GDT: Tag Team GDT #2 - Bruins @ Devils, 7 PM, MSGSN2

[Call Me Al]

not sure why nj would ever make that agreement. who cares if he whines if he’s sucking balls? he’s not more important than the team

 

[Bleedred]

Pathetic. Just blame the goalie.

28 doing 28.

When you're arguably THE WORST GOALIE IN THE NHL...... Then yeah, blame the goalie.

And first rule of thumb for me outside of that is when the goalie TURNS THE PUCK OVER, he creates the entire chance/shot and it doesn't matter if the goal looks bad going in or not. The goalie deserves ALL the blame for that, as he didn't just not stop a shot caused by someone else, he didn't stop a shot that he caused all by himself.

 

[Triumph]

Counting last night, Blackwood is 6-4-2 with a .922 SV against the Bruins. Generally speaking, when Blackwood has gotten a start outside of a crease split, it's been against a team he's done well against.

 

[Bleedred]

The third goal was no damn f***in good. Just watched it again.

I actually didn't realize it was as bad as it was in real time, as I was furious and disgusted that I even had to watch the decrepit #29 already allow 3 goals on 9 or 10 shots by that point and I was still fuming over the goal before it where he turned it over.

Yup, way off his angle, made himself look even smaller than Aaron Dell. Way too much open net on that one.

This guy sucks so much. I don't wanna hear about a screen on that play either.

That's a puck that HITS goalies in the NHL more often than hot.

I don't wanna hear about Pastrnak, goalies STOP over EIGHTY-FIVE PERCENT of his shots.

I haven't even done a goals review yet for last night, like literally haven't even watched any of them outside of this game and the Ovechkin 801st that was shown on highlights during another game. I was so furious.

f*** the decrepit #29 and I don't really care if he reads this post and cries.

f*** him.

And I hope that Panthers fan sitting in front of me that didn't understand why I was booing him after the first goal the other night, actually saw what happened last night when we got a visit from the Blackwood we've come to know so well over the last 65 games.

 

[Bleedred]

Counting last night, Blackwood is 6-4-2 with a .922 SV against the Bruins. Generally speaking, when Blackwood has gotten a start outside of a crease split, it's been against a team he's done well against.

After Ruff's comments last night, I would be shocked if he starts the next game back from the break, barring some kind of holiday food poisoning to Vitek that doesn't allow him to dress.

Last night sounds like it was damn close to the breaking point for him.

I don't think he can afford another game like last night when he does another start, unless there's at least 2 good games before it.

Ruff threw him under the bus as politely as he could. Talked about how there's a mistake on every shot and there's grade A chances and grade B chances and usually there's about 16-17 of those a night (he didn't specify if the 16-17 were grade A or grade B) and the goalie stops it or the goalie doesn't. And that we made plenty of mistakes in Florida and he was making saves that night.

He also didn't try to pretend that the pull was some kind of a ''Momentum changer'' or ''Spark'' or ''Mercy pull'' or any of that.

 

[Bleedred]

Blackwood keeps hanging himself with the ridiculously long leash we stupidly continue to give him. Idk why Tom and this team is so set on giving this dipshit so many chances. He keeps showing he’s no worth it. We keep shooting our selves in the foot for a dog shit goalie. we send the hotter goalie down for an injury plagued idiot that is consistently bad.

I think we've reached close to a breaking point here.

At least with Ruff we have and unless there's some kind of a disconnect between him and Fitz regarding Blackwood (and I don't think there is), then the end is nigh for Blackwood as a Devil.

And I don't think one more good start in his next game is gonna save him from getting blasted if he follows it up with another game like last night. Maybe two more quality games in a row will save him from a potential stinker after that.

 

[NJDevs26]

The coach and blackwood both blamed.... blackwood on that play where he rinmed it too hard. Watch the postgame interviews of their commentary. Blackwood said he made a mistake there and that is one play where he is most bothered by

Are they wrong too?

Not to mention the dude muffed a rebound off a weak shot, somehow lost his stick in the process AND let the shot go five-hole...that goal was all Blackwood from pillar to post.

 

[glenwo2]

My guess is they had some sort of agreement with Blackwood and his agent after last season. Blackwood doesn’t whine or ask for a trade or go to thr press and in return NJ gives him full support to rebound. Just a guess but based on a bit of cryptic reporting that was something along that lines of what might be inferred. Let’s see how long his leash is.

not sure why nj would ever make that agreement. who cares if he whines if he’s sucking balls? he’s not more important than the team

If that was true, Fitz should call up Blackwood's agent and tells him that his client sucks balls and so does he.

Then promptly dump Blackwood.

(i know that's not how things work but it's what needs to be done basically)

 

[guitarguyvic]

Trying to analyze each and every goal Blackwood gives up is a pointless exercise. The bottom line is he hasn’t stopped >90% of the shots he faces in two years. Sure there were plenty of times prior to this season where the team’s play was shit and a lot of that could be attributed to them. But there were plenty of games where he was just as trash as they were, hell I witnessed one such game in person. And this year there’s zero excuse…even with the team in front of him playing better he still can’t stop pucks at a high enough rate to be considered a legit NHL goalie. Just watch him…he sucks at tracking the puck and anticipating the play. His battle level around screens is weak. He routinely leaves space between himself and the posts. The eye test says he sucks and so do the stats. I don’t need a detailed breakdown of what happened on each and every goal. The best team in the league last night exposed him for exactly what he is, which everyone at this point should know.

And I don’t care what his previous numbers against the bruins were. Those stats don’t mean squat to me, there’s too many variables that could cause a shitty goalie to have decent numbers against a specific team in small sample sizes.

 

[glenwo2]

You couldn't make a save if there were TWO of you guarding the net.

 

[NjdevilfanJim]

You couldn't make a save if there were TWO of you guarding the net.

When I saw that I knew that picture and quote would end up on here

 

[My3Sons]

If that was true, Fitz should call up Blackwood's agent and tells him that his client sucks balls and so does he.

Then promptly dump Blackwood.

(i know that's not how things work but it's what needs to be done basically)

I’m not sure how many bad starts they give Blackwood but if he yo-yos with one good and one bad start they probably keep him around and give him pretty regular starts. He’s still probably got a longer leash than most would expect. I’m not sure why Blackwood struggles so badly with consistency even when he is healthy but my guess is that among other things the position specific coaching isn’t helping him.

 

[Devils090]

if you just focus at the one game from yesterday evening the devils have gained nothing. but the season has 82 games and no single team has ever won all of them. therefore with a broader perspective of a full season the performance carries more weight than the actual score for the upcoming games.

but i am sure you know that, you just like to baby rant here on the board with your hyperbole takes. real fans support their teams through wins and loses.

Yeah def not a real fan lol

 

[guitarguyvic]

I’m not sure how many bad starts they give Blackwood but if he yo-yos with one good and one bad start they probably keep him around and give him pretty regular starts. He’s still probably got a longer leash than most would expect. I’m not sure why Blackwood struggles so badly with consistency even when he is healthy but my guess is that among other things the position specific coaching isn’t helping him.

He struggles with consistency because he’s not an NHL caliber goalie.

Why is this so hard for people to simply accept?

 

[Devils090]

if you just focus at the one game from yesterday evening the devils have gained nothing. but the season has 82 games and no single team has ever won all of them. therefore with a broader perspective of a full season the performance carries more weight than the actual score for the upcoming games.

but i am sure you know that, you just like to baby rant here on the board with your hyperbole takes. real fans support their teams through wins and loses.

Yeah def not a real fan lol, f***ing spare me

 

[MadDevil]

I’m not sure how many bad starts they give Blackwood but if he yo-yos with one good and one bad start they probably keep him around and give him pretty regular starts. He’s still probably got a longer leash than most would expect. I’m not sure why Blackwood struggles so badly with consistency even when he is healthy but my guess is that among other things the position specific coaching isn’t helping him.

It's likely between the ears and that's not an easy thing to fix. Even when he plays well he often looks lost or shaky. His size and athleticism help make up for it at times, but I just don't think he reads the play very well. I don't know if a fresh start somewhere else would help him or not, but I'm done with him.

 

[My3Sons]

He struggles with consistency because he’s not an NHL caliber goalie.

Why is this so hard for people to simply accept?

Define “NHL caliber goalie”.

 

[Guttersniped]

You mean the Devils didn't score with the goalie pulled and the "powerplay" on the ice?

I don’t really expect scoring in those situations but Ruff really did a shit job managing the end of the game and getting the them time with an extra skater.

He had Nico’s line on and then McLeod with Sharangovich and Wood went on with slightly less than 2 minutes left.

McLeod’s line had possession for good while in the offensive zone and Ruff kept waiting and waiting for some f***ing reason to pull the goalie.

Hughes hit the ice as the 6th skater mixed in with that hodgepodge with ~1:30 left.

Then Vanenek came in for a neutral zone face-off with 1:17 left before getting off and giving the team slightly less than a minute with the main unit. They had five shot attempts, 3 were blocked.

Coaches these days often try to give their guys more time with an empty net, it really increases your chances at scoring in that situation.

We’ve given up a few empty net goal lately but I don’t see how that McLeod line was pulling off any miracles without an extra skater. I didn’t know what Ruff was waiting for.

 

[Guttersniped]

Wins and losses matter, we lost…again

Keep repeating that bullshit though, lmk how useful it is if we keep playing well and losing

I don’t want to shock you or anything but everyone here is familiar with the concept of winning vs losing and prefers winning.

People often like to take the discussion here beyond “it’s better when they win games, they should really do that more instead”.

I don’t understand what you think people should do, be so upset to the point of not being able to discuss anything about the team other than the game results and sulk?

Pessimism is just an emotional reaction, it’s no more logical than optimism.

 

[Bleedred]

He struggles with consistency because he’s not an NHL caliber goalie.

Why is this so hard for people to simply accept?

Yup average goalies don’t have one good game, followed by one really bad game.

Average goalies aren’t struggling to stay over .890% over the last 65 games and failing to break .880% over the last 26 games and 13 calendar months of play.

I’m not sure if he can salvage his NHL career anywhere at this point, but he certainly won’t salvage it here.

And people can talk about how tough the opponents are that are lighting him up, but no matter how many goalies get destroyed by Boston this year or Washington (or Philly lol) like he did, most goalies don’t get scored on as frequently as Blackwood does. That’s just the reality of the situation.

And for as much as I mock the Cory Schneider .920% second half of 18-19 and “Bounce back” thing, Blackwood certainly hasn’t had a 20 game long stretch like that since 19-20. I’m not sure if he’s even had a 10 game stretch or .920% since that season. I guess the first 10 games of 20-21 he was .920%, heavily influenced by his first 5 games of .945%, but the implosion was already well under way by that point, as it really started around game 9 of that year.

 

[Bleedred]

And if you followed his two game AHL conditioning stint, it was basically a carbon copy of his two starts since returning from it.

One game just like this, 4 goals on 22 shots. Only he wasn’t pulled. I think 3 goals came on his first 7 or 8 shots against.

And then he had a game against the AHL Islanders where he stopped I think he stopped 31 of 33.

 

[glenwo2]

Define “NHL caliber goalie”.

Someone who can stop a routine shot instead of letting it past through him like he wasn't even there.

 

[My3Sons]

Someone who can stop a routine shot instead of letting it past through him like he wasn't even there.

And yet there are games he does that. You and I aren’t NHL goaltender because we would play zero games where we stop routine shots. Blackwood plays games where he stops routine shots and hard shots. Very few people can do that. The talent is there and even the toughness but something critical is missing that shoudnt be. Practice and repetition should have allowed him to reduce the number of clunkers but he can’t. It’s not for want of talent.

 

[Guttersniped]

My guess is they had some sort of agreement with Blackwood and his agent after last season. Blackwood doesn’t whine or ask for a trade or go to thr press and in return NJ gives him full support to rebound. Just a guess but based on a bit of cryptic reporting that was something along that lines of what might be inferred. Let’s see how long his leash is.

There’s zero chance of that sort of agreement or even a need.

The team really needed him to rebound, you can’t look at this with the hindsight of a nice stretch of play from Schmid after he bombed in the NHL last season.

Daws struggled too, they couldn’t count on either of them to be a NHL back-up all season.

Bernier was always very questionable at best. It wasn’t feasible to replace Blackwood because he only makes 2.8m. Add Cory and we’re spending 8.2m on goalies plus Bernier’s 4.125m on the LTIR.

The Blackwood’s disgruntled rumors were before he came back at the end of last season and had two underwhelming starts. He’s playing for future contract here, he needed a bounce back season for himself.

There’s zero chance Fitz throws away goalie depth after last season so we aren’t dumping Blackwood with months of the season left. Goalie depth is very thin across the league, GM can’t that picky.

I thought Schmid was getting shaky, and we were getting sloppy in front of him as well, so I was ok with sending him down.

Also I don’t see how Blackwood has gotten too much rope this season in some crazy way. Yes, I get it, I don’t have faith in him either, boo hiss, he sucks, blah blah.

There isn’t a start got that didn’t make sense, even this one. He got our first win after 6 losses.

Vanecek gave up 4 goals on 17 shots in 24 minutes of the the Islanders game and then 4 goals on 23 shots to the NYR in the next game. Shit happens.

If he can’t get his game straight then the team will have to figure out what to do with him but they aren’t going to call time of death after this game. Again, boo hiss Blackwood, but Mr Inconsistency has had some very good stretches when healthy and the team is hoping he can do that.

 

[glenwo2]

And yet there are games he does that. You and I aren’t NHL goaltender because we would play zero games where we stop routine shots. Blackwood plays games where he stops routine shots and hard shots. Very few people can do that. The talent is there and even the toughness but something critical is missing that shoudnt be. Practice and repetition should have allowed him to reduce the number of clunkers but he can’t. It’s not for want of talent.

If it's not for want of talent, then what is it?

If he is talented like you imply, then he is the Sam Darnold of Goaltenders : All the Physical ability but missing the Mental aspect to process the game(or in his case, the position he plays).