NHL Season Start Date: January 13, 2021

[dudacek]

Nikita Kucherov may have had a hip injury and may have to go on LTIR, which may fix the Tampa Bay Lightning's cap problems.

The NHL may be facing a flurry of such news.

Edited December 21, 2020 by dudacek

[JohnC]

38 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Nikita Kucherov may have had a hip injury and may have to go on LTIR, which may fix the Tampa Bay Lightning's cap problems.

The NHL may be facing a flurry of such news.

The Tampa organization is one of the best run hockey operations in the business.  One way or the other their front office was going to figure out a way to adroitly handle their cap and roster situation. Their record over the years is a testament to their savviness. 

[jsb]

As for TB, that's a temporary fix, they'll have the same issues soon enough and Kucherov being out is a huge loss especially if Stamkos doesn't become Stamkos again.

[Eleven]

Can we get a schedule up in here already, Gary?

[PASabreFan]

No preseason games? Eight games against your division rivals? No trips out West? No games with Columbus or Florida? Sign me up permanently.

The divisions would need tweaking, but I could live until the sweet release of death with eight games against seven division rivals (56 games), home and home with the other division in your conference (16 games) and one game every other year with the other conference (eight games). 80 games.

What's the problem? Where's it written that LA has to come to town every year? About as often as the Olympics seems right.

Oh yeah, lose the geographic division names while you're at it. And bring back Henry Pendleton.

[Eleven]

9 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

No preseason games? Eight games against your division rivals? No trips out West? No games with Columbus or Florida? Sign me up permanently.

The divisions would need tweaking, but I could live until the sweet release of death with eight games against seven division rivals (56 games), home and home with the other division in your conference (16 games) and one game every other year with the other conference (eight games). 80 games.

What's the problem? Where's it written that LA has to come to town every year? About as often as the Olympics seems right.

Oh yeah, lose the geographic division names while you're at it. And bring back Henry Pendleton.

This is fine by me, but you know the NHL wants McDavid on screens in Montreal and Matthews on screens in Vancouver.

[dudacek]

41 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

No preseason games? Eight games against your division rivals? No trips out West? No games with Columbus or Florida? Sign me up permanently.

The divisions would need tweaking, but I could live until the sweet release of death with eight games against seven division rivals (56 games), home and home with the other division in your conference (16 games) and one game every other year with the other conference (eight games). 80 games.

What's the problem? Where's it written that LA has to come to town every year? About as often as the Olympics seems right.

Oh yeah, lose the geographic division names while you're at it. And bring back Henry Pendleton.

Sabres in the Adams and this would be perfection for me.

[I-90 W]

2 hours ago, Eleven said:

Can we get a schedule up in here already, Gary?

I know, right?

[dudacek]

Some interesting thoughts about what is happening league-wide

[Thorny]

On 12/20/2020 at 8:26 PM, dudacek said:

For all intents and purposes, it will be four separate leagues.

There will be no way of knowing if the 62-point Sabres are better or worse than the 72-point Leafs. There is no frame of reference because they are playing completely different opponents.

I take your point (and probably agree with it) when comparing to the Dunce Canadian division, but aside from close separations I'd imagine a team that's 10 points better than another team, in a different division (again, exception the Canadian) is very likely better than the one with 10 less. 

Of course we can't know for sure, and in a regular year it's less severe - but even in a regular year the schedules of teams is unbalanced. If you are playing in a weaker/tougher division, the matchups reflect that. It's never strictly equal. 

Again, the schedule difference are way more severe this year, but I hope we don't get into a situation where anyone is tempted to call our successes or failures this season a "write-off" due to the odd allignment. 

[Brawndo]

[LGR4GM]

Blue cross blue shield should be the Sabres helmet sponsor 

[Brawndo]

 

[Marvin]

16 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

Blue cross blue shield should be the Sabres helmet sponsor 

I wonder if teams will endeavour to have their sponsors blend in passably with their colour scheme.

 

16 hours ago, Thorny said:

I take your point (and probably agree with it) when comparing to the Dunce Canadian division, but aside from close separations I'd imagine a team that's 10 points better than another team, in a different division (again, exception the Canadian) is very likely better than the one with 10 less. 

Of course we can't know for sure, and in a regular year it's less severe - but even in a regular year the schedules of teams is unbalanced. If you are playing in a weaker/tougher division, the matchups reflect that. It's never strictly equal. 

Again, the schedule difference are way more severe this year, but I hope we don't get into a situation where anyone is tempted to call our successes or failures this season a "write-off" due to the odd allignment. 

Your argument is why I believe that the conference schedule should be balanced (15 other teams x 4 games) while the out-of-conference games are 1 per team with the remaining 6 (or however many, depending on schedule length) spread out for whatever reason (e.g., Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa always have 2 games against Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver; Chicago plays Detroit, Toronto, Montreal, Boston, and the Rangers twice each year).