CHICAGO BLACKHAWKS 4 VEGAS GOLDEN KNIGHTS 3 (41-31-8 92 PTS) – SO (1-0)

It is more and more obvious:
The Eichel trade was a terrible mistake. VGK is below .500 with Eichel!

His defensive awareness is not good enough for a so called elite player.

And most importantly, he can not perform when it matters. He never could in the NHL, and most probably never will.

There are reasons why he never made the Playoffs in his NHL career.

Marc Andre Fleury denies the VGK of 4 crucial points wearing 2 different sweaters in 2021-22.

Shall we talk karma, curses, poetic justice, etc..?

Everyone is free to their own thoughts and opinions in this public forum but I’m hoping that most of you don’t shit on Jack Eichel too much. I expected more from him but we are still talking about a guy that had a very long layoff and no training camp. He at least deserves a full season next year to be properly judged.

I would hope that the focus of the fans anger would be squarely on the team management, coaching and I suppose certain players that did underachieve this season. Marchessault had a good season but his fellow misfits declined. Even when healthy Riley Smith like most of the players went through extremely long stretches of providing nothing offensively. Karlsson sucked. Lehner did not have a good year.

Meart, what you said is about the biggest insult they can ever be said about professional athletes? Sadly, it could be true. They often looked passionless and like they didn’t care.

We are so spoiled. Injuries devestated this team from day one, just hammered us. It hurt everyone the changes we made. I understood the Fleury move, I get it. $7,000,000 reasons. Suzuki for Patches, I like it. Schmidt ? Stastny ? Reaves ? Ok, maybe, maybe not ? But when you dump Tuch, a complete beast and Krebs, whose ceiling isn’t close to being seen to clear Cap space for Eichel, who underwent neck surgery, I started thinking this could be The Titanic. Nobody plays like Tuch, in the open ice, he’s mind boggling. I’m not giving up on Eichel, he’s not a quitter, but this move could sink our future. I want this team back. Resign Smith, make that happen. Guys we can’t do without 1) Marchy 2) Stone3) Smith4) Patches5) Carrier6) Karlsson7) Petro 8) Whitecloud 9) Kolesar( toughness) 10) Thompson 11) Hague12) Roy 13) Martinez. I’m still convinced we have the core. We got some younger guys that deserve a shot, they kept us afloat during our injuries, it was never their fault. We are at a crossroads. I have a hard time thinking we will end up like the Sharks or New Jersey, you know, 20 games under .500. I guess it is eventually going to happen, but I will point to Tuch and Krebs move that led us into darkness, those guys you just don’t replace.

Speaks volumes how moronic posters here are when they beat the pylon krebs drum

Of the 240 or so rookies this season he finished almost at the very bottom with the worst plus minus.

And that’s who you think will save this mess mccriminal created and who is now sitting in winnipeg with his head up his fat ass???

Galdom – We agree on what the front office is for sure. I was referring to you giving Eichel a break – he in no way is worth what it cost and a trade they will live to regret like many other dumb moves they have made. They prove once again the Cup can’t be purchased. Good thing Foley has a lot of money it is going to cost him big time one way or another to get out of this mess.

Lets start with January of year 3 Gallant gets fired because from what they told us he’s taken the team as far as he can. This came after a 4 game losing streak now this is fact not fake news which you see a lot of on this site. Did he get fired because being an independent thinker they were going to make moves he didn’t agree with? We don’t know but my monies on that’s probably what happened.
Fact at the time San Jose was our biggest rival and can I say our most hated rival. Year 2 what happened in the playoffs was heartbreaking. Year 3 rolls around and in there and low and behold they hire our hated rival Pete DeBoer which never set well with me and sent shock waves through the city.
Fact I believe the way Fleury gave up games in year 2 playoffs against San Jose DeBoer had no confidence in Fleury hence the trade for Lehner. Now part of the fan base is pissed off because of the Gallant firing and after the Fleury debacle they pissed off more of the fan base.
Now sprinkle in ruthless moves like Huala told he’s traded before his wedding, Fleury finding out about his trade on twitter and denying it is cause to be fired right there.
Now our famous trades #1 Mark Stone for Branstrum and a second round pick great trade and if Stones done because of back issues it was still a good trade.
#2 Patch I always considered this a bad trade because we gave Montreal Suzuki, a #2 pick, and Tatar who we acquired from Detroit for get this a #1 , #2, and #3 draft pick. We all know Patch is a sniper only and how many games has he missed? Any the same time we didn’t have to sign Patch and resign David Perron to a 4 year contact at 4 million versus Patches at 7 million and the real kick in the ass is Perron has been durable and has as many points as Patch. Are you starting to get the idea that the train is off the tracks.
Petro 31 at 7 years and 9 million or Martines at 33 with a 3 year extension at 5 million. So many of our other trades involved giving away second round draft choices like candy which has hurt our farm system.
The Jack Eichel trade love it or hate it but it’s still a work in progress. Personally I wasn’t worried about Tuch who gets hurt to much and Krebs who’s a good passer but not a great scorer so besides the 10 million which is steep I think he’ll work out.
So in closing Ex – Knights in this years playoffs include Perron, Nosak, Haula, Reeves, Gallant, and some others who’s names at the moment escape me good luck in the tournament as were pulling our pork at home.

good article from NBC Sports
==============================

PRO HOCKEY TALK | NBC SPORTS S
Golden Knights have nobody to blame but themselves
By Adam Gretz
Apr 28, 2022, 12:24 PM EDT
Golden Knights

If you wanted to be generous you could point to a handful of reasons as to why the 2021-22 Vegas Golden Knights ended up being a colossal disappointment and spectacular failure on the ice.

The biggest reason, of course, might be injuries.

Mark Stone, Max Pacioretty, Alec Martinez, Reilly Smith, William Karlsson, and Robin Lehner all missed time this season (some of them significant time), while Jack Eichel did not make his season debut until January after being acquired in a blockbuster trade with the Buffalo Sabres.

With some better health luck their season almost certainly would have been different. Maybe this preseason Stanley Cup contender wouldn’t have fallen flat on its face and missed the playoffs entirely for the first time in its five-year existence.

But pointing to that — and only that — would be giving them an excuse. It would be giving them an easy way out. And quite frankly, they do not deserve an easy way out or your generosity because a lot of their problems this season were their own creation, while they failed to take care of their own business down the stretch when the schedule (and their health) should have been in their favor.

Let’s start with the injuries
The most significant of those belonged to Stone, Pacioretty, and Martinez. And that definitely took a toll, especially as it related to Pacioretty and Stone who both missed half of the season.

But the Golden Knights are not the only preseason playoff contender that lost key players for significant chunks of the season.

For example:

Washington played half of the season without Nicklas Backstrom, T.J. Oshie, and Anthony Mantha, which accounts for literally half of their top-six forwards, while also never having a consistent starting goalie.
Pittsburgh played half of the season without Evgeni Malkin (who was only a fraction of his normal self when he did play) and had various injuries to Sidney Crosby, Bryan Rust, Jason Zucker and Teddy Blueger for significant parts of the season.
Colorado had injuries to Nathan MacKinnon, Gabriel Landeskog, Sam Girard, Bowen Byram, Devon Toews, Valeri Nichushkin, and Nazem Kadri at different times.
All three of those teams comfortably qualified for the playoffs in significantly tougher divisions than the one Vegas played in. Beyond that, once Vegas did get healthier down the stretch with the returns of Stone, Pacioretty, and Martinez, not to mention a healthy Jack Eichel, they only went 3-3-4 in their past 10 games with losses to Vancouver (twice!), San Jose, New Jersey, and Chicago, not to mention a crucial head-to-head to loss to Dallas. The New Jersey loss is especially unforgivable given that it came at home, against a Devils team that entered the night having lost 13 of 16, has not won a game since, and was playing without its best player (Jack Hughes) and starting a third-string goalie (Andrew Hammond). How do you drop that game with your season on the line?
Even worse, the key players that they were missing for most of the season were mostly invisible during these key games.

• Eichel had five points over the past 10 games and was largely invisible in most games.

• Stone had zero goals and one assist.

• Pacioretty had three goals.

• Jonathan Marchessault had one goal.

Their top offensive players during the stretch run were Chandler Stephenson and Evgenii Dadonov, a player that would not have even been on the roster had his no-trade clause been messed up at the NHL trade deadline. And that does not even get into the fact that in their three consecutive shootout losses their skaters went a shocking and historically bad 0-for-17, wasting a valiant effort from goalie Logan Thompson who did everything he could to save their season.

Before that 10-game stretch began Vegas looked like a team that was starting to put it all together and could potentially be a nightmare matchup if it got in, and there was very good reason to believe in them once they got those players back. And then they got them back in the lineup and the bottom totally fell out.

Problems beyond injuries
Injuries are a fact of life in the NHL and every team has to deal with them and there is not much you can do to control them. Some teams are able to overcome it. Vegas did not. But Vegas also did itself no favors with the things it could control, including roster construction and its entire organizational philosophy.

From the very beginning of its existence Vegas has operated like a pre-salary cap spender where every big name player that becomes available is a realistic target for them, no matter the cost and no matter what they have to do to get it. They act like the salary cap does not exist and are always in the running for every star that becomes available, with Eichel being the most recent.

Individually, there is nothing wrong with any of the signings or trades they made. Stone and Pacioretty have been great. Alex Pietranagelo is a top-pairing defender. Eichel should (emphasis on should) be a cornerstone player going forward. But it has all helped cause havoc on their salary cap situation, especially when combined with other moves on the fringes, and cut into their depth, both in terms of what they have given up in trades and limiting what they can do with the rest of their roster.

For example: Taking on Dadonov’s contract from Ottawa, only to trade for Eichel a couple of months later, knowing full well the salary cap gymnastics it would require.

Or signing Robin Lehner to a long-term deal with a $5 million cap hit when they already had Marc-Andre Fleury, eventually creating a situation where they were going to have to essentially give one of them away due to cap constraints. They of course sent away Fleury just a couple of months after he won the 2020-21 Vezina Trophy. In hindsight, it was a catastrophic decision.

It was another example of just how cutthroat and ruthless this organization has been in its quest to add the next superstar and chase after the Cup.

Vegas fired Gerard Gallant early in year three (with a winning record!) after being behind the bench for consecutive playoff appearances and a Cup Final appearance in year one. They replaced him with Peter DeBoer, who has now created drama with two different goalies in the past three years (Fleury, for benching him in the playoffs for Lehner; and then Lehner for his handling of his injury situation and seemingly calling him out for not being available down the stretch this year).

All of it together almost makes it seem like there is no plan beyond “see big name player; acquire big name player; worry about the rest later.”

It ultimately looks like a directionless organization that succeeds by accident rather than some smart grand plan. It all finally caught up to them this season and it cost them what should have been a guaranteed trip to the playoffs.

Now we get to see what happens this offseason as they try to clean up the gigantic mess they made for themselves.