First of all, thanks to those of you who voted me NT coach. All 17 of you.
And welcome to the mllama era for the Australian NT. May it be a fruitful one.
How can you get involved?
I'd like to see a bit more involvement in the NT this season. So to start off with, I've set up a federation as a trial. It's called Australian NT, so apply to join if you want to be involved in discussions with the NT.
I will keep the offsite forum (forum.buzzerbeaterstats.com) running for those of you who don't have supporter, or don't want to join the fed. If either the forum or the federation discussion dies, I'll probably stop posting there and use the other forum exclusively, so get involved!
If anyone wants to be involved as an assistant coach, let me know that you are interested. I haven't quite worked out how the training system will work, but it is likely I'll try to get the assistant coaches involved there.
Season 27 NT awards
Its about time we had some sort of system to reward the top NT players. Each week I'll try to post a writeup, complete with votes for the following awards:
The Darby Walters medal
Each week, the top three players will be awarded votes on a 3-2-1 basis towards the Darby Walters medal, based on their offensive output for the game. For those who don't know, Darby Walters was one of the first great offensive players for Australia. Couldn't defend to save himself, but that didn't stop him putting up 30 a night. He currently resides on Direwolf's team.
The Rudolph Radford medal
Each week, the top three players will be awarded votes on a 3-2-1 basis towards the Rudolph Radford medal, based on their defensive output. Rudolph Radford was the first truely beastly Australian big man, dominating on both ends of the court. He has now sadly retired - but don't feel bad, he was well compensated for his career.
The Jackson Mansfield medal
The results of the above two medals will be combined, with the overall vote winner getting the Jackson Mansfield medal for all around performance - to honour our NT games record holder.
Game time
We'll be on at 9pm AET every Monday night starting from next week. Drop into chat and share your thoughts on the team and the game.
Next steps
I'll be scouting through the available players starting from tonight. We'll probably only pick a squad of 14, so there will be a chance for players to enter the team if they are trained well and kept in good gameshape. The squad will be finalised over the next few days. Feel free to send me your player details for consideration.