Which of these eight NHL fan bases should be most insulted by the offseason so far?

The NHL offseason has been in full swing for a few weeks now. Have you been mortally insulted yet?

Not necessarily. For plenty of teams and their fan bases, a modern NHL offseason is just a steady stream of being told how wonderful they are. Both Florida teams know the drill. So does Vegas. This summer, Minnesota is playing the role of the lifelong loner who finally gets invited to sit at the cool kids’ table. How long will that last? We’ll find out, but for now they’re living large.

And then there are those other teams. You know the ones. They’re the markets nobody seems to want to play for, which means they’re at a disadvantage from day one. While other teams seem to have the wind behind the backs at all times, these teams are constantly pushing a boulder up a mountain, wondering when it will veer off course and they’ll have to start all over again.

And yes, it’s all a little bit insulting. If you’re a fan of one of these teams, the act gets old. You can be all for player empowerment (and you should), but at a certain point a fan is going to look around and wonder: What’s wrong with us? What’s wrong with my team, or my city? And maybe worst of all: Is there hope?

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

Weekend wrap: Cursing a Blues streak

We knew this was going to be a weird year for the St. Louis Blues. Their coach quit, but still stuck around for one more year. Next year’s coach has already been hired. They traded their best goaltender to a conference rival, but didn’t move the defenceman we all assumed would be moved.

So sure, nobody went into this season thinking it was business as usual in St. Louis. But we all thought they’d be good, right? Maybe not win-the-division good, or another-conference-final-appearance good. But they’d be in the mix, at least. At a bare minimum, they’d definitely be in the playoffs.

And early on, it looked like we'd all be right. Over the season's first half, the Blues were just fine, even if they looked like they weren't quite hitting on all cylinders. That may even have been a positive; after years of following up solid regular seasons with disappointing playoffs, maybe the Blues had learned to pace themselves, the way the Blackhawks and Kings always seem to.

Or maybe not. Maybe the Blues aren't a good team after all. They sure haven't looked like one recently.

After dropping a 5–3 decision to the Jets on Saturday, the Blues have now lost three straight. They've won just five of 12 since the Christmas break. And since a three-game win streak that had them at 14-7-3 on Dec. 1, they've only managed to string together back-to-back wins once.

So what's the problem? These days, the big issue is goaltending, as Jake Allen seems to be imploding in his first year as undisputed starter. The Blues have lost his last four starts and 10 of his last 14, and he's given up three goals or more in six of seven. He hasn't made it through a full game since Jan. 5, and things got so bad on Thursday that he was pulled twice in the same game.

That was the last we've seen of Allen; the Blues took the highly unusual step of leaving him behind when they headed to Winnipeg, citing a need to "get him unlocked." The team insists that Allen is still their guy, but it's clear that his current struggles aren't just a typical cold streak.

It all adds up to a Blues team that's just barely clinging to a Western wild-card spot, just one point up on the ninth-place Canucks. Even the Predators, all but written off after an awful first half, passed them over the weekend, bumping them out of the Central's top three.

The Blues' struggles may be shifting the league's trading landscape heading into the final weeks before the deadline. It had long been assumed that they'd hold onto Kevin Shattenkirk for a deep playoff run, but with that run now looking unlikely, he's back in play. It had also seemed like the market for goaltending was thin, with only the Stars and maybe the Flames or Islanders really in the hunt, but that changes if the Blues decide that Allen can't cut it. (Remember, this is a franchise with a history of making mid-season goaltending moves that are aggressive or even downright strange.)

Of course, that's led to speculation that the team might try to kill two birds with one stone by moving Shattenkirk for a goalie; more than a few observers have wondered if a Ben Bishop deal could be a fit. But there are other options, including shaking up the lineup or even pulling the trigger on Ken Hitchcock a few months early.

Or maybe they stand pat, turn things around and get back into the race. That's certainly a possibility. But the schedule won't do them any favors heading into the all-star break; they'll visit two of the best teams in the league this week, with stops in Pittsburgh tomorrow and Minnesota on Thursday.

Road to the Cup

The five teams that look like they're headed towards Stanley Cup favorite status.

5. San Jose Sharks (29-16-2, +16 true goals differential*): They make their first appearance in the top five since early December thanks to four straight wins.

4. Columbus Blue Jackets (32-10-4, +48): Yesterday's 7–6 win over the Senators was all sorts of fun. But more importantly, they may have dodged a bullet when Zach Werenski left the game after being hit with a shot. It looked bad, but he returned later in the period.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

This Blue Jackets thing can't last... or can it?

Without question, the Columbus Blue Jackets have been one of the season’s best stories. Coming off of a disastrous year and with virtually nobody picking them to even make the playoffs, the Blue Jackets have exceeded all expectations while contending for first place in the Metro Division.

The power play is smoking, the goaltending is excellent, John Tortorella looks like the Jack Adams favorite, and the Blue Jackets are the hottest team in the league today, winning nine straight and counting. After years of misery, fans in Columbus finally have something to cheer about.

It’s too bad it can’t last.

I mean, it can’t… right? These are still the Blue Jackets. Seeing them beat up the Canadiens and run right alongside the Penguins and Rangers has been fun, but eventually things will go back to normal and they’ll fall out of contention.

Of course, plenty of us have been saying that for most of the season, and it hasn't happened yet. If anything, the Blue Jackets are getting better as the year wears on.

So today, let's try to get this settled once and for all. Let's lay out the case against the Blue Jackets—all the reasons why this can't be the real thing and their crash back to mediocrity is inevitable. And then let's pick that case apart and see if it actually holds up.

Let's start with an area where the Blue Jackets aren't just good, but historically good.

They're not for real because: Their power play is too good to be true. Literally.

Plenty of things have been going right for the Blue Jackets. But with apologies to Sergei Bobrovsky and Zach Werenski, the biggest story in Columbus has been the power play. And it's a virtual certainty that that unit will be coming back to Earth soon.

Right now, the Blue Jackets' power play is clocking in at a 27.7-percent success rate. Only one team in NHL history has finished with a higher rate over a full season, and that was back in the high-flying ’80s when everyone was filling the net against tiny goalies who hadn't figured out the butterfly yet.

Wayne Gretzky's Oilers never had a 27-percent power play. Neither did Mario Lemieux's Penguins or Mike Bossy's Islanders. But we're supposed to think that Nick Foligno's Blue Jackets have figured it out? Not a chance. This is a classic case of a decent unit hitting a hot streak for a few weeks, and once it regresses back to where it deserves to be, this team will look very different.

Yeah, but: Plenty of smart people have been studying the Blue Jackets' power play to try to figure out what makes it tick. And they've been finding some interesting things, including a five-man first unit that's doing an excellent job at consistently generating high-percentage shots from dangerous areas.

Sure, there's clearly a degree of good luck happening here; nobody thinks that the Blue Jackets have suddenly cracked the code on 100 years of power play strategy. But the top unit isn't simply succeeding based on a fluke; they've been earning it.

And even if you don't buy any of that, let's not overestimate the impact that the Columbus special teams could be having. If they were hitting at a league-average rate of 18 percent or so, their 23 power play goals would drop to 15 or so. That's eight goals, which conventional wisdom says translated to one or two wins.

That's nothing to sneeze at, and it's possible that Blue Jackets' power-play prowess is even more important because it's forcing teams to play them differently at even strength. But it's not enough to make the difference between them being an elite team and an also-ran. Even if the power play settles down, this still looks like a strong team.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet