Predict the Pacific Standings

[expatflame]

1. Knights
2. Flames
3. Sharks
4. Coyotes
5. Canucks
6. Ducks
7. Oilers
8. Kings

[Britflamesfan]

Spot on Barnet you are properly right about the intensity levels not being there from the start, but, how to beat the buttersoft Flames was put on display for all to see at the end of last season and in the playoffs. I cannot believe I coughed up to watch them get embarrassed like they did, just no fight in them at all despite the goalie playing out of his skin.

It drives me nuts watching Calgary players refuse to lay the body on players. Mon is the worst, every time the hit is there you see him just slide on by . Very sadly I cannot see the flames winning Lord Stanley with the current team built as it is unless they make the NHL non contact and if that happens that will be me done.

Originally Posted by Barnet Flame

A lot rides on how Talbot performs. Equally, a lot rides on how teams approach us.

Colorado showed how to completely neutralise this team. I still can’t get over that.

That said, I doubt that until we get close to the playoffs that we will see teams approach us with that kind of intensity.

This means, I think we will make the playoffs with games to spare. But nothing has changed to make me believe the outcome of the playoffs will be materially different from last season.

Like I said, a lot rides on Talbot and goalies in general. However, there is no upgrade on Smith’s performance in that series. He was phenomenal. One of the best performances I have seen from a goalie.

Despite that, we were on the wrong end of one of the most humiliating playoff displays I’ve ever seen.

My prediction:

San Jose
Calgary
Vegas
Arizona
Vancouver
Edmonton
Anaheim
LA

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Britflamesfan

...The playoffs were a disaster which other teams will have watched and will have a good idea from them how to deal with the flames. Mon will find it much tougher hanging around the front of the net, play him physically and he disappears. In fact play the whole team physically and they disappear...

Do people actually believe NHL coaches watched that first round series, and collectively went: “Eureka! THAT’S how to beat the Flames! Why didn’t I think of it before?! Jared Bednar is a super-genius!”

Come on. The Avalanche did not stumble onto a secret formula, and the Flames do not suffer from an uncorrectable weakness. They will be fine.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Zulu29]

Calgary
Vegas
Arizona
SJ
Vancouver
LA
Anaheim
Edmonton

I think our goaltending will be less of a worry this year without Smith. Also hoping we have a bit more sandpaper with Lucic in the lineup and he should complement the roster better than Neal did. I don’t expect that Johnny and Lindholm will repeat their scoring but hopefully we get an uptick in performance from guys like Dube and Mangiapane to offset the difference.

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by Britflamesfan

Love this team to death and hope I am wrong, make the playoffs for sure but first again I doubt it.

Who’s the competition for first?

We got first, despite losing a bunch of points from poor goaltending. We were the second highest scoring team, and had the second best goal differential.

Sam Jose is clearly worse than last year, with the loss of a 40 goal scorer, and other key players aging.

Vegas was merely average last season, being 15th out of 16 playoff teams. IMO, they have been playing above their heads, and still have some room to come down.

Arizona and Vancouver are getting better, but not likely to compete for the division title.

Anaheim, LA are clearly rebuilding teams on the downswing.

Edmonton might have the worst roster I’ve ever seen on an NHL team. They will finish close to dead last in the NHL unless McDavid ca fins a few extra gears in his offence to overcome his defensive shortcomings.

Calgary coasted to first in the division, and conference, is basically returning the same team again, and there really isn’t a team that is notably improved enough to really challenge.

Of course, chemistry changes, and sometimes thing just come together for a team, but for now, that is just as likely to happen for Calgary as anyone else.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

I think those playoff games are a really big deal when it comes to predicting the division. To ignore it means to disregard human nature, psychology and context of what happened. When you think about how badly they got outclassed, and hopefully you agree with me here but you’re so insanely biased I kinda doubt it- but outclassed is a generous term... when you consider that, it’s not hard to see that a) teams may realize how to beat Calgary b) confidence is fragile on the team and could be easily derailed after a bad stretch and c) they exited the year playing their absolute worst stretch all calendar year...

Well, I will do my level best here to overcome my "insane" bias in order to get to the same level of faux-objectivity that you believe to possess:

a) Teams have always realized "how to beat Calgary." NHL coaches are not dumb. They watch EVERY game, and they know and understand where every team's strengths and weaknesses lie. The trick is actually pulling it off when it matters most, and there is NO guarantee that one coach's strategy will overcome the opposition coach's strategy, just because it worked last time. The playoffs are tricky animal because they do not consist of one-game nor 30-games. A seven game series is enough time to gain or lose momentum and to never get it back once it's gone. But because the margins are so slim, the tactics employed are also subject to several factors beyond the coaches's and the players's control.

Giordano has said that in the playoffs the Flames got away from playing their game; they got into their own heads; they played scared, and they tried to play safe. If they played the way that they had all season—and like they did in Game #1—they would have won that series.

b) Agreed. But by the same token, this is not something that someone can predict nor manufacture. I agree that this is the biggest question facing the Flames heading into this season, but I also think there are good reasons to expect that they will figure it out at the right time, and when it matters most. But again, this will almost certainly not be much of an issue during the regular season.

c) I'm not sure what this has to do with anything this season. Teams go through bad stretches; the Flames's happened to occur at the worst time of year. They will go through bad stretches again this year, but I wouldn't expect it to occur at the end of the season again just because that is when it happened last year.

I’m kind of shocked people would pretend it’s not relevant here. It’s like saying St.Louis could exit December 31st in the NHL because that’s what happened last year. Now do you believe that to be likely to happen? Guess we’ll just ignore what happened in the playoffs for them?

It is nothing at all like that. Last year the Blues were pretty highly favoured by observers to make a push, and that is exactly what ended up happening. This year most observers seem to think that the Flames will be one of the top teams in the Pacific Division. I expect that—like they were right about the Blues—they are probably right about the Flames.

This is a prediction thread. I made a prediction. Sorry you don’t like it, but it’s my prediction. At what point over the last decade have the teams always had the same ranking year over year? Almost never. Teams get worse and teams get better. Teams in Calgary’s division got better and I think via goaltending they got worse plus they showed a lot of weaknesses in the playoffs that could be exposed throughout this season (aka just play tough against them). Hope I’m wrong and again, they are still a good team, honestly.

The Pacific Division teams that improved were so far behind the Flames in the first place, that their improvement likely does not affect them a great deal. The teams with whom the Flames will be competing for the Division are VGK—who looks the same as they did last year, and SJ—who has lost some important pieces including their top goal-scorer and captain. The Flames managed to overcome question marks in goal last year to win the Division. It seems like a good bet that they would come at least close to repeating that feat once again. But what truly does seem "insane" is to expect that three teams will overcome a 14–25-point gap to finish ahead of the Flames this year, and that Calgary will be running neck-and-neck with possibly the worst team in the entire League for a Wild Card berth.

Yeah, it is so outrageously biased to think that last year's Division winner will once again be in the running for the Division.

[Deegee]

Originally Posted by Zulu29

Calgary
Vegas
Arizona
SJ
Vancouver
LA
Anaheim
Edmonton

I think our goaltending will be less of a worry this year without Smith. Also hoping we have a bit more sandpaper with Lucic in the lineup and he should complement the roster better than Neal did. I don’t expect that Johnny and Lindholm will repeat their scoring but hopefully we get an uptick in performance from guys like Dube and Mangiapane to offset the difference.

This is pretty much how I see it. Sharks might struggle a bit this year.

[dino7c]

Tampa is not making the playoffs...they got exposed in the first round sweep. Other teams just need to play like CBJ and Tampa doesn't stand a chance.

See how dumb you sound

[Strange Brew]

My God do people ever get bent out of shape over predictions. It's like someone insulted your mother.

It's against the odds to have the exact same top 3 as last year, but I have a hard time predicting who will be out. I will go with:

Vegas
Calgary
Vancouver
San Jose
Arizona
Edmonton
Anaheim
LA

[Mr.Coffee]

Originally Posted by dino7c

Tampa is not making the playoffs...they got exposed in the first round sweep. Other teams just need to play like CBJ and Tampa doesn't stand a chance.

See how dumb you sound

Thanks

[Samonadreau]

Not just the Pacific standings, but the Athletic just came out with their projected league standings.... Behind a paywall so I will just disclose the Flames and Oilers

#6. Flames
#27. Oilers

Sounds about right

[Mayo]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

Who’s the competition for first?

We got first, despite losing a bunch of points from poor goaltending. We were the second highest scoring team, and had the second best goal differential.

Sam Jose is clearly worse than last year, with the loss of a 40 goal scorer, and other key players aging.

Vegas was merely average last season, being 15th out of 16 playoff teams. IMO, they have been playing above their heads, and still have some room to come down.

Arizona and Vancouver are getting better, but not likely to compete for the division title.

Anaheim, LA are clearly rebuilding teams on the downswing.

Edmonton might have the worst roster I’ve ever seen on an NHL team. They will finish close to dead last in the NHL unless McDavid ca fins a few extra gears in his offence to overcome his defensive shortcomings.

Calgary coasted to first in the division, and conference, is basically returning the same team again, and there really isn’t a team that is notably improved enough to really challenge.

Of course, chemistry changes, and sometimes thing just come together for a team, but for now, that is just as likely to happen for Calgary as anyone else.

I think you are under-estimating Vegas. They added a big piece and have good depth. They also should have won the first round last year.

Although I agree with the rest of what you said...I think it's going to be tight all year between Flames & Knights for the Pacific crown

[Gamblor]

Current Division odds from pinnaclesports.com

VGK +122
CGY +367
SJ +420
EDM +1252
ARI +1252
VAN +1252
ANA +4164
LA +5206

Implied % on CGY are about 21.4%, so if you think they're more likely than that to win the division, the "smart" thing to do is bet on the above line.

It's a far cry from the +900ish that was available last year, but it still doesn't seem too outlandish to believe that's a good bet.

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by Mayo

I think you are under-estimating Vegas. They added a big piece and have good depth. They also should have won the first round last year.

Although I agree with the rest of what you said...I think it's going to be tight all year between Flames & Knights for the Pacific crown

Sure they added a good player, but they were only 15th overall last season, second worst record out of all playoff teams. Fleury will likely return to his career averages too, at some point.

Could they improve, sure. But I’m not convinced that they are even a lock to make the playoffs.

[the2bears]

Originally Posted by Britflamesfan

Wow some people have short memories from last year. Once we got within shouting distance of the playoffs and teams started playing hard the flames really struggled. The playoffs were a disaster which other teams will have watched and will have a good idea from them how to deal with the flames. Mon will find it much tougher hanging around the front of the net, play him physically and he disappears. In fact play the whole team physically and they disappear. What has the team done to upgrade this, well a little bit in swapping a bad player for another tougher one. The Capt had an amazing year last year I will be amazed if he can get anywhere close to that again.

Love this team to death and hope I am wrong, make the playoffs for sure but first again I doubt it.

Well, all it takes is a team to play like Colorado did. But they all have to do it for a whole season, rather than 5 games. And the Flames will surely never adjust. Like "Mon", who trained hard this off-season and recognized things to work on but don't you believe him!

[dino7c]

Every division winner lost in the first round...they have all been figured out

Or maybe they coasted... Calgary had enough points to make the playoffs in February. To me it's a learning experience for a young team

[djsFlames]

Originally Posted by Britflamesfan

Wow some people have short memories from last year. Once we got within shouting distance of the playoffs and teams started playing hard the flames really struggled. The playoffs were a disaster which other teams will have watched and will have a good idea from them how to deal with the flames. Mon will find it much tougher hanging around the front of the net, play him physically and he disappears. In fact play the whole team physically and they disappear. What has the team done to upgrade this, well a little bit in swapping a bad player for another tougher one. The Capt had an amazing year last year I will be amazed if he can get anywhere close to that again.

Love this team to death and hope I am wrong, make the playoffs for sure but first again I doubt it.

The flames slumped going into April. The Avs were surging, and momentum is quite a real thing in hockey. Coaching played in over the few games but ultimately one sides top players were feeling it and the other's were frustrated and not.

It was pretty disaster-y, but theres not some secret formula to beating the flames at will.