Cosmic

Obviously the Utah Raptors (Utahraptor is basically a bigger version of the Jurassic Park raptor).

3 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

He gave the Flames 6 years of his career, and you could never accuse him of not playing hard while he was there. Players aren’t obligated to spend their entire careers with the team who drafted them, and he at least was respectful & told the Flames his intentions so they could get something back for him. 
 

He’s the son of a borderline Hall of Fame American player, and happens to be one of the few elite players who is capable of showing some emotion & personality on the ice. This is the kind of thing people complain is missing from the game, so yeah it’s a marketer’s dream. 

Also should be noted there's a pretty decent chance Tkachuk was trying to get away from a coach that everyone else also wanted to be free from. The GM quit when he wasn't allowed to fire the coach and then when they finally did fire him, it was reported afterwards that multiple players rescinded their trade requests.

21 minutes ago, Cujo said:

I'm mainly a postseason ice hockey viewer, need someone to catch me up on Matthew Tkachuk -- Who was he traded for and how badly was Calgary fleeced? Cause that guy is LEGIT.

The main piece coming back was Jonathan Huberdeau, who had 115 points last year in Florida and 55 this year in Calgary. The trade seems slanted for Florida right now, but it was a salvage job for Calgary as Tkachuk requested a trade. It was viewed as being a pretty even trade at the time, but neither team matched their regular season performance from the year before. The Calgary GM wanted to fix his team by firing the coach, ownership wouldn't let him, and the GM quit... then ownership fired the coach anyway after the reason for the GM quitting leaked.

NFL's probably not too happy about this, but I thought it was pretty funny.

3 hours ago, Gary said:

Funny thing is, it was the opposite, no one came out to vote because they didn’t care. The majority of the voters were 65 plus. It was the blue hairs that turned down the arena.

I don't doubt it was the blue hairs voting, but nobody had to come out- all voters were automatically sent a ballot. It's just that nobody cares about that Coyotes.

As someone who was born after his playing days, I'll remember him best as the guy from Mars Attacks.

Happy Coyotes Election Eve to all those who celebrate!

3 hours ago, Ridleylash said:

An 8th-seed rocking the bracket? A second-year franchise potentially making it all the way to the Conference Finals after getting the reigning champion in the first round? A team with a legendary drought breaking it? The top team in the league being upset in absolutely stunning fashion? The fact that the only remaining teams with a Cup title (Dallas and Carolina) won it 23 and 16 years ago, respectively?

 

There's been plenty of good fortune in the playoffs this year, you're just being butthurt that it's not the teams you wanted to have that good fortune. People love tuning into playoffs for the drama and upsets, and these Cup Playoffs have had a bunch of that.

There's been good storylines for fans, but networks always just want the QB and head cheerleader to be homecoming king and queen.

One of the best things about the NFL on TV used to be that it was predictable. Don't like the Sunday night game missing on a random week.

4 hours ago, the admiral said:

The Hawks have been awful for six years! Is that not karma? Silence, journo.

Six years?! I'm over here in the Chateau d'If trying to remember what the sun looks like. "The hockey gods are never in Buffalo this time of year."

51 minutes ago, habsfan1 said:

Leafs down 3-0 in this series.

 

I think Matthews, Marner, or both won't be back with Toronto next year. I don't see how they keep this core, when many of the top players have 0 goals against Florida, after years of failures and choking.

Dubas and Keefe are definitely gone. New guy will probably try more subtle tweaks first. Like not having Matt Murray and Ilya Samsonov as the goaltending tandem.

41 minutes ago, Unocal said:

I just feel that too much chaos might be too much of a good thing, like having ice cream for dinner every night of the week.

Presidents Trophy winners, by your numbers, have about a 25% chance of winning the Cup. In a field of 16, that's not too bad.

2 hours ago, Cujo said:

The 2023 Boston Bruins -- biggest choke in NHL history?

No way. The Lightning had only three fewer wins than this year's Bruins, and they got swept. Getting swept makes it so much more chokey.

10 hours ago, Cujo said:

We're comparing the Leafs getting past the first round to the 2016 Chicago Cubs?

 

You're right; Leafs getting out of the first round is way bigger.

20 hours ago, tBBP said:

 

You forgot one. THE one, if you ask me...

 

 

 

19 hours ago, the admiral said:

Head writer for a single-camera sitcom that's Actually Really Heartwarming

Former head writer of the Daily Show and Netflix's MST3K:

Just give him a Miami tan...

5 hours ago, throwuascenario said:

I've never understood why you woudn't do everything to copy the NFL if you're one of these leagues that is eating its dust. With the further decline of cable, teams in all 3 of those leagues should be giving their games away, at least locally, like the NFL does.

Going through my father-in-law's junk after he died, I found this weird promotional newspaper all about the local Fox affiliate from ~1990. They had like 20 Sabres games on a free OTA channel that year, and I often think about how backwards things are now.

3 hours ago, CS85 said:

aka “Gruel”

Nike would call it SandSTORM.

4 hours ago, TruColor said:

Someone else here already brought this up (I thought of it as well), but it seems fairly obvious this would be a move towards the coloration of a Desert Cardinal, or Pyrrhuloxia:

 

I've had this idea kicking around in my head for a while. I'm also surprised they haven't tried it at some point in the last 40 years since moving to the desert. I had a color in mind as something they could own, like their version of the Bucs' pewter:

Kokusai Green 2: Electric Igloo

8 hours ago, BBTV said:

IMO the best system is in order of when they're eliminated from playoff contention.  Then eve if they're tanking, they can play hard for the rest of the season (and it's unlikely that a fringe team would tank from day one rather than once they've seen that they're season has gone sideways.)

The one I've heard that interests me the most would work off of points earned after you were eliminated from playoff contention, either straight up or assigning percentages. So you can tank and build a team that gets 50 points in 82 games, but you have to actually win some games at some point to get good odds at #1 overall.

1 hour ago, Luigi74 said:

Why would the NHL rig the Crosby lottery for the Penguins? The Rangers also had three balls in the pot and the Kings, Blackhawks and Ducks each had two, if they were going to rig it one of the big market teams would have won. 

Not that I believe it was rigged, but the Penguins were in serious trouble at the time... old arena, low attendance, poor performance. They were possibly a relocation candidate.

3 hours ago, Walk-Off said:

then a lot of people will feel compelled to ask why that person or group did not try to buy the Thrashers while they were still in Atlanta and were up for sale.

Didn't the owners of the Hawks and arena basically leave the baby Thrashers at the door of the metaphorical fire station? Like Glendale with the Coyotes, helping new owners would have meant another, newer arena to compete for other events.

Pretty pitiful Hail Mary attempt but still a great game.

9 minutes ago, Discrim said:

On topic, this has been one of the better Super Bowls I've seen.  Best atmosphere I can recall for one too.

I think the 2-point conversation sealed it. Whatever happens the rest of the way, this was a damn good game.

11 minutes ago, TrueYankee26 said:

SUPER BOWL DOINK!

I started cackling, and my family looked at me like I was crazy. A solid doink that doesn't hurt your team is pure joy.