OffThePost.org

Zadorov is a very, very interesting player and person. I remain a big fan of his.

Physically the guy has ALL the tools to be an elite shutdown defenseman. He's a big, strong body who skates extremely well for his size, and his puck skills are above average. Got a heavy shot (almost too heavy, dude breaks sticks all the damn time) and can join the rush on occasion. I also think he has the single best hitting technique of anyone in the league. Unlike Chaos Giraffe, he actually knows how to use his big frame, and despite the fact that he towers over a lot of guys, he doesn't hit high very often. He hits through guys, focusing the impact right around the shoulder/midsection area, which is how most kids are taught. None of that uppercut/exploding upward bullshit you see from a lot of guys. I do not believe he's ever been suspended in his NHL career, and there's a reason for that.

I have no idea what kind of defensive system Tocchet employs, but it's important if you want to utilize him properly. In a man-to-man system, Z thrives. When he can focus on a specific player or couple players, he can be almost elite at shutting down that player. If it's a zone-based kind of thing, his game falls apart, he's just no good at anticipating the play, and for a big guy he at least used to be horrid at covering players in front of the net. That's a big reason why Z landed in Bednar's doghouse a lot and ultimately got dealt--he was not a good fit at all in Colorado, though the handful of games where Bednar just plain told him to shut down ONE player on the ice, he turned in some of his best performances.

So my advice to Toc is to get him in there and boot Cole the hell out, and never, ever pair him with the Chaos Giraffe, though that would be a verrrrrrry entertaining pairing in good and bad ways.

Rumor has it the Canucks are still trying to get Tanev back, we'll see what happens, but I actually like this addition for them.

I know Zadorov tool set is huge..........its the decision making. We already have the chaos giraffe to fill the role of "wtf was he thinking" we don't need another.

Right now I believe Zadorov will be on the right side paired with Cole. I like Cole but as our #3?

Friedman and Myers on the 3rd pair.

Scoucy when he gets back from injury might work into Cole's spot but at the start of the year Cole was the better of the two. Its not so much I'm even against Zadorov as I just feel the team needs a high quality #3 to anchor the 2nd pairing or even move up to first pair if lord forbid Hughes or Hronek get hurt. They have a great 1 and 2........then a huge drop to a bunch of 4, 5, 6, 7's.

The good thing is I'd think with Zadorov's tool set he should excel in playoff hockey, and it really looks like the team will make it there and need to consider players for that time.

I think Ethan Bear will return before Tanev does and there won't be room for both. I like Bear but again he's more of a 4 or 5 dman, not a #3. Hell he was #7 in Carolina last year which has a very deep defensive corps. The Nucks defence is improving this year, but still a long way from the depth needed for a deep playoff run.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Okay so I'm warming up to him!

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Haha could be they will try and pair him with Myers, interesting about Tanev too!

wow, after doing some research I'm pretty excited about getting him! Hopefully this doesn't turn into "all he does is takes penalties"

Prepared to be Verrrrrrry entertained. Pairings announced for tonights game with Calgary.........my fears have come true.


btw I just learned a group of giraffes is called a tower. So we now have a Chaos Tower on the back line.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

I loved these nickname suggestions for them

Chaos Giraffe and Calamity Rhino?
Chaos Giraffe and the Pandemonium Bear?
Chaos Giraffe and the Anarchist Ostrich?
Chaos Giraffe and the Moscow Moose?

Tumultuous Tower

but I think I'd go with the Bedlam Bear

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

ugh, with that record, the Nucks better get way, way better at the penalty kill. They're presently 24th in the league, and they and Winnipeg are the only two teams in the bottom 10 that are in playoff contention.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Good article today discussing the Canuck's defense, with specific regards for the second pairing options. Soucy gets Myers, simply because Myers played his best hockey of the year with Soucy, and Zadorov and Myers when paired together have so far been Chaos squared.

Hughes-Hronek
Zadorov-Cole
Soucy-Myers
OR
Hughes-Cole
Zadorov-Hronek
Soucy-Myers

On the one hand, this is not a cup winning defense, even with Demko playing lights out. None of Zadorov, Cole, Soucy or Myers should be on the second pair of a good team, unless a fill in for injury. Meyers should be the #7 on a good team. On the other hand, this is so much better than what the team has had for the last few years. Remember Riley Stilman, Guillame Brisebois, Kyle Burroughs, Oliver Ekman-Larsson with Meyers playing top pairing minutes?

The team has come a long way on defense, but still has a lot further to go. Can't wait for Wilander, D-Petey; Kudryavtsev; Brzustewicz. Pretty certain that a minimum two of those four make the big team. There's talk that Wilander might even make the jump next year, but if he does, I'd think he'd only be a bottom pairing guy.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Nucks beat TB 4-1 last night. I'm impressed, not to exciting but very business like. Despite being outshot again, the team kept TB for the most part outside the high danger areas. Seems to be their style for the most part this year, giving up more shots overall but beating the other team in high danger opportunities. Unless Myer's or Juulesen are on ice.

They now have a 3 win streak for the first time this year. Wild 2-0; Carolina 4-3 and TB. All three games were similar in style, a few breakdowns but no long stretches of undisciplined chaos such as the 1st period against NJ last week. We've seen periods or even games of this discipline at times this year, but never a 3 game stretch. This is exactly what I was hoping for.


EP40 still looks off, not the player of last year and definitely not the player he was for the first month of this year. Its the Boeser-Miller who are main line, if you told me last year that, that would ever happen I would not have believed it. Boeser looks like what we all hoped he'd become after his 29 goal rookie season. Presently on pace for 59 goals, and almost a sure thing for 40-45 if he stays healthy. Miller consistently back checks and has developed really great chemistry with Boeser. I think adding Hoglander is only going to make this line even better once he develops some chemistry with them. Hoglander is high energy, great fore check, tough to knock off the puck, possibly best player on the team at take aways. Doesn't quite have PDG's top speed but is fast and has far better hands. If he stays on this line, can certainly see him getting 25 goals this year. Going to have to work on his back check though, or Tocchet may move him down the lineup again. And Miller, what can I say, other than boy was I ever wrong about wanting to trade him and keep Horvat. Somehow he just keeps getting better, peaking at 30+ is a rare thing, and bodes well for the 7 years left on his contract.

And for the first time in 30 years I love our 3rd and 4th lines. Sam Lafferty has 8 goals (previous best season was 10 goals) the guy has tons of speed, can defend and plays hard. Joshua draws so many penalties, can hit and defend. Garland is a joy to watch, just wish he could get rewarded with a few goals. Still hoping Kuzmenko gets his shit together. He really does well some games, good on the forecheck and backcheck. Then other games he gets fancy and gives pucks up easily. Think that is old KHL habits when he could get away with that. Him getting on track will be a huge plus for the team.

Defense.............well we have Hughes and Hronek then #3 is Ian Cole, who on a good team would be a #5. They're still ridiculously thin on defense, one injury to Hughes/Hronek and good bye playoffs.

Penalty kill sukkage is going to harm them.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

I certainly didn't expect Boeser to be leading the NHL in goals at this point in the season, he had the quick start but I figured he'd cool off soon enough. This homestand has been just what they needed and given them some practice time, I think the PK will be better now and hopefully we get Suter back soon now that he's skating with the team again. PK misses him and the bottom six will look even better with him in it.

Shame we seem to have missed out on Bear, but it's nice to actually be thinking "I wonder what Alvin has up his sleeve" instead of dreading his next move. Can't believe we got Lafferty for a 5th!

Looking ahead, this is a pretty easy schedule for the rest of the month. Florida on Thurs for Robert Luongo night. Then 4 game road trip with no back to backs: Wild, Hawks; Preds; Stars. Back home for Sharks and Flyers.

Panthers look to be the toughest test, and Stars. Others should be at least 8 points.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

https://x.com/TheStanchion/status/17355 ... 67561?s=20

4-0 win over the Panthers on Robert Luongo Ring of Honour night. This is very cool.



Still bothers me how it ended for him here. But he was as usual his complete classy self last night.


Its strange how the Nucks can be consistently outshot and still feel like they've dominated the game. In terms of high danger chances they just out perform their opponents on a consistent basis and last night was no different. Panthers just so often looked overwhelmed in the first two periods. With a 4-0 lead going into the third they just played shut down hockey, outshot 15-1 by the Panthers but with most shots coming from far out, and with Demko having a clear view on them, the shut out was preserved.

So glad we didn't trade Conor Garland, he may not be scoring, but he sure drives the third line, and his defensive play is crazy good. He just seems to always be in the right spot, doing everything correctly. Not sure he's worth $4.95 million but he's worth a lot more than the $3 mil other teams were evaluating him at.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

yeah, how bad do you want to see him get a goal and get going, and how good was it for Joshua to get a pair?! Teams a lot of fun to watch right now!

Thought the Lou stuff was pretty good, having all the kid goaltenders banging their sticks, the ceremonial faceoff, the crowd chanting Lou when Demko made a save on his way to a shutout, all of it.

Should be a couple of good tests against the Preds and Stars. Wonder if he'll keep Suter with Petey or move him back to centre, along this line of thinking was wondering if Kuzmenko might get put back on Petey's wing but just had a quick look at Canucks Army and they reckon Kuzzy is sitting De Smith gets the start in net.

Kuzmenko scores in back to back games and he gets the press box? I think if I was Kuzmenko I'd be asking for a trade, he's changed his playing style a lot to accomodate Tocchet, and it may just be he won't be able to change enough to ever satisfy him. Hoglander still getting low minutes as well, not sure what more he can do. Maybe Alvin should ask Tocchet who he can work with and trade them both for the magic guy he wants.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

yeah I'm wondering how he's feeling too but it's a terrible time to trade him. Sure don't seem to be missing him offensively at the moment though. I thought this game might be a big loss but we just keep rolling along. Even Juulsen seems to be looking better, you know, in a not noticing him kind of way. How was Joshua skating away at the end the of first?