Even if that were completely true, Backstrom has still performed poorly this season and given spectators no reason to assume he'll regain his form. The Wild are stone cold stuck with him and that icky 3-year contract. No way any team in the league would want to be saddled with Backstrom until 2016 the way the wild are.
2013/2014 Minnesota Wild News and Notes - New Division and New Expectations
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Even if that were completely true, Backstrom has still performed poorly this season and given spectators no reason to assume he'll regain his form. The Wild are stone cold stuck with him and that icky 3-year contract. No way any team in the league would want to be saddled with Backstrom until 2016 the way the wild are.
Caior89
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- Mar 31, 2011
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Sorry dude, lots of teams if not half the league would want to have Backs and believe me, his contract.
Although it generally makes you look like a dick I personally don't care if you bump a thread or not. Countless, eh.
Look man, given the level of regard you have for Bernier I'm thinking it's not going to be worth arguing with you. I'll just look forward to the gloating later, okay?ps focus on the negative and the "pleasure" derived is hardly a bogus theory. it's human psychology and possibly sometimes physiology. it's especially evident in online discussions where people are bothering to engage and--presumably, though it's not always obvious--really thinking about things in more than a passing way. i'd be willing to bet you have the ADRA2b gene variant!
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I don't discount the level of desperation some teams hit with their goaltending situations, but I don't think half the league would want to bring Niklas Backstrom in right now or during the offseason. There can't be a huge market for a 35-year old goalie battling a rash of recent injuries and recent poor performance, especially when said goaltender (Backs) is on a contract that counts against the cap even if he retires before it runs out.
You act like he is ancient history. First of all, he didn't come into the league until he was 28. He hasn't been playing in the NHL that long, like many other goaltenders. He has played a lot of games, but not as many as goaltenders his age. Backs has plenty left in the tank, and I'm guessing you just simply don't like him. Look at things rationally. We aren't getting Bernier, we don't need Bernier. Please get over it. Backstrom took a discount to stay with Minnesota, he is still a solid goalie. We say this, you bring up the injury card. We defend that, you just say he isn't good.
His career numbers are significantly better than many of the starters in this league, and just as good as the top goaltenders in the world. Why did we make the playoffs last year? Because we had a solid goaltender. I don't care about the last 5 games. He put up good numbers despite playing a ton of games and not having a lot of rest. Our defense sucked beyond the first pairing as well. The injuries that he has had this year would injure any goaltender in the league, and that's just luck.
You're right. My opinion on Backstrom is that he is not very good anymore to begin with, and that he is never going to be able to keep himself healthy with a full workload in the NHL ever again anyway. Whether I think Bernier would have been preferable over him, I don't think the Wild need to do anything now. I get that Backstrom is here to stay and I'm fine with that, but time will expose how stuck the Wild are going to be with him chewing up a guaranteed roster spot for two years while continuing to decline.
Yes, Backstrom got the Wild to the playoffs by being a horse during a lockout-shortened 2012-13, leading the league in wins. That isn't going to help the club steal games in the 2014 playoffs and beyond. The credit Backstrom gets for taking a discount is a bit overblown when he never bothered to test the open market. Who is to say any team would have been willing to give him a multi-year deal? I doubt we'll see too many 35+ netminders get three-year deals going forward, the way Backstrom did. Russo can get excited about the supposedly low cap figure all he wants, the extra year or two on the length of the contract completely negates whatever annual value is saved.
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He is 35, not 40. I don't know where Russo comes into this, but that's cool that you mentioned him. Tons of teams would take him and his contract, seeing as how he is a top 15 goaltender in the NHL.
I don't care about his start to the season, he really hasn't been given a chance this year.
Anyone heard anything lately on Backs? Russo wrote a couple days ago he skated but not much more. Any sort of timetable been thrown around?
Not sure. Russo said he skated and took shots yesterday, so hoping he will be back soon. He is on IR though, which Fletcher is not generous with. I think they might be signing a goalie soon if he isn't ready.
Russo's article(s) have driven home the point that Backstrom gave the Wild a hometown discount at his supposedly light $3.4M cap figure. I'm arguing that it's not a discount of any kind when Backstrom never even tried the open market, especially when the contract is three years in length and makes him the only goalie in the NHL on a multi-year, age 35+ contract.
Why do you act like 35 is so old? He hasn't been in the league and stressed that long. He just came off of surgery and has had 2 injuries where a player injured him. You act like Backstrom is Tim Thomas. He's not that old, and he is still a good goalie. $3.4M is a sweet spot for him on this team.
I can also argue that he would not have been injured last year if he wasn't playing as much. He played too many games in a row for any goalie in this league, which lead to a hernia.
Are..... Are you serious?
If you ignore his win totals from last year, and you should -- because that's a team stat, not a goalie stat, also inflated by being 5th in games played -- his stats are just not good enough to justify such a claim.
28th in save % last year, 23rd in GAA. 1st in wins... See anything wrong with that? The year before? 19th in GAA and 13th in save % and 29th in wins.
You may have had a leg to stand on with that claim 2 years ago, not anymore.
This year? Yes, he's been hurt, but he has had 7 starts. What does he have to show for those 7 starts? The league's worst save % and a bottom 10 GAA.
He's a fringe starter at this point, not a playoff goalie. And that's ignoring his injuries entirely.
A little history, for us:
There hasn't been a cup winning goalie to have a sub .920 save % during the regular season in at least 3 years (I'm too lazy to go back any further, and it loses impact going back any further anyway.)
Backstrom hasn't been able to say that since '08-'09.
It's mind boggling to me how people can still think he's going to be the goalie that carries us in the playoffs. He's old, he hasn't had a statistically significant season in 5 years, he's a constant injury risk and even in his best statistical years, he was playing behind a Jaques Lemaire team.
Nobody here said he will carry us IN the playoffs. He can carry us TO the playoffs. He should be a part of a tandem, either with Harding or someone else. That is what is most effective.
Also funny for you to say that his .918SV% is bad. I guess your goalie either has .920SV% or you don't win the cup, right?
Terrible argument.
You can also add that he was great in that 1st back to back vs Chicago. We were never going to win both of those games, but he stole the first one for us. He also looked pretty good before he got hurt vs. Toronto.
People love him when he is good, and hate him when he is injured or had an odd game. Gotta blame somebody, right?
Check out the details on the new CBA. There's a reason why it's exponentially worse that Backstrom got his new contract after he turned 35. I've been pretty clear about that little tidbit on my Backstrom-bashing rampage.
His three-year contract counts against the cap through the end of 2016 no matter what -- even if he decided to retire. Seven games into that "discount deal" I bet Chuckie would take a re-do on that one.
GMCF said he wouldn't mind signing Backs to another contract after this one, obviously MUCH cheaper when he is 38. Stop-gap then.
It's not that bad of a contract, I think you are over exaggerating tbh.
WOOSH.
You're absolutely hopeless, really you are. My argument is that this team isn't going to keep winning from here on out. It's inevitable we'll hit a bump in the road. Maybe during the Olympic Break. Who knows. But we'll hit a bump. All teams do. The question is, how will this team respond? Will it go through a month long tailspin like in April or will it take a few games to work itself out? How will the players like Koivu respond when they end up on a cold streak. Will they make excuses or will they elevate their game?
It's easy to praise the team when they are winning. It's harder to find things to praise when they go through a month long drought. We'll see how this team does and how it responds.
night of nights. i agreed with an OpRedDawn post earlier, and now this. people here freak out if we lose one game...a three game skid is a fairly common occurrence in the NHL but here it'll spark debates on whether to tank or fire Yeo or demote Koivu or whatever.
It depends on how they're losing. We had a soft (IMO) team to bounce back on after the first seriously horrible game we've played at Montreal. Lets see what happens when we get spanked then face something like STL or San Jose immediately after. If we come out swinging and "lose well" NBD. I'd start to worry if by game three we were losing for the same reasons we were in game one.
Nobody here said he will carry us IN the playoffs. He can carry us TO the playoffs. He should be a part of a tandem, either with Harding or someone else. That is what is most effective.
Also funny for you to say that his .918SV% is bad. I guess your goalie either has .920SV% or you don't win the cup, right?
Terrible argument.
So you refute my "terrible" argument with a strawman? That would be funny if it wasn't so forced.
While correlation doesn't always equal causation, when you've got statistics around it to back up the idea, it at least warrants discussion rather than being casually dismissed with a thinly veiled strawman.
I haven't "loved him" in years, so go ahead and project that feeling however you want. I've been critical of him for quite a while.
He did look good in Chicago, but I don't remember him looking anything better than acceptable in Toronto. And yet he's looked pretty bad in almost every other game he's played this year, and he has some of the worst stats in the league to show for it.
While we're at it, please remind me the last time a goalie tandem went deep in the playoffs? I guess you could try to argue Pittsburgh last year, but they got swept when it mattered.
I also just plain don't understand how you can think he's a "top-15" goalie, but you don't expect him to carry us in the playoffs? Seems like you're contradicting yourself quite a bit here. I wonder which other team with a "top-15" goalie would be OK with their backup splitting time with their starter in the playoffs?
Either you're not making your argument very effectively, or you've just got nothing to back up your point. You're not coming close to swaying me.
I'm going to hold off on my criticisms of Koivu for now. It'll depend on how the season goes and how we end the season (and by all accounts the playoffs). I hope he has really turned a corner in his development and his career, especially with the added talent of Granlund, el Nino and Coyle on this team. But we're seeing Koivu when he's on a hot streak. I want to see how he responds when he goes back to passing up a shot or being a bit more passive in the offensive zone. Will he recognize that and adapt quicker or will it take a month? How does he do in the playoffs?
And I agree with what you said. If we fight and fight hard against a team like Chicago or Anaheim after losing a game to Edmonton or Nashville, then NBD. But if we play sloppy and don't learn, then that's more of a concern.
Top 15?? Have you even seen him play in any game other than that Chicago game? He'd be hard pressed to qualify for a backup job with play like he's had this year.
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