conundrumed Posted July 12, 2017 Report Share Posted July 12, 2017 Thought I'd try this out, as there is a "surprise" most years, it seems. From the East, easy, Carolina. They missed the playoffs last year, with too many coaches saying, "god they are well-coached". From the West, Arizona. Oullier for sure, but very unpredictable, they have a ton via draft that are maybe forgotten, but that's a lot of young leaders. Stepan and Hjalmmaron are good adds to what they have, imho. Sclippinger away, but it's always a team we haven't quite seen the potential of. Who is yours? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted July 13, 2017 Report Share Posted July 13, 2017 In the east I see Florida (6 points behind the Canes) making a push as well. No sexy signings but internal growth from a pretty good roster. A few teams in the east over achieved last year so both conferences could see teams that didn't make it in the mix. The west is harder as some top teams didn't improve while the bubble 1s did. None of the 1s advancing will be a surprise but I think you are too optomistic about the "Yotes. The 'Hawks, Sharks & Blues are expected to drop like stones but my gut tells me never to count Chicago out. Despite the gloom & doom we hear I expect them to remain a strong contender that pushes harder once the real season starts. The west is wide open for the taking but I still see the road to the SCF going through Chicago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
conundrumed Posted July 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted July 13, 2017 The reason I think they 'yotes is because many tend to come a year early. I fully understand they're the laughing stock, after the Canucks. Im the 1 in 31 I guess lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MAC331 Posted July 13, 2017 Report Share Posted July 13, 2017 13 hours ago, conundrumed said: The reason I think they 'yotes is because many tend to come a year early. I fully understand they're the laughing stock, after the Canucks. Im the 1 in 31 I guess lol. The East is a funny animal because some teams make the playoffs in spite of themselves like OTT and MON. MON is not even a good team without Price. There can be little doubt that CAR is a team on the rise, not sure I share any enthusiasm with FLA. TB is a mixed bag but dangerous if they get Stamkos back and he can stay on the ice. TOR is the team that will continue to rise IMO if not due to coaching, then Lou is building the team in the right way. The West has more parity IMO this coming season, sorry CON but I think ARZ and VAN will be the weak teams. ARZ has the talent to provide some excitement but not challenge for any playoff spot. Rosters seem to be still fine tuning in the West. You mention the SC still going through CHI, I'm not sure I buy that this year. They are now talking about trading Seabrook and Hossa could be done. DAL could be the bounce back team with better coaching and Bishop in the net. A lot of us have improved our rosters in the West and I think it will be a dog fight to the end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted July 14, 2017 Report Share Posted July 14, 2017 23 hours ago, conundrumed said: The reason I think they 'yotes is because many tend to come a year early. I fully understand they're the laughing stock, after the Canucks. Im the 1 in 31 I guess lol. Their new owner assures the fans they'll build a new "stadium". & then apologizes for the way they dumped Doan. Great way to inspire confidence! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
conundrumed Posted July 14, 2017 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2017 12 minutes ago, Flyerfan52 said: Their new owner assures the fans they'll build a new "stadium". & then apologizes for the way they dumped Doan. Great way to inspire confidence! Hey, I meant longshots to have a surprising year. Never said it would be easy. I'm standing by it ff, somebody has to take the short stick, lol. Unless someone wants to think Van, of course... Dallas is really interesting to me. Keep taking high market $ 30yo's. I don't think that's an "approach", just selling it to the fans. Bring back Hitch, that seems like the right match for older players, but I can see this particular group, Benn-Spezza-Seguin-Radulov, a lot harder to pound your salt into,imo. Time will tell, but it's fun hypothesizing.lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MAC331 Posted July 16, 2017 Report Share Posted July 16, 2017 On 2017-07-13 at 10:48 AM, MAC331 said: The East is a funny animal because some teams make the playoffs in spite of themselves like OTT and MON. MON is not even a good team without Price. There can be little doubt that CAR is a team on the rise, not sure I share any enthusiasm with FLA. TB is a mixed bag but dangerous if they get Stamkos back and he can stay on the ice. TOR is the team that will continue to rise IMO if not due to coaching, then Lou is building the team in the right way. The West has more parity IMO this coming season, sorry CON but I think ARZ and VAN will be the weak teams. ARZ has the talent to provide some excitement but not challenge for any playoff spot. Rosters seem to be still fine tuning in the West. You mention the SC still going through CHI, I'm not sure I buy that this year. They are now talking about trading Seabrook and Hossa could be done. DAL could be the bounce back team with better coaching and Bishop in the net. A lot of us have improved our rosters in the West and I think it will be a dog fight to the end. Can't believe I left out COL as the other weak team in the West. Is anyone else not baffled by what is happening to this once proud franchise ? they need to get rid of Sakic and get new management there. Why in the world would you be trading 2 of your best players that are on good contracts. The guy has no sense of imagination or realization of how to build a team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlbertaBoy12 Posted August 23, 2017 Report Share Posted August 23, 2017 On 7/16/2017 at 8:14 AM, MAC331 said: Can't believe I left out COL as the other weak team in the West. Is anyone else not baffled by what is happening to this once proud franchise ? they need to get rid of Sakic and get new management there. Why in the world would you be trading 2 of your best players that are on good contracts. The guy has no sense of imagination or realization of how to build a team. Im assuming he thinks those two best players are not with this team needs moving forward. I was very young at the time but didnt yzerman almost get traded back in 94 or 95 because people were crying he wasent good enough? My point being sometimes the right player cant take you somewhere or sometimes they can like yzerman did. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted August 23, 2017 Report Share Posted August 23, 2017 1 hour ago, AlbertaBoy12 said: Im assuming he thinks those two best players are not with this team needs moving forward. I was very young at the time but didnt yzerman almost get traded back in 94 or 95 because people were crying he wasent good enough? My point being sometimes the right player cant take you somewhere or sometimes they can like yzerman did. It wasn't he that he wasn't good enough as he was still scoring big time but Scotty Bowman had just taken over & hated that Stevie Y seemed to ignore the defensive side of the game. After a heart to heart talk Yzerman said he'd work on it, the deal with Ottawa was not pursued & Stevie Y went from pure gunner to 1 of the best 2 way players in the game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cross16 Posted September 18, 2017 Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 After the Demers trade I think I have to side with conundrumed here and call the Coyotes the most improved in the West. That is a really nice looking blueline and if they can get guys like Keller and Strome going... the playoffs are not out of the question. Seems like a bold statement but between that D core and Raanta (if he is legit) that's a good looking team. Reminds me a lot of the 15-16 Flames and they could play spoiler. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travel_dude Posted September 18, 2017 Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 36 minutes ago, cross16 said: After the Demers trade I think I have to side with conundrumed here and call the Coyotes the most improved in the West. That is a really nice looking blueline and if they can get guys like Keller and Strome going... the playoffs are not out of the question. Seems like a bold statement but between that D core and Raanta (if he is legit) that's a good looking team. Reminds me a lot of the 15-16 Flames and they could play spoiler. I think they have the right pieces, but wonder why they chose to jetison Smith now. He would have been a great mentor to Raanta for the first year and could have been a difference maker there. An improved team in front of Smith? Sounds familiar. It remains to be seen how the new coach will fare. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cross16 Posted September 18, 2017 Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 10 minutes ago, travel_dude said: I think they have the right pieces, but wonder why they chose to jetison Smith now. He would have been a great mentor to Raanta for the first year and could have been a difference maker there. An improved team in front of Smith? Sounds familiar. It remains to be seen how the new coach will fare. Chance to sell high and they also, based on everything I've read, really like Domingue. I think they were smart to deal Smith when they did because I don't think his value was going to get any higher. They still need alot to go right for them particularly at forward. They need breakouts/good rookie campaigns from more than a few guys so it's unlikely they'll be in the discussion but we said the same thing about the 15/16 Flames. Talent is there and your right alot of this will depend on Tochett too. But I think the days of the Yotes being a push over are done. You are going to need to play well to beat them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
conundrumed Posted September 18, 2017 Author Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 2 hours ago, cross16 said: Chance to sell high and they also, based on everything I've read, really like Domingue. I think they were smart to deal Smith when they did because I don't think his value was going to get any higher. They still need alot to go right for them particularly at forward. They need breakouts/good rookie campaigns from more than a few guys so it's unlikely they'll be in the discussion but we said the same thing about the 15/16 Flames. Talent is there and your right alot of this will depend on Tochett too. But I think the days of the Yotes being a push over are done. You are going to need to play well to beat them. I think it was a move to close a chapter. They didn't go about it in a great way, but it's easy to see, they wanted to move on. The young talent they've acquired is the best in the league, imho. But like everyone else, Cap trouble in a few years. Huge young talent though, they'll be fun to watch. What's interesting is if we took Datsyuk's $7.5 for Chychrun last year, we'd be in the clear. Stone pick up and $3.5/for 3 never would have happened. Bartkowski would have been completely unnecessary. Not even a maybe Chychrun would not have made our top 6 D last year, straight outta camp. Just like Ari. Dammit! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted September 18, 2017 Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 32 minutes ago, conundrumed said: I think it was a move to close a chapter. They didn't go about it in a great way, but it's easy to see, they wanted to move on. The young talent they've acquired is the best in the league, imho. But like everyone else, Cap trouble in a few years. Huge young talent though, they'll be fun to watch. What's interesting is if we took Datsyuk's $7.5 for Chychrun last year, we'd be in the clear. Stone pick up and $3.5/for 3 never would have happened. Bartkowski would have been completely unnecessary. Not even a maybe Chychrun would not have made our top 6 D last year, straight outta camp. Just like Ari. Dammit! A nice thought but we had nothing resembling a 20th & 53rd to send back Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
conundrumed Posted September 18, 2017 Author Report Share Posted September 18, 2017 27 minutes ago, Flyerfan52 said: A nice thought but we had nothing resembling a 20th & 53rd to send back yeahbut yeahbut yeahbut, so, if, when. lol. IF'n Van took Tkachuk, would we have taken Nylander over Juolevi and Chychrun? Scary part. lol.Didn't happen, I get it, but would we have taken Juolevi? I think we would have. Based on zero but instinct. Thanks Van. lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted September 19, 2017 Report Share Posted September 19, 2017 2 hours ago, conundrumed said: yeahbut yeahbut yeahbut, so, if, when. lol. IF'n Van took Tkachuk, would we have taken Nylander over Juolevi and Chychrun? Scary part. lol.Didn't happen, I get it, but would we have taken Juolevi? I think we would have. Based on zero but instinct. Thanks Van. lol. Prior to the draft I was stumping pretty hard for us to take 1 of Juolevi or Chychrun (I forget the order) but I was also totally against taking Tkachuk. Shows how little I know. In my defense (no pun intended for a change) when in doubt I tend to go D, C then wingers. I'm so happy with our current proven NHL D I'd be in a pickle if we had a 1st or 2nd in 2018. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DirtyDeeds Posted September 19, 2017 Report Share Posted September 19, 2017 Dallas and Winnipeg. Dallas easily made the biggest strides to fill shortcomings. I say Winnipeg because all that talent has to breakout sometime. If they .. like us can get a bit better than average goaltending...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travel_dude Posted September 19, 2017 Report Share Posted September 19, 2017 3 hours ago, conundrumed said: yeahbut yeahbut yeahbut, so, if, when. lol. IF'n Van took Tkachuk, would we have taken Nylander over Juolevi and Chychrun? Scary part. lol.Didn't happen, I get it, but would we have taken Juolevi? I think we would have. Based on zero but instinct. Thanks Van. lol. I think it was Nylander or Chychrun, probably leaning towards Chychrun. INstead, we picked our 2017 version this year in Valimaki. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flyerfan52 Posted September 19, 2017 Report Share Posted September 19, 2017 14 hours ago, DirtyDeeds said: Dallas and Winnipeg. Dallas easily made the biggest strides to fill shortcomings. I say Winnipeg because all that talent has to breakout sometime. If they .. like us can get a bit better than average goaltending...... Chevy didn't make many moves but IMO Mason is the best goalie Jets 2.0 have had so that should help. Less injuries to the D would also help. The Jets had 0 games last year with their top 4 in the lineup @ the same time & used a patched together bunch all season with only the rookie Morrissey playing a full 82 games. Kulikov (who I'm not really sold on) was added as insurance. Up front Laine & Elhers look like they'll keep improving as will Scheifele. Wheeler, Little & Perreault are steady vets so the top 6 looks good. Connor & Roslovic look ready to add even more offensense while guys like Lowry, Armia & hopefully Lemieux can add snarl & shutdown. The parts look like they are there, the leaders are antsy to play in May & hopefully June so hopefully they can prove it this year. The plan was draft & develop. It looks like over 1/2 the starters will be draftees so it's time to see proof. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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