Quote:
Originally Posted by AlbertaOiler72
lol...Flames will need to toughen up, hope Smith doesn't crumble or blame his defense like he's prone to do, and tighten up that amazing D as to not let McDavid have a few breakaways like he did last year...
because we saw what a "deep" Flames team looks like...and what a "2-player" Oilers team looks like  |
Oh good god, its just like an Oilers fan to live in the past.
You can't argue that the Flames have not improved their blueline over last year, massively.
You can't argue that Smith while playing for a tremendously bad Arizona team had good goaltending stats especially when it came from making saves on chances from the danger area.
You can't argue that the departure of Eberle for Strome (who's been god awful for a long while) and the loss of Sekera makes the Oilers weaker.
you do understand that a blueline that has Brodie, Hamilton, Gio, Hamonic and Stone alone is far better then a blueline of Bridie, Hamilton, Gio Engelland ond some other disposable yeoman that the Oilers faced last time.
You can gloat all you want about the Oilers sweeping the Flames last year, but based on a 10 year curve, its probably a fluke caused by circumstances
Hey I have to wonder, is McDavid going to vanish again when the going gets tough? What's are Oiler fans going to do when Doctor 8.5 struggles? Boo him out of the building.
Its going to be an exciting season, chances are that the pacific is going to be a 4 horse race with Anaheim and Calgary and Edmonton and maybe San Jose (I'm not sold on them yet).
But I wonder? Will Edmonton choke on their expectations, you know everyone predicting Stanley Cup Glory, and if things go poorly at the start, does T-Mac do what T-Mac does best, fall apart and choke?
But hey the good news is that Chia doesn't have anymore contracts to sign this season, so he can't screw up the Oilers cap structure anymore, at least for a little while.