Kind of weird how you're specifically saying they got to the final instead of they won the cup?
Kind of weird how you apparently stopped reading by the fourth sentence?
The standard is - and always will be - winning Lord Stanley's Cup. That's the goal - or should be the goal - of every team who competes, and nothing less. If you asked Lundqvist and Luongo - or the vast majority of the players in the NHL, for that matter - what the standard was, I guarantee they'd say the exact same thing I'm saying.
The Lightning had one of the single best playoff performers in Kucherov, an elite defense led by Hedman and Sergachev, and enough supporting offense on all four lines to win that year.
The Panthers were loaded with a solid number of players everywhere on the ice, including Tkachuk and Barkov, who both would be on the first line of most teams. They worked out, even when Bobrovsky failed occasionally...And I absolutely do not believe that Drury is a competent GM, unlike the Panthers/Lightning GMs.
Yes, you have to have a really good team to win the Cup. A goalie can't win it by himself. Absolutely shocking, groundbreaking analysis that you need a really good team in front of a goalie. No one was arguing otherwise and the Rangers will still have over $80M to spend on building the rest of that roster.
I also don't have much faith in their GM, but that is a very different conversation than the argument that the Shesterkin contract makes it impossible to build a winner. I think Drury has made a number of large mistakes, but that doesn't mean everything he does is a mistake. I very much don't believe that signing Shesterkin to this deal is a mistake.
They have a top 10 winger in the league and a top 10 D man in the league. I don't like their team as much as Florida/Tampa, but they have several key pieces. They have $20M+ of cap space for next year, they hold all of their future 1st round picks, and their prospect pool has three guys they drafted in the 1st round over the last 4 drafts. They have assets to improve and are a desirable market.
I think that they are very much situated to be able to build a winner around him and that contract. I don't think that Drury will be able to do that, but I don't think that he'd have been able to do that even if Shesterkin signed for $6M AAV. I'd have no issue with Drury getting fired, but not everything a bad GM does is proof that they should be fired. And Drury shouldn't have traded Shesterkin based on the logic that he isn't good at his job so he should just stop trying to win a Cup.
I do not think Shesterkin, as uberly talented as he is, is in the same stratosphere as King Henrik or Luongo. I do not think the Rangers have the same firepower that the Panthers and Lightning did. I do not think their defense is nearly as good as what the Panthers and Lightning were.
Disagree. No one will know if his longevity will rival those two, but his resume at 28 is right there with those two at 28.
Through his age 28 season, he has a better SV%, quality start rate, and GA% than either of them had through their age 28 seasons. His GSAA per 60 is better too.
His Vezina is more than Hank or Lou had combined through their age 28 seasons.
His playoff resume is miles ahead of where Hank or Lou's was at 28. In fact, Shesterkin's career playoff performance through 3 years as the Ranger's starter is noticeably better than the best 3 year playoff sample of Hank or Lou. Shesterkin has a .928 SV%, a 76.7% quality start rate, and 33.6 GSAA through 43 starts in his 3 seasons as their playoff starter. Hank's best 3 year sample was a .930 SV%, a .615 quality start rate, and a 28.6 GSAA through 57 starts. The GSAA gap is bonkers considering games played.
Time will tell whether Shesterkin can have a similar age 29+ career as those two, but what he has done so far goes beyond putting him in the same stratosphere as those two. He has outperformed them.
