travel_dude

I was excited when they signed him. More so after his rookie AHL season. I'm glad he doesn;t have to stand in Smith's shadow this season. By the ned of the year, we should have a better understanding of Talbot. He's playing well enough in the Flames darkest hours. When the Flames improve their play, we wills start seeing Talbot's real abilities. Like Rittich, he can be a game stealer.

Just to add a bit... The two council people were against it orinigally. For this to pass, it requires a "super" majority of 10 votes for. This is obviously a move to distance themselves from unpopular spending. After all, the next election in 2020.

Seems like the funding is back in question. https://calgaryherald.com/news/local-news/council-should-reconsider-550-million-arena-deal-woolley?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1574881295 Farkas is going to 2nd the motion.

MAF is only 2 inches taller and maybe 20 pounds heavier, and that is as a 30 year old. Saros is 5'11". With talent, I don't think there is anything stopping a "smaller" goalie from playing well.

And we took Wolf in the 7th round. He's looking pretty good so far (last few years). Wasn't Gillies a consistent .930 in college? Knight has managed slightly better than that for 11 games so far.

I do miss his "Flames from 80 Feet" segments and his podcasts. But, you can't just do that stuff for free, with minimal payback. Man's gotta eat.

I guess the only positive with non-NHL goaltending is that Gillies is playing more consistent recently and Zag is winning games.

You rate players a bit weirdly. Fox is elite? 3rd pairing D on a team that is where it belongs. His ceiling is Barrie, if even that. But your inflamatory posts are alwys appreciated. Basically, the Canes got one season of Ferland out of the deal. Dougie is a very good offensive player still apt to take penalties over making good defensive plays. Ferland is a good player with (unfortunately) one head shot away from retirement. Was crushing it in CAR and still only met came close to a career season. Priced himself out of CAR and ended up taking a bath to play an injury riddled season in VAN. Would easily been welcomed here, but I worry about his health. The trade didn;t hurt us. We ended up taking a bath on the Lucic deal just to get rid of a lousy UFA signing. Ferland and no Lucic. Neal traded for anything. Complain about a trade that actually made us worse.

Is Fox in CAR now? No, he did not want to play for them nor the Flames. Hamilton was traded with Ferland for two players that will be with the Flames for a long time. So, I agree that we gave up a very good player for a very good forward and a decent future #2 D-man. The other things he did are debateable. I don't like his trades much. DRafting has been good.

Hamonic and Ras are the only guys that step up for a player. Only D that is.

The funny thing is that the Oilers have seen the best of Smith and Koskinen, while facing teams struggling or playing a crap goalie. When they play a competitive team or a decent goalie, they fold like a cheap suit. What I find really amazing is that McDavid and Draisaitl are scoring like it's going out of style, and they are still below 2 p/gp. Most games they seem to be scoring in droves. Nothing there to suggest they will slow down, but there has not been anyone scoring 160 points in.....forever.

It's amazing the goalies the Oilers have faced over the start of the season. They get a weakened AVS team, with a goalie who is a backup to a backup. Schneider for NJ. Varly for NYI. Hart at his worst.

I don't think he gets benched for his gritty play going south. I think when he misses assignments, he gets in trouble. They don't fault Tkachuk for being a pest and walking the line, so I think they recognize that from Bennett. As such, Bennett needs to know where the line is. The coach has called him out for his good play more than his penalties. At least in the media.

What I see from Bennett is the failure to get a clean shot away most times. Tries to dange to get away and shoot. Telegraphs his shot, so a stick is on the shot reducing the velocity. When it's a clean shot, it's not on nets, since he trying the perfect shot. I would prefer him to drive the front of the net and stake a claim to it. Let the other team take the penalty for trying to move you, not picking a player trying to defend.

I think they looked at the schedule and figure they would get Talbot two in a row, and let Rittich clean up in game 2 of the B2B. Talbot has gotten the 2nd game too often. He needs to build some confidence and part of that is having a fresh team in front.

Neal is slowing down. One EV goal since October 18th. 2 PPG in the last 13 games. If, at the end of the season Neal is sitting at 20 goals, he will be sat by the coach (by KH demand). Just speculation on my part, but I suspect that would be a tactic used.

He could join the Heat (I think) on an ATO once the season is done. I don't know that would be good, other than him getting the chance to work with our goalie coach. Yikes.

I think he's different from those drafted from a US development league (like Seiloff). He was drafted while playing for a WHL team.

Classic case of a player looking great at a young age. Too young to play in the AHL next season. Too bad there wasn't another option for him. Maybe play in the Swiss league?

Oilers play NJ with Schneider in nets. Woof.

I don't think that applies to EDM. They are getting scoring from their young players and Neal. Strength of schedule for some teams early on pays a big part. EDM had about the 27th easiest schedule in the league. I think they are up to 6 games where they play a team on night 2 of a B2B. Against STL, they faced Allen who has only gotten 4 games this season. Schedules tend to even out. And teams that have a lot of FA's and rookies start to find their legs. NYR should be killing it.

Yeah, I was talking about that elswhere. Smith is starting with the bravado and the waving his hands in the air after a goal. His comment after the win over PITTS was he needed another save to get the next start. I know he felt he was bing funny, but he lets in juicy goals. Just because he has one good game doesn;t make him an All Star. Neal will be wearing the goat horns soon enough. Once the goals dry up and the non-existent defensive play shows up and all he is is a minus player.

Bwahahaha... I keep waiting for him to explode. I keep hoping that they will play him with guys that fit his game. Not sure why Mangiapane should be with Backlund and Tkachuk. He's good, but in a different way. Maybe if they played Bennett on LW and Tkachuk on RW they might have something. We can always hope for the CHL line of Bennett-Monahan-Tkachuk. That leaves JH-Backlund-Lindy, which might not be bad thing. At least right now, since Monahan is struggling to put the puck in. Would be more skill and one finisher. Better defensively, though.

^^^^ His luch is really bad. I don't know if his vision is low or he just reads plays wrong, but he seems to be going the other direction of the puck. A Flames player is has the puck behind the other team's net, he going in on the right side and the puck goes out the other. A point shot is taken, he deflects it up and away. Just don't know what he needs to do. Bring in Jobu?

The Oilers get a bump in the standings whenever they start with a new coach. The narrative starts with play McD less, smart passes from the D-zone and support the goalie. That didn't last very long, though a lot of the extra time is due to playing almost 2 minutes per PP. Smith has been riding an energetic pace team taking advantage of a soft schedule. This week alone they played STL after they played in VAN and NJ after they play us. In October they played 3 or 4 team in the same situation. I guess the other thing we see early in the season is teams trying to figure out the hot goalie for their team. Some goalies with new addresses have been bi-polar this season. ARI is getting Norris level tending from the backup they signed. It levels out after a few months.