The tears that are continually shed over Brian Strait boggle my mind. Are you guys carrying torches for Ryan Lannon and Andy Sertich too? This is not the utter tragedy it has been made out to be.
That said, I'm with KIRK on this. Seems like a precursor move for something else.
I actually was being facetious. I think it's a precursor to Niskanen returning and the plan for now to keep 14 forwards when he does.
And Strait hasn't?
Why do we all of a sudden care about Strait? He's a depth defencemen who wasn't going to get his shot here. Bort and Despres passed him on the depth chart.
This isn't all of a sudden...people were bothered as soon as he was waived over Lovejoy.
The fact is that he's averaging over 18 minutes a night as a rookie (including 2 min of PK time), and looking very good while doing it. If that's just a depth defenseman, what do you call what Despres and Bortuzzo are doing with 13 minutes a night?
I say again that the timing of this is all about Boychuk's play. Bort and Despres can be sent down again, right? One of them will go when Niskanen comes off IR. Sounds solid to me.
Bortuzzo cannot be sent down, Despres can. However, we aren't going to keep just 6 D on the roster and we don't need to send anyone down when Nisky gets back (well other than Reese).
This isn't all of a sudden...people were bothered as soon as he was waived over Lovejoy.
The fact is that he's averaging over 18 minutes a night as a rookie (including 2 min of PK time), and looking very good while doing it. If that's just a depth defenseman, what do you call what Despres and Bortuzzo are doing with 13 minutes a night?
Playing on a good defense. There's a huge difference between playing 18:37 on a D with Streit, Hamonic, MacDonald, Carkner, and Hickey/Finley. Despres would be their 2nd or 3rd best D!
I might've missed that. Are people here saying that?
People are saying that you lost Strait for nothing which looks worse because Lovejoy was traded (presumably implying that they think you could have gotten a 5th rounder or better from Strait). In reality, NYI was claiming whichever of the two didn't make it and the other was still probably only worth a 5th (IMO, this is just ******** asset management from the worst GM in the league, Bob, the garbage GM).
The bottom line is that we lost quality youth/depth when we didn't have to, and considering the hits we took to our defense last year, there's hardly any guarantee that our 8th won't see meaningful NHL ice time this season.
I hope we never have to find out.
Seriously? Reese isn't much worse if at all than Lovejoy. They are comparable players. Plus, from all accounts, Dumoulin is knocking on the door and if Eaton is signed, assuming he isn't totally done, he is better than Lovejoy. This deal was done for 2 reasons IMO:
1.) They aren't ready to make a decision on Jeffrey, Tangradi, or Boychuk and will need an open roster spot when Nisky returns.
2.) They feel confident in Reese as a Lovejoy replacement and Dumoulin as a call up. Also may sign Eaton.
I'm not sure how anyone can find fault with this move.
This isn't all of a sudden...people were bothered as soon as he was waived over Lovejoy.
The fact is that he's averaging over 18 minutes a night as a rookie (including 2 min of PK time), and looking very good while doing it. If that's just a depth defenseman, what do you call what Despres and Bortuzzo are doing with 13 minutes a night?
It's safe to assume every Penguins fan and everyone in the organization would have preferred to get something in return for Strait. There are two possible reasons why they didn't:
1. Shero didn't try to work out a trade for Strait or Lovejoy during the abbreviated training camp — which, to quote Vizzini, is inconceivable — or ...
2. Shero did try to work out a trade for one of these guys and couldn't find any takers.
You can't force a team to give you something for a player ... esp. when all of those teams should have management shrewd enough to realize the Pens would have to waive one of its Dmen sooner or later.
Presumably, Shero thought Lovejoy was the more valuable — either as far as possible on-ice contribution, if necessary, or the more likely or the two to be able to be traded later in the season. It's reasonable to expect that there might have been interest for either of these Dmen but that the time wasn't right for other GMs to make a deal (they might first want to see how their D corps performs in the first couple of weeks, or perhaps they wanted to see which players become available at no cost via waivers) and that Shero, based on conversations he had with other teams, was more likely to fetch a return.
Now, if you want to complain that Despres shouldn't have been here to begin with, his quality of play puts that argument to rest. And it was clear — because after management said Despres wouldn't be at training camp, it reversed itself and he was there — that the coaching staff impressed upon management that they wanted Despres on the team this year.
Once you accept that HCDB convinced Shero of the importance of having Despres in Pittsburgh this season, how this played out appears to have been pretty inevitable.
Seriously? Reese isn't much worse if at all than Lovejoy. They are comparable players. Plus, from all accounts, Dumoulin is knocking on the door and if Eaton is signed, assuming he isn't totally done, he is better than Lovejoy. This deal was done for 2 reasons IMO:
1.) They aren't ready to make a decision on Jeffrey, Tangradi, or Boychuk and will need an open roster spot when Nisky returns.
2.) They feel confident in Reese as a Lovejoy replacement and Dumoulin as a call up. Also may sign Eaton.
I'm not sure how anyone can find fault with this move.
Reese was on the Islanders and they chose not to resign him so what does that tell you about him.
Reese was on the Islanders and they chose not to resign him so what does that tell you about him.
Not a whole lot since we signed him. I don't think we intend on him being a 7th dman and isn't what I was suggesting. My point was that he is a capable call up and fills the role Lovejoy should have served.
Not a whole lot since we signed him. I don't think we intend on him being a 7th dman and isn't what I was suggesting. My point was that he is a capable call up and fills the role Lovejoy should have served.
THIS. He's here until Niskanen returns. Nothing more.
[QUOTE=Chancellor Vitale;59204495]Fixed. The other five guys are not great either based on what I know of them (which isn't much except for Allen who I know sucks), but your point stands. But hey, 5th pick? I'll take that every day over a waiver loss. Watch Shero get the next Hejduk with that pick. [/QUOTE
Yea right we all know that pick is gonna be a dman as well as the 14 out of 16 before it. Lmao.
The great news about this move is that Morrow & Dumoulin will get much more responsibility & icetime in WBS while Reese is up with the big boys. I still think we have way too many D prospects but if we end up trading one more for a good young winger (preferably Maatta, IMO), we'll be perfect.
Here's hoping that Shero doesn't draft another D this year in the 1st or 2nd Rounds.
I'm watching the Anaheim game, and the announcers just mentioned the trade. They said they added a bunch of "toughness and beef on the backend, Lovejoy's not a guy to shy away from throwing his weight around or dropping the gloves."
Really?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Hook
I'd imagine they probably just confused Lovejoy with Engelland. At least I hope that's what it is and not a real evaluation of Lovejoy.
Has to be... a mix up on the part of the announcers. That's just not a description of Lovejoy in any way, shape or form. They got some info on Engelland and not having seen either play got their signals crossed or something. Maybe a "reporters notebook" that got the names crossed. Pertty funny though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrBurgundy
Glad they traded Lovejoy, but it really makes losing Strait look even worse.
Nah. For all we know Anaheim expressed an interest in Lovejoy in the past but wasn't the right time to move him. Also possible Shero tried to move Strait and didn't get any takers because everyone knows about our D log-jam / that someone was getting waived. Shero had basically zero leverage to move either of those guys at the bottom of the depth chart. I wouldn't have traded a draft pick for either one of them if I thought there was a reasonable chance one or both would get waived at some point this year. You take your chances and see if you get one for free and if you don't, no big deal.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HandshakeLine
The tears that are continually shed over Brian Strait boggle my mind. Are you guys carrying torches for Ryan Lannon and Andy Sertich too? This is not the utter tragedy it has been made out to be.
That said, I'm with KIRK on this. Seems like a precursor move for something else.
Hope you and Kirk are right about the precursor... but don't you see what we've done with Strait?! We've created the Streit-Strait pairing! The Brooklyn Nightmare, the Defensive Dynamo... we'll be kicking ourselves for years over this dude. Open the eyes and see the future of defense. His name is Strait. If I didn't know any better I'd think he was a second cousin of Joe.
Quote:
Originally Posted by 87isgod
Yea right we all know that pick is gonna be a dman as well as the 14 out of 16 before it. Lmao.
Who then will challenge our defensive might at all levels of hockey... no one. NO ONE I TELL YOU!
Why do we all of a sudden care about Strait? He's a depth defencemen who wasn't going to get his shot here. Bort and Despres passed him on the depth chart.
Suddenly?
I was bullish on him from last season, as were others.
Did you see Strait making "rookie" mistakes in the two games the Isles played against the Pens?
Really?
