Negative battery cable hot/car not starting?

This is a 2.0 TSI, manual transmission, yes auction car but ran so smooth when I started it. I am familiar with them and know how they should sound, otherwise I would not have bought it. Weird they make it so complicated to replace the hpfp. I replaced many of them on Minis and BMWs as well as VWs. Didn't have to do any adjustments at all.

Yes, I see the starter. I'll see where the bottom bolt is.

Yes, that's how I usually install them, make sure it's all in and slowly screw in the bolts one at a time from side to side until it's in.

No, my tow truck driver is a friend of mine. He knows a bit about cars so I always tell him to drive them for a minute to make sure it's okay. He drove it after he jumped it just to make sure the shifting is fine, only few hundred feet and he said it was so smooth and just shut off.

Installed the used cable, went to try it, I got a different noise this time, it's a push button start, so tried it3 times, stopping between each turn and got a lot of smoke coming from around the starter so I stopped. Nothing from the battery cable this time. But I didn't do it long enough for the starter to develop this heat already, very strange. I had my share of bad starters, and they usually have different symptoms or noises, sometimes no noise at all, sometimes a click. When I tried here the noise was weird, grind noise maybe.I removed the + cable coming from battery to starter, and the negative cable from the ground to starter and the harness as well as top bolt, will remove the bottom bolt soon to see what is going on. Is it possible the starter is bad, or the engine just seized and therefore the starter isn't able to turn it and creates this much smoke?

Looks like the starter is also not working if how I am testing it is correct. If I pull the gear it comes out by hand. The engine is still not turning by hand. Is it possible even if gear is in neutral that transmission maybe has something preventing it from separating? Driver said car shut off as soon as he changed into 3rd gear at low speeds.

We are getting very close to a seized motor, which had oil, and was not being driven fast and with no symptoms. I still don't believe it. From a battery issue to a starter not sure what else.

Unless I am not putting enough force on the ratchet to turn the motor, which I doubt, as I turned by hand many motors in my life time. I think if I do any stronger it will either get loose or break, not sure.

3VW5A7AJ9CM416372. Thanks all for the help. I can see part of the clutch yes, so try to turn it with a screwdriver at the flywheel teeth you mean? This is a big auction for CarMax and they don't spend time trying to figure out why a car will not start, they just announce an engine or a transmission when needed. If the car won't start that's enough for them. The car was dead as many usually are, not strange at all. But I always jump them. When I did it sounded like it was fuel starving a bit then smoothed out, and I mean smooth, no funny noises. Plus, whatever codes it had were mostly gone or all over the place but one was pointing towards a fuel issue, and then o2 sensors, nothing else that tells me it was major. Revved up the engine several times and it was smooth, has oil and coolant. No funny oil color.
My driver went to get it and he jumped it drove it out the gate and shifted it till he got to 3rd and then it died. He said it still had some lights with ignition on but would not make a noise as to crank. Ya whole thing is weird but I doubt she would seize just from a 1-minute drive when it was driven around before in order to park it where it was at the auction. Unless my luck is really bad. One of the codes was for the intake runner, plus the p130 and 135, but it is possible these were not all that are related.

Moved it by a screw driver and it moved same amount that the engine did, couple of inches or so. I actually hear a bump stop around the vac pump whenever the engine stops. Something prevents it from moving either like u said a frozen component or something inside the head. Ugh. I hate these vve covers and their design but I did remove them before including the vac pump and fuel pump. Am just afraid removing them and not finding anything and trying to turn the motor that I mess with timing of the cam, if I only removed the vac and fuel pumps.

Can I mark the location of cam from inside the cam lobe follower and try turning the engine after removing the pumps and if it does or doesn't take it back where it was? We only talking about couple of inches of movement.

3VW5A7AJ9CM416372

Thanks