GDT: Avs @ Yotes - 5:00PM - Zero Star GDT.

[AvsFan29]

No. This team lacks grit. We can proffer explanations all day long. But this team lacks grit.

Further example. Watched Army play Houston in the Armed Forces Bowl. Army teams always outmanned, outweighed, out-a lot of things. Yes, they won by a huge margin. Not the point. What announcers and commentators constantly reflected on was Army has grit. You can see it. Not the score. In the team. And of course this is what you want in members of the armed forces for sure. A core characteristic that describes some teams irrespective of the sports, discipline. Grit.

A word that I would not attribute to the Avs.

Hair on fire. Yes. Grit. No.

What are you even talking about?

 

[UncleRisto]

Kerfoot/Hayes/Compher would be a sick second line.

Nah, it'd be pretty mediocre.

 

[hooverdam]

Nah, it'd be pretty mediocre.

 

[forsbergavs32]

Nah, we need Kerfoot-Compher-Stone

 

[klozge]

It was nice to see some Avs hockey in the third period. It's been a while. MacKinnon's goal was incredible. The whole shift was vintage MacKinnon.
Grubauer is not the answer.

 

[Ceremony]

I feel cheated after a literal jumping out of my chair moment on that 4th goal only for us to not win

 

[AvsFanInMichigan]

Holiday obligations this weekend, so, thusly, & therefore missed the last two games. Insert panic/oh no, we suck, etc gif here?

No we’ll be fine

 

[kl35ha]

Just watched the 9mins condensed game.

-We are so bad at coverage in our own zone.
-Can only blame Grub for 2 of the 4 goals.
#Frankie looks very confident in net, Would like to see him start a few games for us. If Varly and Grub continue to play like trash...why not.
-Glad we show up in the 3rd period.

Thanks god for this short break, hopefully we can get back on track after Christmas break starting with Vegas.

 

[Goulet17]

Just checking in on the thread, Francouz is the new annointed savior...never mind the late goal he let in. Grubs is the problem on the other goals, never mind the team defense and coverage issues.

I think I've got it.

 

[Piestany88]

Missed this one , not gonna hate on Waivers, doesn't look good in the stats though.

How did Francouz look ?

And Nemeth -4 , can we seriously wave him now

 

[Foppberg]

Missed this one , not gonna hate on Waivers, doesn't look good in the stats though.

How did Francouz look ?

And Nemeth -4 , can we seriously wave him now

Outside of a horrible goal he was fine. So not that great but not bad considering the circumstances.

 

[The Shermanator]

Couldn't watch last night but was getting all the text notifications. DAMN!!!!!

 

[Piestany88]

It's never just an attack on his play, though. See how I'm not defending his play? People criticize mistakes and talk about play, that's what we do here. That's fine. With Barrie, it always turns into a ********** where he's a terrible hockey player, he needs to be traded, the Avs would be better off without him, etc.

Players play poorly. Like it or not--and some people ****ing hate it--Barrie is the best actual defenseman at this point in all of his, Girard's, and Johnson's careers. Criticize his play, expect better of him, but some people just wait for their hatred to be justified. That's not an actual discussion, that's a **********.

Barrie sucks , is getting traded , he isn't even worth the $ he's getting now , what is it that you don't seem to understand?

 

[AvsFan29]

Couldn't watch last night but was getting all the text notifications. DAMN!!!!!

Imagine a game where they look absolutely terrible, and then in the 3rd period, they play great for 15 minutes, which only reminds you that this team can play a lot better than they have been, only to lose on a shitty fluke goal because 4 Avs players couldn't get the puck across the blue line.

 

[RoyIsALegend]

We are crapping the bed in fundamentals and good teams just don’t do that.

You can have games where the legs aren’t there and pucks are bouncing against you, but to commit the number of turnovers we are making is inexcusable.

I think MacK, and yes we focus on him because he’s our best player, had a silly giveaway or turnover on every single shift. The puck management is just so poor. He is blindly backhanding pucks into the middle of the ice, those are brain dead hockey plays.

The number of times Barrie and Girard are spinning and losing the puck instead of making a play... the number of times Cole and Nemeth can’t make a pass onto a players stick... the number of times EJ runs around like a chicken without a head pushing the puck with one hand until he loses it... the number of times Jost/Calvert/Wilson(when playing) just miss the net by 20 feet with their shots and turn it over... man I could go on and on.

It’s December, about to go into the new year. Silly mistakes shouldn’t be occurring and teams should be at their best and most crisp when it comes to puck management. We have gone the opposite direction. It seems like a rarity when we can actually breakout and get the puck deep in the opposition zone without turning it over. The breakout, the neutral zone support or lack thereof, the awful decision making in low percentage situations... this is September hockey.

Very concerned with how pathetic our overall game looks right now. We get away with it because of our speed and ability to generate crappy shots, but the eye test doesn’t lie.

Sloppy, piss-poor fundamentals.

6 losses in the past 8 games and Sharks/Jets/Flames in 3 of our next 4. Yikes.

 

[AvsFan29]

We are crapping the bed in fundamentals and good teams just don’t do that.

You can have games where the legs aren’t there and pucks are bouncing against you, but to commit the number of turnovers we are making is inexcusable.

I think MacK, and yes we focus on him because he’s our best player, had a silly giveaway or turnover on every single shift. The puck management is just so poor. He is blindly backhanding pucks into the middle of the ice, those are brain dead hockey plays.

The number of times Barrie and Girard are spinning and losing the puck instead of making a play... the number of times Cole and Nemeth can’t make a pass onto a players stick... the number of times EJ runs around like a chicken without a head pushing the puck with one hand until he loses it... the number of times Jost/Calvert/Wilson(when playing) just miss the net by 20 feet with their shots and turn it over... man I could go on and on.

It’s December, about to go into the new year. Silly mistakes shouldn’t be occurring and teams should be at their best and most crisp when it comes to puck management. We have gone the opposite direction. It seems like a rarity when we can actually breakout and get the puck deep in the opposition zone without turning it over. The breakout, the neutral zone support or lack thereof, the awful decision making in low percentage situations... this is September hockey.

Very concerned with how pathetic our overall game looks right now. We get away with it because of our speed and ability to generate crappy shots, but the eye test doesn’t lie.

Sloppy, piss-poor fundamentals.

6 losses in the past 8 games and Sharks/Jets/Flames in 3 of our next 4. Yikes.

The Christmas break couldn't come at a better time. Luckily our losses haven't been that big of an issue, because other teams in the central are losing.

What we did lose, was a perfect chance to take control of the division. If we had won the last 2 games, we would be in a really good position going into the new year.

 

[Balthazar]

I don't think it's a coincidence that the team stopped playing well when Cole stopped being an absolute stud on D. EJ simply hasn't filled the #1D shoes this year and no one did. The D is all over the place these days and it reflects on the forwards and goalies.

 

[AvsFan29]

I don't think it's a coincidence that the team stopped playing well when Cole stopped being an absolute stud on D. EJ simply hasn't filled the #1D shoes this year and no one did. The D is all over the place these days and it reflects on the forwards and goalies.

Yah EJ and Barrie have been rough. EJ has probably played his best 2 games of the season against Chicago and Arizona tho. Nemeth playing some of his worst

 

[Avalanche]

Looks like the team not practicing this last week before the break has made a huge difference.

 

[NOTENOUGHJTCGOALS]

The thought of one of Makar Girard and Barrie on the ice for the entire game is scary. And not in a good way.

 

[PAZ]

We are crapping the bed in fundamentals and good teams just don’t do that.

You can have games where the legs aren’t there and pucks are bouncing against you, but to commit the number of turnovers we are making is inexcusable.

I think MacK, and yes we focus on him because he’s our best player, had a silly giveaway or turnover on every single shift. The puck management is just so poor. He is blindly backhanding pucks into the middle of the ice, those are brain dead hockey plays.

The number of times Barrie and Girard are spinning and losing the puck instead of making a play... the number of times Cole and Nemeth can’t make a pass onto a players stick... the number of times EJ runs around like a chicken without a head pushing the puck with one hand until he loses it... the number of times Jost/Calvert/Wilson(when playing) just miss the net by 20 feet with their shots and turn it over... man I could go on and on.

It’s December, about to go into the new year. Silly mistakes shouldn’t be occurring and teams should be at their best and most crisp when it comes to puck management. We have gone the opposite direction. It seems like a rarity when we can actually breakout and get the puck deep in the opposition zone without turning it over. The breakout, the neutral zone support or lack thereof, the awful decision making in low percentage situations... this is September hockey.

Very concerned with how pathetic our overall game looks right now. We get away with it because of our speed and ability to generate crappy shots, but the eye test doesn’t lie.

Sloppy, piss-poor fundamentals.

6 losses in the past 8 games and Sharks/Jets/Flames in 3 of our next 4. Yikes.

Honestly, this team relies on momentum. If the top line is dominating, the other lines usually can follow-up and get some decent time, or at the very least play neutral hockey where the possession and scoring chances are equal.

Outside of our top line we're a pretty average team. Everywhere other line is decent, but all of them have small asterisks. Our defense is pretty solid overall, but we don't have that #1 defenseman that we can rely on and help minimize the mistakes of the other defense when they have less than stellar games. 2nd line we've beaten the topic to death. 3rd line i'd almost say is above average, but it's missing another strong two-way player that actually has a scoring touch to compliment Nieto and Soda. 4th line is always a mash-up of whatever is leftover.

 

[The Mars Volchenkov]

Apparently a goalie coming in for a relief can give his team a chance to win a game.

I don't want to jump a gun but Francouz will be the guy giving us a chance to compete for the Cup. He showed much more NHL starting goalie potential than Grubauer has shown in his time with Avs. Grubauer is slow compared to Francouz and Varly and also he has hard time tracking the puck through traffic. Grubauer has posted good numbers under Trotz's system where goalie doesn't have to bail out defensive mistakes all the time.

Right now Avs pay $9,23 for their goalie tandem. In ideal situation for the next season Varly takes a discount contract with a cap hit of 5 million or below and Francouz signs two year prove it deal with cap hit of 2 million. That would be seven million for goalies but I think Grubauer and Francouz will be the tandem because Sakic paid to get Grubauer and Grubauer will be cheaper than Varly.

Man that small sample size really extrapolated for you.

Varly is an average goalie at best and has been for several years. Not interested in another big money deal with him.

 

[Foppberg]

Average goalie at best??? Cmon... When he's healthy and on his game he's one of the best.

 

[Pierce Hawthorne]

That's just it though.... How often is Varly actually on and healthy?


The answer is not very often and not for long stretches. Which is what makes him so average. He'll give you 10-15 games where he's lights out and looks like the best goalie in the league. Then he'll give you a 5-10 game stretch right after that makes Scott Darling look like a Vezina contender compared to him.


And then you throw in the injury concerns/issues with that inconsistency and the result is a very mediocre goalie in the grand scheme of things.


When he's on, he's amazing. When he's not on, he's Swiss cheese, and when he's hurt, he's hurt.

 

[Goulet17]

Average goalie at best??? Cmon... When he's healthy and on his game he's one of the best.

That kind of goes to the heart of the issue, doesn't it, particularly given his advancing age?