ChicagoBlues
Terraformers
- Oct 24, 2006
- 15,020
- 6,070
Now watch Paul Fischer come out of college in a couple years, refuse to sign with Edmonton and then sign with the Blues.
That's a playoff team.Dude I keep trying to make a lineup guess and there is just too many players I want to include. This is the one I keep going back to
Neighbours - Thomas - Kyrou
Saad - Buchnevich - Schenn
Texier - Holloway - Joseph
Toropchenko - Faksa - Sundqvist (if ready at start of season)
Other guys who could push for a spot: Walker, Kapanen, Dvorsky, Bolduc, Dean and Sylvegard
Broberg - Parayko
Leddy - Faulk
Suter - Kessel
Assuming Krug is out for season, you also have POJ and Perunovich
Holy shit has Army done a fantastic job of replenishing the depth.
I’d probably prefer those two scoring a late goal to make it like 4-3 with a minute to go, or even better sealing the deal with an empty netter…. The 3OT games I like in the non Blues related series.In game 7 triple ot?
I’d probably prefer those two scoring a late goal to make it like 4-3 with a minute to go, or even better sealing the deal with an empty netter…. The 3OT games I like in the non Blues related series.
Also I love this narrative Oilers fans are creating about how Holloway should fire his agent for dragging him into this and forcing him to sign the offer sheet. Listening to his zoom interview he was ecstatic to be coming to the Blues to get more opportunity to crack the top 6, and he said the Oilers offer was far apart money wise to him.
Funny you say that because a lot of Oilers fans saw sadness in his eyes during that interview.
They make it sound like he got tricked by his agent into signing the contract as if he's not capable of making his own decisions. I believe he said something try the effect of "people don't know what happened behind the scenes" during the interview so obviously there were some hurt feelings about how the Oilers treated him.
To make the same comment I did yesterday, I enjoyed his interview.Funny you say that because a lot of Oilers fans saw sadness in his eyes during that interview.
They make it sound like he got tricked by his agent into signing the contract as if he's not capable of making his own decisions. I believe he said something try the effect of "people don't know what happened behind the scenes" during the interview so obviously there were some hurt feelings about how the Oilers treated him.
Yeah, I’ve seen some of that stuff. Nothing more hackish than taking a screencap of people’s faces at the most unflattering time and spinning your narrative off that.
That said, why do Oiler fans make McDavid so uncomfortable? Look at those eyes. They scream “please get me away from these people.”
View attachment 902309
Holloway with a Game 7 series winner. Their fanbase would collapse.Hopefully St Louis and Edmonton get matched up in the 1st round this year. Can you imagine the meltdown if the Blues looked competitive in that series, or threatened to win?
It’s all found money for the Blues this year, but for Edmonton this is the culmination of their build up and maybe their best chance.
Hot damn, my instincts were finally right. As I read all the gloating by some Edmonton fans after Ceci was traded, I still didn’t “get it.” That trade allowed them to be cap compliant without Broberg and Holloway, but counting on Kane to be on LTIR for the whole season (or until his NMC turned into a modified NTC just prior to the trade deadline) just didn’t make any sense to me. I’ve heard that Kane might not even require LTIR at all now, so it all makes sense either way (the way it turned out).I’m not convinced just yet that they’re matching either player. Even without Holloway and Broberg, they’re still about $700k over the cap. They received a serviceable cheap RHD to replace Ceci. They can be cap compliant by waiving one of their depth forwards (like Brown). Yes, they may put Kane on LTIR, but by all accounts his injury, even with surgery, would not leave him out longer than a few months. These moves needed to be made regardless of the offer sheets. But, we’ll see
Holloway with a Game 7 series winner. Their fanbase would collapse.
Game 4. RegulationIn game 7 triple ot?
So. I'm not sure if this has been brought up yet or not, but of the things I noticed during #OfferSheetWeek was how badly the NMCs that the Oilers have on their roster ended up handcuffing them.
I would venture a guess that if you wanted to, you could get a player to agree to a trade to just about anywhere with the threat of being waved to the the minors. Hyman, Nuge, Skinner, Kane, and Nurse all have NMCs. Skinner, Kane, and (maaaaybe) Hyman would make the most attractive pieces for a team to add, but their pieces are eliminated off the chessboard due to the NMC.
I heard several people say, "we should just waive Kane and let him get picked up by another team.
Ope.
Now, before you all come after me, I'm not sayin those would have been good ways to get out of the mess. I'm just saying, it would have been A WAY of doing it. One that was effectively eliminated from consideration before it could even be considered.
The other thing were the Oilers being out of buyouts. I don't think I need to go into too much detail here on this one as it speaks for itself.
If the Oilers front office had not exercised these mechanisms, for debatably frivolous and shortsighted reasons, they could have easily gotten themselves out of this jam.
All in all, I think this was a perfect storm that the Oilers created by themselves and serves as a fantastic case study on why Army has categorically told us and shown us he will not dole out NMCs or use any buyouts.
I think he may have preferred your option 2 over 1, the opportunity to play up the lineup could help him financially down the road as wellStrickland reported that the Oilers original offer to Holloway was $1.05M x 3 years. I'm sure there was some wiggle room there, but it is pretty clear that Holloway wasn't going to make more than $2.5M spread over the next 2 years in Edmonton. He's getting $4.5M over the next couple years in St. Louis.
Holloway is a guy who has roughly $1.5M in career earnings. He made $172.5k in the first year of his ELC. He spent about two-thirds of the 2022/23 season in the NHL and the other third in the AHL. So he likely made somewhere in the ballpark of $700k. The same thing happened last year, so he probably made roughly $700k. That's a great amount of money to have made before turning 23 years old.
But that isn't close to enough money for a guy to be able to just ignore an extra $2M. Way, way, way too many fans ignore the financial side of things, especially when we're talking about guys coming off ELCs. And even more especially when those guys spent about half of their ELC in the AHL.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if Holloway was hoping that the Oilers would match. so that he could make $4.5M to spend the next couple years in Edmonton. But I'd bet a large chunk of money that he is extremely happy about getting an extra couple million dollars than he would have gotten had he not signed the offer sheet. I'd wager his order of preferences was like this:
1: Edmonton matches and he gets $2.29M x 2 to play in Edmonton
2: Edmonton doesn't match and he gets $2.29M x 2 to play in St. Louis
3: He forgoes the offer sheet and signs the best 2 or 3 year deal in the $1.25M AAV range that Edmonton presented on the eve of camp.
4: He holds out into camp to try and get over the $1.5M AAV range.
I'd wager that there was a decent gap between options 2 and 3. He made an extra $2M by signing an offer sheet. That's a massive amount of money for a guy who isn't already financially set for life.
But how are we gonna fit Kevin Hayes into the picture?That's a playoff team.
Mom?! Dad?! I always felt different. I just KNEW I was adopted!!Yeah, I’ve seen some of that stuff. Nothing more hackish than taking a screencap of people’s faces at the most unflattering time and spinning your narrative off that.
That said, why do Oiler fans make McDavid so uncomfortable? Look at those eyes. They scream “please get me away from these people.”
View attachment 902309
It tells me the Blues were targeting Broberg for a while, not just as an opportunistic acquisition.According to HFOilers, Bob Stauffer (Oilers media guy) spoke with former GM Brian Lawton who said Armstrong went to Holland before the tdl with an idea of a package deal involving Buchnevich, Broberg and Holloway, which Holland declined.
EDIT: I guess this is not really news.