TrueBlueGED

I've got the Pens in 6 with no confidence at all. Even with the Preds blue line, I don't think they can handle Crosby and Malkin, and I think Rinne is due for a collapse.

Not even remotely comparable. The Avs rode an unsustainable level of shooting and save percentages to success. The Leafs were putting up numbers in their tank year that pointed to a lot of success once the talent level was upped. Nothing the Leafs did this season points to it being an outlier, or something particularly unlikely to repeat. The only thing you can point to is injury luck. If you want to hang your hat on that go ahead, but that team has everything you could want moving forward.

Somebody usually slips, right?

Agreed. Though I'm not sure he'll be any sadder than me, and I expect them to be great for a long time.

I hope you get stuck in the sinkhole with Belichick and he open-mouth kisses you. ...not that there's anything wrong with that.

No, he was definitely a dick. Belichick is "just a coach" too. That doesn't stop me from hoping he gets swallowed by a sinkhole.

I expect something like this as well. I think, at least for this year, he tries to piece together a serviceable defense corps. I think that'll involve a trade, but I don't think the name coming back is going to excite too many people on paper.

More diplomatic Liger: I do not. Schmidt is the type of guy you bring in as a #5 with some reasonable hope he can emerge in a top-4 role. The #8 pick is in play for me, but only for an established top-4. That's not Schmidt IMO.

I want Subban to win, but I don't want Laviolette to win. I also want Kessel to win again for the Toronto lulz, but F Pittsburgh. Quite the conundrum. I'll probably just root for whichever team is behind because I want a 7 game series.

I, too, like Mittelstadt a lot. I so hate agreeing with you :p

I'm not sure I'm expecting a big move. I think he's going to hit for contact rather than trying to knock it out of the park. This isn't to say I think he'd afraid to take a big swing, but I expect there's a sizeable part of him that wants to see what he has with a new coach. Hope I'm wrong, if for no other reason than big moves are fun.

Can't imagine Washington parts with Schmidt, but I'd love to add him.

I'm still recovering from the season. Worst year I've ever had as a fan. Legitimately hated the team. Oh, and if McDermott offers one more cliché, I may just keel over.

Meh.

The best part about this is the fool thinks Benn is a center. If you're gonna be a fake insider, at least know the players!

You hate his contract? I mean, you've tossed more than a little shade his way since he signed.

I'm not entirely sure NBC execs are aware they have an NHL contract.

O'Reilly, you say? I'll take it off your hands. You hate him, anyway :p

Injured players don't have to be protected?

Buy low!!! After all, I didn't hear nearly enough of the injury excuse this season. I crave more!

I don't think Murray cared as much about the incidents themselves as Pegula might have, but he always struck me as maximally irritated he had to deal with it.

Uh huh. And I always got the impression that Kane's off-ice stuff was a huge issue for Murray. Whenever he talked about it, I half expected him to start berating Kane from afar.

I just found the Harry Potter movies to be totally boring. I never felt immersed in them. The stuff that was supposed to be intense, exciting, or dramatic? It all fell totally flat on me.

Kids are almost as bad as millennials ;) I just don't think dancing trash cans in an attempt to entertain the 6 year olds is a particularly good way to juice up the crowd. More broadly, I'd like the game presentation to reflect that more than kids and families attend games. I appreciate the desire to have a family friendly atmosphere, but I think they've swung the pendulum too far in that direction.

I used to love the competitive aspect of FPS games. But then two things happened: 1) Everything was morphed into a class-based team shooter, and 2) I lost the free time to play enough to be good, and getting smoked by a bunch of 14 year olds who play 6 hours per day is not fun. So I'm on to mostly RPGs and adventure games.