Taylor Hall For Adam Larsson V | 4,000+ Posts and Counting!

[guymez]

25th among regular D in 14/15 in 5v5 points/60 on one of the worst offensive teams in the league ain't bad. Then the next year he got the most brutal zone starts any D has dealt with in 10+ years and still managed more ES points than anyone on his team or any D on the oilers that got to throw pucks to Hall, McDavid, Nuge, Ebs and Drai.

Larsson did get brutal starts and he did play on a team that couldnt generate any offence. All true.

Now we can all hope for the best that Larsson actually has an untapped offensive element in his game and it will express itself on this team this season..

 

[Soundwave]

Larsson did get brutal starts and he did play on a team that couldnt generate any offence. All true.

Now we can all hope for the best that Larsson actually has an untapped offensive element in his game and it will express itself on this team this season..

If he can produce at the rate he was in the 14-15 season I'll be happy with that. Defensively he's the best player to put on an Oiler jersey arguably since Pronger. I think he's better defensively than Visnovsky.

The reason I'm a bit more optimistic about him having untapped potential is he does possess a legitimately high end outlet pass and great vision with it.

If he didn't have that then I would be down on him, but it's not like he needs to learn some new skill, he just needs to apply the skills he has already to the roster he will now get to play with.

 

[Paralyzer]

I did answer your question. I am convinced that another opportunity would shake down between June and September. Barrie and Shattenkirk are 2 names being thrown around right now.

Do you have anything to show why a deal between June and Spetember wouldnt happen?

Even the Pronger deal happened in August.

Yeah but Shattenkirk is rumored to sign out East. You'd take a chance on him for 1 year while giving up Hall? And then there's Barrie who for all we know, could end up being traded to Winnipeg for Trouba. Then what have we got to show for it? You say you don't believe in 'hope', yet the guys you want are DEFINITELY considered to be 'hopeful' thinking. It kind of contradicts your rational thinking on hope.

 

[guymez]

You might as well then just stop cheering for any team that loses and only cheer for the teams that do win. Because what your telling me is you don't believe in 'hope' and you'd rather cheer for proven over factual. I get it. But how do other teams build their defence up? like Philly85 said, ALL great defence were built from within the organisation. There is no team that's built with guys they acquired in trades or signings except for Boston. Getting Larsson is the CLOSEST we have to actually getting a potential Top Pairing Dman and I'd rather have that 'hope' than have no 'hope' at all.

I am suggesting to you that as an Oiler fan I have had 10 years of hoping for the best. We all saw how that worked out.
The fact that I expect more substantial from this team after 10 years of futility shouldn't really be that hard to understand.

If you choose to believe that Larsson is as good as it gets for this team and you comfortable to 'hope' he finds an offensive element in his game thats fine.

Some of us would simply like a little more substance.

 

[oobga]

Larsson did get brutal starts and he did play on a team that couldnt generate any offence. All true.

Now we can all hope for the best that Larsson actually has an untapped offensive element in his game and it will express itself on this team this season..

In 14/15 with slightly less brutal zone starts (still hard) he managed a really good 5v5 points/60 rate:

http://stats.hockeyanalysis.com/rat...ense&minutes=500&disp=1&sort=PCT&sortdir=DESC

So maybe he's already shown he has some good transition game in him.

I'm personally not that worried about the PP. I think Woodcroft getting his head out of his butt would improve the PP a lot more than adding a guy like Barrie. Our forwards are plenty good to be the focal points of our PP and can create space for guys like Klef, Sekera and if we're lucky Larsson to get shots off with traffic in front of the net (nice part about adding Lucic). And, Hall leaving might actually be a positive for the PP. He's been a drain on it for 2 years now, wanting all the play to funnel through him but he's just not good at playmaking. Hall's PP points/60 were bottom of the barrel on our team as a result and hate to say it, he was dragging others down with him.

Our ES play though has been a joke for a very long time, and Larsson has shown in basically the only sample we have where he wasn't either early on in development or getting all time worst abuse from his coach, he was able to put up good 5v5 production and at the same time playing a solid game in his own end.

Still some hope involved for sure, and a nice long wait still before we can see any tangible results

 

[guymez]

Yeah but Shattenkirk is rumored to sign out East. You'd take a chance on him for 1 year while giving up Hall? And then there's Barrie who for all we know, could end up being traded to Winnipeg for Trouba. Then what have we got to show for it? You say you don't believe in 'hope', yet the guys you want are DEFINITELY considered to be 'hopeful' thinking. It kind of contradicts your rational thinking on hope.

I could make up endless scenarios that may or may not happen as well and then use these fictional possibilities to support an argument.

There is no point to what you are doing here.

 

[Soundwave]

Larsson is a better player than Shattenkirk or Barrie.

Points are nice, but Larsson is a far superior defensive player capable of playing hard minutes.

Shattenkirk or Barrie would get points but like Justin Schultz they'd have to be sheltered here and we have no one to shelter them with, look at the plus/minus from the last season for both of them, it would likely go even lower here.

 

[Mr Positive]

Larsson did get brutal starts and he did play on a team that couldnt generate any offence. All true.

Now we can all hope for the best that Larsson actually has an untapped offensive element in his game and it will express itself on this team this season..

imo the trade is still worth it as long as he can duplicate what he did for the Devils. He doesn't need to expand his offense, but his potential to do so is part of the value that we paid for.

And btw, Hall has a certain amount of potential mixed with established value himself. He's considered one of the top wingers in the game by many, but he never even scored 30 goals. There are great excuses and explanations as to why, but to just assume that he would explode in production on a better team is just that, an assumption.

 

[LaGu]

Larsson did get brutal starts and he did play on a team that couldnt generate any offence. All true.

Now we can all hope for the best that Larsson actually has an untapped offensive element in his game and it will express itself on this team this season..

What do you think of the being 25th in EV scoring / 60 in 14/15?

That was the main point of that post imo and not the buried in DZ which was the part you actually addressed.

Everyone, including Larsson who acknowledged it (or rather he put it as one of the main points to work on prior to 16/17), that he had a really bad year production wise in 15/16. What looks odd to me that this is apparently taken in a bubble as the blue print of what he is from now on, at the age of 23 and coming off a 14/15 season in which he was not buried in the DZ and actually did produce at a decent rate.

 

[guymez]

In 14/15 with slightly less brutal zone starts (still hard) he managed a really good 5v5 points/60 rate:

http://stats.hockeyanalysis.com/rat...ense&minutes=500&disp=1&sort=PCT&sortdir=DESC

So maybe he's already shown he has some good transition game in him.

I'm personally not that worried about the PP. I think Woodcroft getting his head out of his butt would improve the PP a lot more than adding a guy like Barrie. Our forwards are plenty good to be the focal points of our PP and can create space for guys like Klef, Sekera and if we're lucky Larsson to get shots off with traffic in front of the net (nice part about adding Lucic).

Our ES play though has been a joke for a very long time, and Larsson has shown in basically the only sample we have where he wasn't either early on in development or getting all time worst abuse from his coach, he was able to put up good 5v5 production and at the same time playing a solid game in his own end.

Still some hope involved for sure, and a nice long wait still before we can see any tangible results

Maybe Larsson can....and thats exactly my point.

Jersey didnt get a maybe in Hall...he has proven that he will deliver close to .9 ppg because he has done just that for his entire NHL career.

Maybes are fine but at this point in time after 10 years of futility and hopng for the best I take exception to any poster that suggests that I am out of line for expecting more than a maybe.

Paralyzer thinks that I shouldn't watch the team because I think that 'hoping' for the best isn't good enough. Where is the justification for that?

 

[Paralyzer]

I am suggesting to you that as an Oiler fan I have had 10 years of hoping for the best. We all saw how that worked out.
The fact that I expect more substantial from this team after 10 years of futility shouldn't really be that hard to understand.

If you choose to believe that Larsson is as good as it gets for this team and you comfortable to 'hope' he finds an offensive element in his game thats fine.

Some of us would simply like a little more substance.

And I get that, but I don't know where you are going with this "All doom and gloom" on the Oilers and that we will never win unless we trade for guys who really aren't within our grasps to a realistic offer. Chia knew he had to make that trade around draft day. I remember LOTS of us said if he didn't do ANYTHING before, on Draft Day or before Free Agency, we knew this team would be back to square 1 and we would be asking for Chia's head for not doing anything. So Chia did exactly what we wanted, but there's still *****ing and complaining about what he could have done and what he should have done. In the end, Chia would have been flamed if he did and flamed if he didn't.

I know your extremely skeptical, but let this all play out. I have said this 5 times now on these boards, but if the Oilers aren't playing better by January, I'll quit on here. Seriously! I will! I won't post another comment.

 

[nabob]

Nice narrative...some of us just dont believe that Chia needed to make that deal at that time. he blinked.

As for the rest of your post...its a strawman in terms of my actual position on things.

This is the one arguement that I really cannot find any way to agree with.

Do you think that if Chia simply waited another week or month or two months that another team would have magically given us OEL or Pietrlangelo or Faulk for cheap? Face it the cream of the crop Dmen in the NHL aren't getting traded for anything less than a massive overpay or for each other (as we saw with PK & Weber). Hell even a great young Dman on a great contract like Larsson was considered damn near untouchable.

 

[Paralyzer]

Maybe Larsson can....and thats exactly my point.

Jersey didnt get a maybe in Hall...he has proven that he will deliver close to .9 ppg because he has done just that for his entire NHL career.

Maybes are fine but at this point in time after 10 years of futility and hopng for the best I take exception to any poster that suggests that I am out of line for expecting more than a maybe.

Paralyzer thinks that I shouldn't watch the team because I think that 'hoping' for the best isn't good enough. Where is the justification for that?

I didn't say don't watch the team, but if you are going to only look at realism then you might as well watch a winning team. I know where you are on this, and it seems it's everyone vs you and McTedi on this matter, so I'll just stop for now and we shall see how this is played by January.

Edit: Here's another good example. Calgary's defence last year looked too good to be true having Giordano, Brodie, Hamilton, Russell, etc on there and people were saying that they could be the best Defense group in the west. On paper, it looks good, but as soon as they played, they fell apart like a deck of cards. I'm not saying it was a bad move to get Hamilton or for them to get excited for having a good defence on paper, but there's more than meets the eyes sometimes and I have a good feeling we will see that in our defence next year and I feel players like Klefbom and Larsson and Davidson, and maybe even Nurse will make a BIG step forward and finally become that core of defence we've been looking for the last 10 years since we made the playoffs.

 

[guymez]

What do you think of the being 25th in EV scoring / 60 in 14/15?

That was the main point of that post imo and not the buried in DZ which was the part you actually addressed.

Everyone, including Larsson who acknowledged it (or rather he put it as one of the main points to work on peior to 16/17), that he had a really bad year production wise in 15/16. What looks odd to me that this is apparently taken in a bubble as the blue print of what he is from now on, at the age of 23 and coming off a 14/15 season in which he was not buried in the DZ and actually did produce at a decent rate.

Who was Larsson paired with that season? Thats an important element to consider here simply because it is an outlier.

As I said previously...we shall see if and when Larsson can contribute offensively with this team. There are elements to his game that simply dont measure up for me not the least of which is Larssons weak point shot. He is not a threat at all from the point...teams know this and wont respect his shot. It wont change the dynamic of how easy it is to defend this team on the PP.

That story is yet to be written but you might understand if I remain skeptical until Larsson actually proves that the unending hope around here is justified.

 

[belair]

When there is no evidence to support that he does have an offesnisve element in his game then yes...it means he doesnt have an offensive element to his game.

Can he develop one...possibly.
Then we are relying on 'hope' again. Lets all hope for the best.
Am i the only one that's tired of playing that silly game?

Except the 24 points in 64 games as a 22 year old, none on the PP.

Maybe his numbers were down this year because 70% of his shifts started directly in front of his goaltender. And maybe his PP numbers were down because he wasn't on it.

Barrie for the four slot would be overkill, especially at the cost of more scoring up front. You do that and you 'hope' the guy you just sent out the door doesn't hold back Tyson Barrie from putting up the offense we expect him to produce.

 

[guymez]

And I get that, but I don't know where you are going with this "All doom and gloom" on the Oilers and that we will never win unless we trade for guys who really aren't within our grasps to a realistic offer. Chia knew he had to make that trade around draft day. I remember LOTS of us said if he didn't do ANYTHING before, on Draft Day or before Free Agency, we knew this team would be back to square 1 and we would be asking for Chia's head for not doing anything. So Chia did exactly what we wanted, but there's still *****ing and complaining about what he could have done and what he should have done. In the end, Chia would have been flamed if he did and flamed if he didn't.

I know your extremely skeptical, but let this all play out. I have said this 5 times now on these boards, but if the Oilers aren't playing better by January, I'll quit on here. Seriously! I will! I won't post another comment.

Why is it that you continue to misrepresent my position?
Makes it exceedingly difficult to have a discussion when you dont bother to actually read my posts and instead try to make things up and re frame my position all the time.

 

[guymez]

Shattenkirk does not want to sign here. What part of that is so hard for this fanbase to understand? He and has wife and the rest of his family are from the New York area and they wish to be closer to home.

Colorado does not want to trade Barrie, and doesn't need RNH so they probably would be asking for Hall as well.

And you know all this to be indisputable facts? Sorry if I dont accept your version of reality.

 

[cbzblaze]

I don't think Smyth or Hemsky are nearly as good as Hall. Hall drives offense the other guys you mentioned do not.

I take Ryan Smyth on my team any day over Taylor Hall. Yes he wasn't the most talented player, but he knew what he was good at and he knew what his limitations were. He literally battled and willed his way to success, no matter what it took. The guy was a warrior.

Hemsky had more skill than hall. He just couldn't bring it consistently. Only thing Hall has going for him is speed, without it he'd be a 3rd line player. The rest of his skill set is average at best.

 

[Paralyzer]

Why is it that you continue to misrepresent my position?
Makes it exceedingly difficult to have a discussion when you dont bother to actually read my posts and instead try to make things up and re frame my position all the time.

I don't think I'm misrepresenting anything. Your either not clear on the matter or you are changing your mind with every post. Whatever you typed is what I'm responding. If you don't like it, don't post. I even SAID I understand you are extremely skeptical. What else do you want me to say?

 

[guymez]

Except the 24 points in 64 games as a 22 year old, none on the PP.

Maybe his numbers were down this year because 70% of his shifts started directly in front of his goaltender. And maybe his PP numbers were down because he wasn't on it.

Barrie for the four slot would be overkill, especially at the cost of more scoring up front. You do that and you 'hope' the guy you just sent out the door doesn't hold back Tyson Barrie from putting up the offense we expect him to produce.

As i posted earlier. I would be interested to know the details of that season (D partner et al) because it looks very much to be an outlier.

I am open to the possibility that it has more meaning than it appears to have but I think that season deserves further scrutiny.

 

[guymez]

I don't think I'm misrepresenting anything. Your either not clear on the matter or you are changing your mind with every post. Whatever you typed is what I'm responding. If you don't like it, don't post. I even SAID I understand you are extremely skeptical. What else do you want me to say?

Actually you dont seem to know the difference between a cynic and skeptic. You call me a skeptic but your posts consistently address me as if I am a cynic.

 

[McTedi]

Except the 24 points in 64 games as a 22 year old, none on the PP.

Maybe his numbers were down this year because 70% of his shifts started directly in front of his goaltender. And maybe his PP numbers were down because he wasn't on it.

Barrie for the four slot would be overkill, especially at the cost of more scoring up front. You do that and you 'hope' the guy you just sent out the door doesn't hold back Tyson Barrie from putting up the offense we expect him to produce.

So you believe we should go the unproven route rather than have the guy in the lineup that could actually help the PP

 

[Paralyzer]

Actually you dont seem to know the difference between a cynic and skeptic. You think that I am a cynic...you are wrong.

Ok so what? Your still complaining about it. Nothing's changed. Except that I have accepted it and you seem to want to fight it more. This is my last post for the night. You believe whatever you want to believe and the majority of HFBoards will just move on.

 

[McTedi]

I take Ryan Smyth on my team any day over Taylor Hall. Yes he wasn't the most talented player, but he knew what he was good at and he knew what his limitations were. He literally battled and willed his way to success, no matter what it took. The guy was a warrior.

Hemsky had more skill than hall. He just couldn't bring it consistently. Only thing Hall has going for him is speed, without it he'd be a 3rd line player. The rest of his skill set is average at best.

Hey I loved Smytty and Hemmer too but neither could hold a flame compared to Hall and judging by your post I won't convince you either, agree to disagree I guess.

 

[guymez]

Ok so what? Your still complaining about it. Nothing's changed. Except that I have accepted it and you seem to want to fight it more. This is my last post for the night. You believe whatever you want to believe and the majority of HFBoards will just move on.

Good stuff. I will explain the difference between a cynic and a skeptic.

A cynic believes the worst of something or someone and isnt open to an alternative outcome.
A skeptic requires evidence or sound reasoning and is open to alternative outcomes.

There are lots of cynics on this board when it comes to the Hall deal...you are confused if you think that I am one of them.