The Buck Stops WHERE? With WHOM?

[kickazz 5,459]

On 3/12/2017 at 5:47 PM, DickieDunn said:

Bowman didn't tell Yzerman to be a checking line center. He told him to be defensively responsible. Everytime AA makes a coverage error he gets benched. Jurco talked about how in Chicago players are told to make plays and in Detroit they're told to play safe. Hell, just watch a Wings game and you can see them pass up chances in order to make the simple play.

Sent from my LGLS676 using Tapatalk
 

You just admitted in the other thread you don't watch the Wings games 

Also my point is Bowman told Yzerman to change his game and conform to his defensive style which is something you equated to bad coaches, so nice backtracking. 

Dickie still waiting on where Blashill said Larkin is to be a powerforward. I'm not letting this one go. 

Edited March 14, 2017 by kickazz

[Krayzie_Bone 58]

This team has not gotten any better at the basics. Blashill should be fired. Holland has made a lot of weird moves but he isent going anywhere.

[kickazz 5,459]

So no proof on Blashill asking Larkin to be a powerfoward.

Cool. I'll bring it up another time. 

[ChristopherReevesLegs 7,022]

1 hour ago, kickazz said:

So no proof on Blashill asking Larkin to be a powerfoward.

Cool. I'll bring it up another time. 

Blashill is a waste. A big fat mistake. Whatever he said is trash. Why isnt he fired yet??? And wheres the tylenol?

[Buppy 1,720]

On 3/12/2017 at 1:56 PM, kipwinger said:

...Perhaps what irritates people about Blashill is that he'll bench guys for not being defensive enough, but his whole team isn't offensive enough and nobody gets benched for that.  He'll bench guys for being careless with the puck, but only SOME guys, because veterans apparently are immune from turnovers. He'll bench guys for not being "assertive enough" (Sproul) but guys like Marchenko and Ouellet get lots of time despite being unnoticeable. 

I think Blashill, like Babcock before him, came up with lots of post hoc justifications to rationalize the preferences they already had.  In Blashill's case I think it's pretty clear that his preference is for defense-first hockey players, and that he doesn't mind if you're one dimensional as long as that dimension is defense.  Which is well and good, but then it's pretty hard to take him seriously when he's benching guys ostensibly to "round out their game" or whatever.  He pretty clearly doesn't care about a well rounded game or Miller, Glendening, Sheahan, Ouellet, Ericsson, Kronwall (at this point in his career), etc. wouldn't all be playing hockey on the same team at the same time.

Let's not get carried away. None of this is a particularly accurate reflection of anything that has actually happened. 

Sproul got scratched a lot. There's also a lot of numbers that say that's the right choice. Ouellet has also been scratched a bit, even though his numbers are generally good. Marchenko too had some good numbers, and he was waived. Miller (and Ott when he was here) were scratched often. Miller was waived and sent to GR. Scratching Mantha likely had nothing to do with defense, considering he's been no worse than many others in that regard (and has the best advanced numbers on the team). Same goes for AA earlier this year. 

Just like with Babcock, the whole idea of this obsessively defensive coach who's killing our offense is poorly supported by both logic and actual fact. Our offensive struggles are far more likely the result of poor offensive systems (and poor execution) rather than an over-commitment to defense or defensive players. The generally poor quality of our defensive play is likely more to blame as well.

It is fans trying to over-generalize and over-simplify leading to these false conclusions, which they then criticize for being so illogical or inconsistent. Never occurs to anyone that maybe the basic premise of their criticisms, or the speculations which usually serve to support them, might be flawed.

On 3/12/2017 at 11:38 AM, krsmith17 said:

Just because a coach tries to mold a player into something he's not, doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work, or be beneficial to the player or team. .... Bowman and Babcock are great coaches, but that doesn't mean they don't make some dumba** decisions. Blashill just seems to make a lot more. Playing defensive hockey is losing hockey, and that's exactly what Blashill tries to implement (in the NHL)...

I would argue that the entirety of the NHL is rooted in playing defensive hockey, and that is why scoring has generally been trending down since the 80's. Even with rule-changes being made to try to increase scoring, coaches adapt and goals start going down again. The secret isn't to not play defensive hockey, it's learning how to score while doing it. 

[PavelValerievichDatsyuk 1,935]

I think there's definitely a false narrative around Mantha's treatment by the coach. Mantha averages 16:42 per game. That's 5th amongst forwards. Only Z, Nielson, TT, and Goose average more. That's pretty favourable treatment for a rookie with a total 60 NHL games under his belt. If he's been getting benched every time he has an "off shift or a bad period" as Dickie says, he must not be having many. I don't think Mantha should have been scratched, but he hasn't been great in the last chunk of games. Maybe they're learning from the experience with Larkin last year where the hot rookie hits a wall and then slumps hard for the next half year or more. Maybe it's an attempt to stop that from happening. 

When Babcock was around this site made so many jokes about how we'd never see any young guys higher than the 3rd line. Now we have Blash, who put 19 year old Larkin on the top line most of last year, Mantha there this year, named Mrazek our #1 after his first full year (and hadn't really earned it). You can disagree with his treatment of some players, but this narrative of favouritism toward vets doesn't work very cleanly. He gave Vanek limited minutes, just like AA, and probably for the same reason of defensive short comings. He sat Ott a number of times and I think we waived Miller a couple of times.

Edited March 15, 2017 by PavelValerievichDatsyuk

[kliq 3,763]

I actually don't have an issue with Blashill being hard on the kids. Vets are what they are, it's very hard to take a player close to 30+ and change the stupid little things that they do (not that you shouldnt still try). When you have a 20 year old kid, they are like clay and you can mold them quite easily into the best player possible, so when that when they get older they do all of those small things that coaches harp on all the time. 

This doesn't mean I love Blashill or think his overall system is any good, but you will rarely see kids be treated the exact same as a vet by any NHL coach.

 

[kickazz 5,459]

How often are vets benched anyway? Maybe Mike Richards, Brad Richards and Vincent Lecaveliar are the main example? But those guys we're terrible and hit a wall in their careers and one guy accused of smuggling drugs. 

Take a look at Dustin Brown. The guy was so terrible for the last few years. 27 points in 82 games for a couple years. Did he ever get scratched? After like 3 years of terrible play he finally got his captaincy stripped. But not yet scratched. 

 

Edited March 15, 2017 by kickazz