NHL 2015-16 Season Thread

Merrith_sl said:

If claimed off waivers doesn't the team only owe half his salary? Also he expires at the end of this season, must be serious salary cap concerns league wide, or teams at the 50 contract limit.

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No, if you pick a player off waivers you're stuck with 100% of the cap hit.

I know power rankings are click bait retarded bullshit, but it really annoys me that the past 2 weeks the Blackhawks were number 1 over the Caps on ESPN's.

Yeah, the Caps with 38 wins in their first 51 (now 40 in the first 53) for the first time in the NHL in70 years, but nah, they're ranked after the Blackhawks. Makes sense...fucking retards.

Anyway, Kuzy hurt tonight against the Wild. Hopefully it's nothing serious.

Eomer_sl said:

No, if you pick a player off waivers you're stuck with 100% of the cap hit.

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Ah sorry I was thinking of re-entry waivers, which were eliminated in 2013.

Elurin_sl said:

I know power rankings are click bait retarded bullshit, but it really annoys me that the past 2 weeks the Blackhawks were number 1 over the Caps on ESPN's.

Yeah, the Caps with 38 wins in their first 51 (now 40 in the first 53) for the first time in the NHL in70 years, but nah, they're ranked after the Blackhawks. Makes sense...fucking retards.

Anyway, Kuzy hurt tonight against the Wild. Hopefully it's nothing serious.

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Yeah, not like we're 8 points up on them with FIVE games in hand either. I mean, who's on the longest winning streak in the NHL right now? Oh right.

Also Ovechkin 20 goals in his last 22 games played. Right around New Year's every year. Feel like he might be the only guy to break 50 again unless Kane can manage to keep pace.

Would have been nice if the Caps had played in the 2nd like they did the 3rd. Williams and Kuznetsov both looked pretty bad in the 2nd, but each redeemed themselves a little. Holtby I think needs to get a little more time off, we were a shitshow in the 2nd but good Holtby saves at least 1 or 2 of those he let in.

Lightning are so bipolar it fucking hurts

I don't really like hockey all that much but I do think it's one of the better professional organizations for purity of essence rather than strictly money gobbling media whores. Proven again, local news about Coyotes backup goalie injured so they just call some dude on his cellphone who plays recreationally after playing in college to come down. They even gave him MVP or something and shit like that for showing up and let him hit the ice just to say he did.

This is why I can still respect the sport, feels like it's played by real people rather than a reality show cast like the MLB, NBA and especially the NFL.

Palum_sl said:

I don't really like hockey all that much but I do think it's one of the better professional organizations for purity of essence rather than strictly money gobbling media whores. Proven again, local news about Coyotes backup goalie injured so they just call some dude on his cellphone who plays recreationally after playing in college to come down. They even gave him MVP or something and shit like that for showing up and let him hit the ice just to say he did.

This is why I can still respect the sport, feels like it's played by real people rather than a reality show cast like the MLB, NBA and especially the NFL.

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The Capitals had to do this a couple of years ago with a guy who worked in their video editing department for their website. He had played goalie in college, and our normal backup got injured, but the call up from the AHL to be the backup for that night's game had been on a road trip with the minor league team so he was arriving late to the stadium. Guy had to sign a 1 day contract or whatever, take warm ups with the team and sit on the bench throughout the 1st period until the backup arrived at the building during the game. Pretty awesome experience.

I saw the video of the Arizona locker room, a lot of teams have some sort of award or item they hand out to a guy on the team that played the best each night or made a big play, etc. Coyotes have a replica championship belt I guess and they gave it to the guy. Pretty cool moment I'm sure.

That whole "beer league goalie backs up NHL team" thing happens once or twice a year. The recent Arizona one was a nice story, from what I saw of it. Otherwise I'd agree with Palum that one of my favorite aspects of hockey is the culture behind the sport. There's some negatives that go with it (it's hammered in to players from a young age to not stand out or say anything controversial, which can make for boring interviews and personalities), but overall I like the fact that showboating is discouraged, the team is always put first, guys play through ridiculous injuries and pain, etc etc. The cultures around basketball, baseball and football for the most part just disgust me. I mean fuck, when did guys start doing little idiotic dances after every tackle and knockdown in the NFL? Why in the FUCK were the Blue Jays celebrating like they'd won the World Series, complete with champagne showers in the dressing room, when all they did was make the playoffs? Shit was just weird to me.

Well, less teams make the playoffs in baseball than in the other 4 sports, and especially for the Blue Jays playing in the same division as the Yankees and Red Sox, it was sorta justified. But I agree with the rest of your points, although I wish they DID allow some more personality to the game.

Gotta love nationally broadcast games against the NHL's poster-children.... 2 really bad calls in the last 10 minutes cost us that one.




and the terrible nyr pk

Ovechkin kinda owns the Isles this year so far.

Another concussion for McDonagh on his second game back from his first one. The good news is we pretty much can't trade Yandle now, the bad news is when he leaves after the season we lost Duclair and a 1st round pick for pretty much nothing.

Go down 3-2 with under 10 left in the 3rd, and I had no doubt we could tie and get to OT. End up potting 2 and winning it in regulation for good measure. Holtby didn't have a great night either. Ovechkin scored again.

Fucking Brooks Orpik got his first ever game winning goal (regular season, because he has one in the playoffs) tonight.

Also Stoic, I must say the Rangers have put together a good effort going 7-2-1 over their last 10 games. We've only managed to increase our division lead by a point over both of our last 10 games. Impressive bounce back by the Rags.

Fucking Toronto. Bottom of the entire league. I didn't think things could get worse. Holy crap.

lurkingdirk_sl said:

Fucking Toronto. Bottom of the entire league. I didn't think things could get worse. Holy crap.

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It's definitely a rebuilding year. Their underlying play has gotten better. I think they're looking long term with Babcock.

I'll tell you what though, Philly has got a player in Gostisbehere.

Oiles pull goalie with like 4 min left down 3-1, get a break with an uncalled hand pass with leads to a Charmin ultra soft 2nd assist for McDavid on a goal to make it 3-2 with over a minute left. Could be a fun finish.

Btw Eomer, I was messing with you about that assist for McDavid. Really wish the Oilers were doing better and that he hadn't missed so much time. Kid is fun as hell to watch. Definitely find myself watching them more on Center Ice on off nights for the Caps or as my late game go to.

Merrith_sl said:

Btw Eomer, I was messing with you about that assist for McDavid. Really wish the Oilers were doing better and that he hadn't missed so much time. Kid is fun as hell to watch. Definitely find myself watching them more on Center Ice on off nights for the Caps or as my late game go to.

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No worries bro. At this point I'm pretty much expecting McDavid and Draisatl to be walking down the street and get killed by lightning. In the middle of winter.

In any case, it'll be interesting to see what changes are made in the offseason. Chiarelli was pretty emphatic that he didn't want to make major moves until he knew what he had. As I mentioned before, at no point during this NHL season will Chiarelli have seen the team play even a single game with the entire lineup (Eberle, McDavid, Klefbom and Nugent-Hopkins have all missed significant time. That's the best RW, the two best centers, and the best D on the roster). But given how inconsistent the team has been and how big the hole on D remains, I would imagine there will be some pretty major moves this summer. I doubt there's anything too momentous prior to the trade deadline, though.

It's so easy pointing out that the Oilers need a 25 minute a night, top pairing, right shot defenseman. But how you acquire one without blowing a huge hole elsewhere is the difficult part. The previous management hilariously thought that Justin Schultz was that guy, and had zero backup plan. We see how that's working out now (and amazingly, the two idiots who hatched that plan, MacTavish and Howson, are presently still employed by the organization! I would be surprised if they are still with the organization next fall. It's a fucking embarrassment that they still are). Here's to hoping that Chiarelli can figure it out. Because if he doesn't, the team will not go anywhere next year either.