[Ryan Hellyer]

[b:36e57jt5]A suggestion for the pile of DIHL changes for 2008:[/b:36e57jt5]
I’ve received three complaints from players in the past two weeks about them not being happy with whose on their team. They said they didn’t realise (or it didn’t occur to them) that they could request to [b:36e57jt5]not[/b:36e57jt5] be on the same team as certain people.

So … my suggestion is to add a section on the individuals rego form for listing players you do or do not want to play with, with a proviso saying that “we’ll do our best, but not all player combinations are possible due to bla bla bla …”.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"twolefts":16u4sazr wrote:

Chris’ idea of chalk signs is interesting, we need slogans! : Get rough – play ice hockey – visit http://www.dunedinicehockey.hellyer.kiwi![/quote:16u4sazr]

That’s a really cheap way to advertise too. Just need some chalkers and some chalk. We should ask the DIHA for some chalk for next year.

Do people normally ask permission first? Or do they just grab some chalk and start chalkin’?

"twolefts":16u4sazr wrote:

I’m thinking of being a walking billboard for womans hockey, on a t-sirt : [/quote:16u4sazr]

We’ll hopefully have some DIHA T-shirts for sale once the branding side of things is sorted. Possibly other items like hoodies, caps etc. too. And everyone (or at least those who have talked to me about this stuff) seems keen to have dunedinicehockey.hellyer.kiwi somewhere prominent on everything.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

FYI, I always found that having a constant supply of posters up up around campus helped a bundle with recruiting players. Of course you then have the problem of convincing someone to do that job. I haven’t seen it done properly (ie: plastered pretty much everywhere for ages) as it takes quite a while to go round putting them up and most people seem to give up after they’ve done a few poster boards. But when it is done over say a month long period, I’ve usually picked up an extra 20 players or so, 10 of which dissapear after a few weeks and 5 of which dissapear after a month. Then if you are lucky the remaining 5 stick around long term.

It takes a crapload of work though, coz not only do you need to put the posters up, but it pays to go around adjusting them each day, making sure they’re on the top of the heap and not lost somewhere underneath a bunch of new posters or that the tags on the bottom have all been ripped off.

It’s an approach that does seem to be quite effective though and you can measure how effective it is by asking new players where they found out about the sport from and from the number of phone calls and emails you receive. For the record, putting posters up in Supermarkets is highly ineffective in my experience and posters in schools usually don’t work unless you personally arrive on their doorstep and ask if you can put them up and if not ask where the appropriate place for them to go and ask them when they’ll be put up in the vain hope that they don’t get filed in the trash (I suspect this is usually what happened when they were emailed, faxed or posted).

Oh yeah, the posters seem to need to emphasise the whole beginner aspect of it. I never got much success from posters which didn’t have “BEGINNERS WELCOME” in big giant writing somewhere.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Chris":14yvq0y8 wrote:

Well, it seems that all our problems have rolled into one bigger problem: numbers

It seemeth to me that if we had the numbers, separating by age would have no overall detrimental effect.

So, do you guys think that Kurt/Cy’s methods (I have no idea who these guys are btw – before my time) could be re-introduced to get more players?
[/quote:14yvq0y8]

Some things yes, particularly the promotional side of things. The social function organising side of things would be much trickier, Cy was a professional at this sort of thing and could get incredibly good deals on venues, bar deals and so forth, plus he was just generally good at it. And, if there’s kids allowed it completely throws a spanner in the works as you are immediately limiting who can attend which is a little unfair. Or even if they are allowed to attend, it’ll need to be a different type of event.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Azzy77":14ez7w1j wrote:

I not sure but I think Deanna (Canadain one, not Phil’s wife) was found there, abliet Megan may have persuaded her further[/quote:14ez7w1j]

Yep. Megan got her to play once I think, then Bode convinced her to keep coming along.

[b:14ez7w1j]From MSN:
[/b:14ez7w1j]

"Deanna":14ez7w1j wrote:

[size=3:14ez7w1j]Hi everyone![/size:14ez7w1j]

Ryan pass that onto the Dunedin hockey crew please <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smiley.gif" alt="” title=”Smiley” />
xoxox Deanna[/quote:14ez7w1j]

"Azzy77":14ez7w1j wrote:

Keith is planning on using some of his fake ice on the back of a truck to promote ice hockey, and figure skating, he hopes to do demos at octagon, and etc[/quote:14ez7w1j]

Cool, great idea.

"Azzy77":14ez7w1j wrote:

Personally I found the old DiHL more enjoyable, no offense to those guys running it now, cos different strokes and all that….[/quote:14ez7w1j]

I found the old ‘Cy and Kurt’ DIHL more enjoyable. But I prefer the seperate grade system and most of the B-graders seem to too.

"Azzy77":14ez7w1j wrote:

But new A grade DiHL is a bit competitive for me, I enojyed the old laid-back, mixed up DiHL, were you didn’t have Dynasty teams, coming back year after year, like the Phantoms, which who are we kidding here makes a bit of a mockery of the grading system…..[/quote:14ez7w1j]

That’s because the Phantoms weren’t forced to go through the drafting procedure. If they were, they would have been severely crippled last season. If the regulations are followed, the teams should all even themselves out eventually and in general the stronger teams will be weakened each season.

"Azzy77":14ez7w1j wrote:

Then people turned up to the end of season social event cos, everyone, well most people were over 18, and it was held at various places, instead of curlers backroom, one year it was at Carisbrook (I kid you not)
And another time, we played NHL 2002, all night….[/quote:14ez7w1j]

Yep, Cy and Kurt had that side of things down pat. I went to the one at Carisbrook, it was totally awesome, although I did get [b:14ez7w1j]WAYYY[/b:14ez7w1j] too drunk. I’ve asked around a few times but never been able to find anyone willing to organise a social function. Organising social functions isn’t my thing really, I’m pretty crappy at it.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

[b:3tqrebbz]Bears vs Kings[/b:3tqrebbz]

"Ryan":3tqrebbz wrote:

My pick, 4-2 to Kings.[/quote:3tqrebbz]

Hellyer has a complete mozzer, makes a bunch of stupid mistakes and leaves poor goalie Wood open to a whole fleet of shots on, some of which make their into the net. Bears goalie Wood cops a shot to the neck, but battles on, stopping all but one goal. Final score 4-2 to Kings. Hellyer throws a temper tantrum and sulks after the game <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/sad.gif" alt="” title=”Sad” />

[b:3tqrebbz]Jets vs Sharks[/b:3tqrebbz]

"Ryan":3tqrebbz wrote:

My pick, another high scoring game for both teams, 6-6, Sedgwick to score four and Baker and Reymond one apiece for the Jets, Johnstone to pick up three, Elkin two and Kliegl one for the Sharks.[/quote:3tqrebbz]

Sharks were too strong for the Jets, final score 4-1. The Sharks are looking very strong this season with some great leadership from coach Sykes and a solid set of players.

NetCam was setup for the second period, but it was pointing straight down at the ice <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/sad.gif" alt="” title=”Sad” /> It was fixed up for the second period though and footage will hopefully be posted tomorrow.

[b:3tqrebbz]Bullfrogs vs John McG[/b:3tqrebbz]

"Ryan":3tqrebbz wrote:

My pick, 4-1 to the Bullfrogs, Dickson, Dilkes, Craw, Honore and Laing to share the goals.[/quote:3tqrebbz]

Score was 1-0 to Bullfrogs last I saw. More solid defense by the Bullfrogs was slowing the game down quite a bit. If you know the final result then please post it here thanks <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smiley.gif" alt="” title=”Smiley” />

cheers,
Ryan

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Kyle":2kp5fupu wrote:

"Michael":2kp5fupu wrote:

The stats app is designed to have the information entered afterwards. there is no need for anyone to sit there with a laptop unless they want to be able to supply live stats.
[/quote:2kp5fupu]

You’ll have to be careful with things like delayed penalties which don’t get put up because a goal is scored. We had one of them at nationals, where penalty 1 was put back up on the clock even though a goal was scored, because the ref had a second delayed penalty at the time.

And penalties that are recorded but not put on the clock for the same reason.

And ‘imperfect clockmanship’. If times are off by a tiny bit on the scoresheet, then the computer might start doing things like calling it a powerplay goal, when in actual fact it wasn’t, and wasn’t recorded as such on the scoresheet.

Why wouldn’t you want to enter the stats live? Why write it all down on paper and then copy it into the computer, when you can skip the intermediary step and do it in one?
[/quote:2kp5fupu]

I think he means it can do both.

Ryan,

PS: Go Bears!

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Kyle":1x4lbirs wrote:

I’ve always viewed the DIHL as picking up people who at the very least, have been to beginners a few times. It’s the role of the club as a whole to bring in those people to the beginners sessions.[/quote:1x4lbirs]

Yes and no I think. I’d guess about 1/3 of the players in the DIHL I played at in the Big Chill were brand new players, some went to Sunday night social a few times first, some were still trying to figure out which way you hold the stick when they got on the ice. Many were more interested in treating it as a big social even, not …

… cut short …. will finish this after I’ve played hockey … with the peewees <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/tongue.gif" alt="” title=”Tongue” />

[Ryan Hellyer]

You guys are selling me on the size issue a bit. Albeit some of the peewees are quite a bit smaller than both Bode and Kara.

Perhaps a better approach would be to market the league more heavily to the older players. This was done quite effectively by Cy and Kurt by really pounding away at recruiting new adult players. They also organised a lot of social events which have never happened with the new version of the league, albeit Cy actually organised (and still does I think) social events for a living so was unsurprisingly quite good at it.

Ultimately I’d like to see a whole swathe of competitive peewee, midget, junior and adult leagues and have a social grade where anybody could compete which would cover the whole social kids wanting to play with parents side of things. We’re a wee way from getting to that level yet though unfortunately.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Kyle":1ukw397o wrote:

You’re not coming out to Long Beach on Saturday?

I’m entirely unsure how ‘$7 for nibbles’ gets transformed into ‘banquet’, yet you’re about the third person I’ve heard call it that.[/quote:1ukw397o]

A bunch of people have been calling it a banquet so I guess I picked it up from them.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Kyle":203zq8a1 wrote:

Even if all the adult A and B graders signed up, we couldn’t have anywhere near that many teams now. We don’t have the students playing, people aren’t taking up ice hockey much socially as young adults.[/quote:203zq8a1]

Yep, and younger players I suspect is one of the reasons why they aren’t signing up. That and Cy and Kurt put more effort into recruiting them which we’ve failed miserably at in recent years. I don’t see any issue in getting at least four teams of 18 plus year olds for a B-grade league. And dropping the age limit to 16 would pump a bunch more in there. I reckon six teams is doable if enough effort was put into it.

And if anyone doesn’t like us debating this issue, then just ignore us. You don’t need to read our dribbling.

Ryan,

PS: Max teams ever in the old DIHL was eight I think.

[Ryan Hellyer]

Sweet <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smiley.gif" alt="” title=”Smiley” />

The only major thing I have on this weekend (I think) is the banquet on Friday night, so if you have something ready by then I can help out with the front end side of things.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Scotty":mjsz012u wrote:

Any luck with that goalie/ref cam yet?
[/quote:mjsz012u]

Yep, posted the videos here on the site a while back.

And they’re here on my blog too … https://ryan.hellyer.kiwi/2007/09/14/gimpcam-and-netcam/%5B/url:mjsz012u%5D

I’ll be running the NetCam again tonight. Should be much better this time as we’re likely to get heaps more shots on and I’ll get the camera angle sorted out better. And I can turn the camera on AFTER it’s been put in it’s case now, so no need to waste most of the memory card watching Neil drive round on the zamboni <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/tongue.gif" alt="” title=”Tongue” />

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"Kyle":14unldjs wrote:

I’m not aware of anyone who doesn’t play in the B grade DIHL because there’s kids in it. There might be, but I’ve never had anyone tell me that, even in hearsay, and I’ve hit a fair number of people up to play in the DIHL over the past couple of years.[/quote:14unldjs]

We must be asking different people then <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/tongue.gif" alt="” title=”Tongue” /> It’s not hockey players I’ve noticed this from so much though which I’m assuming is who you’ve been asking to play, but people who have never seen the rink. They’re the ones who seem most off put by it. And I’ve definitely received a lot of complaints/comments from players not wanting ankle biters competing.

Horses for course though really, there’s benefits to all these different routes. I’ve never considered this a mission critical problem hence never bothered trying to change it.

I still think there’s a safety issue there though as no matter how rough a game is, there’s no chance that they’re going to get squashed by a bit fat 100 kg person in the peewees league. And little old people don’t have any choice but to play with big people. And Kara is quite a bit bigger than Nick Patchett I think.

Ryan,

[Ryan Hellyer]

"battered_and_bruised":2zda3u1g wrote:

do they hackle you?[/quote:2zda3u1g]

Nup, never.

"battered_and_bruised":2zda3u1g wrote:

Are they cheap shot artists?[/quote:2zda3u1g]

Rarely. But adults are just as bad.

"battered_and_bruised":2zda3u1g wrote:

Do they get under your skin and piss you off? [/quote:2zda3u1g]

Nope.

The only time I’ve had an issue was in the last game last season when one of the John McG players seemed to getting pissy at me and followed me round like a hawk and kept trying to elbow, butt end and even check me!? Refs didn’t see the elbow and butt ending and he was so off balance anyway that he couldn’t put any force into it. Then when he tried to check me (twice) I just stepped out of the way and he sailed straight by <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/tongue.gif" alt="” title=”Tongue” /> Basically he was just a testorone filled teenage idiot (don’t know his name). But that’s one player out of two seasons of B-grading. One of the worst incidents I’ve seen was of one of the Kings High school visiting teachers trying to start a fight, so basically no, in my experience I don’t think kids are worse behaved on the ice than the adults. And like you said, it’s hockey … shit happens and we have refs to sort this stuff out as it arises.

Ryan,

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