Re: The NHL Thread
 

IMO, behind Pietrangelo (who was AMAZING in the Chicago series), Parayko was STL's second best defenseman. You can tell he's still learning, but immense talent. I'm impressed by his vision, especially in the neutral zone, and his speed... which is really quite remarkable considering his size.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Crossing my fingers that maybe today's the day that they'll look at Chimera for almost killing Voracek too. Maybe!?!?! Maybe! No? Oh, ok.

I'm fine with the Schenn suspension for what it's worth. (Would have gone two games but his intent and out of controlness in general was probably enough for the ban)

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Yeah, he looked very impressive on D and on the attack he had a rifle of a shot from the blue line, reminded me of guys like MacInnis, Chelios, Keith or Seabrook.

IMO both defenses played great in that series as did both goalies - the only real blip was game 6 where Chicago scored 5 unanswered goals due to a variety of Blues breakdowns.

Sort of sucks that guys like I mentioned are always getting the Norris nods. Just once I would like to see a pure D man like say Nik Hjalmarsson get that award.

EDIT: Again my guess is that Letang, Doughty or Burns will get the Norris due to their points rather than their defense.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Is Lockman on a Lockout? :lol

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Second Round Picks:

Tampa in 6.
Caps in 7.

Blues in 6
TBD in 4, 5, 6 or 7.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

That prediction must have really racked your brain! :lol

Re: The NHL Thread
 

A Caps vs Blues SCF would be great to watch. They'd match up well.

Blues have a slight advantage in defense.
Caps have a big advantage on offense.
Goalies are similar but I would say Elliot has a slight edge over Holtby.
Caps have a big advantage over the Blues in special teams.

All my opinion though. If it comes to it I would predict Caps in 6 or 7.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

I agree that it would be cool to see some of the more unsung defensive heroes of the league win the Norris. There's some hardcore defensemen that do an amazing job every night and never get noticed because of the nature of their game, which only gets noticed when they screw up.

However, we live in a really cool time right now where the best defensemen in the league are REALLY good ALL-AROUND defensemen. The perennial Norris nominees - Doughty, Weber, Keith, Letang, Karlsson - all have great offensive instincts, yes, but all are REALLY good at playing their position as well. Add in those that maybe aren't getting nominated but are arguably just as effective: Ekman-Larsson, Carlson, Pietrangelo, Vatanen, Ekblad, Kulikov (this kid is GOOD, BTW), Shattenkirk, Leddy, Suter, Goligoski, Josi, Alzner, Seabrook, Bouwmeester, Klingberg, Giordano, Hedman, Brodie, Muzzin, Vlasic, Reilly, McDonagh... I could go on, but you get the point

Watch Doughty play one-on-one with a guy; his instincts and anticipation are so undeniably good in his own zone it's scary; his positioning is also key, and he uses his stellar skating ability to make sure he's everywhere he needs to be. He absolutely deserves to be on the Norris ballot almost every season. And it's so true with all the good defensemen in the league.

Of the "star" defensemen out there today, I'm not overly impressed by Burns' play in his own zone... lazy comes to mind. And of course there's PK Subban, who's about as bad a defenseman as there could be. I would've been iffy on Letang 3 years ago, but he's steadily improved in his own zone to the point that I have no hesitation including him in that upper echelon of well-rounded defensemen.

Back 10 years ago and beyond, the hybrid of offense and defense in a defenseman's game was the anomaly. Only a select few could do it with any sort of skill. Guys like Bourque, Lidstrom, Blake, and Scotty Jesus Niedermayer. They were the exception - the jewel - rather than the norm. Instead, there was more contrast between the skill sets - The offensive defenseman was very offensive... Paul Coffey, Al MacInnis (yes, MacInnis got better in his own zone as he aged, but was never that great), and the defensive defensemen had very little offensive skill. Or if they did, they didn't use it because it was an offensive defenseman's "job". For example, Adam Foote actually had some decent offensive skills, but he never used them because that was Sandis Ozolinsh's job or it was Rob Blake's job, or it was Ray Bourque's job.

We see very little of that among the star NHL defensemen today. Almost every NHL team has at least one of those all-around guys that can do it all, and that's very encouraging. :thumbsup
Nice one. But seriously, I know he's moving to Dallas for work, so he's probably busy with all that.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Agree on all of that. It always struck me as odd that Seabrook never got much consideration - he is a damn solid D man too - perhaps he gets overshadowed by Keith in Chicago.

Burns is lazy as shit and he never cuts down passing lanes or anticipates like good D guys do. Also, Subban is extremely over-rated!

Was sort of kidding on Lockman - thought he was settled in down there but perhaps still swigging booze to ease the pain of a rough first round exit! :lol

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Lockman always goes missing when the Hawks are done....Win or Lose he will reappear eventually.

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Drouin creating chances again! Spotty defense by the Ilses on that one.

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Damn, good response by the islanders.

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Bishop looks a bit off tonight. Seems like he's having trouble locating the puck and allowing some more rebounds than normal.

The NHL Thread
 

JFC defense looks lost tonight

Anyone else watching?

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Ugly first period for the Bolts after that guy got knocked out.

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Really poor showing tonight. Just embarrassing. Layoff clearly wasn't a good thing for this team.

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Gotcha, makes sense and was not a knock on him at all. Truthfully it is still setting in for me that the Hawks are only defending champs until one of these remaining teams finds a way to win 12 more games. Isles off to a good start.

Yeah, that was my first thought - too many days off for them.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Bolts are rusty as hell, I've lost count of the number of times they've completely whiffed on shots or passes.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Definitely an outlier of a performance, and not something I expect to see moving forward, but going down 1-0 at home isn't a good start. It's a long series though so I'm confident they can rebound. I have trouble seeing Bishop playing like this again.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Anyone know why the games are not on the nbc sports app?

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Bolts looked really good in the third period, hoping to see more of that kind of play in the series moving forward.

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Probably blacked out for you

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Is there a cooler story in the playoffs than Thomas Greiss?

Also, Tavares proving why he gets comparisons to Sakic and Yzerman. Elevating his game even more in the big games. Some stars shrink under adversity, and some get even better. Over the last 3 games, an already excelling Tavares has bumped it up another 5 notches. Just dominant all over the ice.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Bruce B....1-6 in game 7s.

I feel your pain. (Spoken as a haggled Bill Clinton.)

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C-a-p----oh wait

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For serious man.

He coached our presidents trophy exit.

#neverforget.

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Oh man...I can't even handle this first game 7 in franchise history. Colin Wilson with a beautiful goal. Let's go Preds!

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Defensive breakdown there at the end of the 1st by the Preds but Pekka bailed them out. Holy shit I need to just keep drinking.

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Hey Chad!! Keep it up Preds!

Re: The NHL Thread
 

Just drinking and hoping this continues to work out in my favor.