Dispersal Draft Game: Playoff Simulation Thread

[MRandall25]

St. Louis and LA advance, with LA winning in Overtime.

Here are the conference final matchups:

1 St. Louis v 3 LA

1 California v 2 Montreal

Scoring Leaders through 2 rounds:

1. Datsyuk (CAL) - 7-12-19
2. Kovalchuk (CAL) - 7-10-17
3. Hossa (CAL) - 7-8-15
4. Turris (MTL) - 8-6-14
5. Ovechkin (SEA) - 5-8-13
6. Stamkos (CBJ) - 6-7-13
7. H. Sedin (SEA) - 4-9-13
8. Kesler (LA) - 4-8-12
9. Stepan (LA) - 4-8-12
10. Crosby (STL) - 2-9-11

Top 5 goaltenders
1. Bobrovsky (MTL) - 0.94 94.64%
2. Quick (STL) - 1.26 94.55
3. Bishop (CAL) - 1.45 92.17%
4. Fleury (ICE) - 1.50 95.31%
5. Miller (SEA) - 1.66 92.88%

Will simulate the conference finals tomorrow or Friday, depending on workload.

[count2infinity]

OFFENSIVE JUGGERNAUT!

[MRandall25]

Dat 1st line.

[MalkinIsMyHomeboy]

Bobrovsky giving up less than a goal per game...yipes

[mikey287]

Bobrovsky and Turris...quite frankly, that's all you need.

[MRandall25]

Partially due to the series against St. John's.

But he did only give up 1, 0, 3, 2, 0, 1 in the Magnitogorsk series. 1.166666 GAA there. Would still put him 1st in GAA.

[meow]

Jesus. Use the sliders to turn down the brick walls in net. These games should 12-9

[MRandall25]

I have the lastest game sliders on. All-Star Difficulty.

[mikey287]

All-Star Difficulty.

Not difficult enough for the tournament leader in goals, Kyle Turris apparently.

/insta-jinx

[meow]

All-Star Difficulty.

Not difficult enough for the tournament leader in goals, Kyle Turris apparently.

/insta-jinx

8 empty-netters, I assume.

[mikey287]

All-Star Difficulty.

Not difficult enough for the tournament leader in goals, Kyle Turris apparently.

/insta-jinx

8 empty-netters, I assume.

All nets look empty to him.

[Beveridge]

Tyler Kennedy has that problem too so he shoots right in the middle.

[mikey287]

Tyler Kennedy has that problem too so he shoots right in the middle.

Well played.

[MalkinIsMyHomeboy]

somehow our regular season seeding has stayed true so far for the most part.

[count2infinity]

somehow our regular season seeding has stayed true so far for the most part.

One of the reasons I didn't understand the playoff voting. I understand that some teams may have other team's number, but if a team is voted to be the best team in their conference, how would they be voted to not win their conference.

[Staggy]

somehow our regular season seeding has stayed true so far for the most part.

One of the reasons I didn't understand the playoff voting. I understand that some teams may have other team's number, but if a team is voted to be the best team in their conference, how would they be voted to not win their conference.

Don't worry, I'll let you borrow the Danny Gallivan Trophy for a little if you want.

[Beveridge]

somehow our regular season seeding has stayed true so far for the most part.

One of the reasons I didn't understand the playoff voting. I understand that some teams may have other team's number, but if a team is voted to be the best team in their conference, how would they be voted to not win their conference.

If I understand your questioning, isn't this like saying why didn't Boston win the eastern conference when they were the best team in the conference?

[MRandall25]

There's a fairly large difference between the actual game and voting on hypothetical teams.

[count2infinity]

somehow our regular season seeding has stayed true so far for the most part.

One of the reasons I didn't understand the playoff voting. I understand that some teams may have other team's number, but if a team is voted to be the best team in their conference, how would they be voted to not win their conference.

If I understand your questioning, isn't this like saying why didn't Boston win the eastern conference when they were the best team in the conference?

No, I understand that. It's an actual competition and there are tons of variables in play. What I don't understand is how do you rank teams 1-8 as best to worst, and then turn around and say, oh, but #5 is going to win it all.

[Avyran]

I voted on two different.. criteria, I guess. I voted for regular season champs, and then I voted for who I thought would win in the playoffs.

Basically, I voted for the Pens/Caps/Hawks-esque during the regular season, & then the Bruins/Kings-esque during the postseason.

[Beveridge]

I looked at it regular season vs playoffs.

When I voted on which team would win the conference, I looked at it as an 82 game schedule or whatever and then the matchups, I treated like playoffs. Unless I was missing something.

For example: I thought for a regular season, LA was the 3rd best team in their conference but come playoffs were the favorites and my votes went as such.

[MRandall25]

I don't know how Toronto made it as far as they did with Rick Nash on their roster

[count2infinity]

I suppose my question is more, what makes a team an okay regular season team and a great playoff team and what makes a team a great regular season team and a bad playoff team? Is it all about offense and defense? Is it about the players? Is it intangibles that can't be fully quantified?

[Avyran]

Well, let's look at the Caps from before. They crushed the regular season with their offense. Backstrom/Ovechkin was impossible to stop for most teams, and therefore they would rack up wins & points. But come playoffs, suddenly teams could change their style to fit one team for a prolonged period of time. Suddenly, Orpik & Martin, Staal/Kennedy/Cooke could be consistently matched up against Ovechkin, stymying their main source of offense. The team just did not have the depth to overcome their only source of attack.

Or the Sharks. Thornton, Marleau, Pavelski, Couture... very good offense. But their defense was pretty lacking. Outside of Vlasic, do they have any quality defenders? Braun is getting there, and Demers may turn into one, but they don't have much elsewhere. All of their eggs are in the offensive basket. Come playoffs, and a sound team defense can shut them down. The Kings, Blues, Ducks... all of them could shut down the Sharks. (This is not always the case... after all, the Sharks were up 3-0 on the Kings before the Kings decided to play.)

Even Tampa could be considered the same. An electric offense, and a defense still trying to come into their own. This'll be different this year (most likely), when the Lightning add Drouin, Hedman becomes Norris-worthy, etc.

Now look at a great playoff team, versus a decent regular season team. The Kings and the Rangers. The Kings had depth in every level - Kopitar, Gaborik, Carter, Richards, Brown; Doughty, Mitchell, Muzzin, etc. However, that team relies heavily on energy and grinding. Over 82 games, people get injured and players don't give 110%. They have quality on every level, but don't have that line that wins on skill alone (though you'd imagine Kopitar/Gaborik/etc could...). Facing a different team every few nights, and playing games that aren't big in the overall scheme, their system kinda gets weaker. But come playoffs, when they have a specific strategy and every game counts, the energy is there and the system follows. The Rangers are similar, though they were the product of luck this year (a Pens team that sucked, a Canadians team without their centerpiece in Price).

That's the way I looked at it, anyway. The intangibles are kinda there too: Toews is a great playoff player, but just a good regular season guy. The Sharks players rack up points in the regular season, but kinda collapse in the playoffs. Ben Bishop is good enough in the regular season for the Lightning, but was exposed in the playoffs (and he's young, too); same with Bernier atm.

I mean, a team needs to have enough offense as well. The Bruins and the Kings are steps ahead of, say... the Predators, who had great defense but meh offense.

Thus, for this thing, I voted for the team that could overwhelm offensively for the regular season. However, I voted for the teams that could play legitimate defense (being able to shut down that offense) and play the playoff style.

[MRandall25]

Simulation will happen after I finish this paper. Could be in an hour, could be in 2.

Do you guys want me to simulate all the way through at this point (meaning all the way to the end of the finals), or save the finals for another day?