A Gustav 30 in 30, #8: Dogs In A Pile

[Gustav 6,325]

 

The Hounds would have benefited from a slightly better TPE distribution in the S69 draft. Ironically, BigHARDCORE32 would go to Saskatoon--but sadly would never earn again.

 

 

#4 in this series covers the beginnings of my time as a VHLM GM, and I like to think that my last article does a good job of covering some of what happened with some of my more notable first-gens. But the players I had put their time into growing and developing did so in hopes of seeing it pay off on the scoreboard, and seeing as that's work I put in as a GM as well, it's fair to us both to tell that story as completely as I can.

 

I've covered S66, in which I did what I could with what I had with no real plan other than to pull a couple wins out of my hat and put together a respectable season. But all good things must come to an end, and trading away my first-round pick that season led to me a bit light on assets in S67. It was here that I decided to take my management strategy that was "what the VHLM should be" and turn it into "what the VHLM actually was" and tank for as much as I could in future seasons.

 

None of this was to say that I checked out or that I stopped caring about people who played for me. I wasn't in the business of losing games for draft position, just in the business of getting rid of anyone who was worth anything for quantity of picks. Of course, the latter led to the former naturally, but I'd still try to field the best lineup I could make in every sim. Plus--and too many people don't realize this--having good players to trade away in the first place necessarily means that you have to have put in the time to help them get to that point. So, while my notable S67 draftees (Keven Foreskin/Jeff Downey/Jaxon Walker) all finished the season in different places, I'd still push them to be the best they could be while I had them. I still stayed on top of waiver signings, and I like to think that the Hounds stayed a good place for new players even when we weren't winning. Some new names that signed with me despite knowing they wouldn't win a championship included Nate Telker (@Telkster's precursor to HoNB #8 subject Brendan Telker), Balentine Kidd (@TukTukTheGreat), Yeet Dabberson (recreate of my former AGM @Radcow), Block Buster (@Banana2311), and one of my favorite locker room additions in Jacob Perry (@Liberty_Cabbage), who ended up as a lower-end role-filler for a few VHL teams. While none of these players became VHL superstars, all made me glad to have them and I like to think we were a good place for them at the time.

 

But the "not much" that was S67 turned into a competitive season in S68. First off, the draft was awesome. The Hounds headed into the draft with the #1 overall selection--which I traded straight-up for #2 so I could pick @Beaviss, but not at #1 like he wanted (a move that I kind of cringe at today but one I found funny in the moment). We followed that up with a string of picks that would define both that season and the next. First, we brought back S67 signing Balentine Kidd at #9 (because smart places promote from within). The second round saw Jerry Wang (then the second VHL player ever to be named Jerry, after mine a few draft classes earlier) and @ColeMrtz, a returning member who stayed fairly active for a bit and briefly made it as a VHLM GM. In the third, we picked first-gens Guy Sasakamoose (@Cxsquared, an underrated longtime Riga defender) and Patrik Tallinder (another underrated longtime Riga player managed by the recently returned @Patrik Tallinder). Our string of good picks would continue all the way until our selection of @Ricer13's Kris Rice at 43rd. Funnily enough, that last selection only happened because I traded up in the draft intending to select a player who I was surprised was still on the board...and then found out that the player I had my eye on had already been picked. Who could I have had instead of Ricer, you ask? None other than the biggest one-hit wonder I've ever seen--Sven Nyckel, who joined the league, dropped a 2300-word media spot, and disappeared immediately after the draft. Luck works in weird ways.

 

We were pretty good, but after having depleted the entire roster, we were still mostly just a solid core lineup. We had holes on defense and at center, and I did my best to fill them. This was first addressed when I traded for @DizzyWithLogic's Finnegan MacBurn (who would unwittingly benefit us by going inactive right at the cap, at a time when such a player didn't have to be released. I don't want that to be the main point of Dizzy's time with us, though, because he was a great person to have around when active). I'd also never had a huge recreate signing yet, but this would finally change when none other than @Beketov signed with us at the deadline with future Hall-of-Famer and perennial Boulet winner Mikko Lahtinen. It's also worth pointing out that my original Houston roots still ran deep--our hole in net was filled by signing Aleksandr Aleksandrov, managed by my former teammate in @aleks. We had a legitimately good team--maybe not quite on top, but very good and a sneaky threat to make a deep playoff run.

 

And then we lost right away, with an embarrassing series against Yukon featuring practically no scoring. We were shut out twice by my former player Block Buster, including a 1-0 Game 5 to end it all. It would be best not to dwell on that too deeply, though. We had all the draft capital in S69 that we did in S68, and this time I had players returning. Before making a single selection, I had Rice and Tallinder up front and MacBurn on defense. All would spend just about all of S69 fully capped, and we were ready to get down to business.

 

Here's the thing--so was Saskatoon. Where we had #5, #8, and #11 in the first round (our maximum of three first-rounders!), they had #1, #2, and #3. Where we were picking at #20 and #22 in the second, they had #13 and #14. And that meant a lot when there were exactly 19 active players in the draft and we only half-hit on two of our first-rounders. The Wild would go 5 for 5 with their early selections, while our two seconds, two thirds, two fourths, fifth, sixth, and two sevenths translated to zero players who meant anything and our first round essentially just amounted to the solid choice of Jimmy Spyro (@DarkSpyro), who under us would blossom into a capped goaltender and well-known member. That was really disappointing, but the core we had in place already was still enough to make our roster look good. And as it turned out, a good roster in a season with a thin draft class is powerful.

 

Because of all of these circumstances, Rice, Tallinder, and MacBurn absolutely exploded in S69. I reached out to San Diego and traded for Will Clarke (the last player I remember @Will managing before his current one), and we looked pretty good to go. But, again, so was Saskatoon. They went on a run managed by GM @Peace that I've never seen in any league of the VHL since, winning game after game and carrying a crazy undefeated streak deep into the season. Nobody could figure them out, not even in overtime, and they were destined to be the Cup champions.

 

And then we took them down.

 

50 games into the season, and the Wild had just been figured out. And while this was just once, it was a flicker of hope. Across all my time as a GM, there isn't a single game I remember better than this one.

 

Saskatoon also had a full roster where we didn't, and my solid reputation as a GM combined well enough with our regular-season success that we had a super strong pull on recreates at the deadline. Kyl Oferson (@Nykonax), Ola Vikingstad (@Dil), and Roque Davis (@Josh) all signed with the Hounds and had earned well enough to serve legitimate purposes in the playoffs. We beat Saskatoon again before season's end (and so did Mexico City--the Wild only lost 4 times, and it was twice to each of us). But it wasn't the win-50-games-in-a-row situation that it once was for them. They were still easily favored on paper, but we had a fighting chance and the balance of power had been somewhat adjusted.

 

That wasn't before we got past the Kings, though. We'd finished second overall in the standings, but they weren't too far behind and were the only team that could realistically pose a threat to us before the final (we blew past Ottawa in the first round and I had to look at the index to even remember that). That said, we did have to go through them. We'd done better with recreates, though, and Nyko volunteered to obsessively test-sim for me behind the scenes. This led to a fairly decisive series win in which I got cocky and set all the strategy sliders to zero for the game that closed it out.

 

And then there were two. You get one guess as to the other, and it was the team that hadn't lost a game in the playoffs yet.

 

And we took it to Game 5!

 

That's about all I'm going to say about the S69 finals. You know what happened and you know I didn't win it. But we still handed the Wild their fifth loss of the season and could claim that we were more of a speed bump to them than anyone else. I wasn't even disappointed! Luck wasn't on our side in the draft, but the players I'd hoped would get a second good look in S69 did end up with that chance and it was only because of a weird combination of not having active players to pick that the chance wasn't better. It was my best season as a GM to that point, and it would remain the deepest I've ever taken a team in their playoffs.

 

This was, of course, the VHLM, and what that meant was that after a couple seasons of buying, it was time to burn down the team again. S70 was uneventful, underwhelming, and unmotivating--and that would also be when I moved up to GM Davos not long into the season. That is, obviously, a collection of stories for another time. Functionally speaking, my time as a VHLM GM spanned 4 seasons between S66 and S69. I never won a Cup and I never won the top GM award, but I sincerely believe that I was one of the M's best of the time. Now that Gustav 30 in 30 has closed its book on what I did in Mississauga, I hope you'll agree.

 

 

Read my other articles for the full Gustav experience (hi Berocka):

 

#1: Lightning Glory Gonna Be My Name

#2: Can't We All Just Get Along?

#3: Who Needs Cybersecurity Anyway?

#4: The House That I Built

#5: Can We Fix It?

#6: American Beauty

#7: The Kids Are Alright