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Around the League 2019-2024 Edition

MindzEye said:
In fairness to Edmonton, they're a good team that will look real gud in that division.

Kane-Connor-Jesse
Holloway-Draisaitl-Hyman
Yamamoto-RNH-Foegele
McLeod-Shore-Ryan

That's better and deeper than they've ever been at forward.

- That top line should be really good. Kane is a good/great offensive play driver (dodgy defensively though) and plus finisher. Connor is obviously what he is, and PoolParty is a sneaky solid winger. At minimum, Connor has 2 wingers to play with now and isn't dragging Kassian's or 21 yr old Yamamoto's around anymore.

- 2nd line should be at least okay at 5's. Drais isn't really a centre per se and gives up chances about as often as he generates them, but one of the top 5 players in the league finishes more than the other team finishes against him. Going shot for shot against someone who hits like a train might look okay on the scorecard, but you're going to lose against them usually. Holloway might be fine, might not. If he's not, Yamamoto isn't good, but he has enough skill to not be a trainwreck there. Zach is what we all know him to be. Great engine, good play driver, solid defensively. Good complimentary winger who does a lot of things your skill players probably don't.

- RNH was a nerdies train wreck last year, Foegele was better than his offensive totals suggest and fine here. Yamamoto/Holloway is where this maybe gets dodgy. What does this line do? It can't be your matchup line, surely? Could be a really tertiary offensive line getting the light work...but then wtf is that 2nd line with Leon at C?

- 4th sure looks like a tire fire to me

Overall the forward group is going to score goals but I seriously want someone choosing them as a 110+ point team and a contender to tell me who they're using to match up against opposition bests? Who is taking defensive zone faceoffs here?

Nurse-Ceci
Kulak-Barrie
Murray-Bouchard

Nurse is probably a solid #1, but having Ceci ride shotty on your heavy usage pair sounds like a bad idea. Bouchard might be something, but we've all seen kids murder 3rd pairing competition and not be able to make an impact further up the lineup. Duncan Keith and Russell were both turrible and there could have possibly been some addition by subtraction here....but putting that on Nurse/Ceci alone could be bad. Kulak-Barrie can't be trusted.

Campbell
Skinner

Will probably be a competent tandem. Not having Koskinen sucking dick for 30-40 games a season is a bonus. Any upgrade overall is likely to be marginal though. Mike Smith had been almost a .920 guy over the previous 2 seasons. The potential downside exists here too. Jack is fairly fragile so expect heavy workloads at your own peril. Stuart Skinner had a nice season across AHL/NHL last season, but only has a good, not great pedigree across his WHL & AHL careers. We thought Garrett Sparks was part of the future in our net once too and Sparks was way better in the AHL than Skinner. Calvin Pickard is their insurance ffs. A Jack injury could leave them ugly ugly in net.

It's weird to me that Edmonton's goaltending keeps getting quoted as a strength going into this season and ours is allegedly garbage. But I don't know if I would take Jack-Skinner-Pickard over Murray-Samsonov-Kallgren. At minimum, it's not a crazy comparison at all.
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The forwards are the same as last year, with the possible exception of Holloway, who was a 20/50 type guy in the AHL last year, if he sticks.

People still haven't clued in that guys like RNH and Yamo are legit terrible. RNH's entire value at the moment is picking up assists between McDvaid and Draisaitl on the PP. He can't score or defend at even strength. He's less productive at even strength than any of our top 9 forwards, despite playing plenty with McD and Drai.

Nurse isn't a #1, he's an offensive 2/3. We all saw Ceci and Barrie get beat out by Holl fair and square. Their best hope is Bouchard who might actually be good. But as bad as Keith may have been, he still soaked up all the toughs. Now the usage gets much tougher for the rest.

The goaltending was good last year. Should be similar this year.

Their saving grace, as always, is the terrible division they play in, which boosts their regular season totals (though they still have yet to crack even the top 10 in any season!) and always gives them a chance to have a "deep" 2 round playoffs run.
 
MindzEye said:
It is, but I think process is important. I would rather be the Leafs, with all of their playoff winning issues, but possessing a team obviously talented enough to win the whole fucking thing than I would be a plucky 7th place team that flukes their way past a playoff team or two and gets decimated by the first cup calibre team they play. I personally could give a fuck about winning a round or two, I want the whole thing. Winning a round or two just makes the emotional coping waiting for next year's playoffs easier.
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Right now, yeah, a round or two is just relief from the mediots squawking all offseason, but still sucks.

Prior to this year though, a round or two would've at least demonstrated some fucking postseason progress. Now, it means nothing so we basically have to go from first round zeros to Cup heroes from last season to this one.

I realize that I don't think I've ever typed or written out the word "squawk" before so I couldn't figure out why the red misspelled notification. Not sure the "w" has any business being in that word.
 
MindzEye said:
It is, but I think process is important. I would rather be the Leafs, with all of their playoff winning issues, but possessing a team obviously talented enough to win the whole fucking thing than I would be a plucky 7th place team that flukes their way past a playoff team or two and gets decimated by the first cup calibre team they play. I personally could give a fuck about winning a round or two, I want the whole thing. Winning a round or two just makes the emotional coping waiting for next year's playoffs easier.
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Part of the ''process'' is advancing in the playoffs and not simply saying "oh look we have 2 elite players in M and M so we're better than you".
 
Red Line said:
Part of the ''process'' is advancing in the playoffs and not simply saying "oh look we have 2 elite players in M and M so we're better than you".
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Well, they play that whole 82 game season thing too. We don't think that our club is really good just because we have 2 really good players
 
Bolts are still a good team but damn do they look awful tonight.

Good goalie, Great top line, but everything else is a bit of a mess.
 
still can't quite wrap my head around them hitching their wagon to Sergachev with #1 dman money for the next 9 years when he's been sheltered so hard behind all of Hedman, McDonagh, and Cernak his whole career so far, and has still only looked good not great.
 
Why would you have a segment predicting individual winners before most of them have even played a game?

So dumb.
 
Jack campbell isn't even the best starter in Alberta. Markstrom has a fantastic chance of winning it. Far better D and he will play much more than Campbell.
 
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