Edit Avatar
  • png, jpeg
  • Recommended minimum size 800px by 800px
  • Maximum size: 1MB
Drag image to reposition
Save
Cancel

TheEarthmaster

Good Opinion Haver
Member Since
Jun 7, 2018
Favourite Team
St. Louis Blues
Forum Posts
1164
Posts per Day
1.09
Forum Threads
12
Forum: Armchair-GMThu at 8:09 pm
Forum: Armchair-GMThu at 4:01 pm
Thread: Stay on course
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>BubbleDemko</b></div><div>I remember looking on this other site called Hockey Buzz in the Canuck forum and almost everyone on there said do not sign Toffoli for four years that he was too slow. Today they are the first ones crying what a mistake Benning made. The hindsight of this fan base yourself included is mind boggling.

For your info, the year before Colorado turned the corner their fans were calling for the head of Sakic . It's amazing when you draft the first overall ,a franchise player like McKinnon or Matthews how your luck changes.

If you hate the Canucks stop watching them . Simple.</div></div>

Dude I am not even a Canucks fan, I just like hockey. You don't need to be so sensitive about this.

Also, you have a generational player on par with those guys! Pettersson is that good! Why are you not good again if that's all it takes? The answer is because that's not all it takes. MacKinnon was on that bad Colorado team too.

Your point about Colorado is semi well taken though, because Sakic was really awful at first. BUT, once the team invested some money in analytics and started targeting undervalued players like Toews, Nichuskin, Girard, Saad, suddenly they got really good. Toffoli has always had really good underlying numbers. I can't imagine why the Canucks aren't having similar success when they are constantly signing guys who don't.
Forum: Armchair-GMThu at 3:25 pm
Thread: Stay on course
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>BubbleDemko</b></div><div>This is what I don't get about guys like you . You whine about Pearson's contract of 9.6 mil for three years even though he has played 131 games for the Canucks scored 40 goals 72 points kills penalties and plays a good two way game. Then you cry that Benning did not sign Toffoli for 4 years at 17 million who played 10 regular season games and scored 6 goals 10 points . Hindsight is a wonderful thing but do you really think Toffoli would have scored 28 goals Pettersson playing less than half the season? It will be fun to see next year if Toffoli scores 28 goals or more.

I bet you were at the last Sedin game screaming one more year and then crying about the rebuild later.</div></div>

I don't think Toffoli would have necessarily been a 28 goal scorer on Vancouver regardless because that's never really been his game and I obviously think it's an anomaly what he's doing in Montreal this year. But let's not pretend that this is everyone in hindsight saying that that was a mistake to let him walk. Toffoli is an excellent play driver which is good to have next to natural scorers like Boeser and Pettersson. It was clear he fit in well with the team and helped them make the playoffs that year. And everyone said when he signed with Montreal "wow that's all it took? Why couldn't the Canucks figure that out?" But Benning's bad contracts for players who aren't difference makers forced them to walk away from the table. Having one Tanner Pearson during the rebuild, I guess, is fine. But it's a pattern of behavior with the Canucks- Beagle, Sutter, Ferland (yeah he got hurt, good for Benning it allowed him to *checks notes* sign Pearson's extension), Roussell, Myers, Holtby- these are players who are overpaid and preventing them from actually making any sort of impact moves. I'm not saying Tyler Toffoli is Connor freaking McDavid but like he would be worth the four million and change that the Canucks could be paying him even without this Montreal season but whoops we signed Jay Beagle for a million years to have a 3 xGA/60 so now we have to lose a top six forward who was clearly good on a bad team like the Kings and then clearly better on a better team like the Canucks that year.

And chill on the assumptions buddy. I don't care about the Sedins (I mean they're cool but like as far as their career goes) and I think the Canucks very obviously had to rebuild when they retired. I honestly couldn't care less about what the Vancouver Canucks do besides just wanting them to generally be competent because that's good for the league. But they're not competent. They suck. And maybe they suck because their management has offered no palpable direction for the rebuild in the nine years Benning has been GM beyond "this guy in FA will surely fix all of our problems" and that staying the course will ultimately offer more of the same dysfunction.

Look at Colorado's rebuild, or Toronto's or Carolina's. It's not just about drafting high. You have to make impact moves on the peripheral to have success. Trading for and keeping Jake Muzzin, Devon Toews, Dougie Hamilton. Finding players who will punch above their payrate like Hyman or Nichuskin or Trochek. The Canucks are not doing this.
Forum: Armchair-GMThu at 12:47 pm
Thread: Stay on course
The problem with "staying the course" is that Vancouver has been "staying the course" for the better part of six years now with very little to show for it. They're still missing the playoffs. Benning's machinations in free agency show no signs of slowing up anytime soon (he just re-signed Pearson to that inexplicable contract) and that routinely handcuffs them from being able to make the most rudimentary roster improvements, like signing Tyler Toffoli. You do it again by signing Armia, who is fine I guess, but like come on how many "fine-to-bad" bottom six guys making three million do you need, at the expense of good players?

If you're staying the course by "being bad to get high picks and rebuild", then Vancouver needs to stop signing these weird middle of the road guys like Armia and Pearson and just play bad players there for cheap. Sell the guys who don't fit your window, like you definitely should have done with Pearson and probably should do with Schmidt and Miller and Holtby if anyone will take him, and weaponize the cap space you'll have by taking bad deals from other team for serious payment, like Detroit did with Panik, in order to stockpile assets.

At some point I would like to think being bad for long enough just gives you enough high picks to fill out a good roster, but like, look at Buffalo. Vancouver has two elite core players, two young-ish really good top six fowards, and a decent goalie probably. That's a great foundation, but the key now is making the correct moves so that you can accentuate it. "The course" to this point has not been very successful at doing that.
Forum: Armchair-GMWed at 7:46 pm
Thread: Fire Blake Hire Gorton
I can't figure out where I land on Gorton.

For one, you can't give him much credit for picking up Panarin, Fox, Kaapo, and Laf, who were the results of either lottery luck or players very obviously preferring New York. He massively overpayed Trouba, signed Jack Johnson, and really didn't get much in return for McDonagh and JT Miller (though I suppose Lundvist looks pretty great, you should still have probably more to show on that trade).

On the other hand- Gorton's three months stretch as the Bruins GM in 06 might be the all time best stretch for a GM. He drafted Marchand, Kessel, and Lucic in the same draft, traded Raycroft for Rask, and then also signed Chara and Savard as free agents. Basically built the team that would go on to win the cup in three months.

So is he good or does he suck? Who knows. Kings should probably stick with Blake though, he seems to be doing an okay job (though it's not like he hasn't made some very obvious blunders of his own)
Forum: Armchair-GMWed at 4:19 pm
Thread: Off season approach
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>Chopper02</b></div><div>It all has to do with who can be traded to clear cap plus who can replace the player for cheap. In both cases, Dunn is the answer. I like Dunn and want to keep him, but with Perunovich and the emergence of Walman (finally) Dunn is expendable and can be used for more strength on the wings. Unless there is a way to get rid of Scandella's contracting I don't see any other way around the cap.</div></div>

I really don't think the cap is a problem for us this season. Per Evolving-Hockey's predictions, Kyrou and Thomas are both projected to get around ~2 million, Schwartz is projected to get around ~5, Bozak about ~1.6, Barbashev about ~1.7. If Schwartz or Thomas had had bigger seasons than maybe, but everyone was super injured or underperformed, or both.

You have a point about the roster jam though. But I don't think it's as bad as we think. Perunovich I don't know you can count on being an NHL player quite yet. I would have said so before this shoulder injury, but we saw how long it took Tarasenko to come back from the same injury the first time- about six months of playing in 2018. If anything though you could ease him in on the right side, where he played in college, on the third pair. As for Walman, as much as I would love to keep him, I think if Dunn isn't around to protect he could very well be Seattle's pick. He's got that late-bloomer energy that Vegas really targeted and decently solid underlying numbers that Seattle would theoretically value, and he's super cheap next year.

But if there was a way to shed Scandella's contract, I would be all for that too. I would point out that in OPs proposed trade, we're not getting any immediate winger help for Dunn.

I just have a really bad feeling that Dunn is going to be the Shea Theodore-type of this draft. He's got insanely strong underlying numbers but never had the opportunity to prove himself, and e'll trade him or expose him in order to protect Faulk and Krug like Anaheim did with Fowler and Manson and then three years later everyone will look back and be like "why did they do that".
Forum: Armchair-GMWed at 1:27 pm
Thread: Off season approach
I agree that Faulk has been good but that doesn't mean you have to protect him. If Seattle listens to Alexandra Mandrycky at all, and I assure you they will, they won't take Faulk in a million years even if he has been solid. Six more years at 6.5 million dollars is far too prohibitive of a contract. The Blues will never not do it, unless they get a lot smarter than they have been recently, but they do not need to protect Faulk. And I would also say- if a player isn't that good (at least, relative to what Faulk has been this year) for most of his career and then he suddenly shows up one season and is really good- maybe don't trust that he's just that player now. It's not like Faulk has been playing to the Norris-level he started the season with all this time. He got really hot to start and since has just been perfectly fine.

You know who else has been good this year? Vince Dunn! He's second on our team in defenseman scoring, behind Krug, and he's not getting fed top PP minutes where Krug is scoring most of the time. I get that he had a rough start but he figured it out and there was a stretch where he was clearly our best defenseman right around the trade deadline. He's probably going to cost around what Scandella costs this offseason, which is cheap for what he brings to the table. I'm never going to understand the logic in moving him. Protect Parayko, Krug, and Dunn. Seattle won't take Faulk. Faulk's not even the best exposed defense option for them on our team if we don't protect him.
Forum: Armchair-GMMay 3 at 4:14
Thread: If I was Jarmo
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>justaBoss</b></div><div>Respectively the whole CBJ team has taken major step backs. Naturally that effects on Korpisalo's numbers as well.

Individually speaking I ain't 100% certain that all STL players have had such step backs that Dunn has had...but with CBJ players, pretty much all of them have been worse than what they were a year ago.</div></div>

Well, two things with this.

One, on Korpisalo: Yeah I understand the line of thinking - pretty much everyone on Columbus has been bad, so maybe he's better than the numbers suggest right?

Well, out of the six seasons he's been in the NHL, Korpisalo has been below league average in save percentage in four of them, below league average in GAA in five of them. And Columbus wasn't bad for any of those seasons. So while I understand the impulse to say "well the entire team was bad so what can you do" and yeah if you dropped him on a better team his numbers might be a smidge better, his numbers weren't all that much better the vast majority of the time he was on a better Columbus team. Maybe instead of giving him the benefit of the doubt this season, it's more apt to say last season's performance was an anomaly and this season he fell back to what we're used to seeing out of him, which is him not being very good at all.

Two, on Dunn: I get why people would think he's taken a step back. I don't really agree that he has- he's second on the team in defenseman scoring, on pace for 35 points in an 82 game season, which would match his career high and give him 12 more points than he had last year while mostly maintaining his strong defensive metrics- but I guess if you think he's taken a step back you can think that. HIs advanced stats haven't been as good this year, so there's some truth to it I suppose.

But, if you think that- the Blues themselves have taken a step back I think pretty much everyone would agree right? Last year first in the west, in spitting distance for the President's trophy. This year they've been horrible for large stretches, their playoff chances dipped below 50% briefly, they would have about fifteen fewer points in a full 82 than they did last year, much like Columbus would have 20 fewer points in a full 82 this year than they did last year. So why are we giving Korpisalo a pass for being on a team that took a step back while not giving Dunn a pass for similar circumstances, despite him actually improving his individual performance statistically? Just because St. Louis is in the playoffs and Columbus isn't?

Idk, I don't know why St. Louis is in a rush to move Dunn and I don't know why anyone thinks Korpisalo is good. This seems like a win-win trade for Columbus with the second in there.
Forum: Armchair-GMApr 29 at 11:09
Thread: What Grubauer Deserves
I will say it every time someone gives a goalie a huge extension for a lot of years and money- do not pay for saves.

There's like four goalies who are actually significantly better than everyone else that deserve a lot of money, and everyone else is about the same. Grubauer is good, but he's playing behind one of the best defensive teams in the league. You can throw anyone back there and they'll be decently good. Devan Dubnyk and Jonas Johansson are probably not NHL caliber goalies anymore and Colorado is getting wins with them. If Colorado can't reach an agreement with Grubauer, they just need to do like they did when they traded for Grubauer in the first place- find someone that's probably decent and roll with them. It's much better for your cap anyway.

Also Colorado is one of the most analytically minded teams in the league and the computer boys love to say how overrated Seth Jones is (and based on his year this year, they were probably right). No way Colorado trades for him.
Forum: Armchair-GMApr 26 at 3:07
Thread: Next Year
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>CMcAvoy73</b></div><div>Granted i haven’t seen a ton of the blues this year, but isn’t Faulk playing alright? He’s getting like 24 minutes a night.</div></div>

<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>Ragsandbluesfan</b></div><div>Hes been really good, like living up to his contract good</div></div>

<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>RClay321</b></div><div>yes he is playing decent this year, however they need to dump that contract imo. Sanford is not much of a payment</div></div>

He started off playing really well, but he's fallen back to earth to being about fine to below average. He has five points in the last 25 games, sporting 20.31 expected goals against while putting up 15.43 expected goals for the Blues. In layman's terms, that is a player who is helping generate enough high quality chances that would likely result in fifteen goals for the Blues while hurting his team enough to allow other teams to generate high quality chances that would likely result in twenty goals against the Blues.

Part of this is that he's almost certainly being overplayed- Krug has taken a hit in his advanced stats as well, because these are guys that shouldn't be playing 24 minutes a night- and it's not his fault that he's being overplayed. But part of it is that he was way overperforming to start that season, regressing (in a good way) from being insanely bad last year to being a Norris caliber guy for about two months before regressing (in a bad way) back to the mean of being maybe a fine defenseman, but probably one that is below average, which is where we're at right now. Super excited for the Blues to definitely protect him in the expansion draft and lose Dunn (one way or another).

I've been very consistent this season that you just can't trust that he's suddenly going to be an elite defenseman, or even a particularly good one, at 28 after not having been that his entire career to this point and coasting on a reputation of putting up points on bad Hurricanes teams. And much like we should have done with Sanford last year, you gotta sell high when other GMs are stupid enough to bite on what is clearly an outlying year. Unfortunately, Faulk's NTC will probably hurt their chances of doing that, and honestly the Blues might not even be smart enough to try since they weren't smart enough to realize he's not that good when they gave him that contract in the first place.
Forum: Armchair-GMApr 7 at 12:22
Thread: 2 W in the last 30 days
I'm a few days behind on this thread but felt like posting because I think this is more or less exactly what they should do. You can't truly rebuild because you've got all these guys in their prime locked in (some for a very long time) so you have to move forward with this core. But there's no reason not to sell off the other guys. Hoffman should 100% be gone. I'd sell Bozak too if there's any takers, I don't see why we'd re-sign him. Sanford isn't part of this core either so move him too. I'd be fine with moving Schwartz if you aren't going to re-sign him. You could even talk me into Dunn even though I'm always going to say you want to keep him around. Don't blow up the entire team, but we've got to recalibrate and get some assets for these guys so we can reshape this roster a bit if we're going to contend in the future with this core. And for god sake's don't buy. The team is telling you who they are. I wouldn't even go after Drieger unless you know you're going to be able to re-sign him (in which case, do it he's good).

But your point is well taken. They can't get a save. Husso has been horrible, but Binnington has been comfortably below average himself. He was just barely above average last year so that's really two straight seasons of decline, even if it wasn't expected he would be a .936 goalie or whatever his entire career. Most people who tolerate my comments know how I feel about long term contracts for goaltenders anyway. This could be the start of a long six years. If you can't rely on Binnington, it doesn't matter what the rest of your team looks like.
Forum: Armchair-GMApr 7 at 12:15
Thread: 2 W in the last 30 days
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>West_Virginia_Take_Me_Home</b></div><div>Imo burtozzo is the last grit we have on this team</div></div>

Well thank god for that. God forbid we don't have a guy who can barely play hockey at the NHL level out there cross checking people into the net. I'd rather lose every game.

Bortuzzo's underlying numbers this season have been horrible. They really have never been good. He's not an everyday player, but the Blues have insisted on treating him as such (partially due to injuries, sure, but even then there have been obviously better options). I'm not saying you have to trade him but people need to stop pretending like Bortuzzo-esque players bring something essential to the game anymore. All the best teams in the league- Colorado, Tampa, Carolina- are teams that don't have "grit" guys on their team. They have guys who play gritty- Kadri, Coleman, Goodrow, etc- but those guys are also really good players in their own right. And we've got players like that too in Schenn and Blais.

Besides, the problem with this team is not lack of grit, it's lack of elite talent. I wouldn't be bemoaning losing a Bortuzzo-type while there are much bigger problems with the roster construction.
Forum: Armchair-GMApr 2 at 6:55
Thread: Blues Fans
<div class="quote"><div class="quote_t">Quoting: <b>A_K</b></div><div>Probably not gonna get a consensus out of Blues fans here, and most of us are probably thinking differently than the front office, but IMO:

Sanford should've been gone last offseason when it looked like he was a good player - I'd take anything I can get for him at this point and I'd value the 3LW opening he'd create more than what he'll get on his next deal;

the price for Blais can't be that high based on his performances - maybe a 2nd/3rd rd pick or something like that - but I'd like to see him get more opportunity here;

Sundqvist isn't really tradeable during recovery from an ACL, but even if he wasn't injured I don't think he would get traded even with expansion looming. He's a key role player and they always seem to struggle when he's out of the lineup.</div></div>

I'd more or less agree with all of above. I do think the organization and fans significantly overrate Sundqvist's importance to the team (people say we should protect him in the expansion draft, which I do not understand at all). But I really wish we would have sold high on Sanford last offseason. I do think even this year's Sanford would be pretty valuable to someone like the Canucks though, he struggles with finishing consistently which can make him frustrating to watch but he's replacement level- if not sound in his own right - defensively and he's a clear upgrade over everyone in the Canucks middle six other than (obviously) Horvat I would say.
Forum: Armchair-GMMar 12 at 5:15
Thread: where StLouis would be if they managed their assets properly
I've disagreed with pretty much every decision the Blues have made since winning the cup. I disagreed with the Faulk extension, I disagreed with letting Pietrangelo walk, I disagreed with trading Allen and I disagree now with the Binnington extension.

However, I don't know how much better this team is with all of those decisions reversed than it is right now. Pietrangelo has been horrible in Vegas and Faulk has been elite this year in St. Louis. I don't expect that to continue but having Pietrangelo being bad for one of his last prime years is not ideal. Binnington hasn't been great, but Allen also had that opportunity with the Blues a million times as well and he never ran with it. I think Allen's a great goalie and I'm not surprised it's working somewhere else, but it was never going to work here.

And saying the Blues should have kept Allen would have meant trading Binnington last offseason instead, because "managing our money properly" would mean knowing we didn't have the cap space to have both on the roster this year at nearly 10 million and make all these other moves you want to make (like keeping Pietrangelo and still signing Krug), and if you're saying we should have traded Binnington last offseason that's just ridiculous hindsight-ing, and his value would have been insanely low then anyway after the bubble. In actuality the Blues should have probably not extended either of them.

That said, Scandella &gt;&gt;&gt; Edmundson, and I don't think Scandella is anything special, but Eddy is just sidecar-ing to Petry's Norris-worthy campaign right now. Scandella's contract is too long but so would Edmundson's have been.