Post-Game Talk: Caps/Sabres, 12/5/16, 7pm ET, Phone Booth

[CapitalsCupReality]

Johansson buys Trotz another few games at the helm.

How did that go again...."you don't really believe what you just typed right?"....

 

[Devil Dancer]

Right now Marcus Johansson is the best forward on the Washington Capitals.

 

[Ovechkins Wodka]

Right now Marcus Johansson is the best forward on the Washington Capitals.

He had a really good month or 2 last season

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

Right now Marcus Johansson is the best forward on the Washington Capitals.

Second best, the best is Nicky.

 

[Raikkonen]

I'm wondering if one of the reasons Mojo is doing well is because of increased ice team - it wasn't uncommon last year to see his ice time somewhere around the 15 minute mark in a game - he's playing 17-20 minutes a game right now, with better linemates than a lot of last year.

Nah. He was often the forward with the most TOI last season already. At least at ES. He's playing a lot for Trotz.

 

[Raikkonen]

Also... ZETTA LIGHT!

 

[KoozNetsOff 92]

Lol what? No.

This regular season means zero. Nothing. His fate will be decided in the playoffs. There is enough talent on this team to sleep walk through the regular season, get a 5/6 seed, turn it on and win a Cup.

Like how we slept through the last ~25 games of last season then turned it on in the playoffs?

 

[ovikovy817]

Played for just 10 minutes in the 3rd and still get 2 points. Maestro Caps.

The second goal against, it can never happen. Before this, in a span of 2-3 minutes, the opponent has 3 great chances to score (in fact they even score once), but you continue to play like nothing happened, you don't try to change something in your mind

All 3 goals, especially the first, I celebrated them like it was a playoff OT goal

9-2
27-74
Was it Trotz behind the bench, or someone from this board?

 

[trick9]

Agree generally, but the slashing call tonight was incredibly weak. That was just a bad call

Disagree.

He was pretty much begging for that call. On the forecheck he first takes 2 slashes at Ristolainen and when he passes the puck to the forward, Ovechkin goes ahead and slashes him too. That's pretty much begging for a call when he could have gotten it sooner.

Ovechkin is killing every line he's put out on now right now. Backstrom and Johansson still produce now when they are on the PP or away from him. They were invisible ES for 50 minutes and when Trotz moved Ovechkin from that line they went on to have few dominant shifts on the offensive zone. Coincidence? I think not. This might have been the worst game of the season for Ovechkin and that's saying something. He's incredible lucky that his zero effort play didn't result in goal against on that offside goal that was overturned.

Holtby stole them this win. They had no business to still be in this game after the first 40-50 minutes.

 

[g00n]

Yeah I noticed Ovie taking whacks at guys all night. It was a body of work call.

 

[txpd]

the difference between this season and last season is Kuzy, Burakovsky and Williams. Johansson is picking up a lot of the Cheetah's production along with his own. Chimera never has two big seasons in a row anyway.

That the Caps are keeping up with their leading scorer lost and invisible is impressive. I think Burt and Williams may never score another goal. Williams almost looks like he has gone Knuble, but he seems to have plenty of energy. Maybe pucks will start going in. Burakovsky's fancy stat numbers have to be falling off now. He looks like its starting to wear him down.

Meanwhile I am right in hearing that Eller's fancy stats are huge? Or is that wrong?

 

[txpd]

Trotz just does not trust our young players. 11 minutes for Vrana who looked really good. Is that how you develop your young players? Not giving them a chance even when they look good.

except Kuznetsov and Burakovsky look awful and Vrana is tied to them.

 

[HecticGlow]

Nah. He was often the forward with the most TOI last season already. At least at ES. He's playing a lot for Trotz.

I don't think that's true when he was moved to 3C. I remember following his TOI in the month or so after he moved to center, and he was regularly getting the same TOI as Kuznetsov, but with considerably more PP time. Games where there were few or no power play opportunities, he was getting little more ice time than Chimera and Wilson (given they were often PKing).

 

[NoLookPass]

If Kuzy is coming down the ice to an open net and no defenders in front of him, I think he still looks for the late man in.

 

[twabby]

Vrana had 4 more shots on goal in just 11:58 of ice time and looked dangerous every time he had the puck. Give him a bigger role.

 

[txpd]

Vrana had 4 more shots on goal in just 11:58 of ice time and looked dangerous every time he had the puck. Give him a bigger role.

fine...splain to me that bigger role? give him kuzy's spot on pp2? put him on rw with beagle and put Wilson with Kuzy and Burt?

Would you give him Jojo's spot on pp1?

Trotz said last night that new combinations were coming. I am just sure where the ice time is that uses his skill

 

[Hivemind]

It's pretty obvious he meant to give him more shifts at even strength. Vrana only skated 11:58.

 

[marcel snapshot]

Ovie looks like so many youth hockey players I see - glide around until you think play might develop into a scoring chance for you, and only then start moving your feet and of course by then it's too late. Skate if there's a scoring chance for you - instead of skating all the time so that when there's a scoring chance you'll be in a position to put the other time on their heels. It's agonizing to watch him watch the play and rev the motor only periodically and almost always when it's too late.

That said, I've never seen a superstar, 500-goal scorer, future Hall of Famer get penalized for more BS, borderline, ticky-tack stick or hold penalties than I'm seeing Ovie get hit with this year. Hell, maybe his sluggish play and torpid pace is so apparent to everyone on the ice that the refs are trying to spur him to pick up his game by sending him to the box every time he does something that results from being too slow and two steps behind the play too often. And this business of Ovie skating out of the zone without looking back to receive the puck - decent chance that that's a mental lapse borne of physical fatigue.

On the bright side - Carlson has sucked (seems lost mentally), Ovie has sucked, Kuzy has sucked, Williams has sucked, and our bottom 6 outside of Beagle (and occasionally Winnick) has sucked, and we're still in a playoff spot (barely). So there's that.

Would be a great if we could play one game with 12 Jay Beagles - he's the only one that is consistently playing with the tempo and motor rate required for teams to have consistent success in this NHL.

Orlov - he may have eye-gouging, hair-pulling catastrophic shifts, but at least he plays with pace. We don't have enough guys doing that, so we need to suffer through his lapses because this team is not in a position to subtract players that can play with pace.

I think that's what's driving Holtby crazy - and what's behind his statement that the team isn't in shape. They simply have not adapted to the fact that this generation of NHL players plays at higher average rate of speed than they are comfortable with or accustomed to. It's like a car company failing to adapt to the capabilities of a new generation of motors.

And Trotz may not be the best guy to teach them how to adapt - because he made his bones as a coach when the NHL was materially slower than it is today. He better be thinking about how he's gone change up his approach, because BMac's message after the Pens series was that it wasn't good enough for this team to be defensively responsible and offensively opportunistic (which it can't manage now) - it had to also play with pace in order to get to the next level.

Here endeth the rant.

 

[Hivemind]

^A lot of truth in that post.

It once again begs the question. How many key players have down turns simultaneously does it take before people stop considering it a coincidence? If it were just one or two, it would be easy to write off as slumps. But about half the team is listless, out of sync, and unable to score a goal.

 

[twabby]

fine...splain to me that bigger role? give him kuzy's spot on pp2? put him on rw with beagle and put Wilson with Kuzy and Burt?

Would you give him Jojo's spot on pp1?

Trotz said last night that new combinations were coming. I am just sure where the ice time is that uses his skill

I want him to have more than 11:58 in ice time when he's averaged 3 SOG per game and has in general looked dangerous without looking lost defensively. He should be in the top 6 and maybe get PP2 time:

90-19-13
8-92-77/14
65-83-14/77/10 (Connolly in while Oshie is out with his injury)
26-20-43

Give him a legitimate shot alongside Mojo and Backstrom at even strength. Burakovsky looked best alongside 90 and 19 so I imagine it would set Vrana up for success as well as it would ease his defensive burden.

Meanwhile, Beagle has clearly outplayed Eller and deserves to be in the top 9. Maybe he and Burakovsky can form some chemistry on the third line and make it a legitimate third scoring line.

Also for the love of god please don't revert back to 27-2 for at least a few games. The team looked much better in transition last night after Orlov and Alzner were flipped.

 

[g00n]

Ovie looks like so many youth hockey players I see - glide around until you think play might develop into a scoring chance for you, and only then start moving your feet and of course by then it's too late. Skate if there's a scoring chance for you - instead of skating all the time so that when there's a scoring chance you'll be in a position to put the other time on their heels. It's agonizing to watch him watch the play and rev the motor only periodically and almost always when it's too late.

That said, I've never seen a superstar, 500-goal scorer, future Hall of Famer get penalized for more BS, borderline, ticky-tack stick or hold penalties than I'm seeing Ovie get hit with this year. Hell, maybe his sluggish play and torpid pace is so apparent to everyone on the ice that the refs are trying to spur him to pick up his game by sending him to the box every time he does something that results from being too slow and two steps behind the play too often. And this business of Ovie skating out of the zone without looking back to receive the puck - decent chance that that's a mental lapse borne of physical fatigue.

On the bright side - Carlson has sucked (seems lost mentally), Ovie has sucked, Kuzy has sucked, Williams has sucked, and our bottom 6 outside of Beagle (and occasionally Winnick) has sucked, and we're still in a playoff spot (barely). So there's that.

Would be a great if we could play one game with 12 Jay Beagles - he's the only one that is consistently playing with the tempo and motor rate required for teams to have consistent success in this NHL.

Orlov - he may have eye-gouging, hair-pulling catastrophic shifts, but at least he plays with pace. We don't have enough guys doing that, so we need to suffer through his lapses because this team is not in a position to subtract players that can play with pace.

I think that's what's driving Holtby crazy - and what's behind his statement that the team isn't in shape. They simply have not adapted to the fact that this generation of NHL players plays at higher average rate of speed than they are comfortable with or accustomed to. It's like a car company failing to adapt to the capabilities of a new generation of motors.

And Trotz may not be the best guy to teach them how to adapt - because he made his bones as a coach when the NHL was materially slower than it is today. He better be thinking about how he's gone change up his approach, because BMac's message after the Pens series was that it wasn't good enough for this team to be defensively responsible and offensively opportunistic (which it can't manage now) - it had to also play with pace in order to get to the next level.

Here endeth the rant.

Pretty much all of this. And the thing about Ovie is Trotz initially convinced him that better defensive responsibility meant more scoring chances for him. He seems to have abandoned that commitment. It appears as though he may have tuned Trotz out, which would explain or dovetail with so much of the rest of the team apparently dogging it or refusing to pay attention to detail.

Like I said before, a coach like Trotz bag skating a team after the goaltender calls them out seems like a last resort move for someone who doesn't know what to do and has lost the ability to motivate individually, or with other methods. The fact that it didn't appear to work is even more troubling.

Gloom. Doom. Badda bing badda boom.

 

[txpd]

I want him to have more than 11:58 in ice time when he's averaged 3 SOG per game and has in general looked dangerous without looking lost defensively. He should be in the top 6 and maybe get PP2 time:

90-19-13
8-92-77/14
65-83-14/77/10 (Connolly in while Oshie is out with his injury)
26-20-43

Give him a legitimate shot alongside Mojo and Backstrom at even strength. Burakovsky looked best alongside 90 and 19 so I imagine it would set Vrana up for success as well as it would ease his defensive burden.

Meanwhile, Beagle has clearly outplayed Eller and deserves to be in the top 9. Maybe he and Burakovsky can form some chemistry on the third line and make it a legitimate third scoring line.

Also for the love of god please don't revert back to 27-2 for at least a few games. The team looked much better in transition last night after Orlov and Alzner were flipped.

just so I read you right. you want to demote Ov for Vrana. You want to bump up Kuzy's toi because with Ov it will rise when he is clearly earning less ice time.

You are sending mixed messages

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

^A lot of truth in that post.

It once again begs the question. How many key players have down turns simultaneously does it take before people stop considering it a coincidence? If it were just one or two, it would be easy to write off as slumps. But about half the team is listless, out of sync, and unable to score a goal.

Maybe they're simply following their Captain's lead?

 

[twabby]

just so I read you right. you want to demote Ov for Vrana. You want to bump up Kuzy's toi because with Ov it will rise when he is clearly earning less ice time.

You are sending mixed messages

What mixed messages? I'm just giving my opinion on what would optimize the talent in the lineup. Vrana is extremely raw but has shown talent, sounds like a great fit on a defensively responsible scoring line. It's up to the coach to give the second line the minutes they deserve based on how they're playing. Kuznetsov should not automatically see a bump in ice time just because Ovechkin is on his line.

You can see it as promotion/demotion if you want but it's kind of petty to look at it that way.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

Pretty much all of this. And the thing about Ovie is Trotz initially convinced him that better defensive responsibility meant more scoring chances for him. He seems to have abandoned that commitment. It appears as though he may have tuned Trotz out, which would explain or dovetail with so much of the rest of the team apparently dogging it or refusing to pay attention to detail.

Like I said before, a coach like Trotz bag skating a team after the goaltender calls them out seems like a last resort move for someone who doesn't know what to do and has lost the ability to motivate individually, or with other methods. The fact that it didn't appear to work is even more troubling.

Gloom. Doom. Badda bing badda boom.

#coachkiller

Gets annoying that NHL players so frequently decide to bail on their coaches...I don't get it.