"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

Adam wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 09:10

RDOilerfan wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 09:01 It comes down to effort. They won't win until they start winning more puck battles. That's from McD down. I'll say it because I think it needs to be said. The issues plaguing the Oilers are not related to McDavid or Draisaitl. I've heard rumblings of this from some of the media guys too - but come on. They're the top two scorers in the whole league and they tilt the ice for us. McDavid's had points in all but one or two games the entire season. It ain't him. Time to point at the real villains - the coach and GM are right up there in case you were wondering.

OK. Whatever buddy.

Please point out to me in my last post where I said it's all McD's and Leon fault? I don't need to hear your BS excuses or whatever else you like to spit out to justify you putting words in my mouth like usual. If you are going to quote me and say I am placing blame on the woes of the Oilers at the feet of McD, then show me WHERE I said that in the 14 words I said?

I simply said the entire team needs to play better, that's the freaking truth. If the whole team including the stars plays to their capabilities and wins more puck battles then there is a much better chance they win. That's a true statement that applies to every freaking team. I never said the team is perfectly made up. I never said the coaches are perfect. All I said is the whole team needs to play better, to have a chance to win. That's a 100% true statement. When they played better warts and all earlier in the year, they won games. So it stands to reason that if the team plays better even with their faults, they have a better chance of winning.

[Updated on: Thu, 09 December 2021 09:43]

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

NetBOG wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 12:00

RDOilerfan wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 10:46 Ceci is playing tonight so that's a positive. Do we even know what is wrong with Keith? Another old man injury that sidelines a guy for months without explaination?

Hip replacement.

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

Survivor LX(I) and 67 Champ(i)on

CrusaderPi wrote on Thu, 30 January 2020 12:21

und(i)sputed O.L.F.N Heavybra(i)n Champ(i)on of the Woooooooooooooooooorld. Plus. One.

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

[Updated on: Thu, 09 December 2021 12:49]

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

[Updated on: Thu, 09 December 2021 15:28]

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
#FireBobbyNicks

McDAVID! Oh YEAH Baby!!
Tic-Tac-Tao!
Keep on Rockin' in the Free World
P. Chiarelli math.. T. Hall = A. Larsson, Yak= bag o'pucks (OK he got one right...) K. Russell = $4.1 M+NMC, G. Reinhart= M. Barzal + A. Beauvillier, J. Eberle = R. Spooner,

You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you can get a lottery pick.

You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you can get a lottery pick.

CrudeRemarks wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 14:43

RDOilerfan wrote on Thu, 09 December 2021 15:32 Koskinen is one of the most baffling goalies to me. He can look SOOO good than a switch flips and he's brutal. There really doesn't seem to much of a middle ground. It’s not so baffling. He isn’t a starting calibre goaltender. Most NHL backups are capable of good play in short spurts. Honestly he could’ve been the ideal #2 behind Markstrom in a bizarro universe where Peter Chiarelli fired himself instead of tying up all our goaltending cap, causing us to lose out on Markstrom and be forced to sign Father Time.

I think this is one of the most common misconceptions in sports, the idea that bad players in pro sports are just bad, and average guys are average all the time.

The gap between the best players in the NHL (or any league) and the worst regular players is orders of magnitude smaller than the gap between the worst player in the NHL and like a good junior player that never gets drafted.

Any decent backup in the league can give you a string of good to great games. They just can't maintain it for 40-50 games, which is why they're not a starter. Those good games are then balanced out by a string of bad to terrible games. Look at any goalie with a .910 save percentage, their game log is going to have a huge spread in terms of performance. It's not like all of their games are just in the .900 to .920 range.

It's also why a journeyman defenceman like Marek Malik, who never scored more than 7 goals in a season, can score a shootout goal like this on an NHL goalie:



I think I first started to realize this was the case when I found out that a large portion of players in the CFL were All-Americans in the NCAA. Being a really good college player does not remotely mean you're good enough to play in the NFL.

I went to watch a Vancouver Grizzlies game back in the day. Keep in mind the Grizzlies were one of the worst franchises in the history of the NBA, so I was not expecting much. But I remember watching them do their shootaround before the start of the game and they didn't miss. Like at all. And they were just messing around, chatting, whatever. But everything went in. And I realized at that point that my idea that they were terrible basketball players was skewed by watching them play against the best players in the world on a nightly basis. The Grizzlies players were elite athletes (even Big Country ), it was my perception that was off.

[Updated on: Fri, 10 December 2021 11:05]

Oilers Goal Differential
17/18: 234 GF / 263 GA (-29)
18/19: 232 GF / 274 GA (-42)
19/20 (82 game pace): 257 GF / 254 GA (+3) in 64 games
2021 (82 game pace):269 GF / 235 GA (+34) after 38 games

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

Survivor LX(I) and 67 Champ(i)on

CrusaderPi wrote on Thu, 30 January 2020 12:21

und(i)sputed O.L.F.N Heavybra(i)n Champ(i)on of the Woooooooooooooooooorld. Plus. One.

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty

Please do not feed the bears. Feeding the bears creates a dependent population unable to survive on their own. Bears.

Survivor CHAMP S52 | S66
OG's #MUSTWIN Scale
Category 1 - Lightly Musty
Category 2 - Moderately Musty
Category 3 - Considerably Musty
Category 4 - Severely Musty
Category 5 - Incredibly Musty