TheBigKahuna
Well-known member
I want Darling to succeed. I hope he does. We need him to. But there are a lot of people out there who seem to want him to fail.
GDT: Canes @ Bruins 1/6 7PM
- Thread starter HeyKurtz
- Start date
They were so bad in that game I don't know how you begin to assign blame. Cam was terrible, the D was terrible, the forwards were terrible on offense and weak defensively, they looked slow, Darling wasn't the answer, and the coach was unable to get anything turned around. Every time this team seems like it has something going, they throw one of these into the mix, and the fear around here is that it turns into a 7 or 8 game slide out of contention. I guess let's see what happens in the next games.
This loss was not on Darling seeing that Ward was awful, and the team played awful giving up "grade A" chances, while looking inept and silly defensively.
The next few games may go into the loss column, but the schedule in February with all the home games, will be the deciding factor in my opinion. Keep your chin up through this period. You never know, we may be pleasantly surprised. At least that is the hope.
The next few games may go into the loss column, but the schedule in February with all the home games, will be the deciding factor in my opinion. Keep your chin up through this period. You never know, we may be pleasantly surprised. At least that is the hope.
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Who are these people and where are you encountering them ... other than Twitter, which frankly doesn't count since it's a septic tank for trolls and haters. And worse ... politicians.
cmaleski2
Well-known member
We all should be hoping Darling succeeds. We know Cam will eventually play like 'Bad Cam' (aka exactly what happened @Boston), Cam is up there in age and has had injury issues. Your other goalie better be capable of carrying the load.
We are in trouble if Darling cannot get himself straightened out. He better figure it out quickly because the Caps are coming up again and he is going to be starting a game against them. We will look pretty foolish if we have to buyout Darling or eat half his salary in a trade. He also has one of those contracts we have generally avoided where his salary goes down over the life of the deal, meaning we would take a bigger cap hit during some buyout years to make up for that.
Darling is making $4.75 million this season and next...then $4.1 million and $3 million. The signing worried me at the time, but I never expected he would end up looking like the worst goalie in the league (which statistically is exactly what he is for any goalie who has played more than half of his team's games). Its been a train wreck for Darling. We need him to be better very quickly here or Ronnie is going to need to do something and get Darling the heck out of here.
This all might be salvageable by burying Darling in the minors for a while to try to get his head on straight, but we have NO ONE who looks capable of even being Cam's backup:
Alex Nedeljkovic 14-5-0 2.85 GAA .891 Sv%
Jeremy Smith 7-9-1 2.87 GAA .902 Sv%
Callum Booth has only played 16games as a pro (11-3-1 2.48 GAA .907 Sv%)
Neds I guess would be the guy if we try to allow Darling to play his way out of things in the AHL. But I can't see the Canes going that route. Unfortunately it seems every time they put Darling in there everything comes apart. Sometimes its because Darling just allows way too many soft goals, other times our entire team just hangs him completely out to dry. Darling was brought in to stabilize our crappy goaltending...he has actually done the exact opposite, he's made it even worse and forced us to rely on Cam Ward again. I'm not sure how this ends up, but I'm not quite sure how much longer we can put Darling out there at the NHL level and hope that he figures it out.
I'm really pushing for Darling to show us SOMETHING either Thursday or Friday night because the alternatives (losing every time he starts, trading for another goalie, sending Darling to the minors, playing Cam much more) all really really suck.
We are in trouble if Darling cannot get himself straightened out. He better figure it out quickly because the Caps are coming up again and he is going to be starting a game against them. We will look pretty foolish if we have to buyout Darling or eat half his salary in a trade. He also has one of those contracts we have generally avoided where his salary goes down over the life of the deal, meaning we would take a bigger cap hit during some buyout years to make up for that.
Darling is making $4.75 million this season and next...then $4.1 million and $3 million. The signing worried me at the time, but I never expected he would end up looking like the worst goalie in the league (which statistically is exactly what he is for any goalie who has played more than half of his team's games). Its been a train wreck for Darling. We need him to be better very quickly here or Ronnie is going to need to do something and get Darling the heck out of here.
This all might be salvageable by burying Darling in the minors for a while to try to get his head on straight, but we have NO ONE who looks capable of even being Cam's backup:
Alex Nedeljkovic 14-5-0 2.85 GAA .891 Sv%
Jeremy Smith 7-9-1 2.87 GAA .902 Sv%
Callum Booth has only played 16games as a pro (11-3-1 2.48 GAA .907 Sv%)
Neds I guess would be the guy if we try to allow Darling to play his way out of things in the AHL. But I can't see the Canes going that route. Unfortunately it seems every time they put Darling in there everything comes apart. Sometimes its because Darling just allows way too many soft goals, other times our entire team just hangs him completely out to dry. Darling was brought in to stabilize our crappy goaltending...he has actually done the exact opposite, he's made it even worse and forced us to rely on Cam Ward again. I'm not sure how this ends up, but I'm not quite sure how much longer we can put Darling out there at the NHL level and hope that he figures it out.
I'm really pushing for Darling to show us SOMETHING either Thursday or Friday night because the alternatives (losing every time he starts, trading for another goalie, sending Darling to the minors, playing Cam much more) all really really suck.
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All of which is why I suspect that if Darling continues to stink and the Canes continue to hang onto anything like a shot at the playoffs, we might see a move for a third goalie. Nobody's claiming Darling on waivers so you can bury him in Charlotte ... where he hopefully would get his mess together ... and Ward obviously can't carry the load by himself. With no clear options amongst the kids ... you really don't have a lot of options.
Either Darling wakes up or Carolina pretty much has to go out and find another option.
Either Darling wakes up or Carolina pretty much has to go out and find another option.
CanadaCanes
Well-known member
Which is not really that bad of an idea if the new owner does not mind spending a little extra cash down the stretch for a third goaltender! I can think of a handful of veteran guys that could likely be had in a minor trade. I'm thinking along the lines of Michael Hutchinson in Winnipeg who has put up good numbers in the AHL, Calvin Pickard in Toronto currently playing well with the Marlies or even a guy like Jaro Halak who is apparently on the block with the Islanders.