Simplified Neal/Lucic trade Poll

[TheIronMaiden]

Originally Posted by Locke

But hes more than just a deterrent. He holds the puck up well and has nice fancy possession stats.

When Lucic eventually acquires the puck its difficult to get it off of him, if he can hold the puck while his linemates eventually show up then you've got a pretty good 4th line player whereas Neal fires it as soon as he gets it, and then not all that well.

The face-punching element is likely just an occasional bonus.

As fast as the game is, half of the game is won along the board and in the corners. Neal was useless in open ice and in the trenches, at least Lucic can lean on D men.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

As fast as the game is, half of the game is won along the board and in the corners. Neal was useless in open ice and in the trenches, at least Lucic can lean on D men.

And can be effective with the puck when D men try and lean on him.

[TheIronMaiden]

Originally Posted by Locke

It would, but I doubt it. One would think any injury of that sort would have been diagnosed and common knowledge by this point.

It's tough to say, and it would be common knowledge within the league brass, it would really come down to how desperate Edmonton was. Still, occam's razor should be in effect, and I am letting July get the better of me.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

It's tough to say, and it would be common knowledge within the league brass, it would really come down to how desperate Edmonton was. Still, occam's razor should be in effect, and I am letting July get the better of me.

She is a cruel mistress.

[TheIronMaiden]

Originally Posted by Locke

And can be effective with the puck when D men try and lean on him.

I think the bottom line is players need to be put in a position where they can succeed. With Lucic that never happened, based on play time and expectations. In Calgary, fans are already expecting the worst, and their bottom six has enough skill to complement his play. I don't know if he is as useless as many are suggesting.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by ricardodw

Valid point about counting stats.. same as SOG and goalie save % and Shots attempted (driving Corsi and possession stats) all being subjective.

Does your watching the Flames play support a theory that they are not a soft non-physical team and that the home town stats counters are not counting their hits to the same degree as the rest of leagues hit counters?

Yes and no.

I think what determines a hit in a NHL building can be sketchy. But possession stats are done through sample size minimums from the same person, so you can throw that out.

I'm honestly not sure where hits, shots, giveaways and takeaways come from these days. If it's building specific it's an issue.

I think the bigger issue is teams not having the puck much though.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

I think the bottom line is players need to be put in a position where they can succeed. With Lucic that never happened, based on play time and expectations. In Calgary, fans are already expecting the worst, and their bottom six has enough skill to complement his play. I don't know if he is as useless as many are suggesting.

Precisely. And I've mentioned that many times.

As Edmonton's 4th best forward and his contract his usage and expectations were wildly out of line with his abilities and contributions.

We look past the cash and see what he can do on this roster and who knows?

[taxbuster]

Still dislike it after a week in the bush with no internet. :-)

Why? Because all it does is help the owners (it saves them money and an almost insignificant cap drop).

It does NOTHING for the team in advancing towards a Cup.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by ricardodw

Valid point about counting stats.. same as SOG and goalie save % and Shots attempted (driving Corsi and possession stats) all being subjective.

Does your watching the Flames play support a theory that they are not a soft non-physical team and that the home town stats counters are not counting their hits to the same degree as the rest of leagues hit counters?

There are normalizing mechanisms in place which help significantly to eliminate the subjectivity of all of these numbers, but I think the more important point made here has to do with the correlation between hitting and success: simply put, high-possession teams don't register near the same numbers of hits because they have the puck more often than not.

To look at it another way, last year, five of the top-ten hitting teams were playoff teams (Pittsburgh, VGK, TBL, Carolina, NYI), with only two of these teams playing past the first round. Seven of the bottom-ten hitting teams made the playoffs (CBJ, Colorado, StL, SJ, Nashville, Toronto, Calgary), with four playing in round two, two in the Conference Finals, and one ultimately winning the the Stanley Cup.

I think the Flames could manage to be a little more physical and certainly exhibit more intensity, but I doubt this will result in them being much "better" than a bottom-five hitting team in large part because they are a high-possession team. Fortunately, the numbers seem to show that this won't matter significantly as to their success next year.

...oh, and another fun little fact here: for all the flack the Flames take for having been too soft in the playoffs, they had a higher hits/GP average (36.2) than both the SC Champions (31.5), and the team that beat them in five games in Round One (29.7). Why? Because the Flames did not have the puck nearly enough.

[Dajazz]

Originally Posted by Bingo

If you sign a similar player it's $3M a season ball park, because Hathaway at $1.5M isn't the same deterrent.

So Neal at $5.25M is overpaid as a bottom six forward, agree 100%. But if he's an above average deterrent and doesn't get filled in defensively he's only overpaid by $2.25M

1) You don’t sign a Hathaway player for 1.5, you sign them for league minimum two way contracts or use entry level contracts.
2) You don’t keep a goon on the roster every game, they are in the press box for league minimum

Lucic might work, he might not, but Treliving pulled the trigger too fast. Neal had one poor season, Lucic three.

I want it to work, I want Neal to crash and burn while dragging down McBeggarface and Drabbadabadaisaddle, but I still don’t understand the valuation of Lucic vs Neal.

I consider Treliving a good GM so I will assume there were other influences to the trade. But if that was the reason (off ice stuff maybe or a trade request) he could have traded Neal anywhere but Edmonton. Anywhere.

He took the worst contract in the league. What if Neal plus a third could have landed Turris, isn’t that a much better trade? Or another, less incredibly overpaid player. Why not add to Neal and get something good back?

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Dajazz

1) You don’t sign a Hathaway player for 1.5, you sign them for league minimum two way contracts or use entry level contracts.
2) You don’t keep a goon on the roster every game, they are in the press box for league minimum

Lucic might work, he might not, but Treliving pulled the trigger too fast. Neal had one poor season, Lucic three.

I want it to work, I want Neal to crash and burn while dragging down McBeggarface and Drabbadabadaisaddle, but I still don’t understand the valuation of Lucic vs Neal.

I consider Treliving a good GM so I will assume there were other influences to the trade. But if that was the reason (off ice stuff maybe or a trade request) he could have traded Neal anywhere but Edmonton. Anywhere.

He took the worst contract in the league. What if Neal plus a third could have landed Turris, isn’t that a much better trade? Or another, less incredibly overpaid player. Why not add to Neal and get something good back?

And made it into, at worst, the second worst contract.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Dajazz

...He took the worst contract in the league. What if Neal plus a third could have landed Turris, isn’t that a much better trade? Or another, less incredibly overpaid player. Why not add to Neal and get something good back?

Why not? I suspect because there was nothing better coming back. I think you are probably correct—that there were unseen factors behind the urgency to move Neal. Without knowing everything that Treliving knows, it’s hard to fairly evaluate this trade.


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[TheScorpion]

I'd say that Lucic had one-and-a-half poor seasons... three is really stretching it.

2016-17: 23 goals, 50 points
First half of 2017-18 (Pre-All Star): (49 GP) 9 goals, 30 points
Second half of 2017-18 (Post-All Star): (33 GP) 1 goal, 4 points
2018-19: 6 goals, 20 points

I honestly wonder if Lucic was demoralized halfway through 2017-18 because his team was underperforming compared to the previous season, and he never got that mojo back.

Funny enough, the splits for Neal are kinda similar, with a lower peak...

2016-17: 23 goals, 41 points
First half of 2017-18 (Pre-All Star): (48 GP) 22 goals, 34 points
Second half of 2017-18 (Post-All Star): (23 GP) 3 goals, 10 points
2018-19: 7 goals, 19 points

[Split98]

Originally Posted by Dajazz

1) You don’t sign a Hathaway player for 1.5, you sign them for league minimum two way contracts or use entry level contracts.
2) You don’t keep a goon on the roster every game, they are in the press box for league minimum

Lucic might work, he might not, but Treliving pulled the trigger too fast. Neal had one poor season, Lucic three.

I want it to work, I want Neal to crash and burn while dragging down McBeggarface and Drabbadabadaisaddle, but I still don’t understand the valuation of Lucic vs Neal.

I consider Treliving a good GM so I will assume there were other influences to the trade. But if that was the reason (off ice stuff maybe or a trade request) he could have traded Neal anywhere but Edmonton. Anywhere.

He took the worst contract in the league. What if Neal plus a third could have landed Turris, isn’t that a much better trade? Or another, less incredibly overpaid player. Why not add to Neal and get something good back?

If that was the trade, I'd hope that Treliving didn't elect to take on Lucic instead.

But maybe there wasn't much interest in Neal? Maybe a 32yo sniper that can't snipe wasn't gaining much interest outside of teams that wanted to trade problems. Not only that, how many teams with a problem would actually value having Neal on their roster?

Turris for Neal+ would have only held water if you believed that Nashville could get NashvilleNeal back. But looking at that roster, it's tough to imagine he's playing top-6 there, and Poile would be shown the door if Neal didn't improve (let along regress).

Other than that, I can't think of any other team that would take Neal on - let alone take Neal on without us adding.

[Huntingwhale]

Classic win-win trade if there ever was one. Neal is likely going to perform better with the Oilers then with the Flames. Likewise for Lucic's situation.

The Flames were the 2nd best offence in the league last season. Removing Neal does absolutely nothing to affect that negatively, given his lack of offence all season. Lucic didn't show much of the toughness the Oilers had hoped for, but I doubt they miss him that much given they still have Kassian and couple other goons who can punch faces.

Both players bring different skillsets to the table, and their new teams can utilize them better then their previous clubs could.

The fact both players are immensely overpaid makes this a high-profile trade that's going to attract a lot of attention. However from a hockey perspective, having had time to reflect on it, both teams can potentially come out of this 'winners' and get what they desperately need from their new acquisitions.

Of course they could both still suck and become albatrosses. That is still very much a possibility. It will be interesting next season to follow both players.

[Wolfman]

I'm rooting for Looch

[bubbsy]

Originally Posted by Wolfman

I'm rooting for Looch

Everyone here is/should be, regardless of how one voted.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Wolfman

I'm rooting for Looch

And we all should be. Because like as not, hes here for the foreseeable future.

[JackIsBack]

Oiler fans love to scapegoat.. Remember it was all Rieder's fault.... If he only scored 12 goals... they'd be playoff bound last year - and they said that publicly.

Well... since Rieder is gone... it was all Lucic's fault now... and now that he's gone - the parade route preparations are now back on. The problem with scapegoating - those little goats tend to bite you in the ass.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by Dajazz

1) You don’t sign a Hathaway player for 1.5, you sign them for league minimum two way contracts or use entry level contracts.
2) You don’t keep a goon on the roster every game, they are in the press box for league minimum

Lucic might work, he might not, but Treliving pulled the trigger too fast. Neal had one poor season, Lucic three.

I want it to work, I want Neal to crash and burn while dragging down McBeggarface and Drabbadabadaisaddle, but I still don’t understand the valuation of Lucic vs Neal.

I consider Treliving a good GM so I will assume there were other influences to the trade. But if that was the reason (off ice stuff maybe or a trade request) he could have traded Neal anywhere but Edmonton. Anywhere.

He took the worst contract in the league. What if Neal plus a third could have landed Turris, isn’t that a much better trade? Or another, less incredibly overpaid player. Why not add to Neal and get something good back?

I think effective "goons" ... guys that can play a regular shift and still scare the crap out of you are few and far between and therefore rewarded with more money.

They're certainly not the type that play for league minimum and only dress some games.

You get what you pay for.

Lucic at 7x6 is a mess if he's just a bottom roster player that can intimidate.
Similarly Neal at 5x5.75 is a mess if he can't hold is own defensively and doesn't score.

Lucic at 3M though is a good price tag for an effective player that can still scare the opposition. He's not 5.25 but he's good money from 2.5-3.5M. The guy you are describing is Peluso and we saw how that worked out.