I'm expecting a rough first half of the season where the team is bottom-5 in the standings but players work hard. Goalie controversy and whinging about Quinn over-playing vets and not gifting kids top-six and top-4 minutes. Strome crippling the assured-dominance of Kreider and Kakko on a line. Staal dragging down everyone on the blue line. McKegg, Fast, and Names all getting far too much time out of the press box. Quinn's clear North American bias as he puts Howden, Nieves, and Lindgren in the lineup over Hajek, Rykov, and Kravtsov. Frantic waiving of spreadsheets and *****ing about 'toffnuss' and intangibles. Calls for Quinn to be fired before the new year.
Then sometime around January some players start to find their game. The team starts to creep out of the bottom-5 and fans panic about the team's lack of a plan and assume they'll be buyers at the deadline. Rumors start flying about DeAngelo holding the team hostage after building on a great season and whether or not they should trade him at the deadline. A random post by a "long-time-lurker" asking if we should trade Panarin for some lottery team's unprotected first so we have a better shot of getting Byfield, the center we desperately need. Dagoon shows up to complain that we don't respect him and to remind us that Hank is in fact, deep down, a huge dick. Some new fancy metric is released showing that Corsi isn't granular enough and that "times a player thought about attempting a shot" -- or "TAP-ThAAS" -- is indeed a higher-frequency event and thus the new standard. However, the only way to view the accurate stats model is through an Oculus VR headset while chanting "Dan Girarid was never a top pairing defensemen." Chaos ensues. Ultimately all coinciding with the team trading Kreider, Fast, and Names just before the final moments for way less than people think the market should've dictated -- largely due to the fact that someone reminded us that Paul Gaustad once returned a 1st at the deadline, ergo Kreider should've returned at least 4. In the distance, calls for signing Nakladal.
Kravtsov and Chytil are recalled from The Pack to replace Kreider and the others. They struggle. The team lands in the 9th spot again. The rebuild is deemed a failure. ODC blames McIralth. Edge finally starts swearing at people regularly in his posts. MSG is in flames. Lias Andersson is named interim-GM for some reason after Gorton flees the country.