Blues vs Avalanche Round 1

[Spektre]

I like the Blues chances if they finish every check. I don’t think Colorado wants a physical series

 

[BlueSeal]

I believe

 

[LetsGoBLUES91]

Stay. Out. Of. The. Box.

 

[BlueMed]

Some quotes from their board...

Avs in 5.


This is an example of where models really dont tell very good stories IMO.


Blues are a dangerous team, they've won a cup recently already with a lot of the same guys still on the team. They played much better down the stretch and really since the deadline have looked a lot better


I still think the Avs are just too deep not to win and win fairly quickly... But it wont be a cake walk by any means either. I think the value of home ice for us will really push this series in our favor. Bednar gets his preferred matchup and keeps the top line away from ROR as much as possible.


We'll get ahead 2-0, split the road games in St. Louis and clean up the series back at home in game 5.

Expecting RoR and Parayko out against the top line every shift. Gotta get some depth scoring in this one. Big question to me is Binnington. If he is not good this could end pretty early. If he's good, who knows.

Those games they won against us recently were fluky. If we’re healthy, we’ll curbstomp them. If Mack isn’t back to normal and a few other guys are hurt, then all bets are off

Avs in 3. The Blues had their fluke run 2 years ago and followed it up by getting speed-bagged by a "play-in" team. The Avs are the hungrier team.

 

[Linkens Mastery]

Some quotes from their board...

I mean, I don't mind the Alex Jones one. All the others just seem overly arrogant and full of themselves, but that's every fan base, including some of our own fans.

 

[BlueMed]

I mean, I don't mind the Alex Jones one. All the others just seem overly arrogant and full of themselves, but that's every fan base, including some of our own fans.

I don't see any of our fans seriously thinking the Blues are going to curbstomp them and beat them fairly quickly...

 

[Linkens Mastery]

I don't see any of our fans seriously thinking the Blues are going to curbstomp them and beat them fairly quickly...

Just a reminder, we have a fan base outside of just HFBoards, and, Luckily you don't know since of my family and friends who are already planning the parade.

 

[BlueDream]

Yolo prediction: Blues in 4.

Blues in 2.

 

[TheDizee]

Some quotes from their board...

Who cares what their board says tbh.

fans of both teams know if the avs dont get PPs, they will get clowned. that team gets suffocated without 5Power plays a night, thats their oxygen.

plus dont forget their goaltending is playoff unproven, he always chokes sooner or later. think of roman turek or brian elliott for us.

 

[mk80]

So what are we thinking on lines going into Colorado? Something like this?

Barbashev - O'Reilly - Perron
Schwartz - Schenn - Kyrou
Sanford - Thomas - Hoffman
Clifford - Bozak - MacEachern/Blais

Krug - Faulk
Scandella - Parayko
Mikkola - Bortuzzo

Binnington
Husso

I'm not too sure on what to do with the 3rd and 4th lines.... If Tarasenko is ready do we play him and try to add some extra offense he could generate? And yes I know it hasn't been as good of a year for him offensively to this point. I guess if so put him with Schwartz and Schenn and reunite Kyrou with Thomas and Hoffman. If Tarasenko is not in, do we trust Kostin enough already to keep on that 3rd line with Thomas and Hoffman like he was against the Wild?

 

[LetsGoBLUES91]

Some quotes from their board...

Moneypuck is the worst analytic/probability thing out there and EVERYONE uses it. A month ago when we were 2 points back of the Coyotes with 50 games in hand they had us at around 20%. Everyone else had us well over 50.

 

[BlueMed]

Just realized that the Avs will be without Saad, Calvert, and EJ. That's rather significant.

 

[Moose and Squirrel]

Yolo prediction: Blues in 4.

Blues in 3

 

[Moose and Squirrel]

So what are we thinking on lines going into Colorado? Something like this?

Barbashev - O'Reilly - Perron
Schwartz - Schenn - Kyrou
Sanford - Thomas - Hoffman
Clifford - Bozak - MacEachern/Blais

Krug - Faulk
Scandella - Parayko
Mikkola - Bortuzzo

Binnington
Husso

I'm not too sure on what to do with the 3rd and 4th lines.... If Tarasenko is ready do we play him and try to add some extra offense he could generate? And yes I know it hasn't been as good of a year for him offensively to this point. I guess if so put him with Schwartz and Schenn and reunite Kyrou with Thomas and Hoffman. If Tarasenko is not in, do we trust Kostin enough already to keep on that 3rd line with Thomas and Hoffman like he was against the Wild?

at the very least swap sanford and bozak

 

[Reality Czech]

Stay. Out. Of. The. Box.

Pretty much this. The Avs are no better than us at even strength, but they will murder us if we give them too many power plays.

 

[Turbonium]

Just realized that the Avs will be without Saad, Calvert, and EJ. That's rather significant.

They've been without EJ basically the entire season, Calvert as well. EJ played 4 games this year, Calvert played 18. Not exactly significant pieces of the team this year.

 

[Mike Liut]

Here’s my prediction...

Can the Blues? Sure
Will the Blues win? Hell if I know

That’s all I have

 

[Brian39]

Who cares what their board says tbh.

fans of both teams know if the avs dont get PPs, they will get clowned. that team gets suffocated without 5Power plays a night, thats their oxygen.

plus dont forget their goaltending is playoff unproven, he always chokes sooner or later. think of roman turek or brian elliott for us.

You have no idea what you are talking about regarding the Avs. They have been incredibly good 5 on 5 this season. I think that their numbers are inflated by the COVID scheduling and our crappy division, but they have been inflated from "extremely good" to "historically good."

At 5 on 5, they are 1st in CF%, FF%, SF%, GF%, xGF%, SCF%, and HDCF%. They are 58% or higher in every single one of these metrics. Most impressively, their xGF% sits at 60.8%, which is a staggering 5 point edge on the #2 team in the league. There is a larger xGF% gap between the Avs and the #2 team than there is between the #2 team and the #14 team. That is stunning. Natural Stat Trick goes back to 2007/08 for these types of metrics. This is the first time that any team has finished the season above 58% in xGF% at 5 on 5. Vegas got the benefit of playing against the same crappy division and finished 7th with a 53.29 xGF%. Minny was 13th with a 51.21 and we were 26th with a 46.09. They didn't go from mediocre at 5 on 5 to historically good numbers because of the division. They are exceptionally good at 5 on 5.

I think we match up against them very well stylistically and ROR is arguably the ideal 1C to send out to counter MacKinnon. But this notion of yours that they are a PP team isn't based anywhere near reality. They have a good PP (8th in the NHL), but it is absolutely not the driver of their success. The 5 week hot streak from our PP once Berube realized Hoffman is good on the PP put our season-long PP% ahead of the Avs. This notion that the Avs success is driven by the refs is absurd.

 

[Xerloris]

You have no idea what you are talking about regarding the Avs. They have been incredibly good 5 on 5 this season. I think that their numbers are inflated by the COVID scheduling and our crappy division, but they have been inflated from "extremely good" to "historically good."

At 5 on 5, they are 1st in CF%, FF%, SF%, GF%, xGF%, SCF%, and HDCF%. They are 58% or higher in every single one of these metrics. Most impressively, their xGF% sits at 60.8%, which is a staggering 5 point edge on the #2 team in the league. There is a larger xGF% gap between the Avs and the #2 team than there is between the #2 team and the #14 team. That is stunning. Natural Stat Trick goes back to 2007/08 for these types of metrics. This is the first time that any team has finished the season above 58% in xGF% at 5 on 5. Vegas got the benefit of playing against the same crappy division and finished 7th with a 53.29 xGF%. Minny was 13th with a 51.21 and we were 26th with a 46.09. They didn't go from mediocre at 5 on 5 to historically good numbers because of the division. They are exceptionally good at 5 on 5.

I think we match up against them very well stylistically and ROR is arguably the ideal 1C to send out to counter MacKinnon. But this notion of yours that they are a PP team isn't based anywhere near reality. They have a good PP (8th in the NHL), but it is absolutely not the driver of their success. The 5 week hot streak from our PP once Berube realized Hoffman is good on the PP put our season-long PP% ahead of the Avs. This notion that the Avs success is driven by the refs is absurd.

Blues were better than them 5 on 5 in head to head. So who gives a shit about what they did against the rest of the league?

 

[Brian39]

Blues were better than them 5 on 5 in head to head. So who gives a shit about what they did against the rest of the league?

The Avs outplayed us at 5 on 5 this year by every underlying metric. The Avs were between 54-59% in every single possession, expected and scoring chance metric, but we outscored them 14-12. We faced Johansson or Dubnyk in 5 of our 8 games against the Avs and they both let in a number of very leaky goals. We scored 5 even strength goals against Grubauer in 3 games this season and that is the goalie we will be facing in the playoffs. Even ignoring that 3 or 8 games is a stupidly small sample size to favor actual goals over expected metrics, I'm not at all comfortable saying that 1.66 even strength goals a game will be enough to outplay the Avs at 5 on5. Colorado won the 5 on 5 scoring battle in 2 of Grubauer's 3 starts.

This notion that we outplayed the Avs 5 on 5 and just lost the season series due to the refs isn't true.

 

[Punished ROR]

The Avs outplayed us at 5 on 5 this year by every underlying metric. The Avs were between 54-59% in every single possession, expected and scoring chance metric, but we outscored them 14-12. We faced Johansson or Dubnyk in 5 of our 8 games against the Avs and they both let in a number of very leaky goals. We scored 5 even strength goals against Grubauer in 3 games this season and that is the goalie we will be facing in the playoffs. Even ignoring that 3 or 8 games is a stupidly small sample size to favor actual goals over expected metrics, I'm not at all comfortable saying that 1.66 even strength goals a game will be enough to outplay the Avs at 5 on5. Colorado won the 5 on 5 scoring battle in 2 of Grubauer's 3 starts.

This notion that we outplayed the Avs 5 on 5 and just lost the season series due to the refs isn't true.

thats very well thought out, but on the other hand, Reforado Assalanche

 

[Xerloris]

The Avs outplayed us at 5 on 5 this year by every underlying metric. The Avs were between 54-59% in every single possession, expected and scoring chance metric, but we outscored them 14-12. We faced Johansson or Dubnyk in 5 of our 8 games against the Avs and they both let in a number of very leaky goals. We scored 5 even strength goals against Grubauer in 3 games this season and that is the goalie we will be facing in the playoffs. Even ignoring that 3 or 8 games is a stupidly small sample size to favor actual goals over expected metrics, I'm not at all comfortable saying that 1.66 even strength goals a game will be enough to outplay the Avs at 5 on5. Colorado won the 5 on 5 scoring battle in 2 of Grubauer's 3 starts.

This notion that we outplayed the Avs 5 on 5 and just lost the season series due to the refs isn't true.

We outscored them head to head @ 5 on 5 so no, they did not beat us in every underlying metric and I would dare say we beat them at the only metric that matters.

 

[DeuceNine]

You have no idea what you are talking about regarding the Avs. They have been incredibly good 5 on 5 this season. I think that their numbers are inflated by the COVID scheduling and our crappy division, but they have been inflated from "extremely good" to "historically good."

At 5 on 5, they are 1st in CF%, FF%, SF%, GF%, xGF%, SCF%, and HDCF%. They are 58% or higher in every single one of these metrics. Most impressively, their xGF% sits at 60.8%, which is a staggering 5 point edge on the #2 team in the league. There is a larger xGF% gap between the Avs and the #2 team than there is between the #2 team and the #14 team. That is stunning. Natural Stat Trick goes back to 2007/08 for these types of metrics. This is the first time that any team has finished the season above 58% in xGF% at 5 on 5. Vegas got the benefit of playing against the same crappy division and finished 7th with a 53.29 xGF%. Minny was 13th with a 51.21 and we were 26th with a 46.09. They didn't go from mediocre at 5 on 5 to historically good numbers because of the division. They are exceptionally good at 5 on 5.

I think we match up against them very well stylistically and ROR is arguably the ideal 1C to send out to counter MacKinnon. But this notion of yours that they are a PP team isn't based anywhere near reality. They have a good PP (8th in the NHL), but it is absolutely not the driver of their success. The 5 week hot streak from our PP once Berube realized Hoffman is good on the PP put our season-long PP% ahead of the Avs. This notion that the Avs success is driven by the refs is absurd.

We don't need stats against every other team they play, only against us. And we know that PP discipline is key to beating them. Now, will they get "clowned" -- that might be a stretch, but to say we can't win keeping penalties relatively even just screams not paying attention.

 

[ort]

The Avs are the clear cut dominant favorite... and they should be. I don't like our odds against them. I never have...

That said, the Blues are a much better team than their record indicates and are able to play at a much higher level when motivated.

We see clear cut favorites get ousted early by underdogs every year and there is no reason to believe that isn't possible. I think the odds are stacked against them, but this is still a series they can take with solid team play and some puck luck.

It feels good being the underdog this time. After this goofy-ass, messed up season full of unrelenting injury problems and frustrating uninspired stretches, it will be interesting to see how this goes.

Can they turn it on? Will we see the 2019 playoff Blues or the 2020 playoff Blues?

 

[Brian39]

We don't need stats against every other team they play, only against us. And we know that PP discipline is key to beating them. Now, will they get "clowned" -- that might be a stretch, but to say we can't win keeping penalties relatively even just screams not paying attention.

I don't think anyone here is saying that.