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oldnews

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Everything posted by oldnews

  1. He'll probably continue to produce enough to warrant that - but is he a player you "win with"? Maybe not a 'fair' question - but I've never found his hockey intelligence convincing.
  2. they would be - but we needed to get out ahead and take Mayfield off their hands a year or two ago....it's too late now.
  3. I don't think so. If I were going to consider revisiting Gud - I think the circumstances would have to be different. By that I mean - if the team had found the right partner for Hughes - and we'd re-signed Edler - that would be where I think he might make sense - on a hard minutes pairing with AE. I'm not going to beat the dead horse of revisiting Gud's positive and negative metrics/outcomes, particularly with multiple recent small samples to glean meaning from (and further, a waste of time to do so in response to the usual one-liners in any event). I'd like to have a guy that people avoid in the hard areas like they do Gud, I'd like to have a guy that makes opponents anxious on entries, particularly when they don't have their heads up, I'd like to have someone that no one in their right mind wants to drop the gloves with - I'd like to have a guy that skates as well as he does north/south - but with that size, also has the typical limitations pivoting/turning - and with so much youth on the left side that are upside types, I'm not sure he'd fit (perhaps with Juolevi?) Hughes / (all situations, two way, RHD with some size/physicality). Juolevi / Myers Edler / Schmidt / (Gud) With Gud as an alternative on the right side that could be a dedicated shutdown minutes pairing with Edler (that was the one situation where I thought he - and Edler - looked good (together). With OEL now in the mix - I'm not sure how the pairings are likely to flush out - or who they're going to add as complements. To bring Gudbranson in in the present - I'd avoid pairing him with a young (transition) LHD (granted our young LHD are considerable upgrades on his partner the last go-around - Hutton) - but I'm not sure I see a fit. I'd love to have his 'deterrent' effect/backbone effect in the lineup, but having a forward that can play that role is more 'traditional' and makes more sense imo. Not sure I see it - but I'm certainly not going to sandbag the guy in the whipping boy tradition from Edler, Sbisa, Gud, (and most recently, back to Edler...)
  4. So much just plain really bad information circles around the NHL - so many 'analysts' and would-be-experts publishing on a limitless internet - that it's no wonder you get so many horrible takes on players. Was just curiosity-seeking - where all the "one of the NHL's worst contract" comments are coming from.... First thing I read - and I'm not going to link to / create traffic for / encourage anyone to create content like this - but the first article I read was arguing to avoid Ekman-Larson - suggesting alternative, 'better' targets.....one of them being.....Gostisbehere. Is it really necessary to ask wtf? An undersized guy, no physicality, left side D - who scored 45% of his pts on the powerplay - doesn't/can't kill penalties, plays with the benefit of tilted ice, has underproduced a few years running - and who took assets to dump his 4.5 million cap hit (to Arizona, ironically) - was allegedly a better option for this team....Not easy, actually, to think of many worse options - particularly for a team that already has a Hughes, and a Rathbone.... These are the 'expert' sources that posters pick up on online - and parrot in threads like this. No wonder hockey discussion in here can get so futile / annoying / counterproductive / pointless at times. Ekman Larson - allegedly one of the NHL's 'worst contracts' over the past three years.... 98 pts in 193 games over that period - better than .5 ppg defenseman. 363 hits over that time frame. 23, 23, 21 minutes a game... Principal penalty killer / two-way 5on5 minutes. Has played with partners - that are not exactly 'inflating' his numbers (ie Lyubushkin = honestly - how many of you have ever heard of him?) Has played for a General Manager that has made a laughing stock/gongshow of the franchise on a number of fronts = awful deals to take on guys like Stepan, Kessel, ate Datsyuk's contract for a song, blew a first round pick on violations.... Captaining that futile desert ship - must have been torturous at times. With absurd noise surrounding him - reducing him to one of the league's worst contracts - truly laughable noise.... Wasn't even close to the worst contract on his own team, playing with a one-dimensional float-show like Phil Kessel. A team that just ate the contracts of Loui Eriksson, Andrew Ladd, and Gostisbehere. A league that has contracts like Jake Gardiner's, Jeff Skinner!!!, PK Subban, Kyle Okposo, Colin Miller, Frans Nielsen, Matt Murray, Matt Duchene, Adam Henrique, Boychuk, Erik Karlsson, James Neal, Milan Lucic, Brent Seabrook, Tyler Johnson.... And that's just the start / the more obvious to list.....not even near a top 20.... As with any player you sign to term and significant cap - there is inherent risk - but he's still a 40+ pt, 20+ minutes, all situations defenseman....the talk as if he's been awful for three straight years - is baffling to say the least....but that's the nature of internet 'information' surrounding the NHL in this twitter era - so much misleading noise imo.
  5. Be hard to argue with either of these guys as depth options - if McCabe came at the right price. Both are the 'type' (aside from being LHD) of additions needed - harder minutes, relatively physical, competent defensively, reasonably good first pass, can skate.... McCabe in particular has had some of the better 'underlying' numbers (in context) on Buffalo for some time, principal penalty killer....not sure I'd want to pay him in the 3 million range he's been getting, but he may be worth that. Smith is a bit harder sell - but as a depth/injury fill-in placeholder / replacement for the Benn/Fantenburg type roles, he's reasonable, with some edge. Speaking of Fantenburg - his one year KHL deal with Ska expired earlier this spring/summer - haven't heard anything about him re-signing - if we're not being picky about targetting RHD in particular, he's a bargain guy that overperformed for us imo (outcomes weren't 'sexy' but he sure as hell was solid/reliable) - I don't think I'd hesitate to bring him back.
  6. Have always really - really - liked Kole Lind - but I was happy that the guy we retained post-expansion-draft is Gadjovich. I think he fits our teams needs moreso than the skilled RW - I think Gadjovich has a comparable chance of commanding an NHL spot/career - and with the likes of Boeser, Hoglander, Podkolzin, Lockwood and now Klimovich in the organization......I think the fact he's a LW - with a heavier game - probably makes retaining Gadjovich the greater need.
  7. And the space left by not re-signing Toffoli - was not Virtanen's - it was Hoglander's - and when push comes to shove if this team emerges as a contender, I'm pretty confident that Hoglander is/will also be the type of player you "win with" - if anything, he's a 200ft buzzsaw/puckhound that is only going to get bettter and better- and if his linemates had better conditions this season and were more productive, it's not a stretch to imagine him among the Calder candidates. You aint gonna catch me second-guessing the decision - because even beyond Boeser and Hoglander, RW remains imo one of, if not the team's position with the most youth depth.
  8. I think Green was correct all along in the way he 'managed' Virtanen - inching him along, making him earn it, making him develop off the puck first and foremost, not giving him anything prematurely (whereas prior to Green, the team brought a pair of fairly young-minded prospects into the fold prematurely imo - both Virtanen and McCann) - whereas Green was trying to cultivate that drive to earn more and be consistent as a basis to earning more. Virtanen appeared to understand and respect what Green was doing - one of the key reasons I had patience with Virtanen - he never appeared disappointed with his role, he never appeared to question what Green was teaching/telling him. For some people becoming an 'adult' doesn't come until the mid-20s (if ever) - unfortunately growing up off the ice came too late, where mistakes don't cost a (relatively) meaningless goal or penalty. Anyhow - I see no point in hating on 'kids' - and while I hate using that term even in relation to young prospects, that's what Virtanen was when he was drafted, and seems to have remained for a few years post-draft. I wish the best for the young woman - and if the right things are done - for Jake as well.
  9. Keep Schmidt, sign Savard instead of Hamonic.
  10. I'm not going to poopoo this 'rumour' - but I do know that if I were working within Canucks' management and I got an inquiry from Dance, I'd feed him a full dose of well-earned misleading dung.
  11. Yep. He's the next OV-lite. And we also drafted our next Sami Salo in this draft, not to mention a Marty St Louis, Neidermeyer, a Zetterburg, and a Markstrom! Who needs the 9OA when you're about to pull off the stealthiest stealteroo of all the draft stealoramas?
  12. The right decision by the franchise - regardless of / in spite of what the 'asset cost' might be. And that's not to prejudge him - where Bergevin et al have done the wrong thing for the wrong reasons - the Canucks have not imo - regardless of the 'outcome' of the allegations against Virtanen, they've done the right thing. He is a good example of a case where the draft age is (far) too young. Virtanen's emotional intelligence wasn't ready for the next step to becoming a professional. His physical frame, his hockey 'intelligence' was adequate (imo - I'm not going to debate this with people that believe otherwise) - but like many (of us as) young men, growing a/the brain, particularly in the social adjustment/maturity sense, doesn't necessarily coincide. In a way I think he was nevertheless quite fortunate, in spite of stupid actions/behaviour - being so young-minded with a tendency to lean in the wrong direction, to have landed with Travis Green, who seemed to have a positive effect on Virtanen in a wider sense than simply his hockey career, even if that needed to run deeper. Virtanen has a chance to 'grow up' - to hopefully make amends - to potentially recover to the extent possible from hurting/injuring someone else, and by extension, himself in the process. I hope he makes the most of his future, and starts by authentically redressing what he's done.
  13. LA dealt their pick to Calgary...?
  14. are you gonna talk to the little voices in your head, all day, captain flipflop?
  15. I would not have dealt our 9th overall for Florida's (likely late 1st) 2022 - a team that was 1 pt out of the top spot in the eastern conference - and Levi. I think Buffalo got less than a whole lot of posters on these boards were proposing - including ones now 'thankful' we didn't pay the price.
  16. I'd be waiting to see someone actually proclaim a team won the draft with a 4th round pick before finding it 'entertaining'.
  17. was there a single actual post to that effect?
  18. not sure there was a poster on these boards that posted as repeatedly as you did that wanted to deal the 9OA for him....
  19. funny to see the "trade the 9OA for Reinhart" club do an about-face and be 'thankful' we didn't pony up for him.... I prefer the deal we made (was never particularly interested in chasing Reinhart).
  20. https://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdisplay.php?pid=241808 https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/394729/jonathan-myrenberg
  21. https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/498288/aku-koskenvuo
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