NHL Eastside Hockey Manager 2007

[The Sultan of Swank]

I've got some questions for you guys.

In my first Season with the Sharks, we're predicted to finish 10th. We start out pretty mediocre, holding down 4th place in the West. About 55 games in we go through a spell of 2 wins in 11 games and I sack my head coach in favour of John Torchetti and immediately see a turn around. We finished 1st in the West and went to the Stanley Cup Finals, losing to Buffalo in 4 straight.

During the season I dealt away Malakhov, but picked up Madden, Belak and Muir in September, then got Matvichuk in January.

After the season ended, players had raises in their contracts and our cap space shrunk greatly. It also didn't help that I went out and aquired Brind'Amour for 4 mil a year after he posted a 105 point campaign. To help offset the cost I dealt away Matvichuk who at 1.35 Million a year was costing me an awful lot for a -6 player on the third defensive pairing. I also decided to get rid of Vesa Toskala. He was costing me close to 2 million a season and he only played 15 games in the last season. I dealt Toskala to the Habs for Komisarek, and the rights to Justin Bernhardt.

When the start of the pre-season came about, the Sharks are expected to finish #1. But in my pre-season, despite several games with a regular season roster, we lose every game.

So What I'm wondering is why would I be losing so much? How can I get guys to sign for small, or no raise(or hell, less than they were making), And besides the changes stated, I still need to kill off about $2 million from my roster, any suggestions?

And for anyone wondering about Michalek, 29 Goals, 39 Assists for 68 points in 81 games bouncing between the second and third line.

[Clawson]

Well if you're afraid of being fired, I found out today you can switch off the ability of the board to fire you in Preferences. ^_^

Your team should turn it around I'd expect, as I find my team usually does the opposite in the regular season than what they did in the preseason. That said, in my 5th year at Nashville, I finally have a team that could make the playoffs being ranked 13. In the past three years we've added through free agency: Chris Clark (board hates him after a shitty first year but was worth the 1.3 the second year), Ryan Malone (82-18-32-50 in first year), Mike Knuble (went through Clark syndrome but was dealt in the past offseason for Jeff Glass after it looked like Maxime Ouelett wasn't going to resign), Hal Gill (good for 900,000), Jeff O'Neill (may be a steal at 900,000 for 3 years judging by first month) and Jason MUTHAFUCKING~! Spezza.

Through the first month of 2010/2011, Spezza and John Tavares (it paid to suck that year) tore it up but were both outscored by 35 year old Kimmo Timonen who is getting nearly 2 assists per game. Tavares has 9 goals in 10 games and has around a 40 percent shooting average. Ryan Wilson (who you can draft after the first year and YOU HAVE TO) is nuts with about a 8.55 average rating and just under a PPG. Seriousily a fourth round steal who has been nothing but champion. Unfortunely, the same can not be said about Toskala and Ouelett who have been brutal, yet we're still somehow 6-3-1.

The future of my defense looks even brighter as two of them, one current in the AHL, won MVP in the OHL and the other in WHL. So my blueline is gonna be killer in two-three years especially with Ryan Parent and Cody Franson finally ready to break in once Gill and Timmonen retire and Jackman's contract is up.

[The Sultan of Swank]

Why won't the game allow me to offer players incentive bonuses?

[Guest Grapehead]

Why won't the game allow me to offer players incentive bonuses?

[CKN]

Bonuses (goals, assists etc.) were taken out with the new CBA

[Guest Grapehead]

Bonuses (goals, assists etc.) were taken out with the new CBA

[CKN]

Bonuses (goals, assists etc.) were taken out with the new CBA

You mean in real life? or in the game? Cause didn't Bondra's new contract involve a TON of incentives?

[The Sultan of Swank]

I decided to try a game as the Canadiens, whenever I play as anyone else, they suck copious amounts of cock. So far I'm 19 games in and it's been an up and down season. We started out 1-4-1 but then went on a 4 game winning streak putting us at 5-4-1, we've only won 5 of 10 now which isn't terrible, but it's not acceptable. So we're 10-9-1 and in and in 9th place, tied in points with the Bruins for 8th, but they have a loss less and a game at hand.

I'm trying to figure out how to really start up the team so here's some of what's gone on.

The Habs have the third best Powerplay in the league at around 25%, unfortunately we're in the bottom 10 in Penalty Kill.

Koivu, Samsanov and Kovalev are all in the top 30 for scoring, Koivu is in 12th with 30 points(12G 18A), Samsanov in with 28 points(10G 18A) and Kovalev is in 24th with 27 points(14G 13A)

In an effort to help out my line up I decided to go out and acquire Martin Erat from the Preds for Pleckanec and picks. I did this as in every other game I've played, Erat turns into a dominant player very quickly. This isn't happening so far. Erat has played 16 games for the Habs, has 2 assists, is a -4 and is has a game average rating of 6.65, He's also costing me 1.6 Million to do this.

I called up Grabovski and Kotsystin who are playing on a line with Michael Ryder and doing some great things for rookies.

The holes I need to fill are on defence. I desperately need a legitamate top 2 defenceman to play with Markov, and probably a depth defenceman just in case. I have good defenceman, but they're not great outside of Markov.

I have some prospects who could be ready by next season, most notably Alexsei Emelin. But for now I've called up Andre Benoit for my next game to see if he's more capable than Dandenault.

So, who do you think I should go after as a defenceman? I'm not willing to part with Huet, Koivu, Samsanov, Kovalev or Higgins. I'd also not like to lose any defencemen, and I'm trying to find Bonk's way off of my team, but for who?

Edit: Ok, Grabovsky, is officially awesome. He's currently 4th in rookie scoring. 28 games into the season he's on pace for 71 points with 25 points in 29 games. He's got 18 goals(1st in Rookies, 13th in all skaters) and 7 assists. I have him on a line with Kovalev and Higgins. He's been a scoring explosion in the last 10 games with 13 goals, 4 comming in 1 game.

Well I finished my first season. We finished 7th in the East. We were in 10th for basically the first 55 games. I decided to make some moves. One of which was going to be a huge risk. I decided to trade away David Abeschier to the Sabres for Henrik Tallender. Right after that we went on a 13-2 run, including a 9 in a row win streak. Abeschier would only play 3 more games in the season as Miller led the Sabres to 60 wins(and a Stanley Cup).

I also got rid of Streit to the Kings for Derek Armstrong who did very well for us.

We finished 7th with 93 points. Koivu was 6th in League scoring with 112 points.

In the Playoffs we swept the second seed Flyers as Grabovski became our Playoff horse scoring 6 goals in the 4 games. In the semi-finals we went down to Buffalo in 7. We lost Erat, Tallender and Koivu in games 5 and 6. We won 5(barely) Lost 6 and in 7 we were depleted and went down 2-1 in overtime. Buffalo went on to beat the Sens and then the Flames for the Cup.

In the off-season Bonk and Ryder left the team(they had combined for 42 points and a -59 rating) Which opened up almost 5 million in cap space. We signed Dan Boyle to help fill up some holes on Defence. I also traded Niinimaa to Detroit for Andreas Lilja and Johan Franzen, who are both in the line-up and playing well through the first 3 games this season.

At the start of the season we we're ranked #3 behind Buffalo and Ottawa, both unfortunately are division rivals. The only upside is that Toronto and Boston are expected to finish 28th and 24th. But Toronto picked up Angelo Esposito in the draft as they got the #1 pick.

Edited January 11, 2007 by Basha

[The Sultan of Swank]

Now that's just cock.

My second season Canadiens have a great season, we finish 4th in the East with a 50-27-5 record for 105 points(4th best record in the league). We were cruising along until February when Cristobal Huet goes down with a UCL tear for 4 months. Seeing as I didn't bother finding another back-up when I traded away Abeschier in the season before I was forced to call up Carey Price who still has stats like a back-up goalie. Price goes 12-6-3 with a 3.23 GAA. We make it into the playoffs and face off against the Thrashers in the first round. We dispose of them in 6. We then move on to the semi's where we're facing the Buffalo Sabres. We lost to them in the previous season, in the semi-finals as they went on to win the cup. The series goes game for game for 6 games, all end in OT by the score of 3-2. In game 7, it's a shooting gallery as it's 5-5 going into the third. They go up 7-5 with about 4 minutes to play, Samsanov(who finished the season with 74 goals) scores 2 to make it 7-7 with about 1:30 to play. With 1 second left in regulation they score to send us home again. I'm looking at the boxscore right now, 59:59! that's terrible!

So now I've got some off-season goals. I need to find a #1 goalie as Huet refuses to accept a new contract offer from me. I'm going to try to re-sign him in free-agency unless something better is available at a good price. Huet won 35 games for me before getting injured. He was pretty solid-ish. He played slightly better than .500. I also need to find a Centerman. I fixed my defence holes last season, and I've got some great defensive prospects comming up along with James Van Riemsdyk who I picked up in last season's draft after he was suprisingly still available at 18th pick.

Right now I have Koivu, Armstrong, Begin and Franzen playing center. I definately need a #2 center, and maybe a depth center if I can afford it.

So far I have all but 6 players on my roster signed for next season, the only hold-outs are 4 going nowhere AHL players, Mike Johnson who I don't want to re-sign at the 1.9 he's demanding and Huet who doesn't want to hear from me. So That only has me committing 38.9 Million so far. If I resign Hue for 3 million that puts me at 41.9 so I'll have about 2 million to work with for a center.

The next big challenge after that is that all but 3 of my players(Dandenault, Tallinder, Boyle) have their contracts up at the upcomming season's end.

[Guest Grapehead]

Does nobody have an extra code to share? I'm not to close to being able to afford this, I'd rather find someone to split it with, but still have no money to do so. I would make it up to anyone who gave me a code.

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

If someone will buy me the game and let me pay them through PayPal, I'll share with ya, Grapehead.

[Guest Grapehead]

I have a maxed out visa... which doesn't really get us anywheres... hmm.

[The Sultan of Swank]

Does nobody have an extra code to share? I'm not to close to being able to afford this, I'd rather find someone to split it with, but still have no money to do so. I would make it up to anyone who gave me a code.

[Clawson]

I gave mine to my dad too.

[IAceI]

I'm considering buying it sometime this month I hope, so if I get it, i'll most likely post in here and you can PM me, that's if I get it - but I just need my coach to pay me for the work i done for him this week and I should be okay.

But getting the money off him is a right pain ¬_¬

[The Sultan of Swank]

Toronto has become my biggest competition now. They finished dead last in the past two seasons, but early into this one and they're showing much improvement.

While my Habs are 13-4-0 and predicted to finish 1st overall, Toronto has shown a big turnaround. They're currently 8-5-1. They look to have re-vamped their roster as Kari Lehtonen is in nets now and they recently signed Marion Hossa to a contract. I wonder if they'll do much better in this season...

My Habs on the other hand are doing great. We've had trouble at the bginning of each season so far, but this year we've gotten out to a fantastic 13-4-0 start which leads the East and is 1 point behind the Canucks who have played 3 more games than the Habs.

I've managed to lock down everyone to contracts for the next season as all of them except 3 were up. The only exceptions are AHL players who didn't pan out and Souray who I'm going to let go to free agency and just re-sign him for a much lower salary.

After my last game Samsanov, Grabovski and Armstrong are all out for 2 weeks. But I think I have enough depth to fill the holes as I picked up Bill Guerin in the off season and traded away Kovalev for Jeff O'Neal, prospects and picks. If anyone wants a graet player to get early in their game, pick up Chris Higgins, he's turned into an amazing player. I've also got my next oh say 15 years of goaltending locked down as Huet went to FA but re-signed with the Habs on a 3 year 10 Million dollar deal. I also re-signed Price to a 1 yaer $975,000 contract. If I can keep re-signing the two of them, I'll be set in nets for a few years.

I've fared pretty well in drafts so far, picking up a few great prospects, but the real problem I'm having is that I have some talented young guys who could crack the line-up, but I'm having trouble finding places for them on the main roster.

[Toe]

Does anyone watch all their games, or do you guys just have them simmed instantly?

[Clawson]

I just sim them.

Has anybody else picked up Ryan Wilson in the first draft? I want to know how he pans out for the rest of you as I seriousily love this guy. He's def a number 1 d-man for me.

[The Sultan of Swank]

I'm in 2008 and if I search for him he doesn't show up...

[Clawson]

Weird, cause I know hes a real player and hes just under a PPG and a 8.00 rating.