2008/09 NHL Thread

As it turns out he's not the answer but I thought it was worth the risk. I don't think anybody thought he would come in this out of shape. The great question in Vancouver doesn't appear that it will ever be answered.

It's time to make some tough decisions and blow this team up. The Sedins and Ohlund are UFA's and could fetch quite a bit at the deadline. If you do this you will probably have to trade Luongo in the summer as there is no way he will want to be part of a rebuilding program. Although the Canuck rebuilding program appears to be going on 40 years.
They don't have much in the system , although Hodgson is a nice building block.

 

It's time to make some tough decisions and blow this team up.

I've been thinking the same thing about a few Canadian teams.

 

Burke carries this around wherever he goes

 

Honestly I didn't think until the Sundin fiasco that the Canucks needed any blowing up, and it could be the same coming out of it. What does kill them is their system. But they have a ton of cap space, especially after Sundin walks, the Sedins are still young, so is Luongo. there is also that youth and potential on the back end with guys like Bieksa and Edler. They also need some patience with their young forwards like Ryamond and Burrows. Are they a contender with the pieces they have? No. But I wouldn't be about to blow it up just yet. Bring in a new coach, someone who knows something about offence, and see what can be done through free agency.

 

Beef, they've chaged their offensive philosophy, they don't play the same system as last year. I believe they are tenth in goals for. If anything what has let them down is what was supposed to be the strength of their team, their defence. Their first pass is awful and god knows what has happened to Bieska's game.

You make some good points, but their cap flexibility will take a hit if they sign the Sedins. They have a bargain with them right now but when they hit the open market there is always someone out there willing to overpay. Burrows is also a UFA and he is a very good checker but that is all he will ever be. Not sold on Raymond but Edler is going to a good defenseman. Here's the dilema though, anytime you have Luongo you have a chance, so if they sneak in and he gets hot you never know.

 

Are you serious, the goaltending? In my eyes its a two horse race between Hemsky and Roli for team MVP. yeah, Roli has had the odd off night, but what starting goalie hasn't? It's just when he is off his game it really blows up because chances are few other players on the team are going. If not for Roli the Oilers are down there with St. Louis, they certainly don't go .500 in the 10 games Hemsky missed. Goaltending has not been the problem. A headache maybe with the three-goalie system which was finally solved but that's about it.

Also with MacTavish, it's not just the vets that have been there for years that are tuning him out, it is the young guys as well. That's the disturbing part. This started in training camp and has continued on to this point. No one is playing with any jam or jump. It's fricken painful. He's a hypocrit of mass proportions. First impressions are everything with this guy. If your first appearance with him is a good one, you're golden and can do no wrong (see Horcoff, Reddox, Pouliot, Gagner, etc), if it's not, no matter what you do to turn things around from there you're screwed (see Penner, Nilsson, Schremp, Garon, etc.).

There are guys that swear by him. I think he's a fraud. For a guy who was an Oiler for a number of years, he sure as hell doesn't coach Oilers hockey. Until he came in, win or lose, the Oilers were always built on the foundation of speed and aggressiveness. There were years where they were absolutely brutal in the early-mid 90's but you didn't question the effort of the group as a whole, and they at least still tried to play Oilers hockey. The problem was a scouting department that hadn't drafted a legitimate first rounder since Grant Fuhr in 1981. Now they are the exact opposite, they have become everything I hate about hockey. They are defence first, second, and third. They are as passive a team as there is in the NHL. Before he came aboard they were at least a team you hated to play because of their physicality, now they are one of the three easiest teams in the league to play against. The frustrating thing is his style was validated with the miracle run to the final, where they didn't play this thing called offence. The troops were called off almost completely as Roloson and Pronger almost single handidly carried them to the finals. They relied on special teams and the odd break for goals. He figured this will always work. But he forgot that he had caught lightning in a bottle that year. You still have to score, you still have to be aggressive and the systems he is now employing obivously doesn't encourage either. They simply don't initiate jack shit, and don't appear to even try to initiate anything. This is I believe his eighth season behind the Oilers bench, and when it is over and they likely miss the playoffs again, he will have made the playoffs three times. That just is not good enough, especially to be playing safe, passive hockey.

The ironic thing is one of the problems they tried to fix during the lockout was to make the game more wide open -- hense the onslaught of 35 penalties a game, trying to get players to stop hooking and holding, to make the game like it was back in the 80s. As soon as this happend, the Oilers who forever had played that wide open style go into a complete shell.

And that's what pisses me off the most about MacTavish.

 

Sorry by system I meant farm system, not offensive system. There's not a ton of young players ready to jump up and fill holes. Cody Hodgson would be the one forward coming up to be excited about, but the defence is pretty bare.

I think the sedins are re-signable. I don't think they will want to be split up and Vancouver is one of the few teams that can re-sign both of them. Ohlund should be dealt at the deadline, and I think Bieksa will bounce back next year. Coming off of devistating injuries, like the one he suffered last year that kept him out forever, it ususally takes a full year to get back to where they were before.

Luongo is an ace in the hole, which I think frees them up to try and trade Schnieder down in the minors for help in other areas like on defence. For a blue chip goalie prospect you would think they could get a puck moving defencemn in return, even if he to is still in the prospect stage.

And Raymond is just in his first full year, I like his skill set, I don't think he'll be that first line forward, but he should be a constant contributor from the second line moving forward.

Also not sure on Vigneaut as coach, have never been a huge fan.

 

Vancouver hasn't won a Cup since the three boys from Arran-Elderslie, Bruce County, Ontario were scoring all of their goals.

 

Nice link to an Infomart page, JJ.

NHLPA prez Paul Kelly on helmets in the NHL:

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=265782

 

http://vancouvermillionaires.com/

 

Love that bowler.

 

The Lightning, enthused by Mike McKenna's 11 saves in relief last night, are starting him against Pittsburgh.