stardog
Been on HF so long my Myspace link is part of my p
As opposed to the straight up hockey guy who was in charge of putting together the Penguins team that missed the playoffs for the first time in nearly 2 decades during the same season that the "unqualified analytics dweeb" was in charge of the Toronto Maple Leafs team with its highest point total in their stories franchises history?
The experience came in handy for being what many consider to be the worst GM, or doing the worst job in the entire salary cap era.
Great example.
Experience as a player vs none is the number one most important attribute you're pointing to as your threshold?
And then you think that this trade proves your point? A minor swap for players who won't have any impact whatsoever, either minor or major, on their teams fortunes? Wow to the GM who made this awful trade which is the obviously awful and it's what we're always going to get because he is into analytics (as if that means he doesn't have the ability to also know the actual game play). The horror!
Another great example.
Geeks who are into the numbers and studying can be useful to.
Want an actual good example?
Did you consider all of the factors for the reasoning behind this trade? No. Most didn't. But Kyle did.
And he needed to free up an AHL veteran spot as the WBS Penguins were having to healthy scratch Andreas Johnsson because they are over the maximum limit of the AHL vets rule, or should I say they WERE over the limit. Friedman has passed the threshold of number of pro games played used by the league to qualify his status as a vet. Neither player whom the team acquired has reached that limit and therefore, neither would use one of the veteran spots each team can use each game.
Why Friedman let go then and not another veteran? With the recent signing of Libor Hajek, who incidentally is ALSO below the number of games to qualify as a veteran and who also cannot take up one of those limited slots, and with a primary point in any trade being to free up an AHL vet slot, the number of players who fit that criteria became limited to a grand total of 3. Friedman, Ouelette and Fedun. None of which are in demand.
So they chose Friedman. Maybe they wanted to give him a shot on a team with a better opportunity or maybe Friedman himself asked for the move once he again failed at making the big club full time. Not really relevant.
As far the crux of your unhappiness with our GM based upon the player, or type of player he acquired, your automatic assumption of Dibas wanting Rathbone specifically are wrong to. As if he was searching around the league and found his specific guy who fell under the criteria and stereotype of a Dubas guy.
One, you see his size, that he's an offensive defenseman and then think that this is Dubas choice based upon his background and then use that to complain about hiring a guy with such a background and these are the players who they target.
But in your rush to do so, you forgot one small, but critical point that is necessary on order for you to even be able to begin an argument on the point. And that is that you forgot the number one thing analytics dweebs look for.
The analytics. And Rathbone doesn't have great ones. Definitely not to the point that any analytics guy would see numbers so amazing that they think "I've just GOT to have this guy!" then putting a priority target on getting him.
So no, Dubas didn't see this guy, then initiate trade talks for him.
2nd, when Vancouver agreed to a trade, they didn't have the secondary reasons for making a deal that the Penguins did and they options for who would come the other way were extremely limited. They definitely weren't going to give up an actual asset for Friedman when they could have had him for free on waivers just a week prior, nor were they going to bring in a contract for the same reason, without one going out.
Again, limiting the options for the return. A return for a player who already had very little value in the first place.
Obviously Rathbone was one of the options and that is the one Dubas ended up going with from a pool of few choices.
And one more thing, your experienced GM in Hextall also did a horrifyingly terrible job on the WBS Penguins who during his entire tenure saw the Baby Pens as one of the absolute worst teams in the league. The WHOLE time he was at Pittsburgh. Not just in the standings, but in throwing the few prospects we had to the wolves, giving them zero support or help and not even a chance at the giving them even basic things that prospects need to grow. Our prospects mostly regressed. Hextall would have ignored, or not known about making a trade due to the veterans slot. Then again, none of the veterans brought in with a probability of being on the AHL roster were even useful AHL players.
So, dweeb analytics guy has already done more things to show that he understands hockey and what is needed for success than our last, experienced GM with a past as a former player.
But I see evidence isn't going to matter. You're gonna hate on him regardless
