The Saadfather Part II - The 2017-2018 NHL Season Thread

[Flystripper]

Nah. I win the hockey pool I am in if the Lightning win...caps need to continue to fall short. Sorry man. Should be fun to watch either way though.


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[DrumNFeather]

All apologies to DNF, but go Lightning. What happened to our Lightning fan who posts here?

It still sucks that Hossa is unofficially retired from hockey. Long live the Demi-God.

I forgive you (not really). Look, the 'Ning have had their chances the last several years...time to move aside and let the Caps finally break through.

[MartyFunkhouser]

All apologies to DNF, but go Lightning. What happened to our Lightning fan who posts here?

It still sucks that Hossa is unofficially retired from hockey. Long live the Demi-God.

[DrumNFeather]

Quite a performance by the Caps tonight. Game 7...here we go.

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[Flystripper]

This is just one guy's opinion, but he didn't exactly agree. This was from before the season started. Same guy that wrote the bit I posted earlier (although that was from this morning).



https://deadspin.com/wow-the-golden-...bad-1796327043

I didn't see this back then but I definitely disagree.

[falafel]

false - they have players teams wanted but the league forced them to be made available. Choosing to not protect someone does not mean they were not wanted. The NHL set it up so that teams could not protect everyone they wanted and the result is VGK having 4 lines filled with 2nd and 3rd line guys which makes for a very balanced, cost-controlled team. They deserve props for executing their plan and exceeding expectations. Any time you make it to a Stanley Cup final it is an incredible achievement but lets not pretend this is a team of misfits.

This is just one guy's opinion, but he didn't exactly agree. This was from before the season started. Same guy that wrote the bit I posted earlier (although that was from this morning).

There are two schools of thought when compiling an expansion team. One is to go get the very best players available, believing that the best way to build a foundation for a team and a fanbase is to be as competitive as you can and give fans a reason to get and stay invested. Another is to be as awful as you possibly can. The Vegas Golden Knights correctly subscribe to the latter.

With the obvious caveat that the roster is going to change between now and opening night—and the subcaveat that it’ll be the decent players who are most likely to be traded, making the roster even weaker—that is a bad, bad team.

Some forwards are going to have OK numbers only because someone has to score goals, but this team isn’t going to have more than a dozen regulation wins.

The first line—likely Perron and Neal centered by KHL signee Vadim Shipachyov—is fine. After that you get two lines of guys who would be third- or fourth-liners on better teams. The blueline pairings, currently led by Methot and Emelin, are a little better, but this is still a bunch of fourth defensemen, and they’re going to get torn up by the league’s better forwards. (Grimly, Methot and Emelin are expected to be among the first Golden Knights to be flipped in trades as soon as today.) Fleury is a good, capable starter, but it’s going to be a long year.

Which is fine! This team’s not built to win. GM George McPhee isn’t an idiot. He could have maybe assembled a borderline playoff team if he had taken the best available players, but expensive mediocrity is not a sustainable strategy. Much better to do what McPhee did, and accept picks in exchange for agreeing not to take actual useful players. That’s how the Golden Knights have three top-15 picks in this weekend’s entry draft, and obtained 10 picks over the next four drafts in addition to their own (which should be high). No wonder a rival GM said “I feel like I was just held hostage for the last two weeks.”

https://deadspin.com/wow-the-golden-knights-are-going-to-be-bad-1796327043

[DrumNFeather]

I would like to see the Capitals and Ovechkin win tonight.

Me too! Up 2-0, now down 3-2, so many media in DC declaring the series over after the two road wins in Tampa...it's like they don't know the teams they cover or something.

[Flystripper]

If this was such common knowledge, why weren't people taking those 200-1 odds before the season started? Btw, the worst odds for any given NFL team to make the next Super Bowl is 100-1.

I wasn't thinking about betting at the time. I would have put the odds at like 50-1. I don't know how common the knowledge was but I was certainly having these conversations last summer and i wasn't the only one. I don't follow NHL lines nor do I typically bet the NHL but man I should have.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

false - they have players teams wanted but the league forced them to be made available. Choosing to not protect someone does not mean they were not wanted. The NHL set it up so that teams could not protect everyone they wanted and the result is VGK having 4 lines filled with 2nd and 3rd line guys which makes for a very balanced, cost-controlled team. They deserve props for executing their plan and exceeding expectations. Any time you make it to a Stanley Cup final it is an incredible achievement but lets not pretend this is a team of misfits.

If this was such common knowledge, why weren't people taking those 200-1 odds before the season started? Btw, the worst odds for any given NFL team to make the next Super Bowl is 100-1.

[RC Vikings]

I would like to see the Capitals and Ovechkin win tonight.

[Flystripper]

false - they have players teams wanted but the league forced them to be made available. Choosing to not protect someone does not mean they were not wanted. The NHL set it up so that teams could not protect everyone they wanted and the result is VGK having 4 lines filled with 2nd and 3rd line guys which makes for a very balanced, cost-controlled team. They deserve props for executing their plan and exceeding expectations. Any time you make it to a Stanley Cup final it is an incredible achievement but lets not pretend this is a team of misfits.

[falafel]

Ho-hum. Looking forward to another 12 or 13 Stanley Cup finals in the next 13 or 14 years.

No fluke this. The Winnipeg Jets were reckoned the best team left alive, after besting in seven games the league’s other best team, and they ran into a buzzsaw. After losing Game 1, Vegas never trailed again in this series, 240 straight minutes. The fearsome Winnipeg offense was silenced, scoring only 10 goals in five games—just six in their final four. The Golden Knights were fresher, faster, stouter, and are 12-3 in the postseason. Not bad for a bunch of players nobody wanted a year ago—not even, necessarily, Vegas GM George McPhee.

https://deadspin.com/holy-crap-the-golden-knights-1826189286

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Who cares about the Knights? The Las Vegas Aces started playing today.

[Topper]

Four more wins to go. Go Knights!

[Flystripper]

I seem to remember the last time the President's Trophy winner won Lord Stanley's Cup

You see me working. I don’t know if I even believe in the curse but it gives me a chance to remember 2012.


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