JoeSchmoe

Chicken and rice is the big thing. My son is 16 now. He didn't gain any weight into his minor midget year eating the "healthy" way. This was despite following a steady lifting regimen. He was hoping to get at least a late round OHL draft selection but didn't put on enough weight/strength to set himself apart, despite being a very good AAA defenseman. Fast forward a year and went he went all in on the old school eating as much as he can of whatever he can, even when he's not remotely hungry. He's since put on close to 20lbs of muscle without growing an inch- all while following pretty much the same weight regimen. He's at his target weight now, so he's dialed it back somewhat, returning to more healthy choices and seems to be keeping it on. It's all about the calories, and the discipline to eat even when you're not hungry. It's not easy, but if you want it bad enough, it can be done. I just can't understand why these guys who have so much at stake can't do it, when someone like my son can. I also can't seem to understand why I can't seem to stop eating to try to lose weight, no matter how much I seem to want to stop. 🥴

It'd be good if the NHL FA market went the way of the MLB FA market.

I hope you're right. This season beat the optimism out of me... Especially since we finally got good goaltending. Good on you for keeping the torch lit!

I agree. Do you have confidence that we'll get someone via UFA or trade? The only guys Adams seems to be able to get are guys that hurt us more than they help us. Byram for Mitts is a net negative. Byram was a sub-50% expected goal % guy on one of the best teams in the league- which is pretty hard to do. Sure he looks flashy at times, but he makes up for it with poor defensive play. He can still get better... But at the moment he is who he is. Mittelstadt on the other hand is a legit high end 2nd liner right now. I'm not surprised CO wanted him. We were just too cheap to pay him.

Hopefully it's the former, because we don't need any more castoffs.

Without question, not all 4 of these guys aren't legit NHL players, and even if they were there's not spots for all of them. Trade them along with picks for legit NHL players.

Savoie is leading the WHL in ppg. That's pretty hard to do even at his age. If Ostland was bigger, I'd probably think about him some more, but from the cheap seats I'm sitting in, he's also just another Benson... possibly without as high of an offensive upside.

Did you read the initial post? Compare what those two have done to Quinn and Peterka at similar points in their careers. Realistically JJP and JQ would peak out as high 2nd liners or lower end 1st liners on a high end team. Rosen and Ostland are way back of what they did at similar points in their careers (Rosen is actually way worse given he's a year older than Ostland). To boot both of them are smurfs... Too small to be effective checkers in the NHL if the whole scoring thing doesn't pan out. Trade them.

What can we get for him and a 1st?

if we're being completely honest with ourselves, will Rosen or Ostland ever be good enough to be contributors towards a successful Cup winning team? If they ever get a sniff in the NHL, I don't see them being any more than weak 3rd liners. Hopefully they can be dealt for something of value this offseason.

Earlier in this thread I optimistically said 25% and as of March 22, I stand by that. I'm curious to see the shell games and red herrings that will play out to inevitably get me to my usual 75% by September. Everytime I buy into the false hope. Remember Taylor Hall?! That guy was going to get us to cup contention. Boy was I wrong about that... Me and Terry.

If you use Peterka and Quinn as benchmarks to how prospects from the AHL graduate into the NHL, it can tell us something. JJP was basically a ppg in his Draft+1 AHL season. Quinn was 1.35ppg. Both struggled with their 200ft game in their rookie NHL seasons. Kulich is 0.78ppg at the same age, Rosen is 0.64 and he's a year older. Neither one are close to JJP or JQ trajectory. How do we expect they are going to be much help next year. Is there something else in their games that doesn't show up on the scoresheet? As of right now (not going into the 23-24 season) do either one of the project out to be 1st or 2nd line players? If not, we need to move them. Noah Ostland is 0.6ppg in the SHL. It's a low scoring league, but that still sounds too low to be able to make the jump to the NHL, especially with him being small. Is that right? The only hope I have is Savoie. He's pretty much at the top of the WHL for ppg. My concern though is he's too small to be very impactful next year. I'm thinking he's probably a Benson 2.0 level player. Thoughts? I think it might take a while, but he could still have top 1 or 2 line potential. Long story short though is we need to start trading some of these guys for NHL ready players in the offseason. Otherwise, I don't have much hope in breaking the non-playoff streak next year.

25% chance

Sadly, that's the end of the season. It'll be interesting to see what kind of false hope the organization can give me going into next year. Right now, I have no hope. Only dejection.

If we can accurately assess what the underlying issues are we can do better as a society to prevent future players from taking their own lives.

I'm saying both NHL and NFL players have well documented CTE post career. If CTE was the cause of the struggles with hockey players, then we'd see the same in football. Maybe you're thinking the level of CTE is different between the two sports... It's possible but still a stretch I think compared to the lifestyle. Anecdotal I know, but guys like John Scott (Mechanical Engineering Major) and George Parros (Princeton Economics Major) are doing very well post career. Closer to home our very own Rob Ray has practically rewritten the English dictionary on his own throughout his illustrious broadcasting career.

It opened for me. Try incognito maybe? Essentially it said his problem with alcohol started when he was 16 playing in the OHL and partying with the 20yo players in the big city (Ottawa). It did say he cleaned up under Ted Nolan's supervision and was 9 years sober when the article was written. Arguably CTE could have caused him to fall off the wagon, though many career players struggle outside the structure of playing on a hockey team. In any case the long story short is he was prone to party lifestyle without the head injuries.

Evidence? This article from 2000, before the media madness on CTE said that at age 19, Chris Simon was drinking his way out of hockey. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/sports/2000/02/03/a-spiritual-awakening/794f2c2f-6232-4cf2-9f6b-03c9ce4e28b0/

I call BS on that. Hockey culture led to those problems. If we saw the same phenomenon in football, I'd say it was the CTE. On a side note, I know a couple of hockey players that both had a cup of coffee in the NHL. They're some of the biggest drinkers I know. None of them have concussion issues though.

I would argue the drug and alcohol culture precedes the CTE. The Bob Probert story documented this pretty well for him. Hockey players like their ❄️ On a personal note, I sometimes get some pretty good bouts of anxiety after tying one on 🍺. It can last for several days after the other hangover effects have cleared up.

If I'm an NHL coach, first thing I'm doing is making it crystal clear that you're getting paid millions of dollars per year to play a game. It's a great privilege to be here, and if you aren't cutting it you'll be sitting whether you're 18 or 36. No guaranteed spots no matter how good you are in the dressing room.

You're making my point for me. NHL enforcers and NFL players are both prone to CTE. It's just the NHL enforcers that seem to be dying young... Likely not because of CTE, but due to the drug and alcohol culture. Probert Belak Rypien Kordic Boogaard Ewen now Simon I'm sure there are others I'm missing. Montador wasn't an enforcer so I purposely left him off the list, but he also has CTE issues.

I said in the NHL thread... Until I see football players going at the same rate as NHL enforcers, I'll be convinced it's primarily the drugs and alcohol and not the CTE. NHL enforcers have historically been party boys and it sounds like Simon was no different. No question the CTE doesn't help and would be responsible for a lot of other long term health impacts, but we're seriously kidding ourselves if we think it's not the drugs and alcohol ultimately knocking these guys off.

Us ticket buying fans paid Comrie $3.6mill over the last 2 years. He and his 1-7 record can rot on the bench and in the press box for all I care.

Here's a prime example of a media hack blaming Simon's death on fighting.