2023-24 NHL Season Thread.

[Greeney]

You are talking about the creme de la creme.

There are ~150 first liners in NHL. Not all of them are McDavid.

No, but you look at teams some players have their first line centre playing on one line and a top line right winger playing on another (Winnipeg, Toronto, Pittsburgh). A guy like Laine is clearly a first liner playing on Winnipegs second line while a guy like Hyman is clearly a third liner playing on Toronto's top line. Meanwhile Pittsburgh has two of the best centres in the game and a top right winger on different lines, but when you refer to a first liner in the NHL I'm going to assume you're more likely talking about someone like Kessel and a third liner would be someone like Panik even though Kessel tends to be on the third line and Panik tends to be on the first. But if we're looking at playoff teams there's usually an even bigger difference between the talent in first liners and third liners.

[Armourboy]

Yeah this was not your previous expansion teams by any stretch. They were able to get a couple of first liners, a guy or two that probably would have been second liners given the opportunity, and a top notch goalie. Plus the Dmen weren't made up of other teams 6 or 7 guys. The coach has a huge effect and obviously fee people picked them to be good, but some did. I believe I said they would be a bubble team which means they were way better than your normal expansion team.

I'll also add being the only expansion team in a while helped them too, plus the pool wasnt watered down by other expansion teams around them.

[Nazrark]

Man the expansion bubble of the late 90s early 2000s really killed the appetite for new teams. Some of those drafts were absolutely brutal and the new team had an entire team of healthy scratches. Minny was successful because of Lemaire and his extremely suffocating trap game.

Any new team forward. You have to have a coach in place. They make or break that team.

[Armourboy]

Man the expansion bubble of the late 90s early 2000s really killed the appetite for new teams. Some of those drafts were absolutely brutal and the new team had an entire team of healthy scratches. Minny was successful because of Lemaire and his extremely suffocating trap game.

Any new team forward. You have to have a coach in place. They make or break that team.

I think about our roster those first couple of years and man were they brutal. Thanks to Trotz we won most of our games 2-1 or 1-0.

[eschatological]

I think you gotta cheer for Ovi in the Finals. Vegas has been a great Cinderella story, it's enough for them to get to the Finals, imo, for the story to be 30 for 30--worthy. And I think Vegas winning would break all the sportsbooks in Vegas. The line was 500 to 1 before the season started, and lots of Vegasians (Vegasites? Vegasi? Vegans?) put money down on them just because they were the home team and it was fun. $50 on the Knights at the beginning of the season would pay out $25,000 if they win.

BTW, someone pointed this out to me: there have been 3 times expansion teams have gone to the Stanley Cup Finals. 1918, when all the teams were "expansion" so to speak because the league was new, 1968 after the first expansion draft and the Blues made it to the Finals (all the expansion teams were put in the West division, so it was inevitable an expansion team would reach the Finals), and 2018. 50 years apart, each time.

[Zeoni]

Such an oddball final but I'm stoked. Vegas is exciting as fuck to watch and everyone wants Ovie to win.

[Stommped]

Hey I won the bracket challenge btw. I was the only mad man to pick the Caps to win the East. Really pulling for Ovi, would be a shame if the ragtag team cobbled together denied him his only cup (if he never gets back).

[Nazrark]

Hey I won the bracket challenge btw. I was the only mad man to pick the Caps to win the East. Really pulling for Ovi, would be a shame if the ragtag team cobbled together denied him his only cup (if he never gets back).

They did a San Jose Sharks on us. After years of picking them to win the East. Everyone finally gave up and they did it.

Also, the only other comparable to the Vegas situation is what Leicester City did in the EPL. 5000-1 Odds they would win and they pulled it off.

[Greeney]

Hey I won the bracket challenge btw. I was the only mad man to pick the Caps to win the East. Really pulling for Ovi, would be a shame if the ragtag team cobbled together denied him his only cup (if he never gets back).

If you did win it, Congrats.

[sibut]

Glad to see this final matchup. Cheering for Vegas because that'd be a cool story but I'd be good with Ovetchkin and the Caps finally winning one too. Hope it goes 7!

[Armourboy]

I'm taking the Caps in 7. I won't be shocked if Vegas wins, but I think Vegas will finally have met a team that will play as desperate as they seem too.

[Puupi]

Patrik Laine decided to reschedule his barber visit, because the media were camping outside the barber shop he was going to go in today.

[Nazrark]

Patrik Laine decided to reschedule his barber visit, because the media were camping outside the barber shop he was going to go in today.

He goes from looking like a member of the family from Wrong Turn to a great looking person.

[Understarmor]

Glad to see this final matchup. Cheering for Vegas because that'd be a cool story but I'd be good with Ovetchkin and the Caps finally winning one too. Hope it goes 7!

yeah this is definitely a sereies where no team really is hated, both great stories but I want Vegas to win, I think having an expansion team win in it's first year would just put hockey above the rest as the team with the most parity. Unlike sports like basketball.

Plus it'd be nice to see all those vegas people that have been robbing tourists and others of money for so long finally take a HUGE hit in the wallet, that being said, I see the NHL and the refs making sure that doesn't happen lol

It will be a good final non-the-less.

[Sykol]

I just wanna see Vegas win it in Washington. Ovie might retire right there on the ice if that happens.

[Understarmor]

I just wanna see Vegas win it in Washington. Ovie might retire right there on the ice if that happens.

lol what did Ovechkin ever do to you? ahhahaha

[Nazrark]

Baseball is a joke competition wise. The bottom teams spend as little as they can. Then you have the heavy hitters spend above the cap and pay a luxury tax. The small markets don’t mind because they receive a cut of the luxury tax. There is no incentive to be competitive for small markets because they receive more money from the bigger teams than they would make if they did go and try to be competitive.

[eschatological]

I don't know anything about MLB, but teams can spend above the cap? What's the point of the cap? Isn't the cap supposed to be a hard line to enforce parity?

[Nazrark]

I don't know anything about MLB, but teams can spend above the cap? What's the point of the cap? Isn't the cap supposed to be a hard line to enforce parity?

MLB has a soft cap. So anything above it is a 1-1 ratio. Recently they changed the rules that if you are over 50 million you give up draft picks. Which doesn’t really matter when the teams that can spend will buy players by offering a whole lot more money than the player should be paid.

The Dodgers had the highest payroll a couple years ago with 350 million. Around 140 million of that was players that didn’t play for their team anymore. They had paid with luxury tax over 500 million for the players. The BoSox have the highest payroll this season with 238 million.

The worst aspect of the league is the big spenders drive up the prices for players. The NBA is running into this problem as well.

[eschatological]

And baseball fields a smaller roster than football, right? A football roster is 53 people and the cap is 175 milllion.

And we thought we had a problem with 30m a year QBs.