VattghernCZ

An trade

Yeah, it's the rest of the league who didn't

S97 was a down season for the Kings. But it doesn't mean there were no individual standouts deserving recognition. For this purpose, I've thought about a few team awards I'd like to introduce, and perhaps expand on them in the future. In my first year of being trusted with the privilege to help this group succeed, I'd like to highlight these players' contributions and individual performance. Rey del Hielo Award (The King of the Ice Award) The player who was the king among the Kings last season. The player who made things happen every time their skates touched the ice. The player putting the team on their shoulders. The most valuable Kings player of the season. Sombra del Rey Award (The Shadow of the King Award) The unsung hero of the team (borrowing @Gaikoku-hito 's Vancouver award here). The player who is often in the shadow rather than in the spotlight, but is quietly one of the most important players on the team. A player who often goes unnoticed and underappreciated by everyone except their own teammates, who know how much of a gem they really are. Guerrero de Acero Award (The Iron Warrior Award) Every team needs a player with a proper F-you attitude, who gets under the opponents' skin and puts their body on the line for the team. Hits given and taken, shots blocked, fights fought, I'd like to think of this award as the "toughest SOB on the team" award. Guardia del Rey Award (The King's Guard Award) The player who's been the last line of defense in front of the goaltender, while providing elite support for the offense from the back. The all-round best defenseman on the team. Cañón Azteca Award (The Aztec Cannon Award) The most feared shooter on the team. Not necessarily the player who recorded the most goals, but rather a combination of the most goals, the most shots and the best shooting percentage. Simply put, the most natural shooter on the team. With the team's top 3 goal scorers recording 25, 24 and 23 goals respectively, this one is not easy to award. Commandante del Ataque Award (The Commander of the Attack Award) The best playmaker on the team. Just like with the Aztec Cannon Award, I'm not looking for just the assists totals, I'm looking at players who actually distribute the puck to create offense, keep track of each player's position, see plays develop and put their teammates in position to score. Ascenso del Rey Award (The King's Rise Award) The player who stepped up the most, compared to their last season. Maybe it's their new offseason training program. Maybe they've found their confidence. Maybe it's a superstition thing. But there's definitely something that made them the most improved player. Soldado Incansable Award (The Relentless Soldier Award) The player who works his butt off the most. The first one on the ice, the last one off the ice. The player who never takes a day off, always looking for the ways to improve themselves. Alma del Equipo Award (The Soul of the Team Award) When I think of the Kings, who's the first player that comes to mind? Which player lets the rookies crash at their place? Who offers to pay the bill on the team's night out? It doesn't have to be the best player on the ice. but the player who engages with the locker room the most, who's invested in the team the most. Who's the fan favorite and the teammate favorite. Let's call this award a "best teammate award", or less fancy, the "locker room activity award".

I love this community. What should I put my effort in, if not in the things I love It doesn't matter if it's for the team I was trusted to lead or for my team's opponents, it's all one community. Except for Seattle of course (jk)

Claim 2/4 for W.E. 3/9

It's no secret that Wann Kerr has always been a bit of a bellend. Not only his opponents, but even his former teammates and fans could tell you that much. But it's been the ProAm that's really showed his true colors. Maybe he's just naturally turning even more grumpy with age, maybe it's the frustration from his absolute bust of a career, Kerr's not holding back - especially not when it comes to his own family. The fact Alagsantere Grønvold doesn't see his adoptive father as his biggest hockey idol never sat well with Kerr. With his pride being hurt, he decided to punch back and hurt his adopted son in return. S96 was the first time Grønvold took part in the ProAm, being a part of the Candy Canes along with Brian Payne @Scurvy, his actual hockey idol and Kerr's former Vancouver teammate. You can imagine the excitement Santy was feeling, studying Payne's game up close. However, being an absolute insecure prick, Kerr sporting the Rayne Deer jersey decided to partake in a macho showdown with Payne and beat him up in front of Grønvold's eyes, before looking directly at Santy, pointing at bloodied Payne and shouting "this guy? Really?". Rumors say there understandably hasn't been much contact between Kerr and Grønvold since the young defenseman moved to London. But Kerr decided he won't be forgotten and once again is taking part in the ProAm tournament, just like Santy is. One of Grønvold's Whalers teammates is Sadie St-Louis @sadie, a player briefly known to Kerr as they came from the same draft class. After seeing Santy blush when talking about his teammate in front of the camera, Kerr took it as a hint to let his jealousy take over and in the following Whalers vs. Foxes showdown decided to sucker punch Sadie and follow it with a cheap takedown, after retaliating Sadie lost a skate blade. During the "victory" lap, smirking Kerr blew a kiss Grønvold's way while passing the Whalers bench. When there is a couple or a family always bickering, in Czech we tell them "I'd love to be a housefly on your wall", signaling that their fights are amusing. I'd definitely love to be a housefly in the Kerr household now. Sometimes in the sim leagues, the storylines are writing themselves. The "facts" that Grønvold is Kerr's adopted son and that Payne is Grønvold's favorite player and a hockey idol had been established in his Biography long before he took part in the ProAm. I swear there is some sort of hidden AI that's making Kerr do these things in simulations. Honestly, if they're both taking part in S98 ProAm and Kerr beats up Grønvold's teammate again, I'm quitting thr VHL because it's all obviously rigged.

Hello and welcome to the VHL!

Hello and welcome to the VHL!

Yea, but with a pass first player, especially forward, you still want some scoring to be successful imo. And with a shoot first player, I definitely agree, but it's way too much more expensive to build scoring with less OV, I'd just rather have lower gap between the two and overall have the stats higher rather than having overall stats lower for the sake of having a bigger gap between PA and SC

I originally wrote this for the MEX Discord locker room, but why not share it here. Every member has their own approach to building their players. There's also tons of resources on this topic on the forum, starting with Player Build Guide (by Gustav) in the New Member Section: While I'm certainly not the most experienced member around, I'm a low-key numbers nerd and probably spend way too much time playing around with the TPA tool and looking through other players' builds. So I thought I'd give you my take on the topic, no matter if you're a new member or a veteran interested to see other members' approaches. Let's start from the back and move to the front. Goaltenders Sadly, I can't give you my personal experience here. I've never built a goaltender, nor am I particularly interested in building one, to be honest. In this case, I'd recommend following other guides, from which the takeaways are: Rebound Control (RB), Style Control (SC), Hand Speed (HS) and Reaction Time (RC) are the primary attributes. Building these should be your priority. Skating (SK), Size (SZ) and Agility (AG) are the secondary attributes. However, you should not neglect them, as they can act like a sort of a bottleneck for the primary attributes. But you shouldn't build them as high as the primary attributes. You don't need to bother with Leadership (LD) or Penalty Shots (PS) in the VHLM. The effect of Leadership is pretty much negligible throughout both leagues, and Penalty Shots only give you a slight edge in a tiny, very specific area of the game, where your other attributes count as well anyway. If I were to build a goaltender, I would first build the primary attributes to 70, then the secondary attributes to 70, and then I'd continue building the primary attributes until I hit the cap. So this is what my final VHLM goaltender build would look like: Skater Attributes Skater attributes the simulation engine (STHS, SimonT Hockey Simulator, AKA Simon) works with, so-called "STHS stats," are Discipline (DI), Leadership (LD), Checking (CK), Fighting (FG), Skating (SK), Strength (ST), Puck Handling (PH), Faceoffs (FO), Passing (PA), Scoring (SC), Defense (DF), and Penalty Shots (PS). But when you open the Player Management page, you can see you don't put your hard-earned precious TPE directly into these attributes like you do with goaltenders, but rather into a completely different set of attributes, referred to as "hybrid stats". These are Deking (DK), Stickhandling (SH), Passing (PA), Body Checking (BC), Grit (GR), Faceoffs (FO), Poke Checking (PC), Defensive Coverage (DC), Offensive Vision (OV), Speed (SP), Slap Shot (SS), Wrist Shot (WS), Fighting (FG), Leadership (LD) and Poise (PO). These attributes are converted to the STHS stats per this table: This way of building was introduced prior to season 83 to discourage the "meta" builds—builds aiming to be the most efficient, but without any real creativity or variability. So when someone mentions the "hybrid era," now you know it means from S83 onwards, and the "meta era" means before S83. So what do the STHS stats actually do? Discipline (DI) is a weird attribute. It aims to reduce the number of penalty minutes you accumulate. It does so, more or less, but at the cost of lowering your total hits amount. You rarely see members spending TPE on Discipline as it doesn't really make sense. If you want to be physical, you don't want Discipline because it lowers the amount of hits. If you don't want to be physical, don't build up Checking. The only instance where it might make sense is building a player with high Defense, but whom you don't want to be physical. But we're talking about 900+ TPA builds then, which is not really the point of what should be a beginners' guide. Leadership (LD) improves your team's morale, which makes the players perform better. Sounds great, but the effect of morale is so minuscule that it's 100% negligible. It also has a slight positive effect on the faceoff percentage and makes your player slightly more prone to taking part in fights. The general consensus is don't spend any TPE on Leadership. Checking (CK) increases the number of hits and penalty minutes (though not as much as it affects hits) you accumulate. A thing to keep in mind: the number of hits is also heavily influenced by your linemates' CK ratings. A player with CK 50 on a line with players with CK 40 may very well record more hits than a player with CK 60 on a line with players with CK 70+. Fighting (FG) increases the number of fights you get in. But it doesn't directly correlate with your success in those fights. In STHS, fights are objectively a bad thing, but it's fun and it gives the winner bragging rights; you can see tons of players building up some Fighting. But probably not the best spent TPE on the VHLM level; maybe just save it for the big league. Skating (SK) lowers the number of times you are bodychecked while skating with the puck and is a part of the decision-making formula (more on that later). It also helps your positioning, helping you get more pick retrievals and pass interceptions, but the influence of Defense is much higher. Strength (ST) is a helper attribute, which slightly increases the chance of winning a faceoff as well as the chance to fight through a body check without losing the puck. Puck Handling (PH) is a really important one. It's the primary attribute determining if you are able to withstand a body check and not lose the puck. It also helps with blocking shots and scoring on shot deflections. Players with high Puck Handling also tend to record more shots on the net and overall points. Faceoffs (FO) are obviously important for centers. While wingers do take occasional draws as well, it's nowhere near often enough to justify spending TPE on it on the VHLM level. Higher TPA builds use the Faceoffs hybrid stat to build up Strength, but again, that's not the point of this beginners' guide. Passing (PA) determines how successful you are when passing the puck and is a part of the decision-making formula (see below). Just a note: high Passing doesn't necessarily mean you will record tons of assists; someone has to score the goal for you to record one. In real life, sometimes a pass is what creates the goal. In the STHS, not so much. You don't often see pass-first forwards in the VHL, probably for a reason. Scoring (SC) determines how likely you are to score on a shot or on a shot deflection. It's also a part of the decision-making formula (I'll get to it, I swear). Players—or at least forwards—with Scoring higher than Passing tend to be more successful in the points department. Even in the assists department, a good part of assists in STHS comes from deflected shots and from shots on the net resulting in rebounds. Defense (DF) is in my opinion the most important attribute for any skater, regardless of the position. It's basically a "hockey IQ" stat, which is paramount for your positioning. More puck retrievals, more blocked shots, more pass interceptions. Basically, the higher the Defense, the more time you—and your team—have the puck on the stick. You won't be successful without sufficiently high Defense, it's as simple as that. Penalty Shots (PS); just like with goaltenders, it's not really worth targeting. With higher TPA builds, you will eventually build some Penalty Shot when building Scoring, but it's really just a byproduct. When you take a penalty shot, your Scoring counts as well. The Decision-Making Formula Before talking about skater builds, I need to say a few words about the Decision-Making Formula. The game simulation is basically just math, just numbers interacting with each other, determining what your player does and if they are successful at it. Speaking of "what your player does," this is determined by the decision-making formula. It's a comparison between your player's Skating (with Puck Handling having a minor effect), Passing (with Defense having a minor effect), and Scoring to determine whether your player skates with the puck, passes the puck, or shoots the puck. By stacking these attributes accordingly, you can dictate what kind of player your player is. When your player gets the puck, do you want them to pass it or to skate with it? (Passing > Skating vs. Skating > Passing). When your player has the puck in the offensive zone, do you want them to shoot it or to pass it? (Scoring > Passing vs. Passing > Scoring). How to build a player? What I mean by that: is it better to be putting everything in one hybrid attribute until I hit the target value for my final build, or build all hybrid attributes simultaneously? I'm personally a fan of the first option, but with one big but. Think about the rate at which you're earning TPE. Every person has their own level of involvement; it's up to each and every member to build their player at their own pace. If you're regularly earning less than 10 total TPE a week, I'd recommend first building a balanced 200 TPA build, then adding to it. If you're dedicated to earning more than that, I'd recommend going for the 400 TPA target values right away. You'll notice I won't recommend building hybrid stats over 80 in the VHLM. That's because applying TPE gets more expensive. Applying up to 70 costs 1 TPE, 71-75 costs 2 TPE, 76-80 costs 3 TPE, 81-90 costs 5 TPE, 91-95 costs 8 TPE, and 96-99 costs 10 TPE. Now, let's finally take a look at some player builds I suggest. Defenders There's a huge variability between defenders. For the purpose of this guide, let's talk about four general types of defensemen: a Defensive defenseman—hitter, a Defensive defenseman—technical, an Offensive defenseman—playmaker, and an Offensive defenseman—shooter. In my mind, a defensive defenseman is a player who's obviously strong defensively, but what sets them apart from the puck-moving defenseman is the fact that upon puck retrieval, they will look to pass to a teammate rather than to carry the puck into the offensive zone themselves. That means they don't need to spend as much on Skating and Puck Handling as their more offensively leaning counterparts, allowing them to spend more TPE on Defense. When building a defensive defenseman, I'd first build PC and PA (and BC for the hitter, which you can substitute with GR if you want to add some Fighting as well as Checking) until I hit the goal, to give a baseline of Defense and to put Passing above Skating, building it high enough for the passes to be effective. Then I'd simultaneously build DK and DC to continue building Defense along with adding some Skating and Puck Handling. To finish the build, I'd simultaneously build SH and SP for a Skating and Puck Handling boost. My suggested Defensive defenseman-hitter build: My suggested Defensive defenseman-technical build: If you're building an offensive defenseman, you want your player to skate the puck out of the defensive zone themselves, carry it into the offensive zone, and pass it to an advancing teammate or shoot it on the net themselves. They will also be your team's top power play quarterback, distributing the puck, shooting through screens, or sneaking along the boards to look for a shot or a pass to the slot. I'd start with building PC, DC and DK until I hit the goal to build up Defense, Skating and Puck Handling. Then simultaneously SH and SP to improve Skating and Puck Handling further, then OV for some baseline offense, and lastly PA or SS, depending on whether I'm building a playmaker or a shooter. My suggested Offensive defenseman-playmaker build: My suggested Offensive defenseman-shooter build: Forwards There's even bigger variability among forwards than among defenders, mostly because of the fact there is a center build and a winger build per every player type. The player types I'll be highlighting here are Sniper, Playmaker and (shoot-first) Power Forward. There's an overlap between a power forward and a two-way forward in the VHL, as physicality plays a major role in voting for the defensive awards. You can call this power forward build a two-way forward as well. If you're building a sniper, you want your player to shoot the puck and be pretty good at it. In STHS, puck possession is key. So even for forwards, I'd recommend starting with building defensive attributes. I'd start by building DK and DC (and FO, if I'm building a center). Then, to improve overall offense, I'd build OV. Then I'd separate Scoring and Passing by building SS and finish the build with SH, PC, and SP to add more Skating, Puck Handling and Defense. My suggested sniper-center build: My suggested sniper-winger build: If you're building a playmaker, you prefer your player to distribute the puck among their teammates and only resort to a shot if there's no passing lane available. Still, your player will take some shots, so I recommend not to overlook their scoring ability. Just like with the sniper, I'd start with building DK and DC (and FO for a center) first to build some Defense, Skating and Puck Handling. Then I'd build OV for baseline offense, follow it with PA to separate Passing from Scoring, and finish the build with SH, PC, SP (and SS for a winger) to round it. My suggested playmaker-center build: My suggested playmaker-winger build: I've saved the best for last. A shoot-first power forward is definitely my favorite player type. If you're building this player, you like to hit the opposing puck carriers or intercept their pass and move the puck in the opponents' defensive zone, where you like to crash the net to score. You're also one of your team's top penalty killers. Like with all forward builds, I'd start with building DK and DC (and FO for a center) for some Defense, Skating and Puck Handling. Then I'd add BC (which you can substitute with GR, if you want to add some Fighting as well as Checking) to add physicality, then OV for baseline offense followed by SS to separate Scoring from Passing, and finish the build with SH, PC and SP. My suggested power forward-center build: My suggested power forward-winger build: I really enjoyed writinh this. If you've read the whole thing, I tip my hat to you, you're a champ. If you're a VHLM GM and like this guide, feel free to post it in your locker room with your additional notes. That would honestly be the biggest compliment and validation for me. I forgot to check the word count, but there's enough babbling and overexplaining that I'm confident it's over 2k words.

A blue line with CGY Janser and Guntis? I'm happy I'm not a forward playing against this team lol

There's some pretty good stuff in the slow cooker

That's a big guy! Welcome back!

The second and final part of my S97 defense analysis is here. This time, the spotlight is on forwards. The zeroth part, where I give you an introduction and talk about the stats I'm tracking is available here: The first part looking into defenders is here: Now for forwards. For each stat, I will be highlighting top 9 - not because I was picking 6 defenders and I want to make it nice, but because 6 defenders means 3 lines, which means 9 forwards, so it seems fair. Plus I find multiples of 3 weirdly satisfying. Just like with defenders, I will rank the top defensive forwards based on the weighted rankings in all tracked stats, but I will assign different weight to each stat than I did for defenders, because I think some plays are more significant than others based on the position. Puck Retrievals (PR) Weight: 35% Just like with defenders, puck possession is the key. Constantly winning puck battles in the offensive zone and in the neutral zone keeps the puck in your team's possession and as far away from your own net as possible. 1. Maverick Goncalves @leandrofg 885 PR 2. Gustav Mattias @Berocka 844 PR 3. Kimi Raikkonen @mattyIceman 825 PR 4. Wally Lose @youloser1337 797 PR 5. Jebediah Big Ol Doinks in Amish @hylands 774 PR 6. George Richmond @badcolethetitan 766 PR 7. Axle Gunner @Steve 737 PR 8. Harry Callahan @dstevensonjr 734 PR 9. Bryce Woodworth @SirRupertBarnes 733 PR Pass Interceptions (PI) Weight: 30% Intercepting breakout passes helps keeping the puck as far from your net as possible, and intercepting neutral zone passes can directly lead to a counterattack. 1. Gustav Mattias @Berocka 1182 PI 2. Wally Lose @youloser1337 1133 PI 3. Behrens Minion @UnknownMinion 993 PI 4. Bryce Woodworth @SirRupertBarnes 938 PI 5. Maverick Goncalves @leandrofg 897 PI 6. Jebediah Big Ol Doinks in Amish @hylands 861 PI 7. Kimi Raikkonen @mattyIceman 859 PI 8. George Richmond @badcolethetitan 855 PI 9. Steve French @Seabass 849 PI Successful Hits (SH) Weight: 20% Aggressive forechecking can lead to turnovers, which extends your team's puck possession and keeps the puck away from your net. But hitting for the sake of hitting is not always a good defensive play. 1. Toby Kadachi @ROOKIE745 215 SH 2. Grimgor Ironhide @FrostBeard 187 SH 3. Maverick Goncalves @leandrofg 157 SH 4. Savaisk Tzesar @comrade cat 153 SH 5. Axle Gunner @Steve 152 SH 6. Antonia Bucatini @CowboyinAmerica 149 SH 7. Catia Goncalves @cLoWn 146 SH 8. Spanish Moon Moth @Renomitsu 137 SH 9. Maple Dogwood @dogwoodmaple 131 SH Shots Blocked (SB) Weight: 15% While blocking shots is an important part of penalty killing, for forwards it's really a "speciality" stat. Plus as I've said in the article on defenders, I don't think it's a great defensive stat, because blocking a shot is by default a reactive play rather than a proactive play. T-1. Wally Lose @youloser1337 108 SB T-1. Gustav Mattias @Berocka 108 SB 3. Behrens Minion @UnknownMinion 100 SB 4. Taylor Swift @lilchrist 75 SB 5. Maple Dogwood @dogwoodmaple 65 SB 6. Stefan Nikolaev @Is_thatok 64 SB 7. Brandon Petan Jr @sadie 62 SB 8. Kyle Toms @Ktoms22 57 SB 9. Bryce Woodworth @SirRupertBarnes 56 SB Weighted ranking 1. Maverick Goncalves @leandrofg 4.40 rank 2. Jebediah Big Ol Doinks in Amish @hylands 8.40 rank 3. Wally Lose @youloser1337 8.95 rank 4. George Richmond @badcolethetitan 9.00 rank 5. Kimi Raikkonen @mattyIceman 10.15 rank 6. Bryce Woodworth @SirRupertBarnes 12.90 rank 7. Axle Gunner @Steve 13.20 rank T-8. Gustav Mattias @Berocka 14.30 rank T-8. Grimgor Ironhide @FrostBeard 14.30 rank Maverick Gonvalves was highlighted in every category apart from the one with the lowest weight in my ranking, no surprise that he ranked the highest overall. An interesting case was Gustav Mattias, who was 1st or 2nd in everything but successful hits - he ranked 65th out of 87 in these, bringing his overall ranking down to a 2-way tie for 8th. Forgot to add the file with all stats: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1rT4mFnOTNJ9yi_Yb3vgYql6ifCoBMbyw2mgKwHaKjH8/edit?usp=drivesdk

Another name on the hit list

Putting Ninefingers on the hit list for this ProAm

Part 0, where I explain what this is about, is available here. I talk about the stats I'm tracking, and the way I'm tracking them. Now it's time for the proper part one of the project. Let's start with the defenders, because a) there's fewer of them than forwards, 2) this whole thing is about defense which is their main job and thirdly, my player is a wannabe defensive defenseman and I want to see how he performed as a rookie compared to the rest of the league. I'll highlight top 6 defensemen for every stat I tracked, and I'll add my subjective top 6 in overall ranking based on the combined weighted rankings. I'll also include the full list of tracked stats for every defender in the VHL. Puck Retrievals (PR) Weight: 40% Puck possession is the most important factor when evaluating defense, in my opinion. Once there is a lose puck, especially in your defensive zone, you want to get a hold of it before the opponent does. That's why puck retrievals have the biggest impact on the final ranking. Obuz Schneider Canet du Bocage @Grape 1126 PR Tommy Sleeves @dasboot 1102 PR Guntis Gavilrovs @Girts 1095 PR Alagsantere Groenvold 1077 PR Callum Gary Yannick Janser @Daniel Janser 1056 PR Erik Thorvaldsson @Tetricide 1043 PR Pass Interceptions (PI) Weight: 25% First of all, the number of pass interceptions is RI-DI-CU-LOUS. High enough to change my mind about building a pass-first player in the future? Maybe. High enough that passing and playmaking will be the topic of my next offseason article? Definitely. Disrupting passes in your defensive zone prevents the opponents from creating quality scoring chances and often directly leads to breakouts and counterattacks. Joseph Dubois @Dubois 2331 PI Tommy Sleeves @dasboot 2112 PI Alagsantere Groenvold 2077 PI Erik Thordvaldsson @Tetricide 1854 PI Bric Sheithaus @Oldhead91 1816 PI Callum Gary Yannick Janser @Daniel Janser 1736 PI Shots Blocked (SB) Weight: 20% While blocking shots is necessary for penalty killers and true shutdown specialists, the fact it's by default a reactive play rather than a proactive play makes them not the best tool to evaluate players' overall defense, in my opinion. Still, they play a part in it. And out of these stats I'm tracking, it's the only one not requiring a Python code to collect, so that's nice. Joseph Dubois @Dubois 270 SB Slava Kovalenko @OblivionWalker 232 SB Bric Sheithaus @Oldhead91 231 SB Petit Hughie @Sen 217 SB Alagsantere Groenvold 202 SB LaClapbomb Hitstick IV @Greasy Gary 202 SB Successful Hits (SH) Weight: 15% (it hurts me to assign them this little) I'm using "Successful Hits" instead of hits listed on player stats. The difference is that the usual hits include love taps, while "successful hits" are hits that separate puck carrier from the puck. Hits are definitely useful situationally, but overall defense is more about positioning and stick work. Tommy Sleeves @dasboot 257 SH Callum Gary Yannick Janser @Daniel Janser 256 SH Guntis Gavilrovs @Girts 235 SH Fradin McGryer @Fradin99 193 SH Boris Bone-Breaker @RileyL 182 SH Obuz Schneider Canet du Bocage @Grape 177 SH Overall weighted ranking Tommy Sleeves @dasboot 3.25 weighted rank Callum Gary Yannick Janser @Daniel Janser 5.20 weighted rank Alagsantere Groenvold 5.90 weighted rank Bric Sheithaus @Oldhead91 6.40 weighted rank Joseph Dubois @Dubois 8.80 weighted rank Guntis Gavilrovs @Girts 9.25 weighted rank Tommy Sleeves is really running away with this one, in my opinion. He's been an absolute wrecking ball for the most of his career, but he's really showing that there's much more to him than just hitting everything that moves. Article on forwards is coming next week. All tracked stats are available here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/117YLrvSyvX_cfkffe1yT5x1cLJi4O6HmyYnnlBOAPS0/edit?usp=drivesdk

Happy to AGM if anyone wants. Can GM in a pinch

A few seasons ago, I posted a multi-week media spot about some goaltending stats that aren't available to us, but are commonly tracked in the NHL - stuff like Goals Saved Above Average, Quality Starts or Really Bad Starts. It was tedious, because it made me manually go through all the game logs and compile the data. Still, I enjoyed doing it. Last offseason, I got my feet wet in using Python (thanks you, AI!) to create a few programs to collect the data for me, and I put together a big piece on hitting, where I made up a few stats - successful hits (hits that separate the puck carrier from the puck), effective hits (hits that lead to a turnover) and ineffective hits (hits that separated the puck carrier from the puck, but didn't lead to a turnover). This offseason, my focus is defense. Once again, I will be using Python programs to collect data from all game logs and compile it. I wanted to post this article this week, but I didn't find the time to run the programs (courtesy of Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 release) but still need the 6 capped, so I'm writing this introduction that would have been a part of the article anyway. In this 0th part, I will introduce the stats I will be tracking, and the method by which I am collecting them. Successful Hits (SH) Physical play will always be a part of defense. I already used this made-up stat in last offseason's article. The reason I will be using Successful Hits instead of Effective Hits is simple: in said article about hitting, there was a big difference in the ratio of effective to ineffective hits between forwards and defenders - forwards were generally much more efficient in hitting. The reason is simple, as @Pifferfish pointed out; Defense STHS attribute is the most important attribute for puck retrievals, and defenders typically have this attribute higher than forwards. So if a forward hits the opposing puck carrier, there are 2 forwards and 2 defenders available to retrieve the puck, as opposed to 3 forwards and 1 defender in case a defender lays the hit. I will only use Successful Hits to eliminate this discrepancy. The Python program will count a Successful Hit for a player every time it finds the phrase "is hit by [player name] and loses puck." in the game logs. Puck Retrievals (PR) Every time there is a loose puck, either after a hit, a rebound or a blocked/missed shot, you want your team to be the first one to get to the puck. It's especially important in your defensive zone. The Python program will count a Puck Retrieval for a player every time it finds the phrase "Puck retrieved by [player name]" in the game logs. Pass Interceptions (PI) You don't want your opponent to settle in your defensive zone and get the cycle going, or to send a breakout pass from their defensive zone. The premier two-way forwards are proficient in cutting away passing lanes and intercepting the passes between the opponents to start a quick counterattack. The Python program will count a Pass Interception for a player every time it finds the phrase "Intercepted by [player name]" in the game logs. Some stats I would like to compile, but can't be a**ed to think about what formulation to use, because it's not as straightforward as those stats I'm tracking: rebounds clearing, breakout passes, defensive zone exits. Not to mention any stats including expected goals, as these are literally impossible to track without shot maps. Hopefully, the article is coming next week. Unless the programs take too long to run. I'll probably ditch the project if that's the case.

Earlier this week, I went to another interview conducted in english - no F bomb this time haha. It was for Quality Control for Excalibur Army, the biggest Czech manufacturer of military vehicles and equipment. Well, I had my medical examination done today, I'm signing the contract next week and starting training on March 3. This is actually the first time in my life I'm switching jobs, even though I'm 30. It was about time to change something, I guess. Not that much of a payraise compared to my current job, but a new experience for sure. (There went my plan to put 40+ hours into KCD2 during Fri, Sat and Sun lol)

Deadpanda is in my predictions, I need them or Groenvold to win!

Welcome to the VHL!

Welcome back!

Welcome to the VHL!