“How Will I Be Disappointed This Year?” – A DFO NHL Eastern Conference Preview

Hi everyone,

It’s your old pal Beerguyrob with DFO’s annual looksee into the mire that is the NHL’s Eastern Conference. This year, I will dispense with the usual “Ugh – not the fucking Penguins again” tone and instead attempt to provide a balanced one-paragraph per team, highlighting strengths & weaknesses so that you may choose your viewing options wisely.

Nah – I’m going to be snarky.

The Atlantic Division:

A division strangely made up of four of the Original Six teams; Ottawa, because all the Canadian teams have to be in the same division, geography permitting; Buffalo, because they are close to Toronto; and the Florida teams because in the winter Florida is the third most populous Canadian province. SCIENCE!

Boston Bruins: (FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a Bruins fan)

They should have beaten the Blues. But St. Louis, god bless them, found a way to keep Brad Marchand quiet & therefore ineffective. This will be the likely final year for the main core of this lineup, as Zdeno Chara has to break down sometime, Patrice Bergeron will move on to richer climes, and Tuukka Rask is getting pretty tired of wearing a target on his left glove. Luckily, the Celtics have a lonelier recent playoff history, so America’s most intolerant fanbase will have to rely on the Patriots for their only chance at a parade this year.

Buffalo Sabres:

They, like the Edmonton Oilers, exist solely to waste high draft picks on continued irrelevancy. The difference is that their proximity to Toronto means most of the games are sold out but filled with enough foreigners to give an ICE agent priapism. Like the Vancouver Canucks, they enter their 50th season with the longest Cup winless streak at “forever”, a stat which will extend beyond this season.

Also, this is an actual, grammatically correct sentence:

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

Detroit Red Wings:

An enigma of a team. They could have all their pieces finally in a row and qualify for the playoffs. Or, they could have failed to properly evaluate their talent again & end up near the bottom of the conference. It’s proof that the office is as important as the talent on the ice. Luckily, prodigal son Steve Yzerman has returned to be GM, but it won’t help for a few years because he has to dig out from under bad drafts and terrible contracts. But since former owner Mike Illich died, at least the arena no longer smells like America’s fifth-best chain pizza. (Don’t @ me.)

Florida Panthers:

This team exists solely to be a tax loss for owner and previous [DFO] scrutinee Vincent Viola. They routinely draw the fewest fans in the NHL, and have more than once been speculated about as moving to Quebec City – a move Gary Bettman would never consider because he hates Canada. Hilariously, when franchise goalie Roberto Luongo retired last spring, he did so in a way that shifted the salary cap punishment from Florida to Vancouver, as one final “fuck you” to that franchise for the time they hired John Tortorella as their head coach and he turned on Luongo so hard he demanded a trade out of town & to the most geographically distant point from Vancouver.

^{The salary cap equivalent of this.}

Montreal Canadiens:

Dear lord, where to begin? Carey Price is the sole reason this team is ever mildly considered a Cup threat, and he always breaks down by February because the human body just isn’t designed to take as many shots on goal as he faces nightly. Their defence is anchored by salary anchor Shea Weber, who they thought was less work than PK Subban, even though Subban tried to learn French & donated money and time to local charities. Their leading goal scorer is Brendan Gallagher, who is the same size as future Hall of Famer Martin St. Louis but doesn’t have the advantage of playing alongside anyone near the caliber of Vincent Lecavalier. La sécheresse continue.

Ottawa Senators:

They have now gone a full season without a player’s girlfriend threatening to kill another player’s wife, fiancé or baby. So…progress! if not profit. There doesn’t appear to be a plan with this franchise, and current owner / slumlord Eugene Melnyk always seems one step away from the league taking control of the team, especially if he threatens to move them within Canada. The federal election might help him gain new traction for a downtown arena, but it also might harden opposition if a minority government is returned and he has to bargain with a Justin Trudeau that’s had to partner with the socialist NDP or an even-more leftist Green Party.

In the words of our dears Maestro & Scotchnaut, “It’s going to be a long season. Might as well help the city with the homeless count.”

I believe there might be differing interpretations as to how to proceed on that front.

Tampa Bay Lightning:

The prohibitive Cup favourites from the East going into the season, no one will buy into them actually being that until after they win their first-round matchup, because they got their asses handed to them in hilarious fashion last spring by a coach barely able to convince his collective millionaires to drag their carcasses into the playoffs. They are loaded with talent from top to bottom, all of whom will be ‘sick of this shit’ by November of having to answer the same six questions about their choke job from April. Steven (“not Steve”) Stamkos will have 100-points & no respect again, and possible sleeper agent Nikita Kucherov should lead the league in points. Again, none of this will matter until they get past the first round, so don’t bother paying attention to them until the snow melts.

Toronto Maple Leafs:

As a western Canadian, I am constitutionally unable to write anything positive about the Leafs. Because even FUCK THE LEAFS if I try to point out FUCK THE LEAFS that they are loaded with offensive talent FUCK THE LEAFS, my Tourettes kicks in and I cannot finish my thoughts. Despite their obvious advantages up front, their main holes lie on the back end & in net, the result of which will be their continued inability to escape the first round, a fact which will make the rest of the country proud.

Rumour has it that one of the things that led Kawhi Leonard to sign with the Clippers was MLSE’s promise to give him Leafs season’s tickets.

The only guarantee about the Leafs is that they will be on Canadian TV every second night because all the media in this country are in bed to will them into the Cup finals so they can all blow each other in celebration.

The Metropolitan Division:

A division designed to emulate the NHL of old, where teams took the bus everywhere because the travelling distances were so short. Due to the CBA, most teams still fly unless they are playing in the New York metropolitan area.

Carolina Hurricanes:

Fun fact: They should be in the Atlantic Division and called the Hartford Whalers.

Otherwise, who fucking cares?

Columbus Blue Jackets:

A sad franchise coached by Satan’s angriest minion, John Tortorella. They earned the plaudits of the fans, and the enmity of the league, for eliminating Cup favourites Tampa Bay in four straight games back in April. Their reward was having all their free agents leave for other destinations. They enjoyed their moment in the sun, and their slow descent towards relocation begins this week.

New Jersey Devils:

A fortunate entrant into the 2019 playoffs, they will be unable to replicate that progress this season, as Edmonton didn’t trade them any players. They continue to rely on Cory Schneider in net, a result that will produce continued diminishing returns as he gets older & more beat up. (He should start fucking his wife’s sisters to stay young, like Marty Brodeur.) Their coaching staff have yet to decide if they will play the boring, trap-style hockey that won them their Cups in the 00s or the speed game they tried to develop to compete with their counterparts in the division. The longer that indecision goes, the worse it will be for their playoff chances. However, because they play in the New York market they will still get more media exposure than their record will warrant.

New York Islanders:

The ice-Jets of the New York hockey market, they are in the midst of yet more ownership & arena turmoil as they have abandoned their full-time Brooklyn tenancy & are now playing half their games at the old, somewhat refurbished Nassau County Coliseum.

They have no goal scoring, as they have instead focused on netminding, which is what got them to the second round. They have three goalies on the roster, which seems like a waste of money that could have instead been used to sign someone who might score more than 25 goals in a season. By doing nothing to upgrade their offence, and releasing the goalie with diagnosed bipolar 1 with manic phases that carried them that far, it doesn’t appear they have someone crazy enough to withstand being shot at 50 times per game. They might as well sign someone from MS-13 to watch the net, since those guys are used to dodging bullets at close range.

New York Rangers:

Speaking of unwarranted media coverage, their fire-sale at the end of last season has left them unable to compete for anything but the first overall pick in the 2020 draft. But they will still be on NBC a dozen times because Doc Emrick has vertigo and doesn’t want to travel as much anymore. Nonetheless, they should be watchable because half the team have unspellable names, making for a potential play-by-play nightmare and turning this Chance the Rapper bit from SNL into actual truth.

The only possible reason to watch them will be for the Henrik Lundqvist farewell tour that will start in mid-February when he decides he can’t take this shit anymore.

Philadelphia Flyers:

This is Gritty.

Gritty is the mascot for the Philadelphia Flyers. He was invented & introduced last year.

He looks & sounds like Cookie Monster’s cousin Shaggy.

Given how bad the Flyers will be, it is important to note how often Gritty will make the team seem watchable. DO NOT FALL FOR THIS TRICK! They are terrible, and will be on the wrong end of many 8-goal games. The only reason to watch a Flyers game will be to avoid basketball.

Pittsburgh Penguins:

You know how Big Daddy Drew always refers to Saints fans as “GUMBO GUMBO GUMBO!!!”? With the Penguins, it’s just “CROSBY CROSBY CROSBY!!!”. Due to salary cap, their top players haven’t changed, so they are reduced to finding bargain-priced replacements to fill out the roster & hopefully provide stability when called upon in the playoffs. As long as they have Crosby & Malkin up front, Letang & Johnson on the point, and Matt Murray in goal, the Pens are pretty much guaranteed to make the second round. It’s whether or not their “character guys” and “role players” are “good enough” to shoulder the load when those guys are on the bench.

Washington Capitals:

As long as they have this guy,

they’re gonna be fine. If he misses any significant time, they’re fucked.

Predictions:

Atlantic Division:

1. Tampa Bay
2. Boston
3. Toronto

Metro Division:

1. Pittsburgh
2. Washington
3. Carolina

Wild Cards:

1. Montreal
2. New Jersey

I’m not even going to take a stab at playoff matchups. I don’t even think I’m drunk enough to have made this list. Please let me know your opinions below.

Tomorrow: The Western Conference