What do you think the lines should be next season?
Penner (4.25)
New lines for next season?
New lines for next season?
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The-Insider
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UTMCretin
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Optimism abounds. Thinking about next year in the middle of January, boy, that takes me back. 
As for the lineups, those are pretty good if the spoken goal is John Tavares. However, if the motivation to win ever enters Lowe's mind, he'll probably want to add a piece or two. But I'll leave that for later.
I'll just comment on the roster changes. As for the players leaving, I'm more than willing to re-sign Stoll, depending on the price, and I like Thoreson as a 4th liner more than I like Stortini. Get rid of Huggy Bear. Both Pouliot and Jacques are expendable and should be packaged in trades (especially Pouliot, who actually holds some value). Torres should have been traded a year ago when he still had value, but in the meantime, I just want him gone and replaced with someone with talent. It's not even a question of consistency for him anymore, it's a question of whether or not he can bring more to the lineup than Kyle freaking Brodziak. Roloson should be traded to a team with goaltending issues in order to pick up some offensive depth, if possible, due to Garon's stellar play and Rollie's continued habit of being easily expendable.
I like the defensive rotation, but with Pitkanen and Gilbert in there, it'd be hard for me not to. Pitkanen is a franchise d-man. I feel relatively strongly about this. He has just been phenomenal since coming back from injury. Smid is definitely a more polished player as of now than Grebeshkov, if not with the same offensive upside. Grebeshkov's defensive mistakes have grown sparcer over time, but I prefer having Smid in the lineup.
Just in reference to the lines, Penner-Horcoff-Hemsky is gold. Who needs a team full of offensive depth and consistent contributers at all lines when you got these guys producing numbers every single game? Hell, Horcoff's shooting percentage has doubled playing along side Hemsky for every game. He's even an all-star. Any line that turns Shawn Horcoff into an all-star should be kept together for a long time. I have no qualms with the rest of the lines, except that they suck. The matchups are fine, but the parts just aren't good enough to make the sums worthwhile. (Ignoring, of course, future development from Gagner, Cogliano, etc.)
Well, that's about as many opinions as I can muster from a first look.
As for the lineups, those are pretty good if the spoken goal is John Tavares. However, if the motivation to win ever enters Lowe's mind, he'll probably want to add a piece or two. But I'll leave that for later.
I'll just comment on the roster changes. As for the players leaving, I'm more than willing to re-sign Stoll, depending on the price, and I like Thoreson as a 4th liner more than I like Stortini. Get rid of Huggy Bear. Both Pouliot and Jacques are expendable and should be packaged in trades (especially Pouliot, who actually holds some value). Torres should have been traded a year ago when he still had value, but in the meantime, I just want him gone and replaced with someone with talent. It's not even a question of consistency for him anymore, it's a question of whether or not he can bring more to the lineup than Kyle freaking Brodziak. Roloson should be traded to a team with goaltending issues in order to pick up some offensive depth, if possible, due to Garon's stellar play and Rollie's continued habit of being easily expendable.
I like the defensive rotation, but with Pitkanen and Gilbert in there, it'd be hard for me not to. Pitkanen is a franchise d-man. I feel relatively strongly about this. He has just been phenomenal since coming back from injury. Smid is definitely a more polished player as of now than Grebeshkov, if not with the same offensive upside. Grebeshkov's defensive mistakes have grown sparcer over time, but I prefer having Smid in the lineup.
Just in reference to the lines, Penner-Horcoff-Hemsky is gold. Who needs a team full of offensive depth and consistent contributers at all lines when you got these guys producing numbers every single game? Hell, Horcoff's shooting percentage has doubled playing along side Hemsky for every game. He's even an all-star. Any line that turns Shawn Horcoff into an all-star should be kept together for a long time. I have no qualms with the rest of the lines, except that they suck. The matchups are fine, but the parts just aren't good enough to make the sums worthwhile. (Ignoring, of course, future development from Gagner, Cogliano, etc.)
Well, that's about as many opinions as I can muster from a first look.