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IBatch

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Everything posted by IBatch

  1. Cool. Wasn't sure about Lafluer but almost added him. Shouldn't have forgotten and Hull thought ... 82 goals or something. And of course Bossy a regular in that club. Maruk wouldn't have remembered that. Jagr i thought was close a few times. Statsny i remember that. Hawerchuk and Stastny would have owned the 80's if Gretzky wasn't around - the point totals anyways. Agree McDavid is already in very special company.
  2. Tochett is icing an AHL defense. Mostly. And had Brock back checking and playing the walls. Miller also is finally playing a simpler game. Hope it sticks. As far as our offense goes, we have a lot of weapons mediocre ones, upfront but a lot of them. I don't think Martin and Delia were terrible, but they certainly weren't average either. I'm not sure Demko has "stolen" a game for us yet. Has he? (this season). Edit: A few years ago I watched a guy named Hammond come in and OTT didn't lose outright in 23 or so games. Goalies come and go. There is a huge difference between a starter and a back-up and they are constantly moving around. I was around and busy going to games when I could during the goalie graveyard era. Was ugly. Irbe, Potvin, Burke and Essansa were all starter stars or almost stars at one point or another. I'm not totally sold on Demko either. We were absolutely spoiled with Luongo.
  3. Me too but hoping he can do it. Has to score at almost a 3 point pace to do it. Espo, Nichols, Yzerman, Mario and Wayne. That said even 130 is special company. Without checking I think Nilsson, Espo, Orr, Coffey, Hawerchuk, Yzerman, Mario, Gretzky, Kurri, Dionne and that's about it. Did i miss anyone?
  4. Crosby will retire as a top 5-7 all-time center likely. Ovi the best LW likely. Lucky to have them, we truly are. Great examples of what being a superstar really is. I'd have a hard time putting Crosby ahead of Yzerman and Sakic - but he's made a case for it. McDavid? He needs to adapt the same way Yzerman and Crosby did, or EDM won't win a cup. He's for sure the biggest offensive weapon in the league now. Scoring goals like a boss. It's great to see him add that to his game. He's in his peak prime now.
  5. Nope. Mathews deserved it. No skin in the game, he was better.
  6. Crosby never played with Malkin on his line as a regular. Rust. And a bunch of chumps aside from eventually Geuntzal. Drasaitl ... is a great player. Also he never feasted on the PP like McDavid. Even now, Crosby is one of the even strength leaders, and doesn't cheat. It's not like the Oilers don't have a good supporting cast right now either. Like Crosby, who doesn't cheat defensively ever, McDavid going to have to change his game if he wants a cup.
  7. Of note... 80 of McDavids 130 points have come on the power play. That's a ton. Good for him too. He's only one point ahead of bottom feeder team EK for 5 x 5 points and not that far ahead of EP either. He's like Ovi on steroids right now. Gretzky never did this. He scored the vast majority of his points 5 x 5... Hope McDavid scores 160 though. Will be in special company then.
  8. Sure. Of those 22 teams remaining, which one wants that cap hit? Doubt ARI isn't on his list. And doubt CHI is too. I'd be pretty surprised not to see Myers on our opening night roster. He's taken on the role of Edler for club whipping boy, and deservedly so. When he does something cool (Tavares/Keith - or stops a sure goal with his body/skate/stick - then it's not so bad is it) ... Choas Giraffe is hilariously accurate. Only way I see Myers going is next TDL with retention. And good chance that means no playoffs. Hope i'm wrong. And we can upgrade in the off-season or the draft.
  9. Martin played great for us last season and earned the back-up role. Being the starter and running with it is two entirely separate things. Yes you get a few Binningtons now and again, but expecting it is kind of silly. It's rare. Like Martin and was rooting for him. But it became pretty obvious pretty quick he wasn't going to win many games on his own. Do we even have ONE shutout this year? Halak. That was actually a great signing given his career. He's proven he can win games on his own many times. With us? Not so much but there were 2-1 games in there. Maybe i'm missing something ..: but have any of these guys had a shut-out yet? Was critical with Markstrom early on about this too. Your team should get a shutout at some point. Markstrom almost broke the record lol. Not i a good way. Bruce did not get one game from his goalies where they stole one. Most back-ups do this a couple times by January - at least once. And your starter a few.
  10. Bettman. He's made 3 statements this year about the cap publicly. He's played me like a violin lol. First Act - start of the year "we made a lot more money then we projected, taken an entire year less to recoup" and "we are fairly certain owners made whole this season" and "cap will go up significantly over the next couple seasons once owners are made whole - 4-4.5 possibly next season ". Second Act around Christmas " likely the cap won't be going up significantly next season, one million " .... slap in the face thanks Bettman .. Last week ... "up one million for sure", "strong appetite to raise the cap 4.5 even if the owners aren't made whole next season have to talk escrow with NHLPA" etc etc. Starting to think he's playing a game with the NHLPA. Wants to keep escrow high for awhile - which makes sense. It will go down from 20% to 6% next season IF they bump it up 4.5. Given the NHLPA is already used to this ... why not raise the cap? Sure would help the majority of the teams, and i'm sure players themselves are looking forward to some raises. As for escrow it's always been a sticky point with the players, like they don't trust the accountants. Not sure that's justified really.
  11. There is more to this story. Bettman said that there is a high level of interest both with the GMs and the NHLPA to raise the salary cap, up to around 4.5 next year even if they fall short. And that there is fair odds hockey related revenue will make the owners whole this season, and if that happens the cap will go up 4.5. It's going to be close in other words. And close is enough for them to want to push the salary cap up to 87 next year. I think they either have to raise the cap, or allow a free buyout. Not much choice really. The amount of trade action this deadline, possibly the most since the cap came in, to me is also another indication that we really don't have close to all the data. Seemed like an indication last summer as well with quite a few of the deals handed out, cap is about to go up, and when it does, it's going to keep doing that for awhile anyways.
  12. This is something worthy of discussion for sure. We lost quite a few games just using eyeballs, with a weak goal here and there. It's a slim margin really, as far as save percentages go, but for sure over time, it makes a difference. We lose a lot of 5/4 games. And blew some leads lol. So many actually. JB would have made a goalie trade early on. Management did not. They went with Martin and Delia with Demko out. It was a great lesson for the players themselves, albeit a tough one, as well as eventually a deliberate tank move. It allowed management to bring in the coaching staff they wanted as well. Bruce definitely earned the right to his option. And management definitely didn't bail him out either. I'm sure they were hoping once Tochetts system of no cheating allowed came in, and trust, trust of everyone around you, it would make it easier on their goalies to be above average to superb. Love that save percentages are down to .903 .... that's awfully close to early 90's lol. Been saying for years, those goalies were exceptional, small, heavy leather pads, cat like reflexes and they could punt a rebound like a first pass with possession often. Stand up goalies... I don't think that the goalies are worse ... just that the level of play is finally getting back to how it use to be with a smaller league. 1981 was actually the high water mark too. And without Gretzky, Bossy, Coffey and Mario, the 80's wouldn't have been so high scoring either. Snipers and all-time greats. So much talent. Taking away the redline was the ref who just played his 1500th game, biggest change in the game. It sped it up. That and when they finally called what used to be normal hockey plays, obstruction after the lockout. League was so watered down and the next group of players was very vanilla compared to their peers from before. Goons were excommunicated, and enforcers eventually too. Now it's all about speed and skill. And the goalies are the ones paying the price. The goalies weren't way better in the dead puck era. Roy was incredible in the 80's and early 90's too. Leading the league with .903-5 SP lol. Later posted .922 in the dead puck era. Close to retirement. He didn't get "better". 93 was the most unbelievable playoff performance a goalie ever had. Probably stand for a long time. 10 OT wins. Team knew if they got to OT, nothing was getting by Roy. Is Vasilevsky getting worse? Of course not. Same with other reliable usual suspects. All this young talent ... being driven from the D to a degree as well. Im sure 3 on 3 OT also has made an impact. As for us, is anyone surprised that with Demko back, a stronger emphasis on "little things" and no cheating allowed, that we aren't losing like we were the first 2/3 of the season? I'm not at all. Agree it's not all on the goaltender. Sure nice to see instead of .910 being "average" like it used to be in the 2000's for awhile, it's down to .903. And don't see that changing anytime soon.
  13. There is merit in both ideas. Guerin somehow make lemonade out of lemons with Suter and Parise, but those deals won't live on forever ... OEL for 8 years seems like a long time. Agree it's a lot less cap percentage wise then Luongo...that said JB not having access to that extra cap space was the difference on one bigger deal that could of helped... Costs us Tanev for sure, and likely Toffoli as well (cap not going up for sure boned him ... but he never saved any for the future). Living a life with credit card debt seems to be the SOP with this team going back a long time. Allvin finally carved it down to the nickel ... but also spent some too. Next year looks like zero wiggle room. Where do you think he goes with this? I'm guessing he does buyout OEL. It seems to be the way the Canucks do business. That's a huge ask for the owners, although some of that i'm sure gets mitigated with "revenue sharing" and escrow...it's spread around. Still, he will be paying 2/3 of his salary on top of his regular team salary. I like where you're going with this and the thinking behind it. That's an example of why this could work. Every year UFAs come to market and fans in their minds just slot in who they think would be a good fit. Almost always, they don't choose Vancouver. Too many other teams available. Creating a winning culture helps - and i'm sure trying to create the new "Russian Five" lol... something like this has a lot more realism then trading Myers and signing Hamilton, or AP...those guys usually go, to teams that are on the upswing or already a contender. Winning the majority of the rest of the games this year, without OEL, would go a long way i to something like this actually happening. Back to Luongo. In eight years, a little of 2, is going to be around 2.2% of the overall cap. With Luongo, it was almost double that cap percentage wise. The scary part is how does the team navigate the first four seasons. Ideally, OEL comes to play next season and is a solid addition to the top four until his contract is finished. He's only 35 when it's up. Edit: As for UFAs. The last time Vancouver "won" the best of class D's, consensus by a fair margin, it was Tyler Myers. The media and most fans felt it was not only a fair deal but a somewhat below market value deal. 7 x 7 was floated as the high end. RHD, in his prime, buried behind Byfuglien and Trouba - good playoff rep. Burke sure liked the deal for us. 30-49 million. So we sure didn't "overpay". For sure not an overpayment give then market value pre-covid. And the only reason we got him was because that's where he wanted to play. Kelowna. Now we can't wait for his cap hit to be gone lol. So can see how some are thinking we blow that stack on just another overpaid vet. In this case the math gets awfully tough. Can't trade OEL. Can't demote him. Best case for us is he heals, and can play like he did last season after. Pretty sure the medical staff will advise the team on what to expect.
  14. Some good teams is exactly that - TO and Dallas and OTT is in a funk but not a bad team. It's not like we had five bottom feeder's which was the point. Not sure why folks need to denigrate a winning streak. It wasn't just who we beat, it was also about how we played.
  15. Both Demko and QHs want to play that much ... that's what Tochett said anyways in a pressor a game or two back. And "QHs has excellent cardio"... get the fear though, what's the point in risking injury. He's not Pronger, and it's not like Pronger didn't eventually wear down as a result of playing 30 minutes for years. The value that is in this, is to find out IF QHs can play those types of minutes and how sustainable it is. Bruce also played him close to 30 down the stretch last year at times. Maybe that's what QHs wants. So far it's impressive.
  16. Bettman is all over the place this year. But we already know the NHL is somewhat recession proof - sure was in 2009. And that one was nasty. NHL.com posted an article, this week, Bettman saying even if they don't quite make their targets the NHLPA and NHL could agree to raise the cap by up to 4.5 this summer. Did this to us in the fall too so not sure what to believe. Said it most likely would go up, a couple months later said probably not. Now it's for sure 1-4.5 again lol. So who knows for sure. If the cap isn't raised I do think GMs will vote for one free buyout. Too many teams are up against the cap. And players want raises. If I had to wager i'd wager they raise the cap. NHL players for very rich last recession. It's somewhat immune.
  17. Luongo/Turco/Linden series? Sure hope this isn't the case. Best team we had in the regular season, not the best playoff team goes to the Sedins. Been waiting for 30 years almost, to see a team that was built for the playoffs again. So hoping for that. OP make the poll public. IF they didn't re-tool this roster i'd be saying we'd be suck suck suck in two years. Now i'm optimistic we've made some improvements. In two years EPs into his next deal..: same with Hronek. So ... next year we'd better make the show right? No freaking way we are in the conference final. Total fluke in that case. Need reps first. Better than this year absolutely. First round exit? Maybe.
  18. Someone on the CDC created a video of every goal Bure ever scored with Vancouver...it went on for over an hour.
  19. EP says the right things, same with Miller - they just want to win. I think you're thinking about Horvat. EP knows he's getting paid - and it doesn't matter if he doesn't play one more game this season. He's already proven he can score at a 100 plus point pace going back to last season. I'm sure hoping he plays every game until the end of the year. Starting to show he's also got some durability. 11-11.5 x 8 is my prediction. The man is getting paid and paid big time.
  20. Pointed out a few times - what happens if instead we won the Patrick/Hirshier sweepstakes? We slipped from 3rd to 5th twice. Would we have really gone that far off board and picked EP? I have serious doubts. It was already an off board pick at 5. Heiskanen? We'd already tried with OJ and at that time he wasn't a write off yet. Doubt we picked him. Makar? Maybe. Funny - that draft was supposed to be bunk. No "high end franchise for sure guys"...Patrick was supposed to have the highest floor. Hirscheir was nowhere near the top until the WJs then became a guy that would go one or two. This year we have the most hyped draft since McDavid and some folks declaring the deepest draft in forever. I'm not buying it. Listening to the early warnings, they are still stuck in my brain. If the scouts are warning, covid made picking outside of the top of the draft a crapshoot - maybe we should be listening to that a little. EPs draft is now standing up to some very good drafts a few years prior isn't it? Makar has already won - and won big. How many years in the league? EP is starting to look like a future HHOFer too. Anyways - it will be interesting to re-visit how good this draft really is in 6-7 years. No way are "late firsts like 15th overalls" and 5-10 like top 5's ... that's just silly.
  21. I'd say we are in cap purgatory for one more season. Just hope Allvin is much better at filling in the gaps at a lesser price. Did that for us this year with Lazar (and we got a pick which was nice). Joshua and Aman were solid too. Kravstov was a cheap reclamation project. We still need to draft our way into contention. Hope this year we can have a boffo draft like Nonis's first one. Two impact players, a great support player plus a roster player for a few years.
  22. That's the best case for the club. If OEL can bounce back, then we've already found a top four D. And maybe OEL/Hronek becomes a solid pairing for us like Hamhuis/Beiksa. QHs is so good now, we could play him with anyone almost. Still need to find one more D to truly compete. We've got a glut of 5-7 guys.
  23. If his injury was holding him back this year, and he heels 100%, don't see why we shouldn't just use him. Doubt we will get much better at 4-5 million from free agency - assuming he's back to last seasons level of play. OEL-Myers actually worked decently, around 11th overall 5 x 5 and played against top competition. OEL was thought to be the big reason for that .... not this year that's for sure. Feel he avoided contact a lot, which could be on purpose just to keep playing through stuff. As for QHs/Hronek pairing. I suppose it could work but that's an awfully small set-up. Not sure who's going to do the dirty work infront of the net and how effective it would be. OEL/Hronek has some appeal IF OEL can bounce back. We could bring back Schenn and actually feel there is a very strong chance of that. Bear ... we might just let him walk if we can't reach a 1 or two years deal with him. Think Brisbois is making a solid case to start with the big club too. Myers salary is needed for Hronek and some breathing room. Don't think we trade him despite some thinking it's easy. His ten team trade list almost certainly includes all the team with the cap space. He's not waiving to go to ARI that's for sure. Maybe CHI... CHI ... maybe a player swap, OEL for Seth Jones. Sure they'd love to get out of that deal. With some retention (2) it actually might work.
  24. So he just flies around with the team if these cheap replacements beat him out of a spot? That's awkward for him and the team. Get the concern about free agency, we sure whiffed a lot during the JB era. I'd rather buy him out if he ends up playing like he did this year or worse for the remainder of his career. Ideally it was just the injury - he heals, and can play a top four spot without hurting us like his first season. Maybe OEL/Hronek makes a good pairing.
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