Quote:
Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger
While I understand the frustration, I can't help but chuckle a bit at these posts.
This is the EXACT same stuff people said when Johnny and Chucky were leading us to multiple consecutive disappointing seasons and disappointing playoff exits.
Our talent wasn't elite, they weren't true stars and gamebreakers, we have no identity etc. Even the stuff about coaching making the team play down and being less than the sum of their parts was the same.
Then for 1 season everyone acted like Johnny and Chucky and Lindy became elite overnight and they could win with a real NHL calibre coach.
Oops. Looks like it might be more complicated than that. I mean really, which is it? Was it the elite talent? Darryl? Lightning in a bottle? Fluke?
It's actually funny for anyone to suggest Huberdeau was a flash in the pan when Johnny and Chucky have repeatedly shown that they aren't consistent superstars in this league. I thought we'd have learned our lesson by now. I mean legitimately funny. It's like we all have some sort of memory loss issue but collectively as a fanbase.
Time is a flat circle. Everything we've ever done or will do, we're going to do over and over again. - Rust Cohle.
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And it was always overlooked that that line was very fortunate last year.
Gaudreau and Tkachuk had a 13.0% on ice shooting percentage last year. They generated a ton of quality but were also very fortunate and got some good bounces as a line.
It was a huge career high for all three last year:
Gaudreau: 13.17% - previous high 10.6%
Tkachuk: 12.33% - previous high (9.83, 10.8 in Florida this year)
Lindholm: 12.48% - previous high 10.4%
It's quite possible that even if they stay together here as a line that shooting percentage normalizes and we are saying that we bought high on career seasons for Gaudreau and Tkachuk.
They were still dominant with 60% xGF ratio last year, but if they shoot even 11% on the ice together instead of 13% on the ice together that's 14 fewer goals with them on the ice at 5v5 last year. If you look at their xGF last year and their actual goals for they outperformed it by 27 goals - they were unbelieveable as a line last year but also extremely fortunate.