50-PERCENT CAPACITY IN PHOENIX: THE NHL 2022-2023 SEASON THREAD (INC AVALANCHE HANGOVER & SALARY CAP SHENANIGANS. HOCKEY IS THE BEST)

yikes pens. too bad they didn't get VAN a few days sooner.

thought columbus would be better this year - not so far

well that is the worst northwest road trip, in 55 years, the penguins have ever had. because it's now possible to lose to seattle

Really rough stretch for the Pens. Sabres actually looking great offensively so far.

the pens have played maybe 3 good periods last 6 games. rough indeed. that said, some of the cellar-dwellers like kraken and sabes have looked good for longish stretches so far this year. great for overall league competitiveness i guess.

Am enjoying the parity so far.

I don’t like that alternate jersey for the Sabres, it looks a lot like the Preds design, but worse. The alternate neon green Dallas jersey is really cool though.

We could watch John Tavares' (@91Tavares) second goal on repeat all night long. 🤤 pic.twitter.com/AX04cMWUCg

— NHL (@NHL) November 3, 2022

why do teams keep doing shit like the bruins signing this asshole kid?

i mean the guy's a fourth-round defenseman. he's wholly unnecessary and he makes everything you claim to stand for look like garbage

Yeah, doesn’t even sound like the league wants to even let him be eligible for a pro game, so not sure what the Bruins are thinking here

great job, bruins

(actual good job by bergeron/marchand/foligno for being publicly against it, however thoroughly couched in hockey player cliche)

yeah you don't hear pro athletes willing to criticize someone's character like they did very often. as much as I hate to praise those players.

ulf sammuelsson was right

I only caught the first couple of years of Borje Salming's career, pretty much a baseball fan after that. As I'm sure you know, they had a big emotional ceremony for him Saturday night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jl2XAruUdTk

avs, down one, had a 5-on-3 for the last 1:45 of the third — and pulled the goalie with a minute left to go 6-on-3 — and did not score

My daughter’s pee wee A team had a tie game
this weekend with like 45 seconds left and a face off in the opponents’ zone. I so wanted the coach to pull the goalie to show the kids what GOING FOR IT looks like. But he didn’t. Game ended a tie.

kings with basically a perfect road game tonight

outshot edmonton 32-23, 29 blocked shots, held mcdavid and dreiseitel scoreless with one shot each. only oilers pp was cut short when mcdavid crosschecked someone behind the play. danault-arvidsson-moore line was killer

Highly recommended:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nq5W3GxuIuw

I knew the story reasonably well--and was watching Game 8 in my grade 6 pod--but it's hard to convey just how bizarre some of that was, especially Alan Eagleson's antics during the final game. Tretiak comes across as the nicest guy in the world; what Bobby Clarke did in Game 6 puts a damper on Canada's win.

rip börje : /

glad he got that moment two weeks ago

sidney crosby *in* philadelphia (regular season): 40 GP, 25-33-58

regular season + playoffs overall, he has 67 career goals vs. the flyers, apparently the most of all time

<3 <3 <3

https://i.redd.it/tom84w2td00a1.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FiyxsdLVQAAhqsV.jpg

kris letang had a(nother) stroke

anaheim has played 26 games and has one (1) win in regulation

stayed up late to see if the canucks could maintain their wild comeback v. les habs. so glad i did! matheson won't soon forget losing his edge like that.

Quite a comeback, people were saying Vancouver’s season was over a few weeks ago.

wonder if there's ever been a game with that exact sequence of goals before

(4 goals for one team, then 5 for the other, then 2 for the first team, then 2 for the other)

Probert pic.twitter.com/S63XgebuJV

— Jen (@NHLhistorygirl) December 7, 2022

lol tony deangelo is a healthy scratch for the flyers tonight

The entire Lightning franchise should be suspended ten games for the jerseys they wore last night. Sweet Jeebus!!

Isles won a wild one tonight in NJ. Devils pulled the goalie for pretty much the final 8 minutes of the game.

happy birthday jimmy mod

thank u friend i do not feel very wise!

Went to the Isles/Bruins in Boston the other night and can report that being the only one cheering for your team’s goal while 15,000 other people don’t even acknowledge that it happened is still great.

I did this at a Flyers-Isles game at the Coliseum years ago when the Flyers scored twice in the first five minutes. Each time the family in front of us briefly looked around to see what was up. A couple minutes later the Isles scored and one of the kids who might have been 12 jumps up and turns around and shoots me and my friends the most hysterical tough guy look.

so the bruins are 32-4-4

also #1 in goals for (156) and goals against (88)

19-0-3 at home

that's pretty decent

president’s trophy curse incoming?

Did not expect them to be this good honestly

During Odjick’s rookie season, for example, which took place during the Gulf War, a fan brought a sign to a game that read: “Gino is tougher than Saddam,” in reference to Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

The story goes — and, in truth, there are a ton of different versions — that Odjick, having seen the sign in the crowd, approached then-Canucks head coach Bob McCammon (or then-Canucks captain Trevor Linden), to inquire as to which guy exactly on the other team was “Saddam” because he wanted to fight him.

Gino Odjick RIP

https://www.espn.com/nhl/story/_/id/35461463/vegas-goalie-lehner-files-bankruptcy-cites-50m-debt

Lehner's debts also included missed payments for a collection of rare snakes he purchased for $1.2 million in 2017, according to the bankruptcy filing. Lehner keeps the snakes at his reptile farm in Plato, Missouri.

i'm not even mad at ivan provorov; ideally he'd have simply gone with the flow and skated warmups wearing a slightly different sweater. but i don't know what pressure is placed on him as a russian guy playing in north america

and also i recognize that torts is trying to shield his guy

but honestly fuck torts for this whole charade. just say that 'everyone can play' is bullshit compared to his team missing the playoffs by 10 instead of 12 points. or don't. instead, he's too cowardly to make a call

Provorov is a russian guy who has played in North America since he was 14 - he doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt as a dumbass and possibly a bigot. At this point, Torts is a frozen caveman coach who fits in perfect with the org.

The Flyers used to be my favorite team in sports. Now I want the entire org gone for trying to get me to root for Kevin Hayes.

Torts sux and always has

also the way the canucks/jim rutherford are treating bruce boudreau is garbage

terrible ownership, terrible management. this year feels like a new low for a franchise with a lot of them

they're losing tonight (to the reigning cup champions), so no doubt that will be the 'reason' they fire him

like school in the summertime: no fucking class

Kirill Marchenko became the fourth player in NHL history to have each of his first 12+ career regular-season points come in the form of goals, joining Joe Malone (16 in 1917-18), John McKinnon (13 in 1926-27) and Howie Morenz (12 in 1923-24).#NHLStats: https://t.co/xJLu35WWoU https://t.co/RUVzZv08JX

— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) January 28, 2023

I posted this a few years ago on some other thread, but me getting Bobby Hull's autograph at a book signing.

https://phildellio.tripod.com/hull.JPG

You have to be really careful with old-guy autograph stories, but: he was really cranky with me because he didn't like the book I had with me, but he let the good-looking woman behind me wear his Stanley Cup ring for a photo they took together.

I really had no idea about all the unsavoury shit in his life

Someone just passed this along to me:

https://defector.com/bobby-hull-was-not-complicated

happy 30th anniversary of gary bettman getting booed becoming commissioner

obviously jamie benn should have been a healthy scratch

maybe tkcachuk isn't *quite* ready to become the New Messier

it will be ridiculous if the vegas fans boo gary bettman but i hope they do it anyway

𝐀𝐃𝐃 𝐀𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐄 🏆🏆🏆

Phil Kessel is a three-time Stanley Cup champion!#PrideOnIce pic.twitter.com/7Uvzooz9Jq

— Minnesota Men’s Hockey (@GopherHockey) June 14, 2023

when a new GM comes in and for his first contract gives a three-year deal to 36-year-old ryan reaves, it does not bode well for toronto

also we need a new thread jimmy

Oh christ i had not seen that deal

have to say it's a bummer to see legitimately poor basketball players sign $100m contracts while the very best NHLers can maybe get $9m a year

i mean yes it's a different sport and you need more players and stuff, but i don't think the NHLPA has done a very good job at all

No they got rolled. Also kings wtf u do signing trevor lewis u cant score goals

he got sorokin re-signed, which is important, but . . . does lou even understand the salary cap? you don't have to re-sign your bottom-six forwards to seven-year deals, or your 35yo backup goalie to a four-year deal!

if parise decides to keep playing, lou will probably give him multiple years

once you're an islander, you're an islander for life

Will start new thred once i get back from holiday

The seven years to mayfield and engvall is certainly wild, although I’m assuming the strategy is that the cap is going way up in the next few years so it will look better. I guess you can’t also underestimate the friendship between Varlamov and Sorokin.

There is something to the “islander for life” mentality over the past decade though. It’s a team with very low turnover once you’ve fit in.

Debrincat to the Wings n_n

seems . . . nice for u

THE BUSTED WINDOW OF CONTENTION WON'T STAY OPEN: THE NHL 2023-2024 SEASON THRED (INC KNIGHTS HANGOVER & PANIC MOVES. HOCKEY IS THE BEST)