I'm fine with unattractive. Dallas and Columbus do not play attractive hockey in the slightest, but they are gutsy and efficient. A lot of times Coyotes players are not even looking around the ice to make a play, they just instinctively slap at it up the boards, trying to get it through multiple defenders. It's like they're being told "just get it in their end asap!" without any thought behind it. There are no transition plays, they're all variations of chip dump-ins. Guys are not encouraged to skate with the puck, so they get obliterated by teams that can like the Avalanche.
It's not really a wonder that adding skilled guys like Kessel, Hall, and a healthy Schmaltz did not change the offense much at all - it does not utilize or consider the strengths of skill players at all. The whole entire reason you trade for a guy like Hall is to have him skate with the puck at the defense to draw guys to him, make a play, or get a penalty called.
There are no set plays in the offensive zone either, and most of the time they have no idea what they are doing if they even manage sustained pressure. I'm sure private tracking has to have the Coyotes as the worst or one of the worst teams in total offensive zone time.
"just go get more grit" is not going to solve this. They fundamentally do not know where to be on the ice or how to play around other teams. All they know is to move the puck up the ice the Coyote way aka be dumb and inefficient, let the game come to you, focus on turnovers.
I'm pretty sure this tactical incompetence (on top of being asked to skate 24/7 to make this even have a chance in hell of working) is what caused Tocchet to lose the room.
This is so spot on for the autopsy of the offensive scheme. I would add that because of the non-existence of time spent doing offense, there is so much more pressure on the defense to never slip up, and yet because they have to defend so much more often, the defensive numbers take a hit. I'm of the impression that the defense is not actually that bad, but rather just has to play it so much more than most every other team that their raw totals surrendered have gone up making the team defense look poorer on many defensive team metrics.
Additionally, surely playing this way is detrimental to team morale. I think some of the criticisms of team leadership directly stem from playing in such an inept system. How draining it must be to hop over the boards to go chase down pucks on the majority of your shifts.
I would reckon that when a minimally adequate offensive scheme is implemented, the overall team's play will rise significantly, not just because of an increase in offense, but also at that point they will have reduced time playing defense allowing those players the rest needed to defend more soundly. Furthermore, because of a lack of offensive scheme, for all we know, we have players that can finish better than we thought, yet they never get to show that off, so that skill in a player has been discounted, potentially all the reason for drastic upticks when the team makes a trade.
Oh, and finally to tie this all back into Fischer, it wouldn't surprise me if he could take a huge step forward offensively were he to be moved elsewhere. It'd be the same old story where other coaches love to get former Coyotes because they come in so defensively responsible. I hope this can all be remedied before more trades are done without getting to see our guys ever play real offense.
