Well, you could hardly be worse

[Mike]

http://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/world-cup-of-hockey/bergevin-today-feel-im-better-general-manager/

Sitting on your hands for 4 months while your team plumbs the depths of
the NHL standings certainly set the bar quite low so I'm not exactly
anticipating that you'll be worse than last year - I think that might be
impossible.

Describing last year as a small bump in the road was interesting though.
Its easy to write it off like that I suppose now that the new season is
upon us. He's like the other 30 managers - hope springs eternal in
September in the NHL. One thing is certain - we get to find out this
year if you are better or if you are just really good at spewing bullshit.

One other thing, a pet peeve. I find it unprofessional and lacking the
luster of a position that he has on a team like this to be calling
players like Shaw, Shawsie. You're not a player anymore Marc. You're an
executive - behave like one.

[freema...@gmail.com]

Yeah, whenever they talk like that they come across as upper class twits.

[Gerry]

Bottom line to take away from the World Cup... Bergevin has Carey Price back. I bet that makes him a waaaaay better GM right there, hey?

l8r,
Gerry

[Gerry]

No idea what this is worth, but... I don't disagree with 30th and 26th... seems about right...

http://www.nhlranker.com/coaches.html

http://www.nhlranker.com/gm.html

l8r,
Gerry

[Ed]

Yeah, for sure.

I wonder if he realizes how lucky he is to have the best goalie in the game on his roster?
Sometimes I wonder....

[Mike]

He does now I bet. Took complete advantage of that last year by not
having a valid plan B and it blew up in his face.

[Marty]

Well, a lot of fans were pretty OK at the time with him sitting on his
hands and not getting a REAL replacement for Price until the death spiral
was on. I mean, there is no replacing Price, but there were better trade
options than an washed up AHLer not good enough to make Edmonton. Problem
was when things were going well, too muck cock-eyed optimism. Cordon could
do the job, and Price would be back soon enough, probably, people thought.
A lot of people were wrong. Of course, only Bergevin gets paid millions to
NOT be wrong, so yeah, it's on him, but he fell same pray to the allure of
the amazing start as everyone else. A start so good that he thought a
borderline NHL goalie like Cordon could do the job in Price's absence. Not
bloody likely.

Marty

[gorgo...@gmail.com]

30th and last for our MT... lol. And 7 spots behind Torts! That's even better.

[Gerry]

I guess it comes down to what "the job" was. I think they did the right thing sticking with Condon, but that they should have REALLY stood behind him, not just used him as a scapegoat. Condon was good, he was as good as anything else they could have done in terms of filling in for Price. Or at least, as good on a cost-benefit ratio basis anyway.

I think a team in the Habs' position should be able to be .500 with any reasonable facsimile of an NHL substitute goalie, which Condon was, and even the meagre Scrivens also. (.500 doesn't make the playoffs in the modern NHL). The problem with the Habs is that they were a .200 team for so long. And that was not on the goaltending.

Price makes the difference between being a .500 team and a .650 team, between being mediocre and actually having a chance to contend. So that's where he can make Therrien and Bergevin look better than they are.

But nothing excuses the .200 clip they collapsed to last year, nothing.

l8r,
Gerry

[Nyssa]

Yes, Condon was much better than the alternatives out there,
especially for the money paid. The problem was not so much
his playing, but the way the Foxhole (specifically MT) kept
throwing him under the bus after games in his comments to
the press.

Not the best way to motivate a player or to instill confidence
in him with the rest of the team or the fans.

THAT is one of the biggest reasons MT is a failure. He does
NOT know how to handle professional players, especially not
the younger ones who need some, you know, *coaching* from
a coach to help him improve his game without making them
feel like dirt.

Nyssa, who knows that's not the way to build self-confidence
in a player

[Marty]

On Sat, 01 Oct 2016 05:30:33 -0700, Gerry wrote:

> I guess it comes down to what "the job" was. I think they did the right
> thing sticking with Condon, but that they should have REALLY stood
> behind him, not just used him as a scapegoat. Condon was good, he was
> as good as anything else they could have done in terms of filling in for
> Price.

So, that's really so NOT ture. There were better options, on trade, than a
goalie with 0 NHL track-record before the season. Lie, there was a WHOLE
lot of guys with more of a track record. Like dozens.

> Or at least, as good on a cost-benefit ratio basis anyway.

That's is where opinions kicks in, and I would say, I disagree with you.
Unless you truly believe no other goalie could be traded for that might
have sneaked the Hab's into the playoff picture until Price's return
(which seems possible at the VERY end of the season, but the shut him down
because it was pointless).

>
> I think a team in the Habs' position should be able to be .500 with any
> reasonable facsimile of an NHL substitute goalie, which Condon was, and
> even the meagre Scrivens also. (.500 doesn't make the playoffs in the
> modern NHL). The problem with the Habs is that they were a .200 team
> for so long. And that was not on the goaltending.

You want to dismiss goaltending like it is nothing, while holding that
Price is the key as well. It makes no sense.

Price is a great goalie that covers up many holes. Cordon will likely
struggle to be a NHL goalie for the rest of his life. An NHL team will
struggle when they move from a great goalie to a borderline talent.
Ludicrous to argue otherwise.

The Hab's fell further than what can be explained by losing a great
goalie. They had other problems. However, a better than AHL goalie
replacement might have kept them in a play-off position. I would argue,
likely would have. Surely, a goalie matters, doesn't it? Hell, isn't the
entire point of this post of how key a goalie is? Some people want to
argue that only Price kept to team from being terrible, but if he is
injured all random goalie is equal in talent (outside Price's talent) and
thus only coaching matters anyone??! Apparently, the only goalie in the
NHL that impactsa team is Price. The rest are interchangeable. Cripes.

>
> Price makes the difference between being a .500 team and a .650 team,
> between being mediocre and actually having a chance to contend. So
> that's where he can make Therrien and Bergevin look better than they
> are.
>
> But nothing excuses the .200 clip they collapsed to last year, nothing.
>
> l8r,
> Gerry

I am not going to look it up, but was the team a .200 clip from the point
Price was mortally injured to the end of the year? I really disbelieve
you. I think that's bullshit, and bullshit stats are bullshit. If you need
to use them, you are standing on a bullshit argument. The team was bad
after Price, but you present an argument like they were .200 after him.
Maybe you are thinking "well, not until the end of the year, but for a
while they were!" Cripes. Are you running in an American style election?
Stop with the 1% truths.

Marty

[Gerry]

On Saturday, October 1, 2016 at 11:04:56 PM UTC-4, Marty wrote:
> On Sat, 01 Oct 2016 05:30:33 -0700, Gerry wrote:
> So, that's really so NOT ture. There were better options, on trade, than a
> goalie with 0 NHL track-record before the season. Lie, there was a WHOLE
> lot of guys with more of a track record. Like dozens.

Name 3.

> > Or at least, as good on a cost-benefit ratio basis anyway.
>
> That's is where opinions kicks in, and I would say, I disagree with you.
> Unless you truly believe no other goalie could be traded for that might
> have sneaked the Hab's into the playoff picture until Price's return
> (which seems possible at the VERY end of the season, but the shut him down
> because it was pointless).

I think James Reimer became the best available at a reasonable price. Although of course it is always going to be impossible to determine WHEN he became available, and what the cost TO THE HABS might have been. I do not believe that even Carey Price himself could have snuck the Habs into the playoffs the way they were playing, however, so in that sense, the identity of the goalie and the cost is a little moot.

> You want to dismiss goaltending like it is nothing, while holding that
> Price is the key as well. It makes no sense.

How on earth is it nothing if a goalie can make the difference between missing the playoffs (.500) and being a mini-contender (.650)? That's a huge difference!

> I am not going to look it up, but was the team a .200 clip from the point
> Price was mortally injured to the end of the year? I really disbelieve
> you. I think that's bullshit, and bullshit stats are bullshit. If you need
> to use them, you are standing on a bullshit argument. The team was bad
> after Price, but you present an argument like they were .200 after him.
> Maybe you are thinking "well, not until the end of the year, but for a
> while they were!" Cripes. Are you running in an American style election?
> Stop with the 1% truths.

See, I don't think you followed the team very closely last season did you? I think you've admitted that here before. So you can parrot the mainstream media cop-out narrative if you want. For sure, that is what Bergevin and Therrien would love for folks to do. The .200 clip was discussed here ad nauseum. It was post December something? Effectively 2016. Half the season. Enough to take the team from #1 in the East to horrible. They got through an awful lot of Pricelessness staying at the top with Condon. Did Condon collapse? No, he was frequently one of the reasons some games stayed almost within reach. Scrivens - not so much, adding him made things a little worse, true. But I think maybe you also underrate just how bad a half season of a .200 clip really is. That was discussed here already too. It was horrible to a truly outstanding degree. It truly transcended goaltending.

But at this point, who really cares anymore. You can have the BS narrative if you want it. I wasted months on this already, that's my last post wasting more time on it! :)

l8r,
Gerry

[Mike]

Sounds about right.

In support of BBB's position on this list I present to you
http://www.hockeyinsideout.com/news/canadiens-cut-nine-players-including-stefan-matteau

Traded DSP for .... nothing
Traded Tinordi for ..... nothing.

Yep, you're doing a heckuva job there Brownie.

[Gerry]

At the risk of being slightly lured in from UFAdom by the roster moves, for all that Tinordi and DSP parlayed to naught directly, the list of players slated for SJ also suggests that things look somewhat promising for the farm. Well oops, except for the biggie that he kept another floundering coach on board there. But De La Rose was just starting to step up offensively there, and with him and Hudon and Scherbak, it's a really key development year. Good that they are back in the AHL. Plus the older additions of Terry and Samuelsson will help.

One of the main things about shopping at the Dollar Store, when you buy something cheap and it breaks, that's kind of the point, and so long as you just go out and buy another cheap one to replace it, it doesn't really hurt. At the low end of things where you are stocking the farm team and shuffling fringe players, I don't think Bergevin is doing badly there. Lots of teams move those spare bits around, occasionally with minor wins or losses, but usually it is just shuffling the deck. He got nothing for DSP... he got Byron for nothing, etc. There's an endless string of that sort of thing going on. (Maybe I am assuming DSP doesn't stay as hot as his finish to last season in that, however.)

l8r,
Gerry