finally get to test my theory that Stern was just giving Bettman bad advice on purpose all these years.
Hey Eddie, what is your best Luongo story? It was my first training camp and we are all in the locker room before an exhibition game. Darcy Hordichuck is like the only one talking and he's telling jokes and stuff and laughing. I could tell Lu was getting annoyed but he didn't say anything for a good 20 min. He finally had enough and stood up in front of the team and said: Don't worry boys this is gonna be Darcys last game with us. Next day he was traded....
Hi Eddie, huge fan from Vancouver here! Do you have any funny stories or any stories in general from when you were playing under John Tortorella? Haha i like this one but only bc its not about me. We lost against Detroit 1-0 i think and we didn't play very good. Torts came in and said: David Booth was our best player today! Thats great for David Booth but very bad for our team.
There’s this new podcast in French with max Lapierre and Guillaume latendresse, it’s kind of like Spittin chiclets. Pretty nice. Apparently Bruce Boudreau is the worst coach ever, a complete joke. They interviewed Jose Theodore, boudreau has this weird superstition that when a goalie gets a shutout he has to sit him the next game because he views it like when you get a birdie and the next hole you usually struggle. Complete non sense
Cliffs for those that don't have the Athletic 24 team playoff (gets MTL, NYR and Chicago in) As previously discussed, there will be 4 neutral sites chosen to reduce travel 4 pods of 6 teams based on Division (NYR would move to the Atlantic Pod) starting off with a round robin "re-seeding round" that would serve as the pre-season and be weighted to favor the teams at the top of the standings. top two teams from each pod during round robin phase get a bye, bottom 4 teams play a 3 game series. Once down to 16 teams, it plays out like normal. No travel at all until conference finals Conference finals and SCF will be in the same location.
Also, I do appreciate how shameless the NHL is about getting the big markets into the playoffs. Doing 24 teams instead of 20 gets them MTL, NYR, AZ, and CHI. You know that it would be 20 teams if it was the Islanders, Panthers, Coyotes, and Ducks sitting at 21-24.
yeah, that looks bad. But if it makes you feel better I would prefer a better shot at the lottery than mtl getting embarassed in the playoffs. also, you would probably whine if they let them out and ny, mtl or Chicago wins the lottery and get the first pick.
Yeah, this is a business. They are going to try to appeal to larger fan bases. I doubt they care as much about teams that can’t even get their own fan bases to watch them.
It makes absolutely no sense from a competitive fairness standpoint that a team with a .2% chance to make the playoffs when the pause happened is going to get in, but they need the revenue. The article even talks about that teams aren't thrilled about getting into a 3 game series with Carey Price but once again, business has to win out here for the longterm good of the game. it absolutely makes practical business sense. Getting those three big markets will help the ratings and recover a lot of that lost revenue. If they could have found a way to get Buffalo in, they would have, but that was a stretch too far.
TEELSY SCOOP: from a source inside the New York Rangers organ-eye-zation sent to user teel via the social media application “snapchat” #PlayLikeANewYorker Spoiler
why would a French Canadian on a team full of French people say something like this in English? This story doesn’t make a lot of sense unless akim Aliu heard him say it in French and figured it out. « But Canada is a big place with all sorts of people. And lots of people who don’t look like me or my dad. When I was 11, at a tournament in Quebec, I saw a part of Canada I didn’t know existed. I can still hear this guy’s voice in my head. He had that French Canadian accent. “How many times are we going to let this n***** score?” His voice just punched through the air in the rink. I heard him as clear as day. « But it definitely exists, one of my friend is also black with a black father and white mother and he got a lot of shit.
So much worse than the plan from earlier this week. No warmup games. Straight into a do or die series. Ugh.
Here’s what I am in favour of. The 8 teams that lose out in the play in games are then added to the seven teams not in the playoffs thus forming a 15 team lottery. Only the 7 teams have a shot at number 1 but a team can only drop one spot ( in that group ). 8-15 can move up but not win the lottery. And if the Islanders lose out in the play in games Sens could have 3 top 15 picks at worst.
Half the guys will only be quarantined for 30 days ish. Not sure why they are making such a big stink about being away from your family for throw extended period of time. Big question is starting date. Any idea what they are shooting for?
I assume it’s a negotiating tactic. I’d be most of these guys either don’t have a wife and kids, or don’t want to be around them 24/7 anyway.
This plan is so much worse than what was being floated a week ago. Asking teams to jump right into do or die 5 game series makes zero sense. Wouldn’t be surprised at all to see teams like Chicago and Montreal advance.
This entire thing is terrible but it’s not like it won’t be any more random than any other playoffs ever
seriously. at this point who cares about pretending we will ever have a fair and even competition. just get right into it.
agree. However, IMO the plan being floated last week was a lot better. The round robin gave everyone a week and half's worth of almost meaningless games to get back into playing shape before the games really counted. Now its straight from training camp to fighting for your life.
i did not anticipate the younger players factor, which was stupid of me. these guys just want to play and make the money while they can