The TLDR:
Losing Dougie is the most under reported story of this hockey season.
They believe it’s goaltending.
Acknowledge that Ruff is on the hot seat, but liken us to Ottawa and state that even if we make a coaching change we might not have the personnel for it to matter.
Friedman is now speculating that the multi year extension might have actually been a 1 year plus an optional second and that Green is there as the option B if things go south.
They link us to Calgary for a trade and on Marek’s radio show he is constantly linking us to Calgary and Arizona for goaltending and defense. Specifically mention Noah Hanifin. Said that even if we make the trade and miss we can convince to stay long term.
Both speculated due to our depth and term it might not be the worst thing to just ride out the season. Friedman kept saying that he believes we cannot take a step back.
by mustachiolong
7 Comments
I think they fucked up the defense pretty badly. It was always going to be the case that a defense with all 3 of Hughes, Bahl, and Nemec is too young and too inexperienced.
I really like Bahl but with 2 top 5 pick dmen, plus Hamilton, Marino, Siegenthaler, that last D spot is for…. a reliable veteran.
Smith just sucks ass, and Miller is not good. To be fair, most of the time both are being deployed like prime Marc-edouard Vlasic paired with Karlsson covering up every single defensive liability. Smith cant fucking do that. Miller could NEVER do that. It’s obviously not the whole problem of the team that our #6/7 d is suboptimal but man…
Also all our dmen who come into the league learning Ruff’s system are probably gonna struggled to actually adjust to a non-slow-in-french system when we obviously inevitably move on.
Idk what the solution is but going into the season with Smith/Miller/Bahl as our #6 d before the Hamilton injury was pretty fucking delusional.
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Getting Hanifin automatically means Seigs or Bahl are part of the deal imo
Fire Lindy first, then trade Vitek + picks for a goalie if possible
I feel like Dougie was never gonna be a saving grace defensively anyways, same exact problems were there when he was healthy. We’ve banked our D core too heavily on offensive D-men and we’re now seeing the consequences of that
Riding out the season is our best bet. Fans need to think long-term and grow a thicker skin, which you’d think wouldn’t be a problem after the last ten years. This is a good team. There were and are major injuries. Our stars are mostly under 25 and some are teens. These goalies and coach are temporary.
Need better goaltending. Plain and simple.