Post-Game Talk: WSH Vs COL Oct 19

[HTFN]

Armchair psychologist take: Kuznetsov did a little tailspin after the initial coke thing and that wasn’t his rock bottom yet, but I think it happened sometime last year. He could have picked a different path but it seems like he decided to take this seriously and look at himself a little. I think staying for the summer was a big step for Kuznetsov the person and now his mind is getting healthy with huge payoffs so far. I think this was basically always the timeline for someone to get through all the stages of that

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

Laviolette is not sold on either of the kid centers. They are playing the least of any forward. They are getting their feet wet but not a whole lot more. You can see the difference between how McMichael was used tonight and how Fehervary was used.

I also noticed how little Sprong played. He may not be in but he has a key to the dog house already.

I think he is just giving them small amounts of ice time just to get used to the pace of the NHL. If one of them shows signs of adapting quickly to it, I'm sure Lavy will increase their ice time. If they don't, no big deal because they're playing well regardless and Backstrom will be back soon enough.

 

[tenken00]

Wow.. this place is downright giddy!

I didnt get to see last night's game, but we did go 'old-school' and listen on the radio.
I'm not sure how long Jensen can continue to successfully channel his inner-Chara in the physicality department, he's just not that big a guy, but hopefully his shot will stick around regardless. We shall see...

As for Kuz, his career history suggests to me, that Kuz can/will play at this level until his opponents hit him high enough, often enough. And in Kuz's case, 'enough' isnt a really big number. And the rest of the NHL knows this.
So I plan on enjoying the current Kuz for however long he lasts.
I also cant help but wonder if the new team 'therapist'(?) has played a role in any of this.....but I have no idea.

The team just seems to be having fun again, and it's infectious. Highly infectious.

 

[Evgeny Oliker]

How did McMichael look in this game?

I know he didn’t play much but just curious…

 

[Portable Mink]

Man the team wide Stick work so far has been the best I’ve seen.
Everyone battling everything in the corners as hard as they can and no soft efforts.
It’s making a huge difference to win so many 50/50 pucks.

Fever typifies this as well. Very aggressive in a defensive manner - in your face right away style.

great start to season touch wood.

 

[g00n]

So much for the "Lavi is no better than TR" thing, eh? Team looks well-coached.

 

[tenken00]

 

[Neil Racki]

See if you can guess who got the defensive shield and the offensive axe tonight?

didnt know Jensen had guns like that

 

[txpd]

Agree with your take on the kid centers, but I don't see anything too off about Sprong's usage. He played 12:25 tonight - slightly above Sheary and slightly below Hathaway. I think that's just indicative of Lavi liking Hagelin-Dowd-Hathaway so much that they're his de facto 3rd line, rather than Sprong being in/near the doghouse.

Side note - I love how evenly the ice time was spread out in this game. No forward hit 18 minutes and no defenseman played less than 17. Lavi trusted his depth (well, except CMM) and crushed a major contender without overworking his stars. I think if the Caps can play this way all season, not having to lean on the big stars, it's gonna be huge for keeping those guys fresh for the playoffs.

Sprong started the season with Mantha and Eller. Not with Sheary and the kid. My take on the surface is that Sprong's TOI is more about getting Oshie more than Sprong less but it bares watching

 

[txpd]

I think he is just giving them small amounts of ice time just to get used to the pace of the NHL. If one of them shows signs of adapting quickly to it, I'm sure Lavy will increase their ice time. If they don't, no big deal because they're playing well regardless and Backstrom will be back soon enough.

I think the idea is to give them enough ice to keep the other 3 centers from being overworked. He has Oshie to watch their back both as defensive and protective protection.

The thing is that Hagelin Dowd and Hathaway are killing it and as long as they are doing that Laviolette has a lot of flexibility on where he can fit the kids on the ice.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

Armchair psychologist take: Kuznetsov did a little tailspin after the initial coke thing and that wasn’t his rock bottom yet, but I think it happened sometime last year. He could have picked a different path but it seems like he decided to take this seriously and look at himself a little. I think staying for the summer was a big step for Kuznetsov the person and now his mind is getting healthy with huge payoffs so far. I think this was basically always the timeline for someone to get through all the stages of that

Are you suggesting he had a more serious drug problem, or that rock bottom was simply a mental thing?

maybe….I suspect however…..just like he said to the press, he didn’t like trying that hard very often and finally realized he was close to losing it all in terms of the life he and his family built here in DC (likely after some very serious conversations with Management, Coaches, friends and family), and he decided to get it together and rededicated himself.

I’m hoping he decided it was time to grow up and there’s nothing deeper in terms of “problems”.

 

[g00n]

Are you suggesting he had a more serious drug problem, or that rock bottom was simply a mental thing?

maybe….I suspect however…..just like he said to the press, he didn’t like trying that hard very often and finally realized he was close to losing it all in terms of the life he and his family built here in DC (likely after some very serious conversations with Management, Coaches, friends and family), and he decided to get it together and rededicated himself.

I’m hoping he decided it was time to grow up and there’s nothing deeper in terms of “problems”.

I think you may be talking about the same thing. Someone who's forced into PHYSICAL recovery through abstinence may not actually hit "rock bottom" until later as a 'dry drunk', via a series or burst of revelations.

IOW not "rock bottom" as in waking up in a pool of piss in a dumpster and then robbing kids at the bus stop for drug money, but hitting an emotional and psychological breaking point where you realize drastic change is necessary right now.

 

[BiPolar Caps]

Takeaways, said it before the season started that the play of Kuznetsov, Mantha and Samsonov would be critical to how this team performs this season. They all had a good game but especially Kuzy (loved his interview with the ESPN+ announcers after the game).

What was Colorado thinking letting go of Grubauer and then in turn sending their first round pick for this year to Arizona for Kuemper. Talk about being stubborn and poor asset management.

I have the Budweiser goal light, so for most games it'll go off at the time the Capitals score a goal, but there will be lag times where the light and siren/horn will go off a few seconds before a goal is scored by the Capitals or just after a goal is scored by the Capitals. However last night, the lag time was nothing like I've experienced before where the light/siren was going off 90 to 120 seconds before the Capitals goal on ESPN+. The light/siren went off during the 2nd intermission while Cassie Campbell was still talking about how the Caps did in the second period and what the Avs had to do to get back in the game. Then came the Dowd goal at the beginning of the third period.

 

[Baszie]

Sprong started the season with Mantha and Eller. Not with Sheary and the kid. My take on the surface is that Sprong's TOI is more about getting Oshie more than Sprong less but it bares watching

Of all the forwards Sprong was 4th in TOI 5v5. Only 45s PP and no PK or 4v4 makes the difference. You are creating a narrative based on nothing.

 

[HecticGlow]

This is a Caps team that needs to be underdogs. We find success when it’s unexpected, and struggle under the weight of expectations.

Please, NHL, sleep away on the Caps this year.

 

[BiPolar Caps]

Neglected to mention in my game takeaways the play of some of the defensmen, namely Jensen, Fehervary and TVR. Jensen had a great game, but the other two were just as good. Really impressed with Fehervary's play.

 

[Midnight Judges]

@Midnight Judges and g00n —

I watched it on ESPN+ and my IPad. Was able to pause it and either move it 10sec either way (as often as I wanted to), or swipe the bottom — where there was a streaming bar I could forward or reverse with my finger.

worked ok. Not as good as DirecTV, but useable

yeah it let me do short rewinds and pauses, but I missed an entire period and it wasn't letting me go back to where I paused. It gave me a screen saver advertisement instead.

Basically I paid $7 to watch 1/3 of one game with advertisements.

I'll try the iPad thing.

 

[pman25]

Fehervary can really recover with his skating and closing ability. You can tell he's still not as strong physically still but that will come with time. It was interesting hearing Messier says defenseman need 200 games before they're really seasoned enough in the NHL and a reminder for when we play any young defenseman. Fever looks fine so far, he'll have struggles I'm sure, but he should keep trending up. Excited for his play

 

[txpd]

Of all the forwards Sprong was 4th in TOI 5v5. Only 45s PP and no PK or 4v4 makes the difference. You are creating a narrative based on nothing.

I will admit that I look at things too fast and misread them sometimes. Here is the stat page that I read. Colorado Avalanche - Washington Capitals - October 19th, 2021 | NHL.com

It says that Sprong played 12:25 and had 1:40 of pptoi. Did I misunderstand the stat?

 

[twabby]

@Midnight Judges and g00n —

I watched it on ESPN+ and my IPad. Was able to pause it and either move it 10sec either way (as often as I wanted to), or swipe the bottom — where there was a streaming bar I could forward or reverse with my finger.

worked ok. Not as good as DirecTV, but useable

The ESPN Roku channel allows rewinding and fast forwarding, though there is no option to start a live game from the beginning which is quite annoying. I had to mute my TV, block the TV with my hand, and then rewind the stream to the beginning so that I wouldn’t be spoiled.

 

[tenken00]

yeah it let me do short rewinds and pauses, but I missed an entire period and it wasn't letting me go back to where I paused. It gave me a screen saver advertisement instead.

Basically I paid $7 to watch 1/3 of one game with advertisements.

I'll try the iPad thing.

One good thing is that all the games are also on-demand so you will be able to watch the full game today (or tonight if the 24 hour local stream blackout thingy is still in effect).

 

[tenken00]

Neglected to mention in my game takeaways the play of some of the defensmen, namely Jensen, Fehervary and TVR. Jensen had a great game, but the other two were just as good. Really impressed with Fehervary's play.

Looks like a modern day defense now.

 

[HecticGlow]

I will admit that I look at things too fast and misread them sometimes. Here is the stat page that I read. Colorado Avalanche - Washington Capitals - October 19th, 2021 | NHL.com

It says that Sprong played 12:25 and had 1:40 of pptoi. Did I misunderstand the stat?

Interesting to see how low Mantha’s ice time is, given he’s in a top-6 role and currently on PP1.

WSH v NYR: 16:35 (11:51 ES, 4:44 PP)
WSH v TBL: 14:37 (11:13 ES, 3:24 PP)
WSH v COL: 13:31 (10:45 ES, 2:46 PP)

At ES he’s playing around the same minutes as Hathaway each night. Even if you see the Dowd line as effectively a third line, Mantha still isn’t playing top-6 minutes in comparison. I get that Lavi is largely spreading the ice time amongst the forwards, but Mantha is playing less than Eller, Oshie, Kuzy, Dowd, Ovi, Wilson, Hagelin most nights, and barely more than Sheary. Seems pretty similar TOI to Vrana got during the stretches when he got PP1 time - and we all felt he wasn’t trusted by the coaching staff?

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

We didn’t “feel it”…Vrana was not trusted.

I don’t love Mantha’s overall motor so far, but then he flashes a goal like last night in front of the net. Not sure if he’s in that same category with Lavi (as Vrana), but I’d hope there’s still some feeling out going on.

 

[txpd]

Interesting to see how low Mantha’s ice time is, given he’s in a top-6 role and currently on PP1.

WSH v NYR: 16:35 (11:51 ES, 4:44 PP)
WSH v TBL: 14:37 (11:13 ES, 3:24 PP)
WSH v COL: 13:31 (10:45 ES, 2:46 PP)

At ES he’s playing around the same minutes as Hathaway each night. Even if you see the Dowd line as effectively a third line, Mantha still isn’t playing top-6 minutes in comparison. I get that Lavi is largely spreading the ice time amongst the forwards, but Mantha is playing less than Eller, Oshie, Kuzy, Dowd, Ovi, Wilson, Hagelin most nights, and barely more than Sheary. Seems pretty similar TOI to Vrana got during the stretches when he got PP1 time - and we all felt he wasn’t trusted by the coaching staff?

As long as Laviolette is matching Dowd Hagelin and Hathaway against the opposing top line, some other line is going to get the 4th line TOI. That would be the line with the kid at center. Meanwhile Lavy wants Oshie to play more than his line will allow and so he is getting some shifts with Eller.

Is Mantha playing 4 on 4? If he isn't, that would effect his ESTOI. I think if you listen to Laviolette he mentioned that after the Rangers and then the Lightning shortened their bench to 3 lines and with his line matching one line is going to lose its shifts. I will go back and look but if Oshie and Sheary are getting late game shifts with Eller, it would explain where Mantha and Sprong's shifts have gone to.