travel_dude

If the pending birth has any impact, it would line up with two other goalies that faced the same decline in "focus" or general play. Talbot in EDM - as much the play in front of him, but he looked worse Markstrom in CGY - seemed to impact him a lot. I would say that they gave Talbot some time, but as usual dumped on him. Fans probably dumped on Markstrom more than the team did. Then again, both goalies declined, but how much was coaching and how much team in front?

The funny thing is I thought Zary was a RHS. Don't know why I was thinking that. I am loathe to disturb every other line just to try Huberdeau while he is playing poorly. Almost every pass he tries goes into the other team's skates. To put him with Backlund, we had to move off Pospisil. A line that worked well. Through no fault of his own, Govich got 4th line'd. Ruzicka got the bump all the way from 4th to 1st. I would think that if you still want Mangiapane on the top line, play him at LW and Govich on RW. Mange-Lindholm-Govich Zary-Kadri-Pospisil Huberdeau-Backlund-Coleman Ruzicka-Dube-Duehr Let the middle 6 continue and see if it works for both lines. Govich gets the bump to the position he likes and Mange to his natural position. Ruzicka with Dube might work out. Don't know, nothing seems to work with Dube. Greer sits out because of wanting the RHS. Either that or you shift over to Greer-Ruzicka-Dube; we know Dube can play RW.

Pretty hard to coach Huberdeau much worse than last year. RW for how long? Anyway, point is taken about the players, but really, what has changed with the coaching other than a harder more toxic coach to a more positive coach using almost the same ideas. Win, mix the lines. Lose, mix the lines. Push a guy down to the 4th line after a good game. Defensesystem changed and PP supposedly changed but looks like a carbon copy without a sniper. The biggest difference in skill/possession comes from the loss of Toffoli. Not the fastest guy but he scored goals and held onto the puck. No top RW this year and we have tried every possible RW there. Nothing has worked. Lindholm looks like he doesn't care about scoring. Mangiapane the latest guy to play RW. Out of the F group, there are maybe 6 that are playing what I consider to be at the right level. In no particular order; Zary, Govic, Pospisil, Coleman, Kadri. Others that are playing okay, but not quite right: Backlund - slow start as per usual, but is playing better than Lindholm Mangiapane - part is good, part is bad (like cheap penalties) Greer - not expecting a lot, so he is fine Ruzicka - started strong, but moved around to too many lines and positions to get back to his game The rest have had maybe one good game each but can't seem to do much with the puck. I think we need to target players that drive the play. Losing Gaudreau set us back the most, and you see it how they struggle to do anything on the rush.

I know it was Campbell, but it's good to see the Wranglers (and Kerins) continue to play well. We have two of our best prospects on the team now, so good to see others contribute.

Watching Zary I am seeing what I expected to see from Huberdeau. The kid has mitts like butta. As much as Huberdeau is important to get going, the other lines are much more critical. Huberdeau is in a funk and needs to play his way out of it. He will start doing things he hasn't tried, you know like shooting the dang puck? Keep him away from the kids. Put him with Backlund, where the damage now is limited. I'm fine with that. He still gets minutes and maybe Backlund's zone entries will instill some confidence in him playing more aggressive in the O-zone. Backlund is going to take most of the shots, but he often passes. Push Hubey to shoot. And speed up the decision making. I think our struggles on the top line come from Lindholm. He's good defensively but can't seem to match up against other lines well. Loses too many battles. His shot seems to be on vacation. We were always a top line team, but we don't have a top line now. I would play Kadri's line as the top line and gift Lindholm with soft zone starts and competition.

I couldn't find the chat either.

Naw I'm good. No desire to watch it.

Well, I haven't seen anything to suggest Ruzicka would be comfortable on RW. He had initial struggles adapting from lifelong C to LW. Huberdeau can't play RW, at least with Kadri. Nothing in what I have seen suggest he would be able to play RW on any line. I would go with the new lines for 10 games. We need some consistency. You can give Govich special teams time to get him more play. Dube probably should only be 10 minutes right now. He's been good on the PK though. Also consider double shifting Govich in Pospisil's spot if he's going. But saying that, Pospisil is playing his minutes well. He generally gets 11 minutes average.

No big surprise today with Markstrom healthy enough to start against Montreal. The emergency conditions no longer eist, so Wolf assigned back to AHL. Hope they are able to look past the dreadful play in front of him to truly assess his NHL play.

That would be our trend. We used to have the most expensive 4th line in the NHL.

If this was the only game where we saw a bad start or a serious letdown, I would say the YYZ transit and game was the cause. And tired has a way of impacting the mental side more than the physical side. But we have seen too many games like this. I can't really point to one lineup and say it was the best or the worst, we tend to see half the roster playing well and the others meh. I don't always find Steinberg to be factual in the way he shows the lines, since it sometimes seems like he has the wings reversed. I thought that until I saw Zary playing LW. Now we have RHS Zary on LW and LHS Pospisil on RW. What I like about the changes is that two guys playing their butts off have are playing in the top 6. Ruzicka hasn't been much since returning, but to be fair he was relegated to a mixed up 4th line. And he was doing well before the injury. The 4th line (except Govich) has players that have done little in the last 5 games. Moving Dube to C might be a decent enough move, since he's good on faceoffs. Huberdeau is doing nothing with Lindholm, but he has to own that. He's not willing to shoot. He will anticipate a spot that the player isn't going to get to. I don't know that Backlund is the best partner for him, but at least he will be in the O-zone more often. What I don't like is that here we are at the 15 game point and we still don't know who makes up the top 6. Every move seems to be getting Huberdeau going. Whay not focus on the rest of the players that are going and coach Huberdeau on using his tools better. Show him tape of every pass he attempted where he had a lane to the net or the pass was the worst choice available. Other teams know he's not shooting.

Is it any surprise though? There was not any consistent lines in camp, especially with Kadri missing most of it. I can't remember what line Pelletier was playing on, but I suspect it one you wouldn't expect. I'm somewhat guessing this has more to do with Huberdeau's lack of chemistry with anyone. But honestly, everyone else including Govich deserves to play above Hiberdeau right now. If yo go with that logic, then top line replaces Huberdeau with Ruzicka (as noted in practice line). 2nd line unchanged from last two games. (best line on the team). 3rd line remains unchanged (2nd best line). 4th line is Huberdeau-Dube-Duehr. I know what you are saying, we should be sticking to a lineup for 5 games minimum, win or lose. The problem with that is we see uninspired games or starts like the Ottawa game. Or the Oilers game (previous consistent lines).

I support these lines only because it keeps Pospisil in the top 9. Govich with Dube and Duehr isn't a bad idea. Keep Dube in the middle of the ice. I tend to think you need Ruzicka on the wing, so this may be the best fit. It does highlight the lack of true RW's we have. Pospisil and Mange have been more successful on LW, but whatever. No worse than the lack of consistent play on Saturday.

The mess that Sutter left will be felt for some time. From the losing of players were traded for to settling for a meh coach to a divided room to the perception we needed to change only the D systems....That is the hardest part of the start to the season. The bad habits have crept back in. The divided room is still in turmoil. The new captain isn't putting his stamp on the team. We have a boat load of pending UFA's that we seem to have no idea how to deal with. Priortize one guy and then get nowhere. The non-priority guys feel slighted or decide they want to ask for a lot more due to the rising cap. We are neither a last 10 team by end of the year nor a top 10. We will start playing better as December and January creep closer. We have young guns that are showing the vets how to play. They have invigorated 2 lines. We should deal with one or two of the pending UFA's and ship them out. It doesn't have to be a home run trade. Just a single or double. Advance the runners. That way we are not left at TDL trying to be a seller when we are still in the running for a playoff spot. You can still trade one or two then and not kill your chances. But you have to have a plan. Not signing guys now is not doing anything to address it. You want Tanev or Zaddy? Make it clear to them what the plan is and back it up with offers and moves. Lindholm has soured because we have no plan. Hom and Backlund both wanted to see us do something to improve. Our solution was do nothing other than one trade and a waiver claim.

He wasn't punted per se. He quit before the Flames decided it was a firing offence. But, yes it's a double standard. Babs punted. Q punted. Coffee hired and placed. EDM is the biggest OBC team remaining in the NHL. CHI still has issues but seems to escape criticism more than other teams.

So the team finally wins a game and they fire the coach and replace him with OBC (Old Boys Club). If McD's injury is impacting Craisaitl, abbility to score, and the only scoring happens off his passes, then the problem is you built a one line team and have overspent on so called depth to play with him. Woody didn't make the team, he made them try to play as a team. I don't think he's good or bad, just the guys there can't seem to execute. Not often do you fire a coach with a tilted win/loss record like he had. Before McD's injury, he looked normal. Now he looks like an everyday player that is struggling. Again, not so much a coaching issue. Every player on that team that got a big payday played with McD on the PP when they got career numbers. Hyman excepted since he was paid to play with McD. The rest like Nurse and Bouchard and Kane and Nuge were rewarded for being part of a passing play resulting in PP goals.

The stats weren't kind to Wolf, though I have only seen the GA and SA% for this one start. We take our top goalie prospect who has been waiting in the AHL to play for a long time. Best goalie there for like 2 years. He gets the call and has to be backup while the team is fresh and can score goals. Vladar gets lit up a bit, and some maybe were weak sauce, but mostly it was an onslaught. What does Wolf get? The 2nd half of a B2B where the team did just enough to not get shutout themselves. Did they make his job easy? Took 4 stright penalties in the 2nd, including the 2 man advantage one. Scored zero goals on their PP. They barely touched the puck in the 3rd. Backlund may have been the only choice for captain, but he sure is doing nothing to gel this team. I don't know if they do media scrums on the road much, other than one offs, but does he say anything? Anything, like the usual stuff our player have said, gotta be better, embarassed, etc. Don't know. I've seen Huska talk, maybe it's too early to see those pressers.

I would agree. I wonder if having too many bench guys with less experience is hurting them. Savard and Huska both are relative rookies at their present level. What I will never understand about hiring him was why they decided to clean house, but only really clean the bathroom.

He wasn't what we needed on the Flames right now, since you can't expect him to gel with guys that are not playing well. I suppose you could have played him with Zary and Kadri, but I think you have to look at the bigger picture. Developing his 2 way game is as important as him playing in the NHL.

That is likely, but as likely is they will overreact and make some dumb decisions. Fire the coach may change the fortune short term, but I don't think he's that bad a coach. Make some desperate trade. They can't just trade picks, so big salary going out is needed for any deal. Just signed Campbell so nobody is taking that deal. Top 5 forwards have NMC and Nurse does too. The rest is depth not making a ton. Bouchard would get them a decent haul, but what does that solve? As I said, more likely to panic than let it ride.

I read it wrong. Tied with Zadina and the Sharks. I read it as points by the player. My brain deleted some words when I read it, but other than being a Sharks player, what does Zadina have to do with the comp?

#Flames projected tonight in Toronto per the team: Huberdeau-Lindholm-Mangiapane Zary-Kadri-Sharangovich Pospisil-Backlund-Coleman Greer-Ruzicka-Dube Weegar-Andersson Hanifin-Tanev Zadorov-DeSimone Vladar Duehr scratched.

Dead last? They have more than 5 points.

It all makes sense then. I guess the bump by Weegar did more than we thought.

Looks like Vladar the starter and Wolf the backup. Let the rumors start.