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Devils discussion (news, notes and speculation) - part III

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ZachaFlockaFlame said:
Yes because comparing our bottom 6 to a team who made the dance the year prior is equally smart and I told you why it's completely foolish to compare ourselves to Florida but you do you with coddling this team's bottom 6 being beyond pathetic and especially the fourth line. Tatar has a history of no showing the playoffs through his whole career. Bastian was apart of a line that got absolutely mauled in 2023 v Carolina. But yeah both of them won't be issues, keep telling yourself that.
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You are shifting the goalposts. At no point did I mention the 3rd line, which is very actively the problem. The 4th line is fine, if they get a decent center.

Tatar has a history of not scoring in the playoffs, he doesn't have a history of no-showing the playoffs. Tatar has a playoff PDO of 968 and is still only -7 which is quite an achievement. A little sample of players' 5v5 goal differential who have a ~968 in PDO this year:

Kirby Dach: -17
Kevin Fiala: -1
Will Borgen: -15
Matvei Michkov: -9

And so on.

Comparing Bastian in 2023, when the Devils ran a different system against a team almost explicitly designed to beat a system like the Devils were running, to Bastian now, is also a fine bit of intellectual dishonesty.

The Devils aren't going to acquire 3 forwards at the deadline. They need to figure out who can drive the bus and who can't, Lazar absolutely can't.
 
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Maybe they're not cut out for this whole "Cup contender" thing. It feels like the collective team is still mentally immature and can't handle an ounce of adversity or they fold like paper tigers. A trade will help, but it needs to be a good one, and I don't think that will deal with the very real mental block they seem to run into most years.
 
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Triumph said:
You are shifting the goalposts. At no point did I mention the 3rd line, which is very actively the problem. The 4th line is fine, if they get a decent center.

Tatar has a history of not scoring in the playoffs, he doesn't have a history of no-showing the playoffs. Tatar has a playoff PDO of 968 and is still only -7 which is quite an achievement. A little sample of players' 5v5 goal differential who have a ~968 in PDO this year:

Kirby Dach: -17
Kevin Fiala: -1
Will Borgen: -15
Matvei Michkov: -9

And so on.

Comparing Bastian in 2023, when the Devils ran a different system against a team almost explicitly designed to beat a system like the Devils were running, to Bastian now, is also a fine bit of intellectual dishonesty.

The Devils aren't going to acquire 3 forwards at the deadline. They need to figure out who can drive the bus and who can't, Lazar absolutely can't.
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Kevin Fiala has been ridiculed by Wild and Kings fans on this exact board for not showing up in the playoffs either, so what exactly is the point you're making? Dach sucks, Michkov is a rookie and Borgen????? And lmao, that same team is most likely going to be their R1 opponent again and the Devils have done nothing to show they're able to win in Carolina when the Canes will most likely have home ice in said series. It's going to be same thing on this board, the depth is dogshit +stars get neutered by a very good defensive team/coach who'll be able to match Keefe's life away and we come out of the series saying "How did that happen lolz? when it was beyond evident it would happen in said series. They're not winning a series v Carolina because the skaters showed up anyway with this current group. And no shit, I said the bottom thing, Fitz destroyed the bottom 6 to the point where you need to legitimately make roster moves in the summer to fix it via UFA/trades possibly.
 
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TheBeerNerd said:
Maybe they're not cut out for this whole "Cup contender" thing. It feels like the collective team is still mentally immature and can't handle an ounce of adversity or they fold like paper tigers. A trade will help, but it needs to be a good one, and I don't think that will deal with the very real mental block they seem to run into most years.
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The top guys having to show up for every f***ing game is also beyond comical and on management
 
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ZachaFlockaFlame said:
Yes because comparing our bottom 6 to a team who made the dance the year prior is equally smart and I told you why it's completely foolish to compare ourselves to Florida but you do you with coddling this team's bottom 6 being beyond pathetic and especially the fourth line. Tatar has a history of no showing the playoffs through his whole career. Bastian was apart of a line that got absolutely mauled in 2023 v Carolina. But yeah both of them won't be issues, keep telling yourself that.
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Mikey and Nate upped their games against carolina in that playoff series. I remember the icetime going up for them. Not sure what you were watching
 
ZachaFlockaFlame said:
Kevin Fiala has been ridiculed by Wild and Kings fans on this exact board for not showing up in the playoffs either, so what exactly is the point you're making? Dach sucks, Michkov is a rookie and Borgen????? And lmao, that same team is most likely going to be their R1 opponent again and the Devils have done nothing to show they're able to win in Carolina when the Canes will most likely have home ice in said series. It's going to be same thing on this board, the depth is dogshit +stars get neutered by a very good defensive team/coach who'll be able to match Keefe's life away and we come out of the series saying "How did that happen lolz? when it was beyond evident it would happen in said series. They're not winning a series v Carolina because the skaters showed up anyway with this current group. And no shit, I said the bottom thing, Fitz destroyed the bottom 6 to the point where you need to legitimately make roster moves in the summer to fix it via UFA/trades possibly.
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You didn't read what I wrote at all. These are examples of players who have been similarly unlucky THIS SEASON. Tatar has been a poor shooter in the playoffs, but his linemates have also let him down horribly - territorially, Tatar has traditionally been just fine.

They're not finding 3 forwards.

Hilariously, Bastian was a + in that series while a lot of forwards were a gigantic minus, but I wouldn't take anything away from that series at all. Both teams are different now, it was 5 games 2 years ago.
 
Devs3cups said:
I’m actually quite shocked we’re still in that good of a spot standings wise.
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So am I

but we probably just had our softest few weeks of the schedule that we will have all season.

I know I say often we lose to humpty teams, but we don’t lose to every humpty team. We finally beat Philly on the third try. We don’t lose every game to these types of teams. That’s why they’re humpty teams.

But Vegas was the first particularly good team we’ve played since Toronto 9 games and 3 weeks ago. And Ottawa is literally the only team since then that we’ve played who is even in a playoff spot. Outside of three in a row against Tampa, Florida and Toronto we’ve had a pretty soft schedule since Christmas. Two in a row against Carolina coming out of the break and then LA a few games later, but it’s mostly been a soft ass schedule since Christmas.

And we still only went 4-4-0 in an 8 game stretch against Philly x3, Ottawa, Boston, Montreal, Buffalo and Pittsburgh. And we almost lost to Pittsburgh if not for the extremely rare shootout win.
 
Triumph said:
You didn't read what I wrote at all. These are examples of players who have been similarly unlucky THIS SEASON. Tatar has been a poor shooter in the playoffs, but his linemates have also let him down horribly - territorially, Tatar has traditionally been just fine.

They're not finding 3 forwards.

Hilariously, Bastian was a + in that series while a lot of forwards were a gigantic minus, but I wouldn't take anything away from that series at all. Both teams are different now, it was 5 games 2 years ago.
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Tatar being a consistent bad shooter in the playoffs is in line with how he plays and is in the playoffs, I love the player but there's evident warts in his game as to why he's been scratched on multiple teams in the format. And where did I say it would happen in season for the 100th time? I know they aren't going to find them in year, it's in the offseason if anything. Fitz has to wear making the depth abysmal and it might wind up costing him his job eventually
 
HersheyBob27 said:
Imagine that 9M a year and having to show up for work every day 🤪
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Well if you were a pro athlete, you'd understand that other guys can randomly show up nightly at lower salaries too.

TheBeerNerd said:
I think you're mixing up "showing up" and "carrying the team." They've been asked to do the latter lately and it shows.
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The top guys have been fine, Bratt/Jack have had to carry the carcass of Ondrej Palat for the whole year. The injuries have destroyed any semblance of depth they were going for. Justin Dowling has played 30 games this year which is beyond a joke. You tell anyone here that happened and everyone would think we'd be drafting James Hagens at 1 in June.
 
ZachaFlockaFlame said:
Meier shooting below 10% won't continue when the guy has been at 12-13% his whole career

And the bottom 6 has been destroyed by Fitz being a moron and getting brain damage from the 2023 Carolina series like the whole franchise has
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This is the old 'luck' argument, but the reason he's not shooting 12% could be bc he's become a perimeter non threat player who isn't creating for himself anymore and isn't in a position to score. Or it could be bc we don't get shots to the net for him to get rebound chances, or it could be that his linemates don't make space for him. Idk. It could be allot of things.
Diminished ice time. Lack of takeaways (12 this year, 49 his last year as a Shark... And his giveaways are about the same..

I'm not going to hold my breath. He's not winning puck battles, he's rarely in position to deflect a puck and he's not getting shit for second chance rebounds.

He might regress to his mean, or maybe this his regression to the mean.
 
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HersheyBob27 said:
Mikey and Nate upped their games against carolina in that playoff series. I remember the icetime going up for them. Not sure what you were watching
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McLeod got caved in that series 5v5

Jack and Timo were the only top 6 forwards who showed up that series on the scoresheet most nights + the McLeod/Bastian/Wood line which got caved but somehow scored the most random goals in that series. That's why it looked like that
 
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billingtons ghost said:
This is the old 'luck' argument, but the reason he's not shooting 12% could be bc he's become a perimeter non threat player who isn't creating for himself anymore and isn't in a position to score. Or it could be bc we don't get shots to the net for him to get rebound chances, or it could be that his linemates don't make space for him. Idk. It could be allot of things.
Diminished ice time. Lack of takeaways (12 this year, 49 his last year as a Shark... And his giveaways are about the same..

I'm not going to hold my breath. He's not winning puck battles, he's rarely in position to deflect a puck and he's not getting shit for second chance rebounds.

He might regress to his mean, or maybe this his regression to the mean.
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His 22-23 on SJ was always going to be a fallacy on a good NJ team, his SJ years on good Sharks teams were way more feasible obviously. A lot went right for him in 22-23, he shot a ton on a bad team and got every chance at ice time because of the Sharks most likely knowing they wouldn't re-sign him and therefore allowing him to gather stats to max his trade value.

As for this year's argument, hiis price tag is the reason people are up in arms which is fine, he needs to score, he's making 9M. It's not ok for Timo to be on pace for around 25-28 goals. I also don't agree with the puck battles and other stuff, he's doing everything he can besides score. He shot at 12% last year and scored 28 in a mediocre year for his standards. That alone should tell you this is an aberration and not the norm.
 
billingtons ghost said:
This is the old 'luck' argument, but the reason he's not shooting 12% could be bc he's become a perimeter non threat player who isn't creating for himself anymore and isn't in a position to score. Or it could be bc we don't get shots to the net for him to get rebound chances, or it could be that his linemates don't make space for him. Idk. It could be allot of things.
Diminished ice time. Lack of takeaways (12 this year, 49 his last year as a Shark... And his giveaways are about the same..

I'm not going to hold my breath. He's not winning puck battles, he's rarely in position to deflect a puck and he's not getting shit for second chance rebounds.

He might regress to his mean, or maybe this his regression to the mean.
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I very much doubt more of his chances are coming from the perimeter than earlier in his career. These are just things that are said when the puck doesn’t go in.
 
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