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Laraque is an embarrassment


les_glorieux

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Hey Marky and Komi, i don't like it when someone gets 20 minutes of ice time and doesn't do anything. You can put numerous players in that category.

Laraque will be fine. he has played much better in the last 3 games he played in. If people think he will be the reason the habs win or lose this team is in even worse shape then i think they are in.

He'll do his job, i am looking for the "high skilled" and D men to step up. Without a much better effort in their own end this series will be over in 4.

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He needs to stop believeing his friends that he is a heavey weight and that everyone is affaird of him etc ..

He needs to cause a little shit.

Get under the other teams skin he says I cant just smack someone or I will get kicked form the game.

He doesn't need to drop the gloves go in there and grab the guy by the sweater and twist it or glove a guy in the face make him want to fight.

Ridicule them etc.. intimidate them.

If I am small and you think your to big to fight me and I know that you will not fight me as you think your to big I will be causing all kinds of shit around you.

George they dont fear you mate.

make them know that they should fear you fighting and no fighting ....

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Laraque played terrific tonight. If only the same could be said for Plekanec and, to a lesser degree, Kostitsyn.

Time to get off BGL`s back and acknowledge what he adds to our lineup.

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I liked watching him make Chara nervous heading into the corner to retrieve the puck. If only he could have drawn a penalty or two while parked in front of the Bruins' net.

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Laraque played terrific tonight. If only the same could be said for Plekanec and, to a lesser degree, Kostitsyn.

Time to get off BGL`s back and acknowledge what he adds to our lineup.

Laraque was terrific tonight, no question about it.

But the Koivu-Tang-Kovalev had been fantastic in the last weeks of the reg. season; we could have used it more tonight

I don't want to see BGL on the 1st line anymore

Edited by rafikz
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Laraque was terrific tonight, no question about it.

But the Koivu-Tang-Kovalev had been fantastic in the last weeks of the reg. season; we could have used it more tonight

I don't want to see BGL on the 1st line anymore

It would be very interesting to see Laraque with Plekanec and Kostitsyn.

If those two keep playing like the have, what the hell, he can always turn around and whup THEIR asses.

But seriously, in hockey terms, that freak show combo might actually work. Maybe his presence would give those pansies some balls.

Couldn't hurt.

Edited by The Chicoutimi Cucumber
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It would be very interesting to see Laraque with Plekanec and Kostitsyn.

If those two keep playing like the have, what the hell, he can always turn around and whup THEIR asses.

But seriously, in hockey terms, that freak show combo might actually work. Maybe his presence would give those pansies some balls.

Couldn't hurt.

Very interesting idea.

And since Diago has been better than AK46 and Pleks, might as well put him with Higgins and Metro.

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I don't want to see BGL on the 1st line anymore

You don't seem to get it. Laraque was with Koivu and Kovalev to give Kovalev some breathing room. To allow them to get away from the constant presence of Chara(you do know that Julien has Chara on the ice everytime Kovalev is out there!?)

I agree that Laraque shouldn't be playing 15 minutes per game, but he was very useful yesterday!!

Ideally you have BGL play with Koivu and Kovalev on 2, maybe 3 shifts per period...the rest of the time, you put in Tanguay!

It would be very interesting to see Laraque with Plekanec and Kostitsyn.

Good idea....maybe it'll wake those two bums up a little!! We can't win this series without our second line!

Edited by Habsfan
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I like the idea of having Laraque with Plekanec and Kostitsyn. Those two badly need someone with presence on their line. They're trying hard but they're getting dominated by the Bruins, especially when they're in the offensive zone.

I'd also like how that would make a fourth line of Higgins-Metropolit-D'Agostini. The second line (and even the first line!) need to step up in this series. Metropolit can't be our best centre all series. Nor can Higgins be our best winger.

Game 2 is a game we must win. Splitting the first two games without Markov will be HUGE. When he returns, momentum would swing in our favour.

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He played the way he should have been playing all year weather you fight or not get into the other teams head.

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Laraque should continue to get shifts with the big line. Read that correctly. Get some shifts. Not all. Then he should get shifts with the second line to beef them up occasionally. Using him like that gives the opposition fits because they don't know when he'll be out there.

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In the bigger picture, though, the use of Laraque is almost an explicit admission from Gainey that this team is structurally defective. We have NO forward who can even hope to compete with Chara, except the big guy, and he simply is not talented enough in other facets of the game to warrant 15 minutes of ice-time per night. A fundamentally strong team would have the equivalent of a Lucic - a big, power forward who can justifiably eat up big minutes - to throw out in that situation. Unfortunately Latendresse is not there yet. (He will be eventually).

But ya play the hand yer dealt (or in this case, the hand Gainey dealt himself as GM). Personally, I think the Larqaue experiment was a clever bit of coaching but that the formula should not be overused. The more I think about it, the more I think BGL with Pleks and Kosty is the way to go next game, Chara or no Chara; we HAVE to get that line working, and, to use another cliche, desperate times call for desperate measures.

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In the bigger picture, though, the use of Laraque is almost an explicit admission from Gainey that this team is structurally defective. We have NO forward who can even hope to compete with Chara, except the big guy, and he simply is not talented enough in other facets of the game to warrant 15 minutes of ice-time per night. A fundamentally strong team would have the equivalent of a Lucic - a big, power forward who can justifiably eat up big minutes - to throw out in that situation. Unfortunately Latendresse is not there yet. (He will be eventually).

But ya play the hand yer dealt (or in this case, the hand Gainey dealt himself as GM). Personally, I think the Larqaue experiment was a clever bit of coaching but that the formula should not be overused. The more I think about it, the more I think BGL with Pleks and Kosty is the way to go next game, Chara or no Chara; we HAVE to get that line working, and, to use another cliche, desperate times call for desperate measures.

How many teams have a forward who can hope to compete with Chara? Bob made the big guy nervous - Chara may have scored the winner, but it was on the PP, and after the mid-2nd, Chara at even strength was far less a factor. He was average, IMO.

This is how you win the Cup. Identifying strengths and weaknesses on your opponent and learning to use and counter them. Gainey identified Chara, Laraque made him think. We may have lost the game, but a series is a chess match. Sacrifice the pawn to win the series? Let's see how Gainey works the Plex line against Lucic next. Kosty promoted to continually run Lucic? Lapierre promoted to get under his skin?

Series may be 0-1, but the games within the games may actually favour the Habs. We lost, but when Boston was expected to blow us out of the park... Did you see how they celebrated the winning goal? Looked like a Cup celebration to me. That tells me we have them worried. Julien did nothing in particular out of the ordinary.

For an 8 seed against a 1 seed? Mind games are 1-0 Bob. He has to turn that into wins now.

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I'd just like to point out that while Boston did not play their best hockey last night, they did make it an utmost priority to stay out of the box, which unfortunately is the formula to beat the Habs consistently. The entire 3rd they stayed disciplined and took no penalties in the last 10min of the game, which = success against a team so reliant on the PP to stay in / win hockey games. If that trend continues in this series it won't matter who BGL plays with, 5v5 Boston will beat the Habs over a 6 or 7 game series, even with Carey playing as well as he did last night.

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I'd just like to point out that while Boston did not play their best hockey last night,

Says who?

And even if it is true, is that a function of Boston *not* playing well, or Montreal neutralizing things Boston normally does well.

Why is everything so black and white? Can we not give credit where credit is due? From where I was sitting, Boston played as Boston has played all year. They just came up against opposition that was strong.

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I think Laraque was very very effective playing on the first line ... did anyone not notice that Chara never went after Koivu or Kovalev ? how many times did Koivu nail Chara and he didn't really go back after Koivu ... how many times did Chara have to deal with Laraque in front of the net when Thomas made a save. Boston at home has the match up ability so Chara will always be out there against Kovy and Koivu ... if Laraque is there at least they'll have some room to work with even with Chara out there ... now when the series shifts back to the Bell centre I highly doubt you'll see Laraque as much and we'll see Tanguay out there more.

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Says who?

And even if it is true, is that a function of Boston *not* playing well, or Montreal neutralizing things Boston normally does well.

Why is everything so black and white? Can we not give credit where credit is due? From where I was sitting, Boston played as Boston has played all year. They just came up against opposition that was strong.

...Boston didn't play up to their potential last night. Nor did we, really. It's not like we came in to the game and owned them or threw them off their game; we played a pretty good game and Boston played a pretty good game (weak by their standards). The Bruins came in overconfident, that's it.

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...Boston didn't play up to their potential last night. Nor did we, really. It's not like we came in to the game and owned them or threw them off their game; we played a pretty good game and Boston played a pretty good game (weak by their standards). The Bruins came in overconfident, that's it.

Why do people keep saying this? Irritating. How do YOU know they didn't play up to potential? Did you watch them play all season? Do you know what Montreal did to counter them and how it affected their game? Is it at all possible that Boston played well, but Montreal stopped them from looking like the 100+ point Bruins? Is that at all possible?

I don't get how watching that game could possibly lead everyone to such negativity. It's like so many fans watch the games from a fishbowl. We don't win and therefore we suck. Boston doesn't blow us out, so they must have sucked. Come on! Is it not possible that Boston played well and we matched them?

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Why do people keep saying this? Irritating. How do YOU know they didn't play up to potential? Did you watch them play all season? Do you know what Montreal did to counter them and how it affected their game? Is it at all possible that Boston played well, but Montreal stopped them from looking like the 100+ point Bruins? Is that at all possible?

I don't get how watching that game could possibly lead everyone to such negativity. It's like so many fans watch the games from a fishbowl. We don't win and therefore we suck. Boston doesn't blow us out, so they must have sucked. Come on! Is it not possible that Boston played well and we matched them?

Because there were large stretches of the game where each team just turned the puck over, unforced, time and again with little to no pressure by the opponent. That is not good hockey, I remember watching the latter half of the 1st thinking it was pretty damn close to playoff shinny!

Boston recorded 116 goddam points this season for a reason, they were consistently, and against the very same opponents over the course of the year, BETTER than Montreal.

Now that we have point that cleared up very succinctly Colin it helps to understand why the noticeably lower quality hockey played by both teams last night looked worse on the Bs than it did the Habs. Hence people saying it was the Habs' game to steal in beantown.

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Why do people keep saying this? Irritating. How do YOU know they didn't play up to potential? Did you watch them play all season? Do you know what Montreal did to counter them and how it affected their game? Is it at all possible that Boston played well, but Montreal stopped them from looking like the 100+ point Bruins? Is that at all possible?

I don't get how watching that game could possibly lead everyone to such negativity. It's like so many fans watch the games from a fishbowl. We don't win and therefore we suck. Boston doesn't blow us out, so they must have sucked. Come on! Is it not possible that Boston played well and we matched them?

But we watched the game! That's how we know. It's far easier to tell who played well by watching the game than by using double-edged psychology. We played well, especially to start off the game, but there were long stretches where we trapped in our zone... and in those stretches, plenty of shoddy passing by the Bruins. Our PK did very well but Boston's PP was doing poorly, messing up plays, having pucks bounce over sticks...

We have watched Montreal play all season and I'm sure most people here have seen Boston play a few times this year. Enough to recognize a top-seeded team playing mediocre hockey.

Besides, your argument is "You don't know if Boston played their best, therefore they did." I can easily say "You don't know, therefore they didn't" except it would be an equally weak argument.

The last three lines is grasping at straws. Firstly, where is all this negativity? Second, don't generalize people. Can you find one person that's said that we suck because we didn't win, or that Boston sucked because they didn't blow us out? I think that's called a Straw Man; setting up a new argument and shooting it down. The irony: by saying fans watch hockey through fish bowls based on a single comment, you're looking at people through a fish bowl ("they don't give a gold star to everybody on the Habs roster, therefore they hate the Habs!").

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