Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike F
Completely disagree.
The core of this team is Gaudreau, Monahan, Bennett, Giordano, Brodie, & Hamilton.
Gaudreau is 23 and is in his 3rd season.
Monahan is 22 and is in his 4th season.
Bennett is 20 and effectively in his 2nd season.
Giordano is 33 and in his 10th season.
Brodie is 26 and in his 6th season.
Hamilton is 23 and in his 5th season.
Gaudreau and Monahan were both on a trajectory to reach elite status this year - Gaudreau coming off a year where he was 7th in the league in scoring and would have been a no-brainer for Team USA had he been older, and Monahan a legitimate threat to score 35+ goals while rounding out his overall game.
Giordano and Brodie were coming off years where they were both legitimate candidates for Team Canada, the deepest defensive roster in the world, and given Brodie's age and experience you would expect him to continue his rise. Hamilton's play in the latter 2/3 of last season made it reasonable to expect him to join Giordano and Brodie as a top tier defenseman.
Bennett is still young, but it was reasonable to expect him to take steps forward from his 18 goal, 36 point rookie year.
Supplementing that you had an emerging Backlund and dependable Stajan as depth centres, a blue-chip prospect in Tkachuk, Stanley Cup winners in Frolik & Brauer as middle 6 wingers, and Ferland, Bouma, Hathaway, etc. who could play in a 4th line role that could generate a lot of energy and allow you to truly roll 4 lines.
The core of the team made the second round of the playoffs 2 seasons ago, and the players forming the core all showed individual growth last year that was undermined by AHL level goaltending (none of the goalies the Flames employed as their starter last year could even land a back-up spot this year!). That issue appeared to be addressed by the acquisition of a solid tandum of Elliott & Johnson.
Ya, there were a couple of holes - missing one top 6 winger, and their 4th D position was being filled by a guy who could only tenuously be considered a top 4 D - but to say that those who expected more than a team struggling to play decent hockey for the majority of the season, and only in the payoff hunt due to a terribly under-performing Western Conference is BS.
This is no longer a 30 year-olds league... Chicago, Pittsburgh, Tampa, LA all started having great team success with key players in their early 20s. Just because the Oilers failed miserably to turn things around quickly doesn't mean every team should expect to take 5+ years to turn a team into a legitimate contender.
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That's a fairly re-visionist history post though. Our rebuild is ahead of schedule, for some of the reasons you listed. On your list, only two of those players you list should be in or hitting their primes (Gio or Brodie), the rest have their best hockey a head of them, regardless of age or previous accomplishment.
True, it's not a 30 year old's league anymore, but it's also not a 20 year old's league either. I agree the Oilers aren't the standard to hold yourself too as the norm, but neither are the Hawks and Pens. We don't have Sydney Crosby (no, Johnny is not at that level, but alas McDavid is) let alone the equivalent of a Malkin from our drafting to boot. And our young players don't have the supporting cast that was around in Chicago for that first cup (not to mention their list of young up coming talent was far larger than what you posted for us) at that time as well.
I'm not saying it's not reasonable to have expected or hoped for more from Monahan, Brodie and Bennett for example this year, or more jump from Johnny. But if after last season you thought any of our young talent was on the verg of making this team "elite", you were pinning way too much of our lack of success on goaltending. Progression of these young players isn't going to be completely linear, and if anything your post showed that our run 2 years ago also falsely inflated expectations. That was an overachievement, end of story.
When I say it's a head of schedule, you have to go back to 4 years ago and evaluate, not look at how your expectations got falsely re-set with a playoff run two years ago.
4 years ago:
- People weren't sold on Monahan being the right pick at #6, most didn't think he'd make the team in year one. Now we are all over him in year 4 because he hasn't been one of the best centre's in the game this year.
- Johnny Gaudreau wasn't even a lock to make the NHL, let alone be one of the top 10 scorers in the league (perhaps the main reason we are even upset this team isn't a lock for the playoffs this year is that surprisingly a 4th overall pick in teh system could be one of the best players in the game).
- Hamilton wasn't even in the org. Despite his early struggles, he's come along nicely, a legit top 4 defender in the game. Not sure any of us could have counted on us drafting a player already as good as he was in the draft year we traded for him, that puts us way a head rather than having to wait for a top D prospect to get ready in the minors.
- Bennett. I actually think people probably expected Bennett to be an instant sensation in the NHL. Our highest ever pick, who I think many hoped we stole the best player in the draft because of chin ups and expected immediate impact. Agreed he hasn't been that yet, but he's also only 20, missed a full year due to injury, we owe him some time to develop.
- Thachuk. He seems to have been a more instant impact than anyone should have expected.
So I guess my point being, when we started this thing 4 years ago, even with the way they are playing right now, can you honestly say at this point:
- You expected Monahan to be better than he is now?
- You expected Gaudreau to be better than he is now?
- You expected we'd have a D-man new to the team as good as Hamilton is now?
- You expected Bennett to be as good as he is now?
- you expected our first round pick from this year to be as good as Thachuk is now?
Of those 5 questions, I can only answer YES to the Bennett question. So for me, that's why we are ahead of schedule. Things take time to develop and holes take time to fill. Gaudreau being who he is filled one of those holes without needing another year of tanking to get a player like him. Hamilton being a trade allowed us to by pass having to develop him for a couple of years first. That puts us a head, and we need to give this team team for all those players to continue to progress, and give the GM time to fill the other holes as well (like goaltending), because as we are finding out, it's not easy.