Around the NHL 2023-24 - offseason part II

[Mgd31]

Sounds like Michkov may be the real deal in Philly.

People are already saying he’ll single-handedly keep them as a bubble team. The Metro may not have multiple great clubs, but I think it’s going to be a fight to make the playoffs.

Yea luckily Gauthier decided to go rouge

 

[NJDevs26]

i’ll go one step further and ask if preseason games should even be a thing in 2024. it’s like the olympics- zero upside, all downside from an nhl team’s perspective.

It’s not all downside, they actually need something besides intrasquad scrimmages with no hitting to evaluate people. If we didn’t have a preseason Casey would almost certainly be starting in the AHL. If regulars can’t handle three preseason games at half speed (which is basically the max of what they’ll play) they sure aren’t going to be able to handle 82 at full speed.

 

[Goptor]

The problem with preseason is there are still a bunch of people desperately clinging to the idea of an enforcer. You have NHL regulars adjusting back to their routine and learning new stuff their coaches came up with. Then you have the prospects putting 110% effort trying to show off to get a job. Mixed into those prospects are guys that don't have the talent to play hockey at the highest level so their only path to the NHL is by hitting and punching people.

So you get several guys who desperately want to lay a big hit and punch out a player in hope that it gets them on the team playing against guys who are mainly focusing on improving their conditioning.

 

[Bleedred]

THG on YouTube erroneously referred to Tyce Thompson as the brother of Tage and Logan Thompson, when discussing the players who were waived yesterday, which Tyce was.

Tage is his brother, but I never heard of Logan being their brother. So I just spent a few minutes making sure that wasn’t true. I didn’t know Mark and Michael Stone were brothers for the longes time. And I only just found out two years ago that Brendan and Reilly Smith were brothers. Those surnames are so common, especially Smith and Thompson.

Logan and Tage were born in the same year, and about 8 months apart, so it’s damn near impossible for them to be biological brothers.