[ready to grade, 2308 words x2]


We continue on our quest to review the draft class in a positive manner. There wasn't much to find wrong in the top-10 even if I wasn't trying to stay positive with every pick. I have a feeling not much is going to change for picks 11 through 20. This was an extremely deep draft and all the draft picks coming up give their teams huge value. I look forward to getting a chance to review all these great picks. Hopefully I can get these done quickly because double media is ending sooner rather than later. Let's get going.


11. Chicago Syndicate; Pick: Ryuuji Minamino; User: Nhamlet

Chicago picks a player that some (including the player himself I believe) might view as a surprise. I had good talks with this player and from everything I've seen Nhamlet appears to be a potential power user on the site. His lower TPE may have been the only reason he fell to Chicago at 11. Nhamlet has really put the pedal to the medal with his activity lately. His name was all over the rookie discord, he's become an updater, he's the third and final member of the roundtable trio and most importantly, his activity is spiking at the right time. I like that he's written a prospect guide about the S54 draft. It's easy to write about yourself and do media that's related to your class and player but it's a lot more difficult to find the motivation to write about things you don't have much related to. It's a good sign for long-term success that Nhamlet is willing to diversify his topics and expand his media horizon. The small TPE differences at the draft always getting smushed together by the end of a player's career. If his TPE amount is what kept people from selecting Minamino, then Chicago capitalized on the opportunity and made a great pick.


12. Tampa Bay Barracuda; Pick: Valentin Kalashnikov; User: suavemente

Tampa Bay takes advantage of the Russian factor (is that a thing in the SHL? I'm making it a thing) and gets a great player at 12 in Valentin Kalashnikov. I only had a brief conversation with suavemente before the draft but I liked what I heard. He said he just wants to go to a team that's tight and somewhere he can shoot the shit. When a player says things like that it usually means you've got someone you can build a relationship with in your locker room and they're somebody you're going to want to have around on your team. Now, he's much more than just a locker room guy. Kalashnikov is in that top group of TPE earners and had over $15,000,000 in the bank going into the draft. Suavemente has put out graphics, videos and articles. While they might be more light-hearted than some other members in the draft class I don't think it's a negative. Every locker room needs to have that guy who's going to lighten the mood and not take things so seriously. This whole thing is just a game after all. I like players like Kalashnikov and I think that Tampa Bay is going to like him too! Good luck to both parties going forward!


13. New Orleans Specters; Pick: Erben Kasius; User: Paq

With the 13th pick, New Orleans gets one of the highest TPE earners in the entire draft class in Erben Kasius. Paq is a re-creating member who has the advantage of a $30,000,000 bank being brought forward from his last player. Now the naysayers out there are going to say Paq's last player didn't put him in a position to be deserving of such a high selection. I say that's crap. The guy writing this article went 25th overall in a Reddit draft because his first player only reached a little over 600 TPE. I proved all the teams that passed over me wrong and Paq is going to do the exact same thing. That $30,000,000 in the bank plus his salary gives him the tools to buy training and equipment for a few seasons with minimal effort. I took advantage of that same thing when I first started on Pepperoni. Once you've got those first few seasons done and you're seeing other people slip out of the draft class it gives you the motivation to keep it going and perhaps be the best of them all. New Orleans keeps up their trend of drafting those overlooked players that have potential that no one can see. I hope both New Orleans and Paq keep up the good work and continue to have success. Great pick!


14. Winnipeg Jets; Pick: Reid Sutherland; User: reid_sutherland

The Winnipeg Jets step back up to the podium in the first round and select from the Detroit Falcons, Reid Sutherland. I'd still consider Reid to be in that top group of prospects that have great TPE earning and great ability to make money. Going into the draft Reid had over $10,000,000 in the bank which would get him consideration in a top-3 pick any other draft year. I will admit I haven't seen him around on the forums the same way I've seen some of the other high post users but Reid has over 200 posts since he's joined the site. Maybe we don't visit the same sections all that often but it doesn't matter because he seems to be visiting the site a lot. Reid's strong point is his consistency. He never goes 2 weeks without putting some form of media out into the SHL. He's had some interesting statistic based articles including two focusing on the analysis of point shares and an analysis of SHL team needs based on TPE. He's also written some more qualitative articles including his post-Winter Classic interview with his own player. Winnipeg gets an active player who has all the tools to create a star. Great pick!


15. San Francisco Pride; Pick: Sven Svenson; User: LordBirdman

The 15th overall pick goes to the Cincinnati Sand Lions... I mean er the San Francisco Pride (Sorry don't want to leak the rebrand too early but my backspace key is broken, I'm not throwing out the money because of a little leak). They take Colorado Raptor player Sven Svenson. Once again, Colorado Raptor player so it's an auto good pick but there's a lot more to this one as well. LordBirdman is already rocking over 350 posts on the site and has a bank account of around $13,000,000 at the time of the draft. Svenson is in that same category of TPE earning as almost everyone picked up until this point so it's really only the little things that can separate him from the rest. I've gotten to see a bit of his activity in the Colorado locker room (I really should use that to scout more but there's a part of me that feels dirty doing that) and It looked like nothing but good things. Svenson does some graphics does some articles so there's enough diversity there to keep the money earning fresh. I think Svenson is going to be a great addition to the locker room and team in good time in Cincinnati (whoops), San Francisco. Did I mention he's a good pick? no? good because he's a great pick!


16. Edmonton Blizzard; Pick: William Hartmann; User: thecanadiancanuck

Okay, here we go. I obviously think this is an absolutely wonderful pick as I'm the one who made it. I also get the pleasure of showing pure positive bias with absolutely no drawback (not that there is any) of this pick. First off, when we were thinking about picking at 10 Hartmann was one of our top choices at that pick. I had conversations with Nokazoa asking him if he thought he'd fall to us at 10 because I really wanted him. Our prospect pool is a little bare so we made the decision to trade back and grab an extra first in next seasons draft so we could add some depth in the future. As I was watching the draft I became extremely excited when it became apparent we were getting Hartmann with the 16th overall pick. Some other teams weren't excited as when I made the pick I received a quick but harsh "Fuck You Tommy" (It always feels good when your picks result in your fellow GMs swearing at you). Hartmann was one of the few high earning prospects that had already proved he could earn money. Coming into the draft Hartmann had $21,000,000 in the bank which was extremely impressive to us as a first-gen player. I mention consistency a lot but wow, canadiancanuck is putting out articles all the time and we are so excited for his future with the Edmonton Blizzard. Great pick by a smart and subtly sexy GM in Edmonton.


17. Tampa Bay Barracuda; Pick: Frederick Wanesly; User: Mediocre_Fred

Tampa Bay, you're allowed to share some picks you know right? Obviously there's some kind of good GMing going on over there if they're able to get this many good picks in this good of a draft. Now Fred may have been trying to set some mild expectations by calling himself mediocre but he's anything but mediocre. Very close leading up to the draft he put out two articles. One of which was very interesting and helpful that listed out a bunch of builds that are already in FHM to give players an idea of how to build their players if they wanted to emulate certain real-life players (It appears very unlikely I'll ever hit em with the 4 like Auston Matthews). His other article was a piece about his player entering the draft. Fred was up with all the other players drafted so far in TPE and his $8,000,000 bank left him as an obvious choice to go number 17. I think once again that this pick is going to work out for both player and team. As a result, this pick will be placed under the "great" section.


18. Buffalo Stampede; Pick: Zoltan Topalo; User: Rangerjase

Buffalo Stampede join Tampa in having three picks already in this draft and take Zoltan Topalo of the Detroit Falcons. Topalo has access to one of the most important things to building a great SHL player, a desk job. At least that's my understanding from what I was told by my scouts. I'm sure Buffalo knows the joys of a player who has a desk job and has access to the SHL at work. Sometimes the SHL can become too much work but when you're at work and the SHL is your escape from work it's a recipe for success. Topalo might not have the bank that some of these other young whippersnappers might have but just wait until there's a slow day at the office and Rangerjase pumps out an article the likes of which you've never seen before. He's kept up with the TPE of the rest of the class so obviously he's made the moves in the past to get money and I'm sure he'll be able to do it in the future as he continues with Buffalo. Great pick Buffalo!


19. Texas Renegades; Pick: Burlok Suflurgold; User: leviadan

Texas ignored the trade offer I put in the GM chat and jumped right up to make their selection at 19 and I can't blame them. They grabbed another member of the Detroit Falcons in Burlok Suflurgold. I had a nice conversation with leviadan (pronounced leviadan, not leviadan) leading up to the draft and he seems like a great guy. For one, he's a Leaf fan and there is nothing hockey related websites need more of than Leaf fans, we're very underrepresented. He was sitting in the high 270s TPE wise with what feels like half of the class and he had $11,500,000 going into the draft. Leviadan brought a couple of articles to the table before the draft and recently made some graphics as well. Some people may have been turned off by the fact that he had his activity stat hidden but if they took the time to get to know the person behind the username, all of those worries would have been put to the side. Good luck leviadan and make sure that even though there is no hockey that Texas never goes a day without hearing about the Leafs. Then you will truly be the greatest pick of the draft.


20. Minnesota; Pick: Rocco Berni; User: Blues

Well, I like to talk about myself, so why stop now? I know the pain Blues was going through in this draft. Doing absolutely everything you could to stay near the top of the TPE leaderboard and prove to GMs you had changed your ways and this time it was going to be different. Despite your best efforts you slowly watch yourself slide down the draft board and watch player after player get picked before you. Well, guess what? Just like me, Blues is going to go out there and prove everyone (including myself) wrong. Blues has got a bone to pick with the SHL and it doesn't know what it's in for yet. Minnesota is desperately looking for users with the fighting attitude and the loyalty Blues will have to the organization will be unlike many in this draft. As of right now Blues sits at 383 TPE and has almost $50,000,000 in the bank. These are the kind of numbers we were seeing out of the top-3 in this draft. This is an absolutely great pick for Minnesota because it has tons of upside and when you walk out of a draft with potentially the best player, you've done a great job.