WCSF - Colorado Avalanche (2) vs. Dallas Stars (3)

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

Well, the bolded statement just isn't true.

But yes, the Avs did tank. This is a franchise that has had far more success than our own over the last 30 years, yet they were willing to scrape the bottom of the league for 3~ seasons and now look at their trajectory.

Meanwhile us flames fans perpetually get stuck with a team that, as you put it, stinks. We haven't had anything like sustained success, and we don't have the pieces that the avs do. I would take 3 years of incomparable suckage if it meant Mackinnon and Makar on the other end.

And no one in Colorado gives two ####s that Duchene is gone.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

Well, the bolded statement just isn't true.

But yes, the Avs did tank. This is a franchise that has had far more success than our own over the last 30 years, yet they were willing to scrape the bottom of the league for 3~ seasons and now look at their trajectory.

Meanwhile us flames fans perpetually get stuck with a team that, as you put it, stinks. We haven't had anything like sustained success, and we don't have the pieces that the avs do. I would take 3 years of incomparable suckage if it meant Mackinnon and Makar on the other end.

I get your point, but it wasn't 3 years. They missed the playoffs 6 of 7 years, and 7 of 9. They didn't win a playoff round for 10 years before beating the Flames, missing the playoffs in 7 of those years.

Fortunately for them, they drafted 1st in 2013 and got MacKinnon. The three prior #1 overalls were Yakupov ('12), RNH ('11) and Hall ('10). 2014 was Ekblad. Ekblad is a great player, but he isn't a franchise changer like MacKinnon is.

So, to be a little more accurate with the point you were trying to make, they sucked for 10 years but were fortunate enough to hit bottom on the right year.

[Enoch Root]

They were also fortunate enough to suck for 3 years after drafting MacKinnon, which helped lead to his (relatively) modest success in those 3 years, which in turn resulted in him signing a long term deal with a cap hit of $6.3M. That turn of events continues to benefit the Avs greatly.

[Jiri Hrdina]

I think Enoch raises an important point. Is this team nearly as successful if they didn't get Mackinnon? Points to the element of fortune to tank, tank hard and tank at the right time.

[Enoch Root]

The Flames are actually a better example of a '3 year drop' than the Avs are.

The Flames went full rebuild in '13 and drafted Monahan at #6, then Bennett at #4 the next year. Had Bennett become the #1 C that he was projected to be, the Flames would have come out of that with C depth of: Bennett, Monahan, Backlund, which would have been the foundation of a true contender.

Unfortunately for them, 2 things happened to derail the plans:

1) they drafted a kid in 2011 in the fourth round named Gaudreau, who joined the team in year 2 of the rebuild, and immediately connected with monahan and the team found success too quickly, and

2) Bennett didn't turn out to be that #1 C.

It's wrong to blame this on Bennett, thse simple fact of the matter is that all draft picks down't turn out. That's why you can't just tank for 3 years. Only some players are going to turn out, only only rarely do you luck into franchise players, which is why when teams tank, they are down for much more than 3 years. Some (see EDM, FLA, ARI) stay down indefinitely. But some (COL, CHI) get a good collection of talent and become contenders.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

I think Enoch raises an important point. Is this team nearly as successful if they didn't get Mackinnon? Points to the element of fortune to tank, tank hard and tank at the right time.

Landeskog is a good player - maybe on a similar level to Monahan (at best)

Rantanen is a very good player, but I don't think he is as good as Gaudreau (inagine what Jahnny looks like, playing with MacKinnon every day)

Makar is a really good player. But he looks a lot better playing with those guys than he would if he were drafted by ARI for example.

MacKinnon makes the team what it is.

Take MacKinnon off that team and replace him with RNH. What do you have?

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

Landeskog is a good player - maybe on a similar level to Monahan (at best)

Rantanen is a very good player, but I don't think he is as good as Gaudreau (inagine what Jahnny looks like, playing with MacKinnon every day)

Makar is a really good player. But he looks a lot better playing with those guys than he would if he were drafted by ARI for example.

MacKinnon makes the team what it is.

Take MacKinnon off that team and replace him with RNH. What do you have?

You have a team like the Flames which is stuck in the middle.
What MacKinnon appears to share with Crosby is they lift the entire team and make everyone better.
That's something that McNotAsGoodAsMackinnon hasn't figured out.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

You have a team like the Flames which is stuck in the middle.
What MacKinnon appears to share with Crosby is they lift the entire team and make everyone better.
That's something that McNotAsGoodAsMackinnon hasn't figured out.

Exactly

[tvp2003]

I think most people thought MacKinnon would be good -- did he just need some time to mature and figure things out? His stats were pretty mediocre, but I don't think you can say he was simply a victim of being on a bad team.

14/15 - 64 GP, 38 pts (14 + 24)
15/16 - 72 GP, 52 pts (21 + 31)
16/17 - 82 GP, 53 pts (16 + 37)

Obviously he's on absolute fire right now -- don't think he can keep that up forever but it seems like he found another gear a few years ago and found another this year as the Avs have started to hit their stride.

[Tbull8]

http://stevenpellis.com/the-2022-nhl...-to-be-wicked/

Sounds like 2022 top end could be franchise changing. Maybe now is the right time to tear it down?

[Winsor_Pilates]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

The Flames are actually a better example of a '3 year drop' than the Avs are.

The Flames went full rebuild in '13 and drafted Monahan at #6, then Bennett at #4 the next year.

I wouldn't say the Flames ever went full rebuild.
They held on to Iginla and other assets too long to be considered that way.

Never drafting top 3 is a big difference vs Colorado, or Chicago, Pittsburgh, Washington and other successful teams in the last 10 years.

Agree with the rest of your assessment.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by tvp2003

I think most people thought MacKinnon would be good -- did he just need some time to mature and figure things out? His stats were pretty mediocre, but I don't think you can say he was simply a victim of being on a bad team.

14/15 - 64 GP, 38 pts (14 + 24)
15/16 - 72 GP, 52 pts (21 + 31)
16/17 - 82 GP, 53 pts (16 + 37)

Obviously he's on absolute fire right now -- don't think he can keep that up forever but it seems like he found another gear a few years ago and found another this year as the Avs have started to hit their stride.

I didn't say that. But I did say that being on a bad team contributed to the (relatively) slow start for him. And those relatively modest numbers led to a very reasonable contract for him.

Then he hit another gear and became the player he was projected to be. And the Avs are very fortunate that it played out the way it did, because now they have the best player in the game at a ridiculously favourable cap hit.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

I wouldn't say the Flames ever went full rebuild.
They held on to Iginla and other assets too long to be considered that way.

Never drafting top 3 is a big difference vs Colorado, or Chicago, Pittsburgh, Washington and other successful teams in the last 10 years.

Agree with the rest of your assessment.

I agree that you need to get into that top 3 of the draft. But I don't agree that they didn't go full rebuild. They did, but they had success too quickly.

Getting all the way to the bottom is actually fairly difficult. It takes time, and having a really bad team for a while. Or, you can get lucky and win the lottery. But you can't plan for luck.

[tvp2003]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

I didn't say that. But I did say that being on a bad team contributed to the (relatively) slow start for him. And those relatively modest numbers led to a very reasonable contract for him.

Then he hit another gear and became the player he was projected to be. And the Avs are very fortunate that it played out the way it did, because now they have the best player in the game at a ridiculously favourable cap hit.

I agree 100%, and wasn't suggesting you were taking that position. I guess my point was more about his development -- compared to someone like McDavid who was leading the league in scoring by year 2, and Crosby who has never finished below 1 PPG in his entire career. What is it about MacKinnon that enabled him to flip the switch in 17/18? It's not like his skating his improved or that he's matured physically -- was it just a mental thing?

In terms of the cap hit, yeah the Avs completely fluked out on that. Part of it was the timing as well -- the cap has gone up significantly since then.

[Winsor_Pilates]

Definitely agree our "success" came too quick.
Avs drafted top 10, 7 of 11 years.

It's a hard strategy to sell to fans, but does seem prolonged sucking is the most likely path to the top.

Hopefully it's not the only path and whatever retooling the Flames do can find us another way.
This organization has too much pride to go full rebuild so we'll see what that means, for better or worse.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

The Flames are actually a better example of a '3 year drop' than the Avs are.

The Flames went full rebuild in '13 and drafted Monahan at #6, then Bennett at #4 the next year. Had Bennett become the #1 C that he was projected to be, the Flames would have come out of that with C depth of: Bennett, Monahan, Backlund, which would have been the foundation of a true contender.

Unfortunately for them, 2 things happened to derail the plans:

1) they drafted a kid in 2011 in the fourth round named Gaudreau, who joined the team in year 2 of the rebuild, and immediately connected with monahan and the team found success too quickly, and

2) Bennett didn't turn out to be that #1 C.

It's wrong to blame this on Bennett, thse simple fact of the matter is that all draft picks down't turn out. That's why you can't just tank for 3 years. Only some players are going to turn out, only only rarely do you luck into franchise players, which is why when teams tank, they are down for much more than 3 years. Some (see EDM, FLA, ARI) stay down indefinitely. But some (COL, CHI) get a good collection of talent and become contenders.

The funny thing is that the only Cs drafted after Bennett that have put up more points are Larkin, Point and Schmaltz. None of whom were on the radar as being that high but also not really that elite #1C you'd think of either, though obviously very good. And drafted ahead of him were Reinhart and Draisaitl. Reinhart hasn't blossomed as a C (but has become a good winger) and Draisaitl we all know about where he gets points.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

The funny thing is that the only Cs drafted after Bennett that have put up more points are Larkin, Point and Schmaltz. None of whom were on the radar as being that high but also not really that elite #1C you'd think of either, though obviously very good. And drafted ahead of him were Reinhart and Draisaitl. Reinhart hasn't blossomed as a C (but has become a good winger) and Draisaitl we all know about where he gets points.

Yeah, it was a #### draft. Flames' highest pick ever and it was a really weak draft.

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

Definitely agree our "success" came too quick.
Avs drafted top 10, 7 of 11 years.

It's a hard strategy to sell to fans, but does seem prolonged sucking is the most likely path to the top.

Hopefully it's not the only path and whatever retooling the Flames do can find us another way.
This organization has too much pride to go full rebuild so we'll see what that means, for better or worse.

I was making this same argument but frankly i'm tired as #### of it. Proud of what exactly? We haven't come close to the cup more than once in the last 30 seasons. That's nothing to be proud of at all.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

Definitely agree our "success" came too quick.
Avs drafted top 10, 7 of 11 years.

It's a hard strategy to sell to fans, but does seem prolonged sucking is the most likely path to the top.

Hopefully it's not the only path and whatever retooling the Flames do can find us another way.
This organization has too much pride to go full rebuild so we'll see what that means, for better or worse.

I don't think it's pride, it's fear—and a fairly well grounded fear, at that. A team in Colorado can tank for several years because the fan base and the local media will either fail to notice, or simply stop caring. But the market is big enough, and ownership wealthy enough to sustain the team through the lean years. This is a VERY hard sell in Calgary because of how front-and-centre the Flames are in this market. The Flames have remained in Calgary in large part on the good-will of the owners, but I think they are rightly terrified of the prospects of staring down a decade of futility like Colorado was able to endure.

Does it suck? Yes. Is it fair? No. But even in spite of how successful Canadian franchises have become in the cap-era they all still suffer from many of these same issues.

Sent from my SM-G960W using Tapatalk

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

The Flames are actually a better example of a '3 year drop' than the Avs are.

The Flames went full rebuild in '13 and drafted Monahan at #6, then Bennett at #4 the next year. Had Bennett become the #1 C that he was projected to be, the Flames would have come out of that with C depth of: Bennett, Monahan, Backlund, which would have been the foundation of a true contender.

Unfortunately for them, 2 things happened to derail the plans:

1) they drafted a kid in 2011 in the fourth round named Gaudreau, who joined the team in year 2 of the rebuild, and immediately connected with monahan and the team found success too quickly, and

2) Bennett didn't turn out to be that #1 C.

It's wrong to blame this on Bennett, thse simple fact of the matter is that all draft picks down't turn out. That's why you can't just tank for 3 years. Only some players are going to turn out, only only rarely do you luck into franchise players, which is why when teams tank, they are down for much more than 3 years. Some (see EDM, FLA, ARI) stay down indefinitely. But some (COL, CHI) get a good collection of talent and become contenders.

Flames were in the running for the MacKinnon draft, but then just decided to play actual hockey when it didn't matter. And even if Flames made it to the bottom 5, knowing their luck, they probably wouldn't have won the draft lottery anyways.