kipwinger

I don't think Chiarot sucks. I think he's just a bigger, stronger, meaner version of Gostisbehere. It's not Chiarot's fault that Lalonde seems to think he's a decent defender and asks him to try and shut down top talent. If he were a 3rd pair rover/puck mover with good 5on5 scoring (like he already has) I'd love him. Instead they seem to think he's Jake Walman and can defend well too. Put him on the 3rd line with someone who defends well and can skate (Albert Johansson?) and watch him thrive. Just don't play him in the defensive zone.

Almost all of Rasmussen's shifts start in the defensive zone. Anybody with that usage (Luke Glendening?) will have s***ty possession numbers. Conversely guys who start in the ozone all have better than anticipated possession stats. This is why Rasmussen's numbers suck and Gostisbehere's (for example) are good. "Hey Ras, you're up again. Hop out there for this defensive zone draw against Connor McDavid, and would it be too much to ask you to win possession against the best line in hockey, skate the puck 200 ft. down the ice and get a shot on goal? It's help your possession stats a ton."

I agree that we hoped for a breakout (I sure did), but in hindsight I don't think we considered the extent to which his knee injury affected his offseason prep. But I don't agree that he's been "blah". The only thing he's not doing for the team right now is scoring at a top six level, and even then he's on track to score nearly 20 goals as a bottom six winger, defensive specialist, and penalty killer. IMO Rasmussen is the victim of the age old false perception by fans that a player's value is determined by scoring more than anything else. A guy who scores 60 points and does nothing else well IS NOT worth more to your team than a guy that scores 45-50 points but wins faceoffs, plays on special teams, and can be trusted defensively.

It's being reported that Lyon and Reimer will each split a game this weekend. Given that we're only 3 points behind Toronto in the standings, it makes sense to me that Lyon would get the start tomorrow against them and Reimer would go tonight. Will be interesting to see how Lalonde handles this.

I don't really understand the Rasmussen grade. He plays amongst the hardest minutes on the team, is a key part of one of the top PK units in the NHL (something that's actively winning games for us), can be trusted late in games, has more blocked shots than any other forward on the team, is fourth on the team in hits, and has as many goals as Compher and Perron (one fewer than Sprong). I get that ideally he'd look like he did last season (before blowing out his knee) but this is a useful player, eating hard minutes, and contributing to wins. I'd give him a "B" for playing his role well but regressing a bit offensively.

Call up Albert Johansson immediately. Rather can concede the empty net goal on an Icehog breakaway he took a penalty and made the refs award it. He doesn't want to win, he hates to lose.

Icehogs with 22 shots on goal in the first period. Woof. Cossa standing tall though.

Cossa looking very sharp. Not so much the rest of the Griffins. Big powerplay coming up tho.

Im definitely watching

The amount of really great "secondary" players that Chicago shuffled through was unreal. Their core group gets a ton of credit (and should) but their scouting during that period was unbelievable. Byfuglien, Campbell, Leddy, Ladd, Saad, Teravainen, Versteeg, Brouwer, Shaw just to name a few. In most cases Chicago had good players already in their system, who out performed their salaries, and were let go/traded and replaced internally by other good homegrown talent. That's how they were able to keep winning despite so much of their cap space going to Toews, Kane, and Keith. Toronto doesn't have a luxury because they don't have any homegrown talent in the minors, let alone enough of it to replace guys they trade away with other quality options.

Well the good news is that they just signed William Nylander for 8 years and 11 million dollars so that should help with the defen...err...uh oh.

Lol, if you could clear enough cap space in Toronto to take on Chiarot's contract they'd make you the GM.

How are things going in Toronto anyway?

Oh yeah? Last I heard he was "betting on himself". How's that going for him?

Don't know anything about this guy, or whether he's credible or not, so take this with a grain of salt but...reports that Nate Danielson is heading to Portland at the WHL trade deadline today. https://x.com/jjcritzer/status/1745196509875028059?s=20

Two in the same draft actually. Joe Veleno was supposed to go about 15(ish) spots higher than he actual did in the same draft.

I'd quibble with your characterization of some of these, and for others I think they got as much as could be expected out of the draft position. The only one I think is egregiously bad is the Nolan Patrick pick. His career was sidelined by concussions in juniors and his professional ceiling was in doubt before he was ever drafted. A number of people around here (including myself) had him on their "do not draft" lists that year. They got caught up in the hype just like so many other teams that seem to believe that if the Canadian media starts talking about a kid when he's 15 years old he's bound to be a superstar.

Has there ever been another player in the league who over estimated his own value to a team more than Ilya Kovalchuk? That dude was SUCH a loser. I blame Lou Lamoriello (also a total dips***) for it. Apparently Lou cares a great deal if you want to have a beard or long hair and play for his team, but he's less concerned paying you a zillion dollars to half-ass it every game.

Ken Daniels is such a professional that he could squeeze air time out of a stone. That dude is unbelievably good at his job. Mick is hilarious, and I love him for all the nostalgia and everything else. But Ken is the driving force of that broadcast. I'm absolutely positive he could freestyle an entire segment out of that Russian dude's name. He's already done it with Kostin and Berggren.

Not worried about ASP at all. His legs are the foundation of his game and they're fine. And because they said he's in a "plaster cast" it suggest a bone break and not something terrible like a joint issue or back issue or something. He's good.

Quenneville will be back if he wants to be. It'll just take a minute. All things considered Quenneville's part in the Chicago scandal was relatively minor, it just blew up so much that heads had to roll.

Cutter Gauthier is really good. He was just the 1C for Team USA at the World Juniors. But he left Philly in a bad spot by telling them he wouldn't sign with them, so the return is suboptimal. Drysdale is good but injury prone, hence why the 2nd was thrown in.

This is why I want Quenneville so bad. He's an excellent systems coach (like Jon Cooper for example), but also a total hardass that demands his players work their asses off (like Torts). The league needs to reinstate this guy who Yzerman can hire him.

Torts is the man. Love that guy. I'd really like to see him get another one before his run as a coach is over. Just the other night he shut down a reporter that wanted to ask him questions about Connor McDavid. Like, this is a Stanley Cup winner. A Jack Adams winner. He's coached absolutely legends, Hall of Famers, for a long long time and these people want to get sound bites of him gushing over 27 year olds...or worse, pining for 19 year olds. Thank god Torts has some dignity.