THE MANAGERS' TRIBUNE
THE VOICE OF THE FANTASY GAME
A Year in Review - Part 1
2018 AND THE WACKY WORLD OF WHATEVER WE DO
BY MICHAEL HAYMAN
DECEMBER, 2018
A ‘year in review’? What a terribly cliché idea: summarize everything that happened since the last time we were at this random point in our orbit around the sun. Luckily, we’re in the business of taking something ordinary, pumping it full of ridiculousness and over-the-top-ness, and making it awesome. And I have just enough of an ego to think that ability can be transferred to a Year in Review.
How am I going to do this?
I am going to have to try harder at digging into stats than GOAT does when searching for a viable NHL goaltender.
I’ll have to uncover more value than the Cambridge Tchuggs seem to think they do, every single time they draft a player.
I am going to develop some interesting tidbits that are as astonishing as Funky Cold Molina is disgusting.
Each tangent I branch off on will need to focus on making this article more awesome, unlike Dick Cheese’s trade strategy for his roster.
Now that some shade has been thrown, let’s get this party started.
JANUARY
The year kicked off with the GM for Mr. Trade celebrating his recent nuptials, which was a helluva contrast to the lack of celebration for where they were in the NHFL standings on January 1
NHFL Standings as of January 1, 2018
As of January 1, the ten GMs of the NHFL had made 54 trades – just 6 trades short of setting an all-time league mark for trades made in a season. It took 3 whole days before the first swap of the year was registered, and it was a beefy one that had ripple effects right through to the end of the NHFL season:
Cerberus HC sent Jamie Benn and Scott Darling to the Fisher Kings, and in return they received Joe Pavelski and John Gibson.
The impact of Gibson – and Benn, once he returned to Cerberus HC’s lineup - was enormous, but more on that later.
Not to be outdone in the beefy trade category, Dick Cheese and GOAT hooked up on January 5 to consummate one of the biggest trades of the year in terms of sheer number of pieces changing teams:
To GOAT: Mikko Rantanen, Martin Jones, Tyson Barrie, Pat Maroon, Aaron Dell and a farm spot.
To Dick Cheese: Mike Hoffman, Viktor Arvidsson, Ben Bishop and Jake Muzzin.
The trade was Step 1 in GOAT’s attempt to overhaul his goaltending situation, which had been his achilles heel for a number of seasons. The next day – January 6 – GOAT flipped Gabriel Landeskog and a handful of mid-round picks to Cerberus HC to complete Step 2 of his attempt to overhaul his goaltending situation, bringing in Cory Schneider from Cerberus HC. In case you haven’t heard about Cory Schneider’s 2018 (aka the entire time that GOAT has had him on his roster):
Switching gears, and ramping up the positive vibes for a change, our focus shifts to the 9th of January and where an idea for a testimonial blog morphed into a type of ‘hockey ramblings’, and ultimately into the Managers’ Tribune.
Except from discussion on NHFL message board
Hockey Day in Canada landed on January 20th, as NHFL GMs came from near and far to convene in Belmont. Dick Cheese, HC Haymos, Brigade HK, Cerberus HC, Fisher Kings, State College MML, and a late-day-surprise-Mr. Trade gathered for beer, bifanas, buffet and hockey, as hosted by Funky Cold Molina. This years’ HDIC marked the introduction of the NHFL Hall of Fame, as all present GMs cast their votes for the class of 2018. January 28th was the official induction ceremony, as Martin Brodeur, Nicklas Lidstrom, Martin St. Louis and Teemu Selanne kicked off a new NHFL tradition.
By the end of the month, 15 trades had been made (almost averaging a trade every other day) – setting a new season record for total trades with 69 (nice), 10 more than the previous league-high, set three seasons ago. And still with a little over a month to go until the trade deadline!
HC Haymos ran away with the best on-ice record of the month, with the Fisher Kings not far behind. Funky Cold Molina continued their strong season with the 3rd best record in January.
NHFL Win-Loss Records in January 2018
FEBRUARY
February is the month that marks both the countdown to trade deadline day, and do or die time for making a playoff push – with the two not being mutually exclusive.
Taking a look at how teams’ January performances affected the playoff picture, the following shows the standings at the start of February:
NHFL Standings as of February 1, 2018
HC Haymos rose from 6th to a tie for 2nd, Brigade HK dropped from 3rd to 5th, and the Fisher Kings couldn’t quite nudge their way into a post-season position, despite their strong January.
The theme of February was trades. Lots of trades. Piles and piles of trades. And then more trades on top of that. With the trade deadline on March 1, GMs spent the last few days of February trying to get a leg up on the competition. The table on the right summarizes the flurry of activity that the league saw in those final days before the March 1st trade deadline:
As GOAT had attempted at the beginning of January, State College MML overhauled their goaltenders in the span of one minute – bringing in Sergei Bobrovsky and Pekka Rinne in separate trades with the Fisher Kings, and then the White Stache HC.
In addition to the big goaltending fish, the following is a partial list of some of the other more notable names that switched teams in February: Braden Holtby, Jason Zucker, Nazem Kadri, Nikita Kucherov, David Pastrnak, Henrik Lundqvist, Dustin Brown, Jake Muzzin, Cam Talbot, Brayden Schenn (twice), Nicklas Backstrom, Aleksander Barkov, James van Riemsdyk, Cam Atkinson, Mats Zuccarello, Roberto Luongo and Matt Duchene. Not to mention all of the keeper spots, farm spots, and dozens of draft picks that exchanged hands.
30 trades total in the month, that’s 2 more than the league completed over the entire duration of the 2011-2012 season. That’s more than half of every other season total in league history. All done within a 28-day period.
Brigade HK was the top team in the month of February, climbing back up to 3rd place overall. Funky Cold Molina, HC Haymos and Dick Cheese all cemented their positions in the standings as the end to the regular season drew closer and closer. All of the gains made by Fisher Kings in January were undone through February, as by the end of the month they had turned into full-on trade-deadline sellers:
NHFL Win-Loss Records in February 2018
NHFL Standings as of March 1, 2018
MARCH
March 1 – Trade Deadline Day.
Oh boy. What a high. If the 30 trades made in the 28-day month of February was an impressive total, then having 17 – SEVENTEEN! – trades made on March 1 is truly extraordinary.
The party got started at 5:49 am. Seriously. GOAT flipped Tyson Barrie to HC Haymos first thing in the morning, while 99% of fantasy hockey GMs are still fast asleep. Five more trades were made that morning - while 25% of fantasy hockey GMs are still fast asleep - and then the circus came to town with 11 more trades being made that afternoon.
The whirlwind day culminated with Jamie Benn returning to the Cerberus HC roster that he was traded away from to kick off the New Year. The Fisher Kings received three - yes, three - 2018 1st round picks in return. That swap closed out the 2017-2018 trading season at 11:46 pm and was the 62nd trade of the year, in only the 60th day of the year. Gold star, everyone. 117 total trades on the year smashed the previous record of 59.
The day after trade deadline, the GM for State College MML made a very serious announcement:
It is with much mixed emotion that I am writing to let you know that this will be the last week that State College MML will be a part of this league. After much reflection and discussion with family, we have decided that it is best to move on. I realize that this will come as a bit of a shock to many, but after 5 years being based in State College we feel as an organization that we may be better suited elsewhere. I would like to thank our fans and hope that they will continue to support us into the future.
We are very excited about the future of our organization. Over the past few months we have been in negotiation for a new arena and new sponsorship to move our team to Massachusetts. We are currently working with our media team to determine our new name and the name of our stadium. We believe this move will be greatly beneficial to us as an organization as we relocate to a hotspot of hockey and sports in general.
Sincerely,
Dr. M. Sheriff, GM
One era ends, and a new one begins.
The regular season ends, and the playoffs begin.
The 2018 Fifty Mission Cup playoffs started on March 5 and, for the third consecutive year, the quarter-finals matchup week kicked off with the annual NHFL Awards, highlighted by Alex Ovechkin netting the Bar Down Trophy as league MVP, and Michael Mesquita securing the Brethren Award as GM of the Year for his work at the helm of Funky Cold Molina.
Andrei Vasilevkiy (top goalie), Roman Josi (top defenseman), and Brock Boeser (rookie of the year) also took home some hardware. Connor Hellebuyck and William Karlsson earned their GMs some recognition as the top draft pick and top free agent adds of the year. Mr. Trade won the first ever Traders’ Cup, swinging 43 of the 117 total trades.
The quarter-finals featured two blowouts – as Cerberus HC sent State College MML packing with an 11-2 drubbing and Brigade HK crushed Dick Cheese 10-3. Cerberus HC and Brigade HK remained hot through their semi-final match-ups, as they upset the top two teams in the regular season, Funky Cold Molina and HC Haymos, by scores of 11-3 and 8-6. In the consolation bracket, The White Stache HC and GOAT won their match-ups and advanced to face each other for a shot at the 1st overall pick in September’s draft.
On March 25, Cerberus HC completed their steamrolling of opponents during these playoffs with a 10-4 victory in which they never trailed. In fact, the closest the match-up ever got was an 8-6 Cerberus HC advantage heading into the final day of the match-up. John Gibson won 2 starts, one via shutout, and led the match-up with a 2.28 GAA and a .932 save percentage, Claude Giroux notched 7 assists, and Jamie Benn netted a pair of goals, an assist, and 12 hits – which led the match-up. Anze Kopitar scored 4 goals, assisted on 2 others and was chosen for the Hanson Donnybrook Trophy as Playoff MVP.
The White Stache HC defeated GOAT in the consolation final to secure the 1st overall selection in the fall draft, and Mr. Trade – after one of the worst regular seasons in league history – rightfully ‘earned’ their first ever JOCKO crown.
APRIL, MAY & JUNE
Ah, the spring and early summer months. Where NHFL GMs have to wait patiently for something hockey-related to do, and it drives every single one of them crazy.
Completely unrelated to going crazy (is it though?) and going out of chronological order, but not out of order of importance: on May 28, sometime in the afternoon, our league family grew by 9 lbs, and 2 oz. Cerberus HC and family welcomed Bennett to the world!
To help fill the void of no fantasy hockey, Dick Cheese organized the first ever NHFL playoff box pool. The NHL playoffs kicked off on April 11, and concluded on June 7 (Bennett was born right in the middle) with the Washington Capitals winning their first Stanley Cup over the Vegas Golden Knights.
The box pool ended up being the last hurrah for State College MML before they officially shut down operations and relocated to Massachusetts, as they held off the competition and won with a somewhat anti-climactic finish: only the White Stache HC had more than 2 active players in the Stanley Cup finals. Not a single Golden Knight was selected by any of the 8 participating teams. Womp womp. At least Bennett doesn't suck.
Before we get back to our regularly scheduled hockey-related programming, it's time to wish a happy birthday to State College MML (April 1), Dick Cheese (April 14), the White Stache HC (April 29), HC Haymos (May 14) and Cerberus HC (May 20). Alright. Enough of that.
The conclusion of the NHL playoffs meant the start of a special phase of the NHFL off-season – the expansion draft process. Welcoming Johnny Beamsville and Wilsonvillains to the NHFL and increasing the competition pool to 12 teams, as confirmed at the 2017 Kawagama Lake draft, was the highlight of the hockey down-time this year. While the draft itself wasn’t scheduled until the first weekend in July, there was a significant amount of preparation work that was taken care of in June.
By June 9, each existing NHFL team had to submit their lists of protected and unprotected players. Once all the lists were made public, the two-week expansion-draft-trade window opened, with each established NHFL club being permitted to make a single trade with either Johnny Beamsville or the Wilsonvillains. When the dust settled, 8 separate trades were made in the 14-day window – 5 by the Wilsonvillains, 3 by Johnny Beamsville – with only Mr. Trade and State College MML electing to sit tight during this once-in-an-NHFL-lifetime event.
Claude Giroux, Aleksander Barkov, P.K. Subban, Shayne Gostisbehere, Henrik Lundqivst, Mike Smith, Jordan Eberle and Alex Galchenyuk all found themselves on an expansion roster, and the stage was set for our first, and only, expansion draft.
Expansion Draft Protected Lists, as submitted by every NHFL GM
June 29 was the farm team freeze. It should be noted that every single established NHFL club allowed the deadline to pass without making a claim for Elias Pettersson.
That brings us to the mid-point of the year. In part 2 of this elaborate Year in Review, we take a closer look at the expansion draft, the Ottawa draft, and a wild first half to the NHFL season.
MICHAEL HAYMAN / HC HAYMOS
