"For all the loyal fans in and around Portland and the great state of Maine. Hello everyone and away we go, with another edition of the Maine Timber show! On the program tonight, we've got a special guest, he's the long time trainer of the Maine Timber, the legendary Naughty Muscle! Welcome to the show Naughty!"

Naughty Muscle: "Why thank you Mr. TV host, it's... it's a pleasure to be here!"

TV Host: "So tell me Naughty, just how long have you been the trainer for the Timber?"

Naughty Muscle: "Um, which camera do I look at? Is it that one?" Naughty exclaimed as he pointed excitedly from side to side, "Or maybe that one? Why you got so many?" 

TV Host: "It's the one with the red light on."

Naughty Muscle: "Ohhhh, gotcha... Okay so I just look over yonder?"

TV Host: "Yeah, you can look at me too."

Naughty Muscle: "Well which is it? Look at you or look at the camera?!"

TV Host: Okay, we can just edit that out... And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor." Suddenly the airwaves were flooded with a lively jingle intended to sell dish soap. Meanwhile, back in the studio our fearless host has had enough Muscle: "Where in the $!*! did you find this guy?"

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On a serious note, what we'd like to do now is take a look at how your favorite players are performing from one week to the next. Basically, we're interested in discovering who's making the most progress amongst the forwards, defense and goaltending positions. Generally speaking, for a junior team it's critical to know where any given player is on their development curve and this series hopes to analyze the stats and disseminate that information for the home viewer. So let's begin by looking at the numbers for games 1 through 8, and then we'll break it down comparatively by looking at games 9 to 16.



As stated previously, games one through eight will be our starting baseline, then we'll move forward with the next block of eight games to determine which way specific players are trending. (You can kind of think of it as a who's hot list).



By comparing the two sets of statistics, we're able to deduce which players made the greatest strides in their current development cycle. Timber skaters will be evaluated in terms of point production, offensive game rating (OGR), game rating (GR), plus/minus, and defensive game rating (DGR). While goaltenders will be graded separately with a different set of criteria. At this point, this is all highly experimental, but we're willing to give it a try and see where it leads.

First off, let's start with the skaters. The three Timber with the highest point gains of the week are:

1) Mando Lorian, who went from 4 points to 15 for an incredible gain of plus eleven! (In just eight games).

2) Iam Downski, also had an astonishing week going from 7 to 17 points for a fantastic plus ten!

3) Defenseman Tam Bunnings rocketed up from 5 points to 14, for a very impressive plus nine!

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Next up, the top three Timber of the week in plus/minus levels!

1) Defender Tim Bunnings came in at plus 3 and closed the week at +6 for a amazing gain of three levels!

2) D-man Rocky Baljoa started off with a team leading plus 9 and then stepped it up even higher for a one point gain to plus 10!

3) Pawter Meowski started the week at +5 and moved up another level to plus 6 for another one point gain!

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We'll have the baselines for all three game ratings next week, but in the meantime here are the current team leaders in the three ratings categories:

1) Gravy Train | GR 79 - The best all-round Timber! Often imitated but never duplicated, there's only one Gravy Train!!

2) Iam Downski | GR 78 - Only a whisker away from the top spot! When it matters most, Downski is right there!!

3) Daniel Swift | GR 74 - The rookie cracks the top three in all-round performance! What an honor to even be in this group!!

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1) Iam Downski | OGR 79 - The top offensive player on the Maine Timber! It's good to be King!!

2) Daniel Swift | OGR 78 - Sensational for a rookie! Just a hair away from being the team's best offensive player!!

3) Gravy Train | OGR 77 - A tremendous rating! Definitely first line material! The top three are so close!!

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1) Mando Lorian | DGR 81 - This is truly outstanding! Anything 80 or above is phenomenal!!

2) Emil Egli | DGR 76 - Exceptional strength! A D-man you can trust when the game is on the line!!

3) Matthew Mayhem | DGR 75 - Very strong! A defenseman who can shut down the other team's top line!!

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So that's all the time we have for now. Next time we'll continue developing our database and expand it to include additional stats, more analysis and of course the goalies as well! Hope you enjoyed the show and until next time - keep the Timber rolling!!