Salary Cap: '24-'25 Salary Thread: Crosbicles Volume MMXXV - Poolman and Poolparty?!?

I just hate the fact that we’ve gone from playing exciting uptempo hockey to boring zero event hockey with nothing that makes the sport great going on. It’s not age, it’s the fact that we’ve made the roster up of guys who are just frankly terrible.

And the worst part is, many of those guys aren’t the result of trades, we signed them! We could have signed literally anyone else!

No matter how you slice it, it’s objectively just a failure of vision, from an organizational standpoint.

That happened in 2017 when Letang went down, long before Dubas got here. When we still had a roster Sully decided his original idea that won us a cup wasn’t as good as his new idea, which unfortunately coincided with us winning another cup... The roster sucks too, but we stopped playing uptempo for good in 2018 and I and others have 6+ years of posts pointing it out.
 
That happened in 2017 when Letang went down, long before Dubas got here. When we still had a roster Sully decided his original idea that won us a cup wasn’t as good as his new idea, which unfortunately coincided with us winning another cup... The roster sucks too, but we stopped playing uptempo for good in 2018 and I and others have 6+ years of posts pointing it out.
I'm mean, I've been beating the same drum with you for about as long on that. :laugh: It's just so frustrating because this whole problem is something that was intentionally done.
 
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This slow death where everybody's too afraid to commit to something bold out of fear of how it'll be received by the fanbase or Crosby is just f***in' dogshit man. It's awful. :laugh: And I know sports misery, I've been a Bills fan since the 80s. This no man's land of Sullivan nothingness since the B2Bs, and knowing it'll continue until Sid's had his fill of a retirement lap, sucks way worse than any JP Losman led Bills team or Tarnstrom and his dogshit instant ramen perm.
 
This slow death where everybody's too afraid to commit to something bold out of fear of how it'll be received by the fanbase or Crosby is just f***in' dogshit man. It's awful. :laugh: And I know sports misery, I've been a Bills fan since the 80s. This no man's land of Sullivan nothingness since the B2Bs, and knowing it'll continue until Sid's had his fill of a retirement lap, sucks way worse than any JP Losman led Bills team or Tarnstrom and his dogshit instant ramen perm.
Another rough one tonight for the bills but all three sports teams in this city are currently mediocre because management refuses to make obvious moves.
 
This slow death where everybody's too afraid to commit to something bold out of fear of how it'll be received by the fanbase or Crosby is just f***in' dogshit man. It's awful. :laugh: And I know sports misery, I've been a Bills fan since the 80s. This no man's land of Sullivan nothingness since the B2Bs, and knowing it'll continue until Sid's had his fill of a retirement lap, sucks way worse than any JP Losman led Bills team or Tarnstrom and his dogshit instant ramen perm.
We're tracking for a pretty high pick anyways so it's kinda whatever at this point.

Please Sid, don't please him. Whatever. We're picking 7th right now and the way we're trending it might get even worse.

And it's not likely to get any better next year when Sid, Letang, Malkin, and EK are all a year older.
 
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This slow death where everybody's too afraid to commit to something bold out of fear of how it'll be received by the fanbase or Crosby is just f***in' dogshit man. It's awful. :laugh: And I know sports misery, I've been a Bills fan since the 80s. This no man's land of Sullivan nothingness since the B2Bs, and knowing it'll continue until Sid's had his fill of a retirement lap, sucks way worse than any JP Losman led Bills team or Tarnstrom and his dogshit instant ramen perm.

It really makes me resent Sid, tbh. If he was as dedicated to making this team the best team possible it would be admirable, but it’s curdling into this really entitled ego fluffing because he clearly does not give enough of a shit about the big picture to give himself even a little discomfort, as a treat.

Like at least AO has been open his entire career about just being out for AO.
 
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He has 2 more goals than Rakell, whose production has exploded since replacing Guentzel on L1 with Crosby.

Their top-6 winger production wasn't much better last year with Guentzel than it is this year without Guentzel. Rakell exploding on L1 and Bunting doing better with Malkin this year than Rakell did with Malkin last year makes the difference in production fairly small.

Not having Guentzel obviously made the team worse, but losing Guentzel is pretty low down the list for why this team is ass at this point.
Imagine if Sullivan were able to conceive the idea of playing Guentzel with Malkin when Crosby wasn't hurt.
 
It really makes me resent Sid, tbh. If he was as dedicated to making this team the best team possible it would be admirable, but it’s curdling into this really entitled ego fluffing because he clearly does not give enough of a shit about the big picture to give himself even a little discomfort, as a treat.

Like at least AO has been open his entire career about just being out for AO.
It's not up to Sid to determine what is best for the team. Sure, maybe the coach and management are acting based on what they think (or even know) makes Sid most comfortable. It's their job to make those decisions anyway.
 
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People bitch about the Malkin contract, but he's done after next year. We got how many more years of Letang?
That’s a contract I feel we could get out of. Letang is still somewhat useful on the transition which is really important in today’s game. If we were smart we being shopping him now.
 
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I don't think it's Sid's fault that this team feels an obligation to not tear it down while he's still here. The team should still have the authority/guts to make the correct moves for the organization even with Crosby here.

If Lemieux could spend his last few years on those dogshit selling Penguins teams, why can't Crosby? Yeah I understand the bankruptcy factor was a major reason why the Penguins had to sell everything off, but still.
 
If Lemieux could spend his last few years on those dogshit selling Penguins teams, why can't Crosby? Yeah I understand the bankruptcy factor was a major reason why the Penguins had to sell everything off, but still.
Because Lemieux, being the owner, was forced to cut costs, which indirectly lead to the rebuild because, well, we were broke and needed to sell.

Sid is resisting change to the detriment of the team selling things it can conceivably get at least some value out of.

Simple as.

Like you get they're two completely different situations? Lemieux was forced to make the hard decision and that's worth some applause. Sid has the option force change or not to. He chooses to not make any changes even though it f***s us up more, which sucks and makes the rebuild worse than it has to be. And for what? Just to keep playing a game? Run up his numbers? Bask in adulation?

f*** Sid.
 
It's not up to Sid to determine what is best for the team. Sure, maybe the coach and management are acting based on what they think (or even know) makes Sid most comfortable. It's their job to make those decisions anyway.
Agreed, but Sid not having that organizational vision tarnishes his legacy in my mind.

Like I said, it's fine to be selfish or to want to play to an end date or whatever. But not saying it is the worst and pretending like "next year we're gonna make it, I swear" is insulting. He's well within his rights to do so, but it does lower my opinion of him.

I'd be perfectly satisfied if he said "I just want to go out there and try to cement my legacy on the scoring leaders". Or equally satisfied (if not giving him insane amounts of credit) for saying "yeah, it's time to rebuild, but I want to be here for the next few rookies to help them learn." But to act like he's mystified how bad the team is and yet nothing should change is just the f***ing worst.
 
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That’s a contract I feel we could get out of. Letang is still somewhat useful on the transition which is really important in today’s game. If we were smart we being shopping him now.
I don't think we'll shop him. They made too much of a deal about signing him (for six years lol).
 
Sid is resisting change to the detriment of the team selling things it can conceivably get at least some value out of.

But Crosby isn't "resisting change" here, it's the team resisting change for the sake of Crosby. The organization doesn't need to do that with Crosby, they just feel an obligation to do that.

They could go up to Crosby right now and say "we think it's time to pull the plug on this team and go into a full scale rebuild". Crosby isn't forcing them to not do that, they're just cowards and are not doing it because they don't want to offend Crosby.
 
What did everyone do this weekend? You know, other than clutching their pearls because of a tweet from two guys with absolutely no connections to the team or city?
 
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But Crosby isn't "resisting change" here, it's the team resisting change for the sake of Crosby. The organization doesn't need to do that with Crosby, they just feel an obligation to do that.

They could go up to Crosby right now and say "we think it's time to pull the plug on this team and go into a full scale rebuild". Crosby isn't forcing them to not do that, they're just cowards and are not doing it because they don't want to offend Crosby.
And how does Sid exactly not know this is happening though? He can see the tape as well as us. He knows where the team sits in the standings, he's been in the league for 20 years, he knows what happens to teams who struggle and are this far behind the pack before the TDL. He knows how to make his opinions felt (remember his enforcer phase)?

It's silly to act like Sid has no agency in this situation. Like I said, he doesn't have Lemieux's perspective of having to be an owner and knowing that the team is doomed unless things are cut to the bone for the near future, followed by an aggressive rebuild. So I don't expect him to make that decision. But Sid is allowing this to happen, even if by virtue of trying to stay meek and quiet.

Refusing to make a decision for the good of the club because you don't want to rock the boat is not a good look for a captain of the team.
 
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It's literally the easiest thing in the world to do too, he can just let it slip in a postgame that he's ready for rebuilding and I'd warrant it'd be team policy to ask about NMCs by practice the next day. :laugh:
 
Agreed, but Sid not having that organizational vision tarnishes his legacy in my mind.

Like I said, it's fine to be selfish or to want to play to an end date or whatever. But not saying it is the worst and pretending like "next year we're gonna make it, I swear" is insulting. He's well within his rights to do so, but it does lower my opinion of him.

I'd be perfectly satisfied if he said "I just want to go out there and try to cement my legacy on the scoring leaders". Or equally satisfied (if not giving him insane amounts of credit) for saying "yeah, it's time to rebuild, but I want to be here for the next few rookies to help them learn." But to act like he's mystified how bad the team is and yet nothing should change is just the f***ing worst.
I guess don't get the need to hear players explicitly say something that is clearly happening anyway :dunno:
 
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