Blackhawks Trade And Free Agent Rumors And Discussion

[DewsSox79]

No and it doesn't make him mediocre either.

bickell shows up in the playoffs mostly which i guess is fine.

goalie stats are a bit skewed across the league. crawford imo is a slightly above avg goalie on an avg run of the mill team. if you look at the top 10 goalies for shots against with their save % with exception to the amazing henrik, you will see guys like bernier who was on an ehh team. put him on the hawks...mind you still had better numbers than crawford or a ben bishop as well. crawford on tor or tampa esque teams would see his save % drop probably atleast from 917 to the 900s. now take the top 10 of GAA and crawford and mostly a different list...why? because it is more of a team stat, better defense,less shots etc.

im sure a realistic hawks fan can take atleast 7 goalies ahead of crawford statistically speaking. not talking about salary which a lot of people like to blend into their arguement when it comes to grading goalies.


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[Bigfoot]

Mark Lazerus ‏@MarkLazerus · 1m
#Blackhawks sign defenseman Kyle Cumiskey to a one-year deal. He played in Sweden last season.

 

[nwfisch]

bickell shows up in the playoffs mostly which i guess is fine.

goalie stats are a bit skewed across the league. crawford imo is a slightly above avg goalie on an avg run of the mill team. if you look at the top 10 goalies for shots against with their save % with exception to the amazing henrik, you will see guys like bernier who was on an ehh team. put him on the hawks...mind you still had better numbers than crawford or a ben bishop as well. crawford on tor or tampa esque teams would see his save % drop probably atleast from 917 to the 900s. now take the top 10 of GAA and crawford and mostly a different list...why? because it is more of a team stat, better defense,less shots etc.

im sure a realistic hawks fan can take atleast 7 goalies ahead of crawford statistically speaking. not talking about salary which a lot of people like to blend into their arguement when it comes to grading goalies.


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1. Yes salary is always important when grading players...especially in a capped league like the NHL.

2. The only two goalies I'd take ahead of Crawford by default are Quick and Henrik.

3. You always present this doom and gloom scenario, as "if Crawford was on an average team" or "if Toews gets hurt tomorrow" but it could be just as easily tomorrow using your logic that Doughty tears his ACL or gets injured as well and Quick all of a sudden has a below average d in front of him.

Face it, the reason Minny, Colorado and St. Louis made moves was to catch up with the Kings and Blackhawks. They've done well addressing needs, and the Blackhawks addressed theirs as well. Time will tell if the address was adequate for Chicago.

 

[Diehardfan]

1. Yes salary is always important when grading players...especially in a capped league like the NHL.

2. The only two goalies I'd take ahead of Crawford by default are Quick and Henrik.

3. You always present this doom and gloom scenario, as "if Crawford was on an average team" or "if Toews gets hurt tomorrow" but it could be just as easily tomorrow using your logic that Doughty tears his ACL or gets injured as well and Quick all of a sudden has a below average d in front of him.

Face it, the reason Minny, Colorado and St. Louis made moves was to catch up with the Kings and Blackhawks. They've done well addressing needs, and the Blackhawks addressed theirs as well. Time will tell if the address was adequate for Chicago.

Really? Really? :smh: Quick wouldn't be in my top 10. He will be exposed this year...book it.

 

[nwfisch]

Really? Really? He wouldn't be in my top 10. He will be exposed this year...book it.

Yeah I probably would right now.

Like it's been stated around here non-stop, as much as people want to whine at the goalie situation, the fact is the Blackhawks won with Crawford as their goalie. There aren't marked upgrades in the FA market, because teams generally don't let good goalies go.

 

[Diehardfan]

Yeah I probably would right now.

Like it's been stated around here non-stop, as much as people want to whine at the goalie situation, the fact is the Blackhawks won with Crawford as their goalie. There aren't marked upgrades in the FA market, because teams generally don't let good goalies go.

Re-read my post...you missed the Quick up top. I wasn't talking about Crawford.

 

[nwfisch]

Re-read my post...you missed the Quick up top. I wasn't talking about Crawford.

I saw. :fap:


I respectfully disagree now Diehard...you are correct teams can go high on him...but until they do..he's still better than Crawford now.

Being the 3rd best goalie in the NHL is nothing to sneeze at.

 

[DMelt36]

Really? Really? :smh: Quick wouldn't be in my top 10. He will be exposed this year...book it.

I agree that Quick is highly overrated and helped immensely by the D he plays behind, but I don't think I could put him out of my top 10.

 

[HawkWriter]

1. Yes salary is always important when grading players...especially in a capped league like the NHL.

2. The only two goalies I'd take ahead of Crawford by default are Quick and Henrik.

3. You always present this doom and gloom scenario, as "if Crawford was on an average team" or "if Toews gets hurt tomorrow" but it could be just as easily tomorrow using your logic that Doughty tears his ACL or gets injured as well and Quick all of a sudden has a below average d in front of him.

Face it, the reason Minny, Colorado and St. Louis made moves was to catch up with the Kings and Blackhawks. They've done well addressing needs, and the Blackhawks addressed theirs as well. Time will tell if the address was adequate for Chicago.

Agree on #1 and #3. #2...definitely not. People around here like to hate on Quick, but he is a damn good goalie and definitely a top 5 in the league. Goalies I would absolutely, no doubt, take over Crawford (salary cap aside for this one) include Quick, Lundqvist, Rask, Price, Rinne, Bishop, Miller, Luongo, Smith, and Varlamov. I know, I know - a lot of these guys play on teams that Blackhawks fans "hate" but these guys are damn good goalies and in my opinion they are all better than Crawford and would thrive on the Blackhawks even more so than Crawford. On top of that, you have a hand full of guys that you can make a good case for over Crawford such as Lehtonen, Bobrovsky, Halak, etc.

Crawford, in my opinion, is a #15 goalie in the league - give or take. A middle of the road type guy who plays behind a very good defense and a great team defense. Crawford doesn't have to win/steal games on his own for the most part, he simply just has to keep the Blackhawks in them and not lose them. I'm happy with Crawford as the goalie of this team and I think he is a good fit. He has been improving and seems to know his role on this team, even as a goalie. A good shot blocker who can get in trouble when he tries to get athletic and overly aggressive.

 

[nwfisch]

Agree on #1 and #3. #2...definitely not. People around here like to hate on Quick, but he is a damn good goalie and definitely a top 5 in the league. Goalies I would absolutely, no doubt, take over Crawford (salary cap aside for this one) include Quick, Lundqvist, Rask, Price, Rinne, Bishop, Miller, Luongo, Smith, and Varlamov. I know, I know - a lot of these guys play on teams that Blackhawks fans "hate" but these guys are damn good goalies and in my opinion they are all better than Crawford and would thrive on the Blackhawks even more so than Crawford. On top of that, you have a hand full of guys that you can make a good case for over Crawford such as Lehtonen, Bobrovsky, Halak, etc.

Crawford, in my opinion, is a #15 goalie in the league - give or take. A middle of the road type guy who plays behind a very good defense and a great team defense. Crawford doesn't have to win/steal games on his own for the most part, he simply just has to keep the Blackhawks in them and not lose them. I'm happy with Crawford as the goalie of this team and I think he is a good fit. He has been improving and seems to know his role on this team, even as a goalie. A good shot blocker who can get in trouble when he tries to get athletic and overly aggressive.

The only two I have qualms with are Miller and Luongo being better than Crawford.

At the end of the day though, I really don't care if Crawford is top 3, 5, 10, 15 or even top 30. The rankings are arbitrary. The main point when looking at a roster is if the players are good enough to win a championship. Crawford as a starter is good enough to win a championship.

 

[HawkWriter]

The only two I have qualms with are Miller and Luongo being better than Crawford.

At the end of the day though, I really don't care if Crawford is top 3, 5, 10, 15 or even top 30. The rankings are arbitrary. The main point when looking at a roster is if the players are good enough to win a championship. Crawford as a starter is good enough to win a championship.

I really believe that Miller/Luongo are better than Crawford. They are two solid goalies. Don't need to agree on them all, so that is fine.

The thing about Crawford, just like all of the goalies in the league, is that they are NHL goalies. They can all steal a game. They can get on a roll and stop everything. Just have to hope it happens in the playoffs like it did for Crawford vs. the Wild where he played absolutely great and did win for the Blackhawks and did steal games. I'm fine with Crawford on this team. I think his cap hit is probably $1mil too high as of right now, but as the cap goes up maybe it won't be too bad. Hell, maybe he will continue to play with confidence and he will continue to improve as well. Take Crawford off this team and replace him with a high paid goalie, maybe the Blackhawks defense takes a hit and that may hurt more than having a better goalie. I know some want/wanted to trade Crawford but I don't think there is anything out there that makes sense and would make this team better by getting rid of him.

In regards to cap hit which was touched upon briefly, it is getting extremely hard to compare the contracts of players. In the past 5 years there have almost been 3 different stages of signings...

1. The long term contracts that were front loaded. Hossa/Keith who now have great cap hits.
2. The contracts signed after the latest CBA, with a max of 8 years. Perry/Getzlaf cap hits seemed crazy to me until...
3. The cap going up and planning to go up the next few years because of the new TV deal and revenue increases. Toews/Kane are going to take advantage of this.

 

[nwfisch]

I was just thinking, do you have Howard under Crawford or is he in the same tier?

 

[DewsSox79]

thats a tough call. id prefer howard over crawford but it isnt by a landslide.

as far as luongo/miller. id take them all day long over crawford. you would have to be silly not to. of course im speaking from pure quality of play not money


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[nwfisch]

thats a tough call. id prefer howard over crawford but it isnt by a landslide.

as far as luongo/miller. id take them all day long over crawford. you would have to be silly not to. of course im speaking from pure quality of play not money


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You mean quality of play now or their peaks?

Because Miller and Luongo's peaks were higher, but I'm still not sure they're better than Crawford today.

 

[Diehardfan]

I agree that Quick is highly overrated and helped immensely by the D he plays behind, but I don't think I could put him out of my top 10.

Ok, after further review....it was a bit of an embellishment but not by much. I'd put Quick maybe 8th or 9th. The thing is, you can't rate these guys by what you see on Sportscenter. I get a read watching how they react in a playoff series vs the same team. IMOP, the top guys in this league are Lundquist, Rask, Price, Varlamov, Crawford, Harding(when healthy) and Howard. The group featuring Luongo, Miller and Quick are all guys that I've seen fail for various reasons. From a head case like Luongo to Miller who garnered all kinds of heavy praise just by playing on the east coast to Quick, who for the life of me can't figure out why teams don't go high on him more often.

There is just so much luck involved in playing the position, that it's really hard to rate any of them fairly....save for Lundqvist who is in a league by himself and Varlamov who almost singlehandedly carried his team to the top seed. An inch can mean so much....

 

[Capt. Serious]

You mean quality of play now or their peaks?

Because Miller and Luongo's peaks were higher, but I'm still not sure they're better than Crawford today.

Luongo put up a save % of 92 when he was traded to the shitty Panthers.

Looks pretty good still to me.

 

[nwfisch]

Luongo put up a save % of 92 when he was traded to the shitty Panthers.

Looks pretty good still to me.

In only 14 games :shrug:

 

[HawkWriter]

I was just thinking, do you have Howard under Crawford or is he in the same tier?

For me those two are in the same tier. Howard took a step backwards last year but so did the Redwings. Crawford took a step forward in my opinion. I'd have those two pretty close.

 

[DewsSox79]

You mean quality of play now or their peaks?

Because Miller and Luongo's peaks were higher, but I'm still not sure they're better than Crawford today.

at the current time money aside. I take miller/luongo over Crawford. there really isn't a debate for this. howard can be a debate since the gap is so slim but luongo and miller....all day long

 

[DMelt36]

Just my $.02, but I think Howard is better than Lu, Miller, and Crawford.