kipwinger

Did the Flyers just swap Steve Mason for Sergei Bobrovsky in a round about way?

Vanek, Pominville, Yandle, and Gaborik are all available. But you're not going to get a sniff of any of them if you start by saying "I'm not going to trade any top prospects or my first round pick". You know what's crazy, when you add a "dynamic" player to your team it tends to change the team's...dynamic. Strange I know, but doesn't anyone else feel like even a lateral move might be worthwhile here considering our current core doesn't seem capable of getting anything done?

Nobody is suggesting "selling the farm". Nyquist and a 1st would get a pretty good return, and it wouldn't be detrimental to the long term viability of this team. It's not like we're talking about trading away 4 or 5 prospects here. Moving one or two guys does not equal destroying the future. Tomas Fleischmann was traded for Robert Lang. Lang didn't work out, and Fleischmann is a good player, yet our future wasn't destroyed because of it. Everybody around here acts like if we traded Nyquist or a 1st then all would be lost. It's silly.

Line 1: Thank you for calling Little Caesar's Pizza, how can I help you? Line 2: This is Ken Holland, how much for a large Pizza? Line 1: $10 Line 2: Too rich for my blood, goodbye. The following day in the Free Press, "Well I worked the phones but nothing made sense".

It's not a matter of not making a trade, at least in my opinion. It's a matter of not making a trade or a prominent free agent signing in about 4 years, in conjunction with the fact that this team (or at least it's core) has been woefully inadequate the entire time. The core group we have is not getting the job done, so either add too it, or rebuild it. All we seem to do is add bit parts, or do nothing at all. I just don't understand the strategy. For example: Holland doesn't want to trade his first rounder in case we don't make the playoffs. He doesn't want to trade White or Filppula in case we do. The whole point of hedging your bets is to stand still until something changes systemically that leaves you in a better position. I don't know what he thinks is going to change, but clearly it hasn't happened yet, and I don't see anything on the horizon that bodes well for us. Three years from now we might have Jarnkrok, Nyquist, and Jurco playing decent hockey. We'll also have Zetterberg, Kronwall, and Franzen playing declining hockey and likely no Datsyuk or Filppula either. So how does staying put work out in the long run?

Does anybody know who Jarnkrok's linemates are in Grand Rapids? I saw that he's a plus 2 in four games but he doesn't have any assists and was wondering who was doing the scoring.

Wow, seems like you're trying to make a point here but it's just too subtle. What on earth could you possibly be getting at? Everything is obscured by your insulting tone and blatant, uncreative, provocations.

Last year our powerplay ranked 22nd and this year it's 17th. Our PK was 25th last year and this year it's 18th. So you're right, special teams weren't better, they were about the same. I concede that point.

The only thing I was trying to refute was your claim that we didn't have a shoot first forward, we did. Secondly, the reason why Zetterberg's number have dipped is hard to pin down, but part of it is because back then he was playing the wing on Datsyuk's line. In our system wingers generally score more goals than centers because they don't have as much defensive responsibility. That's why Flip was moved to the wing last year...to get more offense out of him. Other than those two things I agree with pretty much everything you said. Especially the part about not having the supporting cast, and guys keying on Zetterberg. I've been saying this for a while. Without a legit top line, Zetterberg draws the tough defensive matchups, and gets stymied every night. Add Pominville or Gaborik to Pavel's wing and Zetterberg's offense will return, bet on it.

All of that happened last year and we were bounced in the first. Franzen was producing, Flip has having a career year, and Dats and Z were Dats and Z. Plus our special teams were miles ahead of where they are now. Still lost...badly. This team needs more talent, simple as that. We have two world class centers, one above average defenseman and winger, and that's it. Zetterberg is tops in the league every year in shots on goal. In 2008 he had 43 goals and was second in the league in shots on goal with 358. So yeah, we did have that.

Make the playoffs and anything can happen? Right. When was the last time that a team with terrible special teams, and middle of the road offense and defense won a cup? I'm so sick of this "LA did it last year" bulls***. LA was a stellar team in every area but one, they couldn't score. They made some improvements at the deadline, finally got some offensive stars to wake up, and bingo bango you've got a cup team. If Justin Abdelkader thinks any team can beat any other team in the playoffs I'd like to remind him of last Sunday's game. Psss...Justin...they didn't even have Hossa and Sharp. Anything can happen right? Except Justin Abdelkader outplaying a top six forward.

What irritates me the most is that standing pat is fine if you've got a good team, but when your team has been woefully inadequate for the last four years, how do you justify doing nothing? Holland says "we like our team". I respond...why? They've continuously gotten worse and proved nothing when it matters. What's to like? They aren't as bad as Calgary or Columbus? Aren't we supposed to aim a little higher than that in "Hockeytown"?

Yeah if he'd continued to have a bad season then maybe, but the guy's in beast mode right now so everyone in D.C. loves him again.

they won't accept that. Flip is a rental and the Sabres aren't going to make the playoffs. Why would they want a guy that's likely going to walk in two months if they can't even use him for a cup run?

I don't know anything about him so I'll keep quiet on that. I will say though, that Jimmy didn't debut until 26, and even when he came up nobody really had too high of hopes for him. So it's possible, but likely not probable that he'll make it. Side note, that goalie prospect is freaking huge though.

I was all for holding on to Flip until it looked like we weren't going to do anything at the deadline this year. But if that's the case then trade him for a first, because the same old thing just hasn't been cutting it for quite a while now. This is kinda hard for me to type because I freaking love Flip, but man, how many times does your team have to make an early exit before you conclude that the "core" you have isn't as good as you think?

Word was that the blues wanted a goalie prospect and Holland wasn't giving them Mrazek or Patterson. I think that's what did it.

Yeah I keep hearing this 5 million thing and assume that it's just his agent's starting point for negotiations. I think he'll resign for 4-4.5 eventually.

Obviously it depends on what the team in question is asking for. But for Gaborik I'd start with my first and Nyquist and I'd be willing to put second tier prospects or additional picks in as required. With Ericsson I'd be willing to part with any of the above, and I'd put Mrazek in play too.

Here's the thing I don't understand about Kenny's philosophy. He doesn't want to do something and get worse, but he also doesn't realize that by doing nothing and getting older, you are getting worse. Each year he doesn't do anything, our already aging core gets a year older. And there's nothing on the horizon to suggest that we've got a new core in the making. Even our highly touted prospects aren't the next great wave or Red Wings. The next wave would have been guys Abby, Helm, Kindl, and Ericsson's age, and if that's our new core then watch out. If he continues to do nothing and hopes that internal growth will fix these problems, he's likely to lose Datsyuk and Flip, while Z, Kronwall, and Franzen decline and there will be NOBODY there to pick up that slack. Unless, of course, you think Nyquist and Tatar are the answer. I don't.

Didn't Kenny just come out and say he doesn't want a rental? I can't imagine we'd get Jagr. Then again, Kenny does seem to love doing things on the cheap so taking a flier on a zillion year old is right up his alley.

Because we have nobody in the pipeline that addresses any of our needs? We have a ton of two-way skill guys and very young puck moving defensemen. That's it. If we want a goal scorer or a power forward we've got quite a while before any of our prospects will even be close.

The reverse logic around here blows my mind. Very few picks become legitimate prospects, and even fewer of those become everyday NHLers. So the least risky thing to trade is a pick, then a prospect, and then a legit NHLer (obviously I'm not talking about trading Drew Miller for a superstar here. I mean trading quality for similar quality). I have no idea why people are ready to trade prospects but want to hang on to this late first round pick so bad. We're not going to get a lottery pick, we're going to make the playoffs. We've been solidly in a playoff spot for about two months and we're done with the hard part of our schedule. Nobody around here is willing to part with a 20-30th pick for Keith Yandle, or Jason Pominville, or Marian Gaborik? Insane. Edit: I had originally misquoted Euro_Twins on this, which was my bad. Fixed now.

It's one game. Granted, Kindl had a bad game tonight, but not any worse than Smith to be honest. As for the rest... Smith averages 18:40 ice time per game, Kindl 17:54, which is the difference of one shift. Both play on the 2nd PP where Kindl has noticeably outplayed Smith. Neither saw significant PK time until Quincey got hurt, as Quincey, Kronwall, and Ericsson are the primary penalty killing defensemen, so it's not like Smith has been carrying the load there. Even then Smith only has 1 minute of PK time during Quincey's absence. So with the exception of one minute of PK time, they play pretty much exactly the same amount of minutes and Kindl leads Smith in every single statistical category. I understand not really liking particular players, but it's hard to conclude that Smith should play while Kindl sits. However, they're both better than White or Cola, which I think we can both agree on.

Feaster wanted a goalie prospect given all this Kipper drama and we weren't willing to part with ours. St. Louis was. That's pretty much the difference maker there.