• Moderators, please send me a PM if you are unable to access mod permissions. Thanks, Habsy.

2021 Hurricanes Post Season/Summer Thread

Status
Not open for further replies.
The expansion draft is going to be fun because there will be quite a few trades to get teams into spots where they can either hold onto a current asset which means dealing away someone else off their current roster or Francis and the Kraken can broker some side trades after the fact to stockpile some draft pick capital like Vegas did before them.
 
I also think Reimer and Mrazek will not be retained
Here's the thing with those two.

Reimer is gone, I think. I can talk myself into a scenario where he signs a cheap deal here, but I honestly don't know why. He would be fine as a classic backup playing 15-20 times a year. But, Carolina prefers to platoon, and he's just not that guy anymore ... if he ever was.

Mrazek ... I dunno. I think he's blown his chance to grab a real starting job here, mostly because he can't stay healthy. But if you're going to go find a guy to platoon with Ned, are you going to do better than Mrazek? You could 100% do worse. If the money works, I could see him coming back, mostly because this is the best team he's going to get a sniff with. Otherwise ... what? Detroit again? Buffalo? Backing up somewhere else? I suspect he's done here, but I'm not convinced.
The expansion draft is going to be fun because there will be quite a few trades to get teams into spots where they can either hold onto a current asset which means dealing away someone else off their current roster or Francis and the Kraken can broker some side trades after the fact to stockpile some draft pick capital like Vegas did before them.
Remember that we're dealing with Ron Francis in the GM's chair. Acting like he's going to be swashbuckling deals all over the map doesn't ring true to me. He's repeatedly told people he's going to commit as little money as possible in the expansion draft, yet writers keep acting like Seattle is taking that expensive under-performing veteran off their team's hands. Yeah ... if there are actual deals and fireworks, cool. But Francis plays it cool and cautious 90% of the time. I expect boring.
 
I'd miss him more if he wasn't making $4.5 million in Chicago and wasn't getting noticeably slower every year
That’s year 3 of the 4 year/$18.2 million deal he signed here. And he only played 29 games last year and 44 this year, so he’s missed 53 of their last 126 games.
 
Congrats. You made me miss him even less.
That’s year 3 of the 4 year/$18.2 million deal he signed here. And he only played 29 games last year and 44 this year, so he’s missed 53 of their last 126 games.
Wasn’t saying I want him back but rather that it’s easier to make things work with a stay at home solid defenseman like him than with offensive guys. Especially when those offensive guys are not.

I think for all the offensive threat Dougie brings it’s a trade off on what it means your forwards have to be responsible for covering.
 
Another thought on Dougie ...

The unavoidable truth about Carolina's situation as they try to move from B level contender to A level contender is that you need elite offensive talent, especially on your power play. Dougie didn't even have all that good an offensive year this season and he still managed to drive the PP to first in the league for the biggest chunk of the season. Half of his assists came with the man advantage. Take that away and ... what? Bean is a child. Gardner is a decade older than his birth certificate. Free agents? Any right shot guys on the market this year? Not really. The only UFA D in Dougie's league is Tyson Barrie and God knows which version of him you'd be getting.

Honestly. It's one thing to talk about moving on from Dougie and a completely different conversation to talk about replacing him ... and even more different to talk about getting better while replacing him. It ain't that simple.
 
Here's the thing with those two.

Reimer is gone, I think. I can talk myself into a scenario where he signs a cheap deal here, but I honestly don't know why. He would be fine as a classic backup playing 15-20 times a year. But, Carolina prefers to platoon, and he's just not that guy anymore ... if he ever was.

It seems that Ned has played himself into, and Mr Azek has played himself out of (and likely off the team), a full time starter's role. Do you think Brindy will still want to platoon Ned with another goalie, no matter who that turns out to be? It seems to me that Brindy did a platoon system because none of the goalies really proved themselves to be a solid, consistent #1. Until Ned had shown himself to be one, that is.
 
Canes fans have NEVER liked offensive D men. I take all this let him walk and wave goodbye" talk with a grain of salt. Coach likes him. He likes it here. We need him here. You aren't going to replace him with a rookie/free agent. He's one of the top ranked scoring D men in the league. How many of the rest of that elite group want to come here for 8m or less? None.
 
....

Mrazek ... I dunno. I think he's blown his chance to grab a real starting job here, mostly because he can't stay healthy. But if you're going to go find a guy to platoon with Ned, are you going to do better than Mrazek? You could 100% do worse. If the money works, I could see him coming back, mostly because this is the best team he's going to get a sniff with. Otherwise ... what? Detroit again? Buffalo? Backing up somewhere else? I suspect he's done here, but I'm not convinced.

.....
Seattle?

Or Toronto....or Edmonton.... He will have lots of options to consider.
 
It seems that Ned has played himself into, and Mr Azek has played himself out of (and likely off the team), a full time starter's role. Do you think Brindy will still want to platoon Ned with another goalie, no matter who that turns out to be? It seems to me that Brindy did a platoon system because none of the goalies really proved themselves to be a solid, consistent #1. Until Ned had shown himself to be one, that is.
Yes. I expect a platoon again next year ... although I think Rod is open to the balance shifting a bit, I don't think he's going to move away from splitting the load more equally than most NHL teams do. He's talked about his belief that most clubs over-play their starters, and that he thinks it's bad for both guys. Especially looking at Ned as a possible 1A, I think we'll be looking at a decent veteran as the 1B ... that's why I'm less certain than some about Mrazek being done here. He might well be ... but he's a solid fit and if the money's right then he's better than a lot of the easy options. There's a lot of old guys and dreck on the UFA goalie list. You could do worse than Petr for sure.
 
Canes fans have NEVER liked offensive D men. I take all this let him walk and wave goodbye" talk with a grain of salt. Coach likes him. He likes it here. We need him here. You aren't going to replace him with a rookie/free agent. He's one of the top ranked scoring D men in the league. How many of the rest of that elite group want to come here for 8m or less? None.
Agreed.

One issue for long time Cans fans is the fact that they won a Cup with a defense by committee approach. It was 100% lightning in a bottle, but it worked. The fact that nobody's done it since or that nobody who's any good right now is trying to get by with 6 moderately mobile defense-first guys doesn't seem to really bother anybody.

Folks want to let Dougie walk? Then they should have been kicking and screaming when they lost Adam Fox.
 
You still have to have a second guy in net capable of playing 25-30 starts next year...Ned could very easily be the #1 guy, but asking him to carry a 60+ game load is too much to ask. I think the Canes will perhaps want to try something completely different to change things up and steer away from Mrazek and Reimer in search of a decent 1B. Those are out there it just takes some creativity either by trade or free agent signing and it's not all dreck.
 
Folks want to let Dougie walk? Then they should have been kicking and screaming when they lost Adam Fox.
Adam Fox was never playing here just like he was never playing a game in Calgary...that kid is good but kicking and screaming about losing him would have been a complete waste of energy...and for the record I do agree that Dougie type right shot, first pairing offensive D do not grow on trees...and please just say no 1000 times to Tyson Barrie!!!
 
Adam Fox was never playing here just like he was never playing a game in Calgary...that kid is good but kicking and screaming about losing him would have been a complete waste of energy...and for the record I do agree that Dougie type right shot, first pairing offensive D do not grow on trees...and please just say no 1000 times to Tyson Barrie!!!
Not my point, really ... it's a matter of intentionally false equivalence to make a point.

But again, if you want him gone and don't want him replaced with Barrie .... then who exactly? And it doesn't have to be a right shot. Without Dougie, you need a serious, big boy PP1 point guy if the Canes are going to be the contender they want to be. I'm just waiting for somebody (anybody) in the Dougie Must Go Camp to show me a viable replacement. I'm not throwing bricks at you CC ... just shouting into the wind a bit.
 
Dougie is an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He frustrates the crap out of me half of the time. I think he’s often lackadaisical defensively. But he is decent on the point on the PP. I don’t know how you replace that. I also think we’re better when he’s not on the first pair 5v5. I think I don’t want to break the bank to get him back. If he does come back we need our d Corp structured differently.
You can’t have to protect Dougie, Hakenpa, Bean and sometimes Skjei. You need to have a reasonably solid pairing you can throw out there aside from Slavin and Pesce.
I guess Slavin and Dougie is fine if Pesce and whoever is rock solid and your third pair is competent.

or, considering how we gave up 6 goals in 3 losses maybe we ought to be looking at the forwards. Our d and goaltending wasn’t the problem.
 
I'm just waiting for somebody (anybody) in the Dougie Must Go Camp to show me a viable replacement. I'm not throwing bricks at you CC ... just shouting into the wind a bit.
I'm not in that camp, I'm more of the camp of being a realist when it comes to Dundon and how he chooses to spend his money. Dougie at the right price and I think it's a no brainer to bring him back, but the agent is going to want a payday, and most of the time when crazy season begins...they chase the dollars more than the fit. There is no real replacement for Dougie if he decides to leave, the NHL just has always had a shortage of those right shot, first pairing guys that put up lots of points. I wish Bean would have shown more potential as the season went on, but the reality is the kid was in over his head even on a second pairing with Dougie in the lineup.
 
Dougie is an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He frustrates the crap out of me half of the time. I think he’s often lackadaisical defensively. But he is decent on the point on the PP. I don’t know how you replace that. I also think we’re better when he’s not on the first pair 5v5. I think I don’t want to break the bank to get him back. If he does come back we need our d Corp structured differently.
You can’t have to protect Dougie, Hakenpa, Bean and sometimes Skjei. You need to have a reasonably solid pairing you can throw out there aside from Slavin and Pesce.
I guess Slavin and Dougie is fine if Pesce and whoever is rock solid and your third pair is competent.

or, considering how we gave up 6 goals in 3 losses maybe we ought to be looking at the forwards. Our d and goaltending wasn’t the problem.
Realistically, those two pairings (Slavin with Hamilton and Pesce with Skjei) are perfectly fine. If you're looking for something a whole lot better, you're not really finding it in the NHL. Look around a bit and tell me I'm wrong. You'll find guys with better reputations, but not better results. Do those guys sometimes have breakdowns? Sure, but so do every other pair in the league. The third pairing? Have you guys seen some of the third pairings even playoff teams are trotting out? It's carnage out there for competent defensemen. There's a reason Carolina's castoffs couldn't cut it here but get thrown into bigger roles elsewhere ... and it ain't because the Canes don't know how to use them.
 
I think I’m having a hard time being objective. I feel like the wheels came off in April and that frustrates me. There were lots of reasons we lost. One was we had very few guys playing to their established levels for whatever reason. And still we competed.

I think when we’re on our game we’re every bit as good as Tampa.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top