Taro T

As soon as he said he considered the player to be a Hab and a Blue along with being a SC champion in the 80's suspected it was Lalor. But didn't remember ANYONE talking about him being a Buffalo boy. So, checked him on HockeyDB and figure he must be the guy @dudacek was talking about because he played for all those other teams that were mentioned as well.

Pretty sure the reason nobody got his name is he was born in Ft. Erie.

Does it actually? Or is it just more noticable because there's less actual hockey talk to relegate it back to the level of background noise? Expect it stays pretty consistent but there is a real seasonality (another insight from the No Schlitz Sherlock department 😉) to the level of hockey talk and new subjects within that category that we get to talk about.

Would never work. You'd never be able to get the plutonium.

No we aren't. The replies merged.

Marcus Foligno was mentioned but not Nick? That seems to be an oversight. Todd Marchant too.

What about Timmy Kennedy?

Nah. Already know (or am reasonably certain) he's never been in my kitchen.

What if we have no f'n idea who he is? Do we need to open the thread in that case?

They aren't. 11 made a new thread. The posts in the new thread aren't the original posts from the old thread.

It appears the thread was deleted. When a thread is deleted, nobody under the rank of moderator has the "permission" to view any of the posts in the topic. That is what seems to be going on. Really doubt anybody had a problem with any "innocuous" posts.

The same goaltending they ended the year with. The same goaltending they entered the league year with. That is how they are running back the same goaltending. You do realize that, but figured would respond anyhow.

The other awful part of needing 2 more points last year to get to the playoffs. That plan of seeing how things work out without making any goalie upgrade beyond Levi wouldn't have been horrible (just bad) had they been in the playoffs last year. (That, and Okposo could've retired with a clear conscience.) But for the fans' psyches they really need to make the playoffs this year. And running back the same goaltending makes that less likely. (Not unlikely; just less likely.)

Oooooo-kaaay. What does ANY of that have to do with how healthy the team may or may not be this season?

Yeah, the Aisles are the "obvious" choice to expect to fall out of the playoffs this coming year. They have to be so on their game at all times because they simply aren't going to outscore anybody. Low to mid-90's seems to be what they should get over the course of the season and that shouldn't be good enough. Figure one other team will also drop out. On paper, as they continue to age, if Vasilevskiy slips at all like he did down the stretch TB would seem to be a logical guess to be the other one to falter; but until he actually falters for a full year, hard to expect he will. If Shesterkin doesn't stay healthy, could see the Rags slipping too; but if he's healthy expect they're a lock for top 3 in their division.

And, though said above personally prefer Comrie as the backup over UPL, expect that Granato, Bales, and Adams would run the other way. (Though down the stretch, the guy that was dressing as the backup nearly every game was Comrie even though he got almost no starts.)

Personally expect the healthiness was due to a few reasons besides luck which if correct would mean they should stay relatively healthy again this year. Those include: 1. strategic play - e.g. they don't go as out of their way to block shots as other teams do and a significant portion of their injuries came from blocking shots: Lyubushkin, Samuelsson, and Tuch at a minimum missed time with blocked shot injuries; 2. Improved training and recovery methods - those should be sustainable; 3. Youth - except for extremely unlucky events (Quinn's achilles injury) young guys tend to have way fewer soft tissue injuries than older guys do because their tendons and ligaments etc are more supple than they'll be when they're hitting 30 and this team will once again be one of the youngest in the league. Also, have not looked at the overall injury #'s from last year, but don't believe they were significantly healthier than other teams in goal and on D but they absolutely were crazily healthy at F last year. While (even taking Quinn out of the conversation) don't expect they'll stay that healthy again up front; they very easily could stay as healthy or healthier in net and on D.

Experience was a part of it. Staying healthy was another part of it. '73-'74 was doomed by injuries, mediocre goaltending, and inexperience. 2 of those were improved the next season.

He DID have a backup plan last year and the year before. THAT's not the issue. The issue IS he was unable to execute his plan A (or apparently plans B or C either) either year. Guessing plan A didn't happen this year either but there's still a lot of runway left this summer for it to possibly come to fruition. The "backup" plan this year is to run with Levi and one of Comire or UPL (personally would prefer the #2 to be Comrie rather than UPL should it come to that, hopefully it doesn't) as the backup with the other getting claimed trying to get through waivers making Tokarski the emergency plan goalie. Adams has a fallback in place at all 3 levels (F, D, and G) at present. The team is good enough that it should make the playoffs even without any other moves (even with Quinn out for up to 1/2 the season) but there isn't much room for error. It remains to be seen if any of Adams higher ranked plans get executed before puck drop October 12 in MSG. Could envision this team as currently constructed getting to 110 points; but 100 is more likely. And 100 doesn't leave much cushion for injuries nor sophomore slumps. Would really like to see some more moves to get the Expected Points up to the 106-110 range. Won't mean they'll get there, but should make it more likely they do.

Actually, for whatever reason, it probably ISN'T "done" (as in signed by both sides). The team is required to submit all signed contracts to the league office by 5PM the day after a contract has been signed by the player. Fully expect the contract to get done and have no idea why Dahlin hasn't signed a new contract yet. Could be they want to wait until they've got Power's deal done as well and want to have a big "splash" by announcing both at the same time; could be they're still working out some very minon point; could be ... Am not concerned over it not being finalized yet; but just saying would be surprised if it has been finalized because the league has no reason to hide the contract if it has been filed with them.

Pretty sure salary.

BUT were CHICKEN eggs here 1st or were CHICKENS?

Poe-tay-toe, Pah-tah-toe. Or Did the chicken come 1st or was it the egg?

They are. Have the shirts to prove it. 😉

Not to mention having the Team President suffer what is unfortunately quite likely a life long debilitating injury as well. Plus all the weather affected games. Plus there was the Topps masacre before the season that they got involved with some of the community efforts. ALL of those things are extremely mentally taxing and they just kept pouring on 1 after the other. It's actually shocking that the team won 13 games in the regular season and only lost 1 game the entire year by more than a single score.