goaltender discusses the personal TPE goals he's passed This is likely to be the last official six-point media for Hans Wingate. Why? Well, why not? Currently at 1,153 TPE, Wingate has earned at least the cap of nine points every single week since the trade deadline of Season 41. That’s nothing to take lightly. And that trend’s going to continue for at least a while, too – Wingate has four banked free weeks before he needs to start taking welfare. All of that TPE has gone a long way, as Wingate has had 99’s in all of the important attributes since very shortly into his fifth season. And, thanks to 75 banked points, he’s only 45 TPE from already being able to keep that record into his final season as well (following expected Old But Not Forgotten and Jaromir Jagr store purchases). At times, Wingate’s play hasn’t lived up to his TPE level; just look at Season 47, or even this year’s World Cup. However, Wingate’s career was always about more than play on the ice for me. It was a personal challenge to see what I could accomplish if I dedicated myself to working as hard as I could. And in the process, I blew by three TPE goals I set for myself before the start of Wingate’s career. 843 TPE This was my previous high in the VHL, with my last player Karsten Olsen. (Strangely, the Hall of Fame list has him at 829, but his player page says differently.) Olsen had a thoroughly underwhelming career, never even making the finals in 7.5 seasons with Seattle and a half season in Cologne. Part of that was due to a self-imposed sabbatical I took from sim leagues while I studied for the LSAT and GRE, and for the limited time my girlfriend still had in Chicago before going to a master’s program out of state. But even with Olsen not reaching his potential, I still was happy with the way his career turned out. A few top fives in scoring is not too bad overall, and he still was the centerpiece to some teams that made conference finals. Plus, I’m still with said girlfriend and used those GRE scores to get into business school, so I can’t be too angry about my decision, either. 963 TPE My first ever player sim league was the MSFL, which I joined back in April 2006. That lasted about two months before Iceman self-imploded and deleted the boards. Then, when the MSFL was reborn with the not-so-clever name MSFL_Reborn, I was able to get in on the ground floor. Originally as a tight end for the Guatemala Geckos and fighting with our own Knight and Irishbucsfan for Tight End of the Year, I established my love for sim leagues. Ultimately, I would be a Head Grader, Commissioner, and other roles for the league before it would die roughly two years later. At the time, I thought my personal record of 963 TPE would not be broken. I was in high school during that league after all, and I would never have that same amount of free time again. Plus, leagues die so quickly that even if I had the time, the league would not last long enough for me to do so. Honestly, I think the drive to beat this record, knowing that the VHL was stable, is what drove me to be fully active here in the first place. I’ve made no secret that I’m not as huge of a hockey fan as others, but the challenge, the community, and the history here are what make it fun for me. 1000 TPE “I'd say 85% or so that you end up being a great player and none of this ever matters (in fact, if forced to put money down on you either beating or falling short of Olsen's total, I'd bet on you beating it). However, that's still 15% more than people who have been here through entire cycles. It's risk reward, you're 85% going to produce a guy with 800+, and probably a 50-50 bet to be 1000. 15% of the time, you might go for a much smaller amount. Unlikely, but we at least know the possibility is there. Do you go with that, or do you go with a guy who might only end up being 700 or so, but is 97% to be there?” - Diamond_Ace, S43 Draft Discussion Thread In retrospect, this is hilarious, seeing how those sure things such as Jamie and Muffins fell off. Delicious has gotten nowhere close to 700 TPE, and Faux, although close at 671, has been largely inactive in recent times. Other than myself, the only S43 draftees with a solid shot at 700 are two newcomers, Ruutu (already passed) and Christmas (at 608). Still though, I’m not particularly good at being told that I can’t do anything. Even with hedging his bets and saying I was a 50/50 shot, I absolutely took D_A’s words here as a slight, just as I took New York’s passing on me and Riga’s creating a GM goalie as a slight as well. I think that I’m best under pressure and with something to prove, and even if not the most overt fuel, I certainly took it as a challenge. To me, there’s always been too much an emphasis on what somebody has done previously, even as I know I likely fall into that category moving forward. Give me the person that seems dedicated and has something to prove every day. The Future Wingate’s not retiring any time soon; it’s my full intention to play in Season 50 World Cup, then wait to recreate until the Season 51 trade deadline for the S53 Draft. With that in mind, I have two full regular seasons and next offseason to maximize his TPE. At my going rate of about 150 TPE per full season, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Wingate hit 1300 TPE; I honestly expect him to be third all-time in TPE behind Karnage and Tukio when all is said and done (and wouldn’t be surprised if Phil pushes me down from there). Wherever I land on the final list, though, it wasn’t the ultimate goal. The TPE goals and making the Hall of Fame was all I wanted from Wingate, and I did everything in my power to get both. For the latter, after two Shaws, two Continental Cups, two Playoff MVPs, and two World Cup gold medals after six seasons, I’m feeling pretty good about my chances. Wingate’s had a fun career, and I can say with complete confidence that I’m satisfied with all I’ve accomplished with him.

Just my opinion again but:

I'd personally like a two team expansion at the start, if for nothing else because you're hopefully going to see a massive influx of players at the beginning and I want those new players to have ample playing time and be sold on the idea. Also agree with I think Devise that it should be VHLM teams promoted, but not Moscow because that team doesn't have much non-Vasteras history.

Looks pretty damn similar to what my goals were for Wingate. Best of luck

Aww. No CLEGANEBOWL in the knockout round.

What the hell, Wingate. Oh well, a win's a win. Onward!

That's basically where I'm at on it, as somebody who would probably do one. I'm all for super active people, and 2 all-stars on separate squads over a 12-14 team league wouldn't make that much of a dent.

Funny enough, I view these two as related. Take three random TPE whore members, and if their players are staggering, three of them are probably on rookie deals. If, say, those 3 members have 3 players in their 3rd year and 3 players in their 6th year, you've got one hell of a base there at a lower cost because of the rookie deals. For a real life example, see Phil, Victor and Draper all signing their older dudes to Helsinki after the S45 draft. (I don't think it's a back-breaking thing for this suggestion btw, but the thought certainly isn't outlandish.)

The one issue I could see personally is that it makes it kind of a nightmare for updaters that don't have both players. Would be helpful for the Welfare head to make some sort of weekly master list to make sure only one player per member claimed Welfare in that case.

If we end up playing the Mercs in a gold or bronze medal game, I'm 100% cool with a CLEGANEBOWL rematch.

What I'd probably end up doing is having one PT and one welfare player at a time in this case. Or stagger them so my younger player always receives more TPE when it's more useful at the beginning of his career, and let my older dude do welfare.

Only time I would is if everybody definitely has off on Friday as well. Like, I don't think it's a bad idea if your wedding's on a Saturday and you're giving a day to shake off the hangover (though I prefer just the weekend before if you're not bringing people from out of town), but I'd want to make sure I didn't have to work the next day.

A potential World/Europe semifinal would be a great one. Just remember to take the advice here and put me back in the starting lineup @Phil

PMed you guys about this previously but since S49 thread isn't going up: Player Name: Hans Wingate VHL Team: Toronto Legion Cash you have: $23.5 M (with S49 cash) Purchase Name: Jaromir Jagr, for Hand Speed Cost of Purchase: $6 M Cash Left: $17.5 M

GOT HYPED. WASN'T DISAPPOINTED.

Which is funny, because last year I told everyone not to copy off me because I didn't know what I was doing... and got 11

1. Thank you to all for voting me Playoff MVP! But... 2. Eh. Don't wanna go that negative. Good job to all.

Thing is though, I think expansion would have to be necessary. That was the point I was going to make before I saw the last couple posts - I actually don't like the idea of having four full lines at all, even if it corresponds with a new sim engine. You have people as it is not happy about time on ice; well, you're about to see that decreased by about one-third for the top players, by half of more for the players/members further down the depth chart. For me personally, it would be much more fun to have one player at 30 minutes per game than two players at 15. Not to mention the issues of being further behind that YEAH raised. The GM thing is an issue as well, but kill/dramatically retool the VHLM... And yeah, I said it before, but still think that you'd be rushing into it. Until the S49 trade deadline? You know that's about a month, right? To finalize all new rules like salary cap and what to do about carryover that will need to be completely changed, figure out a plan for staggering new players if you want one, issues of expansion that are raised here, and how exactly you're going to leverage all of this into a recruitment plan that actually does something. The BOG argues for multiple months about whether an Offensive and Defensive Defenseman of the Year award is necessary, and you tell me all of this is going to be resolved in a sound way that quickly?

*clears throat* Oh, don't mind me. Just getting ready to yell about the Shaw.

Here you are after Round 2, with the Top 10 tagged. Velevra starting to pull away from the pack. Strangely, @Da Trifecta had the best score in Round 2, but he didn't put in a Round 1 guess so... About 8 hours left to get in Round 3 scores, make sure to do that! *cough* @diamond_ace *cough* @Velevra - 86 + 44 = 130 @DollarAndADream - 76 + 43 = 119 @Smarch - 70 + 44 = 114 @gregreg - 69 + 42 = 111 @STZ - 67 + 41 = 108 @flyersfan1493 - 61 + 46 = 107 @der meister - 60 + 46 = 106 @JardyB10 - 86 + 20 = 106 @jRuutu - 74 + 31 = 105 @boubabi - 70 + 34 = 104 @Molholt - 73 + 31 = 104 CowboyinAmerica - 68 + 34 = 102 Kendrick - 68 + 33 = 101 banackock - 73 + 26 = 99 Green - 70 + 24 = 94 eaglesfan036 - 59 + 34 = 93 Mr. Power - 62 + 29 = 91 Phil - 47 + 44 = 91 Victor - 62 + 28 = 90 diamond_ace - 88 Boom - 67 + 19 = 86 ADwyer87 - 54 + 31 = 85 Dangles13 - 51 + 34 = 85 Jala - 69 + 14 = 83 Beketov - 49 + 33 = 82 Solas - 40 + 41 = 81 fever95 - 60 + 14 = 74 gorlab - 73 Gregy - 69 Draper - 69 Streetlight - 47 + 19 = 66 Daniel - 65 Eggy216 - 60 Da Trifecta - 54 YEAH!stlemania - 51 atw2592 - 50 Stevo - 47 Higgins - 44 JPL - 32 jjdynamite - 32 701 - 21 And for fun (for me), who picked the teams left alive as champions: Pittsburgh - ADwyer87, diamond_ace Tampa Bay - CowboyinAmerica St. Louis - Nobody Nashville - Nobody

It's all good. This point still stands on its own.

User Name: CowboyinAmerica EASTERN CONFERENCE (A2) Tampa Bay vs (M2) Pittsburgh Winner: Tampa Bay # of Games: 6 WESTERN CONFERENCE (C2) St. Louis vs (P3) San Jose Winner: San Jose # of Games: 6

Pretty sure I didn't say that, or if I did it was in the context of career playoff shutouts (which is true)

Well that'll be what my next player's for