What the hell, Davos?

[hedgehog337 3,483]

Not in mood for 2000 word articles so let's just talk about perhaps the most underwhelming team so far. HC Davos Dynamo.

 

Since Tyler stepped down this team was constantly under pressure by the rest of the league. They were meme'd hard and their GM by that time, Shawn Glade was under the fire for most of the time. Rightfully or not, that's for others to judge. Anyways, he stepped down from this job, but left lots of S72 picks for the next chief in charge, @GustavMattias. Things were going great. First two picks in S72 and a good draft overall made people think that Davos is about to return to it's glory. Except it didn't happen. Gus was making so many trades for being a legit contender, but Simon was just disliking their forward lineup. Getting swept by a perennial playoff clients in Riga, then being upset by an upcoming Malmo team in the wild card a season later. And how about the missing the playoffs altogether last season. I mean...oof. Fast forward to last offseason. Before making any moves I was reaching up to couple of GM's to know their plans. Gustav told me he is set to contend again. It made the sense; despite not making the playoffs last season their roster was still looking decent, even without Roque Davis. Fast forward once again, let's look what's happening in the EU conference after 1/3 of the season is gone:

 

 

I mean, a whopping 47 games left and they're only 6 points behind the 5th place Moscow. But something tells me it may not change at all and Davos is on the danger on missing the post season once again. Just look at these stats. Least regulation wins from all Europeans teams. Worst offense in this league. Third worst shots for (only ahead of Riga and LA). Worst goal differental in the league. And that's with four 700+ TPE forwards. THEY ARE EVEN WORSE OFFENSIVELY THAN RIGA!!! At least they beat us twice, I guess that's good. It still wasn't enough to life them from the last spot though. Let's see what the fuck is wrong with this team.

 

First off, forwards. Despite having a bunch of TPE applied, neither Hornet or Winter could find any chemistry between each other. Then we have Jensen who was traded from New York before S73. The player who is constantly underachieving despite being another big TPE guy. It never changed in Davos. Owen Nolan who was traded...khe khem...from New York. A decent player, but never managed to reach the stardom and never elevated this team's offense to even a decent level this season. Also, three more depth level guys, only one of them is showing a promise.

Defense. Oh well. The best of them is the guy who is trying oh so hard being a Condor to Davos, but he is still too young for that. Always loyal Ahma is there as well, I guess there is nothing much more to ask from him given his current build. And also two 300 TPE defs. Seems kinda meh to me.

Goaltending? Bruden is like McPine for Prague, decent at earning TPE, but never being a true saviour to Davos. Plus a backup from Berocka.

 

In conclusion, it doesn't look very good so far for this team. The main offensive weapons are doing very little, the defense is just average, even on paper. The same is for goaltending. Seems like the standing isn't that surprising anymore eh? Although I still was expecting more from them. Anyways, let's looks at their future and see what Gustav might do.

 

I'd say they are in weird position right now. Owen Nolan is retiting following this season and Jensen is going to bid his farewell a season after. Lefebvre stopped developing altogether and Vlad Imir is just a depth tier forward, nothing more. On the bright side, both S72 first picks are locked for 2 more seasons after this one and Tsujimoto is a GM player so that automatically makes him a very promising center.

Moving to defense: situation there is worse in my opinion. Tyler Walker may legit pull Condor in Davos, but it's very muddy after that. Ahma has only 1.5 seasons left with not much TPE left, Wyman never earned lots of TPE in the first place and he is on the prime already. Shawty is a future second pair defenseman at most. That's tough.

Goaltending is an odd one. Bruden is set to regress after this season. They do have a way younger goalie in Berocka, but it may take 2-3 seasons before he becomes a good netminder.

 

In conclusion about their near future...tough telling. Their possible roster for the next season without any signings or drafting:

 

F - Jensen, Hornet, Winter, Tsujimoto

D - Walker, Jokinen, Shawty

G - Bruden, UnGuri

 

Honestly, I'm not sure about others. Vlad is not a fast TPE earner and he may be not needed in Davos. The same for Lefebvre who is just inactive. Wyman might be extended, but not sure about that. Now, they do have a couple of prospects coming up following this season, but I don't see them doing big. They would need a couple of seasons before becoming solid to star level players. So basically they need more big TPE players. The current lineup wasn't just not doing enough in S73, they weren't doing enough in S74, they are not doing enough now and they won't do much next season either. They just never meshed up together and it doesn't seem it's going to change anytime. Maybe more stars going to help them? Maybe rebuid? Retool? The star player swap? I'm not sure about the next offseason's trade market yet, still to early. But I could see one or two teams trying to change things in their respective teams so maybe Gustav may take an Advantage of that if he's still set on competing.

 

One thing is for sure though - don't trade for New York players. Most likely they are aleady have the underachieving mentality, just like the NY itself.

 

That's it and I'm out.

 

23/11 - 29/11

30/11 - 5/12

[ThePerfectNut 563]

Nice shot at NY lol

[hedgehog337 3,483]

3 minutes ago, Jtv123 said:

Nice shot at NY lol

 

glad to see members reading this article whole lol

[Gustav 6,406]

Honestly, fair. I came in expecting to get memed more, and I'm glad that this is an actual evaluation of things (negative as it may be) rather than the "Gustav sucks" article I've seen once or twice. I can actually say I enjoyed reading this, so good on you @hedgehog337.

 

We've had our share of ridiculously awful luck--notably, the past two seasons, we've had a roster that should have put us right up there with the best of them (in my opinion), but got slammed by STHS and ended up going nowhere. I'll also take some of the responsibility for simply not having enough knowledge and experience to properly manage the fat load of assets that got dumped in my lap at the beginning. I probably took things too quickly and impatience and a weird trade or two led to a bit of mismanagement on my part.

 

Davis leaving in free agency this season was certainly a blow (not that I blame Josh at all given how the sims have treated our team during his time with us). I continue to argue that getting negotiations up to a sign-and-trade for a 1st and then flipping that for Walker was as close to perfect as I possibly could have handled the situation, but that doesn't mean our defensive core didn't take a step back because of it (and because of OQuinn retiring due to general lack of interest). I did see a step back coming this season, actually, but wasn't planning on tearing everything down because we're young enough as a whole. Retooling a bit and shifting around assets, rather than going all-in or having a fire sale, is probably best this season. Obviously a nice combination of "roster isn't as good on paper at the moment" and "Simon still hates us" hasn't been doing Davos any favors.

 

Easily my biggest concern in my time as GM so far is whether or not people even take me seriously as a GM anymore. I'm not saying you don't and I'm not saying that anyone else in particular doesn't, but from a pseudo-outside perspective, I was (semi-controversially) brought in to fix up a team, and so far it's been a giant flop. So, to anyone reading this who thinks I'm shit and doesn't want anything to do with me--I don't think your opinion is unwarranted (even though I'd disagree with it). I've learned quite a bit up to this point about running a team and obviously still have quite a bit to learn. Things aren't good now, but I believe we've got what it takes to break through soon.

[BladeMaiden 1,807]

SASSY REVIEWS FROM BLADE (BECAUSE NORMAL REVIEWS ARE GETTIN' OLD :

 

Well well well, what do we have here? Another Davos Hating Article? Like anyone who is anyone needs a reminder about the ultimate struggle bus that is Davos. It's almost low hanging fruit at this point to even mention Davos has become  click bait and memeish. I can't say I was surprised to see Gus' comment about expecting you to follow an oh too popular trend of ppl shitting on  Davos management thinking that they could do better against the sociopathic sim we call Simon T.  I will say that when you mentioned Gus's trades I chuckled, if only because  you mention this as a tactic for winning but lets be honest you don't mention it is an outdated tactic. Like one that died in the 50s because that is probably when it last worked at the VHL level, I can't tell if your memeing or not @hedgehog337 but i do agree with your overall point that Davos should not be in last but then again Helsinki probably should have has a Cup in  the past tow seasons and we have seen how much simon gives a shit about what ppl think should happen. Logic be damned with our sim and you just be happy that Riga  seemed to get away with a few cups, because simon likes you lol

 

Overall your article was fair and gave an informative look at the situation and took a few artful jabs at a bad situation for the VHL's entertainment. Is it good? Hell yes... Did I like it? Roger that.  Do I think you gave gus any clues about what would possible be his issues? Not one bit... lol

 

10/10  Just for the MS paint "Bruh" on the leader board... lol @GustavMattias bonus pts to you because you are a good sport   It's not easy being on the hated on team, I await the day when you snap or win, things will get interesting lol

 

Edited November 30, 2020 by BladeMaiden

[Garsh 1,189]

16 minutes ago, GustavMattias said:

So, to anyone reading this who thinks I'm shit and doesn't want anything to do with me

 

Would be pretty ridiculous opinion to hold imo.

[Gustav 6,406]

25 minutes ago, Garsh said:

Would be pretty ridiculous opinion to hold imo.

 

I think most people who have paid attention for long enough would recognize that I'm putting in effort; still not worried about general consensus. Just more slightly worried about first impressions on new people and such.

[Ahma 1,428]

[eaglesfan036 4,598]

Davos should have drafted malone to turn things around just look at london - clear correlation

 

but gustav is a great guy if he were my GM i would have no qualms playing for him

 

but right now too busy kicking ass on london sorry

[Grape 676]

I'm a first pairing defenseman... to my friends