Bakersfield Condors 24-25 thread

The AHL conundrum for a coach is wins vs development. They have some overlap but often conflict. This year the team is getting neither it seems.
He’s been great at improving two-way play of guys with talent. Holloway and Broberg took big steps in that regard with him. Lavoie was night and day after his time in Bako. Savoie is doing the same now.

Unfortunately the organization hasn’t really provided much actual talent though.
 
Man the Oilers pipeline is in dire shape. The Oilers have to have the worst prospect pool in the league and not by an insignificant margin, even their best prospect in Savoie is kind of mid especially compared to other top prospects. I don't know if it's a talent deficit or coaching down there but it's ugly, probably a bit of both?

It seems that Jay Woodcroft did a lot of good for this organization while he was here. Immediately preceding him we weren’t developing much, the AHL team turned a corner with him and then in the NHL he brought several players along and gave them their first NHL shots. Now we’re struggling. We don’t have as much talent in the system now, but we did before he came along. I don’t know, he seemed to keep an eye on the future more than most of our other coaches over recent years.
 
He’s been great at improving two-way play of guys with talent. Holloway and Broberg took big steps in that regard with him. Lavoie was night and day after his time in Bako. Savoie is doing the same now.

Unfortunately the organization hasn’t really provided much actual talent though.

They really haven’t. Yet somehow we still have Bob Green heading our scouting staff and largely the same group of scouts we’ve had for the last 5-15 years.

Although there have been a number of guys who look like promising players coming out of junior who basically immediately cratered once they got to our development system. Bourgault, Petrov, Tulio for example. Now maybe these guys were just never any good. But we sure as heck know that Chaulk wasn’t helping any of them get better.

I’d hope there is a significant overhaul to the entire scouting/development system we have. With the odd exception it’s been an unmitigated disaster for like… 35 years lol.
 
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Savoie scored fine in the AHL last season considering the opportunity. Instead of re-signing him after trading for his brother, they chose to sign a 25 year old undrafted Cam Wright to put up the exact same production.

Maybe holding on to a guy like Carter Savoie may not have hurt considering we're giving Petrov an ECHL center and a defenseman as his linemates.

There's a problem with the way our AHL team is being run.
I also thought it was quite dumb to get rid of Carter Savoie, who’s a capable AHL player, while literally acquiring his brother. Would’ve been good for both those guys development, but Yenno, oilers gonna oiler
 
They really haven’t. Yet somehow we still have Stu MacGregor heading our scouting staff and largely the same group of scouts we’ve had for the last 5-15 years.

Although there have been a number of guys who look like promising players coming out of junior who basically immediately cratered once they got to our development system. Bourgault, Petrov, Tulio for example. Now maybe these guys were just never any good. But we sure as heck know that Chaulk wasn’t helping any of them get better.

I’d hope there is a significant overhaul to the entire scouting/development system we have. With the odd exception it’s been an unmitigated disaster for like… 35 years lol.

I thought Stu MacGregor was long gone?
 
Man the Oilers pipeline is in dire shape. The Oilers have to have the worst prospect pool in the league and not by an insignificant margin, even their best prospect in Savoie is kind of mid especially compared to other top prospects. I don't know if it's a talent deficit or coaching down there but it's ugly, probably a bit of both?
I don't know how you think Savoie is mid. What on earth gives you that idea lol? We have prospects coming in O'Reilly, Nicholls, Wakely, Clattenburg, Samanski, Brochu, Day, Carfagna. I may have missed a few but our last draft was very good
 
You had me worried there for a second! It would have explained a lot of things though.

Mind you Bob Green can f*** all the way off as well.

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Can you blame me for getting them mixed up?
 
I also thought it was quite dumb to get rid of Carter Savoie, who’s a capable AHL player, while literally acquiring his brother. Would’ve been good for both those guys development, but Yenno, oilers gonna oiler
He isn’t an AHL player this year though, so I’m not sure they missed out on much.

Hard to say what’s happened behind the scenes too. There were rumours that Carter didn’t really care about off-ice work. I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that he would have helped Matt’s development.
 
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He isn’t an AHL player this year though, so I’m not sure they missed out on much.

Hard to say what’s happened behind the scenes too. There were rumours that Carter didn’t really care about off-ice work. I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that he would have helped Matt’s development.
Could've gone either way. It just looks odd when the trade for the guy's brother days after walking away from the table.

Meanwhile here the Condors are with two guys in D'Amato and Swetlikoff who couldn't get a regular shift on the Henderson Silver Knights.

Long story short. I'd rather give a homegrown prospect a longer leash than an undrafted plug who's an obvious miss. Nothing stopping them from putting actual prospects on that roster.
 
Could've gone either way. It just looks odd when the trade for the guy's brother days after walking away from the table.

Meanwhile here the Condors are with two guys in D'Amato and Swetlikoff who couldn't get a regular shift on the Henderson Silver Knights.

Long story short. I'd rather give a homegrown prospect a longer leash than an undrafted plug who's an obvious miss. Nothing stopping them from putting actual prospects on that roster.
To be fair, those guys are only getting minutes because the Condors have like 12 injuries right now.

D'Amato was a good 4th line PKer and Swetlikoff was in the ECHL before the team started dropping like flies.


I'd say the main thing stopping them from that is drafting. Like sure, Carter is younger, but I wouldn't consider him an actual prospect. He's pretty clearly a bust at this point and that's basically the only type of guy the organization has been sending to Bako.
 
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I don't know how you think Savoie is mid. What on earth gives you that idea lol? We have prospects coming in O'Reilly, Nicholls, Wakely, Clattenburg, Samanski, Brochu, Day, Carfagna. I may have missed a few but our last draft was very good

Now how do these prospects look compared to most of the other prospect pools in the league? I think that's the real question. Nicholl is OK, but 1 point in 4 playoff games when some of his teammates already have double-digits doesn't exactly scream future NHLer.

You actually left off the most promising prospect of all: Berezkin.
 
Now how do these prospects look compared to most of the other prospect pools in the league? I think that's the real question. Nicholl is OK, but 1 point in 4 playoff games when some of his teammates already have double-digits doesn't exactly scream future NHLer.

You actually left off the most promising prospect of all: Berezkin.
I left him off on purpose. I won't get my hopes up on him until we sign him. If this team leaves him off, I swear....
 
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To be fair, those guys are only getting minutes because the Condors have like 12 injuries right now.

D'Amato was a good 4th line PKer and Swetlikoff was in the ECHL before the team started dropping like flies.


I'd say the main thing stopping them from that is drafting. Like sure, Carter is younger, but I wouldn't consider him an actual prospect. He's pretty clearly a bust at this point and that's basically the only type of guy the organization has been sending to Bako.
4th line PKers shouldn't be running on your top line is my point. D'Amato has been one of Chaulk's favorites this season. Meanwhile the actual prospect Matvei Petrov is toiling in the bottom six. No interest in giving this player some confidence, I suppose.

Meanwhile all three of these guys are likely to fall short of Savoie's numbers last season. Was there any reason to believe his production was going to regress?
 

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