MubbleFubbles

Funnily enough what you're suggesting is what the VHLM used to be, with new players being signed as they are now and recreates being assigned to teams based on priority claims I think they got rid of it when they were trying something different with recreates and first-gens (they had VHLM players bank their recreate TPE until they got to the VHL so the advantage of being a recreate meant priority waivers for recreates no longer made sense) but that's also gone now.

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Matthew Kai, Elfon Ashelf and Ian Smith Jack Todaro and Haydyn Chet Foreals and barry bigman Dirty Caufield Greg Santos Majestic Buffalo Dawson Thibert Ches Morrison Kiefer Leclerc John Smith Danny dimes Evgeni Shevkov Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: Evgeni Shevkov 3: barry bigman 4: Greg Santos 5: Elfon Ashelf 6: Kiefer Leclerc 7: Chet Foreals 8: Dirty Caufield 9: John Smith 10: Majestic Buffalo 11: Jack Todaro 12: Ches Morrison 13: Ian Smith 14: Danny dimes 15: Dawson Thibert 16. Haydyn Hey, remember last time when we were able to talk about Evgeni Shevkov and ask the question if Shevkov was the best player in the VHL Portal and we were able to use stats in VHL games to ascertain whether that could be the case? That was a cool change of scenery right? Anyway, back to your regularly scheduled look at someone who claimed practice facility only once and never came back with Titomir Pukshuuter, whose last name is just one giant coincidence and this is actually the real name of the user Janis. Pukshuuter’s first visit on the site was on November 18th 2020 at 12:50 EST and their last visit was on November 18th 2020 at 13:30 EST, so we kept there attention longer than a Simpsons episode so that’s something we can brag about. Unfortunately we couldn’t get them to properly engage though as, while they received five offers,60% came with the white background everybody knows and loves and 20% came with: MAXIMUM ICE TIME FOR THE WHOLE SEASON. But this wasn’t enough to sway Janis and they went unsigned throughout their entire VHL career which was stopped short of an eighth season by the hybrid attribute mass-retirements with only one practice facility claim to their name. Funnily enough, this story of a career is near identical to that of the previously reviewed Ches Morrison, even down to the day that they created being the same, but given that we somehow lost Ches Morrison’s interest 3 minutes before he created his player (how does that even work?!), it goes without saying that Titomir Pukshuuter must be recognized as the 12th best player in the VHL Portal. Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: Evgeni Shevkov 3: barry bigman 4: Greg Santos 5: Elfon Ashelf 6: Kiefer Leclerc 7: Chet Foreals 8: Dirty Caufield 9: John Smith 10: Majestic Buffalo 11: Jack Todaro 12: Titomir Pukshuuter 13: Ches Morrison 14: Ian Smith 15: Danny dimes 16: Dawson Thibert 17. Haydyn

I've been in a pretty good place recently when it comes to content because I've recently come up with ideas for content that aren't going to be affected by changes happening in the league, so I can write them up whenever and then wait until the right week to post it. E.g. My best player in the VHL Portal.com series has, for the most part, been written two weeks in advance of posting and I'm starting a new Media series in two weeks time once my previous multi-claim media expires that I've been writing up gradually while I still claim my previous 4 week media. Luckily having a 2 TPE job means I only have to do one more thing for my remaining 2 TPE after that and, at the minute, trivia is the quickest for me to submit since I know pretty much where everything is off by heart, but I sometimes do a press conference if I feel like a change, or a VHL.com graphic/radio if I've got something that I've previously done for fun that qualifies for it (E.g. the Vandelay graphic) or there's something I particularly feel like talking about.

Matthew Kai, Elfon Ashelf and Ian Smith Jack Todaro and Haydyn Chet Foreals and barry bigman Dirty Caufield Greg Santos Majestic Buffalo Dawson Thibert Ches Morrison Kiefer Leclerc John Smith Danny dimes Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: John Smith 9: Majestic Buffalo 10: Jack Todaro 11: Ches Morrison 12: Ian Smith 13: Danny dimes 14: Dawson Thibert 15. Haydyn It’s about time that the powerhouse Matthew Kai had a contender to the title of “Best Player In The VHL Portal” and the randomizer brings that challenger in the form of Evgeni Shevkov. Shevkov, created by the user Syzygy, was recruited to the league by the user Xdjk93 (who had the player Pekko Viitanen, a player we might wind up ranking at some point before the year 2050) and snuck into the overloaded Season 75 Draft Class by creating on the very last week of eligibility for that class. Signing with Houston for their pre-draft season, Shevkov didn’t post up super impressive numbers as they accrued 16 points in 30 games, but they did earn TPE in every single week in the leadup to their VHL and VHLM Draft date, which was enough to see them picked up by the DC Dragons with the 73rd selection of the VHL Draft and by the Las Vegas Aces with the 67th selection of the VHLM Draft. Staying down in the M with the Aces for Season 75, Shevkov only got three more points than they did in their 30 games with Houston the season before, but it’s worth pointing out that they were stuck on the fourth line of a very full roster, so only saw 12 minutes of ice time per game. The following season in the M was a vast improvement though as, now on the first line, Shevkov racked up a very impressive 119 points, good enough for sixth in the VHLM and an incredible 45 points more than the next highest point scoring player on the Aces. Now in their third post-draft season, Shevkov had made their way up to the VHL with the Dragons in their final contract season, however they couldn’t help the Dragons avoid the bottom of the standings as, with limited minutes, they put up 21 points in their first VHL season. Entering Free Agency, Shevkov had started to show signs of inactivity having not updated in the two weeks leading up to it, but they still came back on to accept the L.A. Stars contract offer and played there in Season 78 for what was ultimately their last season playing in the VHL. Like with the Dragons, Shevkov found themselves deep in the rotation and couldn’t contribute enough to help the Stars make the playoffs, meaning Shevkov never played in a VHL Playoff game. While Shevkov did not retire until forced retirement following Season 82, they ultimately weren’t able to find a new home after Season 78, not even in the VHLE. While Shevkov ultimately wound up going inactive towards the start of their fourth post-draft season, they’d had a very impressive run of updating in the lead-up to their eventual inactivity, missing only one week of updating between their creation in early October and towards the end of their third post-draft season towards the end of April. While they never submitted a PT, they did regularly submit welfare and also regularly submitted for trivia and press conferences earlier in their career. They also donated a few times which is pretty rare for a relatively new player who isn’t towards the top end of earning. This is probably my easiest ranking I’ve had to do in a while as, while Shevkov is ultimately not good enough to be considered “The Best Player In The VHL Portal” as Kai spent far more seasons in the VHL pro league, they had a much more impressive career than barry bigman looks set to have, so Evgeni Shevkov will take their place as the second best player in the VHL Portal Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: Evgeni Shevkov 3: barry bigman 4: Greg Santos 5: Elfon Ashelf 6: Kiefer Leclerc 7: Chet Foreals 8: Dirty Caufield 9: John Smith 10: Majestic Buffalo 11: Jack Todaro 12: Ches Morrison 13: Ian Smith 14: Danny dimes 15: Dawson Thibert 16. Haydyn

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@ctots Just cause I like looking at theoretical What If scenarios, here's what your E league could look like based on recreates who are currently in the E and M from S82-S86 (Doesn't include the recent S87 recreates)

So I was able to grab some numbers from my recent look into how many players stall at the VHLE level. Each recent draft class (since Season 73) has brought in a minimum of 18 recreates that have gone on to exceed 200 TPE, and an average of 25 recreates that have eventually gone over 200 TPE per class. So, if you were to times that by two since most players will have a full M season and then an E season (and even those that skip the E would be largely off-set by the numbers of recreates who spend a second season in the E currently), you're talking around a minimum of 36, average of 50 recreates that would eventually get over 200 TPE that would be in your league system at a given time, and that doesn't even account for those who go inactive in the 200-400 TPE range that would stick around for longer. In short since I've just vomited a bunch of numbers out, I don't think there's enough recreates to fill an E league that has 8 teams, but I think there's definitely enough that you could do a 5-6 team VHLE league with what you're proposing.

To clarify, just cause I know some times while I'm driving I can miss out stuff or say the actual opposite word than what I mean for some reason, I'm perfectly fine with people who do VHL stuff in a given week claiming them in the portal a few weeks late cause they've at least got something present on the forum that shows they've been active on it. I'd also be fine with people who do say kinda the reverse of what you mention you do in the EFL, a Press Conference in the VHL after claiming an affiliate PT being able to back-claim it all cause like before, you at least have something that's demonstrated your activity on the forum. My issue is basically just limited to those who don't have any form of activity on the VHL in a given week claiming TPE for it, but I think pretty much everything that you say you do is OK with me! I didn't actually know about EFL having a different claiming week, that's interesting. I just presumed everything in all three leagues was lined up the same after we adapted the 12 cap. And the last thing is basically my big point, I wouldn't have a problem at all if it was just the odd week or two of not dropping in but still back-claiming it (I've seen a few others do that), but the recent instances I've mentioned where it's been 5-6 weeks of back-claiming being allowed just strikes me as way too lenient. But yes, I'd be on-board with your idea that would hopefully mitigate that.

OK that's my mistake, I took your first sentence from the first post "Honestly, I don't think it's ever come up during my time as an updater that we should deny those affiliate backclaims just for not being claimed in the current week." as that the matter of affiliate 12 backclaims hadn't been discussed previously.

I understand how updating for VSN works, I was an updater for several seasons before you joined the league. I was talking about a specific example from the past where updaters weren't properly checking to see if VSN articles were being done and thus approving those claims without checks (There was one such example where a user claimed 11 weeks of VSN pay despite only having one 500 word article to show for it) and I don't think it was until I called it out in the updater forum that stuff like that started to get properly checked. I mean the explanation doesn't really do anything to suggest to me that this is the right course of action for the VHL to take. These people do undoubtedly do a job that does take a lot of time in their respective leagues but their reward for that is the fact that they can come on and claim the maximum amount of capped TPE in affiliate leagues with a single button press and no other activities required, but I don't see why they should be able to bypass what is the core principle of VHL activity since it's creation which is being on the site in a given week to earn TPE. Even more so because they are only required to spend one minute to claim all of their respective TPE over here. I don't understand why people who dedicate hours per week to the VHL should be retrospectively equaled in capped TPE by people who visit once every six weeks. I guess the other issue is that this feels like a situation that updaters have decided for themselves what the ruling is rather than actually following league policy (which I'm gathering officially would still be what is written in that post since I haven't seen otherwise). Shouldn't questions be asked when stuff that they're unfamiliar with is being claimed rather than taking claims for granted and just doing them?

https://anchor.fm/mubble-fubbles/episodes/MiniFubbles-Ep--15---Is-Back-claiming-Affiliate-12-Even-A-Thing-e1n5kul https://open.spotify.com/episode/0HTogSSEcdOcKZKRb1RA2k?si=Nlo3uzWnQfCIKenQMbSHgw Thread I refer to in the podcast is here

Is Danny dimes The Best Player In The VHL Portal? Matthew Kai, Elfon Ashelf and Ian Smith Jack Todaro and Haydyn Chet Foreals and barry bigman Dirty Caufield Greg Santos Majestic Buffalo Dawson Thibert Ches Morrison Kiefer Leclerc John Smith Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: John Smith 9: Majestic Buffalo 10: Jack Todaro 11: Ches Morrison 12: Ian Smith 13: Dawson Thibert 14. Haydyn Danny dimes is the subject of our next hunt for the best player in the VHL Portal, but I think they stand a better chance of winning the award for VHL player most likely to be the name of one of the Italian Mobsters from The Simpsons. Danny was created during the Season 81 playoffs, so only received offers for the JST (for which they received a couple) but never accepted. They did however get a like reaction from Shindigs for creating their player so I guess fino1819 is the real winner here. Interestingly, while they did not make a post after creation, dimes did come back to visit the site nearly a full month after creation. What they did with that second visit though is unclear and dimes languished without a team until the kiss of death otherwise known as the Hybrid Attributes era reared its head to signal a premature end to their existence four months after creating. With not a single added TPE to their name after creation, it’s ultimately a race for the 13th best player in the portal between Dawson Thibert and Danny dimes. Ultimately, due to the fact they at least came back to check the site, I will say that Danny dimes wins the battle and therefore Danny dimes is the 13th best player in the VHL Portal. Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: John Smith 9: Majestic Buffalo 10: Jack Todaro 11: Ches Morrison 12: Ian Smith 13: Danny dimes 14: Dawson Thibert 15. Haydyn

I guess that's fair, I knew we don't have threads for VHL commishes but I felt like I'd seen at least a few VHLM Commish threads for vacancies in the past, so presumed there'd be the same for VHLE, but I guess all the E commishes have been hired without one. I probably focused too much on the fact that the thread was referenced.

VHLM Draft Pick Trading Changes The new VHLM Commissioners announced that there would be new rules regarding draft pick trading in the VHLM starting with S87 draft picks. The most notable change is that teams have gone down from being able to have up to 3 firsts and 3 seconds to only being able to have two picks in the top two rounds. This brings it closer to what it was back in Season 55 where you could have no more than three picks in first two rounds and, to be honest, I was never a fan of the decision to change it to max of three firsts and three seconds in the first place anyway (I think the opinions of the then-VHLM GMs were listened to too much in that instance) so I see this as a good change. There was a slight change made to one of the other amendments after the official announcement as the initial requirement of a team owning at least four picks in the first four rounds was lowered down to three picks in the first four rounds citing difficulties in making trades happen with the old limit, which makes a lot of sense. While I’ve never believed that teams need to utilize a strategy heavily dependent on tanking and following it up with a season of holding several picks to have success in the VHLM, we won’t be seeing that in the future anyway so hopefully it will lend itself to more well-rounded competition in the VHLM. New VHLE Commissioner Rjfryman, who has done a lot for the league in many different jobs, announced that they were to step down from their position as VHLE Commissioner and thus a new vacancy was made available, which was filled by Enorama, who I think will do a great role in the job and someone who I have to imagine was among one of the top candidates for the VHLM Commissioner jobs when they were advertised. Enorama has been a very consistently active presence in the league and has obviously had a big impact on the league, holding the record for most TPE with a player along with currently having the joint-third longest GM stint in the VHL as the Dragons only GM to date, so I look forward to seeing what they do in their most important role yet. As an aside, I was interested in the VHLE Commissioner job myself and was waiting for the job interview post to be made to declare my interest, only to find they didn’t do one and used the VHLM interview thread instead. As someone who didn’t really have any specific ideas to bring to the M but did for the E (as illustrated in one of my last VHL.coms where I mentioned an idea for a change to the VHLE Draft), it was a bit frustrating to find out that the hiring was made based on a different thread rather than a new application thread being made, especially since it’s not like Enorama would have not posted in a new application thread if he was interested in the VHLE role. While I wouldn’t have gotten the job anyway given how pivotal Enorama has been, I’m hoping they consider making new application threads for vacancies in the future rather than presuming candidates who apply for one job would be the only ones interested in another job just because it has similar responsibilities (E.g. I get it for GM jobs in the same leagues when vacancies need filling at short notice but, had the E had a vacancy before the M, Gustav likely would not have posted in an VHLE Commissioner application thread, so if that same logic had been used, we would have potentially missed out on a very good M Commissioner choice) A Closer Contested VHL Season At the time that I’m writing this (After Friday’s sims), the league is proving to be a lot tighter than most that have come before, with a lot of the teams lower down the standings showing up to upset the best teams in the league. With two thirds of the season gone, just 30 points separates the league’s highest ranked team (Warsaw Predators on 69 points) and the lowest ranked team (Riga Reign on 39 points) which, if they kept at their current pace, would be a 45 point gap by the end of the season. Compare that with the gaps between top and bottom teams since the VHLE was implemented: Season 80 – 87 point gap Season 81 – 89 point gap Season 82 – 93 point gap Season 83 – 75 point gap Season 84 – 71 point gap This is likely as a result of the large increase of new players that have made their way through the development system into the VHL pro league as the Season 81 and Season 82 class now combine for more 400 TPE+ prospects than Seasons 78, 79 and 80 combined despite having one less draft class (87 for S81+S82, 86 for S78-S80). The North American Playoff Race Toronto Legion are currently bottom of the North American conference and, looking at the roster, while they aren’t miles away in terms of talent, their current position is a fair reflection of their current ability. Taking into account the average numbers of each North American teams first two lines, the Legion are currently last in the conference in both the STHS scoring (70.9) and defense (77.4) attributes and are also seventh in puck handling (77.7), so seeing them record the least amount of goals scored and the most amount of goals conceded in the conference is maybe not too much of a surprise. Unfortunately, the sim hasn’t been too kind to their goalie either as Oskar Lindbergh is currently 15th among the 16 goalie starters in save percentage despite being third in goalie TPA. I’ve also got Toronto down as having the toughest ending schedule to the season along with eight games remaining for their backup goalie to play, so I think the chances of them making it into the playoffs are not impossible, but incredibly slim. New York currently sit in seventh and five points off of the playoff places, although the team currently in fifth (Los Angeles) has played one less game. Unlike Toronto, New York have had a really good performance all round from their goalie Augustus Kennedy, who currently sits at third place in save percentage. On top of that, the defense led by Poopy Peepants have been limiting opponents shooting opportunities as they have the sixth best record for shots allowed despite playing the most games in the league. The main problem for New York has been their inability to score as they have the second-lowest total number of goals in the VHL, although I do think that this is something that could be improved with a few tweaks to the lines. I think the main problem is that, as things have been most season, their strategy of the second line is heavily dependant on the shooting of Maximus Decimus Meridius, who leads their team by some distance in shots, but they only have 71 scoring while Yun Chiang, who sits at 85 scoring is playing a bit part (lowest amount of shots of the six forwards) on an already strong first line, so I think if Chiang was moved down to the second line, that could potentially unlock Chiang and boost the scoring output on the second line. I think New York could still yet make a late push for the playoffs as they have one of the better schedules out of those in the North American Conference (they are the only team in the conference who doesn’t have any more games against both Moscow and Warsaw), but they need to hope their six backup games remaining don’t have too much of an impact on their results as they cannot afford to have their BOT goalie cost them games in the position they are currently in. Chicago sit in sixth place, but have had a rather bizarre schedule this season which sees them up to four games behind some of the other teams in the VHL and this looks like it may not even out until the very last sim of the regular season, as five of the last sixteen games on the schedule are Phoenix games. While they sit five points behind Los Angeles in fifth place, they do have three games in hand on them, so the current point gap is a little bit deceptive. Chicago’s strongest part of their play this season has come through defenseman Bo Johansson, who sits fourth in assists along with helping the Phoenix record the second lowest amount of shots faced (and are only four shots against behind the leading DC Dragons who have played one more game). This good form hasn’t really transitioned to other positions though as The Board Game Clue on Skates is the only forward above a point per game (and barely above at that) and Cole Pearce, like Lindbergh for the Legion, has been putting up save percentages that don’t really match their TPA levels, sitting at 13th in save percentage among starters. While the good news for Chicago is that they only have to play their backup for one more game, they do have a slightly tougher schedule than their main competitors for the final playoff spot in New York and Los Angeles, but most of their games set for the last sim of the season are against teams who are either looking unlikely to make the playoffs or only just making it, so should Chicago keep it tight up to that point, it could be a very entertaining final sim of the season. Los Angeles are probably the biggest surprise of the North American conference this season. While they do have a lot of potential, it didn’t look like they were quite yet ready to compete given that their first two lines average the lowest skating (72.9) and puck handling (75.2) in the North American conference along with ranking sixth in NA in defense (79.9) and scoring (72.2), but they’ve found a way to make it work this season and currently sit just inside the playoff places. The main contributors to this are definitely Sirdsvaldis Miglaskams, who has scored the second most goals in the North American conference and has more than double the amount of goals that the next highest scoring player on the Stars has had, and Art Vandelay, whose .927 save percentage ranks as the fourth highest in the league. Interestingly the Stars could have been even higher up in the standings, but they’ve had easily the worst shoot-out record in the league, winning only one of the seven that they’ve participated in. They do still have all their backup games left to play, but their run-in is pretty favourable as the two teams that they have to play the most (Toronto and Prague four times each) are both teams that are currently outside of the playoff places. Calgary sit in fourth place and have served to be the most entertaining team to follow for the neutrals as a lot of their games have had plenty of goals for both teams! It’s not really surprising that Calgary have been a very potent offense this season given some of the talents they have at the forward position, averaging the second highest scoring attribute (79.1) in the North American conference, with Daniel Janser and Saku Kotkakoivu both having 60 point seasons thus far. What is somewhat surprising though is the amount of goals they’ve conceded, despite the fact that their goalie Ben Dahl is having a good season, registering a .925 save percentage at this moment, along with the amount of shots that they’ve faced (once games equal out, they’ll likely have faced the most shots in the North American conference) despite the fact that the team has the highest average defense attribute (84.3) in the North American Conference. Calgary still have six backup games remaining (although they’ll be hoping for much better out of Red Gaming than the .859 save percentage they had in their two starts thus far) but their schedule is more favourable than a couple of teams ahead of them in the standings (they have the most games remaining of the North American conference against the Riga Reign team that currently sits at the bottom of the standings), so don’t be surprised to see Calgary move up in the standings in the near future. The winner of the last two Devon Marlow-Marta trophies, the Seattle Bears currently sits in third place in the North American conference. Seattle is a great example of the amount of success a team can have by simply taking advantage of limited opportunities. Despite not having particularly great figures in shots for (once games balance out, will probably be 11th in the league in that stat) or shots against (currently have the most shots against in the conference, although Calgary will likely overtake them once games balance out), they’ve managed to find themselves on the same amount of points as a Moscow Menace team that has the highest shots for/against differential in the league (Moscow have had 545 more shots for than their shots against, Seattle have faced 15 more shots against than shots they’ve had). Dusty Wilson currently sits in 12th in league save percentage but has helped single-handedly win games with five shutouts, which currently leads the league. They have five games left to play their backup, but unfortunately they have one of the most difficult run-ins to end the season, with five games still to play against the other teams in the top half of the North American conference along with four games left to play against Moscow. The D.C Dragons sit just one point behind the conference leaders, but with three games in hand it maybe wouldn’t be too much of a surprise to see the Dragons in the top spot in the near future. DC success has illustrated the impact that star players can have on a team as, despite being only one of two teams to have multiple players record less than 10 points, they have league leading performances in both goals (Ronan Lavelle with 36) and assists (Tui Sova with 53) that have helped carry the team up the standings, along with Bubbles Utonium recording the joint highest save percentage in the North American conference. Perhaps the player who has had the most impact is Sova, as the team has been very strong defensively, facing the least amount of shots in the league. The one thing that could hurt the Dragons’ chances at finishing the season on top of the North American Conference is that they face a much tougher schedule ahead than the league leaders, with DC notably only having three games left to play against the current five lowest ranking teams in the VHL, but at least they can enter those games knowing that they’ll be playing with their strongest line-up as the Dragons have started their backup for the required eight games already. While the Vancouver Wolves had a bit of an iffy start to the season, winning just six of their first sixteen games and needing a shoot-out for two of those victories, the Wolves have put together a strong run of performances since then and now find themselves top of the North American conference with two-thirds of the season played. Funnily enough the current Wolves team is the North American team that looks the closest to the composition and build of the old meta teams, averaging the lowest passing attribute in the conference (64.6) whilst also averaging the highest scoring attribute (81.2) in the conference. Brandt Fuhr has had a good season to this point, their .927 save percentage is the fifth best in the league and they’ve predictably had a great performance from Nico Pearce, who has put themselves in very good position to add to their two trophy haul from last season. Vancouver are the polar opposite of their nearest challenger DC in terms of backup games left to play in that they’ve yet to bench Fuhr once, but I would also say that Vancouver probably has the easiest run-in of any other team in the North American conference. While they do have four games to play against Moscow, they don’t have any more games to play against Warsaw or Calgary and they’ve only got one game to play against both DC and Seattle. Couple that five games against the two lowest ranking teams in the EU conference and it should be interesting to see whether the easier schedule they face than DC will offset the number of backup games they have left to play. 2801 Words, using for W/E 10/9, 10/16, 10/23 and 10/30

Matthew Kai, Elfon Ashelf and Ian Smith Jack Todaro and Haydyn Chet Foreals and barry bigman Dirty Caufield Greg Santos Majestic Buffalo Dawson Thibert Ches Morrison Kiefer Leclerc Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: Majestic Buffalo 9: Jack Todaro 10: Ches Morrison 11: Ian Smith 12: Dawson Thibert 13. Haydyn It’s pretty incredible that after just 14 randomly picked players, we’ve already found two players with the same last name but this is the situation we’ve found ourselves in as we ponder if John Smith is the best player in the VHL Portal. John Smith (who is also a British beer), much like the previously ranked Ian Smith, was created as a member of the Season 84 Draft Class and the user behind the player (Ironwolf1912) had joined the league from a sister league, presumably the SBA where they have had other players. Ironwolf1912 wasn’t just a one time poster, as they posted twice that they were going to wait for more offers for John Smith who had created at the trade deadline. However, they ultimately never accepted an offer from a VHLM team and was one of the youngest players in the VHL to fall victim to the Hybrid-Era mass retirements, given they were auto-retired just six weeks after creating. This makes ranking John Smith incredibly difficult as submitting one instance of welfare and practice facility would usually have you considered as one of the top players in the VHL Portal, but the length of career and lack of signing has to have some sort of negative impact on their rankings. I think ultimately, slotting John Smith as the eighth best player in the VHL Portal seems fairest as they neither signed a VHLM contract like Foreals, nor did they have the longevity of Dirty Caufield, but at least they did welfare which is better than Buffalo and Todaro did. Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: John Smith 9: Majestic Buffalo 10: Jack Todaro 11: Ches Morrison 12: Ian Smith 13: Dawson Thibert 14. Haydyn

Week 4 Claim - W/E 9/25

Yeah, so theoretically you could use the same cut-off date that VHLM uses to determine who can/can't play in the VHLM to be the cut-off point by which players who have exceeded 200 TPE for the first time at that point enter the upcoming VHLE Draft.

TBH, I don't think that's a great comparison because those leagues have other systems built in that are specifically geared towards not penalising you for waiting around in a lower league, whereas the VHL doesn't really have that, if you decide not to earn TPE and stay down in the M for example, that only means you have to earn more TPE to guarantee you get through the VHLE and, if you don't do that, you miss out on a season of VHL eligibility, so I don't see why people would go "hold back for a bit with your earning to stick around in the M". The only difference in moving the VHLE Draft (specifically VHLE, VHL would stay where it is at creation) would be instead of getting called-up your VHLE team after surpassing 200 TPE, you'd be getting drafted to a new one.

I'd like to thank @Garshfor this post that led to the topic of my vhl.com as it did get me curious as to the actual numbers at play. Taking players from the Season 63-Season 78 as a sample size, 694 players achieved 200 TPE or more and, of those 694, 253 finished between 200 and 400 TPE, which is 36.5% of players who surpassed 200 TPE not making it past 400 TPE. Now you can compare that 36.5% with the numbers for players from the S79, S80 and S81 classes: S79: 31.3% (One active still able to get over 400 TPE, which would make 28.1% if they surpassed 400 TPE) S80: 30.6% S81: 36.4% (Four actives still able to get over 400 TPE, which would make 29.1% if they surpassed 400 TPE) So all three of the first drafts that were most likely to be affected by the implementation of the VHLE have all seen similar, if not better, success with getting players through that 200-400 TPE than pre-VHLE. Season 82 and Season 83 still sit above the 36.4% mark with 44.7% and 56% respectively, but both also have several actives still in the 200-400 mark (S82 has 11, S83 has 15) and if all those surpassed 400 TPE, the amount of players between 200-400 TPE from those classes would reduce to 28.3% for Season 82 and 26% for Season 83, so even half to two-thirds of those players making it past 400 TPE would see them getting around the league average. ------------------------ Also of note, Season 81 (our first VHL Draft class with a proper recruitment drive post-VHLE implementation) actually was arguably one of our best recent draft classes at getting first gens past 400 TPE. To date, 20 (57.1%) of the 35 First-Gens that surpassed 200 TPE from that class have gone on to surpass 400 TPE, and this is not accounting for the four active first-gen players from that class who can still surpass 400 TPE. Compare that 57.1% with draft classes that had a similar number of first-gens achieving over 200 TPE. Season 66: 37 First Gens surpassed 200 TPE, 17 surpassed 400 TPE (46%) Season 67: 34 First Gens surpassed 200 TPE, 18 surpassed 400 TPE (52.9%) Season 68: 33 First Gens surpassed 200 TPE, 15 surpassed 400 TPE (45.5%) Season 76: 36 First Gens surpassed 200 TPE, 17 surpassed 400 TPE (47.2%) ------------------------------------------ As an aside, I still do stand by my point that VHLE Drafts should take place in the off-season following the player surpassing 200 TPE rather than just taking place in the same off-season as the VHL Draft. Of the 46 IA VHLE players and Free Agents, 39.1% (18 total) had stopped updating before they'd even played a single VHLE game, and the vast majority of these had spent at least one extra season after their VHLE Draft in the VHLM. Maybe moving the draft to the point where it is more relevant to their careers, that could potentially keep members more interested in the lead-up to their promotion to the VHLE and spread out the natural excitement and intrigue of drafts rather than sandwiching it in at a point where it generates less hype and sometimes more confusion (several players have been under the impression they've been moved to the E once they've been VHLE drafted and have to be corrected).

Thanks for the shoutout Berocka! I'll be looking forward to your VHLM commissioners podcast if you can make it happen. As a question for that, I'll ask since you've all been VHLM GM's and the 2 commissioners have been VHL GM's, what do you think were your best and worst moves as GM? As for the one and a half aussies, I think my favourite bits are when you discover thoughts on the forum that are just out of the blue, like my favourite segment was when you were talking about Creed and his desire to expand the league and create a VHL Player Union within like 24 hours of joining, there hasn't been as many of those kind of things on the forum lately but if they do I look forward to hearing your views on them!

1. How is your VHFL group going right now? They haven't added the scores up yet so not entirely sure, but the draft was unfortunately quite slow! I'm happy with the players I got through and hopefully my picks work out well 2. Would you put the Chicago Phoenix in the top five best contending teams? I would say so, while we're at middle of the pack right now, we had a much more difficult schedule than some of those ahead of us, so I'd expect to see us near the top come end of regular season 3. What's more crucial to a defender, passing or body-checking? I'd personally say passing, physicality is nice but there's a lot of other ways to defend whereas passing is very important for a defenseman 4. How will Baby Bob's impact on the Chicago Phoenix take this team to the next level? It'll be huge, they're a great goal-scorer and will definitely help us rack up the goals in both regular season and playoffs 5. Since Aurelian Moreau has retired, we signed Alessandro Nano as our replacement defenseman. How will he link with Bo Johansson? I think we've decided to play both on different lines which I think is a good idea, as that gives us a great proven defenseman on both lines. 6. The Chicago Phoenix acquired Cole Pearce and Juice Box from London United for an S86 CHI 1st. How can Cole Pearce and Juice Box add some offensive firepower to our roster? Pearce is a very high TPA goalie, so I expect them to be a big improvement on our goalie from last season and Juice Box has been a solid player for London for a few years now and is an improvement on our last #4 defenseman, so that should be a boost as well

Matthew Kai, Elfon Ashelf and Ian Smith Jack Todaro and Haydyn Chet Foreals and barry bigman Dirty Caufield Greg Santos Majestic Buffalo Dawson Thibert Ches Morrison Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Chet Foreals 6: Dirty Caufield 7: Majestic Buffalo 8: Jack Todaro 9: Ches Morrison 10: Ian Smith 11: Dawson Thibert 12. Haydyn For this go round, I’m looking at a player who was actually in Board Game Clue of Skates draft class (Season 82), Kiefer Leclerc. Leclerc was the second player of the user fyrefly who was the member behind the solid former second round selection Sheldon Juniper, a player whose final season in the league was partially spent with the Vancouver Wolves during the first season of their threepeat, but they were traded away in a deal for Dakota Lamb before the playoffs. After retiring about a week after the deadline, fyrefly created Leclerc and earned six capped TPE in their first week along with signing a waiver deal with the Mexico City Kings that saw them put up 11 points in 11 games, a pretty strong start for a new create, but unfortunately that wasn’t enough to get the Kings into the playoffs as they fell two points short of the playoffs. Unfortunately this was the last we saw of Leclerc as Fyrefly’s last site visit was two days after signing with the Kings and their last player’s performance alone wasn’t enough to see them get drafted in what was a fairly stacked VHLM Draft (Players taken in the seventh, and last, round in that draft have gone on to make VHLE and VHL) and they fell victim to the dreaded Hybrid Attributes era mass-retiring prior to Season 83. I think Leclerc must be either the fourth or the fifth best player in the portal and it’s a shame that the VHLM indexes for S59 and 60 are broke in such a way that we can’t properly make out how good Elfon Ashelf was. But ultimately, Elfon Ashelf was drafted and played multiple seasons whereas Leclerc was not so, despite them registering an impressive two first stars in eleven games, Kiefer Leclerc is the fifth best player in the VHL Portal. Current Leaderboard: 1: Matthew Kai 2: barry bigman 3: Greg Santos 4: Elfon Ashelf 5: Kiefer Leclerc 6: Chet Foreals 7: Dirty Caufield 8: Majestic Buffalo 9: Jack Todaro 10: Ches Morrison 11: Ian Smith 12: Dawson Thibert 13. Haydyn