Confirmed with Link: Berube out, Bannister in

[Blueston]

Upon further review ...

It was the right move. Chief gets a two-year, fully-paid vacation and can decide what to do next.

This team needed a new voice. Despite the glaring holes on defense, there is some talent.

Bannister can work with the kids and coax them along, something Chief never would do.

Unfortunately, might be just good enough to sneak into the playoffs, exit early, and hurt draft position.

nearly every team that makes change gets this bump. Let’s give it more than a handful of games before we determine whether was right move.

 

[ToniJ1960]

Agree with that. Armstrong built a Cup team and then dismantled it.

Berube could only work with the players he was given.

I rarely find much to disagree with in your posts and Im not exactly doing it now, but I just had a feeling this int the whole story. The team was losing a lot of games to weak teams, even poor teams put in more consistent honest efforts and would win some of them. I suspected the teams `personality` was a reflection of the coach, and I still do.

They have played a couple solid games,and some they fought hard to win after it was going the other way, in the short time Bannister has had the team. I believe overall theyre putting in more consistent and honest effort. It looks good so far. I want to say it was the right move, Bannister is getting the younger players producing and has more focus on them. Is he the right coach long term maybe not, but to me that doesnt mean it wasnt the right move.

 

[StLewis11]

Upon further review ...

It was the right move. Chief gets a two-year, fully-paid vacation and can decide what to do next.

This team needed a new voice. Despite the glaring holes on defense, there is some talent.

Bannister can work with the kids and coax them along, something Chief never would do.

Unfortunately, might be just good enough to sneak into the playoffs, exit early, and hurt draft position.

I disagree with the notion of Chief not working with kids. During the Cup year he was willing to ride with young guys like Thomas, Dunn & Barbashev, not to mention Binny.

 

[Blueston]

regardless of whether we should have made move, bannister has been excellent interim coach. he knows many of the players, particularly the younger ones, he has a positive demeanor, which is good for a reset, seems almost understated. i have no idea if he will be good nhl coach, but i see why he is interim.

 

[Brian39]

We're at the 10 game point under Bannister and the record is excellent. 14 points in 10 games puts us in a 3 way tie for the #6 points percentage in the league since the coaching change. There are a couple wins vs bad teams in there (Chicago, Ottawa), but 5 of the wins have come against top 10 teams (Dallas, Dallas, Florida, Carolina, Vancouver). 1 of the losses was against a top 10 team (Colorado) with the other 2 losses coming against bubble teams who are currently 18th and 19th (Tampa and Pittsburgh). This has by no means been a soft stretch of the schedule and we got very good results.

We had a much weaker schedule through Berube's last 10 games. We went 3-7 in that stretch despite playing 5 teams currently in the bottom 10 (Arizona, Chicago, Chicago, Buffalo, Columbus) and played just 2 games against a top 10 opponent (Vegas).

Credit where credit is due. Bannister is off to a great start. He took a team that was 3-7 in their last 10 against a soft schedule and promptly led them to a 7-3 stretch against a tough schedule.

With that said, the numbers under the hood are not as great.

We're 20th or worse in possession and expected metrics at 5 on 5 through this stretch, although we are at least 16th in shot on goal percentage. We are getting outscored 20-19 at 5 on 5 and are outscoring the other team 9-6 in all other situations.

The goalies have been really good. Binner was .907 and Hofer was .893 under Berube. All told, the 2 goalies allowed 87 goals on 902 shots for a combined .904 SV% in all situations. Under Bannister, Binner is .894 and Hofer is .949. They have allowed 25 goals on 296 shots for a combined .916 SV% in all situations. That is a sizeable improvement and is absolutely a big contributor to the overall record. As is often the case with him, Binner's numbers are pulled down by a couple big goal against nights (5 on 23 vs Tampa and 5 on 20 vs Chicago) and his play in the other games is probably better than the numbers suggest. When you look at the games we have won, we are often getting excellent goaltending.

But I don't think the record is all goaltending. We're 2-2 in games where we allow 3+ goals and 1-1 when we allow 5+ goals.

The PP is a night and day difference. It was 8.4% under Berube and it is 19.2% under Bannister. That comes out to 5 PP goals in 10 games under Bannister vs 7 PP goals in 28 games under Berube. I would argue we can attribute 2-4 standings points to the PP over these 10 games. Our PP got us back into the game against Chicago. We were down 4-2 when we went on the PP early in the 3rd and then we allowed a shorty. I'd put that shorty about 90% on Binner considering it was a 1 on 2 where he inexplicably gave up his post when it was painfully clear Foligno was going to drive the net, but let's put it on the PP unit. Rather than packing it in, we scored a PP goal a couple minutes later then added a 2nd PP goal a couple minutes after that. In about 6 minutes of gameplay, our PP turned a 2-4 hole into a 4-5 hole and you could see a frustrated team get going. We scored less than 30 seconds after the PP goal to tie the game and then won it late. I have zero confidence that we come back to tie (and then win) that game without PP success. You can probably give the PP credit for 1 or 2 points in the 4-3 win against Dallas too. We scored on our lone PP of the game while we were down 2-0 and ended up winning that game in OT. I thought we were the better team that night, but who knows if we claw it back without that PP goal. That's 4 points that could have been 0 and almost certainly wouldn't have been more than 2 without PP success.

The PK has remained roughly the same. 78.5% under Berube and 80% under Bannister. We aren't scoriung shorties at quite the same rate, so the net PK under Berube was a few percentage points better (88.6% vs 85%).

Kyrou has come alive under Bannister. Don't know if it is luck, confidence, coincidence, usage, coaching, or a combination. But he has 10 points in 10 games (and is +6) under Bannister vs 17 points in 28 games (and a -9) under Berube. I personally think that Kyrou was playing better than his numbers showed under Berube and that pucks were going to start going in eventually. But I also think that we can't ignore that the pucks starting going in immediately following the coaching change. He had 4 goals and 8 points in Bannister's first 5 games, but has now been held off the score sheet recently (0 goals and 2 points in the last 5). There is no question that one of the organizational goals/directives for Bannister is to get Kyrou going and keep him going. We can debate who Kyrou is and how good he is forever, but this team is obviously going to win more games if he is an 80 point guy than if he is a 50 point guy.

The top line with Buch, Thomas and Kyrou has been a problem for other teams to deal with. They are outscoring teams 9-4 at 5 on 5 under Bannister and the possession numbers are all 55% or better. Thomas has 12 even strength points while Buch and Kyrou each have 8 even strength points in the 10 games since Bannister took over. Loading up this line has exposed the lack of scoring depth on the team, but there is a real argument that it gives you a top 10 line in the NHL.

Is this a .700 team under Bannister the rest of the way? Not unless the goalie tandem gives us top 5 goaltending. They might do that. My eyes say that the D zone coverage is improving and I've said since the summer that this tandem has the potential to be fantastic if things break right. I wouldn't bet on it, but I could see it.

More realistically, I think that the record will come back down to Earth. We've outperformed expectation metrics in these 10 games. However, I don't think that we have outperformed them by a massive margin and I think some of the middle 6 has more to give on the scoresheet. I won't be surprised if we see some genuine NHL contribution out of some of the organizational depth who are well versed in Bannister's system. And probably most importantly, I see that top line of Buch, Thomas, and Kyrou continuing to be a genuine problem for opponents.

I don't want to get too predictive in this post. My intent is not to argue for Bannister long term, or to argue that we shouldn't be tanking or anything like that. There is a lot of season left. But my point was to offer some recognition for the good work Bannister has done so far. I see a team that has improved by more than simply the goalies getting hot. I see a team that is competing much more consistently and keeping themselves 'in' games a hell of a lot more regularly than the first couple months of the year. Like a lot of guys on this roster, Bannister is auditioning for a job next year. He's off to a great start.

 

[Majorityof1]

We're at the 10 game point under Bannister and the record is excellent. 14 points in 10 games puts us in a 3 way tie for the #6 points percentage in the league since the coaching change. There are a couple wins vs bad teams in there (Chicago, Ottawa), but 5 of the wins have come against top 10 teams (Dallas, Dallas, Florida, Carolina, Vancouver). 1 of the losses was against a top 10 team (Colorado) with the other 2 losses coming against bubble teams who are currently 18th and 19th (Tampa and Pittsburgh). This has by no means been a soft stretch of the schedule and we got very good results.

We had a much weaker schedule through Berube's last 10 games. We went 3-7 in that stretch despite playing 5 teams currently in the bottom 10 (Arizona, Chicago, Chicago, Buffalo, Columbus) and played just 2 games against a top 10 opponent (Vegas).

Credit where credit is due. Bannister is off to a great start. He took a team that was 3-7 in their last 10 against a soft schedule and promptly led them to a 7-3 stretch against a tough schedule.

With that said, the numbers under the hood are not as great.

We're 20th or worse in possession and expected metrics at 5 on 5 through this stretch, although we are at least 16th in shot on goal percentage. We are getting outscored 20-19 at 5 on 5 and are outscoring the other team 9-6 in all other situations.

The goalies have been really good. Binner was .907 and Hofer was .893 under Berube. All told, the 2 goalies allowed 87 goals on 902 shots for a combined .904 SV% in all situations. Under Bannister, Binner is .894 and Hofer is .949. They have allowed 25 goals on 296 shots for a combined .916 SV% in all situations. That is a sizeable improvement and is absolutely a big contributor to the overall record. As is often the case with him, Binner's numbers are pulled down by a couple big goal against nights (5 on 23 vs Tampa and 5 on 20 vs Chicago) and his play in the other games is probably better than the numbers suggest. When you look at the games we have won, we are often getting excellent goaltending.

But I don't think the record is all goaltending. We're 2-2 in games where we allow 3+ goals and 1-1 when we allow 5+ goals.

The PP is a night and day difference. It was 8.4% under Berube and it is 19.2% under Bannister. That comes out to 5 PP goals in 10 games under Bannister vs 7 PP goals in 28 games under Berube. I would argue we can attribute 2-4 standings points to the PP over these 10 games. Our PP got us back into the game against Chicago. We were down 4-2 when we went on the PP early in the 3rd and then we allowed a shorty. I'd put that shorty about 90% on Binner considering it was a 1 on 2 where he inexplicably gave up his post when it was painfully clear Foligno was going to drive the net, but let's put it on the PP unit. Rather than packing it in, we scored a PP goal a couple minutes later then added a 2nd PP goal a couple minutes after that. In about 6 minutes of gameplay, our PP turned a 2-4 hole into a 4-5 hole and you could see a frustrated team get going. We scored less than 30 seconds after the PP goal to tie the game and then won it late. I have zero confidence that we come back to tie (and then win) that game without PP success. You can probably give the PP credit for 1 or 2 points in the 4-3 win against Dallas too. We scored on our lone PP of the game while we were down 2-0 and ended up winning that game in OT. I thought we were the better team that night, but who knows if we claw it back without that PP goal. That's 4 points that could have been 0 and almost certainly wouldn't have been more than 2 without PP success.

The PK has remained roughly the same. 78.5% under Berube and 80% under Bannister. We aren't scoriung shorties at quite the same rate, so the net PK under Berube was a few percentage points better (88.6% vs 85%).

Kyrou has come alive under Bannister. Don't know if it is luck, confidence, coincidence, usage, coaching, or a combination. But he has 10 points in 10 games (and is +6) under Bannister vs 17 points in 28 games (and a -9) under Berube. I personally think that Kyrou was playing better than his numbers showed under Berube and that pucks were going to start going in eventually. But I also think that we can't ignore that the pucks starting going in immediately following the coaching change. He had 4 goals and 8 points in Bannister's first 5 games, but has now been held off the score sheet recently (0 goals and 2 points in the last 5). There is no question that one of the organizational goals/directives for Bannister is to get Kyrou going and keep him going. We can debate who Kyrou is and how good he is forever, but this team is obviously going to win more games if he is an 80 point guy than if he is a 50 point guy.

The top line with Buch, Thomas and Kyrou has been a problem for other teams to deal with. They are outscoring teams 9-4 at 5 on 5 under Bannister and the possession numbers are all 55% or better. Thomas has 12 even strength points while Buch and Kyrou each have 8 even strength points in the 10 games since Bannister took over. Loading up this line has exposed the lack of scoring depth on the team, but there is a real argument that it gives you a top 10 line in the NHL.

Is this a .700 team under Bannister the rest of the way? Not unless the goalie tandem gives us top 5 goaltending. They might do that. My eyes say that the D zone coverage is improving and I've said since the summer that this tandem has the potential to be fantastic if things break right. I wouldn't bet on it, but I could see it.

More realistically, I think that the record will come back down to Earth. We've outperformed expectation metrics in these 10 games. However, I don't think that we have outperformed them by a massive margin and I think some of the middle 6 has more to give on the scoresheet. I won't be surprised if we see some genuine NHL contribution out of some of the organizational depth who are well versed in Bannister's system. And probably most importantly, I see that top line of Buch, Thomas, and Kyrou continuing to be a genuine problem for opponents.

I don't want to get too predictive in this post. My intent is not to argue for Bannister long term, or to argue that we shouldn't be tanking or anything like that. There is a lot of season left. But my point was to offer some recognition for the good work Bannister has done so far. I see a team that has improved by more than simply the goalies getting hot. I see a team that is competing much more consistently and keeping themselves 'in' games a hell of a lot more regularly than the first couple months of the year. Like a lot of guys on this roster, Bannister is auditioning for a job next year. He's off to a great start.

On the PP, we also have Brad Richard's helping since the Berube firing. So we can't give all credit to Bannister there. I'm not sure who gets how much credit for that improvement. But I'd guess Richards is a non-zero amount.

 

[Brian39]

On the PP, we also have Brad Richard's helping since the Berube firing. So we can't give all credit to Bannister there. I'm not sure who gets how much credit for that improvement. But I'd guess Richards is a non-zero amount.

True.

With that said, I haven't heard anything about Richards being on the ice to work with the units and everything stated publicly is that Richards would be working on the PP 'from a distance' and consulting with Bannister. We probably won't ever know the full distribution of roles, but everything we have seen suggests that he is a behind the scenes support for coaching staff while the coaching staff is then ultimately responsible for presenting the vision to the players.

Whether the vision is 1% or 100% from Richards, it is the current coaching staff who are the ones actively working with the players to get improvement.

 

[ScratchCatFever]

Certain players will dictate, at least marginally, whether or not Bann's leash is extended into next season. If Army plans to follow through with the notion that he needs to better understand the mind of this current generation of players and what makes them tick, that would entail gaining a thorough pulse on how they respond to whoever is behind the bench. I don't think W-L record is or was the main criteria that Army had in mind when appointing him to interim, but rather evaluating how guys he views as core/potential core pieces respond to him and his philosophy.

As others have said, unless an outside name comes up that Army is convinced is the right fit moving forward, I don't see him as eager to supplant Bannister. If he reaches outside the organization and misses, it could mean his job. If he promotes Bannister long term and it works out, he looks like a genius. I know I'm likely in the minority, but I expect him to be our coach to open the season next year.

 

[Snubbed4Vezina]

If we continue on the current trajectory, I don't see the Blues moving on from Bannister unless they have an opportunity to add a high-level coach whose firing would come as somewhat of a surprise: Brind'Amour, Cooper, etc.

Under Chief the play was woefully inconsistent from night to night. Under Bannister it's been nice to see them play more consistently and even in games where they're clearly overmatched, still put up a strong and even winning effort.

 

[Brian39]

I'm putting the cart way before the horse here, but if Bannister earns the head coach job for next season, I'd love to see the Blues make a very hard push to hire David Carle as the head coach in Springfield.

Dude cut his teeth under Jim Montgomery at DU and then took over the program when Montgomery got the Dallas Stars job. He's kept DU as one of the premier NCAA programs, won a National Championship a couple years ago and just coached the US team to gold at the World Juniors. He has quickly built himself a hell of a resume, but he is only 34 and he has regularly had rosters that should be winning a ton of games. I wouldn't want to hand him the reins of an NHL team this summer, but I'd love to give him an AHL opportunity.

If Bannister snags the full-time NHL head coach job and we have an AHL vacancy this summer, I'd love to see us make a hard push for him to coach Springfield. Bannister would very likely be one of the cheapest NHL head coaches next year if he earns the job and I would be shocked if Berube isn't working again (which would get us off the hook for most/all of his salary for 2024/25). Given those two assumptions, we should be able to make a compelling offer to a guy like Carle in the AHL.

He has a recent track record of getting results out of young players (including Snuggy) and the tie to Montgomery is a big plus to me. I'd be shocked if he didn't learn a ton from Montgomery and if the two of them are close then Montgomery would absolutely have good things to tell him about our front office after we gave him his opportunity to get back into the NHL.

Again, this is putting the cart way before the horse, but I'd love to get this guy into our organization.

 

[Blueston]

I'm putting the cart way before the horse here, but if Bannister earns the head coach job for next season, I'd love to see the Blues make a very hard push to hire David Carle as the head coach in Springfield.

Dude cut his teeth under Jim Montgomery at DU and then took over the program when Montgomery got the Dallas Stars job. He's kept DU as one of the premier NCAA programs, won a National Championship a couple years ago and just coached the US team to gold at the World Juniors. He has quickly built himself a hell of a resume, but he is only 34 and he has regularly had rosters that should be winning a ton of games. I wouldn't want to hand him the reins of an NHL team this summer, but I'd love to give him an AHL opportunity.

If Bannister snags the full-time NHL head coach job and we have an AHL vacancy this summer, I'd love to see us make a hard push for him to coach Springfield. Bannister would very likely be one of the cheapest NHL head coaches next year if he earns the job and I would be shocked if Berube isn't working again (which would get us off the hook for most/all of his salary for 2024/25). Given those two assumptions, we should be able to make a compelling offer to a guy like Carle in the AHL.

He has a recent track record of getting results out of young players (including Snuggy) and the tie to Montgomery is a big plus to me. I'd be shocked if he didn't learn a ton from Montgomery and if the two of them are close then Montgomery would absolutely have good things to tell him about our front office after we gave him his opportunity to get back into the NHL.

Again, this is putting the cart way before the horse, but I'd love to get this guy into our organization.

I'd be shocked if Carle would take AHL job. I expect his next position is as an NHL head coach. And for all the reasons you describe, I think he could be a good one.

 

[TheOrganist]

I'm putting the cart way before the horse here, but if Bannister earns the head coach job for next season, I'd love to see the Blues make a very hard push to hire David Carle as the head coach in Springfield.

Dude cut his teeth under Jim Montgomery at DU and then took over the program when Montgomery got the Dallas Stars job. He's kept DU as one of the premier NCAA programs, won a National Championship a couple years ago and just coached the US team to gold at the World Juniors. He has quickly built himself a hell of a resume, but he is only 34 and he has regularly had rosters that should be winning a ton of games. I wouldn't want to hand him the reins of an NHL team this summer, but I'd love to give him an AHL opportunity.

If Bannister snags the full-time NHL head coach job and we have an AHL vacancy this summer, I'd love to see us make a hard push for him to coach Springfield. Bannister would very likely be one of the cheapest NHL head coaches next year if he earns the job and I would be shocked if Berube isn't working again (which would get us off the hook for most/all of his salary for 2024/25). Given those two assumptions, we should be able to make a compelling offer to a guy like Carle in the AHL.

He has a recent track record of getting results out of young players (including Snuggy) and the tie to Montgomery is a big plus to me. I'd be shocked if he didn't learn a ton from Montgomery and if the two of them are close then Montgomery would absolutely have good things to tell him about our front office after we gave him his opportunity to get back into the NHL.

Again, this is putting the cart way before the horse, but I'd love to get this guy into our organization.

Is that true that if an NHL coach is relieved of his duties without cause and a new organization hires said coach, they inherit the contract from the previous employer? Or are you insinuating the previous contract is null and void once the Blues give Berube permission to seek employment and a hypothetical new contract is signed (because again, the coach was “relieved of his duties” and not fired since he had a guaranteed contract and wasn’t fired for cause). Can’t Berube get his money from both the Blues and the new team? I read that in the NFL, teams that fire coaches can use the new contract signed by a different org. as an offset against money owed by the former employer.

Just curious what the rules are in the current CBA in this regard.

 

[Mike Liut]

regardless of whether we should have made move, bannister has been excellent interim coach. he knows many of the players, particularly the younger ones, he has a positive demeanor, which is good for a reset, seems almost understated. i have no idea if he will be good nhl coach, but i see why he is interim.

we could do a lot worse than Bannister, think of Payne and Yeo. Im starting to like Bannister.

 

[Majorityof1]

Is that true that if an NHL coach is relieved of his duties without cause and a new organization hires said coach, they inherit the contract from the previous employer? Or are you insinuating the previous contract is null and void once the Blues give Berube permission to seek employment and a hypothetical new contract is signed (because again, the coach was “relieved of his duties” and not fired since he had a guaranteed contract and wasn’t fired for cause). Can’t Berube get his money from both the Blues and the new team? I read that in the NFL, teams that fire coaches can use the new contract signed by a different org. as an offset against money owed by the former employer.

Just curious what the rules are in the current CBA in this regard.

I could be wrong but I don't think the CBA covers coaches at all. It is negotiated between owners and the NHLPA on behalf of the players, not the coaches. Coaches negotiate their own contracts without union support.

 

[Blueston]

we could do a lot than Bannister, think of Payne and Yeo. Im starting to like Bannister.

well, i don't think payne or yeo should be the bar. do we think he can be our next andy murray to help develop young team right way? do we think he can be next hitch to get us back to among contenders? can he be our next berube and get us over top? i have no idea on any of those, but just saying he is better than 2 worst coaches we have had in last few decades is hardly encouraging.

 

[Mike Liut]

well, i don't think payne or yeo should be the bar. do we think he can be our next andy murray to help develop young team right way? do we think he can be next hitch to get us back to among contenders? can he be our next berube and get us over top? i have no idea on any of those, but just saying he is better than 2 worst coaches we have had in last few decades is hardly encouraging.

I got a little chuckle from how you put that. And I agree

 

[Ted Hoffman]

I could be wrong but I don't think the CBA covers coaches at all. It is negotiated between owners and the NHLPA on behalf of the players, not the coaches. Coaches negotiate their own contracts without union support.

Correct, the CBA has nothing to do with coaches' contracts.

What typically happens when a coach gets "relieved of duties" by Team A: they sit at home and don't coach until the contract runs out. If Team B wants him, they work out something with Team A where Team B assumes some part of the contract. [Keeping in mind, draft pick compensation is no longer a forced thing.] Coach still gets paid, but he's not getting full value from both Team A and Team B.

but just saying he is better than 2 worst coaches we have had in last few decades is hardly encouraging.

If "last few decades" = about 3 decades,

* That would encompass the Mike Kitchen Reign of Error, and I'd still put him ahead of Yeo in terms of the worst coach we've had. Even if one wants to argue Yeo was worse, I don't think it's debatable that Kitchen was worse than Payne.
* Depending on how far you want to stretch "last few decades" that could also include the Mike Keenan era. I'll let everyone decide how they want to rank him for "worst coach" among the group of candidates.

 

[Blueston]

I got a little chuckle from how you put that. And I agree

i don't mean to sound anti-bannister either. i think he has proven to be excellent choice as interim coach. and he might be right guy for permanent job, but i'm not close to ready to decide that. i do think in hindsight that army purposely kept him in springfield this offseason, rather than elevating him to replace mvr. i think he knew he that if (when?) this season went south he might want to axe berube, and he wanted to be able to bring him in clean without already being on coaching staff so he could serve as fresh voice and not be saddled with baggage of what led to berube firing.

and i also now think that when army said he didn't make move because of our record, he meant it. he knows as well as anyone that we aren't talented enough. my sense is that the impetus is that there was too much of a black cloud hovering over team, too much frustration had built up among chief and some key guys, and that team too often had tuned berube out. i think he reasoned that if we didn't have consistency from game to game it would make it much more difficult to both evaluate and develop our players. it would be harder for him to see what we needed, it would be harder for other teams to feel like they were getting valuable assets that they would want to pay up for, and that it would be harder to successfuly develop younger players if they weren't playing within a consistently hard-working, positive, and structured environment.

so i don't think bannister was hired to save our season, in terms of helping us make playoffs, i think he was hired to get more value out of the season, without regard to whether we make playoffs. so if i am basically right on this, it makes me more comfortable with the move. even though i still think berube deserved better.

 

[Mike Liut]

i don't mean to sound anti-bannister either. i think he has proven to be excellent choice as interim coach. and he might be right guy for permanent job, but i'm not close to ready to decide that. i do think in hindsight that army purposely kept him in springfield this offseason, rather than elevating him to replace mvr. i think he knew he that if (when?) this season went south he might want to axe berube, and he wanted to be able to bring him in clean without already being on coaching staff so he could serve as fresh voice and not be saddled with baggage of what led to berube firing.

and i also now think that when army said he didn't make move because of our record, he meant it. he knows as well as anyone that we aren't talented enough. my sense is that the impetus is that there was too much of a black cloud hovering over team, too much frustration had built up among chief and some key guys, and that team too often had tuned berube out. i think he reasoned that if we didn't have consistency from game to game it would make it much more difficult to both evaluate and develop our players. it would be harder for him to see what we needed, it would be harder for other teams to feel like they were getting valuable assets that they would want to pay up for, and that it would be harder to successfuly develop younger players if they weren't playing within a consistently hard-working, positive, and structured environment.

so i don't think bannister was hired to save our season, in terms of helping us make playoffs, i think he was hired to get more value out of the season, without regard to whether we make playoffs. so if i am basically right on this, it makes me more comfortable with the move. even though i still think berube deserved better.

I wonder why Army didn’t want to tank for a top 5 pick?

 

[Blueston]

I could be wrong but I don't think the CBA covers coaches at all. It is negotiated between owners and the NHLPA on behalf of the players, not the coaches. Coaches negotiate their own contracts without union support.

you are correct that cba doesn't cover coaches contracts, as it is agreement between players and league (owners). across professional sport these days, coaching contracts have become big $ affairs and coaches now have their own agents to negotiate their contracts (there are restrictions by the leagues upon agents, so for example nhl player agents can't also represent nhl coaches).

in terms of whether they get to double dip with new club, that depends on spefic language of contract. and unlike players who under cba have standard contract that can only vary within certain parameters (elc rules, over 35 rules, contract length, who can get ntc, etc..), coaches contracts as you say would have much fewer league-required restrictions. so while typically the club that fired him would have what they owe a coach offset by his future earnings, that is an issue that would generally be negotiated as part of this type of an employment agreement. sometimes they can earn as much as they want as a talking head on tv without the firing club getting a break on what they owe, but if they take another head coaching job the first club is off the hook. but again, that can vary and is up to whatever the team and coach had agreed upon in his employment contract. and obviously i have no idea what berube contract looks like.

 

[Xerloris]

We're at the 10 game point under Bannister and the record is excellent. 14 points in 10 games puts us in a 3 way tie for the #6 points percentage in the league since the coaching change. There are a couple wins vs bad teams in there (Chicago, Ottawa), but 5 of the wins have come against top 10 teams (Dallas, Dallas, Florida, Carolina, Vancouver). 1 of the losses was against a top 10 team (Colorado) with the other 2 losses coming against bubble teams who are currently 18th and 19th (Tampa and Pittsburgh). This has by no means been a soft stretch of the schedule and we got very good results.

We had a much weaker schedule through Berube's last 10 games. We went 3-7 in that stretch despite playing 5 teams currently in the bottom 10 (Arizona, Chicago, Chicago, Buffalo, Columbus) and played just 2 games against a top 10 opponent (Vegas).

Credit where credit is due. Bannister is off to a great start. He took a team that was 3-7 in their last 10 against a soft schedule and promptly led them to a 7-3 stretch against a tough schedule.

With that said, the numbers under the hood are not as great.

We're 20th or worse in possession and expected metrics at 5 on 5 through this stretch, although we are at least 16th in shot on goal percentage. We are getting outscored 20-19 at 5 on 5 and are outscoring the other team 9-6 in all other situations.

The goalies have been really good. Binner was .907 and Hofer was .893 under Berube. All told, the 2 goalies allowed 87 goals on 902 shots for a combined .904 SV% in all situations. Under Bannister, Binner is .894 and Hofer is .949. They have allowed 25 goals on 296 shots for a combined .916 SV% in all situations. That is a sizeable improvement and is absolutely a big contributor to the overall record. As is often the case with him, Binner's numbers are pulled down by a couple big goal against nights (5 on 23 vs Tampa and 5 on 20 vs Chicago) and his play in the other games is probably better than the numbers suggest. When you look at the games we have won, we are often getting excellent goaltending.

But I don't think the record is all goaltending. We're 2-2 in games where we allow 3+ goals and 1-1 when we allow 5+ goals.

The PP is a night and day difference. It was 8.4% under Berube and it is 19.2% under Bannister. That comes out to 5 PP goals in 10 games under Bannister vs 7 PP goals in 28 games under Berube. I would argue we can attribute 2-4 standings points to the PP over these 10 games. Our PP got us back into the game against Chicago. We were down 4-2 when we went on the PP early in the 3rd and then we allowed a shorty. I'd put that shorty about 90% on Binner considering it was a 1 on 2 where he inexplicably gave up his post when it was painfully clear Foligno was going to drive the net, but let's put it on the PP unit. Rather than packing it in, we scored a PP goal a couple minutes later then added a 2nd PP goal a couple minutes after that. In about 6 minutes of gameplay, our PP turned a 2-4 hole into a 4-5 hole and you could see a frustrated team get going. We scored less than 30 seconds after the PP goal to tie the game and then won it late. I have zero confidence that we come back to tie (and then win) that game without PP success. You can probably give the PP credit for 1 or 2 points in the 4-3 win against Dallas too. We scored on our lone PP of the game while we were down 2-0 and ended up winning that game in OT. I thought we were the better team that night, but who knows if we claw it back without that PP goal. That's 4 points that could have been 0 and almost certainly wouldn't have been more than 2 without PP success.

The PK has remained roughly the same. 78.5% under Berube and 80% under Bannister. We aren't scoriung shorties at quite the same rate, so the net PK under Berube was a few percentage points better (88.6% vs 85%).

Kyrou has come alive under Bannister. Don't know if it is luck, confidence, coincidence, usage, coaching, or a combination. But he has 10 points in 10 games (and is +6) under Bannister vs 17 points in 28 games (and a -9) under Berube. I personally think that Kyrou was playing better than his numbers showed under Berube and that pucks were going to start going in eventually. But I also think that we can't ignore that the pucks starting going in immediately following the coaching change. He had 4 goals and 8 points in Bannister's first 5 games, but has now been held off the score sheet recently (0 goals and 2 points in the last 5). There is no question that one of the organizational goals/directives for Bannister is to get Kyrou going and keep him going. We can debate who Kyrou is and how good he is forever, but this team is obviously going to win more games if he is an 80 point guy than if he is a 50 point guy.

The top line with Buch, Thomas and Kyrou has been a problem for other teams to deal with. They are outscoring teams 9-4 at 5 on 5 under Bannister and the possession numbers are all 55% or better. Thomas has 12 even strength points while Buch and Kyrou each have 8 even strength points in the 10 games since Bannister took over. Loading up this line has exposed the lack of scoring depth on the team, but there is a real argument that it gives you a top 10 line in the NHL.

Is this a .700 team under Bannister the rest of the way? Not unless the goalie tandem gives us top 5 goaltending. They might do that. My eyes say that the D zone coverage is improving and I've said since the summer that this tandem has the potential to be fantastic if things break right. I wouldn't bet on it, but I could see it.

More realistically, I think that the record will come back down to Earth. We've outperformed expectation metrics in these 10 games. However, I don't think that we have outperformed them by a massive margin and I think some of the middle 6 has more to give on the scoresheet. I won't be surprised if we see some genuine NHL contribution out of some of the organizational depth who are well versed in Bannister's system. And probably most importantly, I see that top line of Buch, Thomas, and Kyrou continuing to be a genuine problem for opponents.

I don't want to get too predictive in this post. My intent is not to argue for Bannister long term, or to argue that we shouldn't be tanking or anything like that. There is a lot of season left. But my point was to offer some recognition for the good work Bannister has done so far. I see a team that has improved by more than simply the goalies getting hot. I see a team that is competing much more consistently and keeping themselves 'in' games a hell of a lot more regularly than the first couple months of the year. Like a lot of guys on this roster, Bannister is auditioning for a job next year. He's off to a great start.

I'm curious what coach you would be interested in if we move on from Bannister? I was always a huge Trots guy and then I found out he's a f***ing GM now so I'm out of coaching ideas unless it's Brindamour.

 

[kimzey59]

I'm curious what coach you would be interested in if we move on from Bannister? I was always a huge Trots guy and then I found out he's a f***ing GM now so I'm out of coaching ideas unless it's Brindamour.

Brind'Amour or Dean Evason.

 

[Davimir Tarablad]

I wonder why Army didn’t want to tank for a top 5 pick?

Because this roster is not capable of landing a top 5 pick.

 

[Mike Liut]

Because this roster is not capable of landing a top 5 pick.

The way they were playing at the end under Berube might have been close. And they probably would trade Buch too.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

No, this group isn't going on a Cup run. Compare it to the 2019 roster, it's glaringly worse. If Bannister gets this team to a Cup, Binnington is probably going to be the Conn Smythe winner and Bannister will go down in NHL lore as having pulled off one of the all-time greatest coaching efforts in winning the Cup and will be the head coach here for a while. Even if he just gets them to the Finals, it'll be an all-time coaching effort but I don't think that gets him the job long-term.

Beyond the "not even in our wildest dreams" scenario: if this team continues to perform well, and at the end of the season the front office looks around at all the available candidates and concludes "Bannister is better than anyone else we could bring in," fine. But make the search, do the talking, ask questions, come to that conclusion after you've got a ton of information and have carefully evaluated it. Don't just say gosh, what a great record we had under him, let's sink ~3 years into a contract for him and hope he keeps it up.

I still think this team is playing over its head, and "working hard" is only going to carry it for so long. Using the 95-point threshold, we have to go something like 25-15-4 the rest of the way. As it is, 7-3-0 has moved us from T-9th with Edmonton, a point out of a playoff spot (technically 10th because Edmonton had 2 games in hand on us), to .... T-8th with Edmonton, technically 9th because we lose the first tiebreak [and Edmonton still has 2 games in hand on us]. We go 3-7-0 in the next 10, that's going to change how we're looking at things.