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The S45 Grok Awards
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grokRegistered Posting Freak
With the SMJHL awards ceremony complete, I couldn’t help but think that many of the awards were short-sighted. It’s almost as if there wasn’t a ton of thought put into the awards this season—reading the list of winners feels like a who’s who of the #1 ranks on a single individual leader page. I think we can do better than that. Without further ado, welcome to…
The Inaugural Grok Awards Show!
Celebrating SMJHL excellence with analysis!
We’ll go down each regular season voted award, one by one, analyzing each of my choices (and notable omissions) and giving the award to my top choice for each category. Key rules from the outset: 1. I am allowed to give the award to any eligible player—I don’t have to choose from the finalist list generated by the SMJHL Awards Committee 2. I am allowed to give multiple awards to the same player, but have to have a good reason to do so. 3. If I omit a player that the Awards Committee selected, I have to explain why I didn’t choose that player as a finalist. 4. I don’t feel like doing the MVP races. They were always going to turn out the way they were. So I’m skipping them. Deal with it. 5. I’m right, you’re wrong, shut up. First off… The Ron Bolt trophy, for Most Sportsmanlike.
Willy Mack  Willy Mack put up a fantastic season, nearing PPG pace and recording only 2 penalty minutes on the season. His limited hit total helps explain his low PIMs—he isn’t a physical player, so he avoids the time outs. However, Mack is a great part of the SMJHL community off the ice, being a welcoming part of the IIHF community and a friendly face in the SMJHL index thread. Mack has been great this season, and deserves recognition. Jimmy Slothface  Jimmy Slothface has been a mainstay of the Raiders’ public presence, serving briefly as Co-GM and making himself well-known in SMJHL media with a positive attitude. He’s a great guy in the community and has a clean player, tallying 8 penalty minutes on the season. Although he doesn’t have the lowest PIM on this list, his positive outlook and outgoing behavior combined with a well below-average PIM gets him in my finalist list. Hiro Fujikawa  Fujikawa had a similarly great season to Mack and Slothface. Somewhere in the middle of the two on points and PIMs, he still neared a PPG pace and had only 6 PIM. Marley has also been a constant presence around the SMJHL side of the forums, providing some input for his rookies to model after. The big difference between Fujikawa and the other two finalists is hit totals. Fujikawa finished the season with 48 hits, the most of our finalists. Being able to play a physical game while keeping point totals down is exactly what you’re looking for in a sportsmanlike player. Notable Omissions: Borromini Cannellini, Dominic Montgomery I’m grouping these two players together because it’s clear that the awards committee voted for two players and two people. I think there’s plenty of space for the Ron Bolt to represent both sides—the player and the person behind the screen, so I omitted Cannellini and Montgomery, both of which had over 20 PIMs on the season. Winner: Willy Mack Mack has the lowest PIM and most points out of our finalists and does a ton of work on the site contributing civil and encouraging comments and content. Mack is the easy choice here. Zach Miller Trophy, for Most Dedicated Player
Vyacheslav Onoprienko Trophy, for Most Underrated Player
Helmuts Akmenlauks  Akmenlauks quietly put together one of the strongest seasons of his career, and it was a turning point for an embattled St Louis team throughout the season. Putting up a career high 40 points, he scored more in S45 than in S44 and S43 combined. Meanwhile, he beat his own shots and power play points records. Akmenlauks looked to be a middling, top-4 to top-6 guy, but he proved his place as a top defenseman when he was called on to do so and produced at both ends of the ice, finishing with a positive +/- and 37 shot blocks. Bernard Freeman Freeman’s story isn’t one of explosive growth like Akmenlauks’s, but rather a story of progressive growth. Adding 7 points to his S44 campaign total, Freeman broke 40 points and 20 assists for the first time in his career in S45. Add on a miniscule 14 PIMs compared to his 62 hits, and you see a story of a player who has become more dangerous with the puck, more aggressive on the ice, and more disciplined with his play. Relied on for penalty kill time for the first time in his career, Freeman has become a renaissance man for the Scarecrows, and a key part of their team. As a player who didn’t receive any recognition for a solid S44 season, Freeman’s S45 dominance puts him among the most underrated forwards in the league. Vivian Leblanc  At first glance, Leblanc isn’t the definition of “underrated”. While Leblanc has little recognition, that lack of recognition comes with only one season of starting play, a middle-of-the pack SV%, and a below average GAA. Leblanc becomes underrated when you look at her surroundings. Kelowna is the definition of a “best defense is a good offense” team. They have a high flying offense, getting 3 players in the top 5 league scorers. They were dominant in the opposing end. And that dominance belies a porous defense. Leblanc faced 1147 shots in S45, the second most of any goaltender. She was hung out to dry on a regular basis by a shoot-first defense. Keeping her team in games and grinding out a third-place finish doesn’t happen with a league average goaltender, and Leblanc should be recognized for keeping solid numbers behind a defense that did her no favors. Notable Omissions: Hippo Passamus is a great player (and a dear friend), but he won a Defensive Forward of the Year award last season. He is not underrated, even though his offensive production was unexpected. Shaquille Derisraka is a solid player and a great contributor to Vancouver, with huge defensive numbers, but his offensive numbers were middling. He put together a great season, but it was admittedly what we expect after his superior S44 campaign. Knute Knurtsson was a big surprise this season and played great hockey for a late-round draft pick, but ultimately doesn’t outclass some of the 7th round picks that went just above him. He is close to this list, but I wouldn’t call him underrated and expect him to get a ton of recognition next season. Winner: Helmuts Akmenlauks Akmenlauks ultimately had a monster season that St Louis needed for a favorable playoff position, and very few people in the league would have relied on him in the way St Louis did. It worked out for them, and it worked out for him. Mathias Chouinard Award for Top GM
Detroit Falcons  I won’t toot my horn for too long. Detroit fought through a lack of center depth and a season of surprise call-ups with smart drafting and hard trades, and put together a second consecutive Laurifer Trophy season with a strong rookie class. Anchorage Armada  Anchorage had a fantastic season, only one point out of the top seed. Their current team is the product of seasons of good drafting and tough decisions from Aclosap, and the addition of artermis has made them a real threat. Their position here represents growth, hard work, and a top placement that their roster challenged themselves to reach. Vancouver Whalers  Who said you need to rebuild? Vancouver has been competitive for, I dunno, forever? Since I’ve been here at least. Glyc and Luke have done a terrific job retooling the Whalers season after season, and have yet another top seed to show for it. They manage to be perennial contenders for the cup no matter what the circumstances, which really demonstrates how smart the guys behind the wheel are. Notable Omissions: Kelowna Knights Kelowna did outperform their expectations and put together some great lines for the season. That said, they had their controversies at the management level which makes it tough for me to put them in the top tier of GMs this season. As is, they’re just barely on the outside looking in. Winner: Anchorage Armada The Armada made the right moves to come from a bottom-of-the-league position in S42 to a real contender in S45. They’ve earned the right to call themselves great GMs. Quilha Agante Trophy for Top Defenseman
Sanyi Kocsis The league’s top scoring defenseman by a wide margin, top hitter among defensemen with 30 or more points, a player on the PK and the PP units…Kocsis does it all. Putting up an absurd assists total, second only to league leader Nickolas Klaus’s 46, Kocsis deserves to be a household name at this point. He’s a monster. He did it all. His only “weakness”, if you can call it that, is his goal total. Tauras Karazija Putting up 44 points and tying for most goals by a defenseman with 16, Karazija is a different breed of point scorer from Kocsis. A heavy shooter—the only defensemen in the top 100 skaters with more than 100 shots on goal—Karazija’s huge slapshot led Vancouver’s offense from the blue line. His hit totals, shot blocks, and power play time are all acceptable, but he suffers a bit in his penalty kill deployment. It’s clear that he isn’t the go-to guy on the PK from his minutes total. Cassius Darrow  Darrow is our lone defensive player on the list. With a ton of assists he appears to be a scoring monster, but the stat line belies a different type of player. Darrow got a mere 27 hits, but blocked nearly 70 shots on the season. Standing at a +12 and playing huge special teams minutes, Darrow is Colorado’s go-to guy to get the puck out of their own end and back up the ice. His scoring is a little low, but protecting his high +/- is key to his success. Notable omissions: Barret McCarthy I can’t in good faith put a defenseman with a -9 into the top defenseman conversation. +/- isn’t a great stat but it’s what we got, and McCarthy is a physical player and a good shot but had a lot of trouble protecting his own end. It’s hard to put that up against Kocsis (+16), Karazija (+14), and Darrow (+12). Winner: Sanyi Kocsis Kocsis had one of the best defenseman seasons in the history of the league, straight up. This was an obvious choice. Brandon Holmes Trophy for Top Defensive Forward
Derisraka is the quintessential aggressive defensive center. He has a huge 122 hit total on the year. He has a +15 on the season. He has a bunch of penalty kill minutes and defensive zone starts. But most importantly to his game, he led the league with a near 57% faceoff percentage over almost 1200 faceoffs taken. While his TOI and penalty kill time leaves something to be desired, Derisraka is the center you want on a defensive zone start. David Fantobens Fantobens had a real breakout season, leading the Falcons in points, but his defensive play is key to his game. Putting up a respectable 54 hits on the season, he used those hits to protect his league-leading +20 even strength goal differential. Add on a massive 146 penalty kill minutes and a league-leading 3 shorthanded goals, and Fantobens puts together a resume of a player that is absolutely dominant in his own end. On top of everything, Fantobens plays from the wing. It’s rare to see a winger create the kind of defensive season Fantobens was capable of, but his utilization and success with it shows he’s a premier defensive player in the league. Lillie Jacobs Jacobs sits among the greats for a truly preposterous hit total. Clocking in 135 hits, Jacobs leads our finalists by over 10. Jacobs has an incredible knack for getting a player off the puck, challenging them for position, and creating turnovers. Jacobs also sees a lot of penalty kill time, and has been effective offensively when down a player. There is real concern that Jacobs played sheltered minutes, with less TOI than Derisraka or Fantobens, but Jacobs makes use of it and works with the ice time given. Notable Omissions: Jerry Mander is a great defensive forward and a future of the Outlaws forward lines, but he struggled to keep himself away from even strength goals and his penalty kill utilization was pretty even keel compared to other players on his team. His hit total was great and he is certainly one of the best defensive rookie forwards in the league, but he is a tier below. Ty Hoover had a fantastic season, but again—he had a tough time at even strength. A truly great defensive player has to be more capable in 5 on 5, and Hoover struggled to play both ends of the ice equally throughout the season. A great offensive season and a fantastic faceoff percentage, but not a truly elite defensive performance. Winner: David Fantobens Call me a homer, call me what you will. When a winger puts up a +20, they’re doing something right. Fantobens had an unreal defensive season with a monster penalty kill resume, and deserves recognition for that season. Tom Corcoran Trophy for Top Goalie
Cedric Robinson I had a good season, ok? Aleister Cain Cain had a dominant season with St Louis, regularly saving the team from disaster. His performance outplays his team’s rank, and he earned his 0.894 SV% and lone shutout on the season. It’s really critical to compare Cain’s performance to his team’s, noting that Cain kept his stats high despite some real struggles from St. Louis early in the season. He earned his spot here by keeping his team in the race enough to avoid the play-in round. Peter Larson Larson had a fabulous season. League leader in SV%. League leader in GAA. 24 wins on the season. He did it all. The only asterisk on his season is his sheltered play. Anchorage had the best defense in the league, and Larson faced less shots than any other 40-start goaltender in the league. He only faced 100 more shots than Cain, who played 8 fewer games on the season. Winner: Peter Larson Despite his sheltered time, Larson was a rookie starter. The effort required to keep up with a team and produce at that level as a rookie is incredible, and he has earned the right to consider himself the best of the season with that workrate and production level. Esa Anrikkanen Trophy for Top Rookie
Matt Kholin Matt Kholin had an extremely productive rookie season with 32 points. He pushed a struggling Halifax team, scoring big when they were struggling to get by. Add on his significant usage on the top power play unit, and you can see a player that Halifax relied on and that was successful despite his team’s hardship. Raino Kyllonen Fuck the rules, I’m putting four rookies in here. Kyllonen’s numbers look almost identical to Kholin’s. Points, penalty minutes, hits, PP time, PK time, minutes. Team success can account for the difference in +/-, and Kyllonen is a slightly better faceoff guy. Otherwise these two are practically the same players and it’s impossible to include one without the other. But I want another guy too, so we’re getting four. Monkey D. Luffy  Luffy finished just one point shy of Kholin and Kyllonen, but played a wildly different game. A bigger hitter, a more prolific shooter, and more penalty kill time set Luffy apart from the two peas (in a pod, get it?). But what really goes in Luffy’s direction is his TOI. Luffy was depended on for an average 2 minutes more a game than his contemporaries. He’s the kind of player that provided value to a bad Lethbridge team by eating up minutes and sheltering worse players. Peter Larson Come on, this guy is good. Winner: Peter Larson Come on, this guy is good! He put up a league leading SV% as a first season rookie and took goalie of the year. He won it fair and square. That does it! Thanks everyone for attending, and if you have any complaints just remember: I’m right, you’re wrong, shut up. Quote:2800-ish words. Site text editor says 3100 which is definitely not true. Ready for grading
HoovuhRegistered Probably fixing planes
I feel like the awards committee slept on Ty Hoover for this tbh. Below are the pointed out and maybe 'relevant' stats to a defensive forward.
Fantobens : Even Strength Points 31|Special Teams Points 15 (3 SH) | Penalty Kill Minutes 146 | Hits 54 | FO% 38.16 Non C | +/- 20 Derisraka : Even Strength Points 21 |Special Teams Points 15 (2 SH) | Penalty Kill Minutes 111 | Hits 122 | FO% 56.98% 1197 FOT | +/- 15 Jacobs : Even Strength Points 20 |Special Teams Points 3 (2 SH) | Penalty Kill Minutes 137 | Hits 135 | FO% 32.31 Non C | +/- 16 Mander : Even Strength Points 14 |Special Teams Points 9 (0 SH) | Penalty Kill Minutes 141 | Hits 110 | FO% 44.30% Non C | +/- -9 Hoover : Even Strength Points 29 |Special Teams Points 13 (1 SH) | Penalty Kill Minutes 150 | Hits 63 | FO% 56.18% 1344 FOT | +/- 4 "the best defensive centres of the league, often the unsung heros of a team, winning those key faceoffs and maintaining possession in order to put their team mates into space." All the props to Jacobs for a good season and all, but idk man. Fantobens is a good pick as well, but wouldnt really call him a defensive forward.
grokRegistered Posting Freak 02-26-2019, 12:50 AMHoovuh Wrote: I feel like the awards committee slept on Ty Hoover for this tbh. Below are the pointed out and maybe 'relevant' stats to a defensive forward. I'll own up to fantobens being a bit of a homer pick, but I 100% think there's a narrative around him as a defensive guy. He might not put up huge hit totals, but he protected a crazy goal differential on one of them lowest scoring top lines in the league. At the end of the day, I see Hoover and Derisraka competing for kind of the same spot. They provide similar value to their teams for similar reasons, and come out with similar stats. The big difference maker is Denisraka's hit total and +/- (I know, that stat isn't perfect), which is why in a field of 3 Hoover winds up just outside. That said, Hoover easily cracks a field of 4 for me. 
slothfacekillaGraphic Graders Killing you slowly
I appreciate the kind words and including me with the other [much more deserving] players!
![[Image: 66818_s.gif]](https://signavatar.com/66818_s.gif)
TnlAstatineBuffalo Stampede LEEOUT
TomasnzRegistered Filthy Casual
TomasnzRegistered Filthy Casual 02-26-2019, 12:06 AMgrok Wrote:Such nice things said . 
Inf1d3lIIHF Federation Head Old Man
Zoone16Media Graders Loveable Buttnugget
@grok I agree with you that Anchorage deserved the GM of the Year award more than the Knights did. But to call what happened "controversies at a management level" is a bit of a stretch from you. It was only a controversy because the Raptors GMs made it one. I never hid the fact that Samee was helping out and even had a media article out a few days after I got hired as GM.
![[Image: Zoone16.gif]](http://sig.grumpybumpers.com/host/Zoone16.gif) (note: add S50) ![[Image: 9QVaMRC.png]](http://i.imgur.com/9QVaMRC.png) ![[Image: canybyK.png]](http://i.imgur.com/canybyK.png) ![[Image: sXDU6JX.png]](https://i.imgur.com/sXDU6JX.png)
grokRegistered Posting Freak 02-26-2019, 11:02 AMZoone16 Wrote: @grok I agree with you that Anchorage deserved the GM of the Year award more than the Knights did. But to call what happened "controversies at a management level" is a bit of a stretch from you. It was only a controversy because the Raptors GMs made it one. I never hid the fact that Samee was helping out and even had a media article out a few days after I got hired as GM. Honestly I agree with you in most points. But unfortunately the truth of the matter is that it was made a controversy, and that controversy will be memorialized as a part of this season with the new SMJHL management rule. I still think Kelowna had a top-4 GM team this season, and that asterisk is the only meaningful tiebreaker I can cite. KEL and VAN are very close in quality of management across S45 and I could write pages on the similarities, but for brevity's sake I chose to focus on the (admittedly sensitive) reason for my decision instead.
daBenchwarmerTeam Germany Posting Freak
lukeSHL GM Admiral of the Data Seas 02-26-2019, 12:17 PMgrok Wrote:02-26-2019, 11:02 AMZoone16 Wrote: @grok I agree with you that Anchorage deserved the GM of the Year award more than the Knights did. But to call what happened "controversies at a management level" is a bit of a stretch from you. It was only a controversy because the Raptors GMs made it one. I never hid the fact that Samee was helping out and even had a media article out a few days after I got hired as GM. Quality of Management. :hearteyes: you know how to get to my heart after breaking it twice
DacoRegistered Scott Stevens 02-26-2019, 12:50 AMHoovuh Wrote: I feel like the awards committee slept on Ty Hoover for this tbh. Below are the pointed out and maybe 'relevant' stats to a defensive forward. Yeah I actually wrote out a lengthy argument for Shaq to point out some of his stats, it's easy to not notice other good candidates until someone mentions them I still think Shaq should've won for those exact reasons on faceoffs; no disrespect to Jacobs but a winger winning is a total joke look at the Selke centers have more defensive responsibilities and Shaq accounted for 84 possessions won over 50%, that's way more defensive positive production to the team then the extra 15 hits Jacobs put up, and Shaq carried his line in +/- leading the team with mates who only had +3 or so. ![[Image: S3zuZxo.png]](https://i.imgur.com/S3zuZxo.png) ![[Image: 10cjae8.png]](http://i54.tinypic.com/10cjae8.png)
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