GoldenAlien
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Please hockey gods, give us this Loui in Vancouver:
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Hughes is an one man transition game.
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Gaunce reminds me a bit of Dowd when he was with Vancouver. Both 6’2” guys with decent size but not enough bite to their games. Good defensively yet nothing stands out. Dowd was 28 when he left as an UFA and his NHL career looked dead in the water. But he turned it around with the Caps and now he’s a very serviceable fourth liner. Plenty of teams short on cap space need a cheap forward who can play 10 minutes without costing them the game. Gaunce can play shut down with aplomb and chip in on the PK. A team like Tampa or Toronto, who’ll be forced to trade some of their supporting cast to keep their stars, could be the perfect landing spot. The Canucks, on the other hand, is swimming in cap space and would trade money for veteran leadership and physicality. Gaunce was unfortunately caught in no man’s land in the rebuild — too old to be considered promising, too young to be considered experienced. There are enough question marks at the top of the lineup, the last thing the Canucks want to deal with is an unproven fourth liner. Hopefully he gets the second chance he needs.
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2018-19 Utica Comets Thread
GoldenAlien replied to stonecoldstevebernier's topic in Prospects / Farm Team
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Now that’s a drop pass:
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What's up with this conundrum over smaller skilled players? Pettersson is 6'2". The average NHL player is 6'1". Unlike Gaudreau, or Kucherov, or Marner, he's not small, just skinny. It's been widely reported that he hit a growth spurt at 17. But let's see his progression over the years. For the 2014-2015 season, he was listed at 176cm, 56kg by Timra. That's 5'9", 123lbs, for his 16 year old season: http://stats.swehockey.se/Teams/Info/TeamRoster/5780 By April 2016, at the U18s, he was listed at 6'1", 152 lbs. He was 17 years old at the time: http://u18worlds2016.iihf.com/en/games/2016-04-21/SWE-vs-SVK/ In June 2017, he measured 6'1.75", 165lbs at the NHL Combine. By September 2018, he was 6'2", 176lbs. Pettersson's older brother, Emil, was listed at 6'1", 158lbs by Central Scouting in his second draft eligible year (he went undrafted at 18). By the time he was 22, the SHL listed him at 6'2", 176lbs. He was listed at 185lbs last season in the AHL, when he was 24. Elias is a late bloomer who's still catching up to his height. Jankowski was also noted for his late growth spurt. He checked into the 2012 NHL combine at 6'2.5", 168lbs. The AHL All-Star game in 2017 listed him at 6'4", 215lbs. Not to say that Pettersson will also put on 40+lbs, but why wouldn't he be 6'2", 190 -195lbs in a couple years? He's put on 10+lbs every year since he hit his growth spurt and is easily ahead of his brother at the same age. Sutter is 6'3", 190lbs. Simmonds is 6'2", 185lbs. They're pretty lean, but no one would ever call them small players.
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And it looks like Baylee has Boeser's hoodie from the Player Design Series to boot!
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In a redraft Pettersson wouldn't be there for Dallas and Colorado to take. He's a clear step above Hischier and Patrick and would be drafted in their spots instead. In fact, it's almost certain that Pettersson would go #1. Teams don't usually take a defenseman #1 unless they're much better than the best forward. If a forward is projected to be top line material, they always come out ahead, like Tavares vs Hedman, Stamkos vs Doughty, MacKinnon vs Jones or even Yakupov vs Murray. Defensemen tend to go first in weak forward crop years -- Johnson vs Staal, Ekblad vs Reinhart, Dahlin vs Svechnikov. Anyhow, a redraft would likely see a Pettersson - Heiskanen - Makar - Hischier top four. At this point, I'm not sure I'd take Patrick over Brannstrom and Glass, and probably a few of Necas, Thomas, Chytil, Jokiharju, and Tolvanen will turn out to be better as well. Even Comtois and Poehling may have the same upside as Patrick. Only goes to show, always draft for high ceiling and not high floor with the top picks.
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2018-19 Utica Comets Thread
GoldenAlien replied to stonecoldstevebernier's topic in Prospects / Farm Team
Wheeler has watched Lind and Gadjovich since they were 16: -
Hutton signed his extension a month into his sophomore season, for $2.8m x 2 years. I would expect Tryamkin to get something similar. It would be a nice bump from the reported $1m he's making. Or the team could offer three years if he joins in March 2020, with a big signing bonus in the first year. He gets to burn a year off by playing for a month, and could get close to a full year's pay. That would be a good incentive to lure him, plus we could negotiate a lower AAV in the remaining years as a result. Tryamkin confirmed that Benning offered him a two year, one way deal when he left. Not much has changed, at most I can see three full years, maybe $3m per because you're buying an extra UFA year. That could be four years if he burns a year off by coming in March. But I don't think either side would want to commit to longer than that, and you're not going to pay much more than $3m for a guy who's essentially in the bridge contract stage.
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It's not about whether it's fine if Pouliot burned off a year. He didn't because no CHL prospect ever gets to play for the purpose of shortening their ELCs. Not Pouliot, not Reilly, not anyone. Yet Hughes, Makar, Fabbro, and countless others across the league routinely get this treatment. How is that fair? Why can't these college prospects be more blue collar? Why can't they finish the season in the AHL, prove that they're too good to stay on the farm, and make the team next year like everybody else? How entitled is Gaudette, strolling in and asking to sign an ELC right away instead of an AHL ATO? He's a fifth round pick who's projected to be a third liner, he should be grateful the Canucks even want to give him a contract in the first place. Should the Canucks have said, either you sign with Utica first, or you can go back to college for another year and go to free agency? We don't want you if you're not willing to be treated like every other CHL draftee. People act like the NHL is getting faster by the minute. But most of the turnover in the league is at the bottom -- depth players, bottom six forwards, bottom pairing Ds, etc. The top players are not getting rotated out year after year. The league led by Kucherov, McDavid, Crosby, P. Kane, Ovechkin and Stamkos was dominated by the same players two years ago. Tryamkin could play in the same league as McDavid then, but woah, what if you add Cooper Marody? Could he handle that? There aren't hundreds of thousands of people trying to make the NHL every few years. You can't include every person who played some kind of minor hockey. As the article you linked said, 223 of the 32,000 Ontario kids who played minor hockey were drafted into the OHL. Most of the others went on with their lives. They no longer played hockey with making the NHL in mind. The biggest reason why most don't make it is because of talent. I was watching a tournament a while back, for 13 year olds. At least half the kids didn't play like hockey had positions. You know, besides being the closest to the puck. The vast majority of the population simply do not have what it takes to be an NHL player, regardless of their work ethics. Which is why if you do get a guy with NHL level talent, you should try to work with him and hang onto that. Tryamkin could barely speak English. How are you assuming that he must have known that the coaching staff was being scrutinized? Why are you assuming that Benning would openly tell a player that WD is getting fired before he hands the man the notice? How is that even remotely appropriate? Can you imagine if your boss told your subordinates that you're being fired, before they told you? Tryamkin clearly said it was both coaching and family. If other media outlets chose to only take quotes about coaching because it made a better story, that's not on him. What, you want him to issue a press release? Call up reporters and tell them their articles didn't quote his whole interview? First, you said none of the players I named had anything in common with Tryamkin. Now, you're saying they're not Tryamkin's twins. Of course no one would have exactly the same set of issues as Tryamkin. Tryamkin doesn't have identical issues as other players either. For example, Tryamkin did not sign another contract in the middle of his current one, sparking an incident between the NHL, the KHL and IIHF. He was not spotted at a bar at 5 a.m. the day of a playoff game. He did not get benched for mouthing off to the coach, or get scratched for being late to a skate, at 32 years old. Oh wait, that's Radulov. What about posting a homophobic tweet, getting along so poorly with his teammates that they throw his clothes into a shower, not letting the coach know he was outright skipping a game until a hour before puck drop, getting investigated for sexual assault in a hotel, agreeing to a plea after grabbing two women by their necks/ hair in a bar, complaining publicly about his former city, or sued for assault after getting into a fight in the middle of the night? But hey, E. Kane was only 24 and could grow out of it in a strong locker room with the Sedins! You take anybody on this planet, list all the flaws they have, and you won't be able to find the exact same combination of flaws in another person. You won't find the same combination of strengths either. That's a part of being human.
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Pouliot was picked #8 and was an outstanding prospect at Hughes' age. He had 58GP - 17G - 70pts - +40 in his last year in the Dub and scored a whopping 32pts in 21 playoff games. A 1.5+ ppg pace for a Dub defenseman is almost unheard of. At 6'0", 196lbs, he had the size to be a top pairing offensive defenseman. As an 18 year old, Schroeder scored 45pts in 35 NCAA games. Gaudreau at the same age scored 44pts in 44 games. Nobody knows what they have until the player is actually in the NHL. Every prospect needs to see what the NHL is like so they know how much work they have ahead of them. Yet top CHL draftees never get to play games just to start their ELC early. If we had drafted Reilly would you give him 10 games so he can burn a year off? Why not? Also, there's no probably about Tryamkin. He was a bottom pairing NHL defenseman. There's zero reason to believe he isn't one now. Who knows how much he has improved, but there's no indication that he took a clear step back. I'm not sure what your point is at this juncture -- so AHL is not a point, you just want the Canucks to sternly warn Tryamkin that he needs to show up ready to work? - Mouthing off: Carter wouldn't show up to the Jackets training camp until Nash visited him and convinced him to. He then made it very clear he wanted to be traded and sulked until he was. CBJ paid Voracek (a former 7th OA pick who was a 50pt scorer at 22), the 8th OA pick (Couturier), and the 68th pick (Cousins) for Carter. Because everyone and their mother knew about Carter's attitude, they had to trade him for Johnson and a 1st (which became the 27th pick, or Dano). - Being in shape: Byfuglien was arrested on 8/31/2011 for drunken boating, at which point he checked in at 6'5", 286 lbs. For reference, Tryamkin was 6'7", 265 lbs. Training camp was merely weeks away. I'll let you judge what shape Buff showed up in. - Refusing to play in the AHL: Kuznetsov literally said, "I want to go to the NHL prepared, when I am confident I can make the team. To play in the AHL for 2-3 years – that’s not for me." He played five seasons in the KHL to avoid the possibility of AHL. When talking about apartments, he said, "Most important thing is to be close to the practice facility. They explained everything to me. The agent said he would help with the car. There shouldn’t be any problem. They told me: “Just come. We’ll take care of everything”. Does that sound like a team who told him he might go to the AHL when he crosses over? - Bolting: Once upon a time, there was a 22 year old Russian youngster. He was talented, but in the middle of his ELC, he suddenly signed a three year contract in the KHL, leaving his team holding the bag. Yes, the correct answer is, who is Alexander Radulov? - Family, and Desjardins' (well noted) lack of communication were the main reasons behind Tryamkin leaving: IE: Is that the reason why you got back here? NT: Many times I was left out. It was almost always me. I couldn’t understand why. I played well, and then at the end of the game I don’t get to play without an explanation. It was a bit strange. IE: Canucks GM Jim Benning said that you left the team for family reasons. NT: That was true too. And also for hockey reasons. All of these together brought to this situation. Thousands of players don't make it, period. The vast majority of CHL and NCAA players never get a sniff of the pros. If Tryamkin doesn't reach his potential, well worst case scenario the Canucks get nothing. Which is exactly what the Canucks get right now. Nothing, zilch, nada. I'm not sure what you're arguing other than you have a right to complain about Tryamkin. My point is that it's not possible to treat everyone the same, and some players are Toews, and some are P. Kane. You make the most of what you have. Think of all the time that Green has spent on Virtanen, and the chances he got. Would he get this treatment if he was drafted in the sixth round instead of sixth overall? So should Benning just tell him that either he shows up busting his butt every shift, or he can find a new home on waivers? Because if Motte's effort level was as inconsistent as his, that's exactly what would've happened. But I hardly think it's good asset management to toss Virtanen for nothing. Good GMs don't say "it's my way or the highway" and walk away from useful assets. We all want Horvats, but that doesn't mean guys like E. Kane or Drouin can't be turned into great players. Duchene was a locker room cancer just a season ago and now he's a playoff hero.
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From Harvard Medical School: Best case scenario, Ottawa wins the next couple of games and advances to the Memorial Cup, which starts on 05/17 and ends on 05/26. DiPietro comes back for the Memorial Cup and ends his junior career with another championship. Since the recovery time for a first degree sprain can be as little as a week, DP could be back for game 6, which is on 05/12. But Cedrick Andree had a 34-5-2 record in the regular season, and his 0.910 SV% and 2.48 GAA ranked 6th and 2nd in the league among goalies who played at least 5 games. So hopefully he can shut the door and let DP rest up.
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The point is either the Canucks can get something or they can get nothing. A KHL All-Star playing on his hometown team isn't leaving that situation to go ride buses in Utica. You tell Tryamkin he might end up in the AHL, he says no thanks, I'm going to stay home and make millions and come back as a free agent in a couple years. He doesn't need to be top four. AHL isn't for everyone who's not a top four D or top six F. It's for players who can't make a NHL roster. Seems incredibly unlikely that a guy who held down a NHL spot at 22 can't at least beat out one of Schenn, Biega or Sautner now. You would get back a bag of pucks for his rights. A guy who can be an UFA shortly, who has zero connections to a random NHL team, who left for the KHL and hasn't committed to ever coming back? Teams have lost young players to European leagues before. Please cite examples where they actually got something for their rights. It's like signing Boeser, Gaudette or Hughes to ELCs at the end of the season instead of making them sign ATOs with Utica -- they haven't proved they can play pro hockey yet, so why do they get to step right in and burn a year off of their ELCs? Can't the Canucks just hold out, make them go finish their seasons in the AHL, and preserve a year of their cheap contracts? And really, before Hughes stepped into the NHL, who knows if he's Pouliot or Karlsson? Why should we work with him and give him what he wants? We'll probably let Rathbone burn a year off when he signs, but if Woo's season ends early we wouldn't give him 10 games just to start his ELC. How is that fair? At the end of the day, you can either get a 6'7" defenseman who can skate, hit, protect the crease and play 16-18 minutes a night with more upside, or you can make a point and get zilch. Yes, in an ideal world everyone would be treated exactly the same and earn every little thing they ever got but that's just not realistic. Did Jeff Carter not have red flags? Radulov? Seguin? Kuznetsov openly said the AHL wasn't for him and stayed in Russia until he knew he could make the Caps. Remember when Byfuglien was closing in on 300 pounds in the offseason? Do you think he always showed up in camp ready to play? So what, you rather take Biega and Motte over them because they have better attitudes? Good GMs make the most of what they got. Tryamkin doesn't have to be Chara. If he can be a bigger, mobile Douglas Murray, that's plenty of value considering the alternative is a wasted third round pick.
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Tryamkin is a KHL All-Star playing for his hometown team, he's not going to leave for the AHL. He's turning 25 this August and has one year left on his KHL contract. He can always just wait a bit longer and come back as an UFA, and choose his team. Considering he was already NHL caliber at 22, the chances of him not beating out Sautner now is remote. Playing hardball with him just on principle is alienating and unnecessary. Not to mention if he was brought back in March 2020 when his KHL season ends, he will no longer be waiver-exempt by October 2020, as he's only one game away from being waiver eligible. AHL is just an empty threat unless the Canucks are willing to risk him on waivers.
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What a quality guy: Dig the fedora as well.
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2018-19 Utica Comets Thread
GoldenAlien replied to stonecoldstevebernier's topic in Prospects / Farm Team
New interview with Ryan Johnson: https://www.uticaod.com/sports/20190502/comets-gm-johnson-aims-to-help-team-improve Also: -
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Slightly off topic but I also never understood why Calgary kept the name when it moved from Atlanta. What, just pure laziness? Imagine if Winnipeg went with the Winnipeg Thrashers.
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A bit selective to not include the links that the quote is referring to: The post was referring to the four major North American professional leagues. The fact that there are 122 other pro teams but you had to use an example from a junior league says enough. Is it okay to wear tie dye shirts and ripped jeans to business meetings? Why not, if it's good enough for high school it must be good enough for work. Comparables for the Canucks should be other NHL teams; a $735 million franchise should not have the same look as a bunch of teenagers playing hockey after school for $500 a month.