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NHL 2015-16 - Because we still don't need a new thread!


Jabronius Maximus

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Yeah Crosby was far from invisible lol. From what I remember he was neck and neck with Malkin until the latter half of the playoffs, when Geno went god mode on the league. 

Hopefully this lights a fire under the Pens offense. It has terrifying potential, and I for one would love more offense in the league. Hopefully Dallas' love for goals spreads to other teams. Their being 1st just helps the cause. 

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What playoffs were you watching? Crosby had 31 points the year they won the Cup. The only player to score more points in a playoffs since Crosby did that was Malkin in the same year (he ended with 36). That was also the year Ovie and Sid met in the playoffs, with both scoring a hat trick in the same game. He had one of the best postseasons in NHL history (and Malkin doing the same was just amazing to watch). They don't make the finals for a rematch with Detriot without Crosby. 

 

Was my memory misleading me there?

I mainly recalled him choking quite badly in the finals against Red Wings. Not sure if he was any better in the conference finals. Might have mixed it up with the Vancouver Olympics, where he displayed a mainly lacklustre performance for most of the tournament, and he only showed up for the final to beat team USA. 

 

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That was also a finals that had some memorable moments by Jordan Staal. Man, I miss him. For a third line center he sure never lacked inspiring moments. I'll never forget that SHG he scored against Detroit in game 4 of the finals.

To touch on the coaching change:  I like the call. It's the right call, but I wish they did it in the offseason when there were some good coaches looking for a team. Sullivan seems to have been the anointed coach to succeed  Johnston for the past month. I'm eager to see what he brings to the table, and the lines he draws up. I hope he keeps Malkin's line the way it is. Sprong better be an every night guy. And yes, that means playing higher than the fourth line. We have a crazy amount of offensive talent. I hope he lets them play with that talent, and not re-enact the New Jersey Devils. Please. 

Read an article by Rob Rossi this morning and he was talking about how little Lemieux is around the team. It appears that he and Burkle are tuned out and burned out. I just hope they sell this team to someone who can bring vigor and hockey intelligence to the rink. Yeah I'd like to see Lemieux be a lifer but if he's burned out and doesn't want to do this anymore then leave and let someone hungry take the reigns. 

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And Scuderi just got traded to the Hawks for Trevor Daley.  Scuds served well in his first tour with us but this second has been one I'd like to forget. This should get Warsofsky and Clendening some more time up in the bigs. And Pouliot should hopefully make his debut this season as well.

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And Scuderi just got traded to the Hawks for Trevor Daley.  Scuds served well in his first tour with us but this second has been one I'd like to forget. This should get Warsofsky and Clendening some more time up in the bigs. And Pouliot should hopefully make his debut this season as well.

Don't know much about the D-man they got for him other than he's a puck-moving type, but I'd have taken a bag of pucks in return for Scuderi. This trade made my Monday.

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Anyone watching Pens-Bruins? Bruins 1-0 at first intermission. Pretty fun game so far. I know Brad Marchand is a rotten little rat, but he's our rotten little rat, and it is a pleasure to watch him and Bergeron play together.

I am watching on NBC Sports but seems I've got local announcers. Wondering if people in other markets are getting a different announcing team?

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Anyone watching Pens-Bruins? Bruins 1-0 at first intermission. Pretty fun game so far. I know Brad Marchand is a rotten little rat, but he's our rotten little rat, and it is a pleasure to watch him and Bergeron play together.

I am watching on NBC Sports but seems I've got local announcers. Wondering if people in other markets are getting a different announcing team?

In Pittsburgh its Doc and Eddie. So NBCs national announcers. I think you are getting local because it's a home game. 

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Don't know much about the D-man they got for him other than he's a puck-moving type, but I'd have taken a bag of pucks in return for Scuderi. This trade made my Monday.

I agree.  They already put him on the PP.  Why in the living hell was Matt Cullen getting PP time?

Kessel is getting some loud boos. Dante, did he leave Boston on bad terms?  Kessel seems like the kind of guy that doesn't leave a good taste in your mouth when he switches teams.

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I agree.  They already put him on the PP.  Why in the living hell was Matt Cullen getting PP time?

Kessel is getting some loud boos. Dante, did he leave Boston on bad terms?  Kessel seems like the kind of guy that doesn't leave a good taste in your mouth when he switches teams.

Ah, sorry, didn't see this edit last night.

The Kessel question seems like a simple one on its face but it feels complicated to answer. Kessel is widely loathed and mocked in Boston, but as with all not-fondly-remembered former Boston players, one can question how fair the negativity is. Certainly the Bruins, just like other Boston sports teams, let some smears and shit-talk about Kessel filter into the media when he departed. The fact that the Leafs continued to struggle after getting Kessel seems to validate the assessment in people's eyes. And I can't deny -- when I heard Kessel was going to the Pens, I smirked.

Kessel was viewed as too soft and not dedicated enough to defense for the Bruins, particularly with Julien's system. And he was going to be expensive to re-sign, if he'd even consent to staying in Boston. I've heard the opinion put forth no small number of times that no team that featured Kessel could win the Cup, because he'd wilt in the playoffs. Don't know enough about how he's done since to evaluate that comment.

Fans used to chant "Thank you Kessel!" at him because the picks they traded him for ended up being Tyler Seguin and Dougie Hamilton, who, just a couple of years ago, were regarded as great young building blocks. And then in successive offseasons, Seguin and Hamilton got traded. Seguin for almost the same reasons as Kessel, plus a side of partying/knuckleheadedness/maybe banging a teammate's wife. The PR campaign after the Seguin trade was particularly obvious. It was the offseason after they'd lost to the Blackhawks in the Final, Seguin hadn't done much in the playoffs, and the "Behind the B" team documentary that regularly get shown around here made sure to include footage of team executives complaining about Seguin in their meetings -- in particular, I remember someone saying, "If he'd produced half of what Patrick Kane did, we'd have won the Cup."

With Hamilton, there seemed to be a perception that he wasn't happy in Boston and wouldn't sign an extension so they traded him for what they could get. From a frustrated fan's perspective, who saw all those high-potential young players on a recent championship team, it really does rankle that the front office frittered away talent like that. Especially on the Seguin thing, it sucks to trade away a dollar for four quarters.

Should also be noted that Kessel and Seguin seem to fit the same narrative as Joe Thornton -- offensively skilled players who were traded out of Boston because they weren't defensive-minded enough, and then got a lot of shit talked about them on the way out.

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I was always curious about why Seguin was traded so quickly from the Bruins. 

So are a lot of Bruins fans, still. I just thought he was way too young to give up on. At least let him get to 25 and have his frontal lobe fully developed before you decide he's never going to be the player you want.

I sort of accepted the trade at the time because I was frustrated with his lack of production in the preceding playoffs, but the trade has looked worse over time, and I can remember at least two occasions where Seguin-in-Dallas has burned the Bruins -- with a hat trick in a game this year, and with a game-winner in a shootout last year.

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Didn't some (former) Boston GM address the Seguin trade?

I vaguely recall the argument being made was something like this:

"We were quite happy with his rookie campaign. His work ethic during practice was also never a problem. But the lockout came at a bad time for him. Because he had played too many games at the NHL level he could not go back to play at the juniors (like Taylor Hall did), so he played in Europe during the lock out, and he picked up some playing habits there, we did not like (namely not being aggressive/physical enough on the defensive side of his game). Thus we decided to trade him."

I know there were also some rumors going around that he banged Nathan Horton's wife, which were probably just that. Rumors. And his coed chasing habits in the Boston area. He was a young succesful athlete, so I am inclined to consider those stories as probably true. But apparently it did not affect his work during practice or the games, so that was probably also a non-issue. I mean, we are talking about professional athletes, so there the range of smartness (outside their profession) can range quite a bit: from really smart guys like Lovejoy, Dominic Moore or Killorn down to Eric Lindros/Patrick Kane, who are not exactly future Nobel Prize Laureates.

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Didn't some (former) Boston GM address the Seguin trade?

I vaguely recall the argument being made was something like this:

"We were quite happy with his rookie campaign. His work ethic during practice was also never a problem. But the lockout came at a bad time for him. Because he had played too many games at the NHL level he could not go back to play at the juniors (like Taylor Hall did), so he played in Europe during the lock out, and he picked up some playing habits there, we did not like (namely not being aggressive/physical enough on the defensive side of his game). Thus we decided to trade him."

I know there were also some rumors going around that he banged Nathan Horton's wife, which were probably just that. Rumors. And his coed chasing habits in the Boston area. He was a young succesful athlete, so I am inclined to consider those stories as probably true. But apparently it did not affect his work during practice or the games, so that was probably also a non-issue. I mean, we are talking about professional athletes, so there the range of smartness (outside their profession) can range quite a bit: from really smart guys like Lovejoy, Dominic Moore or Killorn down to Eric Lindros/Patrick Kane, who are not exactly future Nobel Prize Laureates.

The criticism about not being physical enough and not paying enough attention on defense was well-known, but I hadn't heard the thing about the European stuff affecting his playing habits, so that's interesting.

Opinions seem to vary on whether his partying affected his work. I heard definitely that he was dogging it in games from being tired, and the Bruins let it be known, after the trade, that they'd had to station a security guard outside his room during the playoffs. There was this pretty good comment from that article though:

"Easiest money I ever made," said the guard. "He was always in the center of the room, since he refused to get anywhere near the walls, and every time he tried to get past me, he'd end up missing the door completely."

 

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Okay, so.  Pens-Bruins.  My biggest reaction?  I had fun watching the Pens.  No, they weren't great.  Two posts isn't terrible, but that powerplay isn't good and the Bruins were way too good at pinching and swarming the puck, and rebound opportunities were low.  Zatkoff messed up badly on Talbot's goal and simply didn't trust his defensemen.  This could possibly get better, but I think it might be more of a general positioning-skill thing than a coordination skill.  The second, fuck, I don't even know what to say because it was just ugly as balls, and the third was off of a fucking ludicrous penalty call on Hornqvist and a pretty ballsy and (imo) decent call by Sullivan to pull Zatkoff.  But I had fun watching them.  They played in the middle of the ice! They passed!  They entered the neutral zone with speed!  And I'll take a fun losing team over a boring losing team any day.  But on top of that, I think there were some decent changes and I think the Pens could do...eh.  Make the playoffs?  Maybe, maybe, maybe (injuries depending) make the second round, though I'm not hopeful.  But that's more than I was before this last game.  But if Fleury and Letang remain out for a while, Matt Murray better get used to NHL games real fucking quick, and if both are out for a while, I don't see it going well.  

Sheary was good, so was Warsofsky.  Sprong wasn't very noticeable, but he was on the 4th.  Plotnikov started off looking like a bad acquisition but he's really improved and is solid.  I didn't see enough of Daley to get an impression, but that's frankly a step up.  So eh.  I'm looking forward to seeing the rematch tomorrow more than I've looked forward to a hockey game in a while.  

e:  And yes, I am very glad Johnston is gone.  They looked like a team that could get much better, unlike a few weeks ago.  

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Calgary is currently third in the division... with a goal difference of -22 (tied for worst GD in the league). The Pacific Division is weird this season, with only one really good team (Los Angeles). The Sharks should be able to finish top three in this entertaining mess of a division.

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Okay, so.  Pens-Bruins.  My biggest reaction?  I had fun watching the Pens.  No, they weren't great.  Two posts isn't terrible, but that powerplay isn't good and the Bruins were way too good at pinching and swarming the puck, and rebound opportunities were low.  Zatkoff messed up badly on Talbot's goal and simply didn't trust his defensemen.  This could possibly get better, but I think it might be more of a general positioning-skill thing than a coordination skill.  The second, fuck, I don't even know what to say because it was just ugly as balls, and the third was off of a fucking ludicrous penalty call on Hornqvist and a pretty ballsy and (imo) decent call by Sullivan to pull Zatkoff.  But I had fun watching them.  They played in the middle of the ice! They passed!  They entered the neutral zone with speed!  And I'll take a fun losing team over a boring losing team any day.  But on top of that, I think there were some decent changes and I think the Pens could do...eh.  Make the playoffs?  Maybe, maybe, maybe (injuries depending) make the second round, though I'm not hopeful.  But that's more than I was before this last game.  But if Fleury and Letang remain out for a while, Matt Murray better get used to NHL games real fucking quick, and if both are out for a while, I don't see it going well.  

Pens really took it to the Bruins in the second. Rematch tonight!

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Pens not making the play off with their players would be hillarious.

Biggest failure in the NHL since the Gillis and Tortorella clown show in Vancouver. :)

I still kinda hope Florida makes it. Not that I care that much for the cats, but they have Luongo. Nuff said.

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Interesting to see the offense click when Crosby wasn't in the lineup.  I'm curious to see if this continues if he's sidelined for a couple more games. We have a break till Saturday so he may be good to go by then.  Malkin really lights up when Sid is out of the lineup.

Also, nice to see a new rivalry heat up with Columbus.  I'll never say no to some bad blood.

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