Quote:
Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
Over the span of a contract longer than a couple years, 20+ of the teams in the NHL are regarded as effectively in the the same competitive band. It’s only the handful of teams at the extremes where it comes into play.
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Yeah, the Panthers are the President Trophy winners and they haven't made the second round since 1996. But here they are leading the NHL in points because they sucked so much and got to build around Huberdeau (3rd overall) Barkov (2nd overall) and Ekblad (1st overall).
Look at the entire playoff teams in the east, and nearly all of them are where they are because they sucked. Penguins and Washington goes without saying. Tampa got their many later round gems in Kucherov and Point and friends but they still have Stamkos (1st), Hedman (2nd) and Sergachev (acquired via 3rd overall Drouin). Toronto with Matthews (1st) and Marner (4th). He might not be as important as Aho, but Svechnikov (2nd) is a huge cornerstone of the team. It would be cheating to use the Rangers and Lafrenniere (1st) as an example, but even being eligible for the lottery shows they haven't been consistent, though everyone knows the Rangers have a different philopshy ingrained in them from their "buy the Cup" era.
It's a lot harder to build a team like the Bruins by having constant success.
We saw the end of that era with the Penguins vs Wings back-to-back finals. Then it became relying on being bad to win (Kane/Toews, Doughty from the west) with the Blues being outliers.
Which is why I think Philly does present a unique situation especially if the lottery goes well for them. They were bad this year not because they were supposed to be bad like Arizona or Seattle. But because they lost their most important players for most of the season.
The Devils may be on the upswing as well with Hughes breaking out, Hischier finally showing some of his potential, and prospects like the younger Hughes in the pipeline.
If either of them win the lottery and bring in Wright, that's probably Gaudreau's best bet to sign with a winning team. Not in year 1 necessarily, but year 3 or 4 when you still have these prospects and young players on ELC/bridge contracts or Hughes and Hischier peaking on their first contracts (like Gaudreau is now).