Challenge 25: Detroit Red Wings (Discussion)

[bruins72]

I might have to continue this game after the challenge is done. I could even leave Detroit after the challenge and rebuild another team. It depends. If I get to draft some guys that I really want, I may have to stay.

Oh and I was looking at Wayne Cashman's info tab and saw Harry Sinden listed as "Disliked Staff". It's nice to see that Harry was making so many friends back then too.

[nino33]

I’ve made an error (now corrected) in putting goaltender Andy Brown on the Detroit Red Wings.

Brown played for the WHA’s Indianapolis Racers in 1974-75, but in the 1974 db the WHA’s expansion draft never occurred (like it did IRL in the summer of 1974) and the WHA’s Indianapolis Racers “don’t exist” (the team name is used in the ECHL) - so I put Andy Brown on the Detroit Red Wings, but actually he should be (and now is) on the Pittsburgh Penguins; IRL Detroit traded him to Pittsburgh on February 25th 1973

Why am I talking about Andy Brown so much? Just the set up before pointing out that Andy Brown (the Andy Brown on your start-up Red Wings roster) was the last goalie in the NHL/WHA to play maskless! As seen below!

[XenHL]

Oh man, that Racers pic is especially brilliant!

[XenHL]

So, just getting my game started, I'd have a couple of questions that aren't immediately relevant, though.

1: No Euros - this applies only to UFAs, yes? I'm still free to draft a Swede whom I've scouted with my Swedish scout?

1B: Scouting by scout's citizenship: can I assign the Swedish scout to scout "Scandinavia", or must he be assigned only to Sweden?

2: UFA tiers: If I opt for, say, tier A, is that applicable throughout the Challenge, or to that single season only? E.g., say in 2008 I sign a UFA for $1.2m/a, as my only signing. Can I then in 2009 sign two UFAs at each under $525K/a, or am I restricted to signing one UFA at $2m/a or under?

This should be interesting... I'll probably get destroyed though!

[nino33]

I don’t speak as the authority or anything…it’s Bruins72’s challenge!

The idea was to play within the “spirit of the era” – players behind the Iron Curtain weren’t really scoutable in the 1970s let alone available



The basic idea is you have to have a Scout whose nationality is the country you're scouting/drafting from…so yes you’re still free to draft a Swede whom you've scouted with your Swedish scout

As for assigning the Swedish scout to scout "Scandinavia", I would think yes but I’m not sure…what do those from the area say?

UFA tiers: If I opt for, say, tier A, is that applicable throughout the Challenge, or to that single season only?

My understanding is its applicable to the single season only


Regards

P.S. In the future I’m going to create some EU National Free Agent (at start-up) historical Scouts from old Olympic/WC rosters, rather than just a handful of NHL teams have them at start-up and that’s it (IIRC the NHL teams that have them now are based on the team having an EU National on their roster already)

[Manimal]

So, just getting my game started, I'd have a couple of questions that aren't immediately relevant, though.

1: No Euros - this applies only to UFAs, yes? I'm still free to draft a Swede whom I've scouted with my Swedish scout?

1B: Scouting by scout's citizenship: can I assign the Swedish scout to scout "Scandinavia", or must he be assigned only to Sweden?

2: UFA tiers: If I opt for, say, tier A, is that applicable throughout the Challenge, or to that single season only? E.g., say in 2008 I sign a UFA for $1.2m/a, as my only signing. Can I then in 2009 sign two UFAs at each under $525K/a, or am I restricted to signing one UFA at $2m/a or under?

This should be interesting... I'll probably get destroyed though!

1 and 1B are voluntary rules but yes you are free to draft a Swede if you have a Swedish scout.
IMO, A Swedish scout could definately scout all of Scandinavia

For question 2, Nino is correct. It is season-by-season.

[XenHL]

Thanks for the clarifications!

My scout is giving so many stars on Anders Kallur, I'm tempted to sign him, but I think I'll try to tough this one out - no European UFAs unless they've already played in NA.

[XenHL]

I'd have just one more question: where's one to post the end-of-season screenshots? (Perhaps this should be added to the relevant section at http://www.ehmtheblueline.com/forums/vi ... php?t=4463 ?)

[Manimal]

I'd have just one more question: where's one to post the end-of-season screenshots? (Perhaps this should be added to the relevant section at http://www.ehmtheblueline.com/forums/vi ... php?t=4463 ?)

It is in the announcement section:
http://www.ehmtheblueline.com/forums/vi ... =20&t=5077

[XenHL]

Welp... I messed up.

Just realised that I made my one trade too early - on June 10. I'd been looking forward to making this trade from about the middle of season 1, I guess I got overeager...

[outdooral]

Im up and runnignnow in this challenge. Thanks for pointing me to 7zip ,it worked well.
Ok first i have to gush a bit. ....I love this database, thanks Nino for putting this together.I was 8 y/o in 1974 and just really getting into hockey. i remember days spent playing road hockey until dark...Robinson to Lafleur....what a save by Bernie.!!! The names you have here are all the ones we used playing on the street. Palmateer, "chico" Resch, Sittler,Dionne, Bossy it just goes on and on.Thanks again for bringing back memories of those days
On to the challenge , rushed through the preseason just to get going, i signed a scout or two and another assistant coach and trainer.11games in and we are 5-5-1. Dionne got hurt in the first game and missed 4, now I have Danny Grant out.Rutherford is playing decent in goal only one bad game. His Save % is only 89 but GAA is 2.85.
Im stuggling most on the PP which is normal for me, but this one is really bad 14.2% >if i can improve there I should be better, Im getting around 10 chances per game.

[joehelmer]

I've just played the playoff for my third season, this season was the first that I really struggled to get to the playoffs. But in the last matches of the regular season we managed to hold on to 8th position and finished 2 points ahead of 9th.

That meant that we got the winners of the Conference, which was Chicago, that was a little surprise for me as LA had been the better of them earlier seasons. I thought that this would be a easy win for Chicago as I had struggled against the top teams.
But somehow I managed to win the series with 4-2 and Dionne didn't get injured in the quarter finals.
This meant that we proceeded to the Conference Semi Finals against LA Kings that finished second, and as always Dionne gets injured when he is needed the most and we lost 1-4.

LA proceeded to the Conference Final against Calgary, two teams that I hate as they both have beaten me in playoff. Calgary actually won that series and will face Montreal in the Stanley Cup, I have a guess that Montreal will win, but I will be very happy if Calgary manages to win to break Eastern's dominance.

BTW, I hate Montreal as well.
I hate all the teams, except my own, they're awesome.

[nino33]

thanks Nino for putting this together.I was 8 y/o in 1974 and just really getting into hockey. i remember days spent playing road hockey until dark...Robinson to Lafleur....what a save by Bernie.!!! The names you have here are all the ones we used playing on the street. Palmateer, "chico" Resch, Sittler,Dionne, Bossy it just goes on and on.Thanks again for bringing back memories of those days

You're most welcome!
I was 7 in 1974...and I too experienced the childhood joy of playing road hockey until dark!

[XenHL]

I missed the playoffs in my second season... had a horrible first half, but pulled together through the second half, to go into the last game tied on points with Phoenix... and my dinlows choked in their game against Edmonton, and Phoenix won their game and so made the playoffs (only to get bounced out by LA, but).

I'm disgusted with Rutherford. He plays just great through two periods, and then lets in enough goals in the third to lose the game. Once I stopped playing him and using Grant instead, that's when we started to make our ascent out of 10th into almost making the playoffs.

Dionne's been generally healthy for me, but he had a long spell of unproductivity this season. Kindrachuk (whom I got in the offseason for Mickey Redmond) did his utmost to make up for Dionne's slack, as did Danny Grant, but this season we weren't quite as effective up front as in the first. My 1st round pick in the draft, John Tonelli, had a pretty decent rookie season, but this offseason I'll definitely need to look into addressing the black hole that is my defensive corps...

I'm very much enjoying this, though, despite not making the playoffs this season. Looking forward to getting through the offseason and into season 3!

[joehelmer]

For the fourth second I signed Anders Kallur from MODO, now my forward line up looks good with four stars in Dionne, Grant, Ftorek and Kallur.
Kallur will probably play with Dionne and Grant and Ftorek will play in the second line.

[XenHL]

Good season but frustrating at times... absolutely rubbish 3rd quarter. Then we finally clinch a playoff spot, and in the 79th or 80th game of the season my best goal scorer, Brasar, gets injured and is out for three weeks... get to the playoffs, take a 2:1 series lead... and Dionne gets injured. Tonelli had his breakthrough season, Gustafsson broke Dionne's record for points by a rookie, and I got Charlie Huddy in the first round of the latest draft. I think things are looking up for the future!

[bruins72]

How is Thommie Bergman consistently one of my best defensemen when he's got mediocre attributes at best? I just don't get it. Also, Stefan Persson's technical attributes really don't look like they're developing much but he won the Calder in his first season and in 57 games so far this season he's almost matched his points total for his first season, while also having a nice +21 in comparison to a -2 last season.

[Primis]

How is Thommie Bergman consistently one of my best defensemen when he's got mediocre attributes at best? I just don't get it. Also, Stefan Persson's technical attributes really don't look like they're developing much but he won the Calder in his first season and in 57 games so far this season he's almost matched his points total for his first season, while also having a nice +21 in comparison to a -2 last season.

More than with any other DB I've ever seen, this DB seems to have players that look like their attributes should not have them contributing the way they do, and yet they do anyways. Thommie Bergman would in fact be one of my first examples of that. I think it's partially the depth thing again but, that's not all of it.

Tactics also seem to have even more of an effect, possibly because most all of the AI coaches don't have very good attributes. It's hard to put together a coaching staff. Many NHL-level coaches in this DB would not probably be AHL-level in some of the modern ones.

I was fortunate enough to get to GM Team USA for the Olympics, and built the best USA team I could scrape together. And somehow, it took OT for Canada to beat me in the Gold Medal game, and I don't even have a Head Coach for the team because nobody will sign on for it...

[nino33]

I purposely/actively edited tactics, but my initial focus was on the NHL Head Coaches.
The 1974 db for sure has greater Staff Tactical Att variances than a modern database, and "average" Staff Atts are set lower than a modern database.
I was kinda hoping the importance of Tactics would increase!

As a starting point I purposely made historically great coaches (Al Arbour, Scotty Bowman, etc) very good and I made the rest “average at best”

I figured I’d rather error on the conservative side with version 1 (i.e. maybe the NHL Staff need a bit of a boost)…for example, instead of an average of 14-16 in Characteristics/Atts the average NHL Head Coaches in the 1974 db have such Atts between 10-12

And of course part of the reason is the “work in progress” factor – for example 100% of the NHL Assistant Coaches have “0” for all their Tactical Atts! AND there's no Minor Pro or Major Junior Staff at start-up!

I suppose it’s pretty realistic HaHa, given that most teams had just a Head Coach back then (teams simply didn’t have Assistant Coaches)…while it may be true you can’t put together a typical modern coaching Staff, the same Staff level is fairly available to everyone with only a handful of top level Head Coaches – personally I don’t believe that all modern NHL Staff deserve such high Atts! HaHa I wanted greater separation between the good/great Staff and the average (I also think it’s unrealistic to be able to easily “fire/replace everyone” at start-up...but then once I add historical AHL/CHL Staff and Major Junior Staff [I'm working on it!] things'll be different again)



And I think maybe Bergman’s getting a bad rap! HaHa
While his CA/PA places him right at the “average” level (his OFF/DEF Roles are 8/15), he does have a 12 Consistency, 14 Work Rate, for Agility-Acceleration-Balance his starting Atts are 11-12-15…17 Strength, 15 Hitting, 14 Checking…a 14 Pass Tendency with a 12 for Passing/Stickhandling...
In a hockey world where D is King (almost all defenseman have an OFF Role of between 5-8, and a DEF Role of 15-18 + almost all forwards have at least a 10 for DEF Role)…perhaps Bergman’s Atts serve him well (especially if well used by a human coach!)…his OFF Role of 8 places him at the top end of average for D in the 1974 db…I imagine him as a guy who’s hard to knock off the puck who makes a decent first pass



Regards

[bruins72]

Well, I just got knocked out in the Western Conference finals again. For the second year in a row, it's been the LA Kings and Montreal Canadiens in the Stanley Cup Finals. And for the third year in a row, Montreal has won the Stanley Cup. They are just so dominant!

So now I've to get to the draft and then get my screens and stats in. Maybe I'll finally make it to the Stanley Cup Finals in season 4?

[thunderbug]

Season 3 has been rough on me. After I'd already squared my roster away in terms of signings, Red Berenson decided to call it quits. Needless to say this put some strains on my center depth. I was already hoping I could use a trade to strengthen my depth down the middle and get out some of the not so great centers. This made my first 20 games awful. In my first 10 I had won 2. After I could make a trade for a servicable 2nd line center things bounced back and won 6 of the next 10. Our 2nd period we went on a tear and beat a few good teams as well. We won 14 of 20. In the 3rd segment Dionne went down for most of that segment and we looked about like we did in that first segment playing under .500 hockey. Here's to hoping for some good development, as normally I'd start moving kids onto the big clubs, but I'm not into rushing them and nobody seems ready.

[bruins72]

Awards time!

Marcel Dionne: Art Ross 2nd place, Hart 3rd place, Plus=Minus winner, First All-Star Team

Wayne Connelly: King Clancy 22nd place

Danny Grant: Lady Byng winner, Plus-Minus 3rd place

Stefan Persson: 2nd Team All-Star

Not as good as I had previously done with awards. This year Lafleur just dominated the league in goals and points. He had 71 goals (Grant was 4th and had 50) and 148 points (Dionne was 2nd and had 129).

The third draft was pretty poor. I did manage to draft Rick Vaive, ranked 15th, with the 18th pick. In the second I grabbed Anton Stastny with the 48th pick. I had a Slovakian scout, so I felt I was able to draft him (within the optional challenge rules). I got another Swedish scout this season but wasn't able for find any good Swedes to draft this time.

[XenHL]

Season 4 was up and down. Got off to a great first quarter, 14-6 and first in the conference, then a miserable half season: 15-22-3 over the next 40 games. Closed out pretty well with 14-6-2 over the last 22 games, landing me in 6th place. Irritatingly, two of my most important players - Brasar and Gustafsson - got injured at the very beginning of the playoff series against Chicago, which I lost 4-2, whereas at the end of the regular season and after the Game 1 victory I actually thought I had a chance to win the series... ah well. Next season.

Highlights of the season were amongst the awards: Charlie Huddy won the Calder (though didn't get named to the all-rookie team!), while Marcel Dionne won the Richard (68 goals), the Art Ross (137 points) and the Hart.

My one trade of the season proved brilliant: I sent Frank Bathe to Edmonton for a young defenceman with stats better than most of my D-men, who nevertheless hadn't played a single NHL game yet. Immediately winning a spot in my top-4, Brian Engblom ended up named to the All-Rookie Team.

I drafted Lee Norwood with my first-round pick, and I expect him to develop into a core defenceman; between him, Engblom and Huddy, I think I'm pretty set for the future at the back end. Up front, Tonelli had a great season affixing himself as my second-line LW, Brasar and Gustafsson continued their great works. Kindrachuk had nearly a point a game, so another good season, though he missed three months in the middle with a broken shin. I've got Craig MacTavish as probably my best forward prospect, the Assistant Mgr is still rating Gradin highly but he was disappointing in his stint with the big team and his numbers aren't progressing very well.

Season 5 should be interesting. I'm setting myself the goal of making it into the second round of the playoffs, at least.

[nino33]

Thanks to all for posting! I LOVE reading the season recaps!

[bruins72]

I just logged my first 20 games of season 4. I didn't make any UFA signings in the off-season. I haven't seen anyone I wanted to claim from waivers yet and I haven't been able to work a trade yet either. I was originally looking to land an offensive center so that I could drop Berenson down to a lower line because he's getting old. That didn't work out and he's actually still playing pretty well. During the preseason, I saw that Gary Bergman's physical attributes had really dropped. He's 39 years old and his age is catching up to him. I tried going with my big rookie talent, Doug Wilson, but after about a dozen games I saw that he just wasn't ready for the NHL yet. He'll need at least a year in the AHL. So I've put Bergman back in. He's doing okay I guess but I really want to replace him. I'm hoping I can make some sort of deal.

As usual, Rutherford has started off the season well but he usually starts to tank somewhere after the halfway mark. I'd like to be able to keep him as a starter for the season. Brown just isn't good enough. Maybe I can put a waiver claim in on a good goalie at some point?