Thorny

The overarching tone from the Seravali interview was definitely, “see, I told you it would take this long”. The gall lol

I agree. The bed KA made that this team needs to lie in is how much emphasis he put from the beginning on “vibes” and players who “want to be here.” For better or worse, this perceived culture has been a lynchpin of KA’s strategy this is the psyche he’s imbued the team and it’s players with. The only working assumption can be that the messaging of KA’s offseason is as, or even more important than the raw on ice value of the additions brought in. KA doesn’t have a choice, he needs to have a proactive offseason

Good news for Buffalo that seemingly every team in the top 15 is going to get a good player. Or, even a “steal”, if you will I invite the board as an exercise to theorize why this isn’t as beneficial as it seems to a team already looking to make up a ton of ground

McDavid, Draisaitl and Bouchard appear to bridge that gap as a unit Ya the playoffs are going to finish in like august lol You are such a hater. I respect it thoroughly. Thought not as much as me, apparently: I could not give 2 shites if Kyle “we aren’t saluting the fans anymore” Okposo and Sam “at least I called Kevyn Adams back” Reinhart win a cup. Who cares. Ideally this series gets cancelled and no Cup is awarded

At least one of them has to lose good grief this playoffs have been something else

Agree, and not a coincidence the Red Wings always seem to be the team we want to compare ourselves to: it’s the only team where our relative comp doesn’t look as putrid

Canucks are finished

Honestly, I think the versions of those players we get will arguably be largely determined by whether or not we, as a franchise, imbibe the mindset of a team that is going to make the necessary additions to the roster it needs because we believe making the playoffs to be an urgent matter. Did Adams not speak at the end of season conference about how he had early on that sense things weren’t right when it came to the mindset of the players? Adams didn’t deny there was a complacency there? We saw this play out in real time already. Imo there’s pretty strong evidence that mindset was a reflection of the GM’s nonchalant approach to the offseason. I suppose that outside additions aren’t just necessary but vital to the success of the larger portion of the roster we are of course relying on even more. Imo it’s not a “these additions won’t matter if the core doesn’t respond anyways” situation, it’s a “the core isn’t gong to have a chance without the proper approach this offseason, anyways.” situation. A good GM here lays the chess board for success

With McDavid anything is possible

Pp merchants

Exactly what I’m poking fun at

Very prepared for him being labelled can’t miss in the vein of Benson

SOMEONE probably accomplishes that same thing at a cheaper cost. But we aren’t the field: that’s always the issue with said logic. If we want the one team that consummates the deal to be us, the offer you proposed is the one that actually results in completion rather than a “we stayed true to our value evaluation” scenario

Ya I mean if Edmonton wins the cup we’ll have to grudgingly agree they are the 6th best team in the nhl. We can’t forget to square the data the league uses to determine who the best team is for the season with our own personally chosen, biased markers for success, like Expected playoff wins inferred based on how tired we are randomly guessing the teams to be and also prospect pool strength.

Exactly. I’d imagine the winning has value in and of itself, probably great value. It’ll help the entire environment and it’s attractiveness to outside players

Proof meets pudding Least so far

McPowerplay strikes again. Have a feeling it’s the Oilers year i still cannot remember a final 4 with 4 more unlikeable teams. Worst rooting playoffs in memory. Thank God for baseball

Jason Botterill didn’t sign him because he was a CHL player and wouldn’t have drafted him at all had he been the GM when he was selected

Always felt Briere brought it even more so. Left every bit of his soul out there Biggest thing is that powerplays go down and the importance of even strength play goes up. At least it used to be that way not as in touch with current playoff product - - - As for “clutch” I do think it mostly comes down to being by able to play your usual game when the game gets tighter “do your job” You see the grittier guys shine more because the rules aren’t adhered to as stringently by the officials

Do you just hate the rangers or have you co-opted Florida as a second team?

That was a really nice pass by Bennett on the goal

Very much agree, feeding into.. The swap as you point out made a ton of sense in theory: evaluation is in limbo because of the execution - issue with Byram was *specifically* the type of dman he seems to be - which you’ve pointed to before, as a stance others have: “I wanted a D man just not THAT one.” His offensive production is definitely reasonable but at least some portion of those still skeptical of the trade already knew this to be the case: issue is how poor his actual defence was. He produced offensively at ES but also gave it right back at ES. Whether or not Byram improves us more than losing Mittelstadt hurts us is indeed as you point out the only way to evaluate the deal and imo the answer to that will be determined by how well Byram finds balance

Hagel was a special case because it was a brow-furrowing decision from the word go. Not only did Hagel look like the more promising prospect, considering a system depth comparison signing Hagel was always a no-brainer and it was a clear, focused instance of Botterill declining to sign him because he got much too literal/Sith with his “absolutely no Canadian Junior players” bias. Precisely when his bias became a farce

“Winning” trades is the province of teams less concerned with winning games