dilbert719

The only way I like the idea of the Coburn for MPS and 2 2nds deal is if the plan is then to trade Read to CGY for 22, leaving us with 11/22/37/41/56 and MPS. That's plenty of ammo to move up and get whoever we want, and still come away with two or three great prospects. Of course, if Dreger's right, and Coburn for 5 is actually on the table, do that, and we have 5/11/41 and whatever we choose to get for Read.

Funny how we appreciate them more when they're wearing any uniform but ours.

20 games? How about 2:53 PM today?

It's also worth noting that "100% done" doesn't mean "actually will happen." E5's have fallen through before. I'm generally one to accept what Eklund posts as legitimately things he's hearing from people in the game, but even then, I simply take his posts as interesting looks at some of the jillion ideas that get bounced around front offices. If it happens, sure, if not, no shock. It's when people start to take his rumors as gospel and they fall through that people tend to get snippy about his "sources."

I love this whole "the Flyers are acquiring Luongo, but not by trade" thing. Are they kidnapping him? Buying him at auction? Cloning a new Luongo from a blocker cell?

Preferably as one of the braces holding the rocket engines vertical.

I hope he goes to the Penguins. Let them deal with his bullcrap for a while. (Also, the look in Fleury's face when he realizes he's being replaced by Comrade Shtheadski will be priceless.)

It's official. http://flyers.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=675163

Not the second time. The first (hence the reference to Boston, rather than Toronto, or the Blazers.)

I'm not old enough to have seen it, but stats suggest Bernie Parent. Check his Boston statistics, then what he did in Philly.

I'm not a fan of the whole "talent dilution" argument. It holds slightly more water in the NBA, where maybe 5 teams have a legitimate chance of winning the title in a given year, but in the NHL, parity is much greater, and a terrible team one year can become a legitimate threat the next. See Toronto's move from 13th in the East to 5th this year, and their near-elimination of Boston. Hell, in 2010-11, 5 points separated 4th and 10th in the West. The league could stand to move a couple teams, as well. Phoenix to Seattle, Florida to Quebec City, and new teams in Toronto (or Hamilton, close enough for government work) and any other location (my preference would be Hartford, with Milwaukee a reasonable enough second, whereas I'm sure Bettman would love Houston or possibly Kansas City) would result in a reasonably well-balanced league, and probably would be quite financially successful. It also remains relatively easy to balance divisions if this happens. The obvious choices are below, with some discussion of alternatives: Pacific: ANA/CGY/COL/EDM/LAK/SEA/SJS/VAN Midwest: CHI/DAL/MIN/NSH/STL/WPG Central: BOS/BUF/MTL/QUE/OTT/TOR Atlantic: CAR/NJD/NYI/NYR/PHI/PIT/WSH The obvious benefits of PHX to SEA and FLA to QUE are they can stay in the same division and fit logically. Only five teams become questionable fits, and two of them currently don't exist. The issues: Detroit, Columbus, Tampa, and the two new teams. If the new teams are Toronto B and Hartford, they go Central, Tampa goes Atlantic, and DET/COL go back to the Midwest. Sorry to both teams, but that's life. If the new teams are two of Houston, Milwaukee, and Kansas City, they go Midwest and the divisions out East stay put. If they choose Toronto B and one Midwest team, it gets tricky. TOB has to be in the Central, the Midwest team goes to the Midwest *shock!*, then the question becomes "Does TB stay Central and DET go Midwest again, or does TB go to the Atlantic and CMB heads Midwest?" That one I don't know, but it's still not terribly difficult to resolve, all things considered. Of course, if the Devils eventually prove to be insolvent, (since they're the team seemingly most in trouble behind the two in question at the moment) this can also be made easier by sending them out West somewhere, freeing up one more slot in the East. But that's neither here nor there at the moment.

If we can get Read to agree to sign for a length of time at a below market price, we'd be fools to move him. The issue is how much he's going to cost. Next year, Giroux, Schenn, Couturier, Mason, Akeson, Bourdon, and McGinn are RFA. Read, Timonen, Meszaros, and Gervais are UFA. Whether we like it or not, we're going to have to make some tough choices as to who we can keep, and who has to go. Giroux, Schenn, and Couturier have to stay. Of the remainder, Read is the player best equipped to help us bring back value in trade, so he's the one most people propose moving. It's math, not dislike, that leads us to try and ship him out.

That's still dangerous. Every year, all he has to do is pick 10 teams that couldn't afford to add him, and we're still boned.If he wants an NTC, I'd try to set up something where he can't be assigned to the AHL without his permission (except on a rehab assignment) and could choose 5 teams he cannot be traded to, so he can at least rule out those places he really, really doesn't want to go. Honestly, that's the NTC I'd work with for everyone worthy of one, since it doesn't limit the team too badly, and it still provides them a measure of control (and a reason to sign.)

Easiest way to do this: the 11-man wish list. As players leave the list, move down one, and the highest name remaining is the one I want the Flyers to draft. Tier 1 - Hahaha, they'll never be there. 1. Seth Jones 2. Nathan MacKinnon 3. Jonathan Drouin 4. Valeri Nichushkin 5. Alexander Barkov Tier 2: Reasonable, given other teams' needs differ 6. Darnell Nurse 7. Sean Monahan 8. Ryan Pulock 9. Rasmus Ristolainen 10. Hunter Shinkaruk 11. Nikita Zadorov

Going by "which result did I like best," the best series was Sharks/Canucks, since it's the only one of the 8 series in which the team I wanted to see advance actually did. I thought that several series had some great games, but Bruins/Leafs just had that certain something extra. The series that was surprisingly underwhelming, given that it went 7, was Capitals/Rangers. It felt like regular season hockey, while four other series (Bruins/Leafs, Ducks/Wings, Blues/Kings, and Pens/Isles) felt like Cup finals. I wasn't as impressed as some by Sens/Habs. It was a good series, but the four above were flat great.

Something like the first deal is definitely worth it. I'm almost violently opposed to the idea of trading Couturier, under any circumstances, so the second deal isn't, to me. However, OccamsRazor had me thinking. Read's obviously got positive value. St. Louis would likely want at least a steady D presence if they're moving someone like Pietrangelo, who's clearly their best D. Maybe the deal to consider here is Coburn/Read/11 (or, if we can get away with it, next year's #1) for Pietrangelo/Halak. I don't think we get their first in any deal that returns Pietrangelo, but he's still the best fit in terms of finding someone who could step into Kimmo's shoes next offseason. Kimmo going, along with buyouts of Bryz and Briere, and trading Coburn/Read, would probably free up enough cap space to offer appropriately sized contracts to Giroux, Couturier, B. Schenn, Pietrangelo, Meszaros, and Halak/Mason, which would lock down a solid core for the foreseeable future. A defensive corps in 14-15 of Pietrangelo/Schenn, Meszaros/Grossmann, and Gustafsson/some combination of Manning/Lauridsen/reasonably priced vet FA would be solid for a good long time, Mason/Halak is quite a competent goalie tandem, and it'd let us keep practically the entire forward corps together.

My two biggest problems with this have already been mentioned. First, odds are very, very good that Briere refuses a trade anywhere. If he's bought out, he gets his full $5M from us, gets salary from wherever he goes, and can pick from every team with any interest in him at whatever additional salary he can get. If we trade him, he goes to that team, and only there, and gets only the $5M. Doesn't make sense to me, unless he intentionally decides to sacrifice vet minimum+ for two years just to do us a solid. Second, Briere, Read, and #11 probably gets you Jackman/Halak, or maybe Shattenkirk/Halak. No Blues #1. Pietrangelo starts at Couturier + 11 just to keep them on the phone. It may sound crazy, but we're 49 days removed from Douglas Murray costing Pittsburgh 2 #2 picks. Defensemen are worth more than gold these days, and the cost just keeps going up.

1) Who do you buyout, if anyone? - Ilya Bryzgalov and Daniel Briere. Too much money for too little production to justify keeping either, and I don't see either accepting a trade (unless they were willing to accept a trade to a team that would then buy them out, but that seems unlikely as well.) 2) You get too sign 1 free agent, who is it? - I can't field a team by signing just one guy, honestly. I'd rather spread the money around to two or three players. If I absolutely had to concentrate the cash, it'd probably be Mark Streit, but if I could get Brad Boyes, Joe Corvo, and Nikolai Khabibulin (for example) for the same cost as Streit, plugging several holes while conserving money for the Giroux/Schenn/Read/Couturier/Meszaros extension offseason, I'd have to consider that. 3) You get 1 trade, who is in it ? - Given the amount of cash we're going to be plunking out next offseason, I'm probably going to have to consider trading Read for someone who is productive and more cost-controlled, unless he accepts an offer to be underpaid for the next couple years. Much as I don't like losing him, my first thought is to see if Phoenix, which has cap space, had a terrible offensive season, and has a solid NHL-level defensive corps, would be interested in a deal for Read, with a target being David Rundblad (Yandle, if I'm really, really lucky.) My other plan would be to trade Read, who's going to want more than $2.5M, I'm sure, to Calgary (who rumor has it is hot under the collar for him) for Curtis Glencross, who produces well and is locked in for two seasons after this one. Bits and pieces could go either way with this deal, but there's something to be had there. Then again, Feaster's in Calgary, so maybe I should hold out for Sven Baertschi. 4) Who are you going to cut? - Rusty, Shelley, Knuble, Walker, Foster, and Huskins get wished the best of luck. I'll replace them with Phantoms or minimum-salary vets if at all possible. 5) Do you offer sheet someone, and who? - No, unless we've spoken with the team and player beforehand and everyone's agreed, so there's no hard feelings. If so, it'd be someone from the Pietrangelo/Bogosian/Rundblad/Shattenkirk group (since the only Capital less likely to move than Alzner is Ovechkin), and it would cost us a pretty penny, both in cash and in the assets we trade away. 6) Any coaching changes? - Not before the season starts. 7) Do you keep Lauridsen and Gus up? - Gus makes the Flyers roster this year unless I move Read for a top D. Lauridsen's a Phantom. 8) Who do you draft in round 1, or do you trade the pick? - Depends on who's there, honestly. My reasonable draft board likely goes Ristolainen/Pulock/Nichushkin, but obviously if one of Jones, Drouin, Mackinnon, or Nurse were to fall to 6 or so through some bizarre set of circumstances, I start checking the cupboard for assets to move up. 9) Which, if any, of your own F.A. do you keep? - Gagne, Gustafsson, Lauridsen, and Manning stay with the club, the latter two in the minors. Hall will stay if he signs for the same as this year, otherwise add him to the list in question 4. 10) Your starters on the ice for the opening whistle next year are? Giroux centering Hartnell and Voracek, Timonen and Schenn, in front of Mason. (if I sign Mark Streit, it's probably Timonen and Streit, instead.)

OK, I'm off the ledge on this one. SanFilippo just tweeted that the 3rd we gave up is in 2015.

Luongo for Briere and Bryzgalov?

Leighton and a 3rd. Frak. That's too much, IMO.

Ah, now I get it. We took Mason as a favor to CBJ, so they'd be able to add Gaborik.

Yeah, I love the bit about "It seems like destiny that Mason was going to be a Flyer, because they're going to try everybody..."

Aargh. That's going to piss me off for a very long time.

I can't imagine a scenario in which we trade for Luongo and Bryzgalov isn't going somewhere else, whether that's Vancouver or a third city. Of course, I can't really imagine a scenario in which we trade for Luongo, but...