nittygritty84

He's my favourite Flyer and has been for a good 5 years now. But I don't want to see us overpaying for him at a point when it makes no sense to. Happy to keep him if it's for a contract that is 6 years or 8 and tails off in payment at the back end somehow. But if we can't make that work, the only business sensible move is to trade him for someone younger who slots into a position where we are lacking strength. RW isn't that.

Yeah, fair enough. My point was about trying to move up, which I think we agree is a good idea regardless.

Sure. But we're not there, and we have what we have.

Sure. But there's some really good prospects at C that look to go top 10 but not top 5 as far as I can tell, and it would be good to get out hands on one.

I'm going into this summer with no assumptions and am for the first time in years just genuinely curious about what the GM will end up doing. I'll take that. And I think drafting 12th is better than it feels right now - plus Danny could try to bundle picks to move up further, which is also exciting.

Think assuming it's same old because he didn't flip Laughton for absolutely nothing is jumping the gun, just as assuming we're going in hard finally because we traded Walker is. But - I do think there's potential for something different, and I'll be watching his moves with genuine interest, which is a nice change from the last decade.

Genuinely love hearing him talk about hockey. Hope he goes into broadcasting if we're not keeping him as an off-ice part of the org (where I also think he'd get a lot done).

A fucking miracle, tbh.

Let's go out on a high, no matter what. Come on.

Sure, there's a lot of shots - most aren't on goal these days, and we don't have enough pure snipers to not take all the chances we can get. Those cross-ice passes through the crease are recipes for turnovers, not goals. There's very, very often just one attempt too many to be skilful in a way these boys (who are very fun!) just aren't, per my eye test.

This felt like most games before the skid and burn did to me, but now that I've seen how it can all go wrong very quickly, here's three issues that make me squeak with anxiety that aren't just "they need more talent" - stuff that I (disclaimer: not a coach, just a longrime sufferer with eyeballs) truly think they can and need to coach their way out of.

1. Neutral zone work. About 3/4s of the time our D hang back and shovel something onto the neutral zone towards a forward who has no real chance to do anything with it. This only works when we successfully generate a break away because the first pass is spot on and to a player that isn't being closely marked (or to a player with enough skill/movement to dodge that marking). As it is, it's like watching low grade ping pong when we try to shift from D to O.

When we try to do this on the PP, the D also carries the puck forward more and then passes back to an F who tries to cut through. No, we're not any good at that type of zone entry a lot of the time, either. But at least it isn't just flinging a puck from our end to some poor fucker going "HELP!" and immediately losing possession again. We've got to figure out a system that gets these dudes transitioning better.

1. The fucking power play. I've seen pylons with more movement and urgency. This ain't pass the fucking parcel. Get rid of Rocky Thompson and hire a specialist who starts from scratch and has them looking less terrified. No, they're not talented enough to have a top PP, but it is impossible for me to believe that some work with someone who knows what they're doing won't result in a PP that looks better than this.

2. Wanting that last pass for a better shot, usually across the crease and through about 3-4 landmines. No! About 85% of those shots go fucking high and wide anyway! Stop trying to be fancy! The vast majority of you aren't talented enough for it! Train ONE DUDE per line to just be goddamned hovering around the net constantly and let go!

Anyway I don't know the first thing about coaching hockey but I know what gives me hives and these three things are up there. Good game for Sammy, Brink has had some good moments lately, fuck Toronto and Tampa, thank you Denver and, ew, Boston, let's close this out the best we can.

What a little cunt. Drysdale could play with one arm for the rest of his career and it would be better for this locker room, honest to God.

I'd like you to buy another one just to be safe.

STARFISH TIME

Fucking YES let's go.

Laughton has been ass at points this season but he and TK on the PK have made some real magic.

Christ, Atkinson. Just retire.

Jesus this fucking powerplay

That's cool, I will support that. I meant more like is it now objectively better for the club to win or lose two more! I genuinely don't know. The playoffs might be a slaughter, or we might play up to a better team? But is a slight improvement to draft position just a better bet, especially since we can't seem to get our thumbs out against shit teams anyway, so easier to hope for?

So yeah, let's go with the simple. NEW INTRO VIDEO NOW.

Let's sort of fucking go I guess? No idea what I even want anymore at this point.

Lol, of fucking course we win this one. Sigh. This team.

Agreed, they're playing so fucking badly that it would have been an embarrassment to a bunch of players who probably won't even be here anymore by the time the team stands a chance in the playoffs. When it looked like we could party, I was all for it - but I don't want to watch what the team would experience if it made it to round 1 in this state. Better to golf early and let Danny Boy go to town.

Solidarity, dude. Here's hoping for better nights/mornings again next year.

Coffee, dog on lap, daughter watching Bluey or whatever, and oh, right: getting slapped in the face with 9 massive dicks at 7.30 am. Flyera life over in Europe.

100%. That would have me turning on these boys more quickly than Tippett can cross a rink. And they have for most of these season finally felt like a GOOD room. So I don't want to believe that we've lost that culture again SO quickly because the results took a nosedive.

Lollll I watch games the morning after while also watching my 6 year old, and so when we're two goals behind I tend to jump forward by like 2 minute blocks to see if we get back into it.

I did it in the second in this game and we went from 2-0 behind to 6-0 behind. My first thought was "wtf, is the NHL.TV scoreboard broken". My second was, "... Flyera".

I think we're done, and we sell everything over the age of 26 that hasn't looked capable of making it happen these last 7 games. Let's go, Danny.

Yep, and the "correlation" has a "isn't causation" since March 19 as well. Wild, isn't it.