I'm calling it now: Taylor is going to be a sneaky huge part of this season. Or maybe not that sneaky.
22 thoughts on “April 14, 2023: To The MAT”
I kind of hope the Wild get the Avalanche for maximum risk-reward in the first round.
As long as I'm dreaming, I'd also like to order up a second round matchup with the Kraken.
I'm not picky on who they play in the Stanley Cup final.
I realized last night that I don't care too much, because I have no hopes or expectations. I'm just happy to have playoff hockey.
I have no hopes or expectations.
I think that's about right for this team. If absolutely everyone is healthy this Wild team is capable of competing with most teams, but still would be reliant on getting good goaltending to win.
They aren't healthy and relying on goaltending in the playoffs is a coin-flip at best, so ... no expectations is pretty much right.
1) Every team pretty much relies on good goaltending to win.
2) The make up of this team (when healthy) is more playoff ready than last years version. If Eriksson Ek was healthy, I would have a fair amount of hope to upset someone in the first round. With his injury... I am feel we have about a 40% chance of beating the Dallas south stars and maybe a 33% chance to knock off the Avs. We play a heavy game, which gives me some hope.
3) All that being said, as a Minnesota sports fan, I am prepared to be heartbroken.
3) All that being said, as a Minnesota sports fan, I am prepared to be heartbroken.
I told my 8-year-old, sports loving son this while watching the Vikings/Giants, Gophers Natty and telling him about the Wild playoff’s expectations. He’s still learning…
Expanding on how important Gustavsson/Fleury are for this team -- The Wild are barely a playoff team unless their goalies play at an insane level.
The Wild got .940 goaltending for a month and a half. That's not good goaltending, that's outer-space level goaltending. They lost only 2 of 24 games in that stretch in regulation.
The rest of the year, when they got .910 goaltending (which is above average in the NHL this year), they went 22-23-13 in regulation. Every team below .500 in regulation this year is out of the playoffs.
I would argue that a portion of the goaltender success is the result of having 2 of the best defenseman in the league in terms of goals against . The team as a whole played much better, and they scored more goals, during the recent hot stretch. That success without #97 is what gives me some measure of hope. Also, their below .500 stretch that you refer to was earlier in the year when #97 was the only player producing any offense whatsoever.
The below .500 stretch here is the first 50 games of the season.
GF per game in the first 50 games of the season - 2.90
GF per game during their 17-2-5 run in Feb/Mar - 2.83
xGF% in the first 50 games of the season - 52.2%
xGF% in during their 17-2-5 run in Feb/Mar - 51.4%
The amount of goals scored, xGF and xGA per game didn't really change during the hot streak. The change was save percentage.
Oh sure... bring your fancy facts and statistics into the discussion. However, I am still going to choose to feel pretty good about this team. I won't bet my hard earned cash on them, but I do like the make up of this team. I feel better about their playoff chances this year, than any other recent year. My responses in this thread are directed at the "no hopes" and "no expectations" comments.
There's definitely a way for this team to win a series or two. They belong in the playoffs, and now it's on the team to find success in whatever series they play.
directed at the "no hopes" and "no expectations" comments
See Can of Corn, supra.
You say pessimist, I say realist. And yet, I still watch and hope and occasionally pray that my kids will experience what we experienced in ‘87 and ‘91.
Looking at the MLB strikeout leaders. Ryan and Lopez one strikeout behind the leaders. Weird to see from this squad.
Aww, sound like Spotify is shutting down Heardle.
That’s disappointing, even though I usually lose and frequently don’t even know the song once they show the name.
I have fairly bimodal results. I only got it right 28% of the time, but of the times I get it right, I get it in the first guess more often than any other.
Can I get a pinch hit for the gamelog?
gotcha
Wolves back
That game went so swimmingly, I’m still kind of waiting for the Thunder to go on a run even though the game is over.
Alright then. Bring on the Stars and Nuggets!
The Sports Illustrated recap of the Twins game ended with the following line:
The last time they started a season 10-4 in a non-COVID year was 2010 when they also won 10 of 14 games to begin the season.
Now read it in Perd Hapley's voice.
they gotta be using chatGPT
I don’t know what you mean, but I understood it from context!
I kind of hope the Wild get the Avalanche for maximum risk-reward in the first round.
As long as I'm dreaming, I'd also like to order up a second round matchup with the Kraken.
I'm not picky on who they play in the Stanley Cup final.
I realized last night that I don't care too much, because I have no hopes or expectations. I'm just happy to have playoff hockey.
I have no hopes or expectations.
I think that's about right for this team. If absolutely everyone is healthy this Wild team is capable of competing with most teams, but still would be reliant on getting good goaltending to win.
They aren't healthy and relying on goaltending in the playoffs is a coin-flip at best, so ... no expectations is pretty much right.
1) Every team pretty much relies on good goaltending to win.
2) The make up of this team (when healthy) is more playoff ready than last years version. If Eriksson Ek was healthy, I would have a fair amount of hope to upset someone in the first round. With his injury... I am feel we have about a 40% chance of beating the Dallas south stars and maybe a 33% chance to knock off the Avs. We play a heavy game, which gives me some hope.
3) All that being said, as a Minnesota sports fan, I am prepared to be heartbroken.
I told my 8-year-old, sports loving son this while watching the Vikings/Giants, Gophers Natty and telling him about the Wild playoff’s expectations. He’s still learning…
Expanding on how important Gustavsson/Fleury are for this team -- The Wild are barely a playoff team unless their goalies play at an insane level.
The Wild got .940 goaltending for a month and a half. That's not good goaltending, that's outer-space level goaltending. They lost only 2 of 24 games in that stretch in regulation.
The rest of the year, when they got .910 goaltending (which is above average in the NHL this year), they went 22-23-13 in regulation. Every team below .500 in regulation this year is out of the playoffs.
I would argue that a portion of the goaltender success is the result of having 2 of the best defenseman in the league in terms of goals against . The team as a whole played much better, and they scored more goals, during the recent hot stretch. That success without #97 is what gives me some measure of hope. Also, their below .500 stretch that you refer to was earlier in the year when #97 was the only player producing any offense whatsoever.
The below .500 stretch here is the first 50 games of the season.
GF per game in the first 50 games of the season - 2.90
GF per game during their 17-2-5 run in Feb/Mar - 2.83
xGF% in the first 50 games of the season - 52.2%
xGF% in during their 17-2-5 run in Feb/Mar - 51.4%
The amount of goals scored, xGF and xGA per game didn't really change during the hot streak. The change was save percentage.
Oh sure... bring your fancy facts and statistics into the discussion. However, I am still going to choose to feel pretty good about this team. I won't bet my hard earned cash on them, but I do like the make up of this team. I feel better about their playoff chances this year, than any other recent year. My responses in this thread are directed at the "no hopes" and "no expectations" comments.
There's definitely a way for this team to win a series or two. They belong in the playoffs, and now it's on the team to find success in whatever series they play.
directed at the "no hopes" and "no expectations" comments
See Can of Corn, supra.
You say pessimist, I say realist. And yet, I still watch and hope and occasionally pray that my kids will experience what we experienced in ‘87 and ‘91.
Looking at the MLB strikeout leaders. Ryan and Lopez one strikeout behind the leaders. Weird to see from this squad.
Aww, sound like Spotify is shutting down Heardle.
That’s disappointing, even though I usually lose and frequently don’t even know the song once they show the name.
I have fairly bimodal results. I only got it right 28% of the time, but of the times I get it right, I get it in the first guess more often than any other.
Can I get a pinch hit for the gamelog?
gotcha
Wolves back
That game went so swimmingly, I’m still kind of waiting for the Thunder to go on a run even though the game is over.
Alright then. Bring on the Stars and Nuggets!
The Sports Illustrated recap of the Twins game ended with the following line:
Now read it in Perd Hapley's voice.
they gotta be using chatGPT
I don’t know what you mean, but I understood it from context!