der meister

Hey, VHL. I'm so glad it's Thursday. Nothing quite like approaching the end of another shitty week at work. As you may have seen in the status section, I am starting my own business, doing IT consulting in my area. I ordered business cards last night, built the site over the weekend, and am shopping around for business insurance. I really hope it takes off because I can't keep doing what I'm doing. Too much stress and mental health damage. Speaking of mental health damage, thanks a lot, Simon. We were doing so well and now we can't even string 2 wins together. Shevchenko moved to center and has generated a lot of shots, but the shooting percentage is awful this year. Not really sure how to improve on that, but it's very frustrating. The curse of balanced scoring, I guess. I'm happy we're where we are in the standings, don't get me wrong. I had just hoped for more individually at this point in the season. 45 points in 44 games is good, not great, and I want Shev to be great. In the end, though, team success is what really matters. It's a virtual team sport, after all.

Man...even scoring a goal brought Shevchenko's shooting percentage down. 1 goal on 17 shots is terrible, my dude.

Nope. Do over.

Shev enjoying some press box snacks or what? Jesus.

American Gretzky

2 wins, 3 apples. Good enough.

Could have been worse

See qripll's post

Well one monkey off the back at least

The VHL season is just over a third done already, which seems impossible. One team that has to be thrilled with how it's gone so far is the Toronto Legion, who are sporting an incredible 22-3-1 record. They hold an incredible 14 point lead on the North American standings over both the Vancouver Wolves and Calgary Wranglers and the Legion's 93 goals scored rank second in offensive potency behind only H.C. Davos Dynamo's 98. The Legion also have the VHL's stingiest defense, surrendering a paltry 43 goals so far. The next best is Moscow's 51. Rumor has it D.C. uses performance-enhancing drugs whenever they play the Legion But what is the secret to the Legion's surprising start and massive success? Let's take a look under the hood, like the guys on Car Talk on NPR. That was such a fun show. Anyway. Offensively, the Legion are led by defenseman Andrew Skilton. In fact, Skilton is tied for fourth league-wide with 38 points and the only Legion player in the top ten. His 33 assists are second in the league behind Mina of Davos, who has 34. But as impressive as the 6'6" Skilton's season has been - well on pace to break his previous career best of 81 points - the Legion's true strength may just lie in their depth. Every skater on the Legion has double digit points, including rookie winger Inker Belle, who has 12. As expected, every skater is also a plus player, with the lowest being a +13, shared across three players. Tied for second behind Skilton in team scoring at 30 points is Spanish Moon Moth. And Konstyantyn Shevchenko. And DB IV. AND Raimo Tuominen. That's right; FOUR players, including both centers, have hit the 30 point mark already. Just behind them is winger Toby Kadachi, who has 10 goals and 29 points on the season. That segues nicely into the next stat: the Legion have 5 players who have already reached double digits in goal scoring. That covers every forward except for the rookie, Belle. There's a two-way tie for the lead in that category, with Tuominen and Moon Moth both at 17 goals. Winger Dorji Khan has 11, and Shevchenko has 10. To add yet another layer to the argument that Toronto's record is the byproduct of incredible depth, every skater except for defenseman Walter Fitzroy Jr has at least 1 game-winning goal. I would be remiss, however, to not mention the incredible goaltending put on by both netminders this season. Backup Toddly Bobbly is 3-0-0 with a shutout, a 0.971 save percentage, and a 0.67 goals against average. Starter Dalkr Vidarsson is 19-3-1 with a league-leading 6 shutouts (tied with Deadpanda of Moscow), a 0.941 save percentage, and a 1.74 goals against average. Both the save percentage and goals against average are the best in the league amongst all starting netminders. Vidarsson is never out of the play Ultimately, this is just the opinion of one person: me. And I obviously would have a bias here, as I'm a member of this squad. But honestly, when I started looking into the numbers under the hood, this is an incredible start to the year. Our team management must be over the moon with how things are going so far, and I hope we can keep it up.

Keep it up, Belle!

This year has been awful. I've had illness after illness after illness - most recently, a positive COVID test this morning - and an ungodly amount of stress. I'm so tired and burned out, but I have to keep on pushing forward, because my family needs me to do just that. Today I took a step toward trying to make the situation better, by registering an LLC with the state to start my own IT consulting business. I've got a ton to do - website build, open a bank account, order business cards - but I hope this is the start of something big for us. Still waiting to hear on the indie pub submissions, and in case you missed it, I just started Avowed on my channel. It's really fun, but the COVID makes it impossible to record. Again. The VHL league standings are truly something to behold. I'll probably talk about this in media as well, but Toronto is 22-3-1. Three of those 4 losses came to the D.C. Dragons, and the most recent to the London United. Combined, those teams are 25-25-2. How we lost 3 times to D.C. is beyond me. You'd think we'd just get lucky at some point, but nope. No offense to them or anyone there, but the odds of that seem infinitesimally small. As long as we keep winning as often as we are, I guess it doesn't who the losses come to, but it's still weird as hell to look at.

First loss to not-DCD. Huh.

1) The consistency for sure. 2) I was always a big Gambit fan, but it's gotta be Nightcrawler 3) A dragon, obviously 4) BASEketball for sure. So stupid lol 5) absolutely, or else drop the cost of things 6) I don't have gum often so I guess mint

For the holiday raffle game of my choice victory, I chose Avowed. Today, the series starts on YT!

We have 3 losses this year. ALL OF THEM ARE TO DCD!

Shev so quiet in game 1 I thought he was a healthy scratch

...i can't even.

More wins.

1 - So far so good, as long as we don't face D.C. for whatever reason. 2 - I don't BBQ often, but when I do, I like slicing potatoes and onions, adding butter, salt, and garlic powder, then putting them in a foil wrap. 3 - Us losing to DC twice 4 - I'm inconsistent. 3 minutes to 4 hours. 5 - Leave it for now, but use my suggestions if/when we falter 6 - Not really, but Lucy seems cool.

....what the hell?

Hi, friends. As I mentioned in my media spot, I've been dealing with illness the past 5 or so days and have been kinda out of it. Haven't been able to do any recording for YouTube, or honestly much of anything that requires brain power. I was able to play a little 7 Days to Die for the first time in a while and enjoyed that, but otherwise I was just on the couch, watching anime, and dozing off. Not a good time. I'm so glad the VHL season is underway. Not only that, but Toronto is currently killing it [hopefully not a jinx]. Our top 6 has been excellent, our rookie, Inker Belle, has been holding her own, and we're getting crazy scoring from our blue line, thanks to Andrew Skilton. Add in excellent goaltending from both of our guys, and it's not a huge surprise to see us atop the league table. Using that phrase, league table, makes me think of soccer, and reminds me again of how much I want a sim league that has a relegation system. It would be tough, but I think it would be a really fun and unique thing to try to manage. Imagine trying to do a Wrexham-style rebuild of a bottom feeder and take them up to a Premier League title. Hell, put one of the teams in Wrexham. Obvious name would be the Red Dragons. I'm hoping that I can start recording again tomorrow. With the way I'm feeling today, tonight seems unlikely. For those of you interested, I'm wrapping Fallout New Vegas soon, just started Phantasy Star 4 for the Genesis recently, and will be starting the game I won in the VHL holiday raffle [hopefully Thursday!]. I applied for 17 jobs over the weekend, and am waiting to hear back from the two indy pubs, still.

This has been a really tough year, friends. Most recently, I got hit with something, possibly the flu, that knocked my ass out since Wednesday night. I'm feeling slightly better today, but still having a hard time breathing and I'm super low energy. But I'll give this article a go, even though my eyes are already burning and it's only 11 in the morning. Apologies if this is boring and/or unhinged. - Toronto is off to a hot start, and the play of defenseman Andrew Skilton cannot be understated. He leads all defensemen in scoring with 20 points in 10 games, which also makes him second in the league, just a single point behind Seattle Bears' forward Forum Content. - Speaking of Toronto, the Legion and HC Davos Dynamo are the only teams left in the VHL who have not suffered a regulation loss. Through 10 games, both teams are 9-0-1. Toronto has outscored Davos 44 to 41, and holds the edge in goals allowed, 20 to 24. Toronto's loss came in overtime to the lowly D.C. Dragons, who sport a 3-6-0 record, while Davos lost the first game of the season in a shootout to the Helsinki Titans. - I find it interesting that, as of the time of this article, only one team, the London United, have played 12 games, which is the most in the league. Similarly, the aforementioned Dragons have played the fewest number of games, with 9. Quirk of the schedule and not a big deal, but interesting that one team could have played literally a quarter more games. - After three highly successful seasons with the Malmo Nighthawks, goaltender Jorgen Lovstrom is off to a tremendous start with the Helsinki Titans. Sporting a 6-0 record, Lovstrom leads all netminders in save percentage with a 0.946 marker, and goals against with a 1.48. Worth noting, Lovstrom also only has 1 shutout. Deadpanda of the Moscow Menace leads the league in that category with 3 in 11 games. Lovstrom has been excellent for the Titans - I'm so goddamn tired. - While it's obviously premature because of how early in the season it is, the VHL's worst team looks like it will come down to the Chicago Phoenix, who have 2 points in 10 games, or the Warsaw Predators, who have 4 points in 10 games. Despite having fewer points, Chicago is outscoring Warsaw by +9, 25 to 16, and allowing fewer goals against by the same margin, 37 to 46. That equates to Warsaw having the least effective offense and the most porous defense, so my money is on the Predators having the highest odds to pick 1st overall. - I gotta talk about my own player here a bit. Konstyantyn Shevchenko is currently second on the Legion in scoring, behind Skilton, with 17 points in 10 games. He only has 5 goals, however, and his shooting percentage is an even 10%. I would like to see more physicality out of him, as he only has 16 hits in 10 games, which is 1.6 hits per game versus last season's 1.18. Still a far cry from his final season in D.C., where he averaged 3.26 hits per game. But at least he's on a 122 point pace, which would obliterate his current career high of 74 points and nearly double last season's total of 65. - I mentioned Forum Content earlier, but I would be remiss to not mention the absolutely torrid goal scoring pace he's on. Last season, Content set a personal best with a 43 goal campaign, and right now he's scored 12 goals in 10 games. That's good for an 86 goal pace, which I predict will absolutely not happen. The record for goals in a season in any era is 89, from the legendary Scotty Campbell, way back in Season 5. The most recent figure on the leaderboard is Justin Lose, who scored 72 in Season 81. It was 8 thoughts. You're welcome. Fin.

1 game, but it was good one!