Cole Caulifield
Registered User
- Apr 22, 2004
- 27,967
- 2,465
Small recapitulation on the first 8 game slice :
I have to do a mea culpa on Petry. Because of his age, contractual situation and the state of our team I thought that we should trade Petry after a career year last year. I really wasn't convinced he could get better. But he is been even better this season than last year which is impressive. The question is how durable can he be ? How long can this last ? Can he sustain that level of play all season ? Because so far he's been better defensively, and he's also been better offensively IMO. Interesting to think that he's actually better than Subban and Weber this season.
On the other hand, I was not all wrong. I knew that guys like Cousins, Weal, Thompson, Folin, Reilly were astute signings. They couldn't possibly hurt us or prevent us from playing deserving rookies like Suzuki and Fleury. I bet if Poehling had remained healthy he would have started over one of the aforementioned players as well. Anyway, it's not a bad thing for the hype to go down with him after his first game with us. He'll be a better player after playing games under Bouchard.
I have to admit I was shocked at how ineffective we were against TB despite playing with a lot of effort and focus and TB only turning it on for like 3-4 min in the entire game and winning easily on the road. It's hard to reconcile that team with the one we saw against the blues twice but you have to think that the blues likely have their care level at -4 playing against an eastern team at the start of the season after having won the cup. We have to keep our expectations in check.
Let's hope this offense will keep ticking all year, especially on the PP. We have so much depth up front. Even with 3-4 injuries we have guys like Poehling, Evans, Cousins/Weal waiting in the wing. Same thing on defense. It's the first time in 25 years we have this much depth. I don't know if it's just a Montreal thing or league wide phenomenon, or what to degree which is what but it definitely feels like we're ahead in that department at the moment.
And to think Caufield and Romanov (can he?) might join if we get in the playoffs...
I have to do a mea culpa on Petry. Because of his age, contractual situation and the state of our team I thought that we should trade Petry after a career year last year. I really wasn't convinced he could get better. But he is been even better this season than last year which is impressive. The question is how durable can he be ? How long can this last ? Can he sustain that level of play all season ? Because so far he's been better defensively, and he's also been better offensively IMO. Interesting to think that he's actually better than Subban and Weber this season.
On the other hand, I was not all wrong. I knew that guys like Cousins, Weal, Thompson, Folin, Reilly were astute signings. They couldn't possibly hurt us or prevent us from playing deserving rookies like Suzuki and Fleury. I bet if Poehling had remained healthy he would have started over one of the aforementioned players as well. Anyway, it's not a bad thing for the hype to go down with him after his first game with us. He'll be a better player after playing games under Bouchard.
I have to admit I was shocked at how ineffective we were against TB despite playing with a lot of effort and focus and TB only turning it on for like 3-4 min in the entire game and winning easily on the road. It's hard to reconcile that team with the one we saw against the blues twice but you have to think that the blues likely have their care level at -4 playing against an eastern team at the start of the season after having won the cup. We have to keep our expectations in check.
Let's hope this offense will keep ticking all year, especially on the PP. We have so much depth up front. Even with 3-4 injuries we have guys like Poehling, Evans, Cousins/Weal waiting in the wing. Same thing on defense. It's the first time in 25 years we have this much depth. I don't know if it's just a Montreal thing or league wide phenomenon, or what to degree which is what but it definitely feels like we're ahead in that department at the moment.
And to think Caufield and Romanov (can he?) might join if we get in the playoffs...
