UPDATE – we have been banned from the Rangers Board on SBnation. We must have said something that one of the big bad blue section adolescents didn’t like (original comments posted below). What’s the matter, couldn’t take a dissenting opinion? Did I offend you because I don’t like Josh Jooris as a hockey player? Get.a.life!! And whatever you do, stay away from Ranger games in Philadelphia or Brooklyn. You might get your feelings hurt. What’s the matter, did we trigger you in your safe space?
Oh, and a not-so-kind word for the Hitlerian moderator of Blue Shirt Banter, “NYRWolfer.” You should be grateful that in the middle of the summer we could spark some controversy on your message board. We posted a comment, and one reply (both posted below). The other members of your community did the rest. We didn’t “troll” your site, however we did graciously receive a wide spewing of vitriolic comments aimed at our outsider presence. As a result, you kicked us off.(?) – how very tribal of you.
So this rant is decidedly “Sorry, not sorry.” We neither violated your terms of service, nor tried to play nice the mutants that have infested your board. Personally, as a Ranger fan since the early 70’s your actions nauseate me. You see, back in the good old days (when we hung out before Ranger games at the Good Old Days, you probably don’t remember that, youngster), it was my prerogative to say whatever the heck I wanted within the scope of the law, or in your case, terms of service.
Back then, people with dissenting viewpoints, like Islander fans for instance, entered the Garden “watching their six.” They might have run the risk of getting a misplaced (much cheaper) beer dumped on them, or a less-than-occasional insult hurled their way. Sometimes they suffered a far worse fate from the types of neanderthals that must have complained about our innocuous comment posted below……but at least these people were free to do so and assumed the risks of having someone say they didn’t like them. Adults can normally handle criticism.
Since Blue Shirt Banter apparently no way represents free and open expression, we actually thank you for banning us. As an added bonus you evoked this diatribe where once there was none. You’re welcome.
You see, your actions bespeak the bygone relics of the “Good Old Days” as they represent the descent of society as a whole into one part mealy-mouthed, touchy-feely, kumbaya-singing, hippee-hand holding and one part intolerant castraters of people that rub some the wrong way. I want no part of that….however, I am not surprised there are many on your board that find their over-socialization very comfy and warm……as long as the paper tiger moderator has their back, they can be as ludicrous and banal as they choose. That is what you promote NYRWolfer. Happy?
Oh and BTW, the only reason we discovered the banning was that we were actually going to applaud the Rangers for picking up Mika Zibanejad. The Z man scores very highly on our scale; something the Rangers could sorely use this offseason given several moves that we think could put them in a relatively weaker position than they were last year. Good job.
See, we really do call it the way we see it. And, as such, we not-so-respectfully suggest you rename your site “Brown Shirt Banter” – possibly a more apropos representation of your actions speaking louder than words.
ORIGINAL COMMENTS THAT GOT US BANNED
We just posted this on a message board
“Depending on one’s perspective, the Josh Jooris signing is curious to say the least. As some here point out, he might not even make the team next year. According to our work, this would be a big positive for the Rangers. On our metric, Jooris cost the Flames almost 8 goals by virtue of his presence. A large part of this was his propensity to take penalties……yowsah. It is one thing to say he is good at killing them off; except that in a game where there are, say,four Ranger penalties, he will only get the chance to kill off three…..because he will have committed the other one.
As for McIlrath, OMG, we better hope he starts the year in the minors as well……and stays there. According to our stat, McIlrath was one of the worst players in the NHL at costing goals adjusted for games played and time on ice, in the NHL. It would have been a great addition by subtraction to get rid of him, IMO.
It is moves like these two whereby, as much as I want to find the positive, it is difficult. The Rangers do not appear to be improved at the margin despite all the comings and goings we have seen so far. The additions, and failures to subtract, will likely cause them to drop a few (or more) spots going into next season.”
To which “BigB22,” obviously a Rhodes Scholar replied “your metric is garbage.”
To which we replied…..(and, note to self, we really must remember to NOT engage idiots like this in the future).
The Rangers top brass would agree with you (unfortunately)
Lets see who is right.
BTW, some facts for you, not like you care but here goes………
1) I don’t post like this on EVERY teams’ blog. This is one of the busiest times of the year and I haven’t posted anything for around two weeks. Anywhere.
2) I haven’t mentioned my website or the name of the metric in a post.
3) Sure, I could tell you my methods. Instead I post the research to the website and anyone reading it can archive it in real time to verify the results. For example, if I post predicted rankings in October, you can check them by April.
4) I think I am on to something with my work. In fact, teams with the higher scores in the playoffs this year won 12/15 series (roughly the same percentage for three years running)…….you could have checked that prospectively anytime……..so there must be some veracity to the analysis, or I would be as mediocre on this score as pretty much every other prognosticator……which I have also documented even though many of the mainstream articles have been taken down.
So BigB22, you can trash me all you want. Ignore my work if you so choose. However, I will continue to assert that teams who sign guys that take lots of penalties are not smart…..if that makes me a bad guy so be it.
We don’t see any terms of service violations here. The only thing we are possibly guilty of is impinging upon BigB22’s little fiefdom……..Is that what Brown Shirt Banter is, NYRWolfer, Big B22’s little fiefdom?
ANALYSIS (NOT POSTED ON SBNATION)
The Rangers finished the season with a +4.809 AB and a -18.73 AB adjusted for time on ice. To tally the impact on AB so far for the NYR, what has transpired is a net loss of -6.95 goals at the margin adjusted for TOI (note this does not include the impact of McIlrath playing more games this season, which could be as many as -8 goals if he plays 68 games.)
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