Board of Governors Updates

[Advantage 2,892]

Good evening everyone, this will be the thread going forward that will keep all of you updated on what is happening in the Board of Governors.  As some of you may know this thread here had served as a place where @tfong would update the league with the titles of threads in the BOG.  With that being said, recently we have had a discussion about being more transparent, especially with what happened in regards to the Expansion Teams and the debacle that resulted afterwards.  Transparency has been something that we have been looking to provide for quite some time, but have tried to work around the fact that not everything can be public and we don't necessarily want to put people in an awkward position of providing controversial opinions that would be showcased for the entire league to see.

 

With Mr. Fong separating away from the Board of Governors and more into his role as Head Moderator, the Board of Governors have decided to revamp how they present their content to the league.  This idea was loosely inspired by @Mr_Hatter who had brought forth the idea of a third party coming into the BOG and breaking down the talking points rather than just us posting the title of a thread and leaving the rest of the league to imagine.  After some discussion and debate on whether or not we should have a neutral party do this, one of the Board of Governors do it or even a committee of BOG members, the Administrators and Board of Governors decided to go with the independent option and will be using myself as the new BOG Correspondent.  

 

My goal is to provide everyone in the league with more context into the discussions we are having and break down the different views, with the idea that the league can comment on some of these potential back-and-forths.  We feel this is not only a great way to be transparent, but to also test the temperature of the league on some of the discussions.  Now obviously not everything will be posted (ban threads, potential league surprises, etc.) but I will make sure that everything else is not only posted, but that all the talking points are broken down for you as well.  Feel free to also comment and ask me questions as I want to be someone that you can come to with issues or opinions and I won't hesitate in bringing them up.

 

With that being said, I will be keeping this main post updated with the happenings and will probably post something every week or perhaps I will try and keep it as updated as possible when new things are being discussed. In addition, I will also post any closed discussions that have been ended in the last month.  These will be removed from the main post once they extend past the one month time frame.   

 

ACTIVE DISCUSSION

 

Topic - Hall of Fame Voting Reform (Discussion started June 22)

 

The Issue: The VHL has voted on the Hall of Fame for quite some time based on a system that allows you to vote up to two players in and you need 50% of the vote to be inducted.  This poster is concerned that during weaker classes, there is a higher likelihood that someone who does not deserve to be in the Hall of Fame will be voted in due to the lower benchmark to make it. We have also found quite often that we have been removing a lot of people recently added to the ballot due to their career resumes not matching up.

 

The Idea: Each voting member would have the ability to vote up to 3 or 4 people into the Hall of Fame (they can choose to vote less).  Players would require 70% of the vote to make the Hall of Fame, which is a 20% increase on the current standards.  Additionally, if a player were to receive zero votes in consecutive seasons, that player would be removed from the ballot entirely.  The idea is made in an effort to make the benchmark higher (thus seeing only deserving players make it) and eliminates the idea of players getting in on a weak class.  Said poster does admit that there could be an issue of players getting removed too soon due to the ballot elimination portion of the proposal.

 

The Commentary: A lot of the discussion has been centered around the part regarding players being removed, with some suggesting rather than two seasons with 0 votes that we could do three or five, with the idea that it likely lessens the likelihood of someone undeserving being removed from the ballot.  This is a concern to some with there being a lot of discussion regarding bringing certain players back to the ballot lately and with players like Mathias Chouinard, who was recently inducted into the VHL Hall of Fame after being removed from the ballot for more than three decades.

 

There has been some support for this proposal although a few members disagree that the current voting standards need to be altered and that no one that has gotten in has really been undeserving. The main poster making this point feels that it really doesn't solve any problems because there are no issues and have been none with how the league has been doing the Hall of Fame voting. The thread has gone in a few other areas too in regards to the ideas of players being returned to the ballot, as this is a very hot topic currently going on in Hall of Fame Discussion.

 

July 13 Update: There hasnt been much discussion on this regard and I could see this being a fully closed topic soon.  Since the last update the only new discussion has been continued skepticism of making the change to the way we vote for the Hall of Fame.  

 

Most of the people commenting seem to feel that while the proposed system is fine, that the current system still works for what we look to accomplish when voting on the Hall of Fame.  In addition, it is simple and easy to adapt for the future as well.

 

One person did say that we could add an option to abstain from voting if they feel that no one deserves to be in which as someone already pointed out it is technically allowed.

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Topic - VHLM and Deadline Recreates (Discussion started June 16)

 

The Issue: Recently a number of recreates joined forces on the Las Vegas Aces which caused a lot of complaints around the VHLM Community.  The concern seems to be that by doing this, it stacks a team and that the league can control this by putting in restrictions on the number of recreates that can join an individual team.

 

The Idea: The main idea by the original poster seemed to center around restricting ice time for recreates and that he had discussed with some VHLM GMs that the focus of the minors is to develop players so we need to make sure to put all players in the best position possible, regardless of them being a recreate or new.  The thread, ultimately, was posted to create more ideas so the commentary will have a lot of the ideas that have come up on how to potentially fix this issue.

 

The Commentary: First, a lot of members did not really have a problem with the idea of a team being able to go out and sign five or six players, if those players deem that they want to play for the same squad.  The most significant reason why seemed to be that these players, even with carryover, will not be as competitive as the top teams that generally have several 200+ TPE players as most initial recreates won't be past 120 TPE come playoff time.  Some members also feel that given there is a Dispersal Draft in the off-season anyway, we should allow deadline recreates to have their fun and play for whoever they want.  One member brought up that we could do a waivers system for recreates, but it seemed to get shut down fairly quickly with a lot of members feeling that everyone should get to pick their team for that twenty games and playoffs.

 

The discussion seemed to shift more towards roster construction and how we can avoid the truly awful teams that can surface in the VHLM, with the idea that we should be trying to jump all over all members joining and not just recreates.  A great example of this was a player that was highlighted who didn't receive a single contract offer until almost twenty hours after joining.  Once again, this goes to the focus that all teams (whether competing or not) need to have, and that is to make room for the actives.

 

One idea that did come up was in regards to only allowing recreates to play third line or lower, as it would let recreates go to whoever they wanted to but only play a limited role.  A few members disagreed with the idea as they felt it could really ruin the experience for anyone in this situation and could cause troubles with retaining our retiring members.

 

Finally, there was an idea that we could cap each VHLM Team at 3 recreates that they can sign come deadline time, which did receive a little support due to it being a slight tweak to the current system, but there hasn't been a significant amount of feedback on this idea.

 

July 13 Update: Discussion will likely close soon unless more issues arise, as the majority of discussion has been brought to the VHLM GM Forum.

 

With that being said, in the couple days of discussion since, the main thing that has been discussed is a continued focus on ridding teams of the non-actives that sit around 250 TPE and leave to have a VHLM career player.  

 

As has been stated, its one thing if you are around and interacting with your team and the league but its another issue when the member no longer is here and their player is taking the roles that an active could have instead.

 

CLOSED DISCUSSION

 

Topic - Maximum Backup Games Rule (Discussion started June 28 Closed on June 29)

 

The Issue: The Board of Governors and Administrators were made aware of an incident of potential intentional tanking by playing more backup games than required despite having another goalie on the team.  While the rules do indicate a minimum amount of games, the idea of intentionally tanking has always been an unwritten rule, but not something officially in the rulebook.

 

The Result: Discussion went back and forth on whether it was intentional or not, whether or not there should be severe punishment, do we need to add this a rule, etc.  

 

Ultimately we took it to a vote which saw the individual and team not punished as while we saw it as intentional, the majority of the Board of Governors felt it would be unfair to punish based on something that isnt even in the rulebook.  

 

However, we did decide to officially make this a rule in THIS THREAD which will serve as official legislation to avoid intentional tanking issues again.

 

The Board of Governors was certainly not unanimous in regards to the individual with some calling for the team to receive some pretty severe lunishments while others felt a tap on the wrist is fair given the lack of legislation.  Ultimately there were enough who saw it as unfair if we were to punish so the league moved on in that regard.

 

Topic - Restructuring the BOG (Discussion started June 13, Closed on June 17)

 

The Issue: With multiple members recently stepping down and/or being removed from the Board of Governors, the Administration Team decided that a revamp was necessarily and an opportunity was there to bring in a few new members.  Therefore, each BOG member was to put forth their top four candidates to add based on those who officially applied for the job position posted.

 

The Result: Acydburn, rjfryman, Doomsday and FonziGG were added to the Board of Governors team.

 

------------------------------

 

Topic - GM Application (Discussion started June 15, Closed on June 16)

 

The Issue: Based on tfong's idea regarding a running GM interest list, the Administration Team felt it was necessary to start keeping a running list of those members who are interested after the controversy that resulted from the Expansion decisions.  This thread was posted just to make sure that the language in the post made sense and that there was nothing missing as it seemed to already be a pretty unanimously popular idea with the league.

 

The Result: You can find the GM Application Thread here which was created in result.

 

------------------------------

 

Topic - Inclusion of all BOG in Staff Discord (Discussion started June 13, Closed on June 15)

 

The Issue: After the controversy in the Expansion Draft, it came out that some discussion happened in the Staff Discord, which some but not all BOG members have access to.  Therefore, the idea was brought up to include all BOG in the discord so that everyone can have their say and communicate effectively.  

 

The Result: After some discussion regarding the idea of potentially creating a BOG Discord instead and leaving the Staff Discord for moderation issues, the point was instead made that we should just not be discussing BOG decisions off the forum so that everyone can participate equally.  This also led to the GM Application discussion and an admitting from some of the Administration that there needs to be better communication all-around.

 

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Topic - The 'E' Word. Changes are Coming (Discussion started May 7, Closed on June 12)

 

The Issue: This was the Administrators telling the Board of Governors that Expansion would be happening and that they had already picked GM's who had been figuring out the team names.  It also had the details regarding Expansion Drafts, Draft Lotto, Non-Playoff Team Tournament, etc.  Essentially this was all discussed in the Blue Team Area, and they were just informing us.

 

The Result: There was some discussion about some of the decisions they had made but ultimately a lot of the thread was going through logos being discussed and team names as well.  Ultimately, this thread will have your new four teams to the league and all the other rule changes to accommodate their inclusion in the league.

 

------------------------------

 

Topic - Jericho's Post (Discussion started June 3, Closed on June 6)

 

The Issue: Discussion whether we should run a Donation Campaign regarding the BLM issues going on, and if so, what charities we should be donating to.

 

The Result: There was really no vocal opposition to the idea of running a campaign although some were concerned about coming off as too political.  As many of you know we destroyed our goals and were able to donate a significant amount of money ($1165 each) to both ACLU and Spirit North in an effort to help meaningful causes in regards to systemic racism in both Canada and the United States.

 

------------------------------

 

Remember that this is more than a thread that you can just read up on BOG Content as we encourage to provide your feedback on issues discussed and ask questions.  For those who will have questions, I will try to provide you with answers in a timely manner.

Edited July 13, 2020 by Advantage

[bigAL 2,176]

2 minutes ago, Advantage said:

BOG Correspondent

Cool job title, great idea, and thanks for the update!

[New Member Guide 1]

...

Edited June 23, 2020 by New Member Guide
whoops

[Berocka 2,263]

  12 minutes ago, Advantage said:

Said poster does admit that there could be an issue of players getting removed too soon due to the ballot elimination portion of the proposal.

Could there not be a vote that if there is an applicant on the ballot that is not HoF worthy than the BoG vote and the same restrictions apply you would need a 70% yes vote to get evicted from the Ballot.

 

  12 minutes ago, Advantage said:

The Issue: Recently a number of recreates joined forces on the Las Vegas Aces which caused a lot of complaints around the VHLM Community.  The concern seems to be that by doing this, it stacks a team and that the league can control this by putting in restrictions on the number of recreates that can join an individual team.

I said this in my most recent podcast, but why are recreates done at TDL, why not do it at the start of playoffs, the recreates can focus on their older player and come off-season it then moves on to their new player.

 

I know you are just the messenger but they were my ideas.

[Advantage 2,892]

17 minutes ago, Berocka said:

  12 minutes ago, Advantage said:

Said poster does admit that there could be an issue of players getting removed too soon due to the ballot elimination portion of the proposal.

Could there not be a vote that if there is an applicant on the ballot that is not HoF worthy than the BoG vote and the same restrictions apply you would need a 70% yes vote to get evicted from the Ballot.

 

  12 minutes ago, Advantage said:

The Issue: Recently a number of recreates joined forces on the Las Vegas Aces which caused a lot of complaints around the VHLM Community.  The concern seems to be that by doing this, it stacks a team and that the league can control this by putting in restrictions on the number of recreates that can join an individual team.

I said this in my most recent podcast, but why are recreates done at TDL, why not do it at the start of playoffs, the recreates can focus on their older player and come off-season it then moves on to their new player.

 

I know you are just the messenger but they were my ideas.

As of now the voting system operated that way in regards to removal, but with 50% needed for the removal to happen. That is certainly a potential idea especially if we are concerned with players being removed too quickly.  I do believe part of the reason it was framed that way was that there are better discussion years than others for HOF where more analyzing comes out and better arguments are made.  If its a down year in discussion cause its a seemingly easy ballot id be a bit concerned that someone gets voted off without the proper discussion being had.  That being said, I'm not sure I've really seen that issue come across if I am to be honest.  Ultimately as well, we shouldn't have down years to begin with.

 

As for your idea, it's radical but interesting.  Worth bringing up for sure although given that the majority of the BOG doesn't see the stacking of recreates as a huge issue, it wouldn't surprise me if some don't see it worth it if they don't deem it a major problem.

 

Id be curious to see what kind of TPE side effects that would have on recreates though.

Edited June 23, 2020 by Advantage

[okochastar 97]

1 hour ago, Advantage said:

The Issue: Recently a number of recreates joined forces on the Las Vegas Aces which caused a lot of complaints around the VHLM Community.  The concern seems to be that by doing this, it stacks a team and that the league can control this by putting in restrictions on the number of recreates that can join an individual team.

 

The Idea: The main idea by the original poster seemed to center around restricting ice time for recreates and that he had discussed with some VHLM GMs that the focus of the minors is to develop players so we need to make sure to put all players in the best position possible, regardless of them being a recreate or new.  The thread, ultimately, was posted to create more ideas so the commentary will have a lot of the ideas that have come up on how to potentially fix this issue.

 

The Commentary: First, a lot of members did not really have a problem with the idea of a team being able to go out and sign five or six players, if those players deem that they want to play for the same squad.  The most significant reason why seemed to be that these players, even with carryover, will not be as competitive as the top teams that generally have several 200+ TPE players as most initial recreates won't be past 120 TPE come playoff time.  Some members also feel that given there is a Dispersal Draft in the off-season anyway, we should allow deadline recreates to have their fun and play for whoever they want.  One member brought up that we could do a waivers system for recreates, but it seemed to get shut down fairly quickly with a lot of members feeling that everyone should get to pick their team for that twenty games and playoffs.

 

 

 

Heh, what a coincidence. I know zero of the other players on Las Vegas, so this was definitely not premeditated on my end. 

[NotAVHLM-GM 1,858]

22 minutes ago, Advantage said:

Id be curious to see what kind of TPE side effects that would have on recreates though.

 

The only downside I see on this would be the players that now have created at the trade deadline would have a bigger advantage over the others.  The positive side however, with this being closer to the offseason (where you can retire and keep your player for the 8th season). This would make the difference between the ideal point and new starting point closer, if this is only like 2 weeks, you could opt to wait 2 weeks (and losing 16 tpe for this (6 capped 2 practice facility) and then have less downtime between your vhl years.

 

Now the gap is too big to my liking to consider this option. So it might not even be a bad idea

[McWolf 3,115]

3 hours ago, okochastar said:

 

Heh, what a coincidence. I know zero of the other players on Las Vegas, so this was definitely not premeditated on my end. 

tbf, it's not always a premeditated movement, sometimes it's just that it's the move that makes the most sense. Top teams are too stacked and it doesn't make any sense to purposefully join a bottom dwelling team when you know you can be 120+ TPE by the playoffs and actually help. There always seems to be one team that strikes that perfect balance. They have the potential to do some damage in the playoffs, and they holes for these recreates. This season it's Las Vegas, two seasons ago it was Houston.

[DMaximus 1,046]

4 hours ago, Advantage said:

 

Topic - VHLM and Deadline Recreates (Discussion started June 16)

There have been some other ideas thrown around I don’t see mentioned here. I think the best idea being: change the recreate date from the trade deadline to the start of the playoffs.

This would eliminate a couple of issues, like recreate stacking on VHLM teams, VHL players retiring mid season (I know they remain on the roster, but they no longer earn TPE.) and users having two players playing simultaneously.

[der meister 3,197]

What I see: blah blah blah 

 

What I read: Klose for HoF

 

 

 

{this thread is a good idea}

[Bayley 419]

4 hours ago, okochastar said:

 

Heh, what a coincidence. I know zero of the other players on Las Vegas, so this was definitely not premeditated on my end. 

 

wtf, I am a nobody now?

[Quik 4,113]

1 hour ago, DMaximus said:

There have been some other ideas thrown around I don’t see mentioned here. I think the best idea being: change the recreate date from the trade deadline to the start of the playoffs.

This would eliminate a couple of issues, like recreate stacking on VHLM teams, VHL players retiring mid season (I know they remain on the roster, but they no longer earn TPE.) and users having two players playing simultaneously.

 

The issue with moving the date is you either move all creations, which would become pointless for first gens to create when they're ineligible to join rosters, or you're moving one without the other, which handicaps recreates. With the adjusted starting TPE, it pretty much wipes out any advantage a recreate at the deadline has on players from the draft class ahead of them, so the issue is recreates vs. first-gens, which is a fair issue to bring up, just hard to find a clean solution.

 

Also, users having an "inactive" for ~20 games + playoffs isn't really a major concern, considering there are inactive players who sometimes go 5-6 seasons after their last update.

[NotAVHLM-GM 1,858]

36 minutes ago, Poptart said:

 

wtf, I am a nobody now?

 

do you want a honest, or a polite answer?

[DMaximus 1,046]

17 minutes ago, Quik said:

The issue with moving the date is you either move all creations, which would become pointless for first gens to create when they're ineligible to join rosters, or you're moving one without the other, which handicaps recreates. With the adjusted starting TPE, it pretty much wipes out any advantage a recreate at the deadline has on players from the draft class ahead of them, so the issue is recreates vs. first-gens, which is a fair issue to bring up, just hard to find a clean solution.

 

I think the pointlessness of someone creating during the playoffs when they're ineligible to join a roster is mitigated by the fact there's an upcoming draft for the new player to look forward to. Could also be further mitigated by the awesome idea of a lottery tournament.

You lost me a little on the TPE advantage part being wiped out. Don't the recreates still have the advantage of carryover TPE?

[Beketov 9,034]

3 minutes ago, DMaximus said:

I think the pointlessness of someone creating during the playoffs when they're ineligible to join a roster is mitigated by the fact there's an upcoming draft for the new player to look forward to.

Off-season is 2 weeks. If they create at the beginning of the playoffs that could easily be another week or more. So you're talking about potentially 3-4 weeks of absolutely nothing to do while waiting around for things to end. I've seen plenty of guys get bored joining in the off-season and waiting 3-4 days for the draft so 3-4 weeks seems like it would be an absolute interest killer.

[Quik 4,113]

1 minute ago, DMaximus said:

 

I think the pointlessness of someone creating during the playoffs when they're ineligible to join a roster is mitigated by the fact there's an upcoming draft for the new player to look forward to. Could also be further mitigated by the awesome idea of a lottery tournament.

You lost me a little on the TPE advantage part being wiped out. Don't the recreates still have the advantage of carryover TPE?

 

First-gens creating during a signing moratorium in the playoffs means ~3-4 weeks of them not being on a team/in the sim. That's a major issue for retention.

 

With playoffs being ~2 weeks after the deadline, that's 2 weeks of TPE they'd lose out on, 28TPE just from cap+PF. That's >50% of what carryover covers, and even if you give them the adjusted start, that's still 16 TPE they'd miss out on, which doesn't seem like much, but is still a sizeable chunk out of carryover.

[Spartan 4,418]

5 minutes ago, DMaximus said:

You lost me a little on the TPE advantage part being wiped out. Don't the recreates still have the advantage of carryover TPE?

You'd probably have to boost carryover TPE then to offset the 2-3 weeks lost after the TDL, and I'm guessing that isn't preferred.

[DMaximus 1,046]

1 minute ago, Quik said:

 

First-gens creating during a signing moratorium in the playoffs means ~3-4 weeks of them not being on a team/in the sim. That's a major issue for retention.

 

1 minute ago, Beketov said:

Off-season is 2 weeks. If they create at the beginning of the playoffs that could easily be another week or more. So you're talking about potentially 3-4 weeks of absolutely nothing to do while waiting around for things to end. I've seen plenty of guys get bored joining in the off-season and waiting 3-4 days for the draft so 3-4 weeks seems like it would be an absolute interest killer.

 

I agree that's not ideal. But doesn't that problem currently exist? It's not like the first-gens know when the ideal time to create is and they sit around and wait for that day to create. They just sign up when our recruitment efforts find them. How does pushing back the recreate date effect when first-gens sign up?

[Quik 4,113]

1 minute ago, DMaximus said:

How does pushing back the recreate date effect when first-gens sign up?

 

Means we can't really run a recruitment drive during the ideal creation time. So now you have an influx of members joining weeks after creation has opened, losing out on the opportunity we look to give them with the deadline creation date.

[Beketov 9,034]

2 minutes ago, DMaximus said:

 

 

I agree that's not ideal. But doesn't that problem currently exist? It's not like the first-gens know when the ideal time to create is and they sit around and wait for that day to create. They just sign up when our recruitment efforts find them. How does pushing back the recreate date effect when first-gens sign up?

Because there is no such thing as a recreate date? Recreates can join at the same time as anyone else, the TDL just sets the season number for their draft. Because of this we tend to line up a recruitment drive for the start of the new draft class to fill it up early.

 

Also just in general it isn't really about first gens vs. recreates, it's more so just about giving people something to do. If you were to stop looking at all games for the next 4 weeks how would you feel about the league, even as an established member? I'd wager you'd be pretty bored. Boredom causes inactivity regardless if someone is new or not. Having 4 weeks with nothing to do right when you first create doesn't exactly make people hyped for their new player.

[ThePerfectNut 563]

All of the top prospect in S74 joining the Las Vegas Aces was actually by coincidence ahahahah.

 

Beside for Onde Sandtrom. I had absolutely no idea who I would play with until I realized most of us signed there ahahahaha.

[Mr_Hatter 1,608]

I'm really happy with how this is turning out; I think it's a good thread to point to whenever people say "hur durr BOG do nothing." Thanks for making my idea a reality @Advantage

[Plate 386]

When recreates are joining teams, it's through free agency right? The top prospects weren't drafted by Las Vegas they were signed there? Is that correct?

If that's the case, you can't really limit who goes on what team. Or even how many players are eligible to join that team. Limiting ice-time ruins the experience for people that sign. You also can't push back the date because then players would have weeks without anything to do. 

 

The issue is that recreates are hugging each other, coincidentally or not, because they see that one team has the best chance at winning the cup and they all jump for it.  We can indirectly limit how many recreates can join by allocating a certain amount of cap space a team can have towards recreates. Much like in real life, all the players want to go to the best teams. Those good teams have to manage cap space in order to grab those players. Since the VHLM is a different beast on it's own, and the cap signings are small in comparison, putting a limit to the amount of dollars that can be allocated into recreates might be a possible solution. 

Yes, I hear you say, what if the players just sign the minimum deal to join a team? Well, just like in real life, less money is a decision that a player has to make. Having less money in the start also slows down your TP earnings in the VHLM. (Maybe not by a lot, but by a little). It also means that VHLM GMs have more to think about with their money. 

 

But Plate, isn't that just the same as having a hard cap on the amount of players? There really isn't a difference between a hard cap on the number of recreates a team can have vs the amount of money that a team can sign for them. The difference between limiting how many recreates can sign vs how much they can sign for is instead of a "hard cap" on the number of players into a "soft cap" through cap and signing decisions. Yes, there is still a theoretical limit to the number of recreates that can join. But that number can change based on the decisions by the players and GMs. A hard cap doesn't allow for those decisions to influence the number of recreates that can go to a team, this system can. 

 

This system also doesn't touch any dates or limit ice-time for players as they would still be introduced into the system as normal. I can see why this might get shut down, but it's some food for thought. Sorry for the long post. Thanks for reading. 

-P

 

 

[McWolf 3,115]

6 minutes ago, Plate said:

Yes, I hear you say, what if the players just sign the minimum deal to join a team?

All contracts are the same in the VHLM.

[Plate 386]

2 minutes ago, McWolf said:

All contracts are the same in the VHLM.

Well sounds like my suggestions is dead to rights. 

 

Was it always the same??