Tagger

My thoughts on transparency in sims: Yes, absolutely. We've got the technology, let's do our best to eliminate any doubts about the simming process. My thoughts on the accusations: I'll admit, I have my suspicions, and it's not based just on Beketov winning awards. Just focusing on awards provides no real context because, at the end of the day, Beketov is a member who earns a lot of TPE and has proven before he started simming that he's capable of making players that win awards. Typically before he started simming, Thompson was winning awards solely down to the ridiculous number of shots he was putting up. I seem to remember one season (probably Season 62), where he had over 800 shots and let's face it, if you have that many shots, you're going to score a lot of goals regardless of how many go in. My suspicions focus on those seasons where he didn't have a high volume of shots, yet still managed to find himself very near the top, if not at the top. The two main examples of this are Season 68 and Season 72. Season 68 was Thompson's final season in the league and he was after goals, that much was apparent. But in reality, Malmo was not a team that was able to give Thompson the volume of shots that he'd had previously, as he was all the way down in 17th in total shots, and had over 100 shots less than the top three players in shots. Regardless, Thompson did the incredibly improbable and managed to record an 18.75% shooting percentage and take home the goal-scoring title comfortably. How incredibly improbable was this? Well, prior to this season, the previous shooting percentage record for a player who was in the Top 50 in points was 16.02% (Lars Berger), and that was set all the way back in Season 20, so to not only break a record that stood for that long, but to also break it in such convincing fashion was unfathomable really. The anomalies carry over to the Nighthawks as a team who collectively struggled to shoot (2nd lowest shot totals in the league) and weren't exactly playing elite defense (mid-table in shots against, but were only 30 shots off of having the third most shots allowed in the league whereas they conceded 100 shots more than the Seattle Bears, who were the other team in the mid-table of shots against). Along with that, they didn't have a particularly standout season from their goalie Michael Johnson, whose .917% was average for a goalie that season. Yet they still won the Victory Cup despite having over 150 less shots for than shots against, making them the only Victory Cup winning team in the trackable indexes to win the Victory Cup despite having a lower number of shots than the number of shots they faced. Along with that, they actually had the highest point differential in the league, despite the fact they were the third worst team in the league in shot differential. There isn't as much to Season 72 as Season 68, but it was another instance of Beketov's player (this time Lahtinen) defying the odds that no other player that I can recall has ever really challenged by getting close to the Brooks trophy without having the shot totals to realistically think about competing. This time Lahtinen was way further down in the shooting rankings, all the way down in 49th in total shots, yet somehow managed to finish second in goals. For the second time in three seasons of Beketov simming a season with a player on the first two lines of a team, Beketov's player (and a different one at that) broke Lars Berger's 16.02% shooting percentage mentioned earlier with a 17.45% shooting percentage. Again, not just scraping over the record, but a sizeable leap over it. This is just my stats in an easy to compile area. Again, the fact that Beketov is winning awards isn't a reason to suspect questionable sims, but looking at the anomalies that have cropped up in these sims do make me question the validity of them for the first time in 40-odd seasons.

The extra hours I’m having to do at work due to COVID are still taking up too much of my time atm to put up content for the site so I can’t guarantee I’ll have it up any time soon. If you want to take it off me you can do.

Edwin THE Encarnacion - Protect Scoring

Tres

Dos

Uno

@Josh

. The draft has come and gone. If you were drafted, are you happy with the team that selected you? If you were a waiver signing, why did you choose the team you did? Yeah Im happy that Calgary drafted me 2. If you could sign with any VHLM team based purely upon their logo, where would you go? I would say The Marauders one looks alright 3. Who's winning the cup this season? Take a look at the teams here if you're unfamiliar with them. I hope that it will be Calgary that wins 4. Are there any VHL teams that look interesting to you? Where do you hope you'll be drafted? If you've already been drafted by a VHL team, what's it like? Calgary is a good team and I enjoy playing for them 5. Describe your player in ten words or fewer. His shooting is clinically shit 99 days out of 100. 6. What's something that the league would be interested to know about you as a person? While on a Skype call with other sim leaguers, I accidentally started a small fire in my microwave.

I am ok with this performance

1) Calgary started slow this season, did it concern you? I'd say so, we had some losses I definitely wouldn't have expected 2)the rookies are making an I mediate impact, do you think that this will bring some competition inside the team? Well, they're certainly competing with me for points already at least. 3)our Goalie has been on point this last couple games, has the team ambience has anything to do with that? I think it's mainly that Lafontaine is very good at what he does. 4)what's Calgary's biggest threat now that we proved we could beat Seattle? I think it'll still be Seattle in truth, 5) what would you consider it's your biggest strength? Looking at my stats so far, I really don't know if I have a strength 6) and your major weaknesses? Consistently failing to find the back of the net with my shots.

The most uneducated rambling you'll hear about the VHL this millennium.

If you're looking for eight minutes of well-researched material then by god is this not the place for that.

1. You lost in game 7 vs Seattle. How painful was this loss compared to others you have experienced ? Given that we've lost two finals, this isn't as rough as those. 2. The VHL finals are upon us. Who are you rooting for ? I would've been rooting for Helsinki but hey ho. 3. The S74 draft is right around the corner. Who is someone you would like Calgary to select ? I've heard good things about this Eoin Byrne chap 4. What are your plans for the off season? I'm going to rest in a vegetative state 5. What is something you would like to accomplish in the S74 season ? Actually have a points tally that matches my TPA earning 6. The Wranglers billionaire owner wanted all players to have their own horse. All players were given a horse to ride to practices and home games. What are you naming your horse ? Numpty. Because that's what I'd name my dog if I had one.

1. How do you think your team has played throughout this series vs NY so far? I get the feeling we're going to win this one 2. A Texas Holdem cash game was played on your team's private flight to New York. Who was the big winner ? Gambling was the big winner 3. Whats your favourite tourist attraction in New York City ? The gigantic apple they have in the middle. I've heard it's huge. 4. What VHL team was your favourite city to visit this past season ? London because it's nearest to home. Oh hang on, I'm Dominican aren't I? 5. With his retirement announced is Jet Jaguar a Hof player ? I would say so, it's difficult to compare with older players given stat changes, but he should be good 6. Do you take a nap every game day ? Going off my stats, I had a nap out their during the Seattle series

I’d planned on using a proxy server at least until being signed so that should at least prevent any advantages from occurring

That’s pretty much exactly what I planned on doing

Well, when I say another one of those weeks I mean it's only the second week I've had to do this since THE Encarnacion was created (which, crazy to think, was over 10 months ago now) but I won't be hitting the 12 TPE cap this week due to lack of time and an annoying decision to post the trivia answers earlier than the official end of the week. At this point, I don’t think it really matters that much how often I’m hitting the cap given that this week will take me to 1000 TPE with still one full season to go before regression, but with how easy it is to squeeze in everything before the deadline (or at least when everything is closed at the correct time <_<), it’s something I like to make sure I do just so I don’t fall into that pattern of just not doing anything in a week, because that’s a pattern that's difficult to get out of once you've done it long enough.

1. Its that time of the season again. The playoffs are around the corner. Your team has clinched a spot. Are you ready ? I've always been ready for the playoffs 2. What are your expectations for your team going into the playoffs ? I think we've got another good chance at a final appearance but it's not guaranteed by any means 3. Who do you think makes the finals out of the Euro conference ? Haven't paid too much attention to EU, maybe Riga? 4. What two teams make the NHL stanley cup finals ? The Hartford Whalers and the Boston Red Sox 5. Who will be Calgary's playoff MVP ? It's been goalies recently so LaFontaine? 6. Are you happy with your players performance this season ? Yes and no, the assists have been strong but the goalscoring especially at the first half of season was shocking.

- I haven't been on the league that much this week, so I had to do a double take when I saw that New York were third in the NA conference, cause I remembered them having quite a good lead not that long ago. Turns out they've lost 7 of their last 10 games, including being shutout by LA and their default goalie. They'll remain in the playoffs (they're a good 16 points clear of the 6th place Wolves) but you never like to go on a run like that towards the end of the season. - I'm not going to do the research for it, but it's interesting to see how few of the top points scorers in the league are from the top teams. I know we've had the likes of Cast and Thompson record super-high point tallies when their respective teams were scraping into the playoffs (and their teams were similarly built to the current expansion teams), but it's odd to see that the league-leading Titans current top point scoring player Ben Hafkey doesn't make the top 20 in points and fourth place Calgary only has one representative (RJ Jubis) in the top 25.

1. What part of the vhl has been your favorite so far? While I'm not particularly active in it atm, it's the community 2. What is the most impressive part of your game? My playmaking, although it's definitely unintentional given I have 99 scoring and 95 passing 3. What do you think you are most known for to your team mates? Being their assist man probably 4. If you won the lottery what would you do first? Not tell anyone else that I've won the lottery 5. What movie can you watch nonstop and still love? I don't actually watch that many movies, can't think of the last time I watched a movie for a second time but it was a long while ago. 6. What is the oldest piece of equipment you own? I've got a pair of hockey socks that I never used cause I don't play hockey

So with the theme week being about future players, I’ll use this article to talk about the plans that I have for my next player. Just a pre-warning though to take this article with a grain of salt as I “committed” to several different player ideas for my current player before I went with Edwin THE Encarnacion. Said ideas included the Sentient 120 page A5 Notepad (a notepad who wound up being signed to a hockey team with all my media being done in the form of Amazon Reviews), Pcmeavjis N (what was going to be my second attempt at a random player after the underwhelming Aackckqz Ky) and Russias Greatest Love Machine (an ode to the Boney M song Rasputin which is a certified banger and yes I know there should be an apostrophe but 30 character limit). However, I feel pretty confident that, if I am to make a player after THE Encarnacion, this is the direction that I would go with it. ----------------------- Edwin THE Encarnacion will be the final Encarnacion It’s been a hell of a run which has seen five players spanning over half of the league’s existence share a name and backstory, but as the title of this media states, Edwin THE Encarnacion will be the player that closes the book on the Encarnacion saga. While I’ve enjoyed the different paths each of the Encarnacion’s have taken, whether it be Encarnacion’s PIM obsession, Threencarnacion’s all-time leading save percentage as the world’s greatest backup goalie or Reencarnacion and Preencarnacion being actually very good, but I think it’s time to move away to a new story now. Hopefully the transition will be more like when the Killzone developers went and made Horizon: Zero Dawn rather than when the Mass Effect crew went and made Anthem. This player will not have any carryover This might sound a bit odd given that my player currently has more than enough TPE even now to warrant a boatload of carryover but it will make more sense once you continue on into the article. On this topic though, this will make this player my first player to start with 30 TPE (if I create later, I’ll be forgoing any catch-up PT allowance) when I’ve had the option to use carryover available to me. It will certainly be a challenge to get out of the VHLM when I’m essentially starting from scratch, but I think this is the least of my worries given the next point… I will not earn any TPE until after my VHL Draft Yep, I’m going to be starting my eight seasons of eligibility with the base 30 TPE and see how high I quickly I can climb up into the VHL and whether I can make a legitimate challenge for awards given my starting point. I took the influence of this from the league’s former simmer and HOF builder JardyB10 and his first player Jardy Bunclewirth. Bunclewirth was selected in the third and final round of the Season 16 VHL Draft with only 12 TPE to his name (for comparison, the leading TPE player in that draft class had 191 TPE) but overcame the odds and wound up winning three continental cups along with being inducted into the Hall of Fame for players. Given that this was in a very different era of the VHL (one that had only half of the number of teams that we currently possess), I’m interested to see if I can even come close to repeating the same feats that Jardy achieved with Bunclewirth. But what about my VHLM team that selects me? Will I be screwing them over? Well no, because… I will not be signing with a VHLM team until after the VHL Draft So as to not screw over any of the teams in the VHLM, I will not be signing a contract offer with a VHLM team until after I have granted myself the ability to earn TPE. I’ll still be spending plenty of time down in the VHLM I imagine (especially given the current 250 TPE cap for the VHLM as opposed to the 200 and 175 I had to overtake with my previous players) so it won’t be like I’m ignoring the VHLM, I’ll just be there at a different point of my career than the norm. But the player will be evident by my member name right? Well… This player will not be created under the Tagger username Yep, just like Persona 5’s battle theme Last Surprise says: I’m going undercover with a completely new username with zero rep ready to take the league by storm! I wonder how easy it will be for people to catch on to which username and player will be mine, but I figure I may as well bring an element of surprise to the mix. Hell, maybe a GM will super-sleuth it like a Town of Salem game and take a punt on a player in the final round of the draft that they believe is mine rather than waiting for Free Agency to snap me up? ------------------------------------------------------- Obviously these are all a ways off as I’ll definitely be playing eight seasons with THE Encarnacion (so creation would be trade deadline of Season 77 at the earliest) and there’s no guarantee that I make this player immediately after THE Encarnacion, but this certainly gives me a challenge to look forward to!

I've not done a ton of research for this but I can say now that this looks like a very good year for candidates for the Most Improved Player for Season 73. Granted, this was to be expected as the rise in teams meant that talent on some of the lesser off teams was thinner, especially at goalie, which has led to a big increase in points scored by the league's leading players, But yes, a lot of players have improved dramatically: High scoring players like Guy Lesieur and Jerry Wang have already beaten their previous season highs this early in the season to go along with Sigard Gunnar and Barabash Jr. making huge strides in their standing within the league with players like Alex Bridges also making dramatic improvements. So who will win the award? I'm not going to tell you, because I actually know who is going to win it even though there's still several games of the season to go, but I have no intention of ruining the surprise for you because that would be a dick thing to do.

Did that thing where I completely forget to do any PTs so I’m scrambling around to make sure I get the maximum. Just gonna address odd topics that come to mind. Encarnacion Bouncing Back I did a VHL.com either last week or the week before where I was bemoaning Encarnacion’s first third of the season and in particular his lack of goals. While the goal output is still far from acceptable (a below 3% shooting percentage), his playmaking over the last week of sims have been incredibly promising and has seen him rise up to ninth amongst defensemen in points and third amongst all of the league’s players in assists. Hopefully I can keep this run of form going and make a solid challenge for my first individual trophy with THE Encarnacion. SBA Affiliation Returns It isn’t something that will affect myself personally but I’m happy to see that the SBA partnership with the VHL has returned. I think it’s been about eight or nine months since the incidents took place and over that period, the information coming out didn’t seem to indicate that any reconsideration of stances was set to take place. But now we can all be psyched because this will help recruitment and retention for both leagues. Weekly TPE Change Another change that was announced this week by the VHL Admin was a minor change to weekly capped TPE that now includes jobs in the 6 TPE cap for mini-point tasks when it was previously exempt from it. Apparently, the reasons behind this are to do with a change that was implemented to the portal (I presume to safeguard from any incorrect updates that could potentially be approved by an updater) and because people were using it as a “loophole” to not do 6 TPE PT’s (which is a bit of a silly way to put it because they were originally going to do exactly this back when they first officially announced a 6 TPE cap for mini-PTs and jobs, but they changed their mind and made jobs exempt after complaints from people who were specifically stating they wanted to cap with jobs and welfare). I think the only thing I would say on the matter is maybe it would be worth reassessing updater pay considering this change. There have been a few changes made to updating that I presume makes the job a bit easier than it did (Training camp and welfare becoming buttons rather than update claims that had to be approved for example), but even with those changes I would not expect the job to be too different than from when I was an updater, and I can tell you now that when the job is done properly, you spend more time approving updates than it would take you to submit all your 12 TPE weekly activities if you weren’t an updater. Now, with jobs having to be compared with mini-PT pay given they’ve been shoved into that bracket, I don’t know if 4 TPE is fair for the updater job and

1. Did you even notice the forum was down for a few hours today ? I didn't, but it happens from time-to-time 2. How much of the NHL playoffs have you watched so far ? Absolutely none of it, I don't follow NHL 3. If you had to give our bot goalie a name, what would it be ? Gunnar Saveitsson, or something like that 4. How many seasons would you be willing to miss the playoffs, if it meant winning 1 Cup ? I dunno, probably one maximum, two would be excessive given where our team is at atm. 5. It is rumoured Sigard Gunnar's helmet does not fit on his head anymore. Why is that ? He's storing bacon sandwiches in his helmet for safekeeping 6. Rating it from 1 to 10 how do you think this season has gone for your team so far ? I'd say 7, we're not on top but at least we have a playoff push going

At the start of the season I wrote a VHL.com article about how I was expecting bigger things for Edwin THE Encarnacion this season coming off the back off a strong performance in the S72 Playoffs and World Cup, however that hasn't happened. Much like last season, Encarnacion currently can't even break into the top 50 in points and, yet again, it comes down to his appalling shot percentage. As of this point of the season, Encarnacion has scored on less than 3% of his shots, ranking 15th amongst defenseman in shots taken but all the way down in 40th among defenseman in goals scored. While Encarnacion isn't the only one on the Wranglers suffering from a rough patch of shooting (Calgary as a team have below an 8% shooting percentage and Mikko Lahtinen's shot percentage is the worst among all forwards), he'll be desperate to pick up some kind of form towards the latter end of the season, like he did in Season 72.