2024 preseason (camp, media stuff)

[tiburon12]

In a salary cap league, roster decisions are made as contracts are signed unless somebody on a one-way really underperforms. The point of preseason games is mainly to gouge season ticket holders.

No, the point of pre-season is to warm up before the real season. That's why no one is in favor of eliminating the pre-season, but rather truncating it because players only need a few game reps.

In that light, pre-season is also the chance for coaches to see how their players have progressed as a result of their off-ice training and judge the changes in in-game settings.

While you're right the pre-season is ultimately meaningless w/r/t points (Doug Murray hattrick excluded ), it still remains the best place to judge whether a player is NHL ready for the upcoming season or not. Gushchin has proven he is worth giving a shot to, especially early on. That's not a full roster spot, but that's a chance to prove it.

 

[Hodge]

No, the point of pre-season is to warm up before the real season. That's why no one is in favor of eliminating the pre-season, but rather truncating it because players only need a few game reps.

In that light, pre-season is also the chance for coaches to see how their players have progressed as a result of their off-ice training and judge the changes in in-game settings.

While you're right the pre-season is ultimately meaningless w/r/t points (Doug Murray hattrick excluded ), it still remains the best place to judge whether a player is NHL ready for the upcoming season or not. Gushchin has proven he is worth giving a shot to, especially early on. That's not a full roster spot, but that's a chance to prove it.

Preseason is a horrible way to judge whether a player is ready for the upcoming season or not. The quality of rosters teams are icing, especially in week one, are barely above AHL caliber. Even when they draw into the lineup, veterans on one-way deals are incentivized not to exert themselves and risk injury. We haven't learned anything new about Gushchin who has already established he can score at the AHL level.

 

[Reijo]

Man, it's such a logjam.

• I have to believe Sturm continues to be the 4C. So this means one of Grundstrom, Dellandrea, Kostin, (less likely) Goody/Kunin are getting scratched until/unless injury.
• Then we add 1 more roster fwd - G. Smith, and then Vlasic.
• So Cardwell, Gushchin, RIP Bords, Mukh, Thompson, maybe Cagnoni (I'm not up on the AHL roster battles) are in the AHL hoping for callups.
• Off chance that Grier moves one of these logjam fwds for a depth RD or a pick, giving the kids one roster spot sooner til callup.
• Sidenote, up-and-down lineup wingers will be Kostin and Grundstrom; Smith could get demoted to 3C and Wennberg plays 2C or 2W with Granlund at C; no matter what, our 3rd line is actually a good 4th line but a bad 3rd line... unless Kunin and Goodrow surpass expectations. They'll grind hard though.
• D is now a mid-to-weak 2nd pair as the 1st pair, and two third pairs. better than last year but not by much, and thin behind that.

Now that theres been some games already etc, is it clear that Walman is the number one d-guy on the first pp unit no?