EHM The Blue Line

I've been thinking too to trade O'Reilly away, 'cos he's just not producing for me. I know he is still young (20yo) and projected as a 1st line forward. But as I have Stastny and Duchene I'm all set for the No 1 and 2 centers for awhile and I don't really want to play O'Reilly as a 3rd line center for too long. And the other guy who has to go this season (season 3) is Salei. He did play pretty good last season for me but he's getting too old and he's not really worth the 3 million I'm paying for him. I will be looking for a defensive or two-way defenseman to replace him.

Laker2415 wrote: I have a question though. Matt Duchene is having a rough year in season 2, and he played the entire first season in Colorado. I looked at his profile and it said that I could still send him back down to his junior team. I was under the impression that if a player played 10 games with his pro team, he couldn't be sent back down. Am I correct and has anyone else seen something like this?

You can still send him back as long as a junior team has right to him. The 10 games doesn't have anything to do with that. The deal with the 10 games is that once a player plays 10 games in the NHL, that counts for a year on his contract. So most teams don't want to lose a contract year from a youngster. They'll send him back down before the 10 games so they maintain that contract year.

I wish EHM was so intuitive. I hate losing a contract year on every, single European I sign.

CatchUp wrote:Now I had to figure out how to get good value for old, slow, overpaid Salei. The Flames were rating him ***. Who else on my roster is under performing and probably doesn't fit in my plans? O'Reilly. Compared to Duchene, he's a joke. Plus, other teams seemed to rate him even higher than Duchene in negotiations. So add him to Salei and I've got myself Dion Phaneuf. I'm now pretty set on D.

Liles - Phaneuf
Hannan - Preissing
Quincy - Clark

I just remembered this:

CatchUp wrote:

jbsnadb wrote:Seems like those who buck the spirit of the challenges tend to not do so well, since they sacrifice depth for stats. Meanwhile, all I did was claim Martinek off of waivers and we've started 5-1.

^ What he said.

Those that are trading away Duchene, Wolski, Stastny, O'Reilly, etc are *in general* sacrificing the future to win in the present. Whereas those that keep their prospects and make minor upgrades via free agency and THE DRAFT are more likely to benefit in Seasons 3, 4, 5 and onward. Winning the later seasons of a Challenge gets more props from me than seasons 1 & 2.

"Never say never" applies to many situations. Not only that one with Batdad

Note the *in general*, wise guy.

And plus, none of the comments I make apply to me anyway.

Lidas wrote:Man... my game crashed, and I have tried everything I could to recover it.
17 games into season 2, and it's all bye bye. Ive tried to go back to ALL my autosaves, going on vacation on the day it crashes... but nothing helps. I had just done my trade, and I was really happy with it (O'Reilly for Chris Neil AND Mike Fisher). Got to use them in one game, but then the world collapsed.

Have fun everyone, I'll play around with another team, and be back for challenge 16.

Ouch! Sorry to hear that, Lidas, especially considering all that great work you did with getting the update done. That's definitely not cool.

I've had a really busy time recently, but I'm finally able to head into the second season.

Made my trade on July 2, sending Foote and O'Reilly to the Blackhawks for Andrew Ladd and Brent Seabrook. I was reluctant to let O'Reilly go, but I think that Stastny, Duchene and Hensick should provide enough coverage in the centre. And Foote actually retired not long after the trade had gone through. Oh, well.

I also decided to go Tier I this season, and added Éric Bélanger for a little over 1.7M. Hope he'll prove to be a good 3rd line centre. I thought about signing Malhotra instead, but finally went with Bélanger. We'll see how it goes.

Now comes the camp, we'll have a look at our prospects.

Great job landing Ladd and Seabrook! That addresses the 2 biggest concerns for this team, left wing and a tough defenseman. I'm surprised you were able to trade Foote. I got stuck with a NTC on him.

I'm 7-3 in my first 10 games of season 2. I'd probably have a better record but 2 of my 3 losses came just recently after Hedjuk and Liles when out with injuries (only a week or so each). I still haven't made a trade (I'm kind of liking O'Reilly in the 3rd line role) yet but I'm really liking my waiver claim. Moreau has been a great addition to the team!He's got 5 point in 10 games playing on the 2nd line and PK (no PP time). He's got a 8.20 average rating and 45 hits so far. He's adding some of the physical element that the team was missing. Stewart has been pretty good too. He's got 6 points in 10 games with a 7.70 average rating and 26 hits. He's played mostly on the 3rd line and PK but he's getting a little 2nd line and PP duty while Hedjuk is out.

Into year 2 preseason. Rankings came out... In spite of going to Conference Finals, I moved up all of 5 places. From 30th to 25th. Just going to have to prove em wrong again!!

Ruutu is lighting it up 5-4-9 in 3 pre season games with Stastny and Hejduk.

batdad wrote:Into year 2 preseason. Rankings came out... In spite of going to Conference Finals, I moved up all of 5 places. From 30th to 25th. Just going to have to prove em wrong again!!

Ruutu is lighting it up 5-4-9 in 3 pre season games with Stastny and Hejduk.

I was ranked 16th, having been beaten 0-4 in the first round of the playoffs. Whatever.

Ruutu's been impressive for you, even though it's only pre-season. Ladd's 1-2-3 in 2 games, but I really hope he'll be a huge boost to this team.

Alright--Duchesne top prospect #1. Only guy on any list. I also picked up some beligerance and truquelence from waivers in Nick Tarnasky. he will play with Koci on 4th line and destroy hopefully.

Going into reg season my lines look like this (Hensick and McLeod on IR)

Ruutu-Stastny-Hejduk
Wolski-Duchene-Stewart
Jones-O'Reilly-Svatos
Tarnasky-Durno-Koci
Willsie

Hannan-Preissing
Quincey-Wilson
Alberts-Clark
Salei

Anderson
Budaj

Svatos is not starting well, so he will go 3rd line and get 2nd line PP duty. Stewart has been very good with Wolski and Duchene in preseason. Svatos must earn spot back, and may lose pp duty and thus...well Season 3 is a ways away.

So I made the deal for Tuomo of course. Guess who just came available on waivers? And he is a LW. Hmmm......Should I get his brother?


Nah...would have to waive someone or send down Duchene.

Wanted to get Ruutu too. But might grab Vermette or Saprykin from free agency instead. I made a deal that finally sent Liles out of town. Had deals accepted for Nick Schultz, Brooks Orpik and Mark Stuart. Went with Orpik. Don't think either deal can be considered exploiting the AI, but Liles just didn't deliver considering his salary.

What kind of production have you been getting out of Liles? Last season I got 12-42-54 and 7.70 Avg. I feel that is not bad for his money.

2nd season 13g 26a -3 rating of 7.29
1st season 7g 36a -20 rating of 7.49

He can't handle big minutes for me. He only started getting better when I demoted him to the third pairing last season for the last set of games, but then of course he stopped producing offensively, unlike his new partner Preissing. prior to that he was around -15 as well. And I don't need a 4.2m 5th defenceman.

Since I won the cup with an all-offence approach I want to change things up a little bit anyway and see if I can succeed playing a more defensive game. We're getting stronger and more solid on the back end with Orpik instead of Liles, and I plan to distribute ice time more evenly amongst my top 3 lines and have them backcheck and trap a bit more.

This team is driving me crazy! My top two lines are scoring well(Wolski-Stastny-Hejduk and Stewart-Duchene-Svatos) Svatos has actually scored in ten straight right now. Anderson has grabbed the starting role after being rotated at the beginning.
But the grinders are not doing their job. We are constantly letting in goals and losing games. I am lousy at making my team play D. Can't wait to get to the off-season to make some changes

batdad wrote:So I made the deal for Tuomo of course. Guess who just came available on waivers? And he is a LW. Hmmm......Should I get his brother?


Nah...would have to waive someone or send down Duchene.

Didn't you already claim Tarnasky? If so, you wouldn't be able to claim Jarko Ruutu. You get one waivers claim if you don't make any UFA signings.

Since the Avs have been theoretically eliminated from amking the play-offs, I have decided to fire JOe Sacco and make Bobby Carpenter head coach. I can now add another assistant coach, can I?

How far into the game are you? How long has Carpenter been under contract to your team?

EDIT:

9.4 If you wish to sign another Head Coach, you must sign somebody who has been contracted to your team for at least the past six months.

Far enough. Carpenter was signed in september(4th) and I'm now in March(24th).
Can I pick up a new assistant?

You're only limited on how many assistants you can fire in a season. There are no limits on how many you can hire.

bruins72 wrote:

batdad wrote:So I made the deal for Tuomo of course. Guess who just came available on waivers? And he is a LW. Hmmm......Should I get his brother?


Nah...would have to waive someone or send down Duchene.

Didn't you already claim Tarnasky? If so, you wouldn't be able to claim Jarko Ruutu. You get one waivers claim if you don't make any UFA signings.

Phew...I am glad I did not do it. I was thinking it was 2 Waiver claims. Thanks.

bruins72 wrote:Great job landing Ladd and Seabrook! That addresses the 2 biggest concerns for this team, left wing and a tough defenseman. I'm surprised you were able to trade Foote. I got stuck with a NTC on him.

Maybe he had already set his mind on retiring and wanted to help his beloved team for the last and final time? Or maybe he wasn't happy with what I told him his role with the team would be for the upcoming season. Anyways, I'm happy with that trade. And Ladd and Seabrook are already proving to be great additions to the roster. Bélanger is not so good, however, or maybe I just can't get the third line tactics right.

I'm 15 games into the season, and my lines so far look like this:

Wolski - Stastny - Hejduk
Ladd - Duchene - Svatoš
McLeod/Hensick - Bélanger - Tucker
Kočí - Durno - Stewart

Hannan - Seabrook
Liles - Preissing
Quincey - Clark

Anderson
Budaj

I'm really happy with the top lines' production, and rather satisfied with my 4th line. Bélanger and Tucker are visibly underachieving, and I'm thinking of shaking things up a bit. Defence looks ok after the addition of Seabrook, only I expected a little more from Liles (15 games played, 2-2-4, 0 in +/- ranking, 7.00 AvR). I'd hate to have to trade him after the season, but there will be no other option if he doesn't produce.

I am pleased with Clark's new contract, as he's agreed to a 2-year, $685K p/y deal. Saved me lots of caps space.

Ciryatan, I'd consider moving Stewart up onto your third line with McLeod and Belanger. That could be a decent physical line. Then I'd make Koci-Durno-Tucker your 4th line and play them very little.

bruins72 wrote:Ciryatan, I'd consider moving Stewart up onto your third line with McLeod and Belanger. That could be a decent physical line. Then I'd make Koci-Durno-Tucker your 4th line and play them very little.

That's what I'm planning to do for the next couple of games. I've got a feeling that Stewart has some really nice potential. And it's finally dawning on me how bad Tucker is. Couldn't come to terms with it, I suppose.

Tucker is HORRIBLE! I hate him! Stewart isn't bad. He's a good banging 3rd line winger with some offensive ability. If one of your top 2 right wingers is hurt, he can fill in. I can't see him ever being better than a 2nd line RW though and even that is questionable.