News & Notes XLIII: Cam Ward is a Cute lil 10 Year Old

[bleedgreen]

I mean they are people who would absolutely know and I have no reason to doubt what they were saying. I was a little surprised as well

Coming from you when he’s on the way out the door is curious timing, and I can’t help but wonder if the people you talk to are similar to you in how they feel in the first place. TDA was always a polarizing person/topic that some people were never going to accept no matter what. There has to be a story somewhere, always. He could do the same exact thing another player would do and someone would tell the tale of TDA being TDA. There’s been zero talk about this stuff his whole time with us…at all….and now that he’s gone we’ve got a “trust me bro” story that people around here are going to take as actual truth. I don’t accept your slander of the guy without more proof than that.

At most we heard halfway through the year he was frustrated he couldn’t get into the lineup…..which is kind of a “no shit Sherlock” situation. I would never expect that guy to be dancing jigs because he can’t play. He wants to play well enough to stay in the league, and he knew he wouldn’t stay if he couldn’t get it. Which has played out, he was right.

 

[hblueridgegal]

See, I have doubts about this story.

If he was dealing with that kind of pain constantly and apparently attempted to tell the Caps medical staff/GM/whoever (and I suppose the Canes as well, though he never mentioned them), why would they ignore him? And the medical staff never noticed that he was self-medicating or only sleeping 2 hours a night? And I don't know much about RA, but to my understanding, it's not something that just "gets better" to the point where you can go off medication for months at a time.

A lot of his statement doesn't really add up.

I take a biologic for PA and several in my family have been on Embrel and Humira for RA for almost 20 years. I have had all the therapies but the biologics have worked best for me. They've evolved a lot in recent years and can be very targeted in how they attack the symptoms without completely wiping out your immune system. In the early days, the immunosuppressants could leave you vulnerable for just about everything.

It takes a while to find the best one with the least amount of side effects. While you do get a period of remission from the biologics even if you stop them, flares do tend to happen eventually or while you're transitioning to a different med.

 

[bleedgreen]

See, I have doubts about this story.

If he was dealing with that kind of pain constantly and apparently attempted to tell the Caps medical staff/GM/whoever (and I suppose the Canes as well, though he never mentioned them), why would they ignore him? And the medical staff never noticed that he was self-medicating or only sleeping 2 hours a night? And I don't know much about RA, but to my understanding, it's not something that just "gets better" to the point where you can go off medication for months at a time.

A lot of his statement doesn't really add up.

How did Bryan Bickle go from being a top power forward to a guy they could barely play once he got paid, to the point where he became a cap dump they had to attach TT to so they could move him only to find out in a very short amount of time with us that he had MS? How the hell does a professional team with a professional medical staff miss MS?!? MS and ALS are the first things they want to rule out when you have anything neurological or just weird symptoms they can’t explain.

I’ve known a couple of people that lost their careers to RA, it hit them young too. RA has a lot more credibility to it than a flesh eating bacteria hiding in your shin pads. The meds can mess you up and you can get in your own head about it too. The stress of dealing with all this on top of the meds could easily lead to big sleep problems which snowballs.

 

[WreckingCrew]

How did Bryan Bickle go from being a top power forward to a guy they could barely play once he got paid, to the point where he became a cap dump they had to attach TT to so they could move him only to find out in a very short amount of time with us that he had MS? How the hell does a professional team with a professional medical staff miss MS?!? MS and ALS are the first things they want to rule out when you have anything neurological or just weird symptoms they can’t explain.

I’ve known a couple of people that lost their careers to RA, it hit them young too. RA has a lot more credibility to it than a flesh eating bacteria hiding in your shin pads. The meds can mess you up and you can get in your own head about it too. The stress of dealing with all this on top of the meds could easily lead to big sleep problems which snowballs.

Word choice here is a bit on-the-nose

 

[chaz4hockey]

Athletic survey on public/fan base confidence of each team's front-office. Canes were #2 LY and now #8. The"Public" made up of other team's fan bases view the Canes mgt. more favorably than our "fan base".

 

[DaveG]

I mean let's be real, they punted at the deadline two years ago when they absolutely should have been buyers and this year when they did buy they FAFO'd on a guy they should have had no issues re-signing. C+ for trading seems generous.

 

[bleedgreen]

We have smart people running us and generally their plan seems to make sense but I can’t help but feel at times that there’s some learning on the job going on. TD being a big part of that, as we’ve learned how big a part of the gm duties he likes to be involved in.

 

[chaz4hockey]

We have smart people running us and generally their plan seems to make sense but I can’t help but feel at times that there’s some learning on the job going on. TD being a big part of that, as we’ve learned how big a part of the gm duties he likes to be involved in.

Worth a chuckle.... Leafs came in at 30 and Islanders at 32.

 

[Nikishin Go Boom]

I mean let's be real, they punted at the deadline two years ago when they absolutely should have been buyers and this year when they did buy they FAFO'd on a guy they should have had no issues re-signing. C+ for trading seems generous.

2 years ago deadline was awful as far as available players, lets not pretend that us punting that one was a bad thing.

 

[DaveG]

2 years ago deadline was awful as far as available players, lets not pretend that us punting that one was a bad thing.

no it wasn't, they just got so hyper-focused on Meier that they completely blew their chance at some of the guys that could have made a difference that were moved before he was: Nino, Barbashev, O'Reilly, Tarasenko, Horvat. If we had told San Jose "shit or get off the pot" a week earlier we could have brought in two of those guys rather easily.

 

[Big Daddy Cane]

A conservative approach at prior deadlines is why they were able to be aggressive with Guentzel and come away relatively unscathed futures-wise.

I do concede that the importance of that is a question mark in an era in which teams that have drained their war chests have lifted the cup (Tampa, Vegas, Florida).

 

[chaz4hockey]

Canes STM trip to Seattle in October this year.

 

[Nikishin Go Boom]

no it wasn't, they just got so hyper-focused on Meier that they completely blew their chance at some of the guys that could have made a difference that were moved before he was: Nino, Barbashev, O'Reilly, Tarasenko, Horvat. If we had told San Jose "shit or get off the pot" a week earlier we could have brought in two of those guys rather easily.

so we did go after horvat, vancouver wasnt interested. vancouver was only interested in the highest first round pick they could get.

tell me how ROR did. how about Tarasenko? how much did they cost to not affect their team's playoffs?

Barbashev wasnt a good target until he actually looked like a good player. He had 11 goals up to that point.

who doesnt target Meier over Nino?

 

[DaveG]

That's why you tell San Jose to stop f***ing us around a week before they made their decision, so that there's time to go back to get a Nino deal worked out when they inevitably say they're going with New Jersey's offer. It's clear the team didn't have a plan B worked out instead of Meier because the end result was Poolparty to facilitate a trade for Edmonton to bring in their best defenseman. There's just no defending the end result of that deadline in my books when we knew that the cap crunch was coming up after last season anyway.

 

[Chrispy]

That's why you tell San Jose to stop f***ing us around a week before they made their decision, so that there's time to go back to get a Nino deal worked out when they inevitably say they're going with New Jersey's offer. It's clear the team didn't have a plan B worked out instead of Meier because the end result was Poolparty to facilitate a trade for Edmonton to bring in their best defenseman. There's just no defending the end result of that deadline in my books when we knew that the cap crunch was coming up after last season anyway.

I understand the "all-in" nature of the Meier bid. If they were willing to sign Meier long-term as NJ did, he certainly helps the transition this off-season having another top 6 forward signed long-term.

A rental like ROR or Barbashev doesn't help the transition unless you sign them at market value. Nino would have been yet another piece to deal with this off-season. Terasenko they almost got the following off-season and then he fired his agent(!?)

I can see an argument for Horvat if you're willing to sign a similar deal to Meier, but as @Nikishin Go Boom points out Carolina couldn't match the pick the Islanders could offer. And that's before considering Horvat signed through his age 35/36 season; Meier through his age 34 season. That's the type of thing Tulsky factors in.

 

[Nikishin Go Boom]

That's why you tell San Jose to stop f***ing us around a week before they made their decision, so that there's time to go back to get a Nino deal worked out when they inevitably say they're going with New Jersey's offer. It's clear the team didn't have a plan B worked out instead of Meier because the end result was Poolparty to facilitate a trade for Edmonton to bring in their best defenseman. There's just no defending the end result of that deadline in my books when we knew that the cap crunch was coming up after last season anyway.

A top line beefy scorer is what we needed. There was only one available. You don’t try to rush that process by putting an ultimatum on the event

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

That's why you tell San Jose to stop f***ing us around a week before they made their decision, so that there's time to go back to get a Nino deal worked out when they inevitably say they're going with New Jersey's offer. It's clear the team didn't have a plan B worked out instead of Meier because the end result was Poolparty to facilitate a trade for Edmonton to bring in their best defenseman. There's just no defending the end result of that deadline in my books when we knew that the cap crunch was coming up after last season anyway.

Maybe we did tell SJ to shit or get off the pot. SJ’s job is to get the best deal possible so they weren’t inclined to rush it.

They trade Meier 5-6 days before the deadline. The Guentzel trade, for instance, deal didn’t happen until the last day.

 

[hblueridgegal]

Worth a chuckle.... Leafs came in at 30 and Islanders at 32.

Sounds like fans have lost faith in Ron Francis, too.

 

[LakeLivin]

Let's face it; unless the Canes win the Cup, after the fact many fans will be critical of what the Borg did, no matter what it was.

Tulsky has said on a couple occasions that they're not afraid to make a move, and if they hit 3 out of 5 they probably come out ahead of where they'd be if they'd done nothing. But which of those 5 do you think will get the most attention?

 

[DaveG]

Sounds like fans have lost faith in Ron Francis, too.

I think unrealistic expectations on that one based on what Vegas was able to do in the expansion draft. Other teams learned from MAJOR mistakes in that one and weren't caught with their pants down when Seattle got their turn. Seattle looks a lot like your traditional expansion team except they had a really bad coach for three seasons to go along with it. That (and the Montour signing) is the place that Ron should be getting the most heat.

 

[hblueridgegal]

I think unrealistic expectations on that one based on what Vegas was able to do in the expansion draft. Other teams learned from MAJOR mistakes in that one and weren't caught with their pants down when Seattle got their turn. Seattle looks a lot like your traditional expansion team except they had a really bad coach for three seasons to go along with it. That (and the Montour signing) is the place that Ron should be getting the most heat.

In the article, the quote they used from the fanbase was "too slow to act or move."

 

[cptjeff]

In the article, the quote they used from the fanbase was "too slow to act or move."

Some of us did warn them...

 

[bleedgreen]

In the article, the quote they used from the fanbase was "too slow to act or move."

They’ve been saying that before he had a chance to make a move. I’ve followed the team not just for obvious reasons but I truly like them. There’s been a strong force amongst him from day one. It felt like they took so much heat from the expansion draft they were against him from the get go. RF has group of haters that rival Yzerman, to the point of it doesn’t even really make sense. I feel like most people aggressively voting against him are probably like this.

They made the playoffs once and went far, have three top ten picks and a coffer full of prospects. They have a solid team with a good future, even if it wasn’t RF you’d have to say they’re in a pretty good spot. They are going to have to fight to get good players not unlike the Canes as they’re not a big market either, which is why they’ll have to overpay a bit with free agents.

I listened to Boomer give the report card the other day and assumed he’d be down on them like every one else….nope. He thinks RF has them set up well and things are about as good as they can be.

If they fired him now it would be pretty similar to him being fired then, whoever takes over will have a lot of assets to work with from day one.

 

[CandyCanes]

I think unrealistic expectations on that one based on what Vegas was able to do in the expansion draft. Other teams learned from MAJOR mistakes in that one and weren't caught with their pants down when Seattle got their turn. Seattle looks a lot like your traditional expansion team except they had a really bad coach for three seasons to go along with it. That (and the Montour signing) is the place that Ron should be getting the most heat.

The Montour contract is alright, but not good. But I thought the Chandler Stephenson 7 years @ $6.25M might go down as one of the worst contracts ever. He’s going to get fired for that one

 

[bleedgreen]

The Montour contract is alright, but not good. But I thought the Chandler Stephenson 7 years @ $6.25M might go down as one of the worst contracts ever. He’s going to get fired for that one

Maybe. Maybe not. They are really weak down the middle. I heard an interview with Trotz who said they were in big on Stephenson too. If he’s a 50 pt or more center in the top six with the cap rising I’m not convinced that’s a bad deal at all until the back half where all ufa contracts go bad. He could score more than that. To me it’s a continuation of deals like JT Compher with some inflation to it. A mid range player who fits anywhere in the lineup and as your kids come along you move him where you need to. He’s a much better player than KK and he only makes a million and change more which could just be the difference in the market a few years later.