from Adam Proteau of The Hockey News,

Over the years, the Nashville Predators have been arguably the biggest “meh” team in the NHL. To their credit, they’ve made the playoffs in each of the past eight seasons. On the other side of the spectrum, they’ve lost in the first round in five of those eight years – winning two games or fewer in that span – and they’ve made it out of the second round only once, pushing to the Stanley Cup final in 2016-17.

For every step forward the Preds have taken, there’s been a step sideways or a half-step back. They’re in the league’s mushy middle – the place where a team is too good to finish at the bottom of the standings (and thus, set themselves in the best position to select a generational player in the entry draft), and not good enough to be a genuine Cup frontrunner.

This is the case again thus far this season: Nashville began the year 2-4-1 (including a five-game losing skid), then battled back to improve their record to 12-9-2. However, since then, they’ve stumbled into the four-game losing streak they’re currently mired in. And so, after 28 games, they’ve got a .500 points percentage (good enough only for sixth place in the Central Division, tying them with the roller-coaster St. Louis Blues). They’re a pedestrian 7-5-2 at home and a sub-pedestrian 5-7-2 road mark. By virtually every metric, the Predators are average at best.

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