Drag0nDan

I agree with most of this and think they should and probably will draft more defensemen. Johnson is a wildcard, Lindgren is 18, and everything in the near term is bad. That is the issue - drafting someone this year doesn't help the team likely for at least a year or two. Factor in that the pipeline is pretty barren at almost every level, and you're short depth of some 20 somethings. Losing borgen sucked, cost controlled 3rd pair guy and a righty at that. But looking at the roster i'm not sure what else you could've done. If we used hindsight i guess we trade out 10 for 8 skaters and leave out asplund bjork and mittelstadt. But at the time - that last one could've been thompson

I know a lot has fallen in right for Montgomery... but its a very similar roster to last year. And they are absolutely rocking the league right now. Among the league leaders in goals scored, miles ahead on goals allowed. On a ridiculous points pace. And its his first year - if he doesn't win it, when should he?

He's way too close in AAV to Gaudreau and Huberdeau (similar age at contract signing), considering they signed their deals much later. Rantanen and Kucherov signed around the same time as well and are again far too close. In any case - he's found a home on that line with thompson and tuch. He still draws penalties, he still chirps, and he's still finding greasy areas for rebound goals. At the time a lot of people were concerned on term and what kind of player he'd be towards the end of the deal, and I'm seeing a player who doesn't rely too much on speed. I think he'll be fine.

He's still finding his way - he doesn't know where to be sometimes or when to be there. Takes time.

Makes sense to me - the bench shrinks down to like 3 players in the playoffs and you have a condensed game schedule.

I'd agree on Nylander. I hated that pick - everyone kept saying "Eichel got his winger!". We were terrible, why not draft good players? I think the reason grigorenko is a disappointment is that good players were selected afterwards.

I think Orr would be the pick. The other 3 were on the list behind hasek. Howe is discluded as the majority of his statistical impact happened prior to expansion.

Gretzky, Crosby, Lemieux Jagr, ovechkin Whos missing?

He seems to have gotten over his allergy to shooting. If there is nothing open, don't force a pass - just shoot. Sometimes it goes in.

You will get Olofsson and like it!!

They played a lot better after the first. But the passing was just off all night, turnover city, passes in skates. They were disruptive to anything we tried to do in the neutral zone, and zone entry was an issue all night. Power played really badly. So did Skinner. Thought Anderson was mostly fine. The other goalie played really well to get that shutout.

I meant serious as in off roster IR.

Assuming he clears waivers, he's likely the first call up if the team suffers a serious injury to a forward.

Whats he made like 6 million in his career? I don't think he's going to throw money down the drain.

At the end of the day - they claimed jost... who was not part of the plans earlier in the year. He has essentially taken hinostrozas job, so he's become somewhat expendable.

So... Dahlin has... a shot? maybe? Pastnak should get in. Vasilevsky should be the goalie. I'd guess matthews - which gives them no d-men on the actual all star team. I don't think any of this matters 🙂

Makes sense to me - he might even clear waivers. 9 teams have available cap to sign him without doing other stuff first, and one of them is buffalo (https://www.spotrac.com/nhl/cap/). If Krebs or Jost were hurt, asplund is first off the bench. If it were olofsson or mitts, maybe it'd be Hino? Personally I'd like to get asplund off the bench in general, but as long as olofsson and mitts are here they're gonna play i think. Seems like no one has cap space too, so its going to be a limited market for rentals without moving stuff back. That and everyone and their mother seems to have some level of NMC, NTC,M-NTC these days.

Playing with fire though giving up that much space to Dahlin. You'd have to have your other 3 players trying to prevent cozens and skinner from cross crease dunks to tuch on the same side, and one wrong move sets up dahlin for a 1 timer in the slot.

Seems about right - He seems a natural fit next to Lybushkin. Joker and power have played well together when joker has been available. Dahlin and Sammy seem to have some chemistry as a pair of lefties and make it work. The remaining guys just... Bryson has played freaking terrible this year, but he's also had 0 consistency. Clague stunk it up at first but hes finding his way. Fitzgerald is bad, and no one can convince me otherwise. Pilut can pass and seems a good skater but he can't get the puck out of the zone consistently and seems to second guess when to pressure people at the blue line - he also seems to have that same power allergy to shooting :-).

He was noticeably huge when i sat behind the net a few weeks ago. You cannot teach that kind of size, he just needs to figure out how to use it better and just generally how to play with more ownership. Dictate what you want people to do - it takes time. It's like catching in baseball - you can hit well and teams won't put you behind the plate if you can't call a game for the pitching. There's communication, there's reps, there's just... learning that speed.

Hey now, we're all friends here.

Different players need different metrics too. I don't need an xGF metric to see what my eyes tell me in that tage has a nasty shot, and some dirty dangles. He can shoot, create space, and deke the goalie. Thats a star player. But if you wanted to evaluate Krebs, or Mittelstadt utilizing analytics. This is a nice piece of data to have them digest when they re-watch their games. Your xGF is low because... your corsi is low because... and what pieces of your game you can improve upon to clean it up.

Offensively, he could shoot a little. He can't be useful on a PP though because he was a giveaway machine. His stretch passes constantly hit people in the skates, or miss them entirely. And he was always reacting to where people ARE not where they are going to be, or where he thinks they should be. Just too reactionary. Defensively, a lot of the same problems. No trust in his teammates or pairing, constantly chasing, and doesn't put pucks where they should be going. He holds it too much in the zone, chases hits, etc. 0 Points is Lybushkin level though. This means he isn't shooting (27 shots in 26 games would mean a career low pace), and the stretch passes are coming from his line mate. I think he's playing with Provorov so that makes some sense - Provorov is a better passer and shooter.

Justify the trade most likely.

Bryson is caught out of position too much. Fitz seems a touch slow, and his stick always seems to fall out of his hands. Pilut isn't a great defenseman at taking the puck away, but he moves it OK for the most part. He was better in this one at challenging forwards a bit more on zone entry. He at least seems to be the best fit from a style perspective. The key i think to him and dahlin working together so well is - it isn't just one of them that plays on their off side exclusively. They fluidly kind of move to either side and both play each side pretty well.