07-27-2020, 10:53 PM
The Tampa Bay Barracuda have won a game. Scratch that, they didn’t just win. They dominated a game, won by a wide margin and made the bettors in Vegas start to sweat. We are one game into the season.
Those in Vegas aren’t the only ones who took a bet, however. Heading into this season, a bet was made by the new Tampa Bay General Manager, Trella, who took a look at the free agent market and saw that he had a major surplus in money and it was burning a hole in his pocket. He went out and gathered free agents and made trades to utilize that budget space, and he weaponized his space to make his team significantly better.
These bets are the bets that general managers make every season, with every decision they make. There is yet to be a situation that has 100% odds, and so a bet is needed. For Trella in Tampa Bay, he targetted players past their primes like Herb Robert, who assisted on the game winning goal and added two others of his own, and legends like Benjamin Blue, who put up a 35-save shutout in the first game of the season to give them their first win since he was last on the team in S53.
With these kinds of additions in mind, Trella has to be among the favorites for the Lance Uppercut Trophy. If it’s meant to be season over season change, he would be the winner. However, ultimately, the award will go to somebody who has experienced great change and great success. While Tampa Bay has had more success than they had all of last year, they’re still a team on the outside looking in and so with that in mind, I took a look at who’s made the most change from the previous season to look at who are the favorites for the management and coaching awards.
LANCE UPPERCUT TROPHY
Making changes to your line-up is important, you need to always be improving, always be evolving. This is a crucial part of a general manager’s role on their team. As such, the following teams have had the greatest change in their line-up in terms of the difference in the amount of goals and points they traded away and how many were added in their place.
Edmonton Blizzard (+54 Goals, +121 Points)
The Blizzard are the winners of the award for the most season over season change in a line-up. They lost only 11 goals and 24 points out of their line-up, most of which were in Daniel Bischoff, while adding 65 goals and 145 points. The majority of this is in Theo Morgan, the potential all-star added in the trade that sent Bischoff to Los Angeles. However, likely their biggest change was that they managed to pull a free agent. Bo Kane, the young man developing into a franchise center, decided his home was not in San Francisco and his 16 goals and 34 points was the third most the Blizzard added outside of the 51 points from Morgan and 38 from Hiro Fujikawa. While only sending out Daniel Bischoff and Jordan Von Matt, the Blizzard proved they are all in this season and the front-runners for the Lance Uppercut Trophy.
New Orleans Specters (+13 Goals, +64 Points)
The reigning Challenge Cup Champions did not rest on their laurels this off-season, making an immediate move following their victory and sending the Cup clinching goal scorer Mitchell van der Heijden to New England. While moving an exciting young player isn’t always ideal, they found themselves gaining a return of Rex Kirkby and Boris Poroshenko in the deal, and ultimately coming out ahead in their points added. They also added Nicolaj Muller to the team to take the place of Joe Kurczewski. The unfortunate part of this being their loss of Keith Lee to free agency, where he opted to go to Toronto instead. Even while losing a high-level prospect, the team continues to improve and has been doing their best to keep Edmonton within earshot.
Manhattan Rage (+26 Goals, +55 Points)
Second only to Tampa Bay in the number of goals added to the team’s line-up, Manhattan went all in this season after being swept by the Hamilton Steelhawks in S54. While Edmonton has gone all in and then some, this team in the boroughs of New York City made major moves to add former S53 Ron Mexico and Jay McDonald Trophy winner Ola Wagstrom, and his 29 goals and 57 points, as well as Geoff “Greg” Moore with his 3 goals and 24 points on the blueline. While they had fewer additions than some teams, the difference in their additions to Rainbow Dash and Derek Bohne Jr who were sent the other way end up forming major additions for the team.
Chicago Syndicate (+16 Goals, +45 Points)
This team is easily overlooked in what they did to improve their team, however, the key is that they didn’t send anything out. They only added. Chicago brought in Ethan Ross from the Baltimore Platoon, who was one of the few highlights of the Baltimore season last year. He’s on his way out, and has announced as much that he intends to retire at the end of the season, which means this is a last chance for him. While he had 45 points last season, he could easily break out for more this season as his last push for a Cup, his last chance at success, and that’s the kind of desperation a team sometimes needs to make the final push. It’s a great play by the Chicago management team.
Calgary Dragons (+7 Goals, +42 Points)
Another team like Manhattan and Chicago, they didn’t make major overhauls of their line-up by bringing in a lot of players, but bringing in some who make major upgrades on individual positions and will take the team to even higher heights. Calgary added Anders Christiansen from the New England Wolfpack, with his 13 goals and 35 points, as well as just before the season began finalizing a deal for Leopold Lockhart and his 5 goals and 31 points. They sent out Prince Devitt, who wasn’t exactly a slouch, and Shooter McGavin, a team legend who was fading into the distance a bit, ultimately leading to this difference in their additions, but for both the short and long-term, Calgary has made a major change this off-season to make them also worthy of the Uppercut.
Beyond these teams, Winnipeg added 31 points, while Hamilton and Texas added 28 each. Just going to show this has been one of the most active off-seasons in SHL history, and will be a hotly contested Uppercut Trophy in the end.
Joe McKeil Trophy
This trophy is given to the team deemed to have the best coaching, well often the best coaching job is done by teams that can work with what they’re given. A lot of them are teams where they sold or lost a lot of players and the coach then earns the reward for keeping the team competitive. These are some teams who sold heavily and we could expect the coach to be in for a tough time to keep them afloat.
New England Wolfpack (-56 Goals, -141 Points)
The big sellers of the off-season, New England cashed in and could even be contested to be among the better jobs done by a general manager in the off-season. However, sending out the likes of Ola Wagstrom, Boris Poroshenko, Dick Clapper, Guy Zheng and Rex Kirkby is going to make this a much different and more difficult job on the coaching side of things. While they have great players left, and even brought in Dominic Montgomery from San Francisco shortly before the start of the season, they will be on an uphill battle to stay in the fight with teams like Buffalo, Hamilton, Chicago and Manhattan in the East. If they’re able to land a fifth place spot and be anywhere near the playoffs toward the end of the season, it would be a testament to the great coaching job done in the northeast.
Los Angeles Panthers (-34 Goals, -82 Points)
The team who gave up the second most points this off-season may come as a surprise, as they didn’t make a lot of moves. Their one big move, however, sending out Theo Morgan, Hiro Fujikawa and Jon Toner yielded a lot of picks but only Daniel Bischoff and Jordan Von Matt who are, to say the least, underwhelming comparatively to the trio sent out of LA. This is a team that hasn’t been like the others who lost significant amounts of points from their line-up, as they’re the only one I know has not publicly stated a plan to either retool or rebuild, still expecting to be competitive in a more wide open West, but with the additions made by Edmonton, New Orleans, Calgary and Texas, one has to wonder if Los Angeles did enough to replace the high end offensive firepower of Morgan and Fujikawa with Bischoff and Ricky Bobby. If they stay in the fight to the end, or even make it, this is a team that will deserve major considerations.
San Francisco Pride (-13 Goals, -78 Points)
The team underwent major renovations in short order. As former general manager Jeff Kirkstone had a seemingly random removal from his post and the new regime quickly started making changes. The season started very quickly after they lost Bo Kane to Free Agency, and traded away Leopold Lockhart, Dominic Montgomery, Piotr Czerkawski and Nathan Explosion. This is a very different team, and they didn’t have a lot of time to come together. This is going to take a lot of work to develop chemistry and get the team on the right track, but with so many reports in the news recently doubting them, it gives a lot of bulletin board potential. This may not be a master class in tactics, but it could be something where a coach pushes the right buttons and the team comes together to prove the world wrong -- which could just get them in the hunt for this trophy.
Baltimore Platoon (-22 Goals, -75 Points)
Baltimore didn’t make major renovations to the roster, they sent out only Ethan Ross, Geoff “Greg” Moore, Yoshimitsu McCloud and a prospect Pojo Biscuit, and brought back major pieces ultimately. They did claim former first overall pick Simothy Drunkebird off waivers, and added Derek Bohne Jr. in the Moore trade which is a solid young defenseman. They just weren’t enough to really make a major difference and this is a team that will be rebuilding, or at least retooling, in the near future. As a further example of this, they were the team to lose to Tampa Bay, the first time a team has lost to them in over a year. It’s going to be a tough season in Baltimore, and it could take a miracle, but if the miracle happens, this is a prime candidate for a Krever nomination.
The only other team to lose points in the off-season was Buffalo, who lost 11 points in moving Muller for Kurczewski, but gained a first round pick. A first round pick for 11 points is a masterful move, and one that likely belongs in the Uppercut discussion, if not for the fact this off-season saw such major overhaul and this league is in a constant state of change currently.
For those wondering, Tampa Bay added 29 goals and 79 points to their roster. It didn’t take much to add to that roster, but it did take a general manager who is putting in all their effort to be better. The league may want to look out, because it won’t be long for them to be in the conversation for these awards. And for those in Vegas, maybe next time you’ll even bet the over.
Then again, I wouldn’t bet on that happening anytime soon if I were you.
Those in Vegas aren’t the only ones who took a bet, however. Heading into this season, a bet was made by the new Tampa Bay General Manager, Trella, who took a look at the free agent market and saw that he had a major surplus in money and it was burning a hole in his pocket. He went out and gathered free agents and made trades to utilize that budget space, and he weaponized his space to make his team significantly better.
These bets are the bets that general managers make every season, with every decision they make. There is yet to be a situation that has 100% odds, and so a bet is needed. For Trella in Tampa Bay, he targetted players past their primes like Herb Robert, who assisted on the game winning goal and added two others of his own, and legends like Benjamin Blue, who put up a 35-save shutout in the first game of the season to give them their first win since he was last on the team in S53.
With these kinds of additions in mind, Trella has to be among the favorites for the Lance Uppercut Trophy. If it’s meant to be season over season change, he would be the winner. However, ultimately, the award will go to somebody who has experienced great change and great success. While Tampa Bay has had more success than they had all of last year, they’re still a team on the outside looking in and so with that in mind, I took a look at who’s made the most change from the previous season to look at who are the favorites for the management and coaching awards.
LANCE UPPERCUT TROPHY
Making changes to your line-up is important, you need to always be improving, always be evolving. This is a crucial part of a general manager’s role on their team. As such, the following teams have had the greatest change in their line-up in terms of the difference in the amount of goals and points they traded away and how many were added in their place.
Edmonton Blizzard (+54 Goals, +121 Points)
The Blizzard are the winners of the award for the most season over season change in a line-up. They lost only 11 goals and 24 points out of their line-up, most of which were in Daniel Bischoff, while adding 65 goals and 145 points. The majority of this is in Theo Morgan, the potential all-star added in the trade that sent Bischoff to Los Angeles. However, likely their biggest change was that they managed to pull a free agent. Bo Kane, the young man developing into a franchise center, decided his home was not in San Francisco and his 16 goals and 34 points was the third most the Blizzard added outside of the 51 points from Morgan and 38 from Hiro Fujikawa. While only sending out Daniel Bischoff and Jordan Von Matt, the Blizzard proved they are all in this season and the front-runners for the Lance Uppercut Trophy.
New Orleans Specters (+13 Goals, +64 Points)
The reigning Challenge Cup Champions did not rest on their laurels this off-season, making an immediate move following their victory and sending the Cup clinching goal scorer Mitchell van der Heijden to New England. While moving an exciting young player isn’t always ideal, they found themselves gaining a return of Rex Kirkby and Boris Poroshenko in the deal, and ultimately coming out ahead in their points added. They also added Nicolaj Muller to the team to take the place of Joe Kurczewski. The unfortunate part of this being their loss of Keith Lee to free agency, where he opted to go to Toronto instead. Even while losing a high-level prospect, the team continues to improve and has been doing their best to keep Edmonton within earshot.
Manhattan Rage (+26 Goals, +55 Points)
Second only to Tampa Bay in the number of goals added to the team’s line-up, Manhattan went all in this season after being swept by the Hamilton Steelhawks in S54. While Edmonton has gone all in and then some, this team in the boroughs of New York City made major moves to add former S53 Ron Mexico and Jay McDonald Trophy winner Ola Wagstrom, and his 29 goals and 57 points, as well as Geoff “Greg” Moore with his 3 goals and 24 points on the blueline. While they had fewer additions than some teams, the difference in their additions to Rainbow Dash and Derek Bohne Jr who were sent the other way end up forming major additions for the team.
Chicago Syndicate (+16 Goals, +45 Points)
This team is easily overlooked in what they did to improve their team, however, the key is that they didn’t send anything out. They only added. Chicago brought in Ethan Ross from the Baltimore Platoon, who was one of the few highlights of the Baltimore season last year. He’s on his way out, and has announced as much that he intends to retire at the end of the season, which means this is a last chance for him. While he had 45 points last season, he could easily break out for more this season as his last push for a Cup, his last chance at success, and that’s the kind of desperation a team sometimes needs to make the final push. It’s a great play by the Chicago management team.
Calgary Dragons (+7 Goals, +42 Points)
Another team like Manhattan and Chicago, they didn’t make major overhauls of their line-up by bringing in a lot of players, but bringing in some who make major upgrades on individual positions and will take the team to even higher heights. Calgary added Anders Christiansen from the New England Wolfpack, with his 13 goals and 35 points, as well as just before the season began finalizing a deal for Leopold Lockhart and his 5 goals and 31 points. They sent out Prince Devitt, who wasn’t exactly a slouch, and Shooter McGavin, a team legend who was fading into the distance a bit, ultimately leading to this difference in their additions, but for both the short and long-term, Calgary has made a major change this off-season to make them also worthy of the Uppercut.
Beyond these teams, Winnipeg added 31 points, while Hamilton and Texas added 28 each. Just going to show this has been one of the most active off-seasons in SHL history, and will be a hotly contested Uppercut Trophy in the end.
Joe McKeil Trophy
This trophy is given to the team deemed to have the best coaching, well often the best coaching job is done by teams that can work with what they’re given. A lot of them are teams where they sold or lost a lot of players and the coach then earns the reward for keeping the team competitive. These are some teams who sold heavily and we could expect the coach to be in for a tough time to keep them afloat.
New England Wolfpack (-56 Goals, -141 Points)
The big sellers of the off-season, New England cashed in and could even be contested to be among the better jobs done by a general manager in the off-season. However, sending out the likes of Ola Wagstrom, Boris Poroshenko, Dick Clapper, Guy Zheng and Rex Kirkby is going to make this a much different and more difficult job on the coaching side of things. While they have great players left, and even brought in Dominic Montgomery from San Francisco shortly before the start of the season, they will be on an uphill battle to stay in the fight with teams like Buffalo, Hamilton, Chicago and Manhattan in the East. If they’re able to land a fifth place spot and be anywhere near the playoffs toward the end of the season, it would be a testament to the great coaching job done in the northeast.
Los Angeles Panthers (-34 Goals, -82 Points)
The team who gave up the second most points this off-season may come as a surprise, as they didn’t make a lot of moves. Their one big move, however, sending out Theo Morgan, Hiro Fujikawa and Jon Toner yielded a lot of picks but only Daniel Bischoff and Jordan Von Matt who are, to say the least, underwhelming comparatively to the trio sent out of LA. This is a team that hasn’t been like the others who lost significant amounts of points from their line-up, as they’re the only one I know has not publicly stated a plan to either retool or rebuild, still expecting to be competitive in a more wide open West, but with the additions made by Edmonton, New Orleans, Calgary and Texas, one has to wonder if Los Angeles did enough to replace the high end offensive firepower of Morgan and Fujikawa with Bischoff and Ricky Bobby. If they stay in the fight to the end, or even make it, this is a team that will deserve major considerations.
San Francisco Pride (-13 Goals, -78 Points)
The team underwent major renovations in short order. As former general manager Jeff Kirkstone had a seemingly random removal from his post and the new regime quickly started making changes. The season started very quickly after they lost Bo Kane to Free Agency, and traded away Leopold Lockhart, Dominic Montgomery, Piotr Czerkawski and Nathan Explosion. This is a very different team, and they didn’t have a lot of time to come together. This is going to take a lot of work to develop chemistry and get the team on the right track, but with so many reports in the news recently doubting them, it gives a lot of bulletin board potential. This may not be a master class in tactics, but it could be something where a coach pushes the right buttons and the team comes together to prove the world wrong -- which could just get them in the hunt for this trophy.
Baltimore Platoon (-22 Goals, -75 Points)
Baltimore didn’t make major renovations to the roster, they sent out only Ethan Ross, Geoff “Greg” Moore, Yoshimitsu McCloud and a prospect Pojo Biscuit, and brought back major pieces ultimately. They did claim former first overall pick Simothy Drunkebird off waivers, and added Derek Bohne Jr. in the Moore trade which is a solid young defenseman. They just weren’t enough to really make a major difference and this is a team that will be rebuilding, or at least retooling, in the near future. As a further example of this, they were the team to lose to Tampa Bay, the first time a team has lost to them in over a year. It’s going to be a tough season in Baltimore, and it could take a miracle, but if the miracle happens, this is a prime candidate for a Krever nomination.
The only other team to lose points in the off-season was Buffalo, who lost 11 points in moving Muller for Kurczewski, but gained a first round pick. A first round pick for 11 points is a masterful move, and one that likely belongs in the Uppercut discussion, if not for the fact this off-season saw such major overhaul and this league is in a constant state of change currently.
For those wondering, Tampa Bay added 29 goals and 79 points to their roster. It didn’t take much to add to that roster, but it did take a general manager who is putting in all their effort to be better. The league may want to look out, because it won’t be long for them to be in the conversation for these awards. And for those in Vegas, maybe next time you’ll even bet the over.
Then again, I wouldn’t bet on that happening anytime soon if I were you.
Quote:Word Count: 2000 on the dot. Hope you enjoyed this, it just interested me so I figured I'd do something about it. Consider this part of SHN if you didn't like it, because we have no copyright laws so they can't say anything about it anyway.