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Provost

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Everything posted by Provost

  1. You absolutely have a fire sale of all your expiring veterans if you are in a rebuilding stage. Getting draft picks is how you rebuild. You need a constant stream of ELC players to make the cap work because you keep needing to pay players market rate really quickly. That whole part of not knowing the value of picks is honestly nonsense. The pick is worth more than a few games from a player in a season where they playoffs aren’t happening. Even opening up the roster spot for a younger player currently sitting on the taxi squad is valuable on its own. If Benn goes, maybe Rafferty gets some games in for example. Picks are also valuable just as assets, especially during expansion. They are what teams will look for back in trades for players they can’t protect and would lose for free. There is no such thing as a law of averages working like you say. He isn’t “due” for 10 goals. The closest thing someone could say is if he was way below his career shooting %, maybe it is just bad bounces and maybe it corrects... but he is right around his historic career shooting %.
  2. I think “not taking into account the points” really is a bit silly. That is saying “except for actual results”... he is almost as effective. A lot of the difference in their minutes was Pearson also playing time on the PK which Virtanen didn’t. When comparing stats, you also have to be careful to compare like to like. Don’t take total ice time and then relate it to just 5v5 advanced stats instead of all strengths as an example. Natural Stat Trick is a good site for being able to better look at stats. Virtanen has had plenty of time with top 6 linemates, and he doesn’t produce. His best career production was the middle of last year when on a sheltered 3rd line against lesser competition. If that is what he is, trying to shoehorn him into another role that he has never succeeded in doesn’t seem like a great plan.
  3. Umm because saying you have a plan and actually having a plan are two different things... and having a plan and actually properly executing that plan is a whole different thing on top of that? Benning has said they have a plan (well a long series of plans) all along, but nothing he said has actually materialized before. Each “plan” seems to just be a reaction to the last failed plan. Why should anyone give him an indefinite benefit of the doubt? Why is “this” plan going to be any different than any of the other plans? What is his plan exactly? He didn’t mention that his plan appears to be to let all the bad contracts he signed expire and hope for the best. Did he come into the job 7 years ago saying he had a 9 year plan to contend and that by year 7 he planned on being worse then when he started... and he would spend to the cap and throw away a bunch of draft picks in the process? I don’t remember that news conference at all. Yes we are probably a couple years from being a regular playoff team (forget contending). Did he mention that is because he absolutely crapped the bed on contracts and cap allocation? Did he mention that we don’t actually have any significant cap flexibility coming up at all? This season sign Hughes, Petterson, and Demko to bridge deal extensions because we can’t afford long term deals. We probably have to shed depth to do that because not enough money is coming off the books. Then the offseason after that, we do have money coming off the books... but can’t really spend much of it because we will have major re-signings to do starting the year after that. Boeser, Horvat, Miller, then Petey,Hughes, and Demko’s longer term deals, by then you are having to pay Hoglander and Podkolzin new raises if they turn out. Once you map it out capwise, there is no magic cavalry coming and the whole house of cards relied on a constant stream of cheap ELC players just to tread water for the roster. Benning hasn’t shown to be able to find much value in cheaper contracts on the market. We need a bottom end roster full of Motte’s, not the rest of that crew.
  4. I think this is a bit of revisionist history and creating the opposite “cause and effect” narrative to what actually seemed to have happened. If you go back to the game logs and look deeper it tells a different story. Jake started slow last season, then started producing well at the end of Nov/early Dec coinciding right when Roussel came back from injury and was put on his line. That good stretch of production came primarily on a line with Roussell and Gaudette... not with Petey and Miller. He barely produced any points with those two guys at all. He was producing well in his 3rd line role so THEN earned more minutes and got more chances to play higher in the lineup and more 2nd unit PP time where he got a bunch of his production in that stretch. His great play lasted 5-6 weeks, tailed off and he went back to not producing at all. 1 point in 10 games starting late Jan/early Feb. That tail off actually coincided with him being moved to be tried on the Miller/Petterson line. Jake had a couple of good games with them and then went into a deep slide that lasted the rest of the season all the way until now. Boeser got hurt and Virtanen wasn’t producing in that spot. Jake was dropped in the lineup and Toffoli was acquired to fill the injury hole. People can have a hard on for Green, but he isn’t dropping guys down in the lineup that are helping him win. Jake’s play determined his minutes, not the other way around. We saw how he played in the playoffs... so there is zero evidence that Jake is “made for the playoffs”. I was interested and hoping to see that. The narrative/theory was that once the games got big, it would provide Jake the extra motivation to play at a higher level more consistently to match that intensity. That didn’t happen, quite the reverse... when other players ratcheted up their play, he tailed off. The game seemed too hard and intense for his level of compete. Who knows if he learned from that and might be different in the future, but it isn’t at all reasonable to say he is our best bet after Ferland. Evidence shows our best bet after Ferland were probably Horvat and Motte in terms of being able to have that extra compete level in the big games.
  5. Ya, he would be covered on the part about 2nd and 3rd rounders having a decent success rate in the draft. That is expected historically... the question is whether Benning is beating the average of having 1/3rd of his 2nd rounders and 1/4 of his 3rd rounders make it as NHL regulars. It isn’t a steal to have those guys show up on the roster, that is expected at a certain rate. The post being responded to was about good players being found all through the drafts.
  6. The messaging didn’t seem like he is planning on jumping early. There will be some trades... but maybe the early birds are the only ones who make moves before the market dries up (due to Covid). I actually think the last 6 months were the start of the most important period for. (This iteration) of the organization. Being able to shed bad contracts and re-sign the right players in order to not take a big step back was really important last offseason. He messed the offseason up pretty badly. If he thought he wanted to keep Markstrom... then sign the deal and then use Demko as leverage to get rid of bad money. If Markstrom’s ask was too high, then move on and don’t “run out of time”.
  7. Well if no one can move any players...it mitigates the level of fault. Still his fault because at the end of the day he is the boss so the buck stops at him. He got us into the contracts and he couldn’t get us out. If movement happens and we aren’t part of it, then it is absolutely on him again. Bad money got moved in the offseason (cough... Gudbranson)... but we couldn’t make any moves.
  8. Who? We are doing ok on first round picks... but who else throughout the draft? Gaudette? On average about a third of 2nd round picks play at least 100 games and 25% of 3rd rounders. The numbers go down as the rounds go later. Are we on track to beat that rate? Where is the later round “steal” that came out of nowhere and is contributing in the top half of the roster? He has a mixed bag in the 1st round picks, at least where they are contributing relative to the rest of their draft class. Virtanen and Juolevi get drafted lower, Boeser goes higher, Petterson goes higher, Hughes go higher . For Boeser and Hughes they were the BPA on most of the draft lists when we drafted them... so they fell a little into our laps. We have been above average in drafting I would say, but spectacular. 7 drafts and we net out to having about the level of player we should have with average drafting.
  9. You mean send them to sit in a US hotel room for two weeks in case they get moved to a US team? What if they get traded to a Canadian team, then they have to quarantine this direction? Also the CBA and NHLPA would definitely have something to say about that idea. If you mean have them quarantined at home... that doesn't lesson what would need to happen as mandated by both the league and the appropriate health authorities.
  10. Then I am not sure what your argument was? I took issue with Jim saying a couple of times that he will see how things are at the trade deadline and that he should be proactive... you disagreed with that? Teams have not been waiting until the trade deadline in the last few years, trying to get new players incorporated into their teams a bit earlier. Trade deadline has really been a two week series of moves recently. Add two weeks due to quarantine and he should be trying to make moves right now.
  11. I think you missed the part about quarantine and Covid. Waiting until the deadline means your only buyers are the 4-5 teams in Canada in the hunt. US teams aren’t going to pay top dollar for players at the deadline that they can’t get into their lineup until the playoffs... not when they will have many teams with rentals to choose from other US teams. If we sell off our most obvious pieces now (Pearson, Sutter, Benn) to US teams , that means at the deadline and 4-5 Canadian teams fighting for the playoffs only have a very few options for rentals from us or Ottawa and we could even possibly move guys like Roussel and Beagle with a year of term left... or Baertschi. Moving now means appreciating our assets, not selling low. Also, the earlier we move, the more chance we have of getting under the cap and being able to pay some of the ELC bonuses this year rather than pushing them all out to take away cap space from next season. The longer you wait, the less chance prorated salaries will let you bank anything, especially since we probably have to retain on a trade or two.
  12. Ummm... because our division has played way more games? Correct for winning % and we have the 3rd and 9th best teams... not exactly the top level talent. In any regard, you can’t compare teams when they aren’t playing interdivisional games. Someone has to win on a given night, so even if you had two of the worst teams in the league (us and Ottawa) play each other, one of them wins. We have no idea how any teams stack up league wise.
  13. What? You mean that “if you are one of the worst teams in the league we are good with that?” or ”Hey, no matter how bad you guys perform... You got a job here!” Not sure what the wrong message is? The players can read the standings...
  14. Hey, don’t you remember his speech when he got hired? The vaunted 9 year plan he had at the time before we would get back to winning? How he prepared us for the fact his plan was to be worse 7 years in than when he started while still spending to the cap each year? All going to schedule!
  15. This is all bad news. 1. Aquilini would not have let him go out there if he was close to pulling the pin and firing him. 2. Benning is sitting back again and waiting to see what happens. Be proactive for once. The faster you get rid of rentals, the better chance you have of banking some cap space and eating into the ELC bonuses that are pushed to next year. Also, if he wants to have US teams in on his players, they aren’t going to want to do it at the deadline as quarantine means the guys won’t get in many (if any) games before the playoffs. The rest about only preparing for Pacific division and letting players go because they wanted to fit in Hoglander are nonsense. There was room for Hoglander in any event if he earned a spot. We were short two top 6 wingers, and nothing but good could come out of having Pearson pushed to a 3rd line to make it more effective.
  16. This makes me REALLY worried about us being able to move any rentals out between now and the deadline. This is a decent young player with a contract less than what can be buried in the minors. There is no way he isn't better than the 7th/8th D on every team in the league. If it was one decent player slipping through waivers, maybe there is just something we don't know about that individual. There have been a few this year that raise eyebrows. I guess it might just be a "let the chips fall where they may" season and teams are happy to promote their own taxi squad guys to the active roster and aren't looking for upgrades on the fringes like this.
  17. Benn is trade fodder so should be playing as much as possible over the next couple weeks. Once he is gone, Juolevi can get all the games...
  18. Sorry, Iginla is a BC boy now... he isn’t going to leave the Okanagan to go back to Calgary!
  19. If by that, you mean getting pulled over for drunk driving on the way home from his favourite nightclub after a night with the worst crew ever... then sure... he will absolutely be the next Bertuzzi. (too soon?) :D
  20. He is currently on a 164 goal Pace over an 82 game season if you start counting tonight.
  21. Exactly!! He is on one of his 1 great game out of 12 that happens almost like clockwork. Calgary needs a RW really badly apparently. If they don’t ask Tanev or Markstrom, we may be able to trick them into taking Jake.
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