PerreaultForever

I hear Barry Trotz is open to hearing offers.

No. Give me something to believe in and maybe. Right now, I think they need somebody to "lend them a hand"

So they've decided to suck hard for Bedard? Can't wait for their "contributions". This is a huge game and there is absolutely no reason they shouldn't win it. I watched Vancouver play Boston and they are a total mess. I'd say some of them have quit on Boudreau too. Goaltending is weak. D is weak. Forwards are a mess. If they don't change soon they are definitely in the Bedard race. they are losing, we are losing, let's see who the real losers are.

This is true, especially about their top 2Cs and the front office, but unlike Buffalo they also added veterans. They signed Doug Hamilton. They got the goalie as mentioned. Tatar is playing well for them. They kept grit in Miles Wood and added (or re-added)Bastian, and Ryan Graves. This is not a team built on draft picks alone.

It's actually not that hard to do when you finish at or near the bottom of the league every year and draft in the top group, and when you trade the top players you already had for even more top picks it's even easier. or it should be. in a few years we will be able to draw up comparison charts of who we drafted and who we didn't. Only then will we know how many Nylander's (8th pick in 2016) and how many Thompson's (26th pick in 2016) we got. So maybe for you it's OK, but for me it's not. It's no longer OK to lose all the time and wait for "next year".

I think they're building it backwards. They are focused on the offense (perhaps the belief that it will provide more entertainment value and fill seats faster) and seem content to wait for Power to develop and to get Levi (?) or one of the others in goal. It'll take years. I've always believed and said here you start with goal and move out to D and add the offensive talent after you've built a tough hard to play against culture. maybe I get that belief from watching the Bruins. maybe it's because of Hasek idk. Just seems the right way to me.

Fair, but the lack of depth on forwards hasn't been tested as they are pretty much healthy. Where is this team however if Thompson or Cozens goes down? or Tuch? What's left and who fills that void Sheahan? I think not. We've had at least 3 chances to snap up Reilly. Is he great? No. Is he as good as Jokiharju, probably. Maybe better. So why not? I get it with 1 injury, don't grab that salary burden but with 3? Seems like a "don't spend any money" move to me. As for all those D injuries at once, it happens. Last year at one point the Bruins were down 4 or 5 starters on D. This year they've been down 4 and one of them was the top guy. Good teams have depth. I don't expect us to match that level of depth, but at least something closer. Guys we've ditched and cast off as useless are currently playing in this league. Mostly for teams doing better than us. Surely we could have kept a few of them around.

Right now our rebuild is better than the Ottawa plan. Better than the Blue Jackets and probably better than the Flyers in time (although maybe those 2 are still in tear down mode?) It is Not as good as New Jersey or probably not as good as the Red Wings and the Canadiens seem to have fared better than expected (and us) as well. If you want to include the west it would seem the Kraken might have moved ahead of us already but the Ducks and Canucks and Sharks are all behind I think (maybe all 3 still tearing down). (Looking at Boston and the Ducks it seems Lindholm's contributions may have been underestimated all these years). Arizona, surprisingly looks about even with us at this time. Then there are the old teams falling like Washington and St. Louis and the still okay teams like the Islanders who everyone thought would be worse. So overall, in terms of rebuilds, I think it puts us roughly in the middle of the pack. Considering how long ours has been going and how many assets we got for the last phase we did we should be much better already but if you look at it as just the KA era it's mid level. Maybe that's good enough for some people. I consider it failure and missed opportunity and........ I am simply tired of half assed efforts and loser hockey.

Well there are a number of things wrong but the lack of production by multiple people is certainly contributing. 1) the slow build plan is their plan but it didn't need to be this slow imo and more should have been done to fill holes on the roster - we beat that discussion to a pulp in the summer and going into the season though. Opportunity missed imo but you don't win with an all rookie team. 2) There is no depth. 3) It's not a balanced team and lacks identity. Okay so we are the fast attacking team maybe but only part of the roster can play that way itself. There's simply too many rookies and you get multiple struggling rookies at once (and by rookie you can include the not quite there yet types who are a few years in) 4) Skinner 5) Skinner's contract 6) KO as captain. Is it working? I think not. 7) desire and a winning culture. It's slipping away. I can see it each game little by little. The blank looks, the lack of emotion. They're getting used to it AGAIN. I could go on and rant all day but that's enough. Most of this team is just there, nothing else, and they just lack.

Pretty sure the team making that deal gets to talk to the agent and work out a deal. It's not like the Vesey thing.

It was. I'm not a Bills fan but I did want them to win. Back in the day I did have a fondness for the Bills since they were the "local" (southern Ontario) team on the tv more often than others. Always enjoyed those old Miami/Buffalo match ups back then. I hate Dallas so those superbowls were painful for me too. I actually thought they'd still win or get a tie at least until they blew it.

Regardless of who won, that was one of the strangest game endings I've ever seen.

Trades can be worked out in any number of ways. So you don't take the 46th overall back, you take a lower pick back or no pick or you toss in a later round or whatever. Where there is a will there is a way. Bruins dominated Vancouver today so I guess we are at least better than the Canucks - unless they beat us next game.

Except they did dominate. They started skating (they sleep walked through the 1st, trap game for them and you can see with Kinkaid in there they considered us less significant than Vancouver). They controlled the puck and physically dominated. Not really hitting, just strong on the puck, shielding with their bodies and totally dominating the front of the net and along the boards. There is some truth to your point on match ups though. I don't think it was out coached. Once the Sabres fell behind Granato was more concerned with getting Thompson and his top players out there and Boston gave Bergeron more ice time. They shut open ice play down more and thus our chances became few and were mostly one and done shots from a distance. With luck (maybe Pilut's post shot goes in, the high stick challenge was a high stick, maybe a bounce) this could have been close or a win, but only because Boston started crap (by their standards).

I see Miles Wood has 6 goals for them. I always liked that guy. We could use a Miles Wood on our roster. Also looks like Hischier has his game back so that's part of it I guess. Highes coming into his own. Also seems like Vanecek is working out. I remember a bunch of us here thought KA should have snapped him up when he was available too. Another miss.

Has anyone seen New Jersey play this year? Are they for real? How are they doing it?

Cozens ALMOST got the title tonight against Boston but just not quite.

They would be better with more blue for sure. Blue pants.

I don't think Boosh was any sort of genius move or anything but he was an addition (not a draft pick) and he is an improvement over what we had. If he's playing above third pairing though it really says your D isn't that good.

Pretty good effort overall. They got in the passing lanes well and disrupted the Bruins game early on but keep in mind from what I saw the Bruins pretty much slept through the first half plus and only played their A game in the 3rd. Anderson was pretty good. Bruins dominated the dirty areas in front and on the wall as always. Tage's goal was nice. He played well. I thought Cozens played well. The D was spotty as usual. At least Hall didn't score 🙂

Ya, that's how I remember it too. Ted actually had them winning a few games despite the line up and then Murray ditched all the goalies. I think Ted knew he was being sacrificed but he had pride and he kept trying to win. He was stubborn and bull headed, but Ted was a good competitive coach in his time and he had players competing as best they could as well.

I would assume any deal to take him off the Bruins hands would involve the Bruins adding a sweetener. So you didn't claim him but maybe if they throw you a (idk) 3rd rounder? 2nd? Not sure what it would take.

As we all know, he's pretty much relying on the draft and is comfortable building slowly. Lybushkin was a good add but he really hasn't done a whole lot in terms of immediate hole filling and improvements. For the drafting, well we shall see in time.

Everything except the bolded is true.