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Niemi era Ended quickly in Pittsburgh


yave1964

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Image result for antti niemi meme beachball  MAF is long gone, a distant memory, this is the Murray show in Pittsburgh and Niemi was brought in on the cheap as a veteran backup goalie. If last night was any sign of what is to come, Murray better stay healthy and plan on playing around 75 games this year.

 

  Against the Hawks, a team who Niemi won a cup with what seems a lifetime ago Niemi fell on his way onto the ice then gave up four goals in three minutes forcing the Pens to bring Murray in after he played the night before. Just an ugly game. Niemi could not control rebounds, kept backing up into the net and swatting the puck and looked like his own worst enemy. The game will be quickly forgotten as it should by Pens fans as a blip but they are certainly keeping a weary eye upon Niemi and the leash just got shorter. I almost posted about Steve Mason and his lousy debut two nights ago with the Jets as the worst debut with a new team but Niemi smiled at Mason and said 'hold my beer.'

 

  Paging Tristan Jarry. Be ready.

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1 hour ago, yave1964 said:

Image result for antti niemi meme beachball  MAF is long gone, a distant memory, this is the Murray show in Pittsburgh and Niemi was brought in on the cheap as a veteran backup goalie. If last night was any sign of what is to come, Murray better stay healthy and plan on playing around 75 games this year.

 

  Against the Hawks, a team who Niemi won a cup with what seems a lifetime ago Niemi fell on his way onto the ice then gave up four goals in three minutes forcing the Pens to bring Murray in after he played the night before. Just an ugly game. Niemi could not control rebounds, kept backing up into the net and swatting the puck and looked like his own worst enemy. The game will be quickly forgotten as it should by Pens fans as a blip but they are certainly keeping a weary eye upon Niemi and the leash just got shorter. I almost posted about Steve Mason and his lousy debut two nights ago with the Jets as the worst debut with a new team but Niemi smiled at Mason and said 'hold my beer.'

 

  Paging Tristan Jarry. Be ready.

 

That was g'dawful. Not all on Niemi - he basically had 6 pylons playing D last night and that's really an insult to pylons everywhere. But he certainly didn't help himself.  Pens fans should chillax though. You can't have a $5,000,000 back-up. I loved Fleury as much as the next guy but perspective is needed. Would you rather have Fleury....or Sheary & Dumoulin?

 

But to @hf101's point - if I am Rutherford I have Jarry's number on speed dial.

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If losing 10-1 wasn't bad enough, the Pens had to endure the Hawks god awful goal song 10x.

 

I just wish it was on NBCSN so I could have heard Doc, Eddie and Regis cry about the results. 

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First, the defense in Pitt was horrific.  And they weren't good against the Blues.   Maybe just Stanley Cup hang over?

 

The Kane line made them look like idiots.

 

But Niemi was a bad signing.  I know you cannot have a $5M backup.  I get that.  But there were other better options for similar money.  

 

We were talking about this last night in chat.  I really don't understand why anyone has signed him.  I know he won the Cup in Chicago, but anyone who watched that series knows Niemi sucked at as bad a level as Leighton.  I mean, he was horrible.  So the Sharks see that and say "yeah, gimmie, gimmie."    Dallas watches how bad he was in San Jose and they do the same stupid thing.   I know Pitt didn't spend what Dallas and San Jose did, but they had an even longer body of work to look over and realize this guy just isn't an NHL goalie.   He's just horrible.

 

Some of those goals really weren't on him.   But some of the plays that didn't go in that don't make the highlight real were horrible.  And the one he muffed by--I don't know what the hell he was doing--that was simply ridiculous.

 

I'm not horribly impressed with Murray so far, either, but I think a lot of him is the Bad News Bears team defense in front of him.

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Gotta love Sam Werner's opening line in his article about this game in the Post Gazette:

 

"Before the Penguins faced off against the Blackhawks, Mike Sullivan said his primary goal when assessing the team at this early stage of the season is just making sure they're getting better on a daily basis.

 

That should be pretty easy moving forward."

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Certainly not all on Niemi last evening, but really what were the Penguins fans expecting out of him? Certainly not MAF. All they have had to do is watch some game film from a few seasons past and they could see the writing on the wall of what they are going to get in this veteran back up Goalie. It is going to be quite interesting to see how much the Penguins ride Murray especially if they see they cannot rely on Niemi much at all.

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2 minutes ago, Puck It Up said:

Certainly not all on Niemi last evening, but really what were the Penguins fans expecting out of him? Certainly not MAF. All they have had to do is watch some game film from a few seasons past and they could see the writing on the wall of what they are going to get in this veteran back up Goalie. It is going to be quite interesting to see how much the Penguins ride Murray especially if they see they cannot rely on Niemi much at all.

 

Yeah, and that's the silly part of it.   Murray is an injury threat.   So you want a backup that can shoulder roughly 30 games a year.  So, I get why they went veteran rather than prospect and why they don't hurry to sign a Pickard.      But like you say, just watch some game film from a few seasons and realize, "I don't want this guy in my net for 30 games."      Not good.

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6 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

Yeah, and that's the silly part of it.   Murray is an injury threat.   So you want a backup that can shoulder roughly 30 games a year.  So, I get why they went veteran rather than prospect and why they don't hurry to sign a Pickard.      But like you say, just watch some game film from a few seasons and realize, "I don't want this guy in my net for 30 games."      Not good.

I know it is way too early but this team could be in for a rough go at it this year. Now I am not saying they won't make the playoffs, but they just might not be one of the top teams.

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2 minutes ago, Puck It Up said:

I know it is way too early but this team could be in for a rough go at it this year. Now I am not saying they won't make the playoffs, but they just might not be one of the top teams.

 

Gotta think Rutherford corrects that early if this is repeated on a regular basis.

 

But they can control some of it by playing better team defense.  That has to get fixed quickly or Murray doesn't have much of a chance, either.

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5 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

Gotta think Rutherford corrects that early if this is repeated on a regular basis.

 

But they can control some of it by playing better team defense.  That has to get fixed quickly or Murray doesn't have much of a chance, either.

Exactly, and if Murray does have an injury they are really in trouble. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
19 hours ago, AJgoal said:

7 goals against tonight. Yikes. 7.93 GAA , .809 SV% over his first two starts. He'll be better, but that's not a stat line you want to see early in the season.

It's the start I wanted him to have though! Keep up the good work auntie niemi :haha:

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1 hour ago, B21 said:

We welcome you.....Tristan Jarry?

 

Any other reclamation projects out there with a cap hit of around $700,000? :haha2:

 

2017-18 season stats:  Tristan Jarry 1-2, .883 save percentage. 

edit:

The Pens recalled Casey DeSmith 3-0, .965 save percentage

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2 hours ago, B21 said:

We welcome you.....Tristan Jarry?

 

Any other reclamation projects out there with a cap hit of around $700,000? :haha2:

 

Michael Leighton has to be somewhere in the AHL......right????

 

:VeryCool:

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