TrueBlueGED

And I'm always surprised how much stock gets put into it. The notion of "the room" has almost become a caricature of itself, along the lines of "the code" for the value of enforcers. The best was seeing Jonathan Toews at a table with Crosby, Gretzky, Messier, and Lemieux. What in the actual hell was that? Toews is a great player, but he can't sniff the jock of any of those guys. Intangibles baby! But I guess he forgot how to lead as the Hawks have gone straight down the tubes? I've seen so many teams win with star players that don't get along, and so many teams continually lose despite being a "close group" that I just can't bring myself to buy into it much. It's sort of like faceoffs to me. It's not that they don't matter at all, but the circumstances where I'm picking one player or another because of them are pretty limited. PK Subban got traded because of "the room." Shea Weber was allegedly one of the best leaders in the league. Well, the Preds are Cup contenders and the Habs stink. Ditto for Taylor Hall not "being a leader." Moved, in part, to shake up "the room." Well, the Oilers stink because they don't have enough talent, while Hall is winning MVPs with a team on the upswing. The Bickering Bills hated each other, and then suddenly all was well when they started winning. Kobe and Shaq couldn't stand each other, and won 3 titles. Sammy Watkins was a prima donna who had to go, but somehow played on what ended up being one of the best teams in the league. Philly went from Cup contender to mediocre playoff team when they decided Richards and Carter could never be part of a winner, because of "the room." Phil Kessel and Mike Sullivan don't like each other. Somehow they still managed to win 2 Cups together. This is true for second-rate coaches, sure. Right? For all the talk about speed, and playing fast, we didn't improve on that front at all.

I agree we should give it time (particularly with Thompson...I'm pretty comfortable saying O'Regan is JAG). Just don't go all Hoss on us and say we shouldn't challenge Botterill because he's "in the game."

I mean, these guys get fired all the time because they're bad at it, regardless of background in the sport.

I don't see how you can be confident in Okposo. Hopeful? Sure. But confident?

Jack is entering his 4th year, about to get the C, and has a mega contract. If he needs support from okay 3rd line players, we're screwed. Now if only Botterill could create that competition for the top of the roster, I might be quite a bit more optimistic about the direction of the team.

But he made the wrong choice of core. For a mere $900k he could have had a considerably better player. Also, i don't mean to pick on you with this, but you've been pumping Florida's tires seemingly for 5 years now with little to show for it :lol:

It's one of those things where you have to laugh so you don't cry.

Marchessault made $750k last year. They didn't have to lose him to add Dadonov. Meanwhile Bjugstad makes $4.1 million, a whopping $900k less than Marchessault's new contract, so if you absolutely had to clear out cash, it could have been done this offseason.

Look, if we flip our assets from the O'Reilly deal into Karlsson, I'll take back everything bad I said about it. But something makes me think that's not in the cards :lol: Who was the last good RFA to shake loose for mediocre futures?

I definitely agree that determination was made. I don't think Botterill woke up and said "sure what the hell, this might be fun" and moved O'Reilly. But that assessment, though made in deliberative fashion, could easily be a colossal miscalculation. These things aren't exactly uncommon in professional sports. And see, we can agree on things! :)

There are only 2 pieces from Ottawa I have any interest in: Stone and Chabot. We're not getting either of them for our poop.

Nothing from anyone who watched them play last season :lol:

The more I think about the trade, the more I think they're just warm bodies included to make the money work and be roster placeholders to give some of our kids (Asplud, Olofsson, etc.) time in Rochester. The core of the trade is the futures.

They're definitely not Pominville-like boat anchors, but they're not going to make anyone think of Hecht in his prime, either. They're okay 3rd liners that we blew a giant hole in the top of our lineup to get.

Well let me put it to you like this. Would you trade Guhle for a late 1st? Teams aren't trade NHL-ready players on ELCs for late 1st round picks.

I think the trade was to protect Petrovic, then he chose to protect Bjugstad over Marchessault on his list.

He who gifted Vegas 2/3 of a top line for the sake of protecting Nick Bjugstad?

Respectfully, you're trying too hard here. O'Reilly would have to be a serial killer to completely offset what he does on the ice. And again, if he really does have that much of a negative influence on everyone else, we're right and screwed anyway. Talk about soft.

And just gave Ryan Reaves nearly $3 million for 2 season to play 7 minutes per game.

I think he uses them all. He might want to use them as trade chips for young players, but I don't see him finding a taker for that.

Saving this for future use. I'm actually way too lazy to do that. But I'd definitely bet against this being the case.

He's already there for me. I want to scream every time he acts tough with a late cross check after blowing a coverage assignment.

Well, he sure as hell doesn't belong on the top pair right now.

You can utilize O'Reilly's strengths without giving him literally the most difficult minutes in the entire league. As Flagg has demonstrated, O'Reilly was our second best offensive player, but the extreme usage didn't allow us to maximize that aspect of his game at even strength. My argument isn't abandon his defensive capabilities, it's to find a better balance.

We were considerably more competitive with Vanek than Edmonton was with those picks.