Atomic

With Byfuglien they don't really have a choice... what are you going to do, give his icetime to Postma or Nogier? Come on. And Perreault took less penalties than both Scheifele and Ehlers... so who's really kidding themselves here? You're just seeing what you want to see.

God forbid the players actually take it upon themselves to reduce penalties

Pretty interesting. I hate the idea of a star player calling the shots, in terms of management/coaching, but I believe this is basically what happened in Pittsburgh when Bylsma was fired. Honestly I believe the Sabres would be better off without Bylsma and likely Tim Murray as well.

Though he seems to fit in to the top six on a playoff team...

I think it's not really a question. It's more.... Chevy's entire positive reputation is based off having a few high first-round picks finding success in the league. Other than that, he has done next to nothing. In 6 years as GM he has brought in 3 roster players - Armia, Perreault, and Myers. He has not won a playoff game. He has made the playoffs only once. He has never had a post-second round pick make the team, let alone have a real impact. Honestly his record has been pretty pathetic by almost any measure aside from first-round picks.

It says "Losing is okay. It's what we expected."

The AHL program needs work for sure. You can't just have a team full of losers and expect prospects to come out of there flying high with confidence. However I'm not sure that was the rationale for hiring Pascal Vincent, although that's certainly how the fans perceived the move...

Very true. I'd also say Chevy's draft record has been above average but not excellent. If the plan is to build the team exclusively through "draft & develop", then we have to be damn near the best drafting team in the NHL. I give him full marks for nailing his first round picks - Scheifele, Trouba, Morrissey, Ehlers and Laine. Jury is still out on Connor and Roslovic but they look good too. However, there has to be some success in the later rounds as well. Lowry and Copp are good, but nothing more than role-players. I can't help but look at Jake Guentzel... a third round pick for Pittsburgh who put up more than a point per game in the AHL and then continued a similar pace when he came to the NHL mid-season, and is now tearing it up in the playoffs. Where is our Jake Guentzel? If we are going to be full-out draft & develop, we need those kinds of success stories.

The return of Budaj? Just poring over the list of UFA goalies and there aren't too many guys who fit that backup profile. Darcy Kuemper, Peter Budaj, Curtis McElhinney... there are a few younger guys who had good years - Keith Kinkaid, Anders Nilsson, maybe even Jonathan Bernier? But I'm not sure how they will be impacted by the expansion draft.

Basically what I'm getting at is that the season actually went quite well for most of our players, aside from the major injury to Myers and Little missing a quarter of the season. Uncommonly well, in fact. You can't point to many players on this team that under-performed or missed a lot of games. This season would have been a great time to make a run, but we just didn't have the goaltending, and that's a shame. Who knows what next year brings?

Haha yeah I mean I always have a good time. The quality of matches and competitors seems to vary wildly.

No.... but I get dragged to the odd event by my friend who loves it for some reason

Yeah fair enough, he does everything well!

Is that a WWE thing or a new talent thing? Or both? Definitely seen some good sell jobs recently in NJPW and CWE. I remember back in the day some WWE guys were great at selling. That legendary Shawn Michaels vs Undertaker match at Wrestlemania comes to mind. Bret Hart vs Stone Cold, too. But you don't see it too much anymore. Cena really pisses me off. One second he is supposedly in agony and exhausted, next he is doing multiple AA's and flying around the ring. I get babyface fire but..... it's a little much. NXT is TERRIBLE for this. No one sells at all. One thing that Brock Lesnar actually does really well is sell moves (in the rare occasion someone gets to do a move on him). He's the only guy I can think of right now who really sells moves well.

Long story short, SPuDS is still optimistic

Not at all! Not at all. It's certainly possible that they both have great seasons next year, and I think we're all banking on it. I definitely see Scheifele continuing his upward trend. With Laine.... I'll just say it's hard to score in the NHL, and lots of guys have come in with a bang only to take a bit of a step back in their second year. I can't see the future but what I do know is that the unexpected often happens and we can't bank on EVERYONE on the Jets continuing on an upward trend. It just never works that way.

Decent goaltending would have got us in this year. Next year, who knows? We can't necessarily count on Scheifele putting up 80+ points, Laine putting up 35+ goals, Lowry scoring 15, Trouba having a career season, etc. Morrissey had a fantastic rookie season but will he regress as a sophomore? Wouldn't be the first time that happened. My point is that teams don't develop on a linear upward slope. We had an opportunity to be good this year, and blew it by totally bungling the goaltending situation. Let's hope the opportunity comes again.

I was wondering when they'd bring in some RB competition. Div III but obviously he was head and shoulders above the competition, with those numbers...

The Brett Jones method. Of course, it's not usually that simple. Opportunity doesn't always knock twice, so if he has a chance at the NFL right now, he needs to take that chance. Your way sounds great but not so much if he ends up on a terrible CFL team, or one with a bad coach, or he gets thrown into the starting lineup too quickly and gets beaten all day. Worst case scenario, if he goes to the NFL is that he gets cut and comes back to the CFL with a big paycheck and a starting spot waiting for him and a lot of experience against the best, meanest football players in the world.

If CJOB loses the rights, I could see TSN just simul-casting the TV broadcast such as they are doing in Toronto this season.

Possibly someone the scouts noticed while watching Corney

Yes.... while there are only 40-50 OL drafted to the NFL each year, there are another 100 or so signed as priority FA. And once they've got that FA contract, you can count on them not being in the CFL for at least a year... if they don't make a practice roster at least, they often will wait to see if they can catch on somewhere else later in the year.

Everything is being set up for an Oilers - Pens Final. It's going to be electric. McDavid vs Crosby. Wow.

I'm moving on. The Twins are closer to home anyways. Minnesota kinda looks like Manitoba if you squint. Go Twins Go!