HTFN
Registered User
- Feb 8, 2009
- 12,297
- 10,983
Well...except Titanic hit that iceberg because she was going too fast and ignoring the warnings of icebergs. In other words they were being foolish. Not sticking their heads in the sand and being too conservative.
That's just the same thing at different speeds. The Capitals might be extending the time it takes to reach the point of no return, but that won't matter much if they don't pay attention to the remainder of the trip.
The organization didn't re-invent its own hockey culture, it just transplanted another one and called it a day. There is no evidence of adventurous coaching or systems changes, only questionably-conscious "safety net" tendencies developed over years of transmuting an organization's "luckier" prospects into middle-six forwards. That, and a top down adherence to the notion that trying harder while making mediocre decisions will turn them into good ones.
Even the premise is flawed. Skill is cold, calculating, and repeatable. It rewards practice with small, but measurable, improvements. Will is an emotional force that can either be stolen away, or negatively impact your ability to make detached, logical decisions. While not irrelevant in sports, it implies that Will can be turned on the way a superhero powers up, making a mockery of earned competence. It's the reason we love watching Miracle on Ice, but it's also the reason we inexplicably root for the white kids in Hoosiers. It's an underdog mentality with inherent weakness built in. This team doesn't need to be the plucky upstart that's just happy to be there, it needs to be the machine that makes other teams kind of wish they weren't.
The motto might as well be "Need Over Speed", or "Hype Over Snipes".
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