Old Devils Thread (Lock 'er up please)

[beekay414]

Man, I cannot believe it's been over half my lifetime since we won a Stanley Cup and 8 years since we even played for one. I remember the 2012 SCF like they happened yesterday. We should've won that damn series.

[beekay414]

I was so spoiled as a kid, man. '95 cup, 3 out of 4 appearances in the SCF from 2000-2003 with 2 more titles. God, take me back.

[Forge]

15 hours ago, beekay414 said:

I was so spoiled as a kid, man. '95 cup, 3 out of 4 appearances in the SCF from 2000-2003 with 2 more titles. God, take me back.

Yeah, I was also fortunate enough to have the 49ers super bowl at the beginning of that, and an OSU championship at the end. 

Since then, it's been lean. I don't know what I would have done without that run by the Giants. Really kept me even for the last two decades (though there was another OSU championship in there, don't want to leave that out)

[beekay414]

6 minutes ago, Forge said:

Yeah, I was also fortunate enough to have the 49ers super bowl at the beginning of that, and an OSU championship at the end. 

Since then, it's been lean. I don't know what I would have done without that run by the Giants. Really kept me even for the last two decades (though there was another OSU championship in there, don't want to leave that out)

Thankfully, I've got the Tar Heels who, usually, have a shot at a title any given year and have delivered me 3 since 2005 (should be 4 god damn it, Kris Jenkins).

[beekay414]

They are kinda talking about it on HF but, @Forge, how would you feel about Ty Smith playing 2021 in the AHL on the left side rather than plugging him in there at the NHL level and potentially ruining him? I know it'd be a kind of drag but, if it's best for his learning and development, I'm all for it. We want him on the left side, that's one thing I'm 100% sure of, but he's played exclusively the right side in Spokane. I'm shocked that Devils management didn't talk to Spokane about moving him to the left side full-time.

[Forge]

39 minutes ago, beekay414 said:

They are kinda talking about it on HF but, @Forge, how would you feel about Ty Smith playing 2021 in the AHL on the left side rather than plugging him in there at the NHL level and potentially ruining him? I know it'd be a kind of drag but, if it's best for his learning and development, I'm all for it. We want him on the left side, that's one thing I'm 100% sure of, but he's played exclusively the right side in Spokane. I'm shocked that Devils management didn't talk to Spokane about moving him to the left side full-time.

Meh...I mean, I think it's disappointing if he's not on the roster to start given the state of our defense, but there are plenty of valid reasons to do it, so I wouldn't have a problem with it. 

I think the disappointment is natural, not really an indictment, but I'd certainly feel it

[Forge]

i will say that I'd feel a lot better about it if he came in, had a great camp and looked like he belonged, and they put him in the AHL anyway. Then I could just go with it being a process thing. 

But if he comes up and kind of sucks when he gets to camp? Or has a repeat of last year? Then yeah, I'm disappointed. 

[beekay414]

21 minutes ago, Forge said:

i will say that I'd feel a lot better about it if he came in, had a great camp and looked like he belonged, and they put him in the AHL anyway. Then I could just go with it being a process thing. 

But if he comes up and kind of sucks when he gets to camp? Or has a repeat of last year? Then yeah, I'm disappointed. 

I'm hoping with a new coaching staff, he won't look like he did last year. That system was a total joke. Hell, I'll bet on it.

[Forge]

Just now, beekay414 said:

I'm hoping with a new coaching staff, he won't look like he did last year. That system was a total joke. Hell, I'll bet on it.

I could see that with Smith. Sadly, it's also the reason that nobody wants move off the players we have because they all expect a huge explosion in performance. I think people are legitimately expecting like 50+ points from Zacha now, tbh. 

[beekay414]

2 minutes ago, Forge said:

I could see that with Smith. Sadly, it's also the reason that nobody wants move off the players we have because they all expect a huge explosion in performance. I think people are legitimately expecting like 50+ points from Zacha now, tbh. 

I think we'd have positive regression to the mean. We're nowhere near as bad as we looked last year. I fully blame Hynes and his butt water system. I mean, hell, even Bingo took off after they let Dennehy implement his own, more natural, system. 

[Forge]

3 minutes ago, beekay414 said:

I think we'd have positive regression to the mean. We're nowhere near as bad as we looked last year. I fully blame Hynes and his butt water system. I mean, hell, even Bingo took off after they let Dennehy implement his own, more natural, system. 

The problem is, I'm not even sure that we are as good as we ended up last year. I mean, we really, really banked on Blackwood being a top 4 type elite goaltender for a good stretch of time last year. We were pretty bad off in every metric. 

But a lot may get dictated by Hughes. I don't think anyone expected him to be that bad last year...and hopefully, he has nowhere to go but up. I don't think that we are a good offense with Zacha in the top 6...he should be on the third line, with Zajac hopefully on line 4. The top 6 should be like Goose - Nico - Bratt, FA - Jack (hopefully) / FA C - Palms. I think that Bratt is a top 6 forward, so I'm going to say that is an okay top 6. We also need Nico to pick it up offensively (one of the reasons I really want him with Goose and Bratt, who were amazing together). 

[beekay414]

1 minute ago, Forge said:

The problem is, I'm not even sure that we are as good as we ended up last year. I mean, we really, really banked on Blackwood being a top 4 type elite goaltender for a good stretch of time last year. We were pretty bad off in every metric. 

But a lot may get dictated by Hughes. I don't think anyone expected him to be that bad last year...and hopefully, he has nowhere to go but up. I don't think that we are a good offense with Zacha in the top 6...he should be on the third line, with Zajac hopefully on line 4. The top 6 should be like Goose - Nico - Bratt, FA - Jack (hopefully) / FA C - Palms. I think that Bratt is a top 6 forward, so I'm going to say that is an okay top 6. We also need Nico to pick it up offensively (one of the reasons I really want him with Goose and Bratt, who were amazing together). 

Again, I'm going to put off judgment until we see this team under new guidance. Hynes' system on both ends of the ice was putrid and the PP was even worse. We literally have nowhere to go but up and we're far too talented to be that bad. I mean, we were Red Wings bad for a majority of the season and we have far more talent than they do. That's 100% on the coaching staff IMO. 

As far as Jack goes, the kid was just snake bitten almost all year. He easily could've been a 40+ point rookie. I was only able to watch a handful of games this year and the amount of times his teammates flubbed perfect set ups or Jack hitting the cross bar/flubbing a set up himself was staggering for the limited viewing I got. His talent stood out whenever I saw him and I have no doubts about him either.

Under a proper head coach, who knows wtf he is doing, we'll contend for a WC spot. We have a franchise goalie and a potential franchise centerman or two. That's a good enough start. I know it's been a long time but I'm still preaching patience. I trust these kids and I trust the plan Shero had. I have unwavering trust in Paul Castron's ability to draft impact talent. We were just straight up handicapped by our coaching staff and that's on Shero, who has shown that he's too loyal to his guys in two stops now. We're in a better spot than most think. Yes, our blue line needs a #1 but we have depth coming through. If we have 3 lines of 2nd pairing blue liners, that's better than we've been. I like what we've got coming through even without a bonafide #1. Just land Drysdale this year and then Luke Hughes with the Vancouver pick next year (wouldn't that be rich) and we're set. LOL

[Forge]

1 minute ago, beekay414 said:

As far as Jack goes, the kid was just snake bitten almost all year. He easily could've been a 40+ point rookie. I was only able to watch a handful of games this year and the amount of times his teammates flubbed perfect set ups or Jack hitting the cross bar/flubbing a set up himself was staggering for the limited viewing I got. His talent stood out whenever I saw him and I have no doubts about him either.

 

I can't remember the last time I saw someone with such awful luck. It was incredible. I don't quite understand the "sky is falling" people on HF about him. Was I disappointed? Sure. But he could be a couple of years away..that's not the most insane thing in the world at all. I hated the "worst number one pick since stefan" because it was so arbitrary. I mean, Eric Staal had a bad rookie season as well and just happened to be a #2 overall, as if there was a huge difference. He turned out perfectly fine. Lecavalier had less than 30 points in a full season. ROR had 26 points in his first two  seasons, each of which was basically a full season (though side note, crazy he made the team as an 18 year old as a second round pick...you almost never see that any more) 

 

[beekay414]

1 minute ago, Forge said:

I can't remember the last time I saw someone with such awful luck. It was incredible. I don't quite understand the "sky is falling" people on HF about him. Was I disappointed? Sure. But he could be a couple of years away..that's not the most insane thing in the world at all. I hated the "worst number one pick since stefan" because it was so arbitrary. I mean, Eric Staal had a bad rookie season as well and just happened to be a #2 overall, as if there was a huge difference. He turned out perfectly fine. Lecavalier had less than 30 points in a full season. ROR had 26 points in his first two  seasons, each of which was basically a full season (though side note, crazy he made the team as an 18 year old as a second round pick...you almost never see that any more) 

It's HF, man. I don't take anything those dudes say seriously. I just go there to get my hockey fix and that's pretty much that. If anyone is questioning an 18 year old kid jumping straight from basically high school level hockey to the NHL and showed he belonged despite the #s, then they don't deserve to have their opinion taken seriously. I mean, this is the same site that brings up Pettersson, as revisionist history, when we talk about Hischier as if there was ANYONE on the planet that projected him at #1. It's just a "woe is me" type place. Funny, they can't ***** about not taking Kakko because he was even worse than Hughes while playing on the wing. It's almost like playing in the NHL at 18 is hard or something.

[Forge]

1 minute ago, beekay414 said:

It's HF, man. I don't take anything those dudes say seriously. I just go there to get my hockey fix and that's pretty much that. If anyone is questioning an 18 year old kid jumping straight from basically high school level hockey to the NHL and showed he belonged despite the #s, then they don't deserve to have their opinion taken seriously. I mean, this is the same site that brings up Pettersson, as revisionist history, when we talk about Hischier as if there was ANYONE on the planet that projected him at #1. It's just a "woe is me" type place. Funny, they can't ***** about not taking Kakko because he was even worse than Hughes while playing on the wing. It's almost like playing in the NHL at 18 is hard or something.

For sure. Dach wasn't any better and he's already freaking built for the NHL lol. 

The only thing I say about the Nico pick is that there was talk we were going to take Makar. That's factual. And I'll give Shero a ton of credit for that because that draft was all about the Patrick vs Nico thing, so for Shero to even be considering that says a lot. But the Pettersson thing? Yeah, that wasn't a real thing at all. 

Frankly, if I have the #1 overall pick and he ends up a top 3-5 player in that draft (which nico easily is so far), then honestly, I'm pretty happy, because they don't always end up being that. You have the years where you have the clear cut #1 (McDavid), quite a few years where there is a number 1 / 2 tier, but then you have the years where there is considerable questions about who it should be, and honestly, I don't consider that year to be particularly good at the top (even if a lot of the top guys have panned out really nicely).