TR

[Spaz 296]

  Today marks an important day in my career.... My first professional start with Riga. If you would’ve told me as a goalie I would’ve laughed at you and asked how does a defenseman like myself drop what I’ve know my whole life, a position I felt like was natural at the time only time I ever played goalie would be when my other brothers didn't want too, and boy was a horrible, but being the middle child I had no choice. I watched and learned to play defense from my brother Reylynn when I was younger, he taught me all I knew and I just wanted to be like him. I tried to follow in his footsteps I looked up to him greatly, but if I have to be honest when I look back at it all, I wasn't that good, the only thing I was great at was blocking shots, my shot was always way off target and my passes were always inconsistent and the realization would hit with reality fast. 

 

I was looking for a league to join, living in Greenland didn't give you much of an option, you either had to be a superstar or know someone to be able to get on the path to join the NHL, and the home country teams weren't good at all it would be like playing on a beer league team, I knew I had to find another way. I would eventually get a call from former Hounds gm Zetterberg. He asked me to send in my hockey tapes, he said he might have a job for me but he needs to be certain that I will fit the position. I would eventually be called to Mississauga to sit down and talk with Zetterberg and he was straight forward with telling me that if I wanted to play for the Hounds, it wasn't going to be my natural position, that I had to change to goalie, and I honestly laughed at him and said 

 

“There is no way in hell I’m playing goalie, if you don't need me at a defensive position what about forward?”

 

He replied “ Its goalie or you don't play in this league, I'm going to be honest with you, you wont make in this league if I keep you as a defenseman and i don’t have space for you either for forward and on top of that if I sign a forward I need someone that can shoot and/or be able to be consistent with passing. My team is stacked and we are going to easily win the cup this season, as a goalie I can offer you free training for the rest of the season, get you good enough for the draft and then you can work on turning into a starter before you head up to the VHL. Even if you aren't that good you will always have a secure job as a goalie as the league is always desperate for them.”

 

He told me I should sleep on it, he also brought up that my brother referenced me to him, but that he also felt like he was making the correct choice for me after watching the tapes. I would eventually agree to sign with the Hounds after trying out for a couple of teams and not making the cup, and would get my first start against Ottawa, who had been rebuilding  all season and even though I would only face 9 shots I would get my first career shutout in a 1-0 game, the only goal coming from Guy Lambert. As the rest of the season would go on I would post a 12-1 record with a .865 save percentage 2.89 goals against, it wasn’t the greatest stats but for someone who never played the position on an actual team it wasn’t horrible. As the playoffs came I would get two starts and go 1-1 in both games, we would eventually make it to the finals only to get swept by the underdog Miami marauders that would stun all of us. I would like to note that my younger brother Tyler Reinhart would end up joining the team around the end of the season. He would eventually be drafted by Yukon (R.I.P) with my other brother Jerome and would end up winning the M Finals and be drafted to Vancouver together where they have tore both leagues up, they almost remind me of the Sedin twins but easily better.

 

The VHL and the VHLM Draft eventually came around and I would get drafted by Philadelphia Reapers (14th overall) and Riga Reigns (32nd overall). I played two seasons with Philly as I knew I needed more time to get better before I wanted to be called up. My first season would be my best season in the VHLM I would end up splitting games with Luke Spinelli who I backed up the previous season with the Hounds, I convinced him to sign a year contract as I still wanted to learn more off of him, and on top of that  I wasn't comfortable starting, especially since we would've started the season without a backup. I would end up finishing the season 23-14-2 as I remember I would start the season off strong going career wise 25-1 but would end up struggling the rest of the season but I would end the season with my best career save percentage in the minors with an .888 save percentage and a also all time low to this day a 2.81 goals against average with 1 shutout in 39 games played. We would make the playoffs and  I would start in game 2 to see who would get the start, but unfortunately I would get lit up for 6 goals on 30 shots posting a .800 save percentage, Luke would finish the rest of the playoffs as we would get eliminated in 6 games. The next season I wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue to play for Philly, it's not that I hated the team or front office, but when it came to the fans it was hard to show up when things didn't go exactly as planned, they are die hard fans but when you go through a rough patch or for our sake lose a playoff series it was as bad as playing in front of opponent fans, and I had a chance to get out, Zetterberg messaged me and told me he would love if I would come back to the Hounds for another cup run, as he believed again that they would end up winning it this time for sure, all I had to do was tell Kaleeb that I wanted out. I can’t lie the offer was tempting but the only problem was I believed Philly could go far this upcoming season as we looked promising the previous season and my issue with the Hounds was that I feared I wouldn't be able to test my abilities and have full control of the team. Luke would end up leaving Philly and resign with the hounds and Zetterbeg and as much as I wanted to resign and become the dynamic duo that we made a name of, I decided to stay with Philly and give myself a shot at putting the team fully in my hands knowing I was going to be a starter as selfish as that sounds but I felt like I needed a season to be able to try and prove myself. 

 

Season 79 was a disappointing season for myself. In fact out of 61 games I went 42-17 -2, but I would post a disappointing .885 save percentage and a near 3.00 goals against with three shutouts. It wasn't the season I was dreaming of or had expectations of myself and it really put a damper on my morale when it came to the playoffs as we would get swept by Mexico City Kings, as we were expecting to go head to head with them in the playoffs, a seven game series and i just couldn't get my head out of my ass as I would post a horrendous .863 save percentage and a 4.32 goals against. I’ve never felt more defeated playing hockey in my whole time stepping on the ice, I wasn’t certain that goalie was my position, I thought it was going to be the end of my career fast as, any GM that looked at how I played wouldn't want to take the risk of having a goalie that can face adversity, but that's when the VHLE saved me. Mexico would end up making the Conference finals to fall to the Hounds in 7 games, but the Hounds would end up meeting what seems like their kryptonite. Miami. Miami in 5 games would stun the Hounds again who went an astonishing 56-12-4 finishing first in the league and also 13 points ahead of the Marauders in the regular season.  

 

The VHLE was announced in season 78 or 77 if I recall right, the league wanted to expand to Europe because the M was getting too crowded and they wanted to give an option for players to play a longer career to be able to work up the confidence to play in the VHL, as jumping to the VHL from the M could be intimidating as most rookies struggled to fit in to the professional style. I wasn't sure what I was going to do as I knew Riga needed a goalie but I went with my gut and decided to join the VHLE and take one more year to rebuild my confidence to be able to compete, also my gut was telling me that good things were going to come from the E and I didn't want to make the mistake of missing it. 

 

I was drafted 29th (overall) by the Rome Gladiators from the former GM of the Marauders Rockstar. I knew I had to make an impression this season, for me it was an opportunity to show that I could compete in the spotlight when it mattered, and that would be what I did. The season didn’t start out like I hoped, I knew the league was going to be competitive as most of the superstars of the VHLM would end up opting out of the VHLE as they didn't need to show the league they had something to prove and could handle their own in the VHL, but anyways as I stated above the season would start off rocky as we would hang around the middle of the standings and at a point we even fell to the bottom of the standings. I forgot to mention that Rockstar decided to bring back the dynamic duo in net as he would also draft Spinelli, but this time he would end up backing me up. As the season went on we would eventually bounce back and start fighting for first place, but would finish the season in second place with a 36-28-8 record 14 points behind Stockholm. I would finish t7he season with an astonishing 30-17- 7 record with a .927 save percentage and a not so good 2.91 save percentage tallying on 2 shutouts. I would eventually win goalie of the season but that didn’t matter to me, winning it all did. As the playoffs started we would end up facing Bratislava Watchmen who finished the season 36-29-7 one point behind us, we knew it wasn’t going to be an easy series but we would fight hard to win the series in a shocking 4 games to move on to the finals. Vasteras would face the first place Vikings and it looked to be all over for them, until they would fight back from a 3-1 series deficit to move on to the finals to face us. We would start the finals strong also taking a 3-1 series lead, we needed one game to finish them, one goal to put the series behind us and give Rome the first European Cup, Vasteras would have other plans as in game 6 and game 7 they would combine for 13 goals and only give up 5 goals to end a cup drought in their first season of re-existence. I still can’t explain the emotions and it's very difficult for me to talk about, maybe one day I will be able to more into depth about the series but right now I think it would be good for me not to dwell on it and look towards the future and that’s the move that has lead to decide to move up to Riga. 

 

Today I will get my first career start against Chicago, I can’t be certain on how this season or the rest of my career will go, Riga is filled with a ton of young talent that I think could end up going far in a matter of time if not this season. I signed a new three year contract in hope to compete and eventually in the hopes to win the cup, but I need to prove to my GM that I have the skill to compete on a professional scale. It's not going to be an easy rookie season, as the game is much faster and mistakes will be capitalized at any chance that they are made. I am excited for this opportunity and to be able to compete and prove to my brothers that I’m a threat to be reckoned with as well. 

 

This is Tobias Reinhart and it's time for me to sign off.

 

 

 

word count:2273

[a_Ferk 760]

The fact that you somehow found a way to write more than 2000 words about your player is amazing to me, I struggle to hit 500 sometimes when writing these types of articles. I think you should format your text without the bold font next time, just a personal preference. Maybe use bold on some key points to make them stick out more. Interesting read, 9/10.

[Spaz 296]

20 minutes ago, a_Ferk said:

The fact that you somehow found a way to write more than 2000 words about your player is amazing to me, I struggle to hit 500 sometimes when writing these types of articles. I think you should format your text without the bold font next time, just a personal preference. Maybe use bold on some key points to make them stick out more. Interesting read, 9/10.

I'll keep that in mind I appreciate the feedback. It took me about two days, plus a day of how I wanted to go about doing this, but once I started I couldn't stop lmao, this was honestly only suppose to be 500 words, but then it also took me 3 seasons to even write anything on my player lmao. 

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