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Post by habsorbed on Jun 25, 2020 2:12:06 GMT -5
For all the criticism the NHL has received for the 24 team 'play-off, play-in' format (all of which I agree) the lottery plan adopted by the league is even more absurd. As I understand the lottery scheme devised as a result of Covid 19 (and I may be incorrect as it is confusing), 23 teams will have a chance at getting the first overall draft pick this Friday - WTF! The 7 teams not involved in the play-ins understandably will have a strong percentage chance of landing a top pick based on their terrible records, with the Wings having the best odds at 18.5 %. But the league has decided to allow the 8 teams which lose in the play-ins a combined 24.5% chance of getting the top pick; while none of these 8 teams will be specifically assigned the pick at the time of the lottery this Friday, it will be a place holder winning the lottery and determined by a lottery of the play-in losers at the conclusion of the play-ins when the league knows the 8 teams which lost the play-ins. So if in the initial lottery this Friday, a place holder play-in loser team wins the lottery with the 24.5% chance, each play-in loser will have a 12.5% chance of getting the first overall at a subsequent lottery after the play-ins are concluded. Got it? Ya,sort of So yes, a strong team like the Penguins (17 games over .500 at the time of "the pause")) or the Leafs (11 games over .500 at the time of "the pause") may get Lafreniere. Seriously. This is so contrary to the fundamental purpose of the draft that it is heresy. Particularly troubling is that these play-in teams will be playing an abbreviated best of 5 series after a long lay-off thus minimizing the likelihood of the best team winning. So although you may have a strong team not deserving of a #1 overall pick (see Pens), you may lose to a hot goalie or a team that catches fire for one week, and you suddenly have a great chance at drafting Lafreniere. Perhaps even more troubling and contrary to the fundamental concept of the lottery, is that the Covid lottery model would seem to promote tanking which is precisely what the lottery was designed to prevent. If an anonymous play-in team wins the lottery this Friday, most play-in teams would do their best to lose the play-in so they can get a 12.5% chance at Lafreniere. Think about it, in ordinary circumstances only the worst 2 teams in the league get a better than 12.5% chance in the lottery to get #1. Yet as of this Friday, if a palce holder play-in team wins the lottery, teams which are considered the 9th to 23rd worst teams in the league would have a 12.5% chance at #1. That's right - the 9th best team in the league at the time of "the pause" would have a 12.5% chance at #1 overall. WTF! Now from the Habs perspective, this may all be very good. If a play-in team wins the lottery with the 24.5% odds this Friday then the Habs should TANK to the Pens and would get a 12.5% chance at Lafreniere which is about twice as good odds as they were looking at at the time of "the pause". As I said, normally to get those odds at the #1 pick you'd have to have one of the 2 worst records in the league. The Habs were bad this season but they were not that bad:( We should all be hoping for the play-in team place holder to win the lottery this Friday! And then MB and CJ can figure out how to tank - pretty sure Carey has already played a lot of hickey this year and should rest up for next season
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Post by BadCompany on Jun 25, 2020 8:49:46 GMT -5
Welcome to the NHL, where the standings are made up, and the points don't matter.
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Post by folatre on Jun 25, 2020 9:51:40 GMT -5
Jeje, point totals have been highly misleading for many years and this season it is not hyperbole to say the regular season was very close to being entirely meaningless.
Habsorbed, I agree with you. Even the NBA is only taking 22 teams into the bubble. Under no one's reasonable interpretation of who was in the hunt for the Playoffs when the season was halted could conclude that Chicago and Montreal deserved a shot. It was all about enlisting the help of two big traditional hockey markets to squeeze more advertising dollars out of the play-in phase. Ironically, Chicago and Montreal are the organizations most negatively impacted by the farcical design of Phase 2 of the Draft Lottery.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 25, 2020 11:29:39 GMT -5
Yes, you make a compelling point except, to get Lafreniere, you would have to win the lottery twice. First time would have to be a placeholder and the second time out of the 8 teams that didn't win the best of 5. Os in theory your odds are harder.
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Post by seventeen on Jun 25, 2020 11:49:19 GMT -5
To NHL team owners, Bettman, etc., "fair" is simply a word taking up space in a dictionary. I have never trusted the draft lottery. Especially since it's 'run' by a nationally recognized accounting firm. Those are never influenced by money, of course.
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Post by UberCranky on Jun 25, 2020 13:25:19 GMT -5
Welcome to the NHL, where the standings are made up, and the points don't matter. I had huge issues with that program. It caused me far too many injuries from laughter. Punch line should be....."welcome to the NHL, where the points don't matter but the money does." Followed by a skit where there is a voice over of moving butt cheeks. Possibly butt singing to the audience of "YOU ARE THE FOOLS" based on "We Are The World".
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Post by Willie Dog on Jun 25, 2020 13:30:53 GMT -5
If the Habs take out the Pens, the Pens will win the draft lottery, if not, the Kings will win it because that big market team needs a generational talent... The NHL needs a TV contract because the NBC contract expires at the end of 21-22 and a big name like LaFreniere would get the buzz going in LA.
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Post by seventeen on Jun 25, 2020 14:05:45 GMT -5
If the Habs take out the Pens, the Pens will win the draft lottery, if not, the Kings will win it because that big market team needs a generational talent... The NHL needs a TV contract because the NBC contract expires at the end of 21-22 and a big name like LaFreniere would get the buzz going in LA. Damn, we're betting on the same outcome. How can I get good odds that way?
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Post by UberCranky on Jun 25, 2020 15:25:55 GMT -5
Every day, I come to the site in the hope of seeing some good news and something that I can cling some hope too.
Every day, I'm disappointed.
If it wasn't for the community, I wouldn't bother.
Sad.
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Post by habsorbed on Jun 26, 2020 1:03:25 GMT -5
Every day, I come to the site in the hope of seeing some good news and something that I can cling some hope too. Every day, I'm disappointed. If it wasn't for the community, I wouldn't bother. Sad. But there is good news! Assuming the lotteries aren't fixed, Habs still have a chance at Lafreniere or the top 3 - and it's not marginal
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Post by habsorbed on Jun 26, 2020 1:20:00 GMT -5
Yes, you make a compelling point except, to get Lafreniere, you would have to win the lottery twice. First time would have to be a placeholder and the second time out of the 8 teams that didn't win the best of 5. Os in theory your odds are harder. Yes you have to win 2 lotteries, But we have pretty good odds in our favour. Habs and all the play-in teams are the favourite to win the first lottery as we are a block selection with a 24% chance of winning. i'll take those odds on a lottery any day. And then, assuming we lose the play-in to Pens we have a 12.5% chance at winning the second lottery - which is not bad given in normal times the worst team in the league ussually only gets about an 18% chance of winning the 1st pick. And also keep in mind that as I understand the model, the first lottery session is not just for 1st overall but there will be lotteries for 2nd and 3rd overall pick as well. So for each of the lotteries for the first 3 picks we have a 24% chance or better of winning. Those are pretty good odds for a lottery. I'd be very surprised if the the block of play-in teams doesn't get one of the top 3 picks tomorrow. Then 8 teams including Habs are eliminated in the play-ins and we have a 1 in 8 chance of getting this top 3 selection. I like! Suffice it to say, I'll be watching the lottery tomorrow as it may be our first step at rebuilding this mess.
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Post by habsorbed on Jun 26, 2020 1:29:25 GMT -5
If the Habs take out the Pens, the Pens will win the draft lottery, if not, the Kings will win it because that big market team needs a generational talent... The NHL needs a TV contract because the NBC contract expires at the end of 21-22 and a big name like LaFreniere would get the buzz going in LA. If the Pens pull this off and get Lafreniere as a result of the Covid model, it would be history repeating itself with some freak season (lock-out) creating a crazy draft process, resulting in the Pens landing a generational player (Crosby).
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Post by habsorbed on Jun 26, 2020 1:34:09 GMT -5
One thing that I haven't seen in anything I've read is what happens with this lottery process if the season does not resume - which i believe is likely given the current Covid situation. I suppose the League could declare that all 16 of the play-in teams would be involved in the 2nd lottery. Which would reduce Habs odds to about 6% which ironically was about what we were looking at had there been no pause and the season had been played out.
But to think the Pens and the Leafs would also have a 6% chance at Lafreniere is absurd. Welcome to Bettman's NHL!
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Post by folatre on Jun 26, 2020 9:31:29 GMT -5
One thing that I haven't seen in anything I've read is what happens with this lottery process if the season does not resume - which i believe is likely given the current Covid situation. I suppose the League could declare that all 16 of the play-in teams would be involved in the 2nd lottery. Which would reduce Habs odds to about 6% which ironically was about what we were looking at had there been no pause and the season had been played out. But to think the Pens and the Leafs would also have a 6% chance at Lafreniere is absurd. Welcome to Bettman's NHL! Yeah, no one really knows what happens if a placeholder wins one of the lotteries in Phase 1 and then the 2019-20 season never resumes. I doubt the league would allow Phase 2 to have 16 teams in it because that is casting the net too wide and includes teams who had excellent seasons such as Pittsburgh and a team like Dallas could turn around and say the Penguins had a better record than us so if there are no Playoffs then we deserve a place in the lottery more than they do. A second option for Phase 2 would be to have the next worst eight teams (by points percentage) take part – Montreal, Chicago, Arizona, Minnesota, Winnipeg, New York Rangers, Calgary, and Vancouver – and give them equal odds in the Phase 2 lottery. A third option would be not to bother with Phase 2 and simply award the pick to the placeholder that actually struck gold. For instance if the Placeholder called “Team A” wins, Montreal takes the pick because Team A’s probabilities were those associated with the eighth worst team in the league and Montreal was the eighth worst team in the league. Similarly, if the placeholder called “Team D” wins, Minnesota takes the pick because Team D’s probabilities were associated with the eleventh worst team in the league and Minnesota was the eleventh worst team in the league. If the season is cancelled, I think the third option is actually the fairest one. However, unless behind closed doors, Bettman and Daly have already informed GMs that this is how such an eventuality gets settled, then they would have a war on their hands. If I had to guess, I would bet that the league would opt for the second option because it would be the most aligned with the league's two phase design. However, I really do not feel this is particularly fair because teams like the Canucks and the Rangers really had solid seasons compared to the s***fest campaigns that Montreal and Chicago subjected their fans to.
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Post by Skilly on Jun 26, 2020 10:04:44 GMT -5
The whole NHL Draft is rife with possible corruption and back room shenanigans ... Instead of this foolish 14 ball -4 team combination foolishness that no one can understand, just put 1000 balls in a machine, and televise the actual spinning and ball popping out. It would be way more televisable and transparent than listening to BIll Daly boringly monotone his way through placards
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Post by seventeen on Jun 26, 2020 10:51:34 GMT -5
Exactly. I can only think of one reason for keeping the lottery ball selection 'secret'.
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Post by UberCranky on Jun 26, 2020 11:59:59 GMT -5
If TO or Pens gets Laffy, there will be epic uprising around every other nhl fan base.
So Butty would have to way any gain for a large market against the serious anger from the fans from the other 30 teams. Even he's not THAT stupid. Ifanything, laffy getting "drafted" by the habs would be heaven sent because habs have the largest fan base around the world.
Did i mention that Butty is not that stupid? But i could be wrong.....
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Post by UberCranky on Jun 26, 2020 12:04:11 GMT -5
They should put x amoumt of balls in a huge clear drum and spin it with those concentric red circles.....
"You are sleepy....very sleepy...sign the no refund season ticket contract now...you are sleepy."
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Post by Habs_fan_in_LA on Jun 26, 2020 12:09:36 GMT -5
If TO or Pens gets Laffy, there will be epic uprising around every other nhl fan base. So Butty would have to way any gain for a large market against the serious anger from the fans from the other 30 teams. Even he's not THAT stupid. Ifanything, laffy getting "drafted" by the habs would be heaven sent because habs have the largest fan base around the world. Did i mention that Butty is not that stupid? But i could be wrong..... If the games cannot be played in front of fans, and then Covid phase two causes the playoffs to be cancelled, imagine how big the tv audience will be to watch the phase three lottery where Bettman awards the Stanley Cup to the lottery winner. The NHL has a lot of balls!
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:13:21 GMT -5
Don't know if anyone is watching the draft but man Bettman is looking kind of frail.
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Post by folatre on Jun 26, 2020 19:15:31 GMT -5
I have no idea how old he is but it sure feels like he has been commissioner forever.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:18:13 GMT -5
Someone moved up.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:20:01 GMT -5
Ouch wings.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:20:25 GMT -5
Watch L.A get it.
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Post by folatre on Jun 26, 2020 19:21:40 GMT -5
Poor Detroit. The historically shambolic season they had did not even get them a top three pick.
I suddenly have a bad feeling that the Sens are getting Lafreniere.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:22:57 GMT -5
But placeholder will get the most intrigue if it is #1. People will watch the playoffs to see who loses.
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Post by folatre on Jun 26, 2020 19:23:57 GMT -5
Thanks God.
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Post by folatre on Jun 26, 2020 19:24:28 GMT -5
Wow, that's crazy.
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:24:34 GMT -5
Holy Saperlipopette....12.5%
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Post by Tankdriver on Jun 26, 2020 19:25:46 GMT -5
Ok. Carey Price stay home. Kinkaid...suit up.
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