Around the League Thread part V

[Steve Zissou]

Beginning of hockey season is the best season.

 

[Statto]

It's the same thing as, how many 1D are there in the league? Is it 32? Is it 7? Does it depend on what you think a 1D would and should do?

This is one of my big issues with how people categorize players now.

Generational, Franchise and Elite are used interchangeably and they get misused frequently.

Generational - They are true outliers, something almost freaky. Gretzky and Lemieux were generational and it’s a fluke that they were active at the same time. A generational player is a once in 15-20 years players that dominates and compiler changes the game. There are a bunch of guys now that some call generational and given the number of them by definition they are mischaracterized. If there is meaningful debate if a player is generational then they prob aren’t. For my money only peak Crosby is even in the conversation right now as he had “it” as a winner. McDavid needs to take another step, the first of which he took last season.

Franchise: the first error is people think that there are 32 of them. Nope. They are players you can build an entire franchise around them, they are dominant, they are winners. There will be a reasonable group of them but not 32. These guys are box office draws. I’d put peak Doughty in here. You’d struggle to convince me that there were ever more than 15-20 in the league at any one time.

Elite: That’s the group of top, genuine 1st line stars that excel in their roles. Again just playing on the top pair doesn’t mean they are Elite. These guys should at least be in the conversation for NHL awards at their peak. Again there is no set number of them, the notion is daft as a set number assumes talent is present and distributed at the same level year on year, which is a complete lack of understanding on how probability works. This should be where most star players are categorize. This is where I put Kopitar and Quick.

Anyone Elite and above at least warrants a HOF discussion but it still depends on context.

I know nobody will agree but across the league players are badly overrated. My descriptions are much more inline with how these terms used to be used, before the inter-web started blurring the lines and definitions.

 

[DoktorJeep]

Players fit in the following categories for me.

Superstar
All star
Star
Role player
Tweener
Minor leaguer

 

[Fishhead]

Players fit in the following categories for me.

Superstar
All star
Star
Role player
Tweener
Minor leaguer

I'd add "Kings goalie pipeline player" at the bottom.

 

[Xirik]

Devils fan with a question and thought this thread was the most suited to it.

A Kings fan posted a picture of the Quick and Brodeur handshake in the Brodeur poll thread and got me thinking.

When you Kings fans think of your two wins in 2012 and 2014...

1. Which opponent do you think was better between the Devils and the Rangers?

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

 

[redcard]

Devils fan with a question and thought this thread was the most suited to it.

A Kings fan posted a picture of the Quick and Brodeur handshake in the Brodeur poll thread and got me thinking.

When you Kings fans think of your two wins in 2012 and 2014...

1. Which opponent do you think was better between the Devils and the Rangers?

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

Honestly, its not exactly fair to compare the opponents. In 2012, we steamrolled everyone on the way to the cup. In my mind there was no way we were going to lose to the Devils, based on our 12-2 record going into the series and then winning the first 3 again of that series. But 2014 was the opposite, coming back from down 3 games to none against the sharks, 7 game series against the Ducks and the Blackhawks. Scratching and clawing our way to the final, I wasn't certain we had enough left to get by the Rangers. So the Rangers appeared to be a bigger challenge, but simply due to the difference in the preceding 3 rounds, and not because of the quality of opponent.

As for which I enjoyed more, also hard to say. My mindset in 2012, after opening the playoffs with a win on the road at Vancouver, was we don't need to win the next game....but we just kept winning and it was easy. We were vastly outperforming expectations and had nothing to worry about. Enjoyed the whole thing, very little stress.

But 2014...my heart was in my throat for 2 months. Which maybe made winning feel that much better, even if the games were far more stressful.

 

[All The Kings Men]

Beating A New York team in 2012 was amazing.

Beating THE New York team in 2014 was also amazing.

 

[johnjm22]

2014 was more enjoyable IMO.

One of the greatest SC runs of all time. Very underrated.

The Rangers had the benefit of playing an exhausted Kings team, where as the Devils were playing a relatively fresh Kings team that had made quick work of all their previous opponents.

 

[Axl Rhoadz]

Devils fan with a question and thought this thread was the most suited to it.

A Kings fan posted a picture of the Quick and Brodeur handshake in the Brodeur poll thread and got me thinking.

When you Kings fans think of your two wins in 2012 and 2014...

1. Which opponent do you think was better between the Devils and the Rangers?

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

1) Rangers were better opponent -- I believe it took the Kings 3 OT wins to win that series

2) Prob 2012 -- not just cause it's the first win, but it was my first experience watching my team in a final. Just getting there was insane and never expected -- by the time 2014 came along, the whole thing was almost exhausting, that was a lot of playoff games in a 3 year span.

 

[lumbergh]

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

Two words. Jazz. Hands.

 

[Xirik]

Beating A New York team in 2012 was amazing.

Beating THE New York team in 2014 was also amazing.

For some Devils fans winning the series against Rangers in 2012 basically a "Stanley Cup" for them. So I can see where you are coming from.

Henrique! ITS OVERR!

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Gonna take a different approach--the 2014 one was more satisfying due to the smugness of the NYR posts, the Lundqvist > Quick, the McDonagh > Doughty, the Stepan is basically equal to kopitar stuff, the whining the whole series, the Dwight King incident making everyone come unglued, the f***ing snow pile preventing a sweep. So many of them still whine about that to this day.

2012 Devils fans 'got it.' They enjoyed it, they knew what it took to get there, they respected the opponent, very little entitlement there.

 

[Xirik]

Gonna take a different approach--the 2014 one was more satisfying due to the smugness of the NYR posts, the Lundqvist > Quick, the McDonagh > Doughty, the Stepan is basically equal to kopitar stuff, the whining the whole series, the Dwight King incident making everyone come unglued, the f***ing snow pile preventing a sweep. So many of them still whine about that to this day.

2012 Devils fans 'got it.' They enjoyed it, they knew what it took to get there, they respected the opponent, very little entitlement there.

I think Devils fans knew we weren't the deepest team. We were relying on Kovy and parise to carry us while our "No stars" rag tag defense seemed to work somehow. Also we all knew it was probably Brodeurs last hurrah at playing for the Stanley Cup. For me personally that Finals was very tiring just because of how Stifling the Kings Defence was. It felt like the Devils barely got any zone time and most of the play was in our own end or was fought at center, I'm actually surprised at how low scoring those games were.

I will say that I still and will always hate that game 6 Bernier penalty call and feel it was somewhat controversial but it was definitely a quality series overall.

And yes I did cheer for you guys 2014 against the Rangers even though the 2012 loss still stung.

 

[YP44]

Devils fan with a question and thought this thread was the most suited to it.

A Kings fan posted a picture of the Quick and Brodeur handshake in the Brodeur poll thread and got me thinking.

When you Kings fans think of your two wins in 2012 and 2014...

1. Which opponent do you think was better between the Devils and the Rangers?

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

Hard for me to say. That 2012 team was very special, they bulldozed everyone! Where as the 2014 was full of drama every round. Coming back 0-3 vs the sharks, and A-Mart double OT!!

If I take out the first cup feeling (which not sure how to do), I would probably say the 2014 just because of being on pins and needles. Has nothing to do with the opponent for me.

 

[Kudelski37]

Devils fan with a question and thought this thread was the most suited to it.

A Kings fan posted a picture of the Quick and Brodeur handshake in the Brodeur poll thread and got me thinking.

When you Kings fans think of your two wins in 2012 and 2014...

1. Which opponent do you think was better between the Devils and the Rangers?

2. Which Finals did you enjoy more as a fan if you took out the fact that 2012 was the Kings 1st Cup?

1. The Fighting Brodeurs. I was afraid Brodeur would will the Devil's to a win the same way Roy managed to beat LA in 1993. Mr. Fancypants in NY, Lundquist, could never win the big one, so that wasn't a worry.
2. I would say 2012. First cup and toughest series of the playoffs. 2014 was great, but there wasn't any doubt LA would beat NY after beating defending champ Chicago... especially having to make a comeback just to force OT in game 7.

 

[johnjm22]

Devils fans HATE the Rangers.

Our hatred of SJ, ANA, VGK doesn't even come close.

It's quite admirable really.

I agree that NYR fans were more annoying during the finals (and still are to this day). "We were the better team!" No, you weren't.

 

[KingsHockey24]

For some Devils fans winning the series against Rangers in 2012 basically a "Stanley Cup" for them. So I can see where you are coming from.

Henrique! ITS OVERR!

The Devils have always been my #2 team so it was a treat to watch.

I really enjoyed the Devils era with Gionta, Lagenbrunner, Parise, Zajac, and Broduer the most.

 

[cyclones22]

The best was the claim that Lundqvist outplayed Quick in the Final when no metrics supported that. Some clowns even mentioned the Conn Smythe for him in a losing effort lol.

 

[Ollie Weeks]

^^^ If your goalie was the conn smyth candidate in a losing cause of a 5 game series, then your team in front was significantly outclassed. Can’t have it both ways.

 

[kingsboy11]

I feel like I go back and forth on the cup wins. By the time we got the finals in 2012 I think pretty much all of us were feeling confident in the team heading into that finals. And yet because we're all Kings fans we all expected that something was going to go wrong and especially after losing games 4 and 5 trying to win that last game probably made a lot of us extremely nervous. And then they went out and scored 3 goals on that major powerplay and that suddenly went away

2014 was just like the scariest roller coaster ride you will ever be on. I think after getting our revenge against the Hawks in the conference finals and doing what we did against the Sharks and the Ducks that we felt confident against the Rangers. Plus 2014 gave us Jazz Hands, its hard to top that feeling. It was extremely satisfying.

 

[King'sPawn]

So much talent. So much flopping

 

[Statto]

The best was the claim that Lundqvist outplayed Quick in the Final when no metrics supported that. Some clowns even mentioned the Conn Smythe for him in a losing effort lol.

Yeah, well it just made the point that Quick was the ‘winner’ out of the two and stuck a finger up at being robbed of the 2012 Vezina. JQ was absolute money at his peak.

 

[cyclones22]

Yeah, well it just made the point that Quick was the ‘winner’ out of the two and stuck a finger up at being robbed of the 2012 Vezina. JQ was absolute money at his peak.

Yeah if you had told Rangers fans that three games would go to overtime, I'm sure they would have bet the house that Lundqvist would outduel Quick in most if not all of those games. Quick is 5-0 in SCF OT games. Clutch.

 

[YP44]

I feel like I go back and forth on the cup wins. By the time we got the finals in 2012 I think pretty much all of us were feeling confident in the team heading into that finals. And yet because we're all Kings fans we all expected that something was going to go wrong and especially after losing games 4 and 5 trying to win that last game probably made a lot of us extremely nervous. And then they went out and scored 3 goals on that major powerplay and that suddenly went away

2014 was just like the scariest roller coaster ride you will ever be on. I think after getting our revenge against the Hawks in the conference finals and doing what we did against the Sharks and the Ducks that we felt confident against the Rangers. Plus 2014 gave us Jazz Hands, its hard to top that feeling. It was extremely satisfying.

alot of people looked at the hawks kings series in 2014 as the true finals

 

[Statto]

It's what happens when you forget hockey is a contact sport.

Starts with his gap control being all wrong, he couldn’t react to the movement.