Cityofchampions33

Great win, as much as I hate Ovechkin when he plays us, you have to respect the immense talent he has, such speed and shooting ability, jeesus christ. Very solid returns from Looch, Bergy n Ference, who oddly enough sported the A on his sweater. All played very well and Bergy had a sick assist to Savvy to tie it back up. Kind of a BS goal in OT, but after the hook you almost knew we were scorin' on that PP. If we get one more solid forward, it's gunna be a tough time knocking us out of the playoffs. Tkachuk-Savard-Kessel Wheeler-Krejci-Ryder Lucic-Bergeron-Kobasew Axelsson-Yelle-Thornton Chara-Wideman Ward-Stuart Hnidy-Hunwick Thomas/Fernandez That looks like a deep playoff run to me (knocks on wood)

Agreed, and it's not like we didn't have a better fighter in Thornton to challenge him anyway

He was blatantly going after players his size's knees and then showing up smaller players like Savard or Krejci. Guy's just a plain ole bag o' douche. I'll give him credit, he's a solid defenseman, but it's the way he plays after the whistle and the way he hits to injure that he's gunna need to answer the bell for if he continues.

We can go .500 the rest of the was and still get 100 points, amazing. Komisareks a little bitch though.

They gave up so much for Hossa to put them over the top in hopes of winning a Cup, but yes if you believe being an elite scoring team is the end all be all of winning then they do need a top 6 winger, I however, value goaltending, and defense, so yes you are right Fleury needs to step his s*** up. I actually think the Caps are the team to watch as the dark horse of the East, I don't know why I didn't think of them earlier, as they've been on a tear espc with the ever dangerous Ovy. And how will become a bigger issue further into the season?

Alright I don't even know where to begin with this post. Umm so yeah besides right out of the gate we haven't really hit any valleys my friend, so while we will slump at some point, I don't really know what you're trying to say. While you say the Pens might need a top 6 forward, despite having 5 players in double digit goals oh and they have Sid and Malkin, they still have potted 118 which puts them 4th in the Eastern Conference, I have a feeling they'll be fine offensively. However, they haveee let up 110 golas, so my feeling is Gonchar and Whitney will help maybe just a litttleeeee bit, dont you? Understood Clemm is holdin it down fine, but over this season where teams go through "peaks and valleys", so do players, and I have a slight hunch that Clemm's valleys might be slightly worse than Brodeur's. Okay, then who from the East can challenge them? Aside from those mentioned and maybe the Habs, state your case. One of the Bruin's strength is down the middle, and if you're referring to their size I'm not really sure that's a humungous issue. And yeah, that Hunwick character is sure playin badly fillin in for the injured, lack of depth indeed cough Lashoff too cough. As for no grit, I'm pretty suree that's what the 4th line is for don't you? How would you describe Yelle, Nokie, and Thornton's play? As for leadership, this team is perfect becauseof it's prefect mix of leading veterans and talented youth, and since when do you need leadership in only top forwards? You might want to see how far Yelle's gone into the playoffs in his career, not too shabby. That's just one example. And while they may not have playoff experience, you're looking at the best tandem in the NHL so you really cant call it a weakness.

Yeah, I mean while I did expect us to challenge the Habs for first in the Northeast and maybe be a division leader, in no way did I think we would be challenging for best in the entire league, leading in goals for, goals against, and 5-on-5 goals. And agreed, when we get all our injured back it will only make us stronger, the only other things I'm worried about is when the Pens get Gonchar and Whitney back, as well as the Devils when Brodeur is healthy. But other than that, I don't see any other potential challengers besides the Sharks and Red Wings, we are just so deep and talented in every aspect, if we come out of the tough january schedule we have it will only be cemented in my mind we are the team to beat.

It's not so much they agve him up for nothing, they just couldn't come to terms on a contract, and thus became a free-agent. remember we're paying him a considerable amount of money for being a rookie, ~ 3mill if I remember correctly.

Everything coming off the books might have to go towards re-upping Kessel and Krejci, not to mention one of the 2 goalies we have right now to platoon with Rask next year.

Krejci and Wheeler have been tremendous, while Wheeler has shown he's going to have growing pains, he's putting it in the net in the meantime, so it's a little easy to overlook.

Hmmmm injuries to the blueline core mightv'e helped that.

Axelsson is very unappreciated, and in a sport where we can't criticize him via statistics (like Cora) it is evry hard to judge how valuable he is in actuality. If you ever go to a game, just iso on him for his shift, the man is everywhere and seemingly does everything right, most of the time resulting in good plays for his teammates rather than himself. As for giving Sobotka a chance to prove himself, we all know he can, but I think it is more wise to have veteran role-players such as Yelle and Gumby rather than have Sob learn the ropes, and perhaps be less effective than the two prior mentioned. He would be up if not for Nokie's being out of options.

Yeah, doesn't sound like this supposed agreement is that big, seeing as it's not just the Sox who persued him, but several teams. Also Gom, I think this honor thing you're talking about is more of a samurai thing, which you can tell is a thing of the past, then again I'm not Japanese, if someone could post any reactions from japanese newspapers, that would probably settle this once and for all.

Darvish impresses me a lot. Great running fastball that has a late break to it. His slider is also late breaking with a nice tight 1-7 break, seems like it's deadly low and away.

Would an injury in his left wrist cause more damage to his lefty ABs? Then it definitely would make sense.

Yeah, completely agreed, this team showed a lot of courage and perseverance through not only this series but the entire season. They could have fallen by the wayside like so many other teams who were hit with the injury bug, and let the Manny distraction consume them. If anything we'll be much much stronger next year. A healthy Beckett, Daisuke with yet another season under his belt, and hopefully he'll improve, a newfound ace in Lester, and a very promising arm in Masterson. Maybe Buchholz can contribute next year, as he's working on his command and while it's against AA hitters, has shown good results so far. Papelbon needed the season to end, Oki was back to his old self 2nd half of the year, a lot of positives. Maybe the most important is the health of Ortiz and Lowell. I think Bay will be a solid contributor, as well, and who knows hopefully one of Coco/Ellsbury will be consistent. But all in all a very good and fun season, I'm proud of our guys, especially in denying what seemed like the inevitable for two more games. I'll be back when they are next season.

Yeah that just about clears it up, haha I knew something wasn't right

holy s*** Holy s*** Holy s***

I'm not going to lie I'm very impressed with this Rays club and out of all the teams we've faced in the playoffs this year and in years past I will actually root for them if they do indeed beat us tonight, which it seems will be. Upton, Longoria, Pena, I enjoy watching these players.

Yeah no I'll pass on Dontrelle

Daisuke, then Lester, and then anything can happen game 7. We've done this before, let's do it again.

Don't let us win Thursday?