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*Zerg* · 04-01-2021, 11:54 PM

[Double Draft Media]
[Ready for grading]

Draft day.

Artemius paced the dining room of his parents' house, the house he grew up in. While most of the Raptors rookies had stayed in Colorado, he'd flown back to Sweden the weekend after game seven. He'd thought getting a head start on the work for World Juniors would be a good idea. The past few days had been a focused blur of bag skating, stick drills, practice goalies chirping his shot, and sunrise hikes in the Norrland woods. Now, with the sun going down behind the tiny square window over his mother's aluminum sink, he wasn't so sure.

The draft was happening right now, thousands of miles away. The rest of the Raptors were on scene there, he was sure - where their teammates could elbow them before every pick, cheers filled the building after one of their names was called, and they couldn't see that the sun hadn't set. Yet here he was, pacing a small family dining room with floral wallpaper. His aimlessly pacing right slipper crashed into a chair leg. He hissed and hopped on his unbruised foot, heard his mother calling down from upstairs.

"No, nothing!" He answered, but his mind was too far away to have paid any attention to what she'd actually asked. 'Nothing' was a good answer anyway. That was all he'd heard since the flight back. Somehow, the silence felt worse this time.

'Last time' had been a little less than a year ago, when he'd paid half-attention to the draft for the North American junior league he'd spent these past months playing in. It had been very quiet then too; no scouts had contacted him, and he'd gone undrafted. He'd had his hopes back then, of course, but no real expectations. He was just a 'big kid from Luleå', as the tiny internet blurb his mother had shown him put it, one who had size and speed, and not much else. Certainly nothing to write home about, the scout who wrote it thought; this Nystrom kid was probably destined for a pedestrian career in the Swedish league. Nothing more.

That must have been why the silence didn't feel quite so oppressive back then. Of course his name wasn't called. He doubted any of those American managers even knew who he was. Spending his career with his hometown team didn't seem like such a bad life. So, he hadn't let it bother him. But when he put his head down and got to work for his local junior team a month later, he felt different. The game was slower, the other players even smaller than they were before, the puck obeyed his hands like it never had before. Suddenly, he felt like something in his game had just clicked, and a two-goal opening night against Stockholm Östermalm made it real. Success hadn't stopped there, either. The season went on, and he didn't peter out or cool off like assistant coach Mendelsson warned him he might. 'Some kid' he might have been to the American scouts, but to his teammates he had a different name: Älgen. Nystrom #75 went from complementing the third line to dominating the first by the time his phone rang.

The big kid from Luleå was well over a point per game when that first call came in. A scout from the North American junior team in St Louis wanted to talk to him. At first he'd thought he was being scouted for next year's draft, but no, they wanted him now. The next team to call had the same plans. Even his mother was confused. That wasn't how drafts worked, she insisted, despite Artemius trying to tell her otherwise. It had taken three hours of googling and gentle argument for her to accept that there was no draft for him. At least, not yet.

She was calling from upstairs again. This time, he heard her question.

"Still no call?"

"No, nothing!" He answered again.

The three days after the first call had been anything but nothing. He'd just gotten used to the idea of playing his whole career at home, but now SMJHL GMs had been calling him personally! 'Yes sir', 'no sir', 'I'd love that, sir' - he'd said those words so many times he could barely remember the rest of those conversations. It hadn't really been on his mind. Now that the chance to leave home had come, did he really want to take it? Did he actually want to leave, cross an ocean, live thousands of miles away in some huge American city? His mother almost yelled at him when he asked the question aloud. 'Norrland isn't going anywhere!' she'd cried, 'come back in the summer if you want to!'

It was with that plan in mind that he'd finally called back the number from Denver. The GM there was a Swede himself. He'd promised Artemius nothing but a contract, strong teammates, and a chance. If the big kid from Luleå wanted to be their star, he'd have to make that happen himself. There'd been a hint of a challenge in his pitch, and the young Swede leapt at it. He'd signed their contract online from a laptop on the chestnut table he was pacing around right now, and been on a flight to Colorado two days later. Not much past his seventeenth birthday, he'd flown alone to a foreign country, like an old viking seeking fortune and fame across the seas.

When he arrived, he had one practice with his new teammates before his first game in the new yet familiar blue and gold. He quickly found himself thankful to be on the fourth line. Despite his fellow European rookies Angus McFife on the blue line and KEKW Kekkonen in the top six taking him under their wings in the locker room, on the ice he'd felt outmatched at every turn. North America was an entirely different game. The ice was narrower, the skaters were faster, the goalies blew his mind at every turn. He remembered that near-helpless feeling as he paced around his mother's table. The puck still obeyed him, but the other kid seemed a step ahead. He could still skate, but now the competition was as fast or faster, and all had more experience with this style of game. Offensively, Artemius had been utterly out of his depth. Only after that first painful game was over had his fellow fourth-liner Reidar Gronkjaer been able to offer some friendly advice in his own fashion. 'Dude, you're huge.' He'd said, almost laughing. 'Lighten up. You're six-six OFF skates and you're on the fourth line. Figure it out, man.' He'd tapped the newbie's shinguards with his stick blade, then gone back to his own stall.

Figure it out he did. The players here were faster, but not all faster than he was, and even the fastest enjoyed being slammed into boards exactly as much as the other Swedish kids had. His GM reinforced Reidar's advice. Nystrom's hands would catch up when they caught up, but an angry elk on the ice would always be useful. So he'd hammered away on the fourth line, racking up hit after hit and grinding down the Raptors' opponents for Kekkonen and Sotakov to finish off.

In the locker room, Artemius was a boisterous cheerleader - the first to slap the goal scorers as they entered, win or lose, and always the first to volunteer for whatever events the team put on that weekend. Even as the team found success, his sheltered role gave his skills time to catch up to North America, and the fans started to remember his name, discouragement crept into his mind. Those same players, Kekkonen and Sotakov, were rookies themselves and were among the team's most potent offensive threats. Even McFife, a defenseman with a less offensive role, put up nearly as many goals as Nystrom did points in their shared rookie season. In Sweden, Nystrom had been a sniper. Now, he felt barely mediocre even as a fourth liner, a stonehands being carried by size. In a league full of Kekkonens and McFifes pushing thirty points as rookies, why would any SHL scout take a second look at a Nystrom nowhere near thirty in any stat but hits? Even now, when he should have known better, the thought still lingered around his mother's table. Perhaps there would be no draft for him after all.

The Raptors' GM must have had a seventh sense for such mental struggles. Just before the trade deadline, he'd pulled Nystrom aside for a quick talk. The kid had tried so hard not to look nervous that his knuckles turned white. He'd been sure he was about to hear that he needed to step it up, that he wasn't living up to the contract he'd signed. Instead, his boss had told him he was doing everything he'd hoped and more. His locker room and community presence alone, he'd said, was already worth the contract. If the kid kept working, kept showing up every night and playing his role, the GM promised he'd turn heads.

"You could be one of the best signings of my career, Temy. I'm at our games too, and I can tell you you're better every night. Keep doing what you're doing, it will pay off."

So he would. He made up his mind to step up even higher in the locker room. As nerve-wracking as it was to stand up between periods as a new kid, to try to get their engines revving after a tough period when he hadn't put up a single shot himself, he made himself swear he would do it. When he got his chance next, he took it.

"Someone's gotta score one here, cause it's not gonna be me, eh?!" He regretted the line as soon as it came out of his mouth, and even now in his own house he winced, but when his teammates had laughed it was with delight. "So next horn we take it to them! Nobody take a step back tonight, not anymore!"

'S'alright, Elk, I'll spot ya this time!' Their first line center Dolphin had roared back, and Artemius had sat down again. The coach had smiled at him before he went over their backchecking one more time.

His teammates, he knew, appreciated him, at least as a presence. His coach loved him, and so did his GM. But even after his few regular-season goals there'd never been so much as a whisper from an SHL scout. Sotakov talked about which teams were looking at him from time to time. Kekkonen was more reserved, but Artemius didn't need him to brag to know he was being scouted. The big kid from Luleå, though, still got no callers. Thoughts that had buzzed through his mind unbidden back then returned now with vengeance as he paced. What if players like him didn't make the SHL? What if he didn't even belong there? His GM could just be saying things to see how far he could push him, couldn't he?

These thoughts had previously been put to bed by the first call, which finally came a week before playoffs. The San Francisco Pride were on the line, and wanted to ask him a few questions. He'd stuttered several times during the phone interview and felt like he could barely keep a sentence coherent. How much more of an idiot must he have looked to that scout? Barely literate, probably! He'd cursed his phone at the top of his lungs. Sotakov had poked his head through the door, 'Fuck me, Elk, did someone shoot your dog? You scream like my aunt!'

Other scout calls came, but few and far between. Only a few teams were paying him any mind, and even they never let on that they saw him as anything more than a 'maybe.' As the season wound down and a playoff series with the rival Anaheim Outlaws loomed, Artemius took to pacing around his bed before going to sleep. He did want the SHL. He wanted it more than he'd wanted anything since his first real hockey stick. But did the SHL want him? Could he make them want him? The stress came to a head at practice just after their first round opponents were revealed - the archrival Anaheim Outlaws. Nystrom was obviously exhausted all practice, and he broke his stick after his squad gave up a goal. Afterward, his coach had called him in. After getting him to admit the problem, the coach reminded him that this wasn't something the team could afford right now. Artemius would not look at any draft-related media, of any kind, until the draft was over. 'If you let this become an obsession it's going to kill your draft stock faster than anything else you could do. We need your head in the game or we're going nowhere in these playoffs. We need everyone at a hundred percent, Artemius.'

He did his best to obey. In the end he had to leave his phone in McFife's care to stop himself from browsing draft hype threads on forums he hadn't known existed four months ago. The first two games against Anaheim were both victories, but Nystrom himself didn't contribute much more than he usually did. A big hit here, a shot block there. Game three, in Anaheim, felt different from the start.

Artemius didn't even like their locker rooms. The dull red paint on the ceiling drew his eyes constantly upward like a deeply disturbed sky, which annoyed him in the regular season, but now he felt like it sharpened his focus. An ocean of boos from the home crowd as they skated out for warmups put a smirk on his face and a narrow light in his eyes. Dolphin must have seen it, because he tapped Nystrom's stick before puck drop. 'Your turn, Elk. You score one for me tonight.'

Right from the first shift, his legs felt lighter. He was dangerous tonight. Ten minutes in, he'd reminded Anaheim's Hagan of that with a hit that sent the home crowd onto outraged feet. No penalty. Nystrom knew how to play a clean game. The puck was on his stick. He blinked, and he was in the zone. An opposing defenseman in Tumovs was racing up behind him; he had only less than seconds to make the play. Mietitore was squared right to him, but the goalie's eyes were wide this time. He put it on his forehand, out to his right. Mietitore bit, lurched left, but Nystrom tucked the puck back to his left side backhand and roofed it. He heard nothing, and saw nothing, as he glided past the net. His heart raced, but he felt that victorious chill in his heart that he always had, only ten times stronger. As he raised his stick high over his head like a sword raised sheathed at its balance point, he saw Reidar and Angus racing towards him, cheering with both arms high. The Anaheim crowd was silent as death. He'd just scored his first playoff goal. Nothing was impossible.

Unfortunately for him, that had been the highlight of his personal playoffs. His fourth line dominated the first two periods of that game against Anaheim, but the Outlaws came back to win it that game in the third. Nystrom was back to grinding for the rest of the series, won by his team in seven games. Against Quebec, he'd been exposed, finishing with an overall minus in the playoffs despite much better performances in the regular season and against Anaheim. The rest of the Raptors seemed encouraged that they had taken Quebec to seven games, something that would only be reinforced when Quebec annihilated Kelowna and disposed of Newfoundland on their way to a Four Star Cup. Nystrom, as much as he played along with raising morale after the loss, kicked himself constantly for that performance. When the team had needed him most, in a seven game series where one goal could have changed everything, and offensive player should have been able to bring in that goal. He hadn't.

Doop, doop.

He paced on around the table. He'd do better next year, he swore, but the draft was happening right now. The SHL would make its decision based on this year, not next, and the end of this year had been one of Artemius Nystrom looking like an absolute fool, exposed by the best team in Juniors. He wasn't fast enough, he wasn't strong enough, and he most certainly didn't have the hands. He couldn't even keep up with Quebec, what business did he have in the Show?

Doop, doop.

His phone was ringing.

Doop, doop.

He stared at it in disbelief for a moment. It was an American caller.

Doop do-

"Hello?"

(2913 words)

ACapitalChicago · 04-02-2021, 12:22 AM

Hey there, great media! This is a really impressive first piece! Just wanna give you a quick heads up though that the First Media bonus and the Double Draft Media bonus do not stack, so you might wanna save your first media bonus for something else

S66 Damian Littleton

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JT3 · 04-02-2021, 01:48 AM

Great read!

Credits to OrbitingDeath, Tweedle, Incite, Wasty, and Slothfacekilla for sigs!

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*Zerg* · 04-02-2021, 08:39 AM

04-02-2021, 12:22 AMACapitalChicago Wrote: Hey there, great media! This is a really impressive first piece! Just wanna give you a quick heads up though that the First Media bonus and the Double Draft Media bonus do not stack, so you might wanna save your first media bonus for something else

Thanks for the heads-up! Fixed it.

Keygan · 04-02-2021, 12:03 PM

This is the type of media we need to see on the site more.

Henrik · 04-02-2021, 02:22 PM

Excellent stuff!

LordBirdman · 04-02-2021, 02:48 PM

SHL GMs will be kicking themselves later if this guy falls

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