Predict the Atlantic Standings

[The90]

Zero pressure on the Sens in the 2nd half of last year being miles out of a playoff spot. History has shown countless times that It's fools gold to think that a late season surge by an also-ran equates to success in the following season. Until the Sens upgrade their D and bring in a HC who can teach them how to play in a structured manner, they are still going to be looking up to the big 4, Toronto, TB, Boston and Florida. One last thing, don't expect career backup and minor leaguer G Anton Forsberg to stand on his head again, he was outstanding last year.

A full year of Lindholm for you guys should be huge. Can’t see you guys any worse than fourth. Likely not first because of the injuries but depending how well they’re able to weather the early season storm 2-4 comfortably.

 

[DaveMatthew]

Show your work. Tiered ranking. 1-12 or 1-18 depending on if you want to do top 6 or top 9. Show your work how Ottawa’s forwards are comparable to Florida

Well let's look at 2023 projections for the top 9 forward groups of both teams, brought to you by ESPN (although for some reason, they projected injuries, so I just used their per game rates to project across 82 games):

Florida
1. Aleksander Barkov: 41 goals, 102 points
2. Matthew Tkachuk: 34 goals, 90 points
3. Sam Reinhart: 35 goals, 86 points
4. Carter Verhaeghe: 25 goals, 65 points
5. Anton Lundell: 23 goals, 56 points
6. Anthony Duclair: 24 goals, 52 points
7. Sam Bennett: 26 goals, 48 points
8. Patric Honrnqvist: 15 goals, 36 points
9. Colin White*: 10 goals, 35 points

Total: 233 goals, 570 points

Ottawa
1. Drake Batherson: 31 goals, 82 points
2. Brady Tkachuk: 35 goals, 80 points
3. Alex DeBrincat: 40 goals, 76 points
4. Josh Norris: 44 goals, 76 points
5. Claude Giroux: 23 goals, 73 points
6. Tim Stützle: 28 goals, 72 points
7. Alex Formenton*: 20 goals, 40 points
8. Mathieu Joseph*: 15 goals, 35 points
9. Shane Pinto*: 12 goals, 35 points

Total: 248 goals, 569 points

*ESPN had no projections so I made them based on last season's performance.

Florida certainly has the 2 most best and most accomplished players, but Ottawa has a better 4-6. I'd say it's pretty comparable.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Well let's look at 2023 projections for the top 9 forward groups of both teams, brought to you by ESPN (although for some reason, they projected injuries, so I just used their per game rates to project across 82 games):

Florida
1. Aleksander Barkov: 41 goals, 102 points
2. Matthew Tkachuk: 34 goals, 90 points
3. Sam Reinhart: 35 goals, 86 points
4. Carter Verhaeghe: 25 goals, 65 points
5. Anton Lundell: 23 goals, 56 points
6. Anthony Duclair: 24 goals, 52 points
7. Sam Bennett: 26 goals, 48 points
8. Patric Honrnqvist: 15 goals, 36 points
9. Colin White*: 10 goals, 35 points

Total: 233 goals, 570 points

Ottawa
1. Drake Batherson: 31 goals, 82 points
2. Brady Tkachuk: 35 goals, 80 points
3. Alex DeBrincat: 40 goals, 76 points
4. Josh Norris: 44 goals, 76 points
5. Claude Giroux: 23 goals, 73 points
6. Tim Stützle: 28 goals, 72 points
7. Claude Giroux: 23 goals, 73 points
8. Alex Formenton*: 20 goals, 35 points
9. Mathieu Joseph*: 15 goals, 35 points

Total: 259 goals, 602 points

*ESPN had no projections so I made them based on last season's performance.

Florida certainly has the 2 most best and most accomplished players, but Ottawa has more depth. I'd say it's pretty comparable. Based on ESPN projections, Ottawa's group is expected to produce more.

Switch one of your Giroux for a Pinto.

Hard for Duclair to get 52 points if he’s going to miss close to half the season.

 

[DaveMatthew]

Switch one of your Giroux for a Pinto.

Hard for Duclair to get 52 points if he’s out until Christmas.

Whoops. Fixed.

 

[Kshahdoo]

 

[TheGoldenJet]

It's a possibility. Like I said, the most important additions to Detroit this year is better coaching and better goaltending. Husso was 7th in Vezina voting on a St. Louis team that was not nearly as good defensively as they were in years past. Boughner has run one of the top PKs in the league the last 4 seasons, and Lalonde comes from the Tampa program.

The blowouts were less a result of a talent deficit and more from poor coaching that the players just stopped listening to. Losing 9-2 against the f***ing Coyotes, pulling a goalie, then putting them back in net after the backup flops, having an empty net with 5:30 left on the clock, and problems like this were a result of Blashill not getting buy-in from the players. Detroit probably should have been an 82-84 point team last season instead of a 74 point team.

The blowouts last year give me very little confidence in the Wings being a playoff team just one season later.

I’d love to be wrong of course.

 

[Blowfish]

oh my this is good...

 

[Blowfish]

Still say it's going to be a dog's breakfast in the East with the real possibility 5-7 teams battling for a playoff spot. Not going to be a cake-walk as some seem to believe.

Thinking Tampa is the only team guaranteed a spot only because they "by a very large margin" have the best Dman and goaltender in the league.

 

[TheImpatientPanther]

Well let's look at 2023 projections for the top 9 forward groups of both teams, brought to you by ESPN (although for some reason, they projected injuries, so I just used their per game rates to project across 82 games):

Florida
1. Aleksander Barkov: 41 goals, 102 points
2. Matthew Tkachuk: 34 goals, 90 points
3. Sam Reinhart: 35 goals, 86 points
4. Carter Verhaeghe: 25 goals, 65 points
5. Anton Lundell: 23 goals, 56 points
6. Anthony Duclair: 24 goals, 52 points
7. Sam Bennett: 26 goals, 48 points
8. Patric Honrnqvist: 15 goals, 36 points
9. Colin White*: 10 goals, 35 points

Total: 233 goals, 570 points

Ottawa
1. Drake Batherson: 31 goals, 82 points
2. Brady Tkachuk: 35 goals, 80 points
3. Alex DeBrincat: 40 goals, 76 points
4. Josh Norris: 44 goals, 76 points
5. Claude Giroux: 23 goals, 73 points
6. Tim Stützle: 28 goals, 72 points
7. Alex Formenton*: 20 goals, 40 points
8. Mathieu Joseph*: 15 goals, 35 points
9. Shane Pinto*: 12 goals, 35 points

Total: 248 goals, 569 points

*ESPN had no projections so I made them based on last season's performance.

Florida certainly has the 2 most best and most accomplished players, but Ottawa has a better 4-6. I'd say it's pretty comparable.

All those points for Ottawa career highs?
Not about to put in the time and effort to check.

 

[DaveMatthew]

All those points for Ottawa career highs?
Not about to put in the time and effort to check.

For the Senators, the ESPN projections have career highs for Batherson, Tkachuk, Norris and Stützle.
For the Panthers, they project career highs for Barkov, Reinhart, Verhaeaghe, Bennett and Lundell.

Both sets of projections are, IMO, overly optimistic. But even if you knock them down a peg, I think the forward groups are pretty comparable, which was the original point.

 

[TheImpatientPanther]

On the Senators, the ESPN projections have career highs for Batherson, Tkachuk, Norris and Stützle.
On the Panthers, they project career highs for Barkov, Reinhart, Verhaeaghe, Bennett and Lundell.

Appreciate it, just seemed high for most of the Senators players.
I believe in their offense, it's just the defense and goaltending that is full of question marks

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

Well let's look at 2023 projections for the top 9 forward groups of both teams, brought to you by ESPN (although for some reason, they projected injuries, so I just used their per game rates to project across 82 games):

Florida
1. Aleksander Barkov: 41 goals, 102 points
2. Matthew Tkachuk: 34 goals, 90 points
3. Sam Reinhart: 35 goals, 86 points
4. Carter Verhaeghe: 25 goals, 65 points
5. Anton Lundell: 23 goals, 56 points
6. Anthony Duclair: 24 goals, 52 points
7. Sam Bennett: 26 goals, 48 points
8. Patric Honrnqvist: 15 goals, 36 points
9. Colin White*: 10 goals, 35 points

Total: 233 goals, 570 points

Ottawa
1. Drake Batherson: 31 goals, 82 points
2. Brady Tkachuk: 35 goals, 80 points
3. Alex DeBrincat: 40 goals, 76 points
4. Josh Norris: 44 goals, 76 points
5. Claude Giroux: 23 goals, 73 points
6. Tim Stützle: 28 goals, 72 points
7. Alex Formenton*: 20 goals, 40 points
8. Mathieu Joseph*: 15 goals, 35 points
9. Shane Pinto*: 12 goals, 35 points

Total: 248 goals, 569 points

*ESPN had no projections so I made them based on last season's performance.

Florida certainly has the 2 most best and most accomplished players, but Ottawa has a better 4-6. I'd say it's pretty comparable.

Maybe I'll end up eating crow, but I'd be surprised if Ottawa ends up with 6 guys scoring 70+ points. How many teams in the past decade have managed to have that many 70+ point scorers in one season?

I know that assumes everyone plays a full 82 games, but still. Most players need a lot of PP points to pad their stats to reach 70+ and there's only so much PP time on the top unit to pass around to achieve that.

 

[OgeeOgelthorpe]

The blowouts last year give me very little confidence in the Wings being a playoff team just one season later.

I’d love to be wrong of course.

The blowouts were a combination of piss poor goaltending from Greiss and Nedeljkovic, piss poor defense from DeKeyser, Leddy, Oesterle, Hronek, Lindstrom, piss poor defense from Suter, Zadina, Fabbri, and the coaching from Blashill and Houda. I'd say 60% on coaching and 40% on personnel. Blashill should have been fired in 2020 when the team first gave up on him. I think Yzerman keeping him until the end of 2022 is probably his only big mistake with Detroit so far.

Suter, Zadina and Fabbri are still there at forward but are going to be properly 3rd line instead of 1st or 2nd.
Greiss has been replaced with a guy that was 7th in Vezina voting. And Nedeljkovic shouldn't be overworked as a result.
DeKeyser is gone. So is Leddy's deadbeat ass. Oesterle will be at best the 8th defenseman for Detroit this year, and Hronek might have a partner worth a damn.

As much as people say Maatta and Chiarot aren't huge additions they would have been the 2nd and 4th best defensemen on Detroit's D last year. I expect Edvinsson to come in and he is pretty advanced defensively for his age. Whether he's the #2 or #3 LD on Detroit doesn't bother me. He's a clear upgrade on any LD from last season.

Detroit also added a full 2nd line. Copp has been trending up for the last 3 seasons. Perron seems to only get better with age and is a great powerplay weapon with more powerplay points than anyone on the Wings last year. Kubalik had a down year but in his rookie and sophomore seasons he paced 55 and 56 points. I wouldn't be surprised to see him play with Larkin and Raymond while Bertuzzi gives line 2 a boost and Vrana is a weapon on line 3.

Also what's forgotten is how good Boughner is at teaching and running PK schemes. His teams have pretty consistently been near the top of the league. Lalonde also runs a solid PK scheme so I would expect Detroit's penalty kill to be at least league average. Same with the powerplay. 10 more PPG for, 10 fewer PPG against doesn't seem crazy.

If scoring in 2023 is similar to last season then I'm expecting Detroit to be somewhere between 250-270GF and 250-260GA.

 

[DaveMatthew]

Maybe I'll end up eating crow, but I'd be surprised if Ottawa ends up with 6 guys scoring 70+ points. How many teams in the past decade have managed to have that many 70+ point scorers in one season?

I know that assumes everyone plays a full 82 games, but still. Most players need a lot of PP points to pad their stats to reach 70+ and there's only so much PP time on the top unit to pass around to achieve that.

I think the ESPN projection for both teams are too much. Personally, I'd say:

Florida
1. Aleksander Barkov: 40 goals, 100 points
2. Matthew Tkachuk: 35 goals, 95 points
3. Sam Reinhart: 30 goals, 75 points
4. Carter Verhaeghe: 25 goals, 60 points
5. Anton Lundell: 20 goals, 50 points
6. Sam Bennett: 25 goals, 50 points
7. Anthony Duclair: 20 goals, 45 points
8. Patric Honrnqvist: 15 goals, 35 points
9. Colin White: 10 goals, 35 points

Total: 220 goals, 545 points

Ottawa
1. Alex DeBrincat: 40 goals, 75 points
2. Tim Stützle: 25 goals, 70 points
3. Drake Batherson: 30 goals, 70 points
4. Brady Tkachuk: 30 goals, 70 points
5. Josh Norris: 35 goals, 65 points
6. Claude Giroux: 25 goals, 60 points
7. Alex Formenton: 20 goals, 40 points
8. Mathieu Joseph: 15 goals, 35 points
9. Shane Pinto: 12 goals, 35 points

Total: 232 goals, 520 points

Still comparable forward groups, IMO.

 

[Sensin5]

Zero pressure on the Sens in the 2nd half of last year being miles out of a playoff spot. History has shown countless times that It's fools gold to think that a late season surge by an also-ran equates to success in the following season. Until the Sens upgrade their D and bring in a HC who can teach them how to play in a structured manner, they are still going to be looking up to the big 4, Toronto, TB, Boston and Florida. One last thing, don't expect career backup and minor leaguer G Anton Forsberg to stand on his head again, he was outstanding last year.

That's part of it.

Forsberg is much better than you give him credit for.

You're just still really mad at Sens bouncing Bruins from the playoffs a few years back.

 

[Team Cozens]

Florida - 105
Toronto - 101
Tampa - 94
Buffalo - 90
Ottawa - 89
Boston - 88
Detroit - 87
Montreal - 61

 

[wintersej]

I suspect this changes the calculus:



Full contact jersey.

 

[Blowfish]

I suspect this changes the calculus:



Full contact jersey.

The calculus in this thread is a little off..

Buffalo and Detroit looking good...Ottawa will get it going. Going to be tough for the normal top teams to make the playoffs. Definitely will be a few surprises this year.

 

[Blowfish]

Tampa
Buffalo
Boston
Florida
Ottawa
Toronto
Detroit
Montreal

Folk are severely under-rating the Sabres and over-rating Florida and Toronto. Sabres and Ottawa will be drastically better this year.

Toronto Boston and Florida are in for a rude awakening.

Surprises so far are Tampa, Montreal & Detroit. Sabres are ready and so friggin young.

 

[Bouboumaster]

What are you doing, Toronto and Ottawa, stealing our spot like this??

Last place was supposed to be our

 

[GOALOFSSON]

What are doing, Toronto and Ottawa, stealing our spot like this??

Last place was supposed to be our

I'd worry about the west

 

[Blowfish]

Tampa
Buffalo
Boston
Florida
Ottawa
Toronto
Detroit
Montreal

Folk are severely under-rating the Sabres and over-rating Florida and Toronto. Sabres and Ottawa will be drastically better this year.

Toronto Boston and Florida are in for a rude awakening.

Yup...

Buffalo without jokiharju, samuelsson and lybushkin...

Tage is a beast!

 

[NyQuil]

What are you doing, Toronto and Ottawa, stealing our spot like this??

Last place was supposed to be our

I'm certainly not complaining that you guys will be drafting in a worse spot.

 

[Blowfish]

Many folk here have Toronto tops...Media influence?

 

[Nico13]

Is there a thread like that for Metro?