What's Your Most Controversial Hockey Opinion?

[cowboy82nd]

Last 6 games with teams not wanting to let him score 700.... 1 goal and the Caps are 1-4-1. If teams played him like this his whole career you could slash his goal total in half.

Also, he lost his defensive responsibility in OT last night and reason they lost.

Then how come teams DIDN'T play him like this his whole career? And just so we are clear on this .... OVI has 699 goals. That's pretty impressive. And you can't slash his total in half because he ACTUALLY scored 699 goals. It sounds like you just don't like him, which is fine, but don't diminish his accomplishments.

 

[GrizzGreen]

Matt Tkachuk is a top 10 player in the league in terms of having true value to his team.

sup

 

[Salsa Shark]

sup

Nicely done Grizz

 

[acor]

Close games are exciting and all, game 1 of FLA/CAR series will be remembered for ages, but... when I'm watching a match between two teams that I have no emotional investment into, and score is is tied halfway through the 3rd period, i'm rooting for "SOMEONE f***IN SCORE, PLEASE!!!!"...

 

[Hockeyholic]

Leetch was a much better Ranger than Messier

I take Datsyuk over Thornton

Buffalo is a better hockey city than Vancouver

Prime Iginla could go with any tough guy out there. Doesn't mean he would/did win all

Crosby's 2010 olympic performance is massively overrated. Iginla made the best play to get him the puck. Miller allowed a very stoppable goal

Don Cherry was right

He was right.

It's just the way it was relayed that got him in trouble.

 

[Cup or Bust]

I am pretty anti-analytics. I think analytics do have some value, any tool is worth using, but these snobs that use them in every discussion about a player and think they know what they are talking about or think they are proving facts usually know nothing about hockey. If you need to use analytics to describe what a player does on the ice, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and not be able to put into context how the team they play for deploys them that either impacts their success or failure then you are likely pretty clueless about hockey. I had a pretty good argument going with some clueless analytics dorks when Jesse Puljujarvi got traded to Carolina and few other of those who are Oilers fans as well over the years. I was called a "hater". No, I am not a hater, I just don't need to look at analytics to understand why Jesse Puljujarvi only has 3 assists in 24 games with Carolina. I had 6 good years of watching the guy to determine that.

 

[PULSATING]

That luck is the biggest factor in determining the outcomes of games and by that token the winner of the Stanley Cup

 

[Mr Kot]

sup

bASED GIANT DOG WITH SMALL EARS.

 

[tarheelhockey]

sup

This is what we call playing the long game.

 

[Ducks4Cup]

2012 LA were not dominant they were lucky
If ever a team lucked their way to a cup it was them

 

[ItsFineImFine]

They need to get rid of the offside and replace it with the three-line pass rule.

 

[Asinine]

Gary Bettman is a lizard person.

 

[patnyrnyg]

In a salary cap league, there is no reason for a draft, RFA/UFA status, contract term limits, etc.

 

[ichbinkanadier]

They need to bring back the offside rule from the start of the 1929-30 season; call a delay of game penalty for freezing the puck and icing; do 4 on 4 with a de factor pp when the team gains the offensive zone in OT

 

[J bo Jeans]

Hockey Canada needs to step it the f*** up. Two gold medals since 2009 is unacceptable, instead they're focused on shit like this. https://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/hockey-canada-age-group-names-1.5364260

What?

Since 2009

WHC: 3 golds 2 silvers
WJC: 6 golds 4 silvers

Not sure what you're talking about tbh

 

[ichbinkanadier]

I am pretty anti-analytics. I think analytics do have some value, any tool is worth using, but these snobs that use them in every discussion about a player and think they know what they are talking about or think they are proving facts usually know nothing about hockey. If you need to use analytics to describe what a player does on the ice, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and not be able to put into context how the team they play for deploys them that either impacts their success or failure then you are likely pretty clueless about hockey. I had a pretty good argument going with some clueless analytics dorks when Jesse Puljujarvi got traded to Carolina and few other of those who are Oilers fans as well over the years. I was called a "hater". No, I am not a hater, I just don't need to look at analytics to understand why Jesse Puljujarvi only has 3 assists in 24 games with Carolina. I had 6 good years of watching the guy to determine that.

Analytics has proven:

Face-offs have no correlation with winning

Dump and chase is less effective than carrying the puck in

Two major conventional wisdoms in hockey- shattered by analytics

Analytics is merely finding patterns and relationships to winning. The trick is to find the meaningful relationships rather than the "eating bread causes cancer" relationship as my stats professor liked to say

 

[TheTotalPackage]

Dump and chase is less effective than carrying the puck in

Is that why every damn team uses the same stupid setup now on the powerplay where they drop the puck back to someone coming up the ice and then have four players standing on the blue line until the carrier brings it over?

 

[ichbinkanadier]

Is that why every damn team uses the same stupid setup now on the powerplay where they drop the puck back to someone coming up the ice and then have four players standing on the blue line until the carrier brings it over?

Possibly.

I have noticed the dump and chase is a lot less common than before- or at least it seems to be

 

[stealth1]

Parity and game management has made the game worse. Salary cap should be enough to create parity. There is no need to keep penalties even and call games to keep them close.

 

[TheDawnOfANewTage]

Defensemen are criminally underrated in the “best players” arguments. In the polls you’ll see Makar usually around #4 or worse. Dude logs more minutes, scores like a solid forward, and shuts down the best opposing players. That’s worth more than a dude who doesn’t make much of an impact if he doesn’t score. Also, D are becoming more important- today’s young guns are used somewhat like a point guard in basketball, a trend that will continue.

 

[JianYang]

The nhl should play no more than 2 games per week and reduce the schedule. There's too many boring ass games in the regular season, and too many games where teams look bad simply due to compressed schedules.

It looks like the play drops after the first round too, and I wonder if things would be different if they play less games before the post season starts.

It will never happen, and perhaps it's not a controversial take, but that's my contribution.

 

[12ozPapa]

Get rid of suspensions on hits that are during plY. Skate with your head up. Why do these people need to be babysat? They know the sport they signed up for, they’re adults. When a fisherman dies, does everyone lose their mind and say the companies need to protect them more? No - it’s part of the job, and part of why you’re paid well.

 

[ichbinkanadier]

The nhl should play no more than 2 games per week and reduce the schedule. There's too many boring ass games in the regular season, and too many games where teams look bad simply due to compressed schedules.

It looks like the play drops after the first round too, and I wonder if things would be different if they play less games before the post season starts.

It will never happen, and perhaps it's not a controversial take, but that's my contribution.

You reminded me of one I forgot:

Reduce playoff series to no more than best of 5

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Goal-differential should be the first tie-breaker. Let's make every minute of every game matter. Shorten the schedule to 76 games to help accommodate.

 

[wasunder]

Get rid of suspensions on hits that are during plY. Skate with your head up. Why do these people need to be babysat? They know the sport they signed up for, they’re adults. When a fisherman dies, does everyone lose their mind and say the companies need to protect them more? No - it’s part of the job, and part of why you’re paid well.

Lol what? Yes if a company had fishermen dying preventable deaths they would be expected to increase safety standards