2019-2020 Western Conference Final Standings

[Bubble Man]

8 minutes ago, IBatch said:

Not bad.   I can’t disagree with a lot of this with the exception of SJ.  I wasn’t surprised EK stayed but have said for a while that this team is on the decline even though their window is still open, much like PIT but even older.  One of those guys left in Pavelski who’s still probably going to be decent for a year or two, the other wasn’t re-signed in Thornton who still is good enough to play a decent 2nd line center but you never know when he’s going to decline further, could be this year.   And Burns is going to be done in two or three years as in a Norris caliber guy and regress too.  They are like we were five years ago.  The difference is Wilson won’t rebuild he’s a re-tool all the way sort of guy and seems to make it work.  But he’s going to have to pay the piper at some point and I think EK will maybe keep them a bubble team at best until it pops.

 

Last year they had some bad spells.  Jones has seemed to regress, fixing that position would go a long way in keeping them relevant (if they had Gibson I wouldn’t be talking about them nearly as much, but they don’t). 

 

Im also not as bullish on NSH.  They seem to have issues, losing Subban will hurt a bit, adding Duchene might balance the hit and put them up.  Rinne is in the twilight of his career and their back-up wasn’t as a bright light last year as he was the year before.  Not saying we are better then them, would say somewhere in between marginally and a different league.  I would definitely swap Vegas with SJ.   Vegas (I’m jealous) added Stone, Patches and MAF still has the stuff (and would have beat SJ handily if not for that Pavelski hit, and all there guys are back basically, not SJ though) at least for now I’d say we are in a different league then them.

 

On paper at least both wild cards look to be coming from the Central.  We have decent odds of fighting for the third spot in our division.   Vegas, CAL, SJ/VAN would be my bets for 1,2,3 and of course on paper is NEVER the same as what the experts say will happen so we do have decent odds that one of the wild cards will come from our division, and slim odds both even.  

 

I also believe we are a team on the rise, EP is also an if...you have to think one of two of those ifs we will hit on and when he does explode, watch out.

The problem with a young core is you can’t in any way bank on their trajectory. Look at Colorado’s road to where they are today. They scratched their way into the playoffs, then regressed, regrouped and progressed again. Their cycle off the top of my head has gotta be around 10 years. That is what I am fully preparing for. An up and down road that we are maybe half way through. 2024-25 is honestly where I see an Art Ross EP, a Vez Marksrom and a Selke Horvat. Everything could go right and we could finish 1st in the pacific, everything could go wrong and we could be in the ghetto with LA. 

[mikeyman109]

7 minutes ago, Bubble Man said:

The problem with a young core is you can’t in any way bank on their trajectory. Look at Colorado’s road to where they are today. They scratched their way into the playoffs, then regressed, regrouped and progressed again. Their cycle off the top of my head has gotta be around 10 years. That is what I am fully preparing for. An up and down road that we are maybe half way through. 2024-25 is honestly where I see an Art Ross EP, a Vez Marksrom and a Selke Horvat. Everything could go right and we could finish 1st in the pacific, everything could go wrong and we could be in the ghetto with LA. 

Theres a lot of room for improvement and everyone knows the injury bug hurt last season and the season before. But injuries happen every season its just to which extent.

Theres no reasojn in my mind not to expect a jump up in the standings with a better D core and the addition of Miller to an emerging top 6. If Pearson and Horvat can gel and Beartschi stays reasonably healthy its not a bad top 6. They could make the playoffs this year and miss again the next or vice versa. Every year a team surprises, bad and good. If they get the same goal tending they got last season its possible to make the playoffs.

I am however jealous of what i see as Colorado's future. They look scary good

[IBatch]

18 minutes ago, Bubble Man said:

The problem with a young core is you can’t in any way bank on their trajectory. Look at Colorado’s road to where they are today. They scratched their way into the playoffs, then regressed, regrouped and progressed again. Their cycle off the top of my head has gotta be around 10 years. That is what I am fully preparing for. An up and down road that we are maybe half way through. 2024-25 is honestly where I see an Art Ross EP, a Vez Marksrom and a Selke Horvat. Everything could go right and we could finish 1st in the pacific, everything could go wrong and we could be in the ghetto with LA. 

Me too.  I never thought this core would have a remote chance in hell of contending, no team does that back-to-back (top to top team with completely different cores).  I figured our best chance would be the parts of this core with parts of the next core,  and that the best we could realistically expect MAYBE a WCE level team.  And they got a pile of riches from Linden and Stajanov.  

 

Now I’m not so sure.  Likely they will bounce jn and out of the playoffs for a few years and then have a run of two or three years as a bubble contender where anything might happen.  Three years is when I expect whatever window they have to open, how long it will remain open depends entirely on who we can keep once they reach UFA status (much like PIT and Boston) and who else they have coming up behind EP, Hughes, Podz and Boeser...Horvat might be traded or gone by then.   A lot could happen by then.   One things for sure, much like Detroit we are going through the aches and pains of years of winning.

Maybe it works maybe it doesn’t, but I’m cautiously optimistic with this group, third group of 21 and unders might move up to 1 or 2 now that we have Podz plus in our group, and when those guys are in their prime we could have a shot.