Felonious Python
Minor League Degenerate
- Aug 20, 2004
- 31,272
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Speculation: 2025-2026 Offseason Thread 2: lol Kucherov is never winning another MVP again is he?
- Thread starter AlwaysSunnyInTampa
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RussianGuyovich
Hella Ennui
- Jan 2, 2007
- 10,104
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lmao, who looks at what happened in NY last season and then decides to add another ranger player to the trouba locker room? oh, pat verbeek. glad we dont still employ him!
Felonious Python
Minor League Degenerate
- Aug 20, 2004
- 31,272
- 10,659
Kreider is 34. It seems that the Ducks want to start winning now.
The Quenneville-Toews connection is also potentially there.
RussianGuyovich
Hella Ennui
- Jan 2, 2007
- 10,104
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this keeps getting better, for me, as i am not a ducks fan
Am I? When is the last time we saw Point do anything remotely close to his physical capabilities? Or Kucherov? Or Cirelli? Why did Paul just suddenly vanish after asserting himself in the threepeat attempt? I know these guys have dealt with injuries and its led to a certain degree of bashfulness.
But Coop and the boys realized they can stack a perfection line and cut out the labor without losing any scoring whatsoever. I understand working smarter and not harder. But again. We literally do almost nothing that makes us difficult to play against. Its been a recurring theme for 3 years. Regular season time and space vanishes and our painfully predictable tendencies get exposed. We need maybe 1 more guy who can carry water in the top 6 and its up to the coaching staff to stop making us play so damn soft. Nevermind playoff Panthers. This crap barely works against our own division in the regular season.
Again. Call it bias but I will never not crusade against Guy Boucher hockey. It gets by on talent alone and flops when teams figure it out because it doesn't loan itself to any ability to be adjusted
Felonious Python
Minor League Degenerate
- Aug 20, 2004
- 31,272
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Im actually kinda disappointed in the lack of cap we have to spend this offseason. Am I mistaken, or weren't we talking about the Lightning having like $10M+ to spend with the rising cap? What changed?
RSchmitz PhD
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Is he a bad locker room guy? Ducks have 39 million in cap space, I get why they'd do it provided they aren't giving anything of value away.
RSchmitz PhD
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We added Bjorkstrand and his 5.4m salary to the mix.
Zwui21
Registered User
- Aug 31, 2019
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I'd do unspeakable things to trade for J. Robertson, insane to me that Dallas is considering selling a 25 y/o that has already eclipsed 100pts in a season and before this playoff was around ppg in the postseason.
But there's obviously no way to fit him inside our cap structure and we don't have the assets.
But there's obviously no way to fit him inside our cap structure and we don't have the assets.
LightningStrikes
Champa Bay Lightning
- Nov 24, 2009
- 26,485
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He’s a LW though. Where’d he fit with Guentzel and Hagel already capable of playing 1st line LW?
Zwui21
Registered User
- Aug 31, 2019
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Doesn't he play RW as well when needed? If I'm not wrong I recall from fantasy hockey that he has dual eligibility on the wing lol
If that isn't the case yeah, LW we are more than covered.
RussianGuyovich
Hella Ennui
- Jan 2, 2007
- 10,104
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the rangers famously exploded this year, with the players revolting against management for perceived slights, i dunno i was enjoying them sucking too much to care.
krieder might be fine, might not be. might could, might couldnt. probably might could.
RSchmitz PhD
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Can’t Guentzel play RW as well? Would love Robertson but we went the Bjorkstrand/Gourde route
I don't think you remember how we won our Cups.
Prior to that, I remember arguing with you, Sky and Matt for like 97 pages about Callahan and Filppula being more worthless than 2023 Stamkos at even strength and carrying on about Killorn's maddening inconsistency. Arguing that firing Cooper was stupid. That we needed turnover from an otherwise unmotivated and complacent roster that wanted to sleep walk into the playoffs.
At the time we were checking/possession heavy team whose core philosophy was "Stack up a super line who does all the scoring, 1 line (that should be scoring) playing defense, 2 lines do absolutely nothing" but guys like Stamkos and Kucherov didn't get too dirty. We let Brown, Paquette. Palat, Killorn, Callahan do that.
Then once we got ahold of Gourde, Cirelli and Point we went full metal Globetrotters with the EXACT same philosophy and got comically bitch slapped by the Capitals and CBJ.
We won our Cups by making the finesse players we had dig and play hard. And not relying on 1 line to carry 85% of our offense. The second we changed our philosophy we won our titles.
And now we're back to the same stupid story: stack up a super that does all the scoring, 1 line (that should be scoring) playing defense, 2 lines do absolutely nothing.
Except this time we have 8 shots on goal in 28 minutes and expect Vasilevskiy to stop that many once we get hemmed in again! What can possibly go wrong?
The Panthers would be lucky to win 2 games against anyone playing like us. Bob is good to let in 2 beach balls a night unless you shelter him with the system currently in front of him. He'd melt down if he had to deal with a fraction of the crap we put Vasy through
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RSchmitz PhD
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Maybe an unpopular opinion but I was happy with how we played in the postseason even before our cup championships. Even if we didn’t win those years were some of the most exciting hockey I’ve ever witnessed, and I think we’ve gotten away from that a little bit too much.
Those teams beat you with speed and we didn’t need size, but the way we play now I think we are too small to make work. We’ve adopted too many tendencies that slow trap teams use because of our losses to Washington and Columbus
Crunchrulz
Registered User
In addition, there is a lot of speculation and hope that salaries like Sheary's will be able to be traded. What folks fail to remember is Sheary cleared waivers to get to Syracuse last season and if another organization did not take him as a waiver wire claim, there is almost no way they are going to trade assets for him now. Perhaps as a throw in for Howard's rights, but not on his own.
It is shaping more and more like we are staying pretty well set with last year's lineup due to cap restrictions and trade clauses. A tweek here and there will still happen but overall, what we have is what we are going to get. The only major player without a trade clause is Cirelli, but it is doubtful JBB deals him as the return would likely not be worth it for the Lightning given the overall lack of depth in the organization right now.
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I more or less agree. Coop fell back asswards into a 1 year Legion of Doom line and rode that thing like a Vegas hot streak with Carle and Sustr playing defense. It might have worked if Johnson hadn't broken his wrist. Better odds if we win game 1 vs the Hawks. The scoring lines just straight dried up and died vs Pitts and our philosophy was more or less exposed. Those years were coaching master classes. The Globetrotter years left me generally uneasy because I found myself waiting for the bottom to fall out.
I am considering actually praying for Halpern to land the Dallas job. We haven't needed needed new voices in the room this badly since Bowness' refusal to utilize our defense in attacking and no one knowing what the hell Brad Lauer's job was.
Yes, we made finesse players play like grinders. But the guys you mentioned are pretty much the only ones who never had that issue. (Point has it now)
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So how is the way we play now supposed to help Kucherov and Point grind again? I have never agreed with you more on a singular issue as I do in that we need someone else to add some sandpaper in the top 6. But its not gonna matter who we get if Kucherov is just gonna dump passes from his office all night. It'll get you a 100 assist season. But it is also how you go 3 years since your last playoff goal. I don't even WANT to talk about how soft and bad Point has gotten
Kucherov never grinded. But he had Point who attacked the net all the time, and then when we added Palat, who creates space, and Kucherov became a machine.
I think the issue with Point is he's tentative because he's taken so many injuries playing that style. But who knows.
But yeah, in general the difference between pre-2020 and post is everyone started buying in to a defensive, grinding system. We made the change at the beginning of the 2019/2020 season and had major growing pains doing it. Jon Cooper more/less became Barry Trotz.
We also have to accept that Kucherov's struggles aren't so much about the playoffs as they are about Florida. The only guy Florida hasn't shut down in two years is McDavid.
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