Triumph Posted May 9, 2009 Author Share Posted May 9, 2009 Elias is going to go down as one of the best playoff players in NHL history. People spew absolute nonsense sometimes. The Devils don't need widespread change. Amazing it hasn't occurred to people that the NHL playoffs is kind of random and all about getting hot at the right time. If the playoffs were in early to mid March the Devils would be marching their way to a fourth cup. It's just how it goes. We've been very spoiled as a fan base. As someone said above, what difference would adding a puck mover or a second line center make if Brodeur sucks again? Or our top two offensive players are somewhat ineffective? yeah i totally agree with this. while hopefully the checking line goes away, this series with the 'canes was not about the defeat of a system. and now that the 'canes are not only beating the bruins but beating up on them, i really don't think the devils were very far away from going deep in these playoffs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaneykoIsGod Posted May 9, 2009 Share Posted May 9, 2009 Amazing it hasn't occurred to people that the NHL playoffs is kind of random and all about getting hot at the right time. Absolutely. And more than anything else, playoff success can usually be attributed to a goalie getting hot at the right time. This is why Dwayne Roloson, J.S. Giguere and Arturs Irbe have all played for the Cup. This is a part of why the NHL playoffs are so great. They're downright impossible to predict. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
devilsrule33 Posted May 9, 2009 Share Posted May 9, 2009 Elias is going to go down as one of the best playoff players in NHL history. People spew absolute nonsense sometimes. The Devils don't need widespread change. Amazing it hasn't occurred to people that the NHL playoffs is kind of random and all about getting hot at the right time. If the playoffs were in early to mid March the Devils would be marching their way to a fourth cup. It's just how it goes. We've been very spoiled as a fan base. As someone said above, what difference would adding a puck mover or a second line center make if Brodeur sucks again? Or our top two offensive players are somewhat ineffective? Nonsense...are you kidding me? Because he had 20 and 23 points in back-to-back playoffs on the best line in the league? I am not trying to downplay the accomplishments, but it wasn't close to the dominating efforts we are seeing now. I am talking about since he signed that 7 year - $42 million contract. I have no doubt he will never be at that level anymore. Elias is one of the most inconsistent players in the league. He is a disappearing act. Sometimes it's for whole seasons while sometimes, like this year, it was for the last 30 games and the entire playoffs. Your best guys have to be your best guys, but at this point in his career...Elias isn't on those guys levels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Voros19 Posted May 9, 2009 Share Posted May 9, 2009 Nonsense...are you kidding me? Because he had 20 and 23 points in back-to-back playoffs on the best line in the league? I am not trying to downplay the accomplishments, but it wasn't close to the dominating efforts we are seeing now.I am talking about since he signed that 7 year - $42 million contract. I have no doubt he will never be at that level anymore. Elias is one of the most inconsistent players in the league. He is a disappearing act. Sometimes it's for whole seasons while sometimes, like this year, it was for the last 30 games and the entire playoffs. Your best guys have to be your best guys, but at this point in his career...Elias isn't on those guys levels. Elias will end up in the top 20 in playoff scoring in NHL history. That's pretty damn good. I have no complaints about Elias this season. He managed a PPG pace with Dainius Zubrus as his center and he was our best powerplay player. And fyi, since 05-06, Elias has scored 35 points in 31 playoff games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sundstrom Posted May 9, 2009 Share Posted May 9, 2009 Here is the sh!tty part. Patrik Elias will never come close to being the top player on the ice when it counts. He might be getting paid top dollar, but he'll never come close to being as dominate as any of the players you mentioned. while it's been said already, i believe elias holds the record (and it's still current) for the most playoff series with at least a point. he was no doubt hurt this postseason - that groin definitely affected him. it's a shame. if langs didn't get hurt and if elias was 100% (or thereabouts), i think the devils beat the canes. i agree the devils were close this season. the changes that are needed are more than just about next year - they're about managing the next 3 years. that's why even though gionta could make sense for next year, even at $4MM again - he doesn't for 3 years. that's why madden and a $3MM contract or something similar has no place on this team next year. if the devils could roll out essentially the same lineup but with bergfors instead of gionta, a healthy rolston and a managerie of similar (but more offensively minded) guys like madden, rupp and holik, they should be ok. if they added one UFA defenseman with some offensive presence (read: ohlund, spacek or the like) i think they could be just as good, if not better than this previous year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
devilsrule33 Posted May 9, 2009 Share Posted May 9, 2009 while it's been said already, i believe elias holds the record (and it's still current) for the most playoff series with at least a point.he was no doubt hurt this postseason - that groin definitely affected him. it's a shame. if langs didn't get hurt and if elias was 100% (or thereabouts), i think the devils beat the canes. i agree the devils were close this season. the changes that are needed are more than just about next year - they're about managing the next 3 years. that's why even though gionta could make sense for next year, even at $4MM again - he doesn't for 3 years. that's why madden and a $3MM contract or something similar has no place on this team next year. if the devils could roll out essentially the same lineup but with bergfors instead of gionta, a healthy rolston and a managerie of similar (but more offensively minded) guys like madden, rupp and holik, they should be ok. if they added one UFA defenseman with some offensive presence (read: ohlund, spacek or the like) i think they could be just as good, if not better than this previous year. Elias said he was fine after the series, and TG said he felt insulted when the reporters insinuated that he might be. He must have been alright if he went to the World Championships. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HellOnICE Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 Elias said he was fine after the series, and TG said he felt insulted when the reporters insinuated that he might be. He must have been alright if he went to the World Championships. He was hurt. He's got too much pride to say he wasn't. Good for patty. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunslinger27 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 Goalie X was tremendous in the space leagues last season, He should get more starts with the Devils. Goalie X/ And that would be Clem correct Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevilMinder Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 He was hurt. He's got too much pride to say he wasn't. Good for patty. He has(had?) to be hurt, his first couple of strides during a transition breakout where very slow compared to his usual hustle. I doubt he has aged that much in half a season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triumph Posted May 10, 2009 Author Share Posted May 10, 2009 Elias said he was fine after the series, and TG said he felt insulted when the reporters insinuated that he might be. He must have been alright if he went to the World Championships. Elias said when he got hurt that he wasn't going to be 100%. I definitely believe he was hurt but isn't going to make excuses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triumph Posted May 10, 2009 Author Share Posted May 10, 2009 (edited) I thought I'd whip this up - it's a look at all 30 NHL teams and where they stand, re: cap room. The first number is how much money they have committed to next year's salaries, the second is the cap room they have. For teams who have their own internal cap, i capped their spending at this year's spending + 1 million dollars, which is remarkably optimistic. PLYS denotes how many players they have signed - subtract that from 23 to figure out how many players they need to sign/call up. The next number, AVG, is the average salary of the remaining players they have to sign/bring up. Key RFA's is self-explanatory - I noted RFAs who I thought were going to get significant raises, so their money is basically already on the cap already. TMS TOTL ROOM PLS AVGS KEY RFA'S ANA 37.4 18.5 13 1.85 Chrstn (1.0M) ATL 29.0 15.5 11 1.29 Armstg (1.5M) BOS 46.7 9.30 14 1.03 Kessel (4.0M), Krejci (3.5M) BUF 46.5 5.20 15 0.65 Stffrd (1.7M) CAR 42.8 9.30 15 1.16 TRuutu (2.2M), Babchk (2.0M) CGY 46.8 9.20 15 1.15 NONE CHI 36.2 19.8 11 1.65 Bollnd (1.5M) CLB 40.7 11.5 18 2.30 NONE COL 43.7 12.3 13 1.23 PBudaj (1.2M) DAL 40.7 15.3 14 1.70 NONE DET 51.2 5.80 16 0.83 Hudler (2.1M) EDM 46.9 9.10 16 1.30 Grbskv (1.5M) FLA 38.0 18.0 13 1.80 DBooth (3.4M) LAK 43.2 12.8 20 4.26 NONE MIN 43.2 12.8 16 1.82 NONE MTL 23.5 32.5 13 3.25 Higgns (2.1M), Plkanc (1.8M) NAS 33.0 13.4 13 1.34 NONE NJD 39.9 16.1 13 1.61 TZajac (3.8M) NYI 32.9 14.8 17 2.46 NONE NYR 42.8 13.2 11 1.10 Zhrdev (3.2M), Dbnsky (1.6M), Cllhan (1.8M) OTT 50.9 5.10 20 1.70 NONE PHI 50.4 5.60 19 1.40 NONE PHX 31.3 15.3 14 1.70 Yandle (1.6M) PIT 46.8 9.20 14 1.02 NONE SJS 46.7 9.30 13 0.93 RClowe (1.9M) STL 44.3 11.7 18 2.34 NONE TBL 38.5 13.5 14 1.50 NONE TOR 41.9 14.1 18 2.35 Grbvsk (1.7M) VAN 31.2 24.8 11 2.06 NONE WAS 45.9 10.1 14 1.12 NONE ------------------------------------------------- AVG --- 12.6 249 1.52 TTL 45.1 AVG = 1.334 AVG IF CAP WENT UP BY 6MM: $2.0M FIVE BUYERS: 1. Montreal 2. Vancouver 3. Chicago 4. Anaheim 5. Florida FIVE SELLERS: 1. Ottawa 2. Buffalo 3. Philadelphia 4. Detroit 5. Edmonton Things to remember: None of this covers the 2010-11 quagmire, where almost no team is in a good spot - you can see the Devils have a ton of cap room opening up but they still can't make many major signings - the same goes for the rest of the league. Edited May 10, 2009 by Triumph Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 Things to remember: None of this covers the 2010-11 quagmire, where almost no team is in a good spot - you can see the Devils have a ton of cap room opening up but they still can't make many major signings - the same goes for the rest of the league. Ya, the cap in 2 years looks to probably decrease so much the NHLPA should want to come up with a workable solution for the owners for that problem before free agency start this offseason. Otherwise I would think a lot of teams with cap space, who might normally spend, will play it conservative due to fear for the next offseason. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sokar Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 you know what i would not do anything to big because A. the cap is going to be going down some and B. you are going to need at least 6mil. to resign parise. btw if i am lou and i see that parise does not want to sign with the devils, i would trade him early in the season to get something back, like we should have done with gomez Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 you know what i would not do anything to big because A. the cap is going to be going down some and B. you are going to need at least 6mil. to resign parise. btw if i am lou and i see that parise does not want to sign with the devils, i would trade him early in the season to get something back, like we should have done with gomez So the Devils should be sellers every season with their free agents no matter how well they've played? If Lou doesn't think he can re-sign Parise and the Devils have the 5th best record in the league and a solid goal differential they should still trade Parise? You think fans will be happy that the Devils trade away a top 5 in the league goal scorer early in a season when the team looks good? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triumph Posted May 10, 2009 Author Share Posted May 10, 2009 Ya, the cap in 2 years looks to probably decrease so much the NHLPA should want to come up with a workable solution for the owners for that problem before free agency start this offseason. Otherwise I would think a lot of teams with cap space, who might normally spend, will play it conservative due to fear for the next offseason. larry brooks claimed the NHLPA has a one-time ability to bump the salary cap 5%. of course i searched for salary cap in the CBA and found no matches (lol). but i really found no indication of it in the CBA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 larry brooks claimed the NHLPA has a one-time ability to bump the salary cap 5%. of course i searched for salary cap in the CBA and found no matches (lol). but i really found no indication of it in the CBA. Did he say if it would be a 1 time bump for 1 year or a 1 time permanent bump? That seems like a huge increase to me, I don't know why the owners would agree to something like that without something equally powerful to counter it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
metallidevils Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 while it's been said already, i believe elias holds the record (and it's still current) for the most playoff series with at least a point. it's unbelievable to me that anyone would use this to support any sort of argument whatsoever Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sokar Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 So the Devils should be sellers every season with their free agents no matter how well they've played? If Lou doesn't think he can re-sign Parise and the Devils have the 5th best record in the league and a solid goal differential they should still trade Parise? You think fans will be happy that the Devils trade away a top 5 in the league goal scorer early in a season when the team looks good? dude look at who we replaced gomez with, you want to go through that again Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 (edited) dude look at who we replaced gomez with, you want to go through that again So the Devils should trade every good player they have before they become free agents and make the team weaker to ensure they aren't as good in re playoffs? The team likely won't ever win if they trade first line players away whenever free agency is approaching. It's also a bad business decision as it depressed ticket buying. So I would say your philosophy makes a team less competitive during a season and also costs the team money. Edited May 10, 2009 by Devils731 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sokar Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 when a player pretty much says no matter how much money you give me i am not coming back to this team you try to get something back for them. btw i am not saying trade every free agent that we have just the ones that dont want to be here, if they dont want to be here get something back for them. btw trading gomez would have been the way to go, maybe if we traded him we would not have zubrus contract right now. also resigning parise should be on top of lou list he is the future of the team, everyone else is just old Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 So you're saying that the devils should make their team worse if they have free agents they aren't sure they can sign. This way they can lose more, make less money, and lose the last years on valuable contracts. How many good teams follow your philosophy? Are there any? If the Devils had made a deep playoff push Gomez last year would you hold this same opinion? If not then you're playing hindsight is 20/20 and assuming since something happened one way once it will work that way every time, which isn't true. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sokar Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 no gomez made it pefectly clear he was not going to came back to this team no matter what so yeah i would have gotten rid of him Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils731 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 no gomez made it pefectly clear he was not going to came back to this team no matter what so yeah i would have gotten rid of him Did you figure out which teams also follow your philosophy? They don't because of the points I'm making. Saying well such and such happened with Gomez doesn't invalidate any of what I've said and you haven't addressed those points Pro teams in all sports know that you don't make 50 cent on a dollar trades in years your team is good because it costs you money, angers your fans, and severely harms your chances of making deep playoff runs. So if the Devils had won the Cup or gone to the cup finals, or gone to the conference finals, Gomez' last year then you'd still be here arguing that Gomez should have been traded that season since he left in the offseason? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevilinLA Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 Its amazing to me that many still think that Elias's 6M is costly when looking at the salaries played to marquis forwards today (Hossa, Vanek, Drury, etc.) ...and so people still think its still 2004 and down the road Parise is going to take like 5M when he'll be easily offered 8M by other clubs on the open market at that point. Why is it some people still don't understand that NJ doesn't not defy market economics and you still have to "give to get", whether it be players or $$$. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devils Pride 26 Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 What's the most realistic offer we could make for Marleau? For sure there would be a first going back at least. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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