Talking about firing Babcock is the same old narrow minded approach that kept our team in the doldrums for decades.
The instant gratification crowd is back.
The marked improvement we saw earlier then expected has got the more inexperienced fans back to their old tricks.
Fortunately I believe our management team is going to stick to the Shanaplan and not deviate, they will completely ignore the blather about firing Babcock because quite frankly they know what they are doing.
That said there are things he does that I don't agree with but that will happen with any coach.
Settle down folks and go back to enjoying the fact we are still a young and upcoming team on the rise and not the cellar dwellers we were for decades.
I have swung over to the “fire the coach” side, after much thought, reading. I agree with you that one has to be careful of the “instant gratification” crowd mentality and the tendency to blindly criticize the coach (exhibit A would be the constant turnstile that is the Edmonton Oiler coaching when the real problem is the product). Then there is the “Babcock mystique”; the reputation, the pedigree (as in he being recognized as the best by his peers).
What clinches it for me though:
*Since 2008 he has won only 3 of his last 12 playoff series
**of all centres in the league, Tavares and Matthews rank something like 30th and 40th in terms of minutes played per game (this is unforgivable when you consider many would consider the two amongst the top 5 centres in the league). Matthews 18 minutes in game 7!
***the constant overplaying of favourites like Brown and Marleau( or Komorov last year), something he is well known for.
*****The abject absence of creativity, of flexibility (like seeing Marleau on the ice in the dying minutes of game 7; the fourth line on the ice, the refusal to double shift a Tavares or Matthews).
*******The neutering of our talent on the power play with its quick changes of personnel.
*********Mitch Mariners comments to the press a few months ago when he answered the question about why the Leafs road record was better than their home record with the comment “the coach can’t match lines on the road, we get to just play”
**********The unmistakeable frustration of Matthews in last years playoffs (which necessitated a Babcock personal visit over the summer); the image of Matthews slamming the bench door at yet being yanked off the ice again so Babcock could have his match.
********The pitiful, corpse like play of our talented team since Christmas (I refused at first to buy the line that the team has tuned out Babcock but now I agree)
I honestly feel Babcock is killing our spirit with his “machine like, Soviet style socialism”. I believe he earned his peers admiration because he is a tactician, a thinker, because he says all the right phrases. To me it is a gross mismanagement of assets, of talent. It is wasting those assets in their prime, it is lost time.
It would be one thing to see him fired for lack of results while seeing him try everything he could to win, doing what all the best do (double shifting, loading two lines etc). But he has shackled the talent with his meticulous stubbornness. I think the “lifeless” team since Christmas was the result, it wasn’t the often heard “the players think they only have to play one period and that because of all the talent they’ll still win”. What hockey player wants that kind of team?
So no, I don’t see my opinion as knee jerk or instant gratification.
