scoop

Secured the fourth seed as planned. Now we can get a playoff series win.

claim 3

1. Second through fourth place in Europe looks like it's going to come down to the wire. With us playing both Riga and Davos two more times, I think if we can get at least one win against both of them, we'll take second place. The rest of our schedule is pretty easy, though there's always potential to drop one of those games. 2. I don't read much, so it's been a while, but I think the last book read in full was Diary by Chuck Palahniuk. I started reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro a few months back, but never got around to finishing it. 3. I'm partial to the music from Mega Man X. All the NES and SNES Mega Man soundtracks are great. Super Mario RPG also has some great tracks. 1. Who is your favorite for MVP, and who do you think are still contenders for the award? 2. If you had to pick one team that you are most confident will make it to the finals this season, who would it be? 3. What's a movie that you enjoy, that is generally regarded as not good?

Also, speaking of Lucy and myself, crazy to think that one of you may not be on Team USA for the World Cup this off-season, unless defenders can be played at forward for the World Cup. Stone and Calaway should be locks, which would leave two spots for Mina, Leitner, and yourself.

ain't that the truth

After a slow start to his career, Jacob Stone had just 200 points in his first four seasons. Playing a nine-season career, that would mean he would need to average just under 90 points per season to finish with a point-per-game career. Despite only reaching the 90-point mark once thus far, that being his 95 points last season, he finds himself with a chance to get there. As we approach the end of the regular season in this his final year, Stone needs 19 points in the remaining 12 games. His current pace for the season would see him get 17 more points, setting a new career high of 104 points but falling just shy of a point-per-game over his nine seasons. While his current pace suggests he will come up short, Malmo's remaining schedule may be on his side. Let's take a closer look at the Nighthawks' final 12 games. Team Games remaining GA/game vs League GA/game vs Malmo Stone P/G against Expected points TOR 1 2.87 4 2.67 2.67 LAS 2 3.1 5.5 2 4 PRG 2 3.74 4.5 1.75 3.5 LON 2 4.47 5.5 1.75 3.5 DAV 2 2.43 3.75 1.25 2.5 WAR 1 2.97 4 1.25 1.25 RIG 2 2.53 3 1 2 When we break it down by his average points against each individual team and use that as his expected points in the remaining games, the expected total does come up to be just shy of 19.5 points. Obviously when we take a smaller sample size of just the 2-4 games he has played against each of these teams, the average is going to be less reliable. But just looking at these teams, it's clear that Stone will have the opportunity for some big games.

Yeah, he bounced around quite a bit. Started in Seattle in S33. Traded at the S34 deadline to Riga. Traded in the S34 off-season to Davos Traded at the S35 deadline to Seattle Traded in the S35 off-season to Calgary Traded in the S35 off-season to New York Traded in S36 mid-season to Vasteras Even the pick that was used to draft him was acquired in a trade.

claim 2 of 4, for week ending 11/17

Yeah, so they matched New York's 11 before there were 16 teams. They didn't pass it before the 16-team setup was established. Look, things were already wordy enough, I didn't feel like I needed to include that detail. Also, I feel like everything was a more dramatic back then. Or maybe that's just me not caring about things as much nowadays.

1. VHL.com articles, because I'm not as self-conscious about the quality as I am with media spots or graphics. But also sometimes they incidentally turn into media spots, and at that point if I've already written the 500 words, I'll just submit it as such because ultimately I know our point tasks don't need to be professional. But back in my day, point tasks used to be graded and the amount of TPE you received would be based on that. Can you imagine? 2. Kiki or Ash 3. The best of all time? That's hard to answer. But I just wrote an article in which I talked about all my past players, so I'm just going to pick one of them and says it's the best. Benjamin Glover. For a goalie, it's a great name. I didn't always know that there was a term for a name such as that where it is fitting of who they are or what they do. But now I know that it is an aptronym. 1. With the VHLE now gone, should the VHL once again allow call-ups from the VHLM? (To be honest, I don't recall if the creation of the VHLE is why that's not a thing anymore, but I know that at least since then it has been the case that players had to be locked into one league at the beginning of the season.) 2. Would you like to see some for of an All Star Game in the VHL? Or do you not really care about that and think it would be a waste of effort? 3. Who is currently your favorite music artist?

With this VHL.com article, I will reach 10000 career TPE across all of my VHL players. It seems a bit crazy to me to think that over 20% of that has all come with one player, considering Jacob Stone is my 13th player in the league. In honor of reaching this TPE mark, I just want to take a quick look back at all of my players. Rather than looking at them in chronological order, I've instead put them into five different groups, with regards to my investment in earning TPE for them. S2 Sam Helberg - 0 TPE S68 Justin Rushmore - 159 TPE S72 Izzy Valencia - 113 TPE The first group is those players who never amounted to anything. My very first player was Sam Helberg, with whom I was never active. I created him, completely forgot about him, and only realized he existed much later. Even after finding that I had created a player for the S2 draft, I had no recollection of it. Justin Rushmore and Izzy Valencia were created during one of my longer stretches of inactivity in the VHL. They were a couple half-hearted attempts to get back into the VHL that ultimately went no where. S11 Fayt Leingod - 545 TPE S33 Keiji Toriyama - 658 TPE S53 mist4ke - 571 TPE These are players that were never destined to be anything great, for various reasons, but were good enough to have lengthy VHL careers, as crazy as that sounds considering what TPE looks like nowadays. Fayt Leingod was my first proper player in the VHL, and I was not one of those first gen players who burst onto the scene. This was also at a time where it was more difficult for just anyone to earn max TPE. Keiji Toriyama came at a time when I was intentionally limiting my investment in the VHL, as I had just gone through some tough times with a previous player, and had a realization that I tied too much of my self worth in the results of the VHL. mist4ke was created during the time period where members were allowed to have two players, and he was my second player that I really didn't care much about. S40 Lloyd Light - 981 TPE S79 Taylor Mourning - 1253 TPE These two players are the hardest categorize. Lloyd Light could maybe fit it with the previous group, but I definitely put more into him than those three. He just wasn't on the same level as my top tier players. He came after Toriyama, as I was finding how to better balance my investment in the VHL with my life outside the VHL. I stepped back into things a bit more with Light. Taylor Mourning should arguably be grouped with the next couple players, but I have him here because I never went fully inactive with him, and as a whole, his career fits nicely alongside Light in that I wasn't a top tier earner with him, but I earned enough to get to the point where more TPE starts meaning very little. S18 Geno Esposito - 630 TPE S61 Samuel Gate - 610 TPE Geno Esposito and Samuel Gate are the two players who I look back and wonder what could have been. As I mentioned with Leingod earlier, I was not concerned with my first player being as good as could be. As I became more involved in the league, by the time I got to my second player, Esposito, I was. While 630 TPE may not seem like a lot nowadays, let's compare him to Lars Berger (a S17 player, so just a year earlier) who held the TPE record at 1104 from S24 to S31. The reason I think of Esposito as a "what if" kind of player is that I retired him in the deadline of his fifth season, in order to make the goalie of the future for New York, as I was the GM at the time. I could have had three more seasons with Esposito, and while I would not have set the TPE record, I probably could have been near the top of the leaderboards at the time. Samuel Gate also had a shortened career, playing six seasons, but he could have been so much more even in just that time. While Gate did end up playing six seasons, I was only active with him through Season 62. And I was truly inactive after that point in that I didn't earn TPE in any capacity. It was not a "turned into a welfare only" situation. I was not earning any TPE at all. S24 Benjamin Glover - 1269 TPE S50 Diana Maxwell - 1126 TPE S88 Jacob Stone - 2085 TPE (and counting) Benjamin Glover was the player I created after the retirement of Esposito, and he became even more than the potential that Esposito had. For a few seasons after his retirement, Glover held the TPE record. The time of his career was no doubt when I was most invested emotionally in the VHL, though that was more so because of my position as GM of New York at the time. The progression from Toriyama to Light to Diana Maxwell was a slow return to form as a top earner in the league. Looking strictly at the numbers, maybe it's not quite right to put Maxwell in this same category, as her TPE is a step back from Glover despite being years later when TPE numbers were going up; but I'm putting her here anyway because I don't care. Jacob Stone obviously belongs in this elite tier, as although he won't achieve the career record as Glover did, I will get him into the top five of all time by the end of the season.

Younger fans of the VHL may be familiar with the Moscow Menace four-season run of consecutive Continental Cup finals losses from Season 80 to Season 83. They were the sixth team to reach four consecutive finals, but they are the only team to have accomplished this feat at a time when the league had more than ten teams. Unfortunately for them, they lost every appearance, helping give the Vancouver Wolves the second ever three-peat in VHL history. To lose the finals in four consecutive seasons is devastating, and although I was not a part of that Moscow team (I was, however, eliminated by them in three of those seasons), I know the feeling quite well. Before there were the S80-S83 Moscow Menace, there were the S25-S28 New York Americans. First, let's set the stage with a little bit of history regarding the New York Americans franchise. They began as the Hamilton Canucks, a bit of trivia that is not relevant to this story, but maybe worth knowing anyway. The team was not great. In the first 11 seasons, they made the playoffs just once; no other team had fewer than five playoff appearances in this time. The team started to turn things around when Brandon Best took over as GM. They made four straight playoff appearances from Season 12 to Season 15. In Season 14, they finally lifted the Continental Cup, being the last franchise to do so. Soon, Vasteras and their "curse" would become the poster child for futility in the VHL. They now had the longest Cup drought, having not won since their victory in Season 1. My story with the Americans begins in Season 17. My player, Fayt Leingod, was traded to the team in the off-season following Season 16. Shortly thereafter, I became GM of New York. Leingod was retiring, and I had my next player, Geno Esposito, set to join the team in the following season. My first tenure as GM of New York did not last long. My goal was to have New York competitive in Season 18, and while we were, the team was not set up particularly well for the future. After two seasons, I stepped down. After a first round exit in the Season 18 playoffs, the Americans missed the post-season the next five seasons. Esposito bounced around a bit between Seattle and Davos during that time before ending up back in New York in Season 22. James Assayag, my successor as GM, was ready to bring his managerial career to an end. Thus began my second stint as GM. Taking over in the middle of Season 22, I opted to retire Esposito while he was still in his prime in order to create the team's goalie of the future: Benjamin Glover. The team had the opportunity to be competitive even with Glover as a young goalie. Still on the roster was Jukka Hakkinen, my first ever draft pick in Season 18 and a future Hall of Famer. Considering how I had left the team in shambles for Hakkinen (who was in fact James Assayag's player), I wanted to win a Cup while he was still on the team. Famously, James had not and still has not won a Continental Cup with any of his players. I was not, however, so desperate that I would make the same mistake as the first time around. I made a more conscious effort to keep the team competitive long term rather than selling future assets and young studs in order to fast track the rebuild. Glover was one of the faces of the franchise for the years to come. The other was Daniel Braxton, drafted third overall in Season 24. After the retirement of Hakkinen following Season 25, these two were the New York Americans. That's not to say they didn't have help, but this was undeniably their team. Glover was a two-time Top Goalie and won the MVP in Season 28. Braxton won four straight Sterling Labatte Trophies (though the last one in Season 30 was with Davos, in the one season he spent away from New York). The two of them would end up being first-ballot Hall of Famers, inducted together in the Season 32 class. While Glover and Braxton were the mainstay stars of the team, there were several other key roster pieces. Those two of course were with the Americans for all four of their finals losses from Season 25 to Season 28, but so were Dom Mazzetti, a true fan favorite, and Jason White. Keon Henderson, a veteran holdover from Assayag's time as GM, was with the team through his retirement following Season 27. Also with the team for the first three were Jarppi Leppälä and Dustin McKullen. McKullen's career was particularly disappointing for me. I had traded up to get him at second overall in the Season 23 draft. Although I do still think the trade worked out well, if McKullen had fulfilled the potential I thought he had, he could have been the elite forward to go along with Braxton and Glover for years to come. The introduction to the main and supporting characters is actually quite important, as it was a major point of the identity of the team at this time. Glover and Braxton led the way, and the rest of the core was made up of average-to-good players. There were no other big stars on the team for more than a season or two. There was of course Hakkinen, who had already been with the team, but what allowed us to stay as competitive as we were was the guest stars we acquired season after season. These were mostly aging veterans who were still quite good, and they mostly came by the way of cheap trades or free agency, allowing us to not sacrifice our future potential. With that in mind, let's start taking a look at how things went down, season by season. Season 25 Season 25 was the final season of Hakkinen's career, and as I said before, I wanted to win. We had Ignatius Feltersnatch in his first of two seasons as a guest star, so while the core of the roster was still very young, we had the offensive firepower to do well. In the first round of the playoffs, we had to play against Aidan Shaw and the Toronto Legion. They had knocked us out of the playoffs in the previous season and had been to the finals in four of the last five. While the stage could have been set for Shaw and Daisuke Kanou, the two greatest goalies of the time, to face off in the playoffs for the fourth and final time, it was not meant to be. We swept the Legion, finishing things in a convincing manner, outscoring them 9-2 in the final two games. We kept things going in Game 1 against Kanou and the defending champion Dynamo, but that would be our last win that season. While it was unfortunate that we could not get Hakkinen a Cup, I was confident that the team was not done yet. Season 26 Hakkinen was gone, so we brought in Adam Schultz, who had been on that Davos team that just beat us, to fill that void. Feltersnatch was still around for the final year of his career, and we added Kristian Carlson as a nearly-free rental. We met the Seattle Bears in the first round of the playoffs. We closed out the series in six games, and things seemed to be aligned perfectly for us to win the championship. While our opponent in the finals was the Victory Cup winners, it was also Vasteras; the same Vasteras who had a namesake curse as a result of their inability to win. That is another piece of VHL lore with which people should be familiar. This was perhaps the most demoralizing of our finals losses, as even with the curse on our side we came out on the losing end. The series again ended in just five games as we narrowly avoided getting swept. Season 27 In my opinion, the Season 27 roster was the least impressive of this era of New York. While our core of Season 23 to Season 25 players were hitting their primes, none of our forwards were on par with the likes of Hakkinen, Feltersnatch, and Schultz in the preceding seasons. Our retiring veteran addition this season was defender Lars Intranquilo. In the first round of the playoffs, we once again matched up against the Bears, who were our biggest rivals during my tenure as GM of the Americans. Despite finishing 27 points behind them in the regular season standings, we took them down for the second straight season. In the finals, we faced off against some familiar faces on the Helsinki Titans. Nick Fisher had been a role player with us for a couple seasons, but he was now on the Titans. Making more of an impact were Leeroy Jenkins and Japinder Singh. They had both been on the Davos team that beat us two seasons earlier, and Singh had actually started his career with New York. After jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the series, we lost four straight games. Season 28 Needing some help on offense, we acquired forwards Pavel Koradek (who, similar to Schultz from earlier, had just beat us in the finals) and Gunnar Axelsson. These two would replace Keon Henderson and Dustin McKullen as our top forwards, and it made quite a difference in our goal scoring. The pair accounted for 14 of our 30 goals in the playoffs. With those two providing the offense, and Braxton and Glover firmly in the prime of their careers holding things down defensively, the team was in a good spot. Playoff crossover meant we played the Dynamo in the first round of the playoffs, rather than the Bears for the third straight season. We made history after a six-game series win against Davos, becoming the first team to reach four consecutive finals. There had been five prior instances of teams making it to three straight, but of those teams won at least once. We were going into our fourth, and as you already know how the story goes, we lost. This fourth loss was against our rivals in the Seattle Bears, who you could say we were lucky to not have to face in the first round. It was a defensive battle throughout the entire series. No team scored more than three goals in a single game, and in the six games it took them to finish the series, the goal totals were just 11 for Seattle and 8 for New York. While this was the end of our streak of consecutive finals appearances, we continued to make playoff appearances. Glover would ultimately played all eight seasons of his career with New York, making the playoffs every year. He was actually the first player to make it to the playoffs eight times with the same team (though he didn't play in the Season 24 playoffs as a rookie, as we had acquired a veteran goalie to give us a better chance of winning). He was reunited with Braxton (after a short stint with Davos) for their final season, and they made one last finals appearance. They would finally make it to a Game 7 in the finals, but again they lost. The Americans would go on to win the Cup in the very next season. While I was still rooting for New York, I was not a part of that victory, as I was also no longer GM after having stepped down following Season 29. While I am proud of how things went in my second attempt as GM of New York, the team certainly found much more success with the GM's to follow. I helped get the team pointed in the right direction, but it was @Devise, @Advantage, and @Tagger who took the team to places I never did and made them one of the best teams over the course of the next 20 seasons. Even still, and although I may be a bit biased, I do think it's fair to consider New York's dominant era to begin with me, even if we never got it done in the end. In addition to the four straight finals appearances, I kicked off a stretch of 11 straight playoff appearances. This was four more than the previous record, and it was not bested until the current 16-team league setup was established. 2092 words; claiming for weeks ending 11/10, 11/17, 11/24, an 12/1

flute girl surely someone will write about flute girl

I am on the verge of setting the Malmo franchise record for points (I currently have 597, one behind Condor Adrienne) and I will likely get there on assists as well (22 behind Adrienne's 442), which has me curious to see if there is anyone else out there close to breaking any team records (just looking at goals, assists, and points) After some research, using just the Statistics page in the portal (which I'm not sure is completely accurate for older players), here are my findings. @Baby Boomer Bobby Bob (TOR) - Assists The next record to fall after Stone takes Malmo's point record will almost certainly be the Toronto assist record. Since retirement following Season 52, Max Molholt has held all of the goals (406), assists (462) and points (868) records for the Legion. One of those will fall, while the other two are likely safe for a long, long time. Bobby Bob needs just 9 more assists to pass Molholt. @Advantage Viktor Jensen (MAL) - Goals, Assists, Points Yes, Stone will definitely pass Adrienne in assists and points before Viktor Jensen, but his records will likely not last long. This is assuming Jensen plays his final season in Malmo. At the moment, Jensen is 40 assists and 12 points behind Stone. While he will be hit hard by depreciation, he should still be good enough to reach those marks next season. I added goals as a possibility here as well, but I'd say it's unlikely. He would need 53 goals in his last 107 games (which equates to an average of 35.7 goals over 72 games). During the peak of his career from Season 92 through Season 95, he did average 33.75 goals per season. @jRuutu Jarmo Ruutu (MOS) - Points Not guaranteed by any means, Jarmo Ruutu may end up with the most points in Moscow history if he plays out the rest of his career with the Menace (though he is not currently signed beyond this season). The current record holder is Hard Markinson, who had 696 points from Season 78 to Season 85. With two and a half seasons to play, Ruutu has 467 points, needing 230 to set a new record. That means he needs to play at slightly above a 93-points-per-season pace. He has only reached that mark once in his career, that being his 125 points a season ago. He came close the two prior seasons, and this year he is currently on pace for 106 points. This record falling is less of a sure thing than the aforementioned team records, but there is no doubt a chance.

1. While we do have on of the best penalty kill percentages in the league, I could definitely stand to take fewer penalties. I have the ninth most penalty minutes in the league. 2. Nothing particularly amazing. I suppose the most creative was the year I dressed up as a "shrunken man." I just wore some of my dad's clothes, which were of course much to large for the child that I was. 3. The last one I binged was Girl Meets World, actually. I grew up on Boy Meets World, and it's still a show that I re-watch every few years. I'd never watched Girl Meets World, but I felt like I needed to at some point. It's not good enough that I'm going to include it in my BMW re-watches, but it had its moments. 4. Button. There's a story behind it. (No one has ever called me that. There's not actually a story. I literally just made it up.) 5. I'll hold guys accountable if what they're doing is affecting us on the ice, for sure. Otherwise I prefer to let others do what they want, but there can be some things that I may disapprove of that warrant a conversation. But that's a private conversation I'd be having with them. 6. B-MAL D10 for sure. They already dress up pretending to be a hockey player.