[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

but that it doesn't address the areas where the Flames were weakest, because they already had a strong blue line. That's, again, true.
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He didn't say that. He said that adding Hamonic is a good thing because he may well excel in a middle pairing role, but that it doesn't address the areas where the Flames were weakest, because they already had a strong blue line. That's, again, true.

Our blue line was an identifiable weakness, though. Brodie-Stone were a sub-50% possession pairing, even if they had their moments you'd be remiss to go into a full season hoping for 82 games of that kind of PDO. Bartkowski-Engelland... where do I begin? It may have been the worst defense pair in the NHL last year. I think when I was checking the various defense pairs on corsica before it went down, there may have been one or two that were worse. So to say we already had a strong blue line is misleading. We had three strong defensemen, a solid bottom pair defenseman playing too high up in the lineup, and the worst bottom pair in the NHL. We were remarkably average, and now I don't believe we are, even if we are overpaying we are arguably a top five defense and probably top two. Which, given the success of teams like Nashville (Ekholm-Subban / Josi-Ellis), Pittsburgh the year prior (Dumoulin-Letang / Maatta-Daley / Cole-Schultz), Chicago the year before (Keith-Seabrook, Oduya-Hjalmarsson), LA the year before (Mitchell-Doughty, Muzzin-Voynov, Martinez-Green-Regehr), Chicago again, etc... is pretty much an annual baseline for being a contender, arguably moreso than forward scoring as many of those teams with the exception of Pittsburgh were extremely average in their forward scoring.

6 points is a lot of points in a tight playoff race. It puts them up in 3rd in the Pacific, playing the Oilers rather than the Ducks. It's the difference between a sweep and a winnable series, particularly given the matchup.

Ducks were a winnable series, though. I mean one might even argue that if the goals followed the scoring chances, we would be up 3-0 after three games, although that's an extreme take. It was a sweep, by chance, but playoff position is pretty irrelevant. Nashville was behind us in the standings and defeated the Ducks (after defeating the Blues and Blackhawks). There is way too much chance at play to say that six point were the difference between a sweep and a winnable series. Cam Talbot could easily have swept us (in fact, did in the regular season).

I mean, I'm stuck defending Ryan Lambert here.

Nope. You elected to defend him when there's nothing there to defend except exaggerated and skewed versions of reality, which is his MO.

As for ignoring Jankowski, Foo and Lazar, this is just magic beans talk. None of those guys have done anything at the NHL level yet. Again, if they do (which no one is saying is impossible) it solves the forward depth problem immediately. Until they do, it's a problem.

Jankowski is not a magic bean. Even if you want to debate his ceiling, his domination of the AHL as a 22 year old is highly indicative of more than just magic beans. He's clearly ready to not only play in the NHL but make some level of impact. I can say this not out of homer-ism but because

1) There were forwards who played and made an impact in the NHL last year who had less impact over replacement level in the AHL than Jankowski, while having worse tool-sets. And Jankowski's minor league strong season was independant of being an AHL vet, a skewed minutes push or a special teams driven skew, the things that historically can cause AHLers to be magic beans.

2) There were already forwards who played on the Calgary Flames last year who probably were below replacement level. Jankowski isn't going to improve upon Lance Bouma or last year's version of Troy Brouwer because he's magic beans? That's not even grounded realism, that's like... "I'm going to walk in -30 degree weather because cars can break down"