Offseason & Draft Priorities

[glen a richter]

Army would be in deriliction of duty if he wasn't trying to shop the entire top 4 defense, in spite of their NTC's. I know he won't be able to move any of them but he has to at least make the effort.

Depending on how the lottery turns out, and I believe the Blues do have a 3.5% chance of moving all the way up to #1, just start grabbing best available forwards. I'm not 100% against them drafting that goalie Hrabal with the 3rd first rounder but just don't waste picks on defense, at least not at the beginning.

Maybe hire a personal coach for Kyrou to teach him how to play on the other end of the ice.

[glen a richter]

Van Ryn and MacTavish let go. Good riddance, I didn’t like the MacTavish hire in the first place.

[flyingnote38]

Van Ryn and MacTavish let go. Good riddance, I didn’t like the MacTavish hire in the first place.

good thing we will still have Ott running the PP
(is there a sarcasm font?)

[theohall]

Still not sold on Van Ryn being an issue.

MacTavish... Good riddance. He was in charge of the PK this season and gave up the role, don't know to whom, halfway through the season after dismantling a system that had worked for multiple seasons. What MacTavish's role on the staff was after that is a mystery yet to be solved.

[theohall]

If Steve Ott is a HC candidate elsewhere, as JR reported... let his butt go along with MacTavish and bring in "new blood" from the AHL. Quit re-hashing coaches who've had "1 year" of success (MacTavish - yes it happened twice, but he couldn't maintain it) with other teams but can't maintain it. And quit letting ex-players with zero coaching experience be a solution (Ott). Don't pull the "coach in waiting" thing ever again. And don't re-hash some other NHL coach unless it's Jon Cooper or Gerard Gallant.

If you want to know options - see which teams over the past 3 seasons have been top 8 in the AHL for all 3 seasons. Or... look to Germany which is having explosive growth in terms of developing talent. It's also worth looking at CHL (WHL, OHL, and QMJHL) coaches, but some simply aren't options. While Patrick Roy completely f'ed up with his exit from Colorado, his QMJHL record as owner, gm, coach looks really good. So look at Jr coaches, but check the record and background. IMO, Roy is Keenan-like in that he needs full control and is part of what led to his departure from Colorado with he and Sakic not being on the same page, which is what will eliminate any NHL GM considering him unless they are desperate to do something. (sorry for the tangent)

I have no idea what Montgomery did with the Blues, but he clearly took it to Boston and had it working in Dallas before he had "personal" issues. Were I Armstrong, Berube and Co, I'd pull video of everywhere Montgomery has coached (including his time and Denver U) and find an offensive minded assistant coach who gets what JM was doing. At the same time, pull the Blues PK video prior to this season and find a PK coach who can replicate what worked with this roster. It's not like the Blues don't have the talent... To me, it seems they lost their way due to one coaching change and that change lost the entire flipping team, which is entirely on Armstrong since he picked MacTavish. Hopefully, Armstrong can admit that was a mistake. Let Berube and Van Ryn work on picking assistants. GMs don't necessarily know best who works best as ACs.

It might be worth promoting Drew Bannister to AC considering how he was able to turn the T-Birds around in spite of the roster challenges the Blues kept throwing at him. Familiarity with the players and their strengths and weaknesses should help.

[theohall]

Van Ryn and MacTavish have been let go.

IMO, Van Ryn will find success somewhere. MacTavish - good riddance.

But Ott sticking around??? His PP sucked. Ott needs to do what most other "fringe" players did and spend some time in the minors/juniors as an AC/HC instead of continuing to be handed the opportunity right of the gate to be an NHL coach/assistant coach. Yeah, I get it when it comes to his video review stuff, but he's not the only man in the world capable of seeing that stuff.

[glen a richter]

I don't know why I wasn't shocked at all by Army talking about guys playing 18 minutes shifts and being more concerned about having 18 seconds of good play to get on YouTube.

When you're being paid copious amounts of money, put your selfish desire to be famous on social websites on the very back burner and do your damn job. These guys are the most narcissistic generation ever, hands down. I couldn't even imagine being a pro athlete, knowing I have an amazing job that the vast majority of people couldn't do even in their dreams and that there were tens of thousands of fans who paid money to see me play--in person or on TV and all I'd care about was getting likes on a fuggin' video clip. Selfish asshats who need a kick in the head to get their brains firing properly.

I think all these schmucks should spend the summer working real jobs and get a handle on how lucky they are.

[flyingnote38]

cross fingers and hope for luck (not sure I see the sense of simulating the lottery in making mock drafts -- saw one with us winning the second lottery and drafting fantilli)

move a dman (or two) -- hard to imagine in the current cap situation across the league that we can move a big contract without significant retention and/or sweeteners but deal Krug and (buyout?) Scandella

get value from the picks

add a top six forward

don't sign anyone to an extension for >$5 million, 5 years and a NTC

[flyingnote38]

with the rangers being eliminated, we will get the stars 1st rounder from them: currently 25th overall
assuming neither the stars nor leafs win the cup, we will have picks 25 and 27

and then we can hope for great luck, good luck, or at the very least no bad luck during the lottery.
possible outcomes for our pick I think are 1, 2, 10, 11 or 12
getting knocked back 2 spots would be a gut punch

[flyingnote38]

with the rangers being eliminated, we will get the stars 1st rounder from them: currently 25th overall
assuming neither the stars nor leafs win the cup, we will have picks 25 and 27

and then we can hope for great luck, good luck, or at the very least no bad luck during the lottery.
possible outcomes for our pick I think are 1, 2, 10, 11 or 12
getting knocked back 2 spots would be a gut punch

guess I jumped the gun on the rangers being out......thought the devils had finished them off already

[glen a richter]

Guaranteed the Blues manage to drop in the draft lottery tonight.

[theohall]

This time - I completely understand Gallant being fired. They were one of worst rated teams at even strength going in the playoffs and, supposedly, Drury addressed this with Gallant mid-season. It never got fixed. Rangers got bounced due to not being good enough at even strength.

[flyingnote38]

well the lottery is over and badness happened
at least we didn't get moved back at all

[glen a richter]

It's not just bad enough we didn't win the lottery which was never going to happen anyway, but why the hell did it have to be Chicago? I can't wait to get utterly dominated by Bedard for the next 20 seasons.

Maybe Michkov slips to 10 but the most Blues thing ever would be for them to get him and then Putin makes sure he never gets out of Russia.

[gaijin]

It's not just bad enough we didn't win the lottery which was never going to happen anyway, but why the hell did it have to be Chicago? I can't wait to get utterly dominated by Bedard for the next 20 seasons.

The best we can hope for at this point is the rest of the Hawks team continues to suck so bad that Chicago is forced to pull an Edmonton and move Bedard after a few seasons.

[theohall]

Just wait for this off-season when the inevitable demands to blow up Toronto are all over NHL news... given the Maple Leafs are the center of the NHL press universe.

[theohall]

Just gotta say.... you all know it was rigged with Chicago losing Kane and getting Bedard. (Huge WINK)

What's nuts about Bedard - he's a damn winger and his center hasn't mattered. He flat out makes shit happen from the wing.

[flyingnote38]

Canadian press is rumoring Armie as a candidate for the Leafs GM position

[glen a richter]

Canadian press is rumoring Armie as a candidate for the Leafs GM position

Since Army is under contract compensation would be involved. May I suggest as compensation for taking him they have to take Krug and Parayko too?

[theohall]

JR did a nice response to the rumors in The Athletic today. He started off explaining why Armstrong is exactly what the Leafs need and why it would be a dream opportunity for Armstrong. He then explained where things stand with the Blues and there is no way Stillman would want someone else running the Blues ship. JR then pointed out Armstrong (Full control of the Blues) or Shanahan (Current Leafs President of Hockey Ops, which Armstrong currently is for the Blues) would have to give up control in some way for a Leafs deal to work. Finally, unless Armstrong asks Stillman for permission to talk to the Leafs (and why would he given his current situation - full control and one of the top paid GMs in the league with strong ownership support) or Stillman grants the Leafs permission to talk to Armstrong (why would he even consider it?), this is a non-story which will be dead on the vine before the draft.

It's just Canadian reporters tying the Team Canada GM and one of the top GMs in the league to the Leafs to create buzz - not based on anything they actually know. Of course when Eliotte Friedman says something, all the other talking heads copy it, whether he actually knew anything or not.

Given some things Shanahan and Dubas have said about how the Leafs work, along with NHL Radio talking heads describing the management issues and that it needed to change, I doubt Armstrong would take that job unless the whole "Leafs board" decision making process above Shanahan were removed. Essentially, Dubas would want to do something. He'd take it to Shanahan. Then they would take it to some board... They've got too many cooks in the kitchen in Toronto - a similar situation exists in Philly.