Washed up...

[Byrddog]

Preds turned Sully loose a deciding to go a different direction. The guy still has game and has just put a hattrick on the Jackets. Hmmm We could have used a hattrick against the jackets... Don't ya think.

Click to read more...

 

[Nashvols]

We could've also faced Steve Mason.

Hindsight is 20/20. He was pretty beat up the last few years he was with us. He was always a good point producer for us -- the question was whether he would be able to play more than half the season.

I don't blame Poile for letting him go. Would it be nice to have him right now? Sure.

Hell, I'd love to have Hartnell right now...but it took him a while (after leaving us) to get to where he is.

 

[PredsV82]

We didnt turn Sully loose because he was washed up... we turned Sully loose because we a)couldnt afford to lock up precious money in a guy who could crap out at any minute and b)because we some young guys (Wilson in particular, and this Kostitsyn kid we had acquired) who needed a spot on our top 6.

Im happy for him, but I wouldnt give up anyone in our top 9 to have him back...

 

[Byrddog]

yeah yeah yeah

He signed with the Pens for 1.5 last year and the Yotes are paying 2.6 this year even with his bonus.

And by the way his point production last year would have placed him 4th in points on the Predator team last year. For 1.5 Mil... Oh i know they had to have that money to pay Tootoo 1.2 mil or to Sign Pekka and get ready to sign Suter and Weber. Opppp's that did not work out to well.

 

[Nashvols]

yeah yeah yeah

He signed with the Pens for 1.5 last year and the Yotes are paying 2.6 this year even with his bonus.

And by the way his point production last year would have placed him 4th in points on the Predator team last year. For 1.5 Mil... Oh i know they had to have that money to pay Tootoo 1.2 mil or to Sign Pekka and get ready to sign Suter and Weber. Opppp's that did not work out to well.

And he had 22 points in 44 games his last season with us.

If Poile had a freaking crystal ball, I'm sure he wouldn't have let him go.

What's the point in stewing over what could've been? It's nearly as bad as saying "WE COULD'VE DRAFTED THAT GUY!!" It's over, it's done. I'm happy for Sully. He's a great person, and he's earned the right to hang up the skates when he's ready. His future just wasn't with us.

 

[NoNecksCurse]

come on.. sully's best days are behind him. he simply did not make sense for us in the long run. especially with his injury history. he's a great guy but his time with the preds had come and gone. ill take wilson, smith, bourque, halischuk, spaling, ect all over the aging sullivan even with the growing pains. not to mention sk, legwand, erat, fisher, hornqvist all in our top 6. if anything we need a bonafide scorer not another old veteran thats alot like a shiny turd.

 

[kypredsfan]

yeah yeah yeah

He signed with the Pens for 1.5 last year and the Yotes are paying 2.6 this year even with his bonus.

And by the way his point production last year would have placed him 4th in points on the Predator team last year. For 1.5 Mil... Oh i know they had to have that money to pay Tootoo 1.2 mil or to Sign Pekka and get ready to sign Suter and Weber. Opppp's that did not work out to well.

Tell me you aren't trying to bring up his stats with the Penguins where he was sometimes playing with Sid of all people. The Penguins might have better offense than the Preds.

 

[PredsV82]

yeah yeah yeah

He signed with the Pens for 1.5 last year and the Yotes are paying 2.6 this year even with his bonus.

And by the way his point production last year would have placed him 4th in points on the Predator team last year. For 1.5 Mil... Oh i know they had to have that money to pay Tootoo 1.2 mil or to Sign Pekka and get ready to sign Suter and Weber. Opppp's that did not work out to well.

I see its already been mentioned but its worth repeating. He had his point total last year with centermen named crosby, malkin, and staal. If you think he'd have had similar numbers on a line with Legwand, fisher or spaling then I don't know how to answer you...

 

[101st_fan]

The usual player X did something on team Y in a vacuum arguments. Some things never change

 

[Cashville]

Sullivan played a ton of PP time in Pittsburgh with one of the most dynamic PP units ever. His hat trick last night was nice, but I wouldn't change anything because of his time in Pittsburgh or his few games in Phoenix.

And I don't think a lot of our fans here realize that we are actually pretty good. I've overloaded on hockey the past week, and I am counting my blessings with the Preds. I went to the Caps v Jets game on Tuesday and holy smokes, I would have lost it if I were a Caps fan. They looked absolutely abysmal. The Rags looked terrible until playing a decent game last night, Philly is just plain awful, and Vancouver kept me up late last night sneaking by a woeful Flames team. Red Wings fans are inches from jumping right now. Even in the loss to the Jackets, I think we have not looked awful in any games, and generally solid in all of them.

 

[triggrman]

Do you really blame Poile? Sully missed a year and a half with us because of injuries, not one or two games but the best part of a year and a half.....

 

[Drake744]

yeah yeah yeah

He signed with the Pens for 1.5 last year and the Yotes are paying 2.6 this year even with his bonus.

And by the way his point production last year would have placed him 4th in points on the Predator team last year. For 1.5 Mil... Oh i know they had to have that money to pay Tootoo 1.2 mil or to Sign Pekka and get ready to sign Suter and Weber. Opppp's that did not work out to well.

Different team, different scheme. Also, much more talented players around him. But that horse has already been beaten and dead. Funny thing though, we made the second round. Penguins didn't.

And if you think re-signing Rinne and Weber qualifies as "not working out too well", I'm not sure I get your logic. Suter screwed us to go "home", to play with his BFF, and Tootoo is worth how much we offered him. Detroit overpaid heavily for him, so he left. We would've been idiots offering him that much money.

 

[Byrddog]

Different team, different scheme. Also, much more talented players around him. But that horse has already been beaten and dead. Funny thing though, we made the second round. Penguins didn't.

And if you think re-signing Rinne and Weber qualifies as "not working out too well", I'm not sure I get your logic. Suter screwed us to go "home", to play with his BFF, and Tootoo is worth how much we offered him. Detroit overpaid heavily for him, so he left. We would've been idiots offering him that much money.

Drake I think you have me confused witha Tootoo fan. Frankly I see no position for Tootoo's ego in the Preds system he is a 4th liner who has asperation of being top 6 guy. He was over paid here hes overpaid in Detroit.

Weber and Rinne

Weber 7.8 cap hit
Rinne 7.0 cap hit

Webers effective salary impact is 14 mil a year considering his bonus. Unless I have been orbed into another reality this is still a team with limited financial power and that effective salary per year is crippling any moves to improve the offense. Sure theres some cap room but this is not the federal gov't that can spend beyond the ability to pay. Weber and Rinne are our franchise players. Can a team be built arround them to make a cup run? While being revenue stable? Thats the position there in, thus far this year there are glaring shortfalls. Depending on lesser players to overachieve and scoring by committee has been the answer in the past. Currently the committee is on vacation. Proposing to move small pieces for a couple impact players is, well not logical. The team needs a couple true scoring threats or a few lower cost veterans with some scoring left in them at a bargan price.

The only other option would be to blow up the team and re-build meaning trabe Weber or Rinne or both since there the two assetts with high trade value. To think there is an ability to get a couple 30 goal guys without moving one of our studs is not concievable. Absent these two you would be hard pressed to package three of the other players to make a credible deal.

So blow up the current team or
Find Sullivan type players that make improvments to the team right away.

And yes Sully is my favorite player but there are many others out there that can fit the description. Sully handles the puck better than any player on this team we need some of that. They also need shots on net and true scoring chances. Instead the Preds pick up Rich Clune. Bring up more young guys. well sometimes it works but more often than not there not ready or NHL caliber players. See Blum which one he is I don't know yet. So for those calling for them to bring up Watson I ask why? To play on the 4th line????? A couple years ago it was bring up Wilson well they did he is coming into his own now but was wasted on 4th line or benced far too much.

In a month I predict the change the system and Fire Trotz threads to be in high gear. Again this is premature but it may just be needed the tipping point will be the players if they reject the system and turn on the coach there will be a change. But Trotz will be unemployed maybe a day before he has another job. Bottom line the guys being paid to perform on ice are not getting the job done now.

 

[Drake744]

Drake I think you have me confused witha Tootoo fan. Frankly I see no position for Tootoo's ego in the Preds system he is a 4th liner who has asperation of being top 6 guy. He was over paid here hes overpaid in Detroit.

Weber and Rinne

Weber 7.8 cap hit
Rinne 7.0 cap hit

Webers effective salary impact is 14 mil a year considering his bonus. Unless I have been orbed into another reality this is still a team with limited financial power and that effective salary per year is crippling any moves to improve the offense. Sure theres some cap room but this is not the federal gov't that can spend beyond the ability to pay. Weber and Rinne are our franchise players. Can a team be built arround them to make a cup run? While being revenue stable? Thats the position there in, thus far this year there are glaring shortfalls. Depending on lesser players to overachieve and scoring by committee has been the answer in the past. Currently the committee is on vacation. Proposing to move small pieces for a couple impact players is, well not logical. The team needs a couple true scoring threats or a few lower cost veterans with some scoring left in them at a bargan price.

Well, Poile said last season that ownership assured him that he wasn't under big financial restrictions. He also said money wouldn't be an issue in re-signing Weber, and it wasn't. We also offered very un-Pred like money to Suter as well. So I don't view money as a huge problem like it used to be.

I think the Weber situation handcuffed us a lot this summer. We didn't know how much he would go towards the cap, if he even DID re-sign. We didn't know how much extra money we had to throw at UFAs. It's unfortunate but there's a lot of truth to it. Also, "overachieving" shouldn't ever be a game plan for success. I also doubt a single player on the team thinks they overachieve.

The only other option would be to blow up the team and re-build meaning trabe Weber or Rinne or both since there the two assetts with high trade value. To think there is an ability to get a couple 30 goal guys without moving one of our studs is not concievable. Absent these two you would be hard pressed to package three of the other players to make a credible deal.

We aren't going to trade one of the league's best goaltenders, who is under contract for 7 seasons. We aren't going to trade our captain, who is the best defenseman in the league, who's under contract for 13 years. That's absurd.

So blow up the current team or
Find Sullivan type players that make improvments to the team right away.

And yes Sully is my favorite player but there are many others out there that can fit the description. Sully handles the puck better than any player on this team we need some of that. They also need shots on net and true scoring chances. Instead the Preds pick up Rich Clune. Bring up more young guys. well sometimes it works but more often than not there not ready or NHL caliber players. See Blum which one he is I don't know yet. So for those calling for them to bring up Watson I ask why? To play on the 4th line????? A couple years ago it was bring up Wilson well they did he is coming into his own now but was wasted on 4th line or benced far too much.

We got Clune off waivers and I doubt he's really around too much longer. He's filling a grinding role. Every team has a gritty 4th line, so that doesn't really have a whole lot of bearing on our skill players. You just said bring up more young guys but then wondered why people would want Watson up here. I'm going to assume the coaching staff knows if he should be here or not. Our system has always been "Get to Nashville through Milwaukee", and even if it's frustrating, it's probably the best way to do it. He'll be here when he's ready. It wouldn't surprise me if he gets called up for depth when we have an injury or two.

Needing shots on net and scoring chances is a pretty fixable issue. We were 8th in the league last year in goals (somehow), so obviously this group knows how to do it. It also doesn't help at all that we just played our 4th game in 6 nights, on the road, against a team that's probably the best defensive team in the league. Every team has stinkers over the course of a season, and I'm sure the Blues are gonna make plenty of teams look bad this season and throw their fans into a frenzy of frustration.

In a month I predict the change the system and Fire Trotz threads to be in high gear. Again this is premature but it may just be needed the tipping point will be the players if they reject the system and turn on the coach there will be a change. But Trotz will be unemployed maybe a day before he has another job. Bottom line the guys being paid to perform on ice are not getting the job done now.

I'll ignore those threads like I always have. Coaching is the least of our worries in my mind. To each their own, but I'm not going to agree with people who think the players "turn on the coach" and "reject the system" because we aren't playing well. As a fan base we don't know how to lose. We're too busy being solid every year and making the playoffs every year except 2009 that we don't know what it's like to fail consistently. We were awful at the beginning of last season, and we ended up doing pretty well. I'm sure these frustrating threads were out in full force back then too. Oh wait, I know they were. Because I started the official negativity thread for many of the reasons you just said. But, I was proven wrong yet again.

Let's give it time. This is a weird season with no training camp and with us thrown into the fire.

 

[Byrddog]

We do agree on alot, however im not conviced money is no option if that were the case more talent would have been found to give the team an offensive threat. Right now there is cap room and need. In a shortened season they can't wait too long or they could well be out of the post season picture. By the first week of Feb. we will know.

 

[glenngineer]

Cap room is there. The willingness of a bone fide elite forward to put his John Hancock on the dotted line is another. The ability and willingness to spend money is there. The money was offered to Suter and Parise and they both went to Minnesota. I think a lot of people are underestimating the arrival of Bret Wilson to the organization. The guy is one, Canadian and two, has deep pockets. When Weber was offer sheeted, he was the one to come out and say, we've got the money, he's being re-signed. My gut feeling tells me in time that his shares of ownership go up as the others slowly start to dissipate. I would gander that he could be the majority owner within the next 5 years, all the while, more and more money is put towards the players.

The other thing is, if we're as poor offensively as everyone thinks we are around here, what team in their right mind would trade a top 3 for one of our 3rd liners and prospects? Doesn't make sense really. The only real chip we have at this point that could net us anything in return is Josi and he's not going anywhere so who do we trade to get a potential game breaker? And this team was ranked 8th last in scoring so I don't see that as our issue. I think getting some of these guys is the issue more than anything. We had stretches like this last year too and we all *****ed and moaned about it. They'll get there. We came out with a solid effort against a good Anaheim team on the road. Guess, what, they've got 4 game breakers and they had to beat us in a shootout. Game breakers don't mean guaranteed success, balance on a roster does.

I'm not saying we couldn't use a game breaker or two but I don't think getting one game breaker changes the dynamic of this team that much. Other guys would still need to step up. Teams cover Weber at the point because of his dynamic shot. Other guys like Josi and Ellis need to produce, especially on the PP to keep teams honest. So if we landed a game breaker, teams would be all over them and other guys would need to still pull their weight.

 

[Legionnaire11]

You make a lot of great points there Glen.

I'm wondering if the only way a real scoring forward (or two) end up here is if Wilson forces Poile to "overspend" on July 1. Because I think we've seen it prove than Poile is not interested in the free agent frenzy.

 

[codeyh]

re: Sully, hindsight is 20/20..

Too bad we couldn't make Peverley work in our system.
Too bad Radulov didn't work out.
Too bad we drafted Chet Pickard when Jordan Eberle was still on the board.

 

[Drake744]

People think we can just go trade for a player as if it's as simple as Play Station. Making a trade is way more complicated than 99% of us, including myself, understand. Also, just because we offer players a contract doesn't mean they want to sign it. If someone doesn't want to play here, they aren't going to play here.

edit: Looks like that was mentioned already

 

[Byrddog]

Where are the Preds going to get 3 goals a game to get competitive?

 

[MrMariusz]

The season has barely started, can people calm down please ?
With a little bit more luck (yes, luck is a huge factor in shootouts), our record would look a lot better.
As long as we are outplaying the opposition like we sometimes do (at least from what I've seen), things will end up alright. Doesn't matter that you lose a few in SO, the season is still very young.

 

[Drake744]

Where are the Preds going to get 3 goals a game to get competitive?

Only three teams in the NHL averaged 3 or more goals a game last season. Pittsburgh (3.33), Boston and Philadelphia (3.17 each). We averaged 2.83/game. Averaging 3 goals a game throughout a season rarely happens. Basically every team will average between 2 and 3 a game. The Kings were actually second-to-last in goals per game last year, they just happened to catch fire at the right time. Philly and Pittsburgh also gave up more goals than we did, which is a factor in my mind of just how we play. We play a defensive style and hope to get as much offensive contributions as possible.

Offense gets noticed but defense wins games. Two of those top three teams in offense didn't get out of the first round, while the Kings won the Cup.

The season has barely started, can people calm down please ?
With a little bit more luck (yes, luck is a huge factor in shootouts), our record would look a lot better.
As long as we are outplaying the opposition like we sometimes do (at least from what I've seen), things will end up alright. Doesn't matter that you lose a few in SO, the season is still very young.

Yeah I'm trying to not worry too much about it right now. We started off really badly last year also and I think the way we're playing right now is a lot better than the struggling we had last season. Right now we just aren't catching many breaks. Last year we were just outplayed all the time.

 

[triggrman]

What we need to do is trade a defensive prospect for an offensive one. Blum or Ekholm for a guy on the verge of being NHL ready...

 

[Drake744]

What we need to do is trade a defensive prospect for an offensive one. Blum or Ekholm for a guy on the verge of being NHL ready...

I'm wondering after we lost Suter if that idea lost some steam within the organization. I'm not against it, but defensive depth is a little more scarce than it has been.

 

[Legionnaire11]

What we need to do is trade a defensive prospect for an offensive one. Blum or Ekholm for a guy on the verge of being NHL ready...

And we're going on about 9 consecutive seasons of saying this exact same thing, yet it never happens. Our GM is very smart, and makes a lot of smart and safe decisions with our assets... yet at the same time that mindset seems to handcuff him from doing other things that we can all see make total sense.

Basically, Poile is great at building a stockpile of two-way 3rd liners and puck moving defensemen with the premise that those players are coveted around the league and make good bargaining chips... but if it came down to it and he did move those assets for some more offensive minded talent then our stockpile would no longer resemble the Poile trademark and that might not be something he's comfortable with.

This is not a direct criticism of the team's record to start this season, but an observation of Poile's M.O. over the course of his Predators tenure.