greenrebellion

lol

I'd like to be a fly on the wall during intermission. My concern is that Babcock is beginning to be tuned out.

I'll tell you what the Wings are good for, helping losing teams turn it around. Dallas had lost a bunch in a row, play us and win. Phoenix loses a bunch in a row, play us and beat us.

I hate shootouts.

I guess...its kind of surprising to me though that one man could have such an impact, especially when he's dealing with a veteran crew that should know what to do at this point without being given a ton of direction.

I'm still kind of in shock that we blew that lead. Why this team can't hold a lead is beyond me.

I laughed out loud when it happened, never seen anything like that before.

K, I'm buying a Helm jersey. AMAZING

I wonder if there is some element of boredom in the regular season. I mean, a lot of these guys have been there done that, won cups, had fantastic regular seasons year after year, its just the expectation. But one thing is for sure, when this team is firing on all cylinders, they are unstoppable. I think (hope) we'll make a deep run and expect at least the conference finals, Vancouver and the Sharks both concern me though if we end up running into them at some point.

We give up a lot of goals in the first five minutes.

Horrible officiating, but at least its consistently horrible.

Hope they don't rush him back, but when he is back I'd like to see him get a couple starts in a row to get back in the swing of things...as long as him getting consecutive starts doesn't push him too hard.

The bolded part is kind of humurous. I'd bet every GM in the league would take Niemi over Howard at $2.25 million per year given the information currently available. And ya, Howard is just one good postseason run away from deserving a higher contract, problem is that he hasn't done it yet whereas Niemi has. Its almost like you give no value to having 4 rounds of postseason experience and winning a cup then coming back the next season and putting up pretty phenomenal numbers after the "hangover" period. I have no problem with Howard. I'm not a huge fan of his inconsistent play this year and at times am concerned if he'll be consistent enough to make it through a deep playoff run, but I've certainly never argued that we should bail on the guy.

So by your logic, if I say Tim Thomas is better than Howard and deserves a bigger contract, then I'm deprecating Howard? There's a logic fail in there somewhere. There's quite a bit of blind homerism on this board though. I mean it cracked me up how many people were saying Holland had some grand master scheme in the works during the Nabokov fiasco, that he wasn't just signing Nabokov to lose him in the waiver process and he was going to pull something out of his rear end. Most of the fans on the sharks message boards love the Niemi signing, many here hate it, I'm just trying to provide some middle ground saying there was no way Niemi was going to sign for anywhere $2.2 million given his resume, so if the Sharks wanted him (and given the lack of goaltending depth they probably need him) they were going to have to make a reasonable offer which it appears they did. They can both be good signings, Holland isn't the only GM in the league that can sign a good contract.

His numbers through the first 3 rounds were stellar. The finals then became a run and gun offensive game with goalies on both sides putting up subpar stats.

I love how the team can throw Cleary on any line in practically any role, and he still goes out there, works his ass off and produces.

Well you gotta have a goalie, right? They could run with Nittymaki, they could sign a Dan Ellis type guy, but those don't always work out as evidenced this year. You could do worse than have Niemi signed for $3.8 million. But anyway, I don't want to sidetrack this too far. I'm glad we have Howard for the next two years at least and I hope he's solid for this years playoff run.

I largely agree and personally like Holland's way of managing goalies, pretty much never committing large $ nor significant terms. There are downsides to that approach though in that we constantly take risks with unproven goalies come playoff time. See Legace and Howard as recent examples. That said, there was no way Niemi was going to sign anywhere near $2.25MM given his "resume" so if the Sharks wanted him, that's what they had to pay and it doesn't seem too ridiculous of a contract to me.

Oh come on. How often have we seen a rookie phenom fall off a cliff and disappear never to be heard from again. So Howard had one great year. Meanwhile, Niemi had a good regular season last year, a great playoffs, and despite a slip early in the year (Stanley Cup hangover or whatever you want to call it) has rebounded and is now supporting a .919 save percentage despite the weak start and he’s on a team with defensive depth problems. At $2.25MM you’d really rather take Howard who struggled in the playoffs over a guy who has been there, done that in the highest pressure situations and proven himself to be more consistent? Sounds like I’m bashing Howard, but I’m not. I just think its funny how people think $2.25MM for Howard is a great signing, but Niemi at $3.8MM is horrible. Not like Sharks have a bunch of options in goal either so they were kind of desperate but still in my eyes they got a fair price. I would’ve preferred a shorter term as I’ve mentioned in some other posts, but a shorter term probably means bigger cap hit.

He won the cup and is putting up excellent numbers again this year on a Sharks team that has been pretty poor defensively until recently. Ya he started off weak, but has played lights out for the past two months. I mean are we trying to argue that Niemi should make the same as Howard, because I think Niemi is clearly a better goaltender at this point (no that doesn't mean I'm saying Howard is bad) and its just a matter of degree. Edit: Put another way, for the same price, would you rather have Howard or Niemi on the team for this years playoff run (ignore intangibles like locker room chemistry). I think most would take Niemi if they are honest with themselves.

One could argue that Niemi is a better goalie and has proven himself in the playoffs making him worth the extra $1.6MM per year.

The cap hit probably is close to fair given his recent play plus the fact that he has a stanley cup, but a four year term on a goalie with so little history in the league is a risk. Guess you can just send him overseas if things don't work out ala Huet.

Lame.

Doesn't really seem bad at all. The prospect is a middle to bottom pairing in the AHL and he gets a late first rounder then a second/third. Fisher commanded a 1st and a 3rd and arguably Penner is more valuable then Fisher. Kings have plenty of prospects, and this team seriously improves their top line. Plus he's not a rental because he has another year to go.

I was hoping for something around $1.8MM to $2.0MM, but I guess its ok. Doesn't seem like any sort of hometown discount applied since I doubt he gets more than $2.25MM in the open market.