Cleveland Barons

The Cleveland Barons are a fantasy ice hockey team in The Conn Smythe Corner (CSC). They are one of the original 16 teams that joined the league.

History
During the lockout of the 2012-13 NHL season, eventually the inaugural season of the CSC, Cleveland was granted a CSC franchise by by tsar commissioner Steve Lyberopoulos. On January 16th, 2013, the first draft in the league's history was held, with Cleveland making Jonathan Quick the franchise's first ever draft pick. A few weeks later, the Barons would make their first trade, sending Sami Salo and Vincent Lecavalier to the Montreal Wanderers in exchange for Joe Thornton and Brian Cambpell.

2012 Season
The 2012 season was a successful one for Cleveland, as the Barons won their division with a 7-4 record, clinching a playoff berth in the process. Their biggest trade of the season involved sending Chris Stewart, Luca Sbisa, Ales Hemsky, and a 9th round pick to the Cal Golden Seals in exchange for Jeff Carter, Ryan Callahan, Nicklas Kronwall, and a 14th round pick. In the quarterfinals, Cleveland advanced past the Brooklyn Americans to set up a semifinal matchup against the 7th-seeded Montreal Wanderers. The Wanderers would defeat the Barons, continuing a cinderella run that would lead Montreal to their first ever Cam Ward Cup. The Barons would go on to win the 3rd-place matchup against the St. Louis Eagles.

Key waiver pickups throughout the season include Nazem Kadri, who had a tremendous season, and Jonathan Bernier. Both would be kept for the 2013 season.

2013 Season
Cleveland entered the 2013 season with stars such as Erik Karlsson, Patrice Bergeron, and Carey Price in tow after the draft. Partway through the season, the Barons made one of the biggest trades in their history: acquiring superstar Alexander Ovechkin, Evander Kane, and a 9th round draft pick from the Colorado Rockies in exchange for the aforementioned Bergeron, Patrick Marleau and a 6th round draft pick. The Barons would go on to make the playoffs with a 14-8 record after having made the most moves in the league (59). The 4th-seeded Barons would advance past the North Stars (who would later relocate and become the SEA Metropolitans) in the quarterfinals, only to fall short in the semifinals once again, this time to the eventual champion Atlanta Thrashers.

Cleveland's 3rd place matchup against the Montreal Wanderers would have the closest finish in CSC history. After the Barons built an 8 point lead to close the week, stat corrections would bring the match to a 417-417 stalemate. Because the Wanderers had defeated Cleveland in their regular season matchup (391-385), the Wanderers owned the tiebreaker, and thus won the 3rd-place game.

Cleveland added defenceman Radko Gudas from the waiver wire early in the season. Gudas responded with a solid season, and was kept as a result.

2014 Season
The 2014 season was a tumultuous one for the Barons, feeling the sting of trading several high draft picks during the 2013 season. Despite a hot start, the Barons wavered during the midway point of the season. Determined to make the playoffs for the third consecutive season, general manager Matthew Taddeo once again traded multiple draft picks for talented players in the weeks headed towards the trade deadline. One trade involved, among other things, sending a 4th round draft pick to the Montreal Maroons for Henrik Lundqvist. Lundqvist would go on to sustain an injury just days after the trade, causing him to miss the remainder of the 2014 CSC regular season.

Also gearing up for a playoff push were the Cornwall Aces, who also traded several high picks for elite talent. What resulted was the CSC's most significant regular season matchup to date: Cleveland would face Cornwall on the final week of the 2014 season, with the winner earning a playoff berth. Cornwall would win a hard-fought matchup to clinch the first playoff berth in Aces history as Cleveland fell to 11-10.

That offseason, the Barons would acquire perhaps the most traded player in the CSC's history, Alex Galchenyuk. Galchenyuk would be kept for, and traded partway through, the 2015 season.

2015 Season
2015 proved to be a difficult season for Cleveland. Armed with superstar goaltender Carey Price, the Barons hoped to recreate the success they enjoyed in 2013. The season looked promising, with the Barons opening with a 5-3 record. In November, however, Price sustained a knee injury and was forced to spend the rest of the season on injured reserve.

During Week 8, in a matchup against QC Athletic Club, the Barons found themselves down 258-335.75 going into the final day of the week. Cleveland mounted a historic comeback, scoring 90.25 points against QC's 5.75, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat. This has been unofficially credited as the biggest single-day comeback in CSC history.

Despite beginning the year with a 5-3 record, the Barons dropped the next 5 straight matches and 6 of their next 8 games, forcing them to sell for the first time. And sell they did - the mass exodus of talent included stars Anze Kopitar, Henrik Lundqvist, and Drew Doughty, as well as Patric Hornqvist, Loui Eriksson, Anton Stralman, Alex Goligoski, and JT Miller. Journeyman Phil Kessel was also dealt mere hours before the trade deadline. Despite winning that very week, the Barons lost three straight matches afterwards. Still, Cleveland's season ended on a high note, as the team defeated the Atlanta Flames by just 0.75 points. For the first time in Barons history, their season ended with a victory.

The acquisition of many draft pick upgrades led to an eventful offseason for the Barons: GM Matthew Taddeo aggressively pursued several trades, which resulted in a keeper crop including Mark Stone, Roman Josi, Ryan Johansen, and Nathan MacKinnon - none of which had played for Cleveland during the 2015 season.

Rivalries
The Barons have several rivals.

Atlanta Thrashers: The Barons and Thrashers have been in the same division or conference since the beginning of the CSC, and the matchups between the two tend to be very close: three of their seven regular season matchups were decided by less than five points. The Barons are 1-6 against the Thrashers all time during the regular season, and 0-1 in the playoffs.

Montreal Wanderers: Cleveland has ended both of their playoff appearances with losses to the Wanderers, with the gravity of these matchups exacerbating the one-sidedness of this rivalry. The first trade in Barons history was in fact with the Wanderers, though the teams have yet to negotiate a trade since. The bad blood between general managers Matthew Taddeo and Gerardo Discepola is said to have begun when, on January 17th, 2014, the Wanderers picked up Gustav Nyquist, who had been dropped by the Barons days prior. Nyquist went on to score 23 goals between January 20th and the end of the season. The Barons are 0-4 against the Wanderers during the regular season, with the matchups having an average point differential of just 10. In the playoffs, Cleveland are 0-2 against the Wanderers.

Cornwall Aces: The Aces and Barons played in the most important regular season matchup to date, with the Aces breaking the hearts of Cleveland fans everywhere. Aces general manager Brahm Hurwitz has gone on record calling Cleveland the Aces' biggest rivals. Despite this rivalry, the clubs have made several high-profile trades with each other. The Barons are 1-4 against Cornwall all time.

The God of Stat Corrections: The interns at Yahoo! that manage stat corrections, ominously coined the "God of Stat Corrections" by Thrashers general manager Marco Scanlan, have had Cleveland in their back pockets for ages. Their first strike against Cleveland was in the 2013 3rd place matchup against the Wanderers, where the Wanderers were awarded 8 points to tie (and, due to Montreal having the tiebreaker, win) the match. The following season, this omnipotent yet severely underpaid force continued to be a nuisance to the Barons, awarding points to the Thrashers and the Vancouver Millionaires in separate matchups and causing them to defeat Cleveland by exactly 0.25 points each. In the matchup against Vancouver, an additional plus was not granted to Cleveland's Blake Comeau, causing them to lose the matchup which, ultimately, was a deciding factor as Cleveland missed the playoffs by a single win that season. Cleveland is winless against the God of Stat Corrections.

General managers

 * Matthew Taddeo, 2012-present

Yearly Record
Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, Pct% = Winning Percentage, PTS = Points per week 

First-Round Picks

 * 2012:  Jonathan Quick (sixth overall)
 * 2013:  Erik Karlsson (fifth overall)
 * 2014:  John Tavares (fourth overall)
 * 2015:  Carey Price (ninth overall)
 * 2016:  Erik Karlsson (ninth overall)