TheFlash

Its just how it goes. It was the same thing last year.

Didnt look at prospects lol but I’ll take your word for it!

Any of these, especially Zurich

1. How do you feel about your player build at this moment in time? Very good. I've been earning steady and have had decent success in terms of my playing time 3. Who is your rival on another team? Always my man @leafssteen, can't wait until he's back in the starters role 4. Which goalie this year is the hardest to play against? JB Rift has been great for TO 5. If you could take over any vhlm team which would it be. Reapers cause I loved my time there 7. What role do you want on this team? Working on one day being a top liner 9. What would you change for personal success (something like that I deleted it by mistake!) I'd see my ice time be increased, I think my build is in a good spot to score a fair amount, but the ice time will come in the future.

22

Mid-Season Mock Draft With the mid-season mark quickly approaching, the season of the mock draft is here. The VHL has seen a few drafts in a row that are chalk full of talent, and this year’s S68 draft should prove to be no different. With 34 players already going over the 100 TPE mark, with plenty of others primed to hit it in the next few weeks, teams will be getting some really solid prospect depth. For the third year in a row, it looks like the VHL will be getting lots of capped players being drafted. Does this give a need for expansion? Many would be able to make a case for that. But that’s a media spot for another week! Let’s get to the mock! Today I’ll just be covering who I believe will go top three, with more to follow in the next few days/week. 1st overall, Malmo Nighthawks, D Condor Adrienne Just like last year, the gap between the top ranked player and 2nd ranked is large. Adrienne has about 35 TPE more than the next best, and Malmo is in the market now for best player available. The Nighthawks, in their sophomore season, are struggling but have the youth and talent to put together a formidable team in a few more seasons. Their oldest player is a S61 Mikka Pajari, but other than that they have mostly 1st, 2nd and 3rd year players. Adrienne is having a great year with the dominate Reapers of the VHLM, scoring over a point per game and throwing the body around, averaging two hits per game. He’ll be an instant impact defender for the Nighthawks, slotting in at #4 of 5 on their depth chart. 2nd overall, New York Americans, D Lance Flowers CowboyinAmerica is back, and a franchise that needs a hero could be in luck. The American’s have by my quik count, eleven inactive skaters and three inactive goalies. They desperately need some players who will stick it out and need to churn out some skilled players. CIA obviously has had success building in the past (see Gabriel McAllister). His current player, Lance Flowers, has been earning like crazy and has had some personal success with Yukon. He’ll be over 300 TPE and will slot in as the number one defender TPE wise on a graveyard of a team. 3rd overall, HC Davos Dynamo, Teemu Lehtinen Jr This is where the draft starts to get tight, with the separation between player #2 and #3 being over 50 TPE. But fear not, teams picking number three to ten (honestly, well beyond ten), you’re going to get some really solid players who will contribute for you. At third, I’ve got Teemu Lehtinen Jr. He’s had a terrific first half of the season, scoring twenty goals and adding nineteen assists for Mexico City. After just two goals in twenty-six games last year, he’s taken off in a big way. Look for Lehtinen Jr. to flirt with fourty goals this season.

143 Seattle Bears @ Calgary Wranglers Calgary 4-3

Going to be hiring for Expansion GMs as well?

Fair enough, and I don’t think VHL needs to really do anything. No issues getting new members. but their PTs are 150 words. Trust me( there’s no effort lol

Some good points Vic, I don’t know why or how they have a younger group. I don’t know how accurate it is, and I bet if you took ages of people on both forums you’d be surprised. I’ve learned the ages of some people around here who I thought were much older, so it’s tough to tell. I’d be really interested to know though. They have a very high activity level. They average about 100 more activity Check posts vs practice, so not a lot. Both forums are active. I’d like to know what you mean when you say it’s more of a side thing? They have a ton of members who are into the double digits for seasons played for their current player. Very common. You can see my previous post for what they do better. Cash for media and their PT system is better IMO of course

If some people have trouble doing 500 straight, how can you expect them to do 1500?

Well as Nyko mentioned, their junior system rocks. It’s needed because of the career length over there, it’s much longer. He pretty much explained it perfect but it allows people to build their TPE before being forced into the bigs. but off the top of my head, I love their PT system and related tasks. Each week their “PT Team” come up with a PT that you write 150+ words about or do a graphic, and earn 3 or 4 tpe. They have Weekend Fun Times, a short PT on the weekend, 3 on 3 showdowns (kind of like a pick em, so we have that in a way) I think the money for media is superior to TPE. Forcing someone to write 500 words for 6 tpe is sometimes a lot. Not everyone has the ability to churn out 500 words a week. This allows people to do multiple, short articles to build cash.

Yeah they don’t use discord like VHL does. Their league discord is terrible, I left ages ago. The few team discord’s I’ve been apart of are great though. and yeah the VHL has the portal which is superior for sure. Although they are in the process of designing one of their own.

Lol whatever dude. You’re so experienced and mighty your opinion is so much more valuable then mine, you’re right! its not about being right or wrong, it’s an opinion. My opinion as I stated is that both leagues are good and have their pros and cons, but other than the portal, the SHL does a lot of things right that the VHL could adopt. I’m not “wrong” because the mighty Banackock has more seasons (in a league where you admit to barely be active hence maybe not seeing all of the things that I believe make it a great league) and I’ve got three seasons of experience btw.

lol! damn, that does suck. Their forum now is quite clean now that they've moved to their own domain.

There's a very strong divide between the leagues, I've noticed a lot of people have chosen a side and vehemently despise the other.

I disagree, I think both leagues have members that are "toxic " and general assholes. VHL probably has more of the asshole variety. They have way more activity over there, the forum is much busier then our forum. Their discord is pretty dead, so most stuff is out in the open and right there for you to see. I've met a lot of people over there that are wicked dudes, probably more so than I have on here (not that I haven't met good people here, just not as much chatting goes on). They also have over double the membership we have, so the likelyhood of coming across someone who is a bit "toxic" as you say, is maybe higher. There are a lot of things that the SHL does that the VHL could adopt to be a better place, no question IMO.

Yeah I've been around sim leagues for 10 years, I've seen many die. Doesn't mean they can't, if not so many people had a negative attitude towards change and new leagues maybe more would last

Everyone has their preferences. Everytime I speak to anyone that's a hardcore SHLer they have lots of bad stuff to say about the VHL. Both leagues are a lot of fun IMO.

Lots of guys from here are there too. Brand new sim league, just had it's first regular season sims yesterday.

Yeah, maybe a bit drastic but it started in the SHL discord, someone posted a screen cap of it on the SHL forums and within a few hours it was 20+ pages of almost unanimous comments against him and his thoughts. He furthered it by claiming it was because he was older and likened it to he not liking rap music. It spilled into the CHL discord where he was very active, as most of the members there are from the CHL. He must of just figured to cut his losses, maybe he plans on making a new account down the road? Who knows. Before he left the SHL, he changed his profile picture to Bobby Riggs and sig to "BATTLE OF THE SEXES" featuring Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. For those who don't know, Riggs was a big time tennis player in the 30's and 40's and claimed in the 1970's that women's tennis was so inferior to mens, that at 55 years old he could beat one of the top women in her prime, Billie Jean King. She beat him and it was a pretty big deal for recognizing women in sports and such. So he was relishing in the hate for sure.

He won't be back. If anyone doesn't know, he retired in at least all three leagues I'm in with him, after hating on women announcers in sports and getting absolutey blasted for it.

Names for bots Fizzy PenKnight Amanda Huginkiss

Also, we currently have 19 players over 100 TPE that are S68 eligible, and many that are very close. By the time the draft rolls around, we could have 30+ players above or very near the cap. Add on a ton of other draft eligible players who are recently joined/will join before the deadline? I think you could definitely fill 2 expansion teams with an expansion draft and the entry draft.

Here's a little map I threw together to get a good view of where we already have teams. I think there is a clear area unrepresented here and it's basically the entire United States. Of course we have a few (2) teams from USA, but even those are from cities that are close (Seattle might as well be in Canada) to the border. There is a lot of choices for teams in the lower part of America. How about Los Angeles? Massive market. Maybe the Los Angeles Stars, due to the presence of Hollywood in the location. New Orleans? Popular travel destination with a rich history. The Voodoo? Gators? Riverboats! Just brainstorming and googling. A popular one that I've seen is Hawaii or Honolulu. I'd be down for that. I don't think South America works, it's not a hockey spot and real reach (even though this isn't real, it's nice to be grounded some how). Same goes for Africa, New Zealand, Australia and Antarctica. Asia as well really. That leaves the rest of Europe. Berlin would be a good spot. Hamburg. Oslo perhaps?