travel_dude

What FFIJL said. Wolf is for sure not a sure thing. But passing up potential sure things on D and at F to take a goalie that is also not a sure thing seems risky. And that assumes that a bunch of teams pass on him. If he dropped, it would be a hard decision for us. If we only had Parsons, I would be more inclined to take a goialie. 2nd choice Cossa is a big guy in a small league. Maybe he's the 2nd coming of Koskinen. We need D prospects and wingers and RHS C in the pipeline. And those aren't just immediate needs, they span the next 5 years as well.

And yet Wolf is presently on trajectory for being a starter in 3 years. I don't hate the idea of going all in on Wallstedt, but it leaves us wanting verywhere else. We don't have any prospects on D other than Poirier that have high reward potential.

Yes, I was actually trying to forget that. The biggest problem was one of those trades ended up being a lotto pick. I remember sweating it out. Oilers traded a 1st for Reinhart. Apart from us though, can you name 5 other trades in the last 5 years like that? The only one that comes to mind it JT Miller. Everything else was TDL stuff. Might be more since 2016, but I can't come up with any. That was my point though, not many teams do those trade before the draft.

I don't track it, but I would suggest that the number of 1st round picks traded after the SCF and before the draft are quite low. Moving up and down is a different story. But those mostly are picks for picks. Add into that the upcoming expansion draft and it make the time window so short.

We would like to be able to do this every year. Last year, a pick at 12 and 24 would have netter two NHL players. Possibly no different this year. There's the problem, no team is gving them away. The cap is forcing team to rely more on drafting and adding in FA. That sounds weird, but the bargains are where teams make hay. A lot less trades these days. Montreal did better signing Toffoli than they did trading for and signing Anderson. Foligno was a waste of a 1st for MTL. Was Savard really worth what Tampa paid for him?

Considering that Varly took NY to game 7 and managed to only give up one goal there, Price may have enough.

I'm not as down on the organization as some. I do think we need a hockey mind to do some better pro scouting. Eichel is a top name, but is he the right player to bring here. Many toss around Tkachuk's name as a guy to get you the best return. Me included, but that's more for discussion than anything. Probably the same for most here. What bothers me is that we have only a handful of players that can be used for 5-10 years. Some nice complementary pieces, and some guys that are starting to age not greacefully. This is true of so many teams. A rebuild is out of the question considering where we are at. We could build a decent team with guys like Gaudreau, Tkachuk, Mangiapane, Lindholm, Monahan, Dube, Ras, Valimaki, Hanifin. It's pretty decent top 6 and top 4 depth. But the only ways to do that are drafting, UFA signings and trades. Unfortunately, draftiing or best players in the core will suffer with trades. Or we suck it up and concentrate this year on the bottom 6 and drafting. Trade Gio and Backlund or whatever we can get. Replace internally and with smart UFA signings. But only with guys that fit or can be used properly. Bring up Parsons and let him actually play as a backup. Get him the support he needs to do it. As much as I want to improve the team this year, the options to do so just seem like moving a guy out that works for a guy that may not.

When people say product of, they usually mean where he was born. Loubo always referred to Glencross as he product of Kindersley Sask. So, Ceulemans is in fact a product of Regina, Sask. I guess Leduc, Edmonton and Brooks are not considered Western Canada? The whole pont of my posting this article link was for perpective. Some guys like Button fall in love too easily. A limited showing in the AJHC does not guarantee success. And ranked all over the map, so I agree that at 12 he is a bit of a reach. May be one of the best 1st rounder D's this year. Or could be a Brandon Hickey. Jusk kidding.

An interesting look at Ceulemans: https://flamesnation.ca/2021/06/25/2021-flames-first-round-targets-corson-ceulemans/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter Some of the opinions don't really match the Makar comp. A very limited viewing in AJHC.

They are playing the exact way we couldn't. Vegas would have been a challenging series for us, but I don't think we would have any chance. We might have beaten WPG. Or we might have beat Toronto. I just don't see our team as capable of playing the way you need to to have any kind of run. Sacrificing for the team. Doing everything it takes.

My frustration would be finally getting a rugged D-man that made our defense look better. How many years was it Gio's team where we accomplished nothing. Our D has gone through good players and we didn't make much headway. It's not that I think Gio is the problem, but he hasn't been part of the solution. Tanev helped improve the defense. Gio added 5g and 13a in 5v5 play, plus another 8 points on the PP. Ras was not that far behind him, so have we seen already a significant decline? I'll put a different spin on it. If Gio is behind the changes made by Tkachuk or his supposed frustration, do you choose Gio over Tkachuk? If that is accurate, then we need to not just expose Gio but trade him if Seattle passes on him.

One thing consistent with both semi final series. Reffing has been bad. A tin foil hat person might suggest Bettman wanted Tampa-VGK in the finals.

Who was the best D man on the team this year? It wasn't Go. Expose the guy that had the best numbers in the league? Maybe scoring on the PP isn't everything. Escpecially considering how many minutes of it he played.

Right, I looked at the wrong numbers.

Hey, not bashing him at all. Any team would love to have him. Oiler stink not withstanding... All I am really pointing to is that goalies haven't figured him out yet.

As of right now, we do not have anyone other than Gio or Tanev that we can expose that actually meet the exposure requirements. Kylington - not enough last or two most recent seasons, unsigned RFA Petrovik - same, UFA Stone - meets the 2 year minimum number of games (54 exactly 🙂 ), but not signed. Nesterov - gone Also we need to sign a forward to meet the requirements

So it's Dave Hakstol as the new coach.

Pretty scary team for a one man team, though. Really, when I am watching McD score, I wonder how the goalies fall for his tricks. His "highlight reel" goals are more about turning a D inside out and he has a set of moves he uses on the goalie. A goalie should be stopping about 95% of those, but they look stunned. What sets him apart is the edge work and his ability to handle the puck at full speed. Want to stop him? Don't let him build speed from the D zone.

The chance to play with McD or Drai should have gotten him 20 goals. Chaisson, Kassian, Archibald, Yamamoto all had career years there. It's not like any of these guys actually have 20 goal ability. Kahun played well in CHI.

I think he is always reluctant to discuss in the media. Last summer he may have felt that protecting Gio over Tanev because he wasn't sure what either would be like. Or at the time, he may have had plans to trade for another D or other forwards. I don't know. To me it sounds like he didn't want to say Gio was being exposed. You want to tell Gio that during the season or on the last media availability?

You had me going. Would be odd to draft while the teams are still playing. Imagine MTL trading Josh Anderson during the playoffs for a 1st. Chill out and enjoy the summer. The Oilers are always good fodder for us. Did you know they want to go full time with the reverse retro dark blues? Blech. Almost as bad as Dallas' reverse retro. Well, at least they will get away from puke orange. Didn't like the Ducks use of it and thought the Oilers Orange Crush was just a hoot. Poor Hunter will have to dye his fur.

I really thought that Kahun would thrive as an Oiler. Really did not achieve close to what he should have playing with Draisaitl.

This cynical post didn't age well. For all the individual successes, they made even less noise this year in the playoffs. Now, they will have to build a team from the ground up with around $21m. No depth last year and even less now. Good times.

In Gio's case it doesn't even matter because he is $6.75m in actual and cap. We could easily offer to retain half (prorated of course in season). I don't pay those bills though. A smart GM has that in his pocket to up the ante.

Both the rumors and suggested returns are pipe dreams. Tank? Tank and Kyrou? No thanks. Friday? You mean in July, after the expansion draft? You sounded like you were going to lose sleep tomorrow night.