The Daily Faceoff Show: The biggest turkey of the 2021-22 season so far
Happy Thanksgiving to our American viewers!
On the pre-Thanksgiving episode of The Daily Faceoff Show, Frank Seravalli and Steve Greeley each gave their picks for the biggest turkey so far in the 2021-22 NHL season…
Greeley: “Gobble gobble to Toronto Maple Leafs fans.
It doesn’t seem like very long ago that they were on a 2-4-1 start and fans were calling for firings, calling for trades, saying the core can’t do it. After that 7-1 loss to Pittsburgh, I thought they would just sell the arena because that’s what the fans wanted.
Since then, they’ve been outstanding. 11-2 in their last 13 games, and what I like about them is that their stars are playing great and all of a sudden the jerseys are selling again. The Tavares jerseys, the Matthews jerseys that people were putting on eBay, they’re back wearing them, they’re back buying them.
Goggle gobble to Leafs fans. This is going to be a great team to watch throughout the year. As we talked about early in the season, it’s all about April.”
Seravalli: “For me, my turkey to start the year is the Seattle Kraken.
Yes, I think they came in with some unfair expectations by virtue of what the Vegas Golden Knights did in their expansion year.
But here’s the thing, and this isn’t my personal opinion, but it’s coming from some conversations I’ve had with front-office executives over the last couple of weeks. There’s actually a little bit of an appetite in the NHL for teams who are actively rooting against the Kraken and their success because they felt there was a bit of arrogance that the team entered the league with.
‘We know how to do it better than you, our process is better than yours, look at our staff and who we’ve hired, we’re smarter than you.’ That’s been the general feel, whether the Kraken wanted it to be like that or not, that’s what other teams took away from what Seattle built this season.
I think it’s interesting to look at their start. It’s been a very traditional expansion with some ups and a lot of downs. But for a team that said ‘we’re going to be relentless, we’re going to work harder than everyone else,’ well, we haven’t exactly seen that approach from the Seattle Kraken.”
You can watch the full episode here…