thewookie1

I’d shoot you into the sun if you meddled with the playoff rounds. 4x7 is a beautifully brutal race to see whose team is the best and can stay the healthiest. No other playoff in pro sports is as incredible to watch as the NHL playoffs in no small part due to how it is. I’d go back to 1-8 seeding though. 1/2 division leaders and 3-8 being merely standings order. NHL playoff hockey is perfect, the first two rounds are crazy speed and skill with players flying around hitting people. By Round 3 they get worn down, and thus are forced to strategize far more against their opponent and we start to see heroes emerge. The guy playing with the broken wrist, or the random healthy scratch all season that magically pops up in the later rounds and makes a huge impact due to his freshness. The strategic game to game, period to period situations that pop up. 4x7 is what allows hockey’s champion to truly be a team accomplishment. Because depth is required in order to succeed; you can’t win with merely 3 super stars and some duct tape. In Football, a team can literally luck their way to a Super Bowl if given the right circumstances via injuries and environment. It’s merely 3 games. A great hockey team with crippling injuries can still win a series because theres 4 to 7 games worth of strategy and situations. It’s honestly part of what I love about hockey; it’s not just super teams and garbage or driven by about 3 key positions to decide relevance. In any other league except probably baseball, Edmonton would be a juggernaut with their two league leading scorers at the helm. But they aren’t, because hockey isn’t decided by any one player but rather the entire team. I don’t hate shootouts, would certainly look at 10mil 3v3 as a better option to cut down on shootouts. Utterly despise ties.

Essentially if we trade 2 1sts and a 2nd for Meier and aren’t able to sign him next year; we likely would only be able to recoup, at most, a conditional 1st due to his UFA status. I’d love to make the playoffs but spending that much to merely have a chance to make the playoffs isn’t worth it. Meier doesn’t magically make us a dark horse Cup contender. This is not the time to throw large assets at short term bandaids

Here's a interesting thought; what about acquiring Alec Martinez for cheap from Vegas; they need cap space and he'd give our defense a legitimate Cup Winner

Myers is awful and is size in literal sense only.

Rough start, but certainly battled hard through the 2nd and 3rd but we’re always in the process of being suffocated by Carolina’s sticks and subtle holdings. Tuch shows us what a playoff player looks like; he was flying out there. Quinn looked good Dahlin and many other seemed to have issues with stick handling for unknown reasons.

2nd game in row where Sabres get interfered with but not one penalty called

So aggravating watching Carolina who just endlessly pressure.

It would also explain the common burst a team gets from AHL callups but they rarely last more than a couple games

You don't trade our 2023 1st, and "Östlund" + a lesser prospect in order to get a guy for about 100 games

Far too expensive to trade for a nigh rental player

It's a rather tight squeeze but would theoretically work https://www.capfriendly.com/armchair-gm/team/3903178 Our lack of ELC Dmen makes it tougher

Well I set the cap at 87mil and we have no idea how that'll actually be. I don't want Kulich or Savoie playing on the 4th line Back up goalies shouldn't be ELCs. I want Levi in Rochester for at least 1 full year and possibly 2. I just don't think its feasible barring a cap jump into the 90's by the time Quinn and Peterka are up. I'll make another in the morning with some fiddling and see however if its still flexible with Meier

I'm unsure how you fit Meier into our long term cap https://www.capfriendly.com/armchair-gm/team/3900973

I think you're jumping the gun a tad; I doubt any combination of acquisitions would make us a Cup Contender which is when you start using young assets.

Glass half full man, after those 3 losses they chained 5 wins in a row and an OTL.

I don't really have an issue with Shootouts to be honest I utterly despise ties

Well 7 out of 8 ain’t bad Hard to beat a team and the refs

They may feel he potentially could have a minor concussion and with only two games until 2/11; they may just be playing it safe.

Im also curious as to where the Eichel that plays against Toronto, Boston, Buffalo and a couple others is other nights. He’s an elite player when he plays 200ft and uses his size and speed to generate offense. But as we’ve seen and has been seen in Vegas he seems to never fully commit to playing 100% every game. Tuch will occasionally have an off day but 9 out of 10 games he’ll at least give you 110% effort and use his lesser skill and far more effectiveness.

Damn Hellebuyek giving us trouble again

I more or less in your camp I was fooling around with capfriendly in 2 years and we have a metric ton of players to sign or resign by then. I had Dahlin 8x10.5mil Cozens 8x8mil Power 8x9mil Quinn & Peterka are Pending RFA's at year's end Notable RFA's Mitts (does he earn another contract?) Krebs (what will he want?) UPL (What will his stats allow him to ask for and Is Levi ready for back up role or does he need 2 full AHL seasons?) Jost (Do we keep him at 2mil?) Jokiharju (Has he become a solid dman worthy of a new contract?) Notable UFA's Olofsson (will he be capable of pushing beyond his current state of being) Okposo (is he still hanging around?) Girgensons (easily could still be an effective 4th liner) Other Questions Ryan Johnson? Rousek? Kulich. Rosen, Savoie, Östlund.... who's ready if any? My shot in the dark Krebs 3 x 3.35mil UPL 3 x 4mil Jokiharju 3 x 4mil Mittelstadt 2 x 3mil Jost 2 x 2mil Rousek 2 x 1.575mil

In this case it’s true; they seem overly pass happy

Easy no, to be honest I don’t even think that would help us all that much. To me the 2023 1st is untouchable and I’m disinterested in trading Savoie. Chychrun won’t put up as much offense due to having no powerplay time and Crouse feels to much like a one hit wonder that is having a great year on a bad team akin to Girgensons looking great when he was force fed 1st line minutes early in his career.

Quinn looks like he always does in his first year in a league; flashes of greatness with intermittent errors. He needs to grow further into his body and get stronger but he is not afraid, he's just weaker presently. Tage is in his own head at the moment; teams are playing him tighter and he's trying to figure out how to adapt and has sort of gotten drawn into over stickhandling the puck. Okposo + Girgensons make their center play more straightforward and we can see how much better Krebs has looked thanks to their mentorship. Krebs probably will never be quite as insane as Marchand but he certainly has the dogged determination and even a sneaky edge to him. Nice goals Dahlin looked great as usual The Bush was a giving tree today GoOlofsson with 2 more Cozens with another nifty goal.

How does that fat bastard always score on us