Miscellaneous NHL Talk XXXI - 2019 Offseason

[Striiker]

If he wasn’t pulling the strings, as you know for a fact, he must have thought hakstol to be a tremendous coach. I just can not believe he sat there and let hakstol over use players that he wouldn’t and then let hakstol continue to do so as the team failed. He just let hak roll out the same lineup day in and day out while overusing bad players which he himself signed and re -signed.

Seems odd from a control freak to let this happen unless he was at minimum TOTALLY on board.

Tremendous? That's a guess. All we know is he didn't think he was bad enough to fire, so Hextall does deserve blame for that.

We also know they disagreed on some things (like when Hextall brought up Sanheim but Hak refused to play him or how Hak clearly loved Vandevelde and Manning but Hextall let them walk) but Hextall repeatedly made a point of how he didn't interfere with the coaching.

Regardless, even if he agreed with some of the bad moves (or at least didn't hate them enough to step in), that's not the same thing as pulling the strings.

That's the point here. Hak can't be absolved of blame.

 

[Jettany]

Tremendous? That's a guess. All we know is he didn't think he was bad enough to fire.

We also know they disagreed on some things (like when Hextall brought up Sanheim but Hak refused to play him or how Hak clearly loved Vandevelde and Manning but Hextall let them walk) but Hextall repeatedly made a point of how he didn't interfere with the coaching.

It’s a guess to say hextall thought very highly of hak, who he recruited and kept to the day he was fired, but we know for sure he didn’t interfere with coaching?

You are giving hextall credit for letting manning walk? Come on now.

Hextall signed manning to THREE contracts totaling 4 years. He gets credit for letting him walk. Now now.

And I think vdv twice for 3 years.

I love the guy but you make it sound in most posts that hakstol had more say in the organization then hextall.

 

[Tripod]

He didn't "sit on his hands" with anything other than the coaching situation, which rightfully was what ended his time here. But this myth that he did nothing is what's confusing, unless we're strictly looking at quantity of moves instead of quality. Like I said, the roster additions this offseason are not too different from last year, so being upset with last year and happy with this year is strange.

As for your list...

We didn't need a 2C. In fact, trading for one would've been a bad thing since it would've likely cost us quite a bit and blocked Patrick, who we understandably hoped was going to pick up where he left off in his rookie year. He did try to sign Statsny though...

We didn't need a better RHD, we just needed our D to be used properly. We also don't know if we even got a better RHD this summer. We gave up a RHD to get a different RHD... one who is declining, coming off a poor year, and is about to get shoved into a huge role. It's a gamble, so we'll see.

As for goalies, we didn't add anyone, we just brought up Hart.

We definitely needed to remove the coaching staff last year, and it's nearly impossible for the current group to be worse, but we'll have to see how this one turns out. I'm cautiously hopeful but not going to get my hopes up too much because going from a 1/10 to a 3/10 (hypothetically) isn't going to do all that much to help us.

Agree to disagree.

When you have a hole on the roster....and that hole is still there the following summer....then yes, you failed at filling that hole.

Talk all you want about Patrick. We had no #2C to start last season. Patrick was given that spot...and failed. Even with Patrick, we needed another C....or were you happy with Weal as our #3C...I can't remember. Now, we have a #2C and we have a #3C that can be a #2C himself. But now we are not pushing all our chips in on that bet.

We absolutely needed a better D last year...but yes we also needed people to be used properly. We actually needed that better Dman BEFORE last year. I have said many a time it was a farce that AMac was our rookie whisperer and that he and Gudas were the 2 "reliable" vets our kids had to learn from.

At G, last summer we 100% should have added a goalie and not "bet" on Elliott/Neuvy/Stolarz. But we didn't. Obviously this year, that fix is from within.

Coaching...no 1-3 won't make much of a difference. But 1-7/8 will. People WILL dislike things he does, myself included. But he also has a track record that can't be ignored. Last 10 years:

2 SCF appearances
8 100 pt seasons
1 96 pt season
1 missed playoff

We will always dislike coaches, playing time, etc.... I expect that. I just hope it's not obvious shit...like playing Hagg more than Sanheim...lol.

 

[wasup]

When a manager hires a coach they usually discuss who they want on the team and this includes input from assistants GM,s and assistant coaches . But once the team is picked it is the coach who decides deployment etc... . But you are absolutely correct on the Sandheim thing and the fact that Hex let some of Haks toys go .

They are both to blame but for different things . Hex was to blame for not firing Hak for self preservation purposes .

 

[Jettany]

Tremendous? That's a guess. All we know is he didn't think he was bad enough to fire, so Hextall does deserve blame for that.

We also know they disagreed on some things (like when Hextall brought up Sanheim but Hak refused to play him or how Hak clearly loved Vandevelde and Manning but Hextall let them walk) but Hextall repeatedly made a point of how he didn't interfere with the coaching.

Regardless, even if he agreed with some of the bad moves (or at least didn't hate them enough to step in), that's not the same thing as pulling the strings.

That's the point here. Hak can't be absolved of blame.

Hakstol is not absolved at all. Not by a long shot.

 

[hatcher]

Agree to disagree.

When you have a hole on the roster....and that hole is still there the following summer....then yes, you failed at filling that hole.

Talk all you want about Patrick. We had no #2C to start last season. Patrick was given that spot...and failed. Even with Patrick, we needed another C....or were you happy with Weal as our #3C...I can't remember. Now, we have a #2C and we have a #3C that can be a #2C himself. But now we are not pushing all our chips in on that bet.

We absolutely needed a better D last year...but yes we also needed people to be used properly. We actually needed that better Dman BEFORE last year. I have said many a time it was a farce that AMac was our rookie whisperer and that he and Gudas were the 2 "reliable" vets our kids had to learn from.

At G, last summer we 100% should have added a goalie and not "bet" on Elliott/Neuvy/Stolarz. But we didn't. Obviously this year, that fix is from within.

Coaching...no 1-3 won't make much of a difference. But 1-7/8 will. People WILL dislike things he does, myself included. But he also has a track record that can't be ignored. Last 10 years:

2 SCF appearances
8 100 pt seasons
1 96 pt season
1 missed playoff

We will always dislike coaches, playing time, etc.... I expect that. I just hope it's not obvious ****...like playing Hagg more than Sanheim...lol.

He'll p[lay who's going on that night. G got doubled shifted with Leino in the finals because those two were f***in going at all times under Lavy at that time and AV does that to. Pitlick could get double shifted some games if thats how it is that night.

 

[Starat327]

We did absolutely suck for 5 years, the team was just kept afloat by 3 or 4 players every year. The only difference is we didn't suck enough to do a full tank job, we got 5 years of mediocrity.

I assume I didnt need to go into that much detail, but my point was that this place woulsve been abaolutely mad had Hextall sold Giroux.

 

[Striiker]

It’s a guess to say hextall thought very highly of hak, who he recruited and kept to the day he was fired, but we know for sure he didn’t interfere with coaching?

You are giving hextall credit for letting manning walk? Come on now.

Hextall signed manning to THREE contracts totaling 4 years. He gets credit for letting him walk. Now now.

And I think vdv twice for 3 years.

I love the guy but you make it sound in most posts that hakstol had more say in the organization then hextall.

You're not even reading my posts apparently. I'm done here.

 

[Striiker]

Agree to disagree.

When you have a hole on the roster....and that hole is still there the following summer....then yes, you failed at filling that hole.

Talk all you want about Patrick. We had no #2C to start last season. Patrick was given that spot...and failed. Even with Patrick, we needed another C....or were you happy with Weal as our #3C...I can't remember. Now, we have a #2C and we have a #3C that can be a #2C himself. But now we are not pushing all our chips in on that bet.

We absolutely needed a better D last year...but yes we also needed people to be used properly. We actually needed that better Dman BEFORE last year. I have said many a time it was a farce that AMac was our rookie whisperer and that he and Gudas were the 2 "reliable" vets our kids had to learn from.

At G, last summer we 100% should have added a goalie and not "bet" on Elliott/Neuvy/Stolarz. But we didn't. Obviously this year, that fix is from within.

Coaching...no 1-3 won't make much of a difference. But 1-7/8 will. People WILL dislike things he does, myself included. But he also has a track record that can't be ignored. Last 10 years:

2 SCF appearances
8 100 pt seasons
1 96 pt season
1 missed playoff

We will always dislike coaches, playing time, etc.... I expect that. I just hope it's not obvious ****...like playing Hagg more than Sanheim...lol.

That would be the case if there was a long-standing hole, but there wasn't.
Patrick was the 2C going into last year, and rightfully so. It was due to this past seasons struggles that people suddenly decided we needed a 2C, not before. It wasn't an obvious or predictable problem that clearly needed action the previous offseason.

We didn't need to add defensemen. We had good pieces that we needed to be able to evaluate and allow to gain experience. All adding vets would've done is further block guys like Sanheim and Myers from getting the icetime they needed.

For goaltending, it's really impossible to even evaluate what happened last year because of the insanity with injuries and how many we ended up going through. If Elliott was healthy do we even have a problem? Probably not. But that's what Fletcher is betting on this year so it's hard to be OK with that now but be mad about Hextall doing the same thing.

And yeah, so long as this coaching staff doesn't do the mind-blowingly stupid, completely indefensible, zero logic stuff like that last one, I'll be able to look past the standard dumb stuff that ALL coaches do. I'm not expecting perfection because that'll never happen... I'll just settle for not consistently/massively detrimental.

 

[Jettany]

You're not even reading my posts apparently. I'm done here.

Did I misread you saying hextall let manning and vdv walk? As if he deserved credit for that?

I just pointed out he signed him to 3 contracts. So giving him credit for letting him walk is a stretch.

Which part did I misread?

 

[Tripod]

That would be the case if there was a long-standing hole, but there wasn't.
Patrick was the 2C going into last year, and rightfully so. It was due to this past seasons struggles that people suddenly decided we needed a 2C, not before. It wasn't an obvious or predictable problem that clearly needed action the previous offseason.

We didn't need to add defensemen. We had good pieces that we needed to be able to evaluate and allow to gain experience. All adding vets would've done is further block guys like Sanheim and Myers from getting the icetime they needed.

For goaltending, it's really impossible to even evaluate what happened last year because of the insanity with injuries and how many we ended up going through. If Elliott was healthy do we even have a problem? Probably not. But that's what Fletcher is betting on this year so it's hard to be OK with that now but be mad about Hextall doing the same thing.

And yeah, so long as this coaching staff doesn't do the mind-blowingly stupid, completely indefensible, zero logic stuff like that last one, I'll be able to look past the standard dumb stuff that ALL coaches do. I'm not expecting perfection because that'll never happen... I'll just settle for not consistently/massively detrimental.

Again...agree to disagree. Patrick was the #2....because he was given that spot. Not because he was good enough for it or earned it. And yes it was a problem...or did Hextall try and sign Stastny because he was happy with Patrick as his #2C?

Reality is, we have not had a #2C the last 2 years since Giroux moved to wing. I can't blame a new GM for not just "hoping" that changes in year 3 when the guy failed the year before. And I say this as someone who has said many a time, that I do think Patrick will still be a 60 point 2-way C. And if Patrick makes that jump this year that we all have seen he is capable of...what a great problem to have...3 good centers. I will worry about having too many good top 9 players, when/if we actually get to that point. I have also said that Hayes money...might need to come from trading away JVR in a year or 2. Sucks because I like JVR, but oh well.

For D...no...adding a good Dman would not have blocked people IF we also fixed the coaching issue. You add the Dman to replace AMac, Hagg. Hextall waived AMac before and it was dumb he did not do so again. But again, he kept Hak too so Hex certainly had flaws.

I think we we looked back on our "needs" last summer, adding a C, a good D, not having Elliott and Neuvy, and firing Hak and the coaching staff would have graded out pretty well by most.(everyone will never agree 100%). We added a LW and a depth Dman. Under Fletch, we did what should have been done under Hextall.

 

[Striiker]

Did I misread you saying hextall let manning and vdv walk? As if he deserved credit for that?

I just pointed out he signed him to 3 contracts. So giving him credit for letting him walk is a stretch.

Which part did I misread?

Yes, you misread it.

I wasn't giving him credit at all. I was pointing out an example of Hextall doing something that went against what Hakstol wanted. Simply showing that they disagreed on that specific topic, nothing more.

There's no way that Hakstol would have wanted Manning to go based on how he was used because you don't go from playing a guy in your top 4 to thinking he's not worth signing to a cheap contract. Or, in Vandeveldes case, from being your shutdown ace to not even being worth a league minimum contract.

 

[pit]

ouch... NHL article pinning Hart with only 28 wins this season..

GOALIE WIN PROJECTIONS FOR 2019-20
NOTES: Goalie win totals have been quantified based on factors including past production, team goalie situations, anticipated start volume, projected goal support (or lack thereof), injury history, sleeper upside, anticipated regression or bounce-back candidacy, age and contract status. … Win totals should be viewed as safe estimates for this season and do not indicate each player's ceiling or floor. … The order of projected win totals (highest to lowest) does not reflect order of rank in NHL.com's fantasy top 250 because those rankings take standard peripheral categories into account. … Injuries could affect whether players meet or come close to their win projection. … These projections are a collaborative effort by Pete Jensen, Rob Reese and David Satriano
---
Andrei Vasilevskiy, TBL: 40
Sergei Bobrovsky, FLA: 39
Frederik Andersen, TOR: 38
Marc-Andre Fleury, VGK: 36
Braden Holtby, WSH: 35
Carey Price, MTL: 35
---
Jordan Binnington, STL: 34
Ben Bishop, DAL: 33
Tuukka Rask, BOS: 33
Martin Jones, SJS: 33
Pekka Rinne, NSH: 32
Matt Murray, PIT: 32
Philipp Grubauer, COL: 32
Connor Hellebuyck, WPG: 32
John Gibson, ANA: 30
---
Devan Dubnyk, MIN: 29
Carter Hart, PHI: 28
David Rittich, CGY: 28
Petr Mrazek, CAR: 27
Jacob Markstrom, VAN: 27
Semyon Varlamov, NYI: 26
Jonathan Quick, LAK: 26
---
Jimmy Howard, DET: 24
Henrik Lundqvist, NYR: 23
Antti Raanta, ARI: 21
Corey Crawford, CHI: 21
Elvis Merzlikins, CBJ: 21
Cory Schneider, NJD: 20
Mackenzie Blackwood, NJD: 20
Darcy Kuemper, ARI: 20
Carter Hutton, BUF: 20
---
Robin Lehner, CHI: 19
Mike Smith, EDM: 19
Mikko Koskinen, EDM: 18
Linus Ullmark, BUF: 17
Alexandar Georgiev, NYR: 16
Thomas Greiss, NYI: 16
Cam Talbot, CGY: 15
Joonas Korpisalo, CBJ: 15
Anders Nilsson, OTT: 15
Juuse Saros, NSH: 14
Curtis McElhinney, TBL: 14
Craig Anderson, OTT: 14
Jaroslav Halak, BOS: 13
Brian Elliott, PHI: 13
Anton Khudobin, DAL: 12
Thatcher Demko, VAN: 12
Jake Allen, STL: 11
Pavel Francouz, COL: 10
Aaron Dell, SJS: 10

Maybe they only think Hart is playing 41 games.

 

[Striiker]

Again...agree to disagree. Patrick was the #2....because he was given that spot. Not because he was good enough for it or earned it. And yes it was a problem...or did Hextall try and sign Stastny because he was happy with Patrick as his #2C?

Reality is, we have not had a #2C the last 2 years since Giroux moved to wing. I can't blame a new GM for not just "hoping" that changes in year 3 when the guy failed the year before. And I say this as someone who has said many a time, that I do think Patrick will still be a 60 point 2-way C. And if Patrick makes that jump this year that we all have seen he is capable of...what a great problem to have...3 good centers. I will worry about having too many good top 9 players, when/if we actually get to that point. I have also said that Hayes money...might need to come from trading away JVR in a year or 2. Sucks because I like JVR, but oh well.

For D...no...adding a good Dman would not have blocked people IF we also fixed the coaching issue. You add the Dman to replace AMac, Hagg.

Again, the way that Patrick ended his rookie year made it perfectly reasonable to think he could be the 2C this past year. This board was largely in favor of that too. We knew why he struggled at the start of his rookie year, he had the skill and draft pedigree, he played great in the 2nd half of the year, and he even had a strong playoff series against the Pens.

Signing Statsny wouldn't have been to replace Patrick, it would've been to have two 2C caliber players and add depth. Which would have been perfectly fine, since it wouldn't have cost us in a trade, unlike it would have after Statsny decided to go elsewhere. Once that option was gone, the best move was to go into the year with what we had or to look for a 3C, not a 2C.

 

[BackToTheBrierePatch]

Hart is entering his first full season. He is a great unknown for how you go about predicting wins for goalies. I think he wins more than 28 games, but at the same time you cannot fault people for guessing a kids win total for his first full season in the league and being a little uncertain

 

[Jettany]

Yes, you misread it.

I wasn't giving him credit at all. I was pointing out an example of Hextall doing something that went against what Hakstol wanted. Simply showing that they disagreed on that specific topic, nothing more.

There's no way that Hakstol would have wanted Manning to go based on how he was used because you don't go from playing a guy in your top 4 to thinking he's not worth signing to a cheap contract. Or, in Vandeveldes case, from being your shutdown ace to not even being worth a league minimum contract.

Hextall signed him 3 times, Twice to one way contracts. So isn’t that proof hexy believed manning was an nhl regular?

Pointing out he let him go, to bring in folin by the way, to me is pushing a hard to sell narrative.

 

[Brayden Fattison]

Maybe they only think Hart is playing 41 games.

I thought the same thing, but they have Elliott for 13.

 

[Jettany]

Yes, you misread it.

I wasn't giving him credit at all. I was pointing out an example of Hextall doing something that went against what Hakstol wanted. Simply showing that they disagreed on that specific topic, nothing more.

There's no way that Hakstol would have wanted Manning to go based on how he was used because you don't go from playing a guy in your top 4 to thinking he's not worth signing to a cheap contract. Or, in Vandeveldes case, from being your shutdown ace to not even being worth a league minimum contract.

I would be very surprised if manning ever had a season in philly being in the top 4 in toi. But I guess it’s possible.

 

[Striiker]

I would be very surprised if manning ever had a season in philly being in the top 4 in toi. But I guess it’s possible.

He spent a lot of time on both the 2nd and 3rd pairings. A tiny bit of time on the top pair.

In his last full year here before Hextall let him walk away, the top 3 in D TOI/GP were Provorov, Ghost, and Mac, and then Hagg and Manning basically tied for for 4th most (separated by 11 seconds).

Point is, Hakstol clearly valued him as a player right up until the end, while Hextall eventually decided they were better off without him.

 

[CanadianFlyer88]

28 wins is reasonable for Hart from a prediction site if they are expecting him to play 55 games or less.

13 wins for Elliott is also a reasonable prediction of you're assuming he plays most or all of the other 27 games.

The Flyers are a tough team to predict this year, so predicting they hit the 0.500 win percentage is not unreasonable if you also factor in 5-10 combined OT/SO losses.

I expect a lot more from this team, but I doubt most predictions will have them higher than 92-95 points.

 

[Striiker]

@Tripod

To put it another way, the Patrick situation prior to last year is basically the same as the Hart situation right now.

We're fine with assuming that he can play in the role he's going to be "given" next year, so it would be unfair for someone to blame Fletcher for not adding a goalie in the hypothetical chance that Hart has a bad year like Patrick had last year. Is it possible that he fails and doesn't play up to the level required? Sure, but we have to see before we spend assets on a plan B.

 

[BrindamoursNose]

It’s sort of funny, at the time of the firing I was more of his defender but now I tend to have swayed a bit the other way.

He did some good things, drafting and deal negotiation with his younger players.

His UFA signings to me, were also questionable but not team crippling. My biggest issues lie in the notion that he would have likely stuck by Hakstol going into even this year. He also was in agreement with the usage of his young kids.

He drafted well but it was the correct decision to move on.

The bolded is pure speculation though --- I don't know how you can pin that on him.

The second part about the kids is just again mob mentality IMO. People act like Hexy never played kids, yet we had what I consider a proportionate amount of kids on the roster in his tenure when they were ready. People were bent out of shape Lehtera or McDonald were played, but there were still a few (at least) rookies/2 years removed from draft players on the roster.

His UFA signings were meh. Only thing that people can really get on him about, but even then most were during a time when he wasn't trying to sign big ticket guys. He got JVR in his last offseason, which was a big deal IMO.

 

[Tripod]

@Tripod

To put it another way, the Patrick situation prior to last year is basically the same as the Hart situation right now.

We're fine with assuming that he can play in the role he's going to be "given" next year, so it would be unfair for someone to blame Fletcher for not adding a goalie in the hypothetical chance that Hart has a bad year like Patrick had last year. Is it possible that he fails and doesn't play up to the level required? Sure, but we have to see before we spend assets on a plan B.

I agree...and I miswrote. We should have said we should have added a C last year...but it didn't have to be a #2C. It needed to be a #2 or #3 capable of playing "up" if needed.

Because even if Patrick played well, we still were betting on Weal as our #3C who was not able to step up...let alone be a solid #3.

Where I don't agree...is that G and F are completely different because only 1 goalie plays at a time. If Patrick comes our guns a blazing, Hayes can slide down. If Frost AND Patrick come out guns a blazing, Hayes can go to wing. And while Elliott should not have been trusted in a starters role, having him in a backup 20-30 game role is certainly not the same.

Anyways...I am done here. We know where each other stand. Off to do other things.

 

[CanadianFlyer88]

@Tripod

To put it another way, the Patrick situation prior to last year is basically the same as the Hart situation right now.

We're fine with assuming that he can play in the role he's going to be "given" next year, so it would be unfair for someone to blame Fletcher for not adding a goalie in the hypothetical chance that Hart has a bad year like Patrick had last year. Is it possible that he fails and doesn't play up to the level required? Sure, but we have to see before we spend assets on a plan B.

The moves the Flyers made this offseason were definitely similar to what should have been done last year.

Goaltending was difficult to address last year given what was available in the free agent market and with two vets under contract for one more year. I hated that Hexy did nothing, but I don't know what the trade market was like, either. Hart is a wild card, but it seems like Hexy was comfortable waiting for him to make the show, even if he was slow playing the promotion.

Bringing in vets like Niskanen and Braun in D would have made a lot of sense last year, even of it meant moving Gudas. They had Provy and Ghost, plus a less experienced Sanheim and a bunch of dregs (and Gudas). No one knew what Myers or Morin would bring if they got a shot and the Flyers were clearly comfortable rolling with Hagg and AMac with only a depth signing of Folin.

2C/3C was a huge hole last year. I was happy to give Patrick a shot as 2C last year, but there was still a huge hole behind him, even if it worked out. I hate the Hayes contract, but the centre depth is the best the Flyers have had in years. Hexy going after Stastny acknowledged the hole; it is unfortunate he couldn't make it work or find an alternative, but the move was needed last year.

 

[CanadianFlyer88]

Tampa signed Maroon. Solid depth signing there.