S58: Back Down to Eight

[Will 4,660]

S58: REVERSAL OF EXPANSION

 

For some time now, the league has been exploring the idea that the VHL would be a better place with only 8 teams. This is not a new idea - many members, even some admins, have questioned whether or not expansion was justified dating back all the way to when it was implemented. Of course these questions were subdued during most of the VHLs life as a 10 team league as it did seem to work for some time. However over the last while in the VHL these questions have surfaced more and more often as the logic and reasoning behind them became more and more apparent.

 

As much as possible, we wish for this not to be a sign of weakness - a primary concern expressed by some people with this plan. The way we are looking at it is that dropping the league to 8 teams will be whatever we make of it. We believe that increasing roster sizes and increasing competition will increase engagement and activity in the immediate term, making the VHL a better environment. Combining this with other changes announced, as well as all of the fantastic suggestions we received from members during the drive (which I promise are being looked at, we've just been busy with this), and we think the VHL can be a much better place right now. 

 

Beyond that, it will be up to us to build on that foundation. @Devise is still working on organizing a permanent recruitment team, and I know there are plans in the works to start up aggressive recruitment drives with what I hope will be great incentives. We also have to commit to keeping up with things like the reddit campaigns, and most importantly exploring new avenues of recruitment, which we will do. The donations made by VHL members also must start being well-spent in the area of recruitment as it is truly the #1 thing we can do to improve the league. This is a time where we need real effort and attention going into recruitment from us as the leaders of the league, but we hope as many people as possible will join us as if even a small fraction of us bring in a new member, it could make a significant difference. All of these changes - going down to 8 teams, no more 2 players, ect. ect. - must be considered improving the situation for when new members get here. If they aren't, that is when a change like this becomes a band-aid. 

 

Apologies for the side-barring but I wanted to be perfectly clear as to how the league is optimistically looking at this change. Now let's get into the specifics. 

 

The Teams

It was very difficult for us to determine the teams that should be removed. After a lot of consideration, we have decided those teams will be the Stockholm Vikings and the Cologne Express. However, the Stockholm roster will not be dispersed. Effective as of this post, the Calgary Wranglers and the Stockholm Vikings swap ALL assets, players and picks. Bushito is the new GM of the Calgary Wranglers. Stockholm, along with the former Calgary roster, will be removed. 

 

We are doing this because Calgary has been without a true GM for sometime ( @Bring Back Chat deserves much credit for sticking it out during a busy time of his life) so it makes sense to disperse that roster and leave at least one other GM/team in the same position it was in. 

 

We regret that this couldn't happen for both GM's. Advantage has a long and respected history of GM'ing in this league, and the fact that he is a causality here is hardly an appropriate acknowledgement of that. As we've told him, we're certainly willing to offer him the next available team and do whatever we can to make up for this. We truly struggled coming to this decision. As Advantages GM player hasn't come to his draft class yet, he will be entered into the S58 VHL Entry Draft as a regular player. 

 

The Dispersal Draft

All current players, prospects, and RFA's of the removed teams will be placed in a special dispersal draft. The draft order will be completely randomized as a list. There will be no special weighting so every team has an equal shot at top picks. This draft will begin today, prior to the actual VHL draft and free-agency - due to that time constraint we are not going to do the draft live but rather in the GM forum and then it will be publicly posted. 

 

All players on rookie contracts drafted will have their contracts carried over in its entirety to the team that drafted them. All other players drafted will be signed to a 1-season contract with the team that drafted them, therefore allowing them to re-negotiate it or choose not to. 

 

Any active player set to be an FA will continue to be a UFA. Any inactive player set to be an FA will be in the dispersal draft. 

 

League Structure
Removing two European teams destroys the current Conferences in the VHL. Therefore, next season will be one world conference. This was actually something we were thinking about anyways before we decided to this, for the purposes of playoffs to address the often large disparity between conferences. And given that the scheduling doesn't take into account conferences, this actually changes very little - however we are going to change the playoff format. 

 

The top 5 teams will compete in playoffs. Round one will be a wildcard round between the 4th and 5th teams in the league to determine who makes it to the Semi-Finals. The next 2 rounds will carry on the same as they always do. Draft lottery will be the same, among the 3 teams who missed playoffs entirely and the team who was eliminated in round one. 

 

Of course it is kind of silly to have 5 NA teams and 3 EU teams. I'm hoping we can turn finding a solution to this into a fun event for the community, for example having a special PT for coming up with solutions. There's been some suggestions in the BOG like moving the EU teams to NA or moving an NA team to EU, but we want to see what everyone else would like the league to look like. So all that being said, we will be very open to proposals of relocating or re-branding going forward. 

 

Draft Picks

The only picks that are of issue are S59 COL or CGY picks belonging to other teams. Teams owning these picks will receive fair compensation in the form of an S59 draft pick at some reasonable point. S58 CGY or COL picks belonging to other teams will be in their expected position. All picks owned currently by Cologne or Calgary themselves will cease to exist. Any S59 STO picks currently belonging to any team will become S59 CGY picks. 

 

Other Notes

The salary cap for S58 will be $33 000 000, representing a 1M increase over S57. While it's possible this is not necessary, we are abruptly removing $64M worth of cap space in the VHL so we're doing this as a safety measure and we will re-evaluate it next season once things stabilize. 

 

That's pretty much it for now. I'm probably missing something but there will be more announcements soon as the draft order and draft results are published. The regular off-season will also be getting underway shortly and we hope to have some special TPE opportunities coming up. 

 

~VHL Commissioner's,

Beketov / Devise / Will

[hedgehog337 3,483]

So that's like only 3 decent players from Cologne are going to draft. I see for majority of VHL teams the contraction draft gonna be trash.

 

or wait, Calgary roster going to draft as well or somethn?

Edited December 7, 2017 by hedgehog337

[Will 4,660]

3 minutes ago, hedgehog337 said:

or wait, Calgary roster going to draft as well or somethn?

 

Yes, Cologne and Calgary rosters

[hedgehog337 3,483]

Just now, Will said:

 

Yes, Cologne and Calgary rosters

 

Thank God, that's better.

[Kesler 1,514]

Nice plays boys.

[Kyle 667]

Interesting.

[CowboyinAmerica 2,889]

Good stuff, think that's a good call. I'm interested in the VHLM-type Wild Card round as well, think that could be a lot of fun. Thanks to the admins for doing something proactive to help 

[Frank 5,211]

What time is the draft? @Will

[STZ 5,360]

4 minutes ago, Frank said:

What time is the draft? @Will

 

 It’s not live

[Kendrick 4,741]

Heads up GM's, if you are thinking about drafting a player; contacting them first is still a good idea.

[Beaviss 4,957]

All great changes! 

[Baozi 1,658]

I'm down with this as well as the one conference thing.

[Da Trifecta 1,899]

Great move going forward

[Quik 4,113]

Obviously I've been big on the contraction. I still think that keeping the contracted teams' picks that they own for this coming draft  (and other teams' picks they own in upcoming drafts) as part of the dispersal draft would work nicely. 5th overall pick in this draft might be more valuable than an actual roster player to teams...and having Seattle's pick in S59 might be a nice gamble as well...

 

Just a thought

@Beketov @Devise @Will

[Will 4,660]

1 hour ago, Quik said:

Obviously I've been big on the contraction. I still think that keeping the contracted teams' picks that they own for this coming draft  (and other teams' picks they own in upcoming drafts) as part of the dispersal draft would work nicely. 5th overall pick in this draft might be more valuable than an actual roster player to teams...and having Seattle's pick in S59 might be a nice gamble as well...

 

 

Not a bad idea, we actually didn't discuss leaving the S58 COL/CGY picks available in the dispersal draft. I thought about putting in picks from other teams that are currently own by CGY/COL (so it would have been an S58 HSK pick and the S59 SEA), I only decided not to for S59 because we're going to have to inject an extra pick somewhere for Davos as they own Calgary S59 1st. So my thought was that by burning the SEA pick, we avoid pushing some teams down one slot in the S59 draft when we give Davos that pick. 

 

S58 picks would be interesting though 

[Advantage 2,891]

Disappointing for Cologne as we had something really good cooking there but we will see what happens.

 

Good luck gents @bgreene21 @Kendrick @TheLastOlympian07

 

Frustrating way to end my run as GM but I guess I'll see where I go for a couple seasons. 

[Kendrick 4,741]

5 minutes ago, ADV said:

Disappointing for Cologne as we had something really good cooking there but we will see what happens.

 

Good luck gents @bgreene21 @Kendrick @TheLastOlympian07

 

Frustrating way to end my run as GM but I guess I'll see where I go for a couple seasons. 

All 4 members in the LR and we had a solid one at that, was really stoked to see where we went with it but oy vey or however you say it

[Baozi 1,658]

Glad I was part of the Cologne path to success while it was available

[Frank 5,211]

2 hours ago, STZ said:

 

 It’s not live

Ok but it must start at a certain point lol. @Will

[Molholt 2,185]

Curious to see how this goes, certainly a key point in league history one way or another.

[Will 4,660]

33 minutes ago, Frank said:

Ok but it must start at a certain point lol. @Will

 

It's going to open up pretty soon but it's just going to be down in the GM forum, a person who picks can just tag the next GM and move on 

 

should be able to get through it in a day or two 

[solas 1,951]

RIP the Vasteras dream

Anyways, I think this makes sense.  I was a bit resistant to the idea of contraction when it was first brought up, but the idea makes sense.  Hopefully this and the Player 2 change can get things back on track.

[Tagger 2,722]

Get told to stop posting about contraction in the BOG because I was "wasting my time" and I was "in the minority".

 

4 Months later, league contracts.

 

 

Anyways good job admin team, hopefully this can be the start towards getting this league back to its peak!

[Kendrick 4,741]

9 minutes ago, Tagger said:

Get told to stop posting about contraction in the BOG because I was "wasting my time" and I was "in the minority".

 

4 Months later, league contracts.

 

 

Anyways good job admin team, hopefully this can be the start towards getting this league back to its peak!

Yes it's all you! Congrats, pat on the back. Good work, top drawer!

[Baozi 1,658]

Got told im not BOG worthy.

 

Am BOG worthy.