WTH is up with Schneider

[yave1964]

  There is an old Billy Wilder movie starring Ray Milland named the Lost Weekend about an alcoholic in the throes of his addiction. One would have to excuse Cory Schneider if he climbs into a bottle for at least a long weekend at seasons end, maybe for even longer.

 

  The Devils added Taylor Hall in the offseason to bring in new blood to an anemic offense and the nine known Devils fans were enthused but the season derailed somewhere along the way and Cory Schneider has to accept that instead of being one of the leagues best goalies as he had been the previous couple of seasons that he has to accept a modicum of blame.

 

  He has now lost nine in a row with a 3.22 goals against during that time and a .888 save pct. during that time. His record on the year counting overtime losses is 19-33 with a 2.72 goals against. He is in short having an awful year.

 

  The thing that has struck me about Schneider from watching him is that he is fighting it, he gives up a goal and GLARES at his defense, he gave up a penalty shot to Dubinsky in the second yesterday and beat the Hell out of his goalpost with his stick even. He is in his own head which is easy for goalies to do and he seems to be playing too tight, too wound up and coiled waiting for it to fall apart and when a goal is allowed he lashes out and places blame. You can see it in his eyes he is not happy with the product in front of him.

 

  The Devils defense in many ways is an NHL defense in name only, Larsson was apparently better than anyone could have thought as the Oilers goals against has dropped by roughly the same amount as the Devils has climbed and nobody in New Jersey has come close to stepping up, Severson can move the puck but gets turned around way too easily in his own zone and is unreliable to put it mildly, John Moore is a human pylon, Andy Greene is technically sound but aging, Lovejoy is a bottom six body and Merrill has been incredibly overrated as a prospect for years and is a nothing player at this point, a typical Devils draft pick in the last decade of Lou's regime well on his way to being a bust. Santini is a kid who plays like one, good one night, invisible the next and bad the night after. This is a very bad defense from top to bottom So Schneider on most nights has to do way too much on his own and he has allowed it to ruin him and get into his head this year. The Devils need to get him some support and Schneider needs a good long drunk or something to exercise the Demons of a lost season.

 

 

[J0e Th0rnton]

The team in front of him.

 

Larsson I had always been high on, and predicted the Oilers would be a much improved team since they filled the void of Hall with the Sandpaper plug of Lucic. In hindsight I had thought Hall would bring a stronger 2 way Dman like Shattenkirk and Larsson was not enough, but he is proving to be an anchor on their blueline.

 

The Devils blueline is reeling from the Loss and Hall has been, well, not as expected.

 

People laughed at me on Fantasy sites for Keeping Talbot in the Keeper league and predicting the Oilers would be on the rise. "Every year they are supposedly turning a corner. Talbot is not the answer you fool!" and the people who said it tried to bring it up everytime I offered advice to other people to devalue my opinion when it clashed with theirs. "Don't listen to him, he thinks Edmonton will be good this year"

 

I bumped some old posts for good measure halfway through the season just because I am a payback kinda guy

[yave1964]

2 hours ago, J0e Th0rnton said:

The team in front of him.

 

Larsson I had always been high on, and predicted the Oilers would be a much improved team since they filled the void of Hall with the Sandpaper plug of Lucic. In hindsight I had thought Hall would bring a stronger 2 way Dman like Shattenkirk and Larsson was not enough, but he is proving to be an anchor on their blueline.

 

The Devils blueline is reeling from the Loss and Hall has been, well, not as expected.

 

People laughed at me on Fantasy sites for Keeping Talbot in the Keeper league and predicting the Oilers would be on the rise. "Every year they are supposedly turning a corner. Talbot is not the answer you fool!" and the people who said it tried to bring it up everytime I offered advice to other people to devalue my opinion when it clashed with theirs. "Don't listen to him, he thinks Edmonton will be good this year"

 

I bumped some old posts for good measure halfway through the season just because I am a payback kinda guy

Let me be clear, I am not now and never will be a fan of guys like Talbot who come of age after 25 or so. 9 times out of 10 they are flashes in the pan and flame brightly before burning out quickly. We had that argument a few years ago with Stalock if you remember.

  Talbot did not get to the NHL until he was 26 and put up solid numbers behind a solid Rags unit in limited time but I still was weary that the Oilers invested so heavily in a guy who had only appeared in 57 games for his entire career and was already 28. But the Oilers have made a conscious decision to build a defense in front of him. Larsson is one of the games top 5 on 5 guys, Sekera is solid, youngsters Klefbom and Nurse have shown flashes and are gaining valuable experience.

  I still admit a certain natural bias against Talbot and feel he is more a product of the team that he plays for than anything, I think he is MAYBE 10 percent better than an average goalie at best but so is Corey Crawford, so was Chris Osgood and the two of them have 3 cups each so as the Oilers mature and add another piece or two they certainly could win a cup with Talbot in net. Like Crawford and Osgood they will never win a cup BECAUSE of him but could win with him.

Darling in Chicago is now being touted as of the same ilk, he is likely to get paid by someone. He is another guy who took forever to make the NHL and has put up very good numbers behind Keith, Seabrook and the boys, if he goes somewhere like Arizona or Colorado he will fail miserably, if he lands a starting gig with the right team he might have close to the same career as Talbot. I do not think Darling is quite as good as Talbot I see him as a replacement level goalie, average type at best.

  So every now and then you get a Tim Thomas who takes forever to establish himself but I still am highly suspicious of anyone over 24-25 years old who suddenly bursts on the scene. Especially goalies.

[jammer2]

  The Devils are a HOT MESS on defence. Giving up Larsson had a real negative effect on this team. The defence was only average anyways, take away Lars and wham, they are pretty well crap on the back end. He ate a lot of minutes for them, the replacement was not good. Schneider has to take part of the blame, I watched him play two games in October and decided right there and then that he was gone, could not wait to include him in the Rask deal. Even his positioning is off, and another thing I have noticed this year, he used to be ELITE at tracking the puck, now he gets beat on wrap arounds with regularity. I swear he's pulling a Leighton and playing hurt or something.

[MadDevil]

He's having a bad year, and not getting much help, either offensively or defensively. The Devils tried to play a more up tempo game to start the year, and for the first 15 games (they went 9-3-3 to start the season) it worked. Then teams adjusted and they were routinely giving up 35+ shots and players were being left wide open a lot. From the middle of November through the end of 2016 Cory couldn't stop a beachball. He picked it up a little in January, which was helped by the team tightening up into a complete defensive shell where they basically just collapsed to the middle of the ice and took no chances at all. Since then he's had some really good games and some really bad games. Tonight for instance the first goal he gave up was horrendous, but after that he pretty much kept them in the game, made a couple of really big saves in OT (including a very Brodeur like poke check on Grabner) , and helped them get the win.

 

Overall I think he's just having an off year. He's been remarkably consistent at around a .920 save percentage for most of his career, so I think he's entitled to have a bad year (especially on a team that isn't very good anyway). I'm hoping Shero gets him some help on defense this summer. Greene isn't getting any younger, Severson still has some defensive issues, and the rest (outside of maybe Santini) should be third pairing defensemen. I think with a (hopefully) improved roster plus a fresh start on a new season, Cory will bounce back next year.

[yave1964]

A couple of weeks ago in fantasy hockey when Filip Forsberg was the hottest skater in the game and Schneider was about as cold as ice I dealt Forsberg even up for Schneider in my pay league and he has turned it around somewhat. That is an awful collection of defenseman on your team and as a Red Wings fan I know something about an awful collection of defenseman, lol.

[MadDevil]

When your #2 defenseman in TOI is Ben Lovejoy at just short of 21 minutes a night...

 

I still think there's potential in Severson and Santini, and Merrill seems to be playing better, but they definitely need some top 4 help if they want to improve.