Team Building Exercises 7/11: Nothing but a Hound Dog

[HenrikZoiderberg 469]

Team Building Exercises 7/11: Nothing but a Hound Dog

 

 

This is the seventh in a series of weekly interviews with the VHLM's GM's. If you have any suggestions for my next series, please don't hesitate to reach out. I'd love to hear all of your suggestions. Back to it:

 

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6

 

We're checking out the good ole Ontariah boys this week, with @GustavMattias of the Mississauga Hounds on running an expansion team, the merits of drafting star players, and the drawbacks of losing those same players in thier draft year. Big thanks to Gustav for joining us this week.

 

As a reminder to those new to this series, these interviews were conducted prior to the S66 season, and as a result some of the information may seem a little outdated. There have been several staffing changes throughout the VHLM's GM's during this time, so if I've missed you please don't hesitate to let me know.

 

For those of us new to the league, could you give us a little history of the team? Is it an expansion team or was it one of the originals?

 

The Hounds are an expansion team--this is our first season. Most people didn't expect the league to expand as much as it did this season, and I can't say I did either. Being a rookie last season, I really didn't see myself being named GM. I saw Nyko @Nykonax apply and knew he'd get a team, and then I found out that IR (at the time, he was under the alias of Goonie) was a league vet who'd come back and I assumed he'd get one too. After that, I really don't know what made me stand out enough to be picked, but I'm happy about it. 

Not much history yet, but we have a strong draft class and a few players with legitimate shots at being stars, so we'll see some history being made before we know it.

 

Oh very cool, so you're in a similar boat to the Knights, your expansion siblings! If you're just starting to build the team, what do you take into consideration when you sign new players?

 

I'm looking for active players. There's really no way to tell if someone's going to be active before you sign them--the signing process generally consists of whatever team is interested immediately offering a contract to a player right after that player has been created, which I can't say I'm a big fan of as it's very possible to sign people who will never log in again.

Usually, I look to see if the person who created the player has been looking at the site for a while--if there's an hour or so between creation of a member and creation of a player, that usually means that person has actually taken the time to look around the site a bit and that they've decided they want to be here. Other things, like making a few posts early on or changing a profile picture from the default, can also be good signs of success. 

 

Any favorite rookies in the upcoming season?

 

As far as Mississauga's rookies go, I love my first two draft choices, Rayz Funk @Rayzor_7 and Hulk Hogan @HulkHogan. I'd say that they both have the highest star potential out of any rookie goalie and defenseman out there in the league.  (Editor's note: Both of these players were taken in the first round of the VHL S77 draft during the Seattle Bears massive rebuild draft).

I kept very close track of goalies before the draft, and I'm also very excited to see what Greg Eagles @Greg_Di (San Diego) will do. I think he was fairly underrated coming into the draft and we would have certainly been interested had we not picked up a goalie in the first. There are a few solid veteran recreates in the mix, too--look for San Diego's Phil Marleau @Phil and Philadelphia's Kevin Low @Smarch to make an impact.

 

How about on other teams? If you could add one player from the VHLM to your roster, who would it be and why?

 

Right now, our biggest need is easily on defense. So, I'd have to go with Rusty Shackleford @K1NG LINUS, an already-capped S66 defenseman from Saskatoon who will also be my teammate in Malmo next season. Having a high-TPE blueliner like him would really help out our guy Hulk Hogan, as well as the rest of the team. 

 

So you'd focus more on positional need than BPA at this point? And for us newbies, what's the TPE cap for the VHLM?

 

At the moment, yes--we're reasonably set at forward and goalie, so I'd like to concentrate our efforts on signing defensemen. It really all depends on the situation, though--in free agency there's really no such thing as "best player available" unless the player is an established veteran member and a guaranteed active. 

If you're new, and would like to stay in the VHLM for another season, be sure to stay under 200 TPE (whether you apply those points or not, it doesn't matter--it's 200 points EARNED, not 200 applied) until further notice. Don't worry about earning more, though, if you'd like to go up. Just know that if you do, you will go up, no matter what.

 

So what's the next step for the Mississauga Hounds?

 

I'm really not sure yet--I did my best to not sacrifice our future for success this season, and as a result I've heard some people saying that we're not as good as the competition. I think any team that keeps its players active can win games, though, so it's really just to wait for the team to improve and do our best to be successful this season. I might be looking to make a few trades later on, but what those trades are really depends on just how successful we find ourselves.

 

Sounds like you're on the right pace for your first season. Do you have any advice for aspiring GM's?

 

If you'd like to be a GM, look around the league and apply for any job opportunity you're interested in, no matter if you think you're qualified or not. At the moment, VSN is looking for a few people, and later on in the season, you can always be hired as a GM for World Juniors. Teams look for AGMs every now and then as well, which will give you very good experience going forward. 

If you don't apply for anything, you'll never get anything. So just keep at it and eventually something good will come your way.

 

That's everything on my list, anything else you'd like to add in closing?

 

I'd just like to throw out there that we're all here to have fun--I think many of us, myself included, have moments on the site when we should step back and remind ourselves that this is an online simulation community where we're really just arguing over fake Internet points. We shouldn't attack each other personally, and we shouldn't take things too personally either--just take a moment to consider the fun in what we're doing here and enjoy it!

 

That's it for this week constant readers. Next week I'll be meeting with @FrostBeard of the Houston Bulls to talk about desert hockey, cattle ranching, and the best way to differentiate a steer from a sow. The answer may not be what you think. Until next time!

 

-Henrik Zoiderberg

 

1259 Words

TPE for weeks ending August 4 & 11

[Gustav 6,098]

@HenrikZoiderberg I forgot all about this! Well done, it's interesting to look at my thought process last season in writing, seeing what's changed, what hasn't...thanks for the interview.

[HenrikZoiderberg 469]

Just now, GustavMattias said:

@HenrikZoiderberg I forgot all about this! Well done, it's interesting to look at my thought process last season in writing, seeing what's changed, what hasn't...thanks for the interview.

 

Its' fun seeing where e we all were at at the start of the season compared to now. So much has changed.

[HenrikZoiderberg 469]

Bumping for this week's TPE