GDT: Devils @ Rangers - 7pm, MSGSN & NHLN

[Patrik26]

And the NHL really thinks that is the sort of garbage play fans pay to watch? it's embarrassing. And the players bear fault as well. If the NHLPA actually cared about its membership they'd want that sort of stuff curtailed. How does it help the union if players cheap shot each other? I'd love to be able to show a video of that sort of stuff to the leadership and ask them those questions in confidence where they could speak freely.

IMO, from the NHL's (and Bettman's IMO) perspective, they love this crap. In their warped sense of fandom, It keeps fans engaged, sports talk talking and controversy never ending.

 

[Eggtimer]

And the NHL really thinks that is the sort of garbage play fans pay to watch? it's embarrassing. And the players bear fault as well. If the NHLPA actually cared about its membership they'd want that sort of stuff curtailed. How does it help the union if players cheap shot each other? I'd love to be able to show a video of that sort of stuff to the leadership and ask them those questions in confidence where they could speak freely.

Yet they call the VV love-tap a penalty …Dude takes a run at a player with intent to blow him up and it’s no biggie .

 

[billingtons ghost]

I don't think Shero did a bad job here at all, other than the weird non-moves he made when we were supposed to ''Compete'' in 2019-2020. I'm not sure if that's what did him in or not, but that was really my only real complaints. Other than failing miserably at his moves with the ''Competitive'' roster in 19-20, I actually didn't think he really did a whole lot to deserve to be fired when he was.

He did miss on just about all of his D acquisitions, other than Vatanen, who was traded for a solid forward and fan favorite in a classic hockey trade. I'm not saying something like Lovejoy was bad, but he was already about 32 years old when he was brought in. He was clearly just brought in to be a veteran stop gap. I'm not counting him, just the young-ish guys he brought in. I mean, don't get me wrong, we got a couple good years out of Will Butcher for sure, but Fitz has mostly hit on his D acquistions, while most of Shero's were just meh. Fitz's Mueller (Siegenthaler) has been infinitely better than we ever imagine Mueller being.

I do think Shero sometimes came off as an arrogant prick sometimes professionally. One such instance was when he got on a podcast after the Taylor Hall MVP year and talked about what he said to him the horrible season the team had the year before. And about how he had Malkin and Crosby in Pittsburgh and how ''These guys are better than you are'' which was not made a big deal of at the time, but I thought it was almost like a low blow and not even needed to be said, like we don't already know that. There were other times where he went a little Torts-lite on the media and used a lot of expletives and just came off like a jerk. Especially the ''I don't care if he f***ing plays in Brampton!'' comment, as funny as we thought it was. Then again, I really would have needed to hear him make the comment to know what kind of a tone he said it in. Maybe he was just being goofy. He also made a lot of backhanded comments towards Lou, without saying Lou's name personally. Not that what he said was untrue in any way, I just thought it was in poor taste. But there were A LOT of ''No more of these band aids and signing these old players. That's not working anymore and that hasn't worked. This is not how you build'' like that in the first couple of years after Lou. They were no doubt true, but I just thought they were low blows at Lou and unneeded. At least as many times as he made them.

Anyway, none of this has anything to do with him as a GM. He just kind of came off snarky as a person sometimes. Whereas Fitz is much more grounded.

I was at a game with my little guy before a game, and Ray and the staff walked past me and I said good luck tonight Ray or something like that and he just sneered at me and fortunately Terreri and I think it was Clowe both smiled and were nice.

I mean, the guy owes me nothing and I get that he's got a job to do, and who am I to grouse, but that did it for me.

Everyone I've ever encountered except him in the Devils org dating back to the 80s has been nice. I've seen Lou answer 'who do you want back?' folks who yelled out that he needed to trade some one and lemaire and Robinson and Burns engage fans and of course Doc/Chico/Mattie/dano etc are always great.

I think you're right and he's a prick.

 

[Guttersniped]

Even with that...Shero's Mirco Mueller move became Fitz's Siegenthaler move. Fitz's Marino trade worked out a lot better than Shero's Subban trade.

Shero can be criticized for ignoring the defense then trying to do an emergency rush build to nowhere. He did a bad job in many ways, it’s ok to say that.

I like to point out that the Rangers traded the 2022 2nd they got for Buchnevich for to Winnipeg for Copp at the last trade deadline. Blais is a 27 year old UFA this off-season, that’s what they got left for a guy with 16 points in 17 games.

 

[Devilsgrl35]

That's certainly better than asking your wife to have 19 children.

 

[Bleedred]

I was at a game with my little guy before a game, and Ray and the staff walked past me and I said good luck tonight Ray or something like that and he just sneered at me and fortunately Terreri and I think it was Clowe both smiled and were nice.

I mean, the guy owes me nothing and I get that he's got a job to do, and who am I to grouse, but that did it for me.

Everyone I've ever encountered except him in the Devils org dating back to the 80s has been nice. I've seen Lou answer 'who do you want back?' folks who yelled out that he needed to trade some one and lemaire and Robinson and Burns engage fans and of course Doc/Chico/Mattie/dano etc are always great.

I think you're right and he's a prick.

This is actually not shocking at all, as he strikes me as a bit of a slimy guy. Sorry he was a jerk to you and your boy. I don't go out of my way to say hello to guys, just out of fear that if they're douchebags it'll ruin them for me. I've met and interacted with players as kid/young adult, but not so much in my older years.

I met Dwayne Roloson about 11 years ago when he played for Tampa. He was up by my work walking around on the beach walk in front of my work. He was real nice and was very surprised that someone recognized him over there. He made a joke that all the younger, better looking guys like Stamkos and Vinny get noticed and even Marty (St. Louis) but he experienced a lot of anonymity in Florida.

He was actually way younger looking and in way better looking shape in person than I imagined only seeing him on TV and in his gear. He was already about 42 by that point and I'm pretty sure he was even the last active NHL player to be born in the 1960's.

I only even said anything to him because I had some Devils gear on and made eye contact with him more than once and felt like I had to say something to him. I think when he saw my Devils attire and saw I made eye contact with him 2-3 times he knew I recognized him. It would have felt awkward not saying something to him at that point. I'm also kind of shy-ish in person and rarely make the first move in engaging with someone, but I'm usually happy to engage in conversation with anyone if they break the ice.

Of course with the Devils gear we had to talk about Lemaire a little bit, as he played for him for quite a while.

 

[Bleedred]

I will never not believe that Brunette has a lot of juice here right now.

Unless he goes and coaches somewhere else and there's not any type of drop off. I hope he doesn't go coach somewhere else.

We look a little too much like the Panthers of last year. The Panthers of this year do not look much like the Panthers of last year. Probably shouldn't have fixed what wasn't broken.

I wouldn't be surprised if there's already a plan for Ruff to step down and ''Retire'' from coaching after this year, with a role of some other kind in the organization, while Brunette completely takes over. Although if my theory is somewhat true, there's probably a better chance that next year might be the final one for Ruff and he'll get a one year extension for next year, with Brunette being guaranteed the job no later than 2024-2025.

And maybe I'm wrong and Andrew Brunette will be the head coach of Vancouver or Philly (ewww) or who knows where next year? I sure hope not. I think Florida made a mistake in letting him go before ever really giving him a chance. I think we may really be making a mistake if we go and do the same.

 

[Hisch13r]

I will never not believe that Brunette has a lot of juice here right now.

Unless he goes and coaches somewhere else and there's not any type of drop off. I hope he doesn't go coach somewhere else.

We look a little too much like the Panthers of last year. The Panthers of this year do not look much like the Panthers of last year. Probably shouldn't have fixed what wasn't broken.

I wouldn't be surprised if there's already a plan for Ruff to step down and ''Retire'' from coaching after this year, with a role of some other kind in the organization, while Brunette completely takes over. Although if my theory is somewhat true, there's probably a better chance that next year might be the final one for Ruff and he'll get a one year extension for next year, with Brunette being guaranteed the job no later than 2024-2025.

And maybe I'm wrong and Andrew Brunette will be the head coach of Vancouver or Philly (ewww) or who knows where next year? I sure hope not. I think Florida made a mistake in letting him go before ever really giving him a chance. I think we may really be making a mistake if we go and do the same.

The Panthers this year are exactly like the Panthers of last year. The puck just isn’t going in. That’s not coaching.

 

[Mgd31]

The Panthers this year are exactly like the Panthers of last year. The puck just isn’t going in. That’s not coaching.

Yea their finishing stinks and their goalies are meh but they are basically the same team.

 

[swiiscompos]

Zacha with the most Zachaest missed open net.

 

[Bleedred]

The Panthers this year are exactly like the Panthers of last year. The puck just isn’t going in. That’s not coaching.

They're not getting as many goals off the rush. They did get a couple in the Blues game the other night.

They play much more of a Pete DeBoer grind it out style. Or dare I say a Darryl Sutter style?

Their possession game is good, but there's really not as many rush chances as they had last year. I'm sure there's data that would back that up. Like the ones Bryce Salvador cites a lot on our broadcasts.

They're playing a different game under Maurice.

Not to mention that Bob has been absolutely worthless and right back in decline mode (gee's there a f***in surprise) after an up year last season. He's toast.

Knight looks like he's ready to take over or at least get a lot more games though.

 

[Patrik26]

I was at a game with my little guy before a game, and Ray and the staff walked past me and I said good luck tonight Ray or something like that and he just sneered at me and fortunately Terreri and I think it was Clowe both smiled and were nice.

I mean, the guy owes me nothing and I get that he's got a job to do, and who am I to grouse, but that did it for me.

Everyone I've ever encountered except him in the Devils org dating back to the 80s has been nice. I've seen Lou answer 'who do you want back?' folks who yelled out that he needed to trade some one and lemaire and Robinson and Burns engage fans and of course Doc/Chico/Mattie/dano etc are always great.

I think you're right and he's a prick.

And here I had a different interaction with Shero. We were at a Riveters Saturday game back in 2017 at Prudential and we were walking the concourse basically by ourselves as we were late to the game. I said to my wife I think that's Shero up ahead talking to someone from the organization. As we got closer, their conversation ended and I said hello. He was more than congenial and we spoke for a few minutes. I remember it was right after Palmieri had hurt his ankle in practice and the Devils had just traded Wedgewood to Arizona. He said Palmieri was hurt but it likely wasn't long term. Nothing about the Wedgewood deal though.

Anyway, I asked for a picture and he said sure. So my experience was positive. Granted this was at the front-end of his time here and things were still rose-colored so, yeah one good season (17-18) followed by the disasters that followed probably contributed to his demeanor souring as time went on.

 

[MasterofGrond]

Panthers gotta stop playing Bob as much as possible. That contract is a sunk cost right now, and you gotta win games, you're below the red wings right now