SH444

Read last post. I made a mistake. I confused the 2 years.

Because I confused his 2007-2008 regular season with his 2008-2009. Unlike you guys, I don't obsess about the Wings. Forgive me for a minor mixup. I'll be sure to focus more on your team than mine next time. Osgood = hockey legend

Osgood's career .905 save percentage = BEAST

Stanley Cups and wins. 2 team stats.

I mean in terms of the higher priced guys (Hjalmarsson, Sharp), he'd be the next guy I'd let go. I forgot about Ladd. I' obviously keep Niemi over him. But yeah, if it comes down to losing Niemi or losing Hjalmarsson, I'd absolutely take Hjalmarsson. Niemi is the end is probably an average goalie. He got hot for a few rounds, but so did Chris Osgood and Cam Ward. With his agents comments after the season was over, it sounded like he wanted out. I was kind of prepared for him leaving and the Hawks faced with the task of getting a Marty Turco type guy. But I suppose since he won the cup, you're going to say Niemi is some kind of badass goalie that would be devastating to lose.

I'm aware of the raises that him Ladd, and Hjalmarrson will likely get. Like I said, if another team wants one of those guys bad enough, the Hawks will have to lose them.

He'd be the next I'd let go. I was kind of prepared for him to be gone anyways.

No, you're supposed to blindly assume that he wasn't posturing, even though everybody knew he was. Comical.

Let me guess, you're counting Huet?

Did you read the article? Or my post? You even cut out the part where I clarified why you're wrong. I'll do it again though. Like I said, he said they didn't NEED to trade anybody (obviously posturing). He never said they WOULDN'T trade anybody. In fact, he hinted pretty heavily in that article that they would still be dealing. Reading comprehension?

Not sure why you think I take bandwagon fans as an insult. I don't care. I'm not one, so why would I? I don't even live in Chicago, so I don't have to deal with them. In fact, I'm on your side with that argument. I hate bandwagon fans as much as you. About what? I'd love to hear this. There's a great chance that this is all we lose this offseason, which is WAY less than (legit) fans thought just a few weeks ago. Really, what are we in denial about? I'm interested. Seems like WIngs fan are grasping for straws now that the offseason isn't going to be nearly as bad for the Hawks as you thought.

So you're replying to the bandwagon fanbase on your message board? That's weird. I'm not 100% certain that the Blackhawks fanbase checks this board. I'm dubious. Perhaps we can do some IP checks to verify. It depends on whether or not someone goes nuts on an offer sheet for one the RFA. If nobody does, this is most likely it. Even Ladd. It turns out the cap hit for bonuses was only the 1.3 Toews Conn SMythe bonus, not the 4 mil + change that was initially reported.

He never said they were done trading. And what he said was obviously posturing anyways.Did anybody really believe they weren't going to be losing anything else? Glad it's Versteeg.

It was probably between Ladd or Versteeg for the Hawks, so this is a good move.

Oh, and by the way... Brent Seabrook was better than Duncan Keith in the playoffs.

Haha Burish is such an idiot.

Lol @ "firesale" The Blackhawks will end up losing a group of 3 along the lines of Versteeg, Ladd, and Sopel. Versteeg was close to worthless the entire second half of the season and a huge liability in the playoffs (despite scoring some timely goals). Sopel is a good PKer and boosted his value with a nice postseason, but losing your 5th best D-man isn't the end of the world. Ladd will be missed most as he is an underrated forward, but come on. Losing those 3 guys is supposed to terrify blackhawks fans? The Blackhawks will get worse this offseason, no doubt. But the change we're talking about is going from the best team in the NHL, to one of the top 5-6 teams in the NHL. They're losing depth, they aren't losing their team. I don't really understand why people are acting like the Hawks aren't going to be an elite team next season. They're going to be very good, again.

All I could do was shake my head and laugh when I saw a poster in this thread earlier call Hossa a "fraud" who "is just along for the ride. Hossa is exactly the same as Toews, in that these guys don't need to get the points to be dominant on the ice. Throughout the postseason, Hossa was the second best forward on the Blackhawks.... and I don't think it was really close at all. Hossa only played 57 games in the regular season, yet ended the season with the highest plus/minus of any player on the Hawks (+24). No, he didn't score the goals in the playoffs, but this guy generated something every single time he touched the puck in the offensive zone, and was all over the ice at all times. It's just sad that people still don't understand that point totals don't tell the story when it comes to players like Toews and Hossa. If anything, look at his plus/minus, which was +7 in the postseason.

It's truly sad that so many people who claim to be big hockey fans are using points and +/- to evaluate a player's performance. If you think Jonathan Toews wasn't good in the Finals, you either didn'nt watch the game, don't understand the game, or are biased and bitter. Toews is the type of player that doesn't need to score points to be the most dominant player on the ice. Toews won more faceoffs than he lost in every Final game. Toews won 60.2% of his faceoffs in the playoffs, tops among forwards who had at least 225 faceoffs. Toews took 460 faceoffs, tops in the league. He took 33.7% of the Blackhawks' faceoffs. Toews was 7th in the playoffs in shorthanded time on ice. Toews led all forwards in the playoffs with 32 takeaways. He had just 9 giveaways, for a +23 differential that tied with Dave Bolland for best in the playoffs. He had just 4 penalty minutes in 22 playoff games. But yeah, let's give it to Byfuglien, who was minus 4 in the postseason. Or Keith, who turns the puck over in his own zone 3 times a period.