[NHL19] We them Dragons - Dragons of Houston

[Lumpjaw]

Record: 35-40-7 | 7th in Central, 13th in Western Conference, 27th in NHL

After barely playing NHL for the last two editions I decided to buy it after christmas. After playing around with some threes and HUT I decided to wander into franchise mode. Expansion team it was and I felt it was time for Houston to get their team. So let me introduce Houston Dragons, who will play in the Western Conference as a part of the Central Division forming a rivalry with the Dallas Stars. As AHL team we have the newly founded Alabama Rockets. I turned of Owner Mode for this one as it's my first one. Also, the first ever game for Houston Dragons ended with a 9-1 loss against Vegas as I decided to try out AlTito's sliders. Safe to say I was not used to them. Injuries, morale and assistant making line up changes was turned on while simming.

We did however score the first goal in the game and the historical first goal in franchise history will forever belong to Mark Letestu who tucked it past Malcolm Subban in the Vegas net. This was the only game I played the first season as my main priority was to get used to all the things off ice and try to maximize the return of our assets. We ended up with a 35-40-7 record which places us 7th in the division, only Nashville were worse, and 27th in the league. Not at all bad for the inagural season. After the draft lottery we ended up with the 2nd overall pick in the 2019 entry draft. The result from that draft will follow in the review of season number two. The first captain of the Dragons franchise was Mattias Ekholm with Rick Nash and Tyler Myers as assitant captains. Adam Henrique and Mark Letestu later replaced Nash and Myers. The reasons for that? Continue reading.

The Houston Dragons will play in three different jerseys with the primary color being maroon and gold. White and black will be the supporting colors in the team identity. A maroon home jersey, white away and black third as shown below.

After looking at the exposed players in the expansion draft I was sure of one thing. There were plenty of good defensemen out there and not much to write home about regarding at center. Therefore the strategi was to pick as many good defensmen as possible no matter the salary as we'd not be near the salarcy cap when it was all said and done. And all in on defensemen it was. Mark Giordano, Adam Larsson, Mattias Ekholm, Josh Manson and Houston native Tyler Myers was quickly picked with intention to swap atleast a couple of them before the inagural season was over. Alex Killorn, Jesper Fast and Mark Letestu was probably the "best" forward picks. In goal the thought was to have Jaro Halak with Dell backing up – but a big blooper from the front office happened as Halak somehow was let go to the free agency and there we stood with Dell and Linus Ullmark as our duo. Givet it was the inagural season we decided to run with Dell and Ullmark.

NHL Expansion Draft 2018
Pick	Team	Player	Pos	Ht	Wt
	Anaheim	Josh Manson	D
	Arizona	Freddie Hamtilton	C
	Boston	Riley Nash	C
	Buffalo	Linus Ullmark	G
	Calgary	Mark Giordano	D
	Carolina	Trevor Carrick	D
	Chicago	Connor Murphy	D
	Colorado	Sven Andrighetto	RW
	Columbus	Mark Letestu	C
	Dallas	Gemel Smith	C
	Detroit	Matt Puempel	LW
	Edmonton	Adam Larsson	D
	Florida	Colton Sceviour	RW
	Los Angeles	Alec Martinez	D
	Minnesota	Gustav Olofsson	D
	Montreal	Kerby Rychel	LW
	Nashville	Mattias Ekholm	D
	New Jersey	Jimmy Hayes	RW
	NY Islanders	Jaroslav Halak	G
	NY Rangers	Jesper Fast	RW
	Ottawa	Tom Pyatt	C
	Philadelphia	Taylor Leier	LW
	Pittsburgh	Carl Hagelin	LW
	San Jose	Aaron Dell	G
	St. Louis	Oskar Sundqvist	LW
	Tampa Bay	Alex Killorn	LW
	Toronto	Brad Smith	C
	Vancouver	Reid Boucher	LW
	Washington	Alex Chiasson	RW
	Winnipeg	Tyler Myers	D

The first entry draft the Houston Dragons participated in was the 2018 one. Seven picks, one in each round, was at the disposal of the new franchise. We picked 6th overall and while we missed out on Rasmus Dahlin we were more than thrilled to make Filip Zadina our first overall NHL Entry Draft pick. We then followed that up with picking Ty Dellandrea, Adam Ginning, the russian Markus Kozhevnikov, canadian Henman before rounding it all off with Arnason and then the finnish defenseman Tuukka Ruutu who has low Top 4 potential. Apart from Zadina, there may not be much to say hooray for – but I hope for the best. If it stinks, I´ll blame the rookie GM.

Houston Dragons 2018 Entry Draft
Pick	Team	Player	Pos	Ht	Wt
5	Houston	Filip Zadina	RW
35	Houston	Ty Dellandrea	C
67	Houston	Adam Ginning	D
99	Houston	Markus Kozhevnikov	RW
131	Houston	Luke Henman	C
163	Houston	Micheal Arnason	C
195	Houston	Tuukka Ruutu	D

We started off with filling in some holes after the expansion draft with signing Rick Nash on a one year deal. JT Brown, Sean Kuraly and Mackenize Weeger was also signed as UFA to bolster the NHL roster. Scott Wedgewood, Matt Hackett, Fredrik Claesson, Corey Tropp, Emilie Poirer, Travis Morin, Brian Flynn, Miro Altonen and Jeff Schultz to go play on the farm.

The interesting stuff however was done in trades. A grand total of seven trades were made before the trade deadline passed. As we were not shooting for playoffs we had our mind set to maximize the value for our assets. As talked about earlier we hade picked as many good defensemen as possible, with purpose on shipping a couple or more out during the inagural season. The first one who got traded was Alec Martinez who went to St. Louis together with Carl Hagelin and a 2nd round pick in 2020 in exchange for Jordan Kyrou, a 1st round pick 2019 and a 2nd round pick in 2020.

Trade number two was with Florida who gave up Aleksi Heponiemi, Jamie McGinn and a 1st round pick (2019) in exchange for Mark Giordano. Adam Larsson were seconds later shown the door and flew to Anaheim with a 2nd round pick in 2023 for Adam Henrique. Henrique quickly became our 1st line center and top scorer, he also got the assistant captain duty when Rick Nash were traded to the Kings for Sean Durzi and a 2nd round picl in 2019. Henrique then signed a three year extension with an AAV of $5.4 million.

Houston native Tyler Myers were shipped to the Rangers with a draft pick and 50% retained salary for the last months of his contract. Houston Dragons instead got Pavel Buchnevich, a 3rd round pick and Marc Staal back. Buchnevich is a great prospect, but Staal was a throw in to even the salary out. We'll have to ship him out soon though as he's on the books until 2021.

After all the trades we hade secured three picks in the first round of the 2019 NHL Entry Draft, which is a great situation to be in. Hopefully I don't messed up the picks and scouting leading up to them.

Trade summary:

Spoiler

Houston acquire: (C) Jordan Kyrou, 1st & 2nd rnd pick (2019)
St. Louis acquire: (D) Alec Martinez, (LW) Carl Hagelin, 2nd rnd pick (2020)

Houston acquire: 2nd rnd pick (2019)
NY Rangers acquire: (C) Tom Pyatt, 3rd rnd pick (2019)

Houston acquire: (C) Aleksi Heponiemi, (RW) Jamie McGinn, 1st rnd pick (2020)
Florida acquire: (D) Mark Giordano

Houston acquire: (C) Adam Henrique
Anaheim acquire: (D) Adam Larsson, 2nd rnd pick (2023)

Houston acquire: (LW) Pavel Buchnevich, (D) Marc Staal, 3rd rnd pick (2020)
NY Rangers acquire: Tyler Myers (50% retained), 3rd rnd pick (2020)

Houston acquire: (D) Sean Durzi, 2nd rnd pick (2019)
Los Angeles acquire: (LW) Rick Nash

Houston acquire: 2nd rnd pick (2020)
Boston acquire: (RW) JT Brown

Houston Dragons Stats - 2019-20 | * Indicates player was acquired during season
Skaters	GP	G	A	PTS	+/-	GW	PIM	SOG	SPCT
Adam Henrique (A)	82	21	35	56	-1	0	12	188	11,2
Alex Killorn	77	21	33	54	-4	1	26	161	13,0
Jesper Fast	81	19	31	50	0	4	10	185	10,3
Pavel Buchnevich*	73	18	25	43	-6	2	33	132	13,6
Riley Nash	82	14	29	43	-5	6	33	164	8,5
Mark Letestu (A)	82	13	25	38	-14	4	12	117	11,1
Alex Chiasson	82	14	18	32	-2	0	32	103	13,6
Sean Kuraly	82	9	23	32	-4	1	26	100	9,0
Colton Sceviour	82	15	12	27	6	1	28	101	14,9
Jimmy Hayes	82	12	15	27	6	1	19	87	13,8
Jamie McGinn*	72	12	14	26	-23	2	36	119	10,1
Josh Manson	75	7	18	25	-3	0	42	148	4,7
Connor Murphy	73	6	16	22	-24	2	36	119	5,0
Mattias Ekholm (C)	69	3	16	19	1	0	20	125	2,4
Marc Staal*	82	2	15	17	-18	0	44	84	2,4
Mackenzie Weegar	45	5	8	13	2	0	12	68	7,4
Sven Andrighetto	47	6	5	11	-4	0	8	60	10,0
Gustav Olofsson	82	2	7	9	-11	0	31	88	2,3
Goalies	GP	W	L	T	GAA	TOI	SV	SV%	SHO
Aaron Dell	62	29	26	6	2,94	3754	1697	90,2	1
Linus Ullmark	21	6	14	1	3,76	1212	547	87,8	0

[Lumpjaw]

The plan going forward is updates after every month with stats, transactions and a look at the farm. Bigger transactions and other big happenings will get their own post. Just tweeted out some bits during the last week for season one at my twitter and then realized I should write something too. Will continue to tweet aboute the franchise over at @lumpjaw_fm if anyone want to follow along.

As I work full time and try to spend time with my girlfriend when we both have time off, I can't guarantee at what tempo this franchise thread will get updated, but I aim for atleast a couple of updates every week - with some days getting more and some less depending on how much I play.

Stay tuned for updates about the 2019 Entry Draft and the 2019 off season.

[Lumpjaw]

The first event of the 2019-20 season was the NHL Entry Draft and after the deals during last season Houston had a grand total of ten picks in the 2019 draft, including three in the first round and four in the second round. As no interesting trades were offered, neither from us to other teams or the other way around, we used all of the then picks to bolster our prospect core.

The ten picks were the following ones: #2, 21, 32, 38, 43, 46, 64, 102, 134, 166, 198.

And with further ado...



With the second overall pick we selected center Kirby Dach from the Saskatoon Blade with medium elite potential. Dach score 69 points in 71 games for his Saskatoon who misses the playoffs. The 18 year old will return to the WHL for atleast the upcoming season. We then used the 21st pick of the first round to grab Finnish right wing Kappo Kakko from TPS in Liiga. Kakko, with medium elite potential was signed and will play top minutes in the AHL this season - along with top minutes during the NHL pre season. Swedish center Kim Renberg was our last pick in the first round with the pick we got from the Stanley Cup champions from St. Louis. Like Dach and Kakko, he has medium elite potential.

The second round yielded two left wingers and two defensemen in Mattias Hagelin, Miiro Linjala, Nils Höglander and Michael Vukojevic, with Hagelin and Vukojevic having medium top 4 potential while Linjala clocks in at medium elite and Höglander low top 6 potential.

Finnish defensemen Ville Hurme was our pick in the 4th round and comes in with a medium elite potential, followed by fellow countryman Samu Suhonen. Suhonen is a medium starter goaltender.

The last two picks in the draft gave us Kari Selanne, a finnish defenseman with medium top 6 potential and russian goalie Yuri Safronov who at the time was unscouted and then showed up as a backup medium potential.

I have high hopes for Dach, Kakko, Renberg, Linjala and Hurme who all have elite potential. With some luck, we can get Hagelin and Vukojevic to reach their potential as top 4 defensemen too. If we, like we hope to do, climb the standings in the future I think we have either a solid core to build around or they could be used as trade chips in the hunt for a championship.

Houston Dragons 2019 Entry Draft
Pick	Team	Player	Pos	Ht	Wt
2	Houston	Kirby Dach	C
21	Houston	Kappo Kakko	RW
32	Houston	Kim Renberg	C
38	Houston	Mattias Hagelin	D
43	Houston	Miiro Linjala	LW
46	Houston	Nils Höglander	LW
64	Houston	Michael Vukojevic	D
102	Houston	Ville Hurme	D
134	Houston	Samu Suhonen	G
166	Houston	Kari Selanne	D
198	Houston	Yuri Safronov	G

Now, we look forward to the free agent window opening shortly. Our primary goal is to strengthen the middle of the ice with a couple centers and hopefully we can add a real starting goaltender too. Both Pekka Rinne and Semyon Varlamov will be UFA and are showing interest to sign with us, but I´d imagine they are both going to contenders instead of a buildin expansion team. On the offensive side name such as Jeff Skinner, Blake Wheeler and Tyler Seguin will be free agents and we'd love to add Skinner or Seguin. I doubt we get both of them.

More on our off season in the next update...

[SeattleBattleCat]

Great start & great presentation. You have some great building blocks to base the foundation of a mega dynasty there with Dach, Kakko, Zadina etc. Can’t wait to read on, best of luck with your ‘chise.

[Lumpjaw]

Following the 2019 NHL Entry Draft the big happening started on the 1st of july, as it does every year. The free agency had opened. Beforehand, Houston Dragons front office and coaches had two positions they really wanted to land a marquee signing at - center and goalie. And there were signs the newest franchise were serious about making a splash with names like Tyler Seguin, Joe Thornton Pekka Rinne, Semyon Varlamov on the market. There were rumours about Matt Duchene and Auston Matthews hitting free agency too, but they decided to stay with Ottawa and Toronto.

With almost 30 million in cap space we decided to go after Seguin, Rinne and Varlamov in hope of landing atleast one of them. After a couple days of negotiationg we got a "Thank you but no thanks, I want to win" answer from both Rinne and Varlamov which was a hard blow as they were clear cut top two goalie named in the free agency.

However, we got a center...



From our rivals down in Texas we poached one of the best centers in the league in Tyler Seguin who decided to stay in Texas after getting a six year contract worth $70,35 million dollars. Seguins contract will eat 11,725 million against the cap every year but given he's only 27 years old he will have plenty of mileage left in the tank. He's the first marquee signing in the history of the franchise and he will offer us a whole new level regarding offensive threat and the will take care of the number one center role foreseeable future.

With Seguin on the books and both goalie targets going elsewhere there were only minor signings done by Houston, mostly to bolster the Alabama Rockets of the AHL. Three signings for the Dragons however was Austin Czarnik and Chandler Stephenson, both centers who will battle it out for 3rd and 4th line duty while Taylor Leier comes in as a depth signing.

Some interesting signings for Alabama includes Oliver Kylington who was let go from Calgary while Brandon Pirri, Matt Puempel and Miro Aaltonen all returns for a second season. Other noteworthy names are Dominik Simon, Tomas Hyka and Collin Delia.

We also noticed Jeff Skinner being let go by the Hurricanes and he showed interest in signing with Houston, as well as defenseman Tyler Myers. Myers who as you know were used in a trade to get Pavel Buchnevich, a draft pick and Marc Staal last season. They both decided they wanted to win and did not believe they could not do that in Houston and therefore picked other destinations.

In total the Houston Dragons handed out 24 contracts during the free agency period up until the 31st of august.

Free agency summary

Spoiler

Next up: Preseason, trades and 2019 opening day roster

[Lumpjaw]

Quote: Originally Posted by SeattleBattleCat

Great start & great presentation. You have some great building blocks to base the foundation of a mega dynasty there with Dach, Kakko, Zadina etc. Can’t wait to read on, best of luck with your ‘chise.

Thank you! Yeah, that was part of the plan, to load up on picks the first year to set a great foundation going forward. Either they stay and is a part of the building or they're used as parts in deals. Win win!

[Lumpjaw]

Record: 3-4-0
vs. Jets, 4-1 W | vs. Blues, 2-3 L | @ Stars, 5-2 W | @ Wild, 2-3 L | vs. Predators, 4-6 L | @ Blackhawks, 1-5 L | @ Avalanche, 6-1 W

With the free agency out of the way we shifted focus to the preseason and in contray to the common of using a big pre season roster we went the other way and rolled with eight defensemen, 15 forwards and two goalies to get the room together after a summer with some big movements given Seguin coming in, Filip Zadina arriving from the juniors and a couple more moves. In total there was seven preseason games planned and we ended up going 3-4-0 with a clear standout in Reid Boucher.

The nifty left winger Boucher was the top scorer in Alabama last year with 33 goals and 32 assists in 82 games. Safe to say he played his way in to the roster during the preseason beating Sven Andrighetto for the last forward spot. Rookie Kappo Kakko was given lots of ice time during pre season, but will start in the AHL as we do not want to rush him in to the show.

When the pre season games were over we hada week to make changes to the opening day roster before the first game of the season was due, against Vegas in Vegas.

2019-20 Preseason Stats -
Skaters	GP	G	A	PTS	+/-	GW	PIM	SOG	SPCT
Tyler Seguin	7	2	6	8	-2	0	2	28	7,1
Reid Boucher	7	5	1	6	4	0	0	15	33,3
Mattias Ekholm	7	1	5	6	3	0	0	12	8,3
Pavel Buchnevich	7	2	3	5	-3	1	0	15	13,3
Jesper Fast	7	1	4	5	0	1	0	11	9,1
Chandler Stephenson	7	1	4	5	0	0	2	12	8,3
Colton Sceviour	7	3	1	4	4	0	0	12	25,0
Alex Killorn	7	2	2	4	-3	0	6	16	12,5
Austin Czarnik	7	2	2	4	3	0	2	6	33,3
Adam Henrique	7	1	3	4	-1	0	4	19	5,3
Erik Gustafsson	7	1	3	4	2	0	0	9	11,1
Josh Manson	7	1	1	2	1	1	2	9	11,1
Gustav Forsling	5	0	2	2	-2	0	0	4	0
Filip Zadina	7	0	2	2	-2	0	0	18	9
Kappo Kakko	7	1	0	1	0	0	4	9	11,1
Marc Staal	7	0	1	1	-2	0	2	7	0
Taylor Leier	7	0	1	1	2	0	2	3	0
Connor Murphy	7	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	0
Mackenzie Weegar	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	4	0
Goalies	GP	W	L	T	GAA	TOI	SV	SV%	SHO
Aaron Dell	6	3	3	0	2,35	357	150	91,5	0
Linus Ullmark	1	0	1	0	5,10	85,3	29	85,3	0

Now we head over to the trade department of the pre season. Three trades were made by the Dragons front office...


HOU acquires: (G) Carter Hart | PHI acquires: (D) Sean Durzi, 2nd rnd pick 2021, 3rd rnd pick 2025

As you know, we missed out on a goalie during the free agency so we explored the trade option. In Philadelphia there was a youngster named Carter Hart that sounded like the answer to our prayers - atleast in a longer term. We started dealing with GM Fletcher, and were clear that we would not give up a first rounder, of the Flyers and after a while we finalized a trade were we sent Sean Durzi, a 2nd round pick in 2021 and a 3rd rounder in 2025 in exchange for Carter Hart. The Flyers said they felt like they were hitting a home run with this but we strongly believe that Carter Hart will turn out to be a starter and elite goalie in the NHL. You rarely get a elite NHL goaltender with a second or third round pick. Hart will be the starting goaltender in AHL with Alabama, and his contract is expiring after the season so we will be looking to extend that before next summer.


HOU acquires: (G) Steve Mason | NJD acquires: (G) Linus Ullmark, (RW) Markuss Kozhevnikov

But Hart was for the future, and we were not sure about the tandem of Aaron Dell and Linus Ullmark. New Jersey had placed Steve Mason on the block and were looking for a backup goalie so we offered Linus Ullmark straight up for Mason. The Devlis said no, but also added they liked Ullmark so we continued talking. When we added our fourth round pick from the 2018 draft, Markuss Kozhevnikov, they liked it enough to accept and we felt like this would be a good deal for our roster given that Carter Hart is in the minors and will be our starter within a couple years. Mason have two years left on his contract with an cap hit of 1.825 million and played 21 games in the NHL last season, winning 10 while posting a .899 saving percentage and a 2.94 GAA. (He did however go from 83 overall to 80 overall before opening day...)


HOU acquires: (D) Henri Jokiharju, 2nd rnd pick 2021 | CHI aquires: (D) Adam Ginning, (LW) Nils Höglander, 3rd rnd pick 2022

The last trade we made before opening day was poaching Finnish defenseman Henri Jokiharju from Chicago. The Blackhawks had placed him on the tradingblock and we swinged for it and were happy when they accepted a deal that saw us swap prospects Ginning and Höglander with a third round pick in 2022 return for Jokiharju and a second round pick in 2021. Sure, we lost Ginning who was poised for a top 4 role according to our scouts and Höglander who could crack the top 9 if things rolled the right way, but getting Jokiharju and upgrading the draft pick was a great deal for us I think. Especially since we used our own second rounder in 2021 to get Carter Hart. Jokiharju scored 64 points form the blue line in 63 games for the Portland Winter Hawks in the WHL last season and will report to Alabama to lift heavy minutes on the top pairing.


After all the free agency moves, all the preseason games and the trades we have finally arrived for the second season in Houston Dragons history. After a inagural season resulting in a 7th place in the Central Division the newest team in the NHL looks to continue to add to ther short history and to continue to set them up for greatness in the coming years.

The biggest story before the season is the signing of superstar Tyler Seguin who will be the biggest start of the team the coming season. Another topic that have fans on their feets is the arrival of Filip Zadina, the first ever entry draft pick in franchise history, who comes with a 65 point in 59 games season in for the Halifax Mooseheads in QMJHL on his back. During preseason he has played on a line with Alex Killorn and Adam Henrique but after Kappo Kakko has been sent down to the minors there is a spot open at right wing in the first line beside Pavel Buchnevich and Tyler Seguin.

Mattias Ekholm and Josh Manson will continue to controll the blue line with Connor Murphy showing signs of stepping upp to be a good top 4 defender. Beside those three, there is three spots open for Marc Staal, Erik Gustafsson, Gustav Forsling and Mackenzie Weegar to fight about.

Pending UFA Aaron Dell and veteran Steve Mason will battle it out in net.

Dragons Opening Day Roster
#	CENTERS	AGE	HT	WT	SHOT	NATION
91	Tyler Seguin (A)	27	185 cm	91 kg	R	CANADA
16	Adam Henrique (A)	29	183 cm	89 kg	L	CANADA
20	Chandler Stephenson	25	183 cm	92 kg	L	CANADA
28	Austin Czarnik	26	175 cm	72 kg	R	USA
#	LEFT WINGS	AGE	HT	WT	SHOT	NATION
89	Pavel Buchnevich	24	188 cm	87 kg	L	RUSSIA
17	Alex Killorn	30	185 cm	89 kg	L	CANADA
24	Reid Boucher	26	178 cm	88 kg	L	USA
21	Taylor Leier	25	178 cm	79 kg	L	CANADA
#	RIGHT WINGS	AGE	HT	WT	SHOT	NATION
37	Filip Zadina	19	183 cm	87 kg	L	CZECH REPUBLIC
18	Jesper Fast	27	183 cm	87 kg	R	SWEDEN
8	Colton Sceviour	30	183 cm	88 kg	R	CANADA
10	Jimmy Hayes	29	196 cm	97 kg	R	USA
11	Sven Andrighetto	26	178 cm	85 kg	L	SWITZERLAND
#	DEFENSE	AGE	HT	WT	SHOT	NATION
14	Mattias Ekholm (C)	29	193 cm	97 kg	L	SWEDEN
42	Josh Manson	28	191 cm	96 kg	R	CANADA
7	Connor Murphy	26	193 cm	96 kg	R	USA
22	Gustav Forsling	23	183 cm	84 kg	L	SWEDEN
19	Marc Staal	32	193 cm	95 kg	L	CANADA
29	Erik Gustafsson	30	178 cm	82 kg	L	SWEDEN
53	Mackenzie Weegar	25	183 cm	96 kg	R	CANADA
#	GOALIES	AGE	HT	WT	CATCH	NATION
31	Aaron Dell	30	183 cm	91 kg	L	CANADA
35	Steve Mason	31	193 cm	95 kg	R	CANADA

Down at the farm, in Alabama, we have a couple interesting names. They missed the playoffs last year but were only eight points away. This year we have put more effort to put together a stronger lineup to get the team in to the playoffs and giving our prospects some valuable experience. The most interesting prospects in Alabama is Kaapo Kakko, Jordan Kyrou, Aleksi Heponiemi, Henri Jokiharju, Oliver Kylington and Carter Hart. There is a debate if the right thing to do was signing Kakko and place him in the AHL between fans and experts, but Dragons front office do believe that was the thing to do. The future will act as a judge in this case.

We signed the best players from last year in Pirri, Puempel, Aaltonen and added a couple seasoned players with NHL experience to help the younger players during the season.

Alabama Rockets Depth Chart -
	1ST LINE	2ND LINE	3RD LINE	4TH LINE
LW	Brandon Pirri (78)	Matt Puempel (75)	Dmytro Timashov (72)	Pierre Engvall (69)
C	Dominik Simon (75)	Jordan Kyrou (69)	Miro Aaltonen (73)	Freddie Hamilton (74)
RW	Kaapo Kakko (57)	Aleksi Heponiemi (65)	Tomas Hyka (77)	Jayce Hawryluk (77)
D #1	Henri Jokiharju (75)	Matt Gilroy (74)	Kyle Wood (76)
D #2	Oliver Kylington (75)	Gustav Olofsson (77)	Petteri Lindbohm (75)
G	Carter Hart (73)	Collin Delia (69)

Next up: October recap

[PFellah]

Quote: Originally Posted by Lumpjaw

As I work full time and try to spend time with my girlfriend when we both have time off, I can't guarantee at what tempo this franchise thread will get updated, but I aim for atleast a couple of updates every week - with some days getting more and some less depending on how much I play.

My big problem is sharing the PS4 with a teenage son. :P

Good job so far, hope the youth movement pans out for you.