I agree there - you cannot SIT back and wait for them to come, you can't be content with the opposition like Crosby having the puck, you can't *accept* that he's so good that he's automatically going to have the puck, so in a way that mentality is like you're collapsing, trying to protect the house.
On the contrary, that shows a lack of confidence, but there really aren't any players better than Crosby man, there's few exceptions where you have to respect his game and play a shutdown role. You have to give him some respect, but I understand that if you have someone like Yandle out there, there's less of a chance for him to have the puck... BUT, when Crosby does get the puck, head for the hills with Yandle out there as the guy who is going to be on him consistently, it's a Catch 22 thing.
It's a game of Chess, and that's why Hockey is so ****in' beautiful.
BTW I appreciate and thank Girardi for his services and what not the past decade, but it's over man. He's absolutely toasted, whether he's been beaten down from how many games he's played and how many times he's gone to the post season. He's done though man, and it's time to face reality. He was great and I liked him for his time being, but he hurts the team now. I was in denial for a while when early adopters said this, but he's really, really starting to show it. The only problem is everyone thinks it's easy to plug in Skjei and McIlrath and everything will be fine - the experience helps more than others think, even when you have turned into garbage. That's just my opinion, of course.
Management should have done the right thing and gave McIlrath split time between him and Girardi consistently. When McIlrath went on a stretch and played really well and our other assets were back from injury, you don't kick a kid to the curb, especially how well he was playing - we're sending the wrong message and he should have sat him when he had a bad game and gave some competition in the backend to actually fight for those positions. As corny as it may sound, you can **** up a kid's psyche that way, and stint his development slightly. We're not in the locker room, we don't know if there was an understanding between McIlrath and management where he gave him the low down right away, "McIlrath, you know your spot, you're the 7th guy here and you're only going to play when there are injuries" - there's certain things us fans don't know about locker rooms - it's sacred stuff.
