The Connor McDavid sweepstakes

[habsfan1]

I truly believe Anders Linback gave the last 2 to please Sabres fans. He didn't want the negative attention, so he knew what his "role" was.

That ovation was even lounder than the Coyotes OT goal. Understandable but ridiculous.

[2001mark]

I keep trying to come up with some sort of secret/anonymous lottery for teams hoping to participate in the actual lottery.

i.e. Instead of the worst handful of teams trying their best to lose simply because of the standings, perhaps if teams were kept in the dark until the draft about whether they're even eligible for high picks, might they play harder?

That's to say instead of Buffalo losing every night with sights set on #1 chances, perhaps if they were unable to be certain of even participating in the lottery at all, might they be play more competitively?

I dunno, like I said, I can't seem to reconcile that idea very well (yet?).

Russian Roulette with potential lottery participation in play.

[The_Admiral]

Remember that time the hockey world lost its collective crap when St. Louis Blues finished with 57 points and drafted first overall, causing everyone to demand ridiculous and byzantine remedies to the draft lottery? Yeah, me neither; it's funny what you can get away with when you're not a cold northern U.S. city with a Canadian media presence, the worst of both worlds.

[Cosmic]

The evil tanking Sabres have tied their point total from last year with four games left. The Coyotes are on pace to drop around 30 points from the previous year.

[HedleyLamarr]

It's not like Erik Johnson was looked at as this once-in-an-opportunity, franchise-changing player two years in advance of his draft eligibility, either.

[The_Admiral]

And the Coyotes could still finish below the Sabres! And that would make people so happy: "shame on you for trying to lose, and shame on you for not doing it." It's like the opening scene from Annie Hall for vindictive simpletons.

It's not like Erik Johnson was looked at as this once-in-an-opportunity, franchise-changing player two years in advance of his draft eligibility, either.

Patrick Kane was, and they turned out to be right. The Flyers finished with 56 points that year, a point total wildly uncharacteristic of the perennially contending Flyers, and no one babbled about expelling them from the league for it. I think it's healthy for teams to bottom out when they're all out of bullets, as the Sabres were, as the Flames were, as the Sharks were and are but won't admit it. If people want parity, the best players have to go to the worst teams. Sometimes that will be yours (unless you like the Red Wings).

[habsfan1]

[Cosmic]

ONE. MORE. regulation loss by the Sabres or one more win by the Coyotes... then this whole damn thing will finally be over.

[Cosmic]

Well, that happened. Our boys (and by "our boys", I mean the Hurricanes, of course) just ran out of time. The Sabres were up 4-0 before the Hurricanes scored, and the crowd really didn't care at that point. But, every successive Canes goal got more and more cheers. By the time they pulled within one, you could tell the crowd had really gotten behind Carolina. 49 frickin saves from Anders frickin Lindback? What does Arturs Irbe do to these goalies?

[DaRadniz29]

I keep hearing this talk of tanking when not in the playoffs and people coming up with measures to prevent teams from tanking. I've come up with something that could be a possibility but don't know if would completely eliminate tanking - It's the Draft Tournament. Here's how it works:

Teams that do not make the playoffs would be seeded 1-14, the team with the highest number of points would be the top overall seed, while the team with the least number of points being the 14th seed. The reason it's not the team with lowest number of points as the 1 seed is to not reward teams for having a bad year.

#8 vs #9 = Winner plays #1

#5 vs #12

#4 vs #13

#6 vs #11

#7 vs #10

#3 vs #14= Winner plays #2

The winner of the tournament gets the top pick in the upcoming draft, the two semi final losers would play a consolation game for the 2nd pick with the loser getting third.

The remaining positions 4-14 would determined based on how deep the teams went in the playoffs (teams that lost in the first round of the DLT would get the last six spots, out of the 14.

So while we might still have teams tanking, they wouldn't get the number 1 pick, they'd be slotted between the 9th and 14th pick.

Logistics such as would they be televised, building availability with NBA shared buildings, etc. I haven't figured out.

Interesting idea I had in my head, but not sure it would work.

[monkeypower]

That might be one of the worst ideas I've heard to eliminate tanking.

The logistics for the league, arenas and players would be too hard to handle. Then there are teams that are just plain bad (Buffalo) and should draft high. You would have teams who barely miss the playoffs drafting first overall as there's no way the Sabres would be able to beat the potentially not making the playoffs this year Kings.

[2001mark]

That might be one of the worst ideas I've heard to eliminate tanking.

The logistics for the league, arenas and players would be too hard to handle. Then there are teams that are just plain bad (Buffalo) and should draft high. You would have teams who barely miss the playoffs drafting first overall as there's no way the Sabres would be able to beat the potentially not making the playoffs this year Kings.

Yeah, it's not happening.

If the Penguins miss these playoffs & won that tournament?!? I'd probably quit watching hockey.

[The_Admiral]

Rewarding the middle of the league rather than the bottom of the league with the best players sounds like a great way to create a permanent underclass. Hell, we have the system we have now and Edmonton is still a permanent underclass. Sorry your team finished 9th.

[IceCap]

It's the draft. The worst teams pick first. Sometimes they tank. It's not a big deal.

It's like whenever a sub .500 team wins a division in the NFL and everyone freaks out and tries to "fix" the playoff format.

One notable year is not reason enough to ruin the draft system with your "improvements."

[chrysleraspen08]

London vs Erie playing on Sportsnet next Tuesday. McDavid vs the Knights (or Max Domi). Get ready for 3 hours of Sportsnet hockey commentators looking like this:

[Sport]

a tournament to determine draft order would be like that South Park episode where all the kids try to lose so they don't have to play in the baseball tournament anymore.

I fully believe veteran players don't give a :censored: about where their team drafts.

[Cosmic]

Seriously, this is one thing the NHL is actually doing pretty well... we don't need to nitpick it to death. With the setup for next year, it will still reward the bad teams, but there will be enough of a fog at the top of the draft that it would be foolish to get your hopes up for any particular player. People will still tank to pick 4th instead of 9th, but it won't be as bad.

[FGM13]

The issue of fixing tanking never came up for Erik Johnson or Steven Stamkos or Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. This is a one-time thing, because everyone wants Connor McDavid, the generational player, the next Crosby. There is nothing wrong at all with the system.

[DaRadniz29]

Okay, so this knucklehead had a knucklehead idea floating around up in the 'ol noggin, partly because I had one of the hockey games on yesterday and the talking heads would not shut up about how to fix tanking.

oh yeah and I never thought this would be actually viable as realistic (well, ok for about 5 minutes I did)

While I might have implied it, I never said it was a good idea.

Looks like the out of box idea needs to be shoved back into the box as far down as it can go and then taped up and sealed shut.

Monkeypower- oh no I could come up with more awful ideas. For whatever reason I'm now getting an influx of crazy/awful ways to determine draft order.

[monkeypower]

Ooh, make the GM's do a Hunger Games. Winner gets first overall and gets to continue being GM, because you know, they aren't dead.