CAsFirstCup

Yes it did. When I posted the thread, I was unaware that Walgreen's and CVS provide free tests. Thankfully there was a kind poster who let me know we no longer have to pay $130+ for Covid tests.

Thank you for the information!

"Effective September 20, 2021, in accordance with State of California guidelines, guests (ages 3 and up) attending events at Honda Center will be required to show proof that they are either fully vaccinated (at least two weeks after the last dose) or received a negative COVID-19 test within 72 hours prior to the event start time." https://www.hondacenter.com/arena-info/reopening-policies/ Since children under age 12 are not eligible for the Covid vaccines, this means children ages 3-11 will not be allowed to attend Ducks games without a negative Covid test within 72 hours of a game. This makes absolutely no sense since the scientific data clearly shows that young children have less risk from Covid than from the seasonal flu, and carry a low viral load and aren't vectors as was feared at the outset of the pandemic. I feel bad for fellow season ticket holders who have children in this age range as they won't be able to take them to games without paying up for Covid tests. According to the California Department of Public Health: "These measures are in effect through November 1, 2021. CDPH will review these measures by October 15, 2021, to assess the need for measures after November 1, 2021." https://covid19.ca.gov/mega-events/#more-info I sure hope the CDPH eliminate this requirement after Nov. 1, especially for the children.

I've been watching Ducks games on nhl66.ir since the Dish Network ended its contract with the Fox Sports Networks (now Bally) 2 year ago.

Brayden Point was a 3rd round pick in 2014. Perry and Getzlaf were late first round picks in 2003. Yes, that was a deep draft, but next year is expected to be one also. Every pick doesn't have to become a star, but the more you have the better chance you have of landing gems like Perry, Getzlaf and Point. Murray hasn't done ANY trading of 28+ year old veterans for significant picks and/or prospects in 3 seasons of missing the playoffs. I expressed frustration over this at the trade deadline and the response was: "Teams aren't willing to make trades for veterans right now because they would have to protect them in the expansion draft. After the expansion draft the market to sell veteran players will improve." And just as expected, Murray did absolutely nothing following the expansion draft to trade for the future....

" Corey Perry, the Ducks’ only Hart Trophy winner, has had four goals in the playoffs in his first season with the Canadiens. The Ducks bought him out and allowed him to chase championships, and he’s been in back-to-back Finals, with Dallas and Montreal. And guess what? He still controls the puck and pushes enemy buttons, to the point that he got slugged by Tampa Bay goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy on Monday. Kyle Palmieri produced seven goals for the Islanders in the postseason. The Ducks sent him to New Jersey for second- and third-round picks who dissipated, and Palmieri has never stopped making them regret it. The playoffs once lived in southern California, quite comfortably. Now hockey season climaxes with the NHL draft, on July 23. That is when the Ducks and Kings, drafting third and eighth in the first round, try to buy the vowels that might unlock their puzzles With some exceptions, those “exes” in the playoffs are understandable casualties of the hard salary cap. But did the Ducks and Kings get enough, in terms of cap room or personnel, for the credible warriors they lost? Of course not, and if you could merely draft your way back to excellence, the Stanley Cup would be a citizen of Edmonton. In a six-year span beginning in 2010, the Oilers had four No. 1 overall picks." https://www.ocregister.com/2021/07/06/whicker-luke-hughes-could-help-ducks-negotiate-long-road-back/

I've noticed the same thing. The players that GMBM traded away, let go, or couldn't keep make up a much better team than the Ducks currently have. I understand some of it: we had to lose a player to Vegas in the expansion draft, Montour was traded for a first round pick, Bonino was traded to get Kesler, Perron left as a UFA to play in his preferred location of St. Louis. But there are some boneheaded trades in there that are maddening. The worst one was trading away Kyle Palmieri at age 24 for a 2nd round draft pick when he was coming off a season scoring at a 20 goal per 82 game pace. He then average 26+ goals a year over the next 5 seasons for the Devils. And he is tearing it up in the playoffs for the Islanders. Another terrible one was trading Patrick Maroon for a 4th round pick plus prospect Martin Gernat less than a year after he had scored 7 goals in 16 games in the 2015 playoffs. He went on to score 27 goals the next season for the Oilers and played a key role for the Blues and Lightning winning Stanley Cups the past two seasons. Hopefully we Ducks fans will only have to suffer one more year with Bob Murray as GM.

I would protect: Rakell, Terry, Lundestrom, Volkov Lindholm, Manson, Fluery, Mahura Gibson Protecting Rakell and Manson primarily for their trade value. Fowler is playing better, but his contract is too rich at $6.5 MM/yr for the next 5 years with a NTC. I don't see the Ducks as a Cup contender for at least another 4 years, by which time Cam will be 33. I think Mahura will be a better player than Fowler by then, and cost a lot less. If those were the protected players, who do you think Seattle would take? What's your protect list?

Good article. It's worth emphasizing this quote "Bob Murray, promoted in November of 2008, has held his general manager’s job longer than all but two NHL counterparts GMs (David Poile of Nashville, Doug Wilson of San Jose)." Murray is now in his 13th year as Ducks GM. The Rangers' GM, who was doing a much better job with their rebuild than Murray is with the Ducks', got fired this week. It's amazing that Murray's incompetence continues to be rewarded with such a long tenure as GM.

Once Calgary and Vancouver are eliminated from the playoffs, I don't see why they would need to delay the Canadian division playoffs any more so than the other divisions.

Buffalo lost so there is no way to finish with worst record, which was always a long shot anyway. Canucks win 6-3. #2 spot is now practically certain even if the Ducks win their last 2 games.

Devils win on Long Island 2-1! They are now guaranteed to finish ahead of the Ducks. The #2 position going into the lottery is now almost guaranteed. There is a very remote possibility the Ducks could finish ahead of Vancouver. The Canucks would have to get fewer points in their last 9 games than the Ducks get in their last 2, and they currently have a 4-0 lead in Edmonton!

Thanks for posting that article. Backes is sure a class act! I didn't know he was so close to 1000 games. It's a shame he didn't play more this season because he could have hit 1000 career games in a Ducks jersey if he had. I believe he played well enough to deserve to play many more games, but he is so classy he never complained about his limited playing time. Instead he was thankful for the games he was in the lineup, especially this one in St. Louis.

I agree. As much as I want the Ducks to be in the best draft position possible, I can't advocate players and/or coaches deliberately losing. And while it would be great if Buffalo manages to win both of their last 2 games and pass the Ducks in the standings, it's a bigger deal for New Jersey to stay ahead of the Ducks since moving up to the 3rd worst record would push the Ducks from the 2nd to 4th best position for the lottery and the subsequent rounds of the draft.

I expect them to lose 3 out of the remaining 4 games in regulation, which would be enough even if the Devils lose all 5 of their remaining games. New Jersey also still has a game left with Philly so they probably won't lose all 5. But anything can happen, so you are right. I still thoroughly enjoyed the Ducks win last night. Was at the Pond when Miller set the record for most wins as an American born goalie 2 years ago and wish I was there last night.

Devils are about to wrap up their 3rd straight win over Philly which will open up a 4 point lead over the Ducks 🙂. I was going to root for a Ducks win tonight anyway, being Ryan Miller's last home game, but now it looks like winning won't cost them the #2 draft position going into the lottery.

He scored 14 goals in 47 games on a bad Ducks team 2 seasons ago as a 21 year old, and you write him off over 8 poor games last season. He has a great shot, has shown he can score goals, and has the potential to be a 25 goal scorer if given the opportunity.

I saw Daniel Sprong snipe a top corner goal tonight. It was Washington's only goal in their 1-0 win over the Islanders that moved them into first place. I remember Sprong scoring 2 goals in his first game as a Duck back in Dec. 2018 because I was at the game. Sprong now has 10 goals and 7 assists and is +10 in 36 games this season. That would rank him 3rd in goal scoring and 1st in goals per game for the Ducks, and he is only 24 years old. GMBM traded Sprong for Christian Djoos at last year's trade deadline, when he should have spent his time trading one of the Ducks' veterans for picks and or prospects. Of course he then lost Djoos on the waiver wire to Detroit, so he essentially traded away a young, good scoring winger for nothing. I remember the rap on Sprong was that he "wasn't responsible defensively." If every single player on the roster is required to be solid defensively, it's no wonder the Ducks have the worst offense in the league and are boring as hell to watch.

If it had been possible to "retool" the Ducks 2 years ago and get back to the playoffs either last year or this year it would have been a decent move, aside from the disrespect to Perry. But since it's become clear that GMBM was dead wrong and should have been in full rebuild mode 2 years ago, it was a bad move to drag out the cap hit 2 more seasons when it could have been done by now.

It's good evidence that Murray was clueless about the competitive state of the team before the season started. It's beyond time to fire him. He has been GM for 13 years. The average tenure for an NHL GM is less than 6 years. It's less than 5 in Canada.

For the upcoming draft Seattle will be slotted as if they finished with the 3rd worst record. So the difference between finishing with the 3rd worst record, as the Ducks currently have, and the 2nd worst record is huge. Odds of having a top 3 pick would increase from 19.6% to 55.5% if the Ducks fell behind New Jersey or Buffalo in the standings. http://www.tankathon.com/nhl/pick_odds I know this year's draft is more muddled as to who are the top prospects because of the Covid disruption of the junior leagues, but I would still much rather have our scouts picking in the top 3 than 5th or 6th, which is likely to be the case if the current standings hold. Also, because it's more likely that good prospects are going to fall to later rounds due to the Covid disruption, the picks in the 2nd through 7th round become more important. I'm not sure, but I believe finishing with the 2nd worst record would have the Ducks picking 2 spots earlier in each of those rounds compared to if they finish 3rd worst. So for the first time I am going to hope the Ducks lose as many of the remaining games as possible, preferably in regulation. I have heard the arguments that we shouldn't hope for the Ducks to tank because it creates a losing culture, but the Ducks finished strong each of the past 2 seasons and still played awful in the subsequent seasons. In short, i don't think winning any or all of the remaining 9 games will make a damn bit of difference to the Ducks' culture going forward. But losing them could significantly help their future. So let's go Devils, Sabres, Blue Jackets, and Senators. And please lose Ducks.

Please explain why. I've seen other teams, including the Kings, trade their veterans for picks and prospects this year and over the past several years. Why can't the Ducks do it when they clearly should be selling?

So Columbus got 1st and 4th round picks from Toronto for 33 year old Nick Foligno who has 16 points in 42 games and has a cap hit of $5.5 MM. Why couldn't GMBM swing a similar deal for Henrique, who has the same points in fewer games with more goals, is younger, and makes slightly more than Foligno? I saw lots of comments how the better deals will come this summer because teams won't have to worry about the ED, but yet other teams were still able to swing deals to get good returns for the futures of their teams. The Ducks have now gone 3 consecutive seasons both missing the playoffs and not trading a single player over 25 years old for a significant return in picks and/or prospects. A lot of you follow this a lot more closely than I do and are smarter in these matters, so please educate me because I sure as hell don't understand what GMBM is doing. I see that Henrique still has 3 more years on his contract while Foligno's is up at the end of the season, but he will be the same age as Foligno is now when his contract ends, so I don't see how it's so much worse.

That's the other part of the buyout I didn't like. Perry was a great player and the only Duck to ever win the Hart Trophy and sure didn't deserve to have his career with the Ducks end that way. People also forget that he tied a record for most OT goals in a single season's playoffs 4 years ago. I sure will never forget the GWG he scored in double OT to complete the 4-3 Comeback on Katella win over the Oilers in Round 2 Game 5.

Agree. Much would be forgiven if he pulls that off.