Post-Game Talk: Holland shits out his mouth.

[Soundwave]

So bringing up what Peter Chiarelli did doesn't make Holland any worse, just makes you look like you have no idea what you're talking about.

Holland sucks. Chiarelli sucked. Tambellini sucked. MacTavish sucked as a GM. It's almost like this organization hasn't had a decent GM in a long, long time.

Yes but Holland sucks even worse than Chiarelli at certain areas.

It's completely fair game to point out even Chiarelli made some trades that did move the needle for the team (Talbot trade, Maroon trade, even Kassian trade was OK I guess). Yes he did also stupid things, but that doesn't really absolve Holland of not even being able to win one trade for the Oilers in 3 years.

 

[Beerfish]

The Leafs gave up a 4-1 lead to Chicago because they can't defend.

They aren't good and are in the same position the Oilers are with Talbot.

Seriously, go cheer for TO since almost all your posts bring up how good they are.

Their goalie, the one they got for a 3rd round pick and a jag prospect is a serious contender for the vezina.

Get real, the Leafs as much as we hate them are run 100 times better than this clown show. I'll throw the as hated flames into that category.

 

[Porkleaker]

I think if Yzerman works hard, keeps people accountable and is competent (which I think most people agree thats the case) it will trickle down. I think nepotism is more of a problem when theres no accountability in place.

That's the problem here, no accountability and seems just like the old boys club again. You've got Nicholson who's more interested in overpriced shitty burgers than hiring a competent GM, he's failed enough and needs to go. You've got Holland who's wasting McDrai's prime years, they can't want to stay around much longer for this shit show. You've got Tippett who's lost the room, yet Holland says "the last 13 games have been pretty bad" what? Gulutzan won 2 in a row!!! Then you've got Dustin Schwartz who's way out of his depth and has never helped a goaltender improve, he makes them worse.
Heads need to roll before they lose their superstars. Plus he was talking as if making the playoffs twice was a big deal when they were absolutely destroyed!!! The failures in this organization are once again from Top to bottom! Time to clean house, Katz needs to grow a pair!

 

[Missing smitty]

lol the Oilers have allowed almost 30 more goals against in 1 more game played, these two teams are not even remotely close defensively, the Oilers suck at defense, the Leafs are a top 5 team in the league GA.

We'll always be compared to the Leafs because they are a core with a similar age range and similarly built around a couple of high picks (Matthews no.1 overall, Marner no.4) who have similar cap challenges. That's just how it goes.

The comparison is one that makes people angry because they're doing a lot better with even less cap room to work with, which tells you their management is better.

It's almost like the Maple Leafs have a starting goaltender that has a .936 save percentage.

Gee, I wonder what the difference is.

 

[Juxta Position]

We were 16-5 solely on the back of a 45-50% pp. That was almost exclusively the only reason we had that record. That is absolutely unsustainable. Because of that pp we were outscoring our defensive and goaltending problems. Now that our PP is back to a normal level we are constantly losing. Sure we should be winning more. We aren't a 16-5 team and we also aren't a 2-9-2 team. What we are is a bubble team on the outside looking in fighting for a final wild card spot. We aren't a good team or a bad team, we are a below average team.

Holland has pretty much said he is good and believes in our goaltending. He won't be trading for a rental and there isn't any long term signed goalies that we can reasonably get (we arent trading for price). He also pretty much said he doesn't think Skinner is ready and needs to see far more. Skinner is absolutely not ready to take on the starter job, but could be in a year or two.

If you have watched both teams, no they aren't playing the same system. They may have a similar designed system but the way the teams execute and play it are different.

Coaching is an issue because he can't get the players ready to play, he is terrible at in game adjustments, he has one play in game, put McDrai together. He massively overplays McDrai and Nurse which hurts their games defensively and screws with the rest of the players.

This is a bubble team. We are not a good team. Goaltending help is not coming this year, he said so. Coaching change isn't coming this year.
Best case is we sneak in a wildcard spot and hopefully win a game or two.

in what way? does he need to pat them on the bum and tell them they're special? These are professional athletes if they can't get motivated to play, especially when they're trying to get out of slump, then that sounds like a them problem, not a him problem

I'm not defending Holland, he needs to figure this shit out ASAP, I'm saying people are massively overreacting to a stretch of hockey that can be chalked up to poor goaltending.

other people have cited that they were winning on the backs of Mcdavid and Draisaitl's ridiculous pace to start the year, and the almost 50% PP effectiveness, while that isn't wrong, all that really did is gloss over the fact that the REAL problem is and always was below average goaltending. if the Oilers would have had a consistent .920 save percentage for the whole season, which isn't outlandish by any means, they are STILL a top 5 team in winning percentage.

coaching only does so much for a team, but a weak goalie not only does the obvious like letting in bad goals, it is the most damaging thing to a teams psyche. Players start to play different in front of that goalie, trying not to make any mistakes, while at the same time trying to sore 6 goals a game. The players know any defensive mistake is in the back of the net and they'll have to score 5+ just to stay in the game. When you can't trust your goalie to make a save it completely alters how you play your game, you start taking stupid risks offensively and gripping your stick to tight defensively.

it's like a bad starting pitcher in baseball, players start to swing for the fences at every at bat just to try and make up for the bad runs the pitcher has allowed, unfortunately for hockey, they don't have bullpens of 7 goalies they can bring in to play 8 or 9 minutes at a time.

 

[Soundwave]

It's almost like the Maple Leafs have a starting goaltender that has a .936 save percentage.

Gee, I wonder what the difference is.

They have a blue line? A goalie alone doesn't account for almost 30 freaking goals against difference, lol.

They invested in decent D like Brodie and Muzzin and are reaping the rewards along with getting a great find by their pro scouting in Campbell and developing him well.

Much better run organization than the Oilers, the Oilers would never be able to manage that.

 

[Beerfish]

It's almost like the Maple Leafs have a starting goaltender that has a .936 save percentage.

Gee, I wonder what the difference is.

The difference? Their gm decided they needed an upgrade and got a great tender for cheap, our gm said koksy and smitty are good, which is what he is still saying after years of proof that they are not 'good' for various reasons.

 

[Missing smitty]

Their goalie, the one they got for a 3rd round pick and a jag prospect is a serious contender for the vezina.

Get real, the Leafs as much as we hate them are run 100 times better than this clown show. I'll throw the as hated flames into that category.

So when they don't get out of the first round, again, where does that put them? They won't be able to afford Campbell because they spent too much on Mrazek.

The Leafs were bad at the beginning of the year when Jack Campbell wasn't standing on his head. The Oilers went 9-1 in that stretch, did that mean they were better than them then?

 

[CycloneSweep]

in what way? does he need to pat them on the bum and tell them they're special? These are professional athletes if they can't get motivated to play, especially when they're trying to get out of slump, then that sounds like a them problem, not a him problem

I'm not defending Holland, he needs to figure this shit out ASAP, I'm saying people are massively overreacting to a stretch of hockey that can be chalked up to poor goaltending.

other people have cited that they were winning on the backs of Mcdavid and Draisaitl's ridiculous pace to start the year, and the almost 50% PP effectiveness, while that isn't wrong, all that really did is gloss over the fact that the REAL problem is and always was below average goaltending. if the Oilers would have had a consistent .920 save percentage for the whole season, which isn't outlandish by any means, they are STILL a top 5 team in winning percentage.

coaching only does so much for a team, but a weak goalie not only does the obvious like letting in bad goals, it is the most damaging thing to a teams psyche. Players start to play different in front of that goalie, trying not to make any mistakes, while at the same time trying to sore 6 goals a game. The players know any defensive mistake is in the back of the net and they'll have to score 5+ just to stay in the game. When you can't trust your goalie to make a save it completely alters how you play your game, you start taking stupid risks offensively and gripping your stick to tight defensively.

it's like a bad starting pitcher in baseball, players start to swing for the fences at every at bat just to try and make up for the bad runs the pitcher has allowed, unfortunately for hockey, they don't have bullpens of 7 goalies they can bring in to play 8 or 9 minutes at a time.

You can't chalk it up to just bad goaltending when the team has been getting outplayed all year and in this losing streak we are struggling to score too.

 

[Missing smitty]

They have a blue line? A goalie alone doesn't account for almost 30 freaking goals against difference, lol.

They invested in decent D like Brodie and Muzzin and are reaping the rewards along with getting a great find by their pro scouting in Campbell and developing him well.

Much better run organization than the Oilers, the Oilers would never be able to manage that.

It's almost like a goalie playing great makes defenders look better.

Did the Flames defenders just forget how to play or did Markstrom come back down to Earth?

 

[Missing smitty]

You can't chalk it up to just bad goaltending when the team has been getting outplayed all year and in this losing streak we are struggling to score too.

You can, kind of. It has to be genuinely deflating when your NHL goaltender routinely let's in goals that you'd yell at your beer league guy for letting in.

These guys are still human. They play differently without Kosinen in net.

 

[Soundwave]

It's almost like a goalie playing great makes defenders look better.

Did the Flames defenders just forget how to play or did Markstrom come back down to Earth?

Oilers have never really been good defensively for like over a decade, lets be honest.

They were poor even in 16-17 I think, just got bailed out by their goalie.

Flames are making due with not much on the blue line (they lost Giordano for nothing basically), at least Sutter has them overachieving which is more than can be said for here.

 

[Behind Enemy Lines]

I just listened to the non sequitur GM talk to the non sequitur organizational mouth organ in a PR controlled follow up to the non sequitur GM's limited and testy media availability. I've come away with Alabama is a football dynasty.

 

[CycloneSweep]

So when they don't get out of the first round, again, where does that put them? They won't be able to afford Campbell because they spent too much on Mrazek.

The Leafs were bad at the beginning of the year when Jack Campbell wasn't standing on his head. The Oilers went 9-1 in that stretch, did that mean they were better than them then?

You have to look at all context. In the month of October Toronto was 4-4-1
They led the league in corsi, were 5th in expected goals %, 10th in shots for % but were 28th in sv% and had a struggling PP. They were a team that was playing well but had a bad streak of goaltending.
The Oilers in the same span were 17th in corsi, 11 in expected goals %, 21st in shots for % and 17th in sv%. They also had a 50% PP.

So what do the numbers show? Toronto was analytically a very good team by all accounts but were being let down by goaltending. They were a team that SHOULD have a better record but had a bad stretch of goaltending. Edmonton was bottom half in the league in almost every metric but with our ridiculous PP we were 6-1-0.

Based on the numbers Edmonton was set to fall off and Toronto was set to start winning. Which happened.

It would have been different if Edmonton was a GOOD team by every metric and winning and Toronto wasn't but they weren't. Our goaltending was playing fine and our PP was excelling and it won us games. As soon as that reverted to the norm and fell back down to earth our winning stopped. Now we aren't as bad as the losing stretch but our current record is the quality of team we are overall. Toronto hyper corrected and is now a top team in the league but the rest of their play has also improved overall too.

 

[russ99]

There are two issues with a trade now:

Number one is Covid and taxi squads. Even if we traded for a goalie, when would they actually play for us? We've had one trade in the NHL since December 1st.

Number two is the cap. We are saving money towards the deadline on LTIR, we've freed up 900K already this season. Dumping Koskinen to the AHL doesn't take a dollar off the cap.

Things could change when we get close to the deadline.

 

[Juxta Position]

You can't chalk it up to just bad goaltending when the team has been getting outplayed all year and in this losing streak we are struggling to score too.

I disagree. every team goes through stretches where they have trouble scoring, the good teams mitigate that by having competent goaltending that can win them games outright throughout the season. how many games can we legitimately say the oilers goaltending has stolen for them? 1? 2? not many anyway.

Poor goaltending magnifies everything, makes other areas seem worse than they are, just like great goaltending can cover up glaring weaknesses. the #1 priority for this team is goaltending simple as that, other holes can be plugged much easier.

 

[CycloneSweep]

You can, kind of. It has to be genuinely deflating when your NHL goaltender routinely let's in goals that you'd yell at your beer league guy for letting in.

These guys are still human. They play differently without Kosinen in net.

Have you seen the way we play to start games? Most goalies will start to let in those deflating back breaking goals constantly when the team gives up so many grade a chances constantly. Its happened to goalies here for years.

Team can't start games goalies try to hold the fort, get worn down start letting in bad goals and then the team blames the goalie and sulks when those goals happen.

Not saying Koskinen is great but Smith has been letting them in too. This team sets their goalies up to fail to start every single game and then when the goalie predictably lets in that bad goal instead of saying "yeah we helped lead to that, lets get it back" the team just sucks instead.

 

[Missing smitty]

Oilers have never really been good defensively for like over a decade, lets be honest.

They were poor even in 16-17 I think, just got bailed out by their goalie.

Flames are making due with not much on the blue line (they lost Giordano for nothing basically), at least Sutter has them overachieving which is more than can be said for here.

Anymore yeah, but arguments?

Goaltending covers up so many holes.

 

[Soundwave]

Have you seen the way we play to start games? Most goalies will start to let in those deflating back breaking goals constantly when the team gives up so many grade a chances constantly. Its happened to goalies here for years.

Team can't start games goalies try to hold the fort, get worn down start letting in bad goals and then the team blames the goalie and sulks when those goals happen.

Not saying Koskinen is great but Smith has been letting them in too. This team sets their goalies up to fail to start every single game and then when the goalie predictably lets in that bad goal instead of saying "yeah we helped lead to that, lets get it back" the team just sucks instead.

They've always played like this. Even 16-17.

If you give McDavid-Draisaitl good goaltending, they make the playoffs.

If you don't. No playoffs.

That's basically all it is. They're not really a great team overall, but making the playoffs is possible when the goalie plays well. When he doesn't, no playoffs.

It's the same team, with the same shit otherwise. People just get carried away when they're winning and think all these other things are going well. Now the start of this season was maybe a touch different because the PP was so ridiculously hot that it covered up the goaltending for a short stretch (10 games) but it's not really shocking the truth would rise to the top eventually.

 

[CycloneSweep]

I disagree. every team goes through stretches where they have trouble scoring, the good teams mitigate that by having competent goaltending that can win them games outright throughout the season. how many games can we legitimately say the oilers goaltending has stolen for them? 1? 2? not many anyway.

Poor goaltending magnifies everything, makes other areas seem worse than they are, just like great goaltending can cover up glaring weaknesses. the #1 priority for this team is goaltending simple as that, other holes can be plugged much easier.

"Other holes can be plugged much easier" you mean the holes this team has been trying to fill for YEARS now?

Our goaltending is bad but our defensive game is bottom 10 in the league.
Our goaltending is bad but our depth players are bottom 5 in the league.
Our goaltending is bad but half of our top 6 wingers produce like third liners WITH Draisaitl and McDavid.

This isn't a good team. This team wins solely on how good McDavid and Draisaitl are on any given night. Biggest reason we are losing right now is that McDrai are human right now. When they go super human again we will start winning some games but the rest of the team does little to help.

 

[CycloneSweep]

They've always played like this. Even 16-17.

If you give McDavid-Draisaitl good goaltending, they make the playoffs.

If you don't. No playoffs.

That's basically all it is. They're not really a great team overall, but making the playoffs is possible when the goalie plays well. When he doesn't, no playoffs.

It's the same team, with the same shit otherwise.

the issue is at this point we shouldn't just be trying to make the playoffs because this team has proven that outside of that one year that this team cant win a game with just Mcdrai.

This team is more than a goalie away from being good.

 

[McSuper]

Who could have been a miniscule $1.5M buyout cap hit if the GM didn't think his job was to be loyal to a fault.

Don't we already have 3 buy outs on the books ?

 

[Missing smitty]

Have you seen the way we play to start games? Most goalies will start to let in those deflating back breaking goals constantly when the team gives up so many grade a chances constantly. Its happened to goalies here for years.

Team can't start games goalies try to hold the fort, get worn down start letting in bad goals and then the team blames the goalie and sulks when those goals happen.

Not saying Koskinen is great but Smith has been letting them in too. This team sets their goalies up to fail to start every single game and then when the goalie predictably lets in that bad goal instead of saying "yeah we helped lead to that, lets get it back" the team just sucks instead.

That's why I want to see these guys with a different coach.

Tippett clearly wants emotionless hockey and a passive system.

There has to be a reason guys have come here and fallen off a cliff. Why do lots of guys get better one they leave?

 

[Soundwave]

the issue is at this point we shouldn't just be trying to make the playoffs because this team has proven that outside of that one year that this team cant win a game with just Mcdrai.

This team is more than a goalie away from being good.

Well yes, but they can't even make the playoffs without goaltending, so that's like an auto fail right there.

At least in the playoffs, I guess you learn something win or lose and making the playoffs makes the regular season a lot more pleasant.

But no, they're not a very good "team", never really have been. Even 16-17, the depth was overrated (Eberle and RNH did not have good seasons and even worse playoffs).

 

[CycloneSweep]

Who could have been a miniscule $1.5M buyout cap hit if the GM didn't think his job was to be loyal to a fault.

Buying out Koskinen would of screwed us over next year with our cap unfortunately. We might not even have the money to sign a goalie above 4 mill next year, throw in a buyout to that and its even worse. We really only could afford one buyout.