Alright, it’s story time!

So I stumbled on to the SHL when I was randomly trying to check how Alexander Wennberg had performed during his last seasons in the SHL (in Sweden) for a research project I was doing for a fan site. I’d never been involved in sim leagues (now it’s probably my biggest hobby) and it’s been an amazing experience. However, I missed the off-season by a couple of weeks. I had not done the SMJHL combine, and experienced a significant TPE disadvantage, as I didn’t realize that various opportunities like PGS’s and Championship Week existed. There were big names in my draft class: VLAD McZehrl, Patrick Brumm, Randy Randleman, Mitch Dambach (who dropped off the face of the earth, as far as I can tell) and Buster Killington. I was really only active in my LR, and while I’d started to make sigs, I wasn’t really doing any kind of articles where people all around the site would see me. I was convinced that I was going to go in the third round, and that I’d be a total after-thought. Then, the mock drafts started rolling out, and people had me being drafted as early as 11th (which at the time was the second to last pick of the first round). I was absolutely ecstatic, especially as more and more mock drafts started putting me there. Shortly before the draft, I was contacted by two teams, one of whom was the team rumored to be taking me at 11! I could barely believe it. In an effort to curb my expectations, I put myself as going 20th in my own mock draft. At the same time, I was also a little disappointed, because even though going 11th was better than I would’ve dared to hope, I was also apparently only interesting to 2 teams.

Draft day rolls around, and I’m watching the thread with anticipation. I watch people be selected at about the time I’d expect, and then we get to number 11… and it’s not me. I was crushed (even though I’d put myself at 20). I watched as more and more people went, until finally, the 19th pick rolled around, and I was selected by the other team who’d reached out to me: West Kendall. Almost immediately, I received an e-mail from the GM of the team picking 20th (who’d given up all prior picks through trades) and he said that it’d been his intention to draft me all along (even though they’d never contacted me prior to the draft), and wished me the best of luck. I’d been fighting back some disappointment, but it quickly evaporated as I got introduced to the WKP LR. They’ve become my SHL family. I feel so completely at home in West Kendall that – unless most of the team leaves – I’m going to have a difficult time convincing myself to recreate, because I might not get to come back.

So what’s the takeaway? First off, don’t put too much credence in mock drafts. Second, the number of teams that contact you prior to the draft might not be a great indication of who’s actually interested in you as you might think. Since my draft, I’ve had at least 3 other GMs reach out to me to tell me that they’d hoped to get me in that draft, and I either wasn’t available anymore, or they’d had a more pressing need they had to fill. Above all, be open to the team that actually drafts you. You’d be surprised at how quickly they might just become like a second family to you.
UP NEXT: Post-draft expectations!