****Official 2016-17 NHL Regular Season Thread****
 

The Western Conference is going to be a bloodbath this year. This thread is for the 9 hockey fans here to talk about it!

Thoughts on the upcoming season?

Blues will choke in the playoffs is a given.

Penguins hoist the banner on Thursday.
Can't wait.

Go Hawks

I'll be honest - as good as the WC looks, I don't think the playoffs are a given.

I'm just hoping it turns out that Roy's system was just shitty and that we actually have the personnel to be competitive this year.

Interested to see what Nail is all about. Where Shatty ends up getting traded (and for what). How Allen holds up as a #1 for an entire season. How Fabbri and Parayko play in their 2nd seasons.

First time in a few years that the Devils have me excited to start the season. Defense is going to be a problem, so I see quite a few 5-4 games in the future. But Hall looks even better than advertised.

I haven't watched hockey closely for years don't know half the players

I've heard a lot of chatter about this. Why does everyone seem so certain that he's getting traded?

Official prediction is that we finish just short of 100 points, 4th in the WC.

I'm really curious to see how the Dustin Brown "de-throning" plays out in LA. It's been a rough off-season for the Kings to say the least.

I was excited to see Devin Setoguchi make the team after battling through alcoholism and a couple years playing in Europe.

I fell in love with Johnny Gaudreau through the WCH, and was glad to see him sign. Calgary could make a push, too.

All in for the disappointment!

{shrug}

I'm still trying to figure out how you beat Chicago and Dallas only to get boat raced by ****ing San Jose.

Eh, the Blues had a 4 year window and spend the first 3 years of it stepping on their dicks. Had they done in year 2 what they did in year 4 it would've been an outstanding springboard that could've propelled them to legitimate cup runs in years 3 and 4. Instead it took them 3 years to realize that playing loaf-ass hockey and then blaming your coach for it wasn't going to get them anywhere.

Seriously, **** your own face, TJ Oshie. Goddamn faux superstar. The glorified 3rd liner and puck bunny magnet fancied himself Jonathan Toews and never won shit. Then he'd have the juevos to call out management. Ugh...good riddance but I still can't believe the best we could do was Troy goddamn Brouwer.

Which leads me to my next point - do you really care what they get for Shattenkirk? It's going to be next to nothing. Army's shown very little ability to 'win' a trade to this point. His trade history is spotty at best (and really, it's mostly just bad).

They're probably a playoff team; hell they're as likely as anyone to win the Central outright.

I just wish we had more to look forward to than Mike Yeo. Gawd, how depressing is it to realize that the Blues are going to go from Hitch to Hitch's skinnier, less successful doppleganger?

There's just no light at the end of this tunnel, man.

Go Flyers

Y'know, there's a pretty good defenseman available that wants to play on the east coast. We'd take Kyle Palmieri off your hands for ya...

P.S. **** you for getting Taylor Hall.

Matthews looks solid

IT"S HAPPENING!!!!!!!11!!!!1!!

2 GOALS IN THE FIRST PERIOD - AUSTON MATTHEWS - wOOt

Holy shit

Matthews a hat trick on your first 3 shots in the NHL. Not too bad.

Jesus Christ, 4 goals for Matthews.
On pace for 492 goals on the season.

.....Leafs still miss the playoffs.

Well there's going to be no hype with this kid now. It's like a rookie QB starting for the Cowboys and throwing 5 TD his first game.

Hawks getting out-everything'd so far. Look flat, yet still tied 1-1.

WOOO WEE! Can't wait man now its the Drive for Five

Blues with the shitty, blind, cross-ice pass in their own zone and now the Flathawks are up 2-1. Funny how that works.

aaaand the Leafs lose in OT ROFL

Tarasenko is fun as hell to watch.

When he is on, he is unstoppable. But he disappears a little too much.

That's what the Leafs do.

Seems like Keith Tkachuk just retired and now I'm watching his kid play for the Flames. His kid is still 18!

I think I'm gonna buy myself an Auston Matthews jersey. Kids gonna be special.

Sharks and Kings getting chippy. SJ just scored to tie it up

Nice to whoop the Hawks ass on opening night

Suuuuure you guys flew in from all across the country to see tha Penwagon raised ROFL

Dean Lombardi on Jonathan Quick's injury last night:

"It's not good."

:facepalm:

Lombardi and I must have a different definition of 'good'...

Ouch!

Looking forward to a Wild win to start the season tonight. Sorry Blues, fans. ;)

The WC is going to be insane this year, which is going to be fun and stressful at the same time. Hoping the Wild can continue to improve, and their young guys and offense improve under Boudreau. Dubnyk needs to get back to the level he played two seasons ago.

Going to be really interesting to see how the character of this team changes under Boudreau, who has a much different approach than Yeo.

Going to be fun in my house tonight. Fiance is a diehard Wild fan. Shit-talking started at 4:50am the minute her alarm went off.

Yes, I'm blessed. We pretty much have hockey on every night from Mid-October until both of our teams flame out in the playoffs.

Quick's injury is the hockey gods getting even for LA employing the biggest piece of shit in hockey (Dustin Brown, though Seabrook gets a very close honorable mention) for several years

Nah, the hockey gods have gotten even by having us stuck swallowing the rest of Dustin Brown's contract.

fair enough

Honestly hoping for the best for Quick. I have no love for any of the Cali hockey teams, but Quick is not one of the guys I'd ever hope to see a serious injury for.

Ugh.

You guys get Boudreau, we get Hitch Light.

****ing wonderful...

Andrew Shaw and Jordin Tootoo.

And of course, when the Hawks lost Shaw, they signed Tootoo. Because their quotient of raging assholes wasn't met once Shaw skipped town. **** the Blackhawks.

The Devils fan assured me that Tootoo found Jesus or something, but I don't buy it. He's still a ****stick and if he wasn't, the Blackhawks wouldn't have signed him.

For me, it's...

1) Brown
2) Seabrook
3) Perry
4) Anyone else on the Blackhawks (DJ is correct. Chicago must have at least 6 raging assholes signed to their roster at all times)

Fortunately Matt Cooke is no longer employed so that opens a slot.

Then there's Brad Marchand who's one of those guys that's just a raging asshole...when he's on the other team but I would murder to have that guy on the Blues. So that kinda takes him out of consideration for this list.

Guys like Shaw, Tootoo, Seabrook and Cooke are guys that I have no interest in having on this squad at all. Frankly, I'm not sad to see Brouwer or Ott gone either.

I would put up with '16 Playoff Brouwer.

Ott never did a damn thing for us. Was happy to see him go.

Brouwer potted a couple of goals but he also took some extremely stupid penalties. I never trusted him and like I said, I'm not sad he's gone.

Ott....ugh; I still can't believe we extended that asshat. WTF where they doing? A minus player who was completely offensively inept and had no concept of puck possession. He was a liability in every single way and yet we gave him a 2-year deal even after getting to witness how shitty he was after the trade.

3 goals in 2+ seasons and 2 of them were on accident (the one where he was trying to go high and fanned so badly that it just trickled through the goalies pads on a breakaway was particularly funny).

He was a special combination of stupid, dirty and bad. And somehow he was a fan favorite. I can only assume it's because his wife is a smokeshow.

Raising the banner tonight! Wooo! Oven chicken will finally see a Stanley Cup banner being raised.

Cats game is blacked out can someone find me a stream please while I'm at work

Thank you sir

Devils defense having a ton of trouble getting out of their own zone, but it's about what I expected. Schneider standing on his head fortunately.

Luongo just made a ****ing killer save.

That was ****ing filthy by Matheson LMAO !! Barkov gets the game winner in OT

Awesome opening night in Pittsburgh. Was late to watch the game due to writing a paper for school. Great to beat the Capitals anytime. Malkin was great, Fleury was solid and great in OT and the shootout, Hornvquist is my boy. Love that guy and how he plays hockey. Nice win overall for Pittsburgh and our first victory in our Drive for Five.

Either way, you're not pronouncing most of them correctly.

I had a dream last night that one day the Toronto Maple Leafs will be the cream of the crop of the NHL and win the Stanley Cup. Oh wait, I've been dreaming about this since I was born and it's only been 50 years now you know? I need to just keep on dreaming man. Like, cool. Haha

My God, the in-game department needs to be fired over last night's Blues pregame. My entire section was just dumbfounded at how terrible it was - we were all expecting better considering they've made such a big deal about it being the 50th season. (Which it isn't, lockout)

Did they show it on TV?

Good to get 4 points out if our first two division games, especially in back to back's.

Y'know, we still have a puck-moving defenseman available that wants to play on the east coast. We'll be willing to take Kyle Palmieri off your hands for him...

**** your own face.

ROFL That Penwagon man

haha all 9 of us! Just saw that part. Well done!

Honestly it fits for how awful their 50th anniversary logo is:
http://3.cdn.nhle.com/blues/images/u...thanniv300.jpg

I just find it hard to believe that is the best they can do, especially with how classic of a logo and color set they have.

I thought the same thing, until I saw it in person on the jersey and on the rink at center ice.

I wouldn't even know that is shitty until the shitheads on chiefs planet bag on it. I wonder how fat Phil Kessel is right now. Go Penguins

Got tickets for Penguins/Ducks in Anaheim at the start of November.
Couldn't afford to get the game vs LA, but hey...I'll take it.

Great 1st game of the season for the Flyers tonight. The young kids played great.

I'm catching the Blues-Oilers game on December 19 in STL with some friends on my way home from school, maybe the in-person view of the logo will help me visually with it.

LOL this shit again huh?

ROFL #hatersgonahate

Tis only begun

It's like there wasn't an offseason! lol

Not sure what the promotion details are, may be local only, but Pens are giving away season tickets for 20 years. I'll take all the games you can't make! I wanna wiiiiiin!

https://www.nhl.com/penguins/fans/golden-ticket

ROFL good luck to your blues? Is that who you like? I can't remember

Hawks with three quick Genos to open the game. Up 3-0 early against the Preds.

Bout time...

Blues go to 3-0 after a win against the Rangers.

Might be the first time I've ever seen a team win a game without a single shot on goal in the 3rd period.

Yep. Not expecting much out of the gate with all of the young kids. Going to take some time to gel. Tonight was encouraging, though, Darling's performance was timely.

The Avs beat the Stars and even won the fancystats battle! Amazing! (Or maybe they were just hyped up for the first game.)

And it didn't take long for every single team in the Central to get points. It's gonna be a rough year.