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Asked Madden · 02-05-2021, 07:58 PM

The influx of Austrians in DACH WJC 2x Media

My media today is a look at a phenomena being seen in the WJC, chiefly amongst the DACH team (made up of Austria, Germany and Switzerland).
Historically these 3 sides have come together and formed a filler team in the WJC, occasionally making a nuisance of themselves in the later stages.
This team, however, is expanding. Growing with a large number of very talented youngsters. Bolstered by a huge influx of fresh talent from the S57 & S58 J draft. We'll take a look at as many of these youngsters as we can, chat about where they've come from and see how they may fair in the remainder of the tournament then moving onto the IIHF. I'm not going to talk about every Austrian on the DACH side, I'll be focusing on its latest recruits. It's worth a passing note that this following core of excellent players is joined by another fantastic player in Jon St. Ark from the S26 J draft. I'm mentioning Arkz as he is a fantastic user and possibly more importantly is the missing link to the following players. In that he is a high earning Goalie. Finishing off a squad that should put up a 1st line and part of a second line for years to come.
Without further ado, let me introduce to you these young Austrians (apologies if I miss you, nothing personal, I'm just not sure where to find nationalities without going through every player).

#A-Rye Izzy - 390TPE - RD @~~Mike Izzy~~
This is the recreate of legendary Hall of Fame user Mike Izzy and son of the original player who went by the same name. It seems only fair to start with Izzy here, being the teams upcoming Stalwart. He's the only one of the following prospects I didn't know before joining Austria and he is by far and away the most experienced when it comes to the SHL.
If you look through his posts you know Izzy is here for the long haul.
Current GM of the Calgary Dragons Izzy was auto drafted back to his team where he had a long and fabled career with Mike Izzy.
The Defenseman is very balanced with a lot of skill on the offensive side of play, making me think he'll very much be a 2 way player. He may end up paired up with a more defensively minded partner but fortunately we won't have to worry about that after we have a look at who else will be joining him.
Personally I just want to mention, that it will be a pleasure to play alongside and in front of this player hopefully for the length of my international career.

Friedensreich Hundertwasser - 416TPE - RW @Asked Madden
The second player I'll come to is myself - Friedensreich Hundertwasser, the player of relative sim league newbie Asked Madden. Hundertwasser is our second player from the S57 J draft just recently drafted into the big leagues. He was first of the "former Dallas Birddogs" to be drafted (much to the chagrin of r0tzbua) at number 6 by the New Orleans Specters. The GM of whom has just been drafted to the Birddogs in the Developmental league over in the ISFL. Having shared a locker room with both Joe and Nic in St Louis, them taking the young Austrian at 6 seems like a complete steal considering he is the current TPE leader in the class.
Hundertwasser is the only young Austrian forward from this draft class so will no doubt be leading the attack in seasons to come. His showing so far in the world junior championships has left a lot to be desired, quite often finishing with a below 50 grade. However in seasons to come he'll no doubt start to perform better.
Although fairly new to sim leagues, Madden is starting to grow an impressive pedigree. In ISFL he is currently second in TPE amongst a very competitive Reddit class, having already won an Ultimus their he has managed to lock down both a Media Grading job and an Auditor job. Impressive for someone going into their 4th season, though nowhere near as impressive as the user I'm about to talk about.

Finn von Murphenstein - 402TPE - Rd @r0tzbua
We now come to possibly the most talented person I've met in my sim league time. Finn von Murphensteins user - r0tzbua (not to be confused with the following player Rotzbua) was part of the same draft class as me in the ISFL and was drafted to the birddogs alongside me. Now I may have gone ahead of him in every draft so far, absolutely none of them were deserved. r0tz brings charm, humour, intelligence and talent.
If you don't know of r0tz yet, you'll know of him soon enough. This man was Head office by the end of his second season in the ISFL, streamer, current Co-gm of the birddogs and has masterfully created at least 3 new logos for different teams across there. Since joining his second league he has helped to rebrand the stale Winnipeg Jets into the much more exciting Winnipeg Aurora and helped transform the draft stream by making sure every player had a render and a draft card when they were selected.
r0tzbua also has something the rest of the people on this list don't have (don't quote me on Izzy) and that is, the fact that he is actually Austrian. Yup, the rest of us are all American or in my case Scottish masquerading as Austrian. r0tz is the real deal and also the reason we selected Austria as our international team in the first place.
So far this Junior championship von Murphenstein has had a couple of fantastic games and a couple of mediocre games, scoring a goal or two and putting up some good grades. Even with more TPE you'd expect von Murphenstein to take a second line approach in the future behind the aforementioned Izzy who has no doubt earned that spot.
Austria have bagged themselves a superstar with this call up and DACH will love to use him for the next few seasons.

Zayne Rotzbua - 364TPE - LD @inverted
Our 4th and final S57 J draft player is the man with the most confusing name and yet another former birddog as well as previous birddog GM aka Inverted.
The name Zayne Rotzbua comes from smashing two birddog alums names together Zayne coming from user of Nikolaj Boyle - Zaynzk on the site and Rotzbua coming from the previous player r0tzbua.
Inverted has decided to create a true enforcing Dman and a proper goon. Rotzbua the player can be seen on the ice cruising around looking for someone to light up. With his defence oriented skills he will matchup and cover up very well for #A-Rye Izzy.
In a strange turn of events this tournament Rotzbua has actually been playing in the wing position due to the DACH coaches very aggressive tactics - he is making up for a couple of weaklings on the wing (me included).
Inverted was one of the first GMs of the Dallas birddog expansion team from the DSFL alongside the next person I'll talk about. He has since become co-GM of the Austin Copperheads in the ISFL.
Zayne Rotzbua was a bit of a beast this season considering he lagged behind a bit in earning. Rotzbua loves a fight but just doesn't do a very good job of finishing them, winning only one so far. He also has the claim or being the first ever draft pick of the Winnipeg Aurora who took him at 15 in the S58 draft.
Rotzbua will look to continue his brutish ways going on to the next round of games in the WJC.

Now that is all from the most recent draftees into the big leagues we'll now take a look at the youngest crop of Rookies who have just been drafted into the juniors.

Dane von Gucci - 243TPE - LD @gucci
Dane von Gucci is a wild left defence recently drafted in the second round to the St. Louis Scarecrows, the player spent the end of last season as a free agent (I want to say for the Kraken but possibly the whalers) and has quite an attacking defensive build. In the future when Austria are playing from behind von Gucci and Ozzy could be a demonic pairing at the back to score a few goals.
Gucci the user is grade A* birddog meat. The second founder of the Dallas Birddogs, Gucci is an ever lasting locker room presence. Absolutely great chat, and always has a good anecdote or story to tell if the locker room is dragging.
A total veteran in the ISFL, he has decided to try SHL and is nailing so far, sitting in the top 5 TPE in his draft class.
With the DACH squad getting stronger each season there was unfortunately not a spot for Von Gucci on this occasion but don't be surprised to see him blazing up and down the rink next world junior championship. With no international games to keep him occupied at the moment, von Gucci will be preparing himself for the season ahead, looking to break out for the Scarecrows. This season should give him plenty of ice fine after Scarecrows hero Colin Lambert got called up leaving a gaping hole in the D to be filled. No doubt von Gucci will be able to impress the DACH scouts for a spot in next seasons championship.

Miguel Hefeweizen - 220TPE - C @ZootTX
Miguel Hefeweizen is the player for, yup you guessed it, another Dallas birddog Amuni in user ZootTX.
Zoot was somewhat of a late bloomer in isfl and a member of the largest draft class and inaugural Dallas team. Picked at 161 overall and practically inactive in his first seasons Zoot was drafted to Yellowknife again in the triple digits. Since that season though, Zoot has come back to both teams and become a huge part of both locker rooms joining the War room for each team in the last season or so.
Zoot is excellent chat, his job often has him awake early so he's there to talk to at midday Scottish Time which is an added bonus and his job makes him an in real life hero.
So I'll stop waxing lyrical about this awesome guy (seriously so happy he's picked Austria) and I'll move onto a bit about his player.
Hefeweizen is a centre and the first that we've had in thus group of new players meaning he may well have the position locked up for DACH in the coming seasons. Like Gucci Hefeweizen didn't make the DACH squad this season, but after being drafted at 5 overall (a far cry from his isfl drafts) he has a huge chance of impressing scouts whilst playing for Maine meaning he should also be another one to watch in next seasons WJC.

Strawberry Sailfish - 158TPE - RW @Frostbite
There's not a huge amount to say about our final new guy. Strawberry Sailfish is brought to us by none other than ISFL power user frostbite.
Frostbite has self proclaimed that he will be a min earner probably the only person in the history of SHL to buy the 1TPE training.
Strawberry Sailfish is a second outing for user Frostbite after his first player - Grapefruit Lizard spent his whole career playing in St Louis. A force to be reckoned with, If sailfish can do anything close to Lizard DACH will have a player here for the foreseeable future as its unlikely he'll earn enough to break the TPE cap.
ALSO FROST ROX LMAP