Just started playing NHL 14 again recently. Mostly BGM, although EASHL might be sticking its ugly head up soon as well.
Naturally ( :p ) won the cup on my first season as Minnesota. Starting 14-15 now with a team that's perhaps not in it's finished form yet, but it's looking good so far. Remember, this is with the revamped rosters, so some of the overalls are lower than they would be on vanilla game. It's also much, much more realistic.
Parise (87) - Granlund (84) - Niederreiter (80)
Zucker (76) - Koivu (83) - Eberle (84)
MacArthur (76) - Bonino (82) - Coyle (79)
M. Reinhart (75) - Haula (80) - Fontaine (76)
Palushaj (72)
Suter (93) - Karlsson (91)
Scandella (81) - Spurgeon (84)
Brodin (83) - Faulk (77)
Weaver (69)
Mason (82)
Kuemper (82)
Some notables: I edited the Wild roster to match the start of this season before starting BGM. Also, some overalls are slightly different to what they were in original. Nino's shot was improved (as in real life), and he was moved to a power forward from a sniper. I also switched him to RW, which seems to be a better spot for him. Similarly, I edited other Wild players as well. No, I didn't improve their overalls on purpose, although some players like Spurgeon and Haula gained maybe two points. Instead, I made them more realistic, by improving Zucker's and Haula's speed, Zucker's aggressiveness and so on. Coyle is now stronger, more defensively responsible but has weaker puck handling, shot and offensive skills than originally, making him damn near perfect for 3rd line.
I also did some trades, like Harding to Philly for their 2014 1st, Steve Mason & Matt Read. Read was a good acquisition, but I had to release him due to cap last summer. The 1st turned out to be 8th OA, so I couldn't be happier. Drafted William Nylander (who turned out to have 63 OA, 4 red star potential and over 90 speed) with the 8th OA and Haydn Fleury with my own pick at 30. Fleury has even higher potential, with 4½ yellow stars, but a lower overall to begin with (58).
Also, Karlsson was acquired by trading Vanek and Dumba to Ottawa. Yeah. Vanek, for some reason, never really found his stride for my team, and while losing Dumba hurt a bit as he had good potential, adding him to the package to acquire EK was a no-brainer.
Certain players improved a lot during the summer, notable examples include Fontaine (70 -> 76), Zucker (74 -> 76), Scandella (79 -> 81) and Haula (78 -> 80). Meanwhile, Koivu and Brodin (!) interestingly lost one point on their overalls each, dropping them from 84 to 83.
I have placed quite a lot of attention to my depth this time, acquiring a lot of middle-round picks via transactions as well as players who could one day be useful in my NHL team, but are at least improving Iowa. Those guys include Matt Cooke, who I sent down this summer, at 72 OA. He will have a leadership role in Iowa. Zack Phillips already had his cup of coffee at NHL level, getting 1 assist in 4 games during regular season and 2+2 in 11 playoff games. Jonathon Blum is making good progress, but will need one more season in AHL at 73 overall. However, he has Justin Faulk to beat if he wants to make it to the NHL roster.
As for goalies, Kuemper started out at 82 and hasn't improved. His play was disappointing, despite me applying realistic stats to him. It seems that he lets in soft goals more often than not, and while he can play out of his mind occasionally, he forced me to acquire Steve Mason in the Harding trade. Harding's play was also disappointing, I modified him to 87 OA, reflecting his magnificent play last season, but also kept his durability at 37, which is the minimum. It was a tough decision to trade him, but also necessary, since he simply wasn't doing as well as I thought.
Mason, on the other hand, has been magnificent. He started out at 79 OA, quickly made it to Wild's #1 last season, lead the team to the Stanley Cup by great play. Only once did I have to pull him after two goals in three shots, but Kuemper wasn't really any better. In the summer, I signed him to a 5-year extension at $4m/year. He then improved to 82 during summer, and I'll be looking forward to seeing him play for a lot of years. Kuemper also signed a 1-year extension at $2.5m, and I'm expecting him to prove himself this year.
As for scoring leaders, last year saw the breakthrough of Nino Niederreiter. Starting out at 3rd line, he simply forced his way up. First to 2nd line with Koivu and Vanek, and then to 1st after the Pominville -> Eberle -trade and the latter failing to produce in that role. After leading the team in goals for a long time, he had an unfortunate injury but still finished the year with 29 goals and 13 assists in 69 GP. Eberle, on the other hand, proved himself worthy after placed in the 2nd line alongside Koivu and MacArthur (later Zucker), scoring at almost PPG pace en route to a 40 goal, 35 assist season, playing all 82 games. Zucker's stats may look somewhat disappointing, but he scored goals at important times and improved during the playoffs, cementing his spot at 2nd line after MacArthur was injured. He may only have 18 goals and 10 assists in 76 games, but he was 9+4 in 23 playoff games. He is one to watch out for this year.
Fontaine, who improved a lot during the offseason as mentioned previously, starts out at 4th line but will also receive #2 PP minutes due to his shot and offensive awareness receiving tremendous boosts. I'm curious to see how the 4th line fares, as they will mainly be out there to create a match-up hell for the opposition.
