Official lead up to 2015-16 season thread

[Alessandro]

And we have... THE CHINESE!

[batdad]

I can hear Charles Wang at the table...>GARTH TAKE THIS KID OR YOU ARE FIRED! Kid has been in North America for 9 years.

[batdad]

PD

Griffin is a guy who all scouts will tell you are 2 or 3 dman. Maybe 4. How much have you seen him play to completely discount all these players? I have seen him over 1000 times. Same with your boy Lehner by the way. I have seen him live quite a few times, and on tape quite a few times.

Gropp-Skilled, not physical. Great shot. Sees the ice. Does not work hard sometimes. Decent skater. This is a guy that has a very high upside, but is not going to be a bottom 6 player in spite of his size. He is boom or bust. My bet is bust, but he surprised me doing as well as he did last year when Barzal was out.

Morrison-Soft, skilled super skilled good wheels, but at times a bit selfish. He is another boom/bust type and a gamble. Will never be a bottom 6 guy.

Hagelin-Another one of those great skaters, that is just a great skater like Kylington. You say it was a monster steal, but that is a strong word like the word elite. It is not a monster steal if a large percentage of the players above him in the draft perform well, or a few below him perform well. He COULD be a steal, but right now.....you are completely discounting all the hockey experts who have discounted him big time over the last year.

Bold predictions are fine, but well...they are based on something that is not going to help you in evaluating talent...emotion. Take the emotion out. sure you have seen these guys do something good and you have read some reports on them.

But I will guarantee you I have seen and have evaluated players over andd over and and over and if there is one thing I have learned....take the emotion out of it and evaluate carefully. Compare to any and all you have ever seen.

Skating is not the only element to being a hockey player, and that is all Kylington brings according to just about everyone in the know.


LOL at Ray Ferraro comment on Gyrba...decent skater, big and mean....puck is not his friend.

[Peter_Doherty]

batdat - I haven't seen him ALOT but i've seen him enough to feel like i can have an opinion, and that opinion is that i think he won't be more then a #4.

Your saying the same things about Gropp as what i've read about him between now and when he was drafted, high upside, might not get there. I like the Morrison pick, love picking boom-bust in the mid-late rounds.

Hagelin is more then just a great skater though, defensively that is, he's smart defensively.. Sadly he's not smart offensively and he has no shot, still scores like a 1st/2nd line tweener in 5v5/60. I will miss Hags alot but we just can't pay him what he wants and probably deserves.

Yeye, he COULD be a monster steal, i think he will be...

Hopefully Sather can get a good top-9 forward for Klein (maybe +) so we don't go into next season banking on one of JTM, Fast or Etem to step up and become a top-6 guy... Anyone has seen Etem alot? From what i've seen (limited) and read he's fast but awkward on the skates, physical and can shoot but doesn't see the ice well at all and doesn't use his teammates well either.. Has had trouble transitioning to NHL... Am i far off? If that's pretty close to what he is then i hope he can skate well enough that he can atleast find space, because then the pucks will come to him if he plays with Hayes on the 3rd line..

Edit: Great move by Slats just now, sent Ryan Haggerty to Hawks for Raanta...

[Prowl]

Wow I am really impressed with Treliving. I know Kylington was dropping but to get him at 60 is a nice touch and rounds out a really solid weekend for Calgary. I'm still in awe we got Dougie Hamilton!

Batdad - agree wholeheartedly on Reinhart. I'm really surprised people are upset in Edmonton. They needed a good defenseman with good size and responsible. He does that and he is young. He will complement the likes of Nurse and Klefbom well. They did well with Gryba and while I'm not totally sold on Talbot, hit there too. I think it's about time that both the Flames and Oilers became good at the same time. It won't be too long that teams will call Alberta Death Valley again.

I love the Jets approach as they are stuffed with prospects and will be following how they do.

[CJ]

Edit: Great move by Slats just now, sent Ryan Haggerty to Hawks for Raanta...

No surprise that Raanta got traded, but I was hoping he would have gotten to a team where he can actually play a few games.

[Peter_Doherty]

Edit: Great move by Slats just now, sent Ryan Haggerty to Hawks for Raanta...

No surprise that Raanta got traded, but I was hoping he would have gotten to a team where he can actually play a few games.

He will probably get close to 20 games atleast, AV doesn't like to overwork Hank, Hank is better in the playoffs when he doesn't have to play 70 games.

[Peter_Doherty]

Even if i think Oilers overpaid on Reinhart i gotta admit that they improved their defence MASSIVELY in the last few days... Talbot is a stud aswell, he's just so calm, i think he will be a hit in Edmonton.

[CJ]

He will probably get close to 20 games atleast, AV doesn't like to overwork Hank, Hank is better in the playoffs when he doesn't have to play 70 games.

And that's not much. He would have gotten a lot more games on a lot more teams. Even as a starter in a few teams.

[Peter_Doherty]

Maybe, but with Rangers he gets to work with the best goalie coach alive

[philou21]

Philly got Sam Gagner and a pick for Grossman + Pronger's contract. Dunno how that improves the Flyers. Gagner sucks.

[Peter_Doherty]

Think they are buying out Gagner, they just wanted to dump Grossmann.

[philou21]

Poor Gagner lol Everyone just dumps him. He's not THAT bad.

[batdad]

batdat - I haven't seen him ALOT but i've seen him enough to feel like i can have an opinion, and that opinion is that i think he won't be more then a #4.

Your saying the same things about Gropp as what i've read about him between now and when he was drafted, high upside, might not get there. I like the Morrison pick, love picking boom-bust in the mid-late rounds.

Hagelin is more then just a great skater though, defensively that is, he's smart defensively.. Sadly he's not smart offensively and he has no shot, still scores like a 1st/2nd line tweener in 5v5/60. I will miss Hags alot but we just can't pay him what he wants and probably deserves.

Yeye, he COULD be a monster steal, i think he will be...

Hopefully Sather can get a good top-9 forward for Klein (maybe +) so we don't go into next season banking on one of JTM, Fast or Etem to step up and become a top-6 guy... Anyone has seen Etem alot? From what i've seen (limited) and read he's fast but awkward on the skates, physical and can shoot but doesn't see the ice well at all and doesn't use his teammates well either.. Has had trouble transitioning to NHL... Am i far off? If that's pretty close to what he is then i hope he can skate well enough that he can atleast find space, because then the pucks will come to him if he plays with Hayes on the 3rd line..

Edit: Great move by Slats just now, sent Ryan Haggerty to Hawks for Raanta...

Etem is just an okay player, barely a top 6, but needs to play there. Mason Raymond without the speed, but more size. Great junior, very average pro.

The hockey guys on radio out here...Ferraro, Tomlinson, and Garrett...all worried that AV and Ranger system made Talbot what he was in New York and that with Edmonton much like the others they have got in the past few years, he will just be okay.

Love what Benning said about the market for Eddie Lack. 10 teams interested and chatted one serious offer. Feels that the Eastern GMs do not stay up late enough, often enough to get a good sense of the goaltending out here, and that the systems teams play make a BIG difference in what a goalie can really do. At the same time, he would not even listen to Edmonton and San Jose for Lack, and both probably would have paid more. Interesting comments re the extra value many feel that Talbot and Lehner received in their deals for their old teams. Anyway, I believe that the three (And even 4 with Khudobin) are pretty much the same, just interesting in value received in return for them all being different.

Will wait and see what happens, but I am not sold completely on Talbot being the saviour for Edmonton...with their improved D he will definitely do better than the others that have been there lately, but not sure it will be tangibly because of him.

[Peter_Doherty]

We'll see, i'm just so impressed by Talbot, he's SOOOOOOOO calm it's almost scary... I really don't feel like he's a product of our system, we were far from the best team at preventing high danger shots etc, i don't have the advanced stats here but Rangers defensive system is quite overrated around the league just because we have a nice looking D lineup. If he can handle the work load then he will be good, maybe even great.

Etem probably won't be in our top-6 unless AV thinks the best way to get the best out of everyone is to make him the new Pouliot and put him with Brass+Zuke, everyone is good when playing with them. I think he probably starts as our #3 LW with Hayes as his C and Miller/Fast as his RW.

[sao.phim]

Think they are buying out Gagner, they just wanted to dump Grossmann.

Yes, good move to dump Grossmann and free some cap space. And the draft pick as a bonus

[philou21]

Does the Flyers have any prospects to take the place or they plan on landing a UFA? Flyers's history with UFA is far from being good.

[sao.phim]

Hextall stated, that team can not be built from UFAs. He wants to build within.

Actual defence looks like this:
Streit, AMac, N. Schultz, MDZ (RFA this summer), L. Schenn, Gudas, Medvedev
In the system:
Manning, Alt, Gostisbehere, Hagg, Morin, Sanheim, Marti
Add to that Provorov

Future is bright, just have to get rid of AMac & Schenn or at least one of them..

[Peter_Doherty]

I assume you will try to get rid of atleast 1 more D-man and let Ghost/Sanheim try to make the team?

[bruins72]

So I was staying up all night too watching the draft. Most things went as expected, but what I still think about are the picks of the Bruins. Can anybody tell me what strategy they went after? Their picks were rather surprising ... Do they have information about the better rated prospects we all miss or do they hope to have gotten some hidden talents?

Seems to me they wasted at least one of their three picks for less than they could get on first look.

They weren't prepared to make those 3 picks. They were thinking they were picking much higher. When the picks came, they panicked. Sweeney looks like the biggest chump GM.

[batdad]

I do not think they panicked. I think they just had a hard time which three guys to pick, because they had no intention of being in those 3 spots. But the Debrusk pick in particular is iffy to me at that point. But everyone is right, not the best debut for Sweeney, and not the best sophomore season for Benning. Only Chiarelli came out looking good in the Boston franchise model.

[Schneides]

Wow I am really impressed with Treliving. I know Kylington was dropping but to get him at 60 is a nice touch and rounds out a really solid weekend for Calgary. I'm still in awe we got Dougie Hamilton!

Prowl

Yes it has been a good couple of days for the Flames. I am just a little worried we drafted Kent Nilsson Mark II. A Magic Man but for his disappearance act as much as talent with a puck! I'll wait to see how he plays in Stockton before I get too excited, but yes worth the gamble!

Cheers

Schneides

[bruins72]

So Don Sweeney pushed the self-destruct button on the Bruins. He was trying for that #3 overall and whiffed. What a cluster-Lindros (I did that, not trying to bypass the swear filter). And then he picked guys way above where they were ranked. BIG FAIL!

So can anyone make me a new avatar of a Bruins logo with red circle and line through it? Or maybe the face of Don Sweeney with devil horns and such? Seriously, I'm fuming mad right now. I've been in a bad mood since I heard about the Hamilton deal and it's just gotten worse and worse.

So it's looking like we could do a Bruins challenge in the fall without having to do much to the team.

Sure did whiff on that. But they got three players in a row in the draft, all represented by the same player agency. LOL.

Some Bruin reporter name Joe is on the radio in Van right now....just talked about maybe Boston moving Chara and Krecji, and that they do not like Malcolm Subban as a goalie now. Reporter is ripping into Subban actually.

What is funny? They are now talking about how Peter Chiarelli may be closer to winning a Stanley Cup than the Bruins. Ripping how would not talk to Chiarelli or Benning on HAmilton because they were widdled at them. Spite not calling. Oilers had a good package and would not deal with Chiarelli. Package had a better 2nd round pick.

Was the reporter Joe Haggerty? He's not the most respected reporter. He's more of a blogger/twitter guy that ended up getting hired by one of the bigger companies. At this point, with what the Bruins traded away and what they still have, they might as well trade Krejci and Chara. They're not going to be a contender. I really don't want to see them trade Bergeron. He's a guy I'd like to see be a Bruins for his entire career. But when I think about, he deserves better.

The Bruins played Subban in a game this past season and he was terrible. I don't think management or anyone else is that high on him. He's still young but a lot of people have been soured on him. I don't think his value is that high right now. He was probably offered in some of the trade talks for a higher draft pick.

I'm not that surprised that Sweeney and Neely were so spiteful towards these guys that used to be in their organization. I think the relationship was quite bad towards the end. There's a whole bunch of egos and cluelessness involved in the Bruins management and they've made a mess out of the organization. I'm just glad they won that Cup in 2011 so that I can finally say I've seen them win one in my lifetime. I'm only 43 now but I wouldn't be surprised if I didn't see another in my lifetime.

[philou21]

Hextall stated, that team can not be built from UFAs. He wants to build within.

Actual defence looks like this:
Streit, AMac, N. Schultz, MDZ (RFA this summer), L. Schenn, Gudas, Medvedev
In the system:
Manning, Alt, Gostisbehere, Hagg, Morin, Sanheim, Marti
Add to that Provorov

Future is bright, just have to get rid of AMac & Schenn or at least one of them..

And in offense how does it looks? Needs more drafts? I kid, I kid, my question is serious. I know nothing about Philly's pool prospects.

[sao.phim]

I assume you will try to get rid of atleast 1 more D-man and let Ghost/Sanheim try to make the team?

Yes, at least one more has to go..
I expect Ghost or/and Provorov will make the team then.