Buppy

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. We just added an upgrade on defense, downgrading now wouldn't make any sense. And at this stage, none of our kids look to be an upgrade over Quincey or Ericsson. If we could build a package to get someone who is, great. But trading them to make room for any of the kids would be silly. Let's see how the season goes. Start all the kids in GR. If Green meshes really well, and/or Smith/Kindl shows something, and/or the kids show some major development in GR, we can do something during the year. But before the start of the year, no. Personally, I'd like to see Q up with Kronwall. Maybe open up his offensive game somewhat. He was asked to babysit Smith when he first came back, and the results were...displeasing. Rather not see that again. That stay-at-home mindset seemed to stick even with Dekeyser, where it wasn't needed. If that pair's breaking up anyway, might as well see what Kronwall can do for him. Pretty sick of seeing E on the top pair anyway.

Holmstrom taking #96. Seems unlikely to be a coincidence.

http://www.nhl.com/stats/shootout?season=20142015&team=&viewName=shootoutsSkatersAllTime

A lot of defensemen played in the 80s-90s, and few put up the numbers Housley did. To me, the HHoF is as much about the history of the game as the greatness of the players, so I believe players with exceptional achievements deserve to be in there. Housely, Andreychuk, Recchi, Cujo, Osgood...all deserving IMO. Borderline for sure, and nothing really lost if they never get in, but I think they should be. While Osgood's status relative to his peers is often brought up, I think you have to keep in mind that three of those guys could all make a good case for best goalie of all time. I think if he was in his prime today, he'd be right up there with Lundquist, Quick, Price, Rinne, etc.

He had a bad year, but he's still near the top all-time. Neilsen's better, but that's about it. Silfverberg maybe, but he has less than half as many career attempts. Oshie may be way over-rated as a player, but he is very good in the shootout.

I don't hold any grudge, and I saw him play from beginning to end, and I'm still against it. Wouldn't be the worst thing to ever happen, but I'd rather not see it. He only has 17 goals in his last 6 years (47 games). 10 in the last 5 (35 games). At the rate he's been scoring over the last 6 seasons, he'll need another 40-50 games. Certainly possible that he'll get there, and even one good run could get a big chunk of it, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if he falls a bit short. Yzerman himself only scored 9 in his last 51 playoff games.

Callahan is RFA. He doesn't have much choice. Barring the unlikely event of someone claiming him off waivers, he'll be back in GR. Same goes for Aubry. Also, none of Turgeon, Hicketts, or Svechnikov are AHL eligible. If I had to guess at the GR roster (barring any UFA additions): AA-Larkin-Bert Mantha-Meile-Callahan Tvrdon-Nosek-Nastasiuk Zengerle-Aubry-Campbell Frk with Hoggan or one of Ferraro/Andersson possible for the last spot (and if one of those three, they probably bump one of the bottom six out of the lineup). Ouellet-Marchenko Evans-Sproul Lashoff - Jensen Probably a revolving door of Toledo scrubs McCollum Coreau That, and some people are obsessed with the kids, even though none have yet shown to be a definite upgrade over Smith/Kindl let alone Q or E. Also, he is in the last year of his contract and seems destined to move on after the year.

So, I assume he'll wear #91...

He has 5 goals and 18 points in his last 35 playoff games. Exactly the same as Richards has in his last 35.

Huge middle finger to Weiss. Funny in a way.

If Franzen is healthy there's no choice but re-activating him. If Cleary is signed (which I doubt) it would maybe cost us Andersson or Ferraro. Not "some", and not particularly "good" either. Not saying I'd like it, and it would kind of defeat the purpose of dumping Weiss, but it wouldn't be nearly as bad as you and most of the board would make it out to be.

When Tatar signed he'd played one season and scored 19g, 39p. Nyquist has played 2 seasons, scoring 28g, 48p and 27g, 54p. He should and almost certainly will get more than Tatar. ~$4.5 range I would guess, around 5 years. I would much rather have that than a 2 yr cheap deal (when we don't need to be cheap) after which he'd be unrestricted.

An extra roster spot this year is probably worth more than the ~$1.7M in cap space in in 20-21. The next four years are about the same caphit-wise. So I think it's still a good move even if we don't use any of the cap savings this year (and I doubt we will). This puts us at about $15M in cap space, and I doubt our remaining RFAs will take more than half of that.

There's maybe not even anyone worth underpaying. Just adds to the logjam and depending on how Datsyuk and Zetterberg go, we could still be a worse team next year. I'm all for some trades, and if we were to move a few people out it could make room for a UFA or two. But I hope Holland isn't feeling any pressure to sign someone just to appease the fans or upper management.

Technically Lidstrom could un-retire and play this year.Technicalities aside, Pronger is retired. Has been since the injury. The problem should not be with his HHOF eligibility, but with the ongoing circumvention of the 35+ clause.

Yes, the article is wrong. All four defensemen are waiver exempt for the coming season.

http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?fetchKey=20152ALLDADALL&ord=desc&sort=player.height&viewName=bios

Of the 307 defensemen to play in the league last year, only 75 were 6'0 of shorter. 6'1" is even on the small side. 113 are 6'3" or taller.

Not a big fan of Ellis or Enstrom, but Krug or Vatanen would be a big upgrade for the Wings. Shattenkirk, Barrie, Stralman, Goligoski, Wisniewski... Kronwall is undersized for a defenseman.

People were disagreeing with your notion that Stamkos, Kopitar, and Seabrook will be traded. It wouldn't even make sense to say that in regards to all "big name players" since (depending on what you consider a big name) trades like that happen practically every year. And this trade doesn't make sense for Boston no matter what.

Especially since what they got for him was probably worse than the RFA compensation they could have gotten, and then they went and used the 1st rounder they got on a kid likely to go in the 2nd or 3rd.

Kylington and Roy both still available. Would be great if we could find an early 2nd somewhere without giving up much.

I'm predicting you're going to be even more pissed when we take a goalie at 73. I'd assume it does make a trade more likely, but I don't think that's why we picked him (if that's what you're suggesting).

I don't think Sweeney's going to last very long the way he's going. Svechnikov...not bad I guess, but there were others I'd have preferred.

Even if the cost would have been the same, their first was better than ours and we don't have any 2nd rounders.