Coach John Hynes Discussion

[theoptimist]

They need to take a long hard look at their PP scheme in the offseason because this current scheme is a joke.

If I see another drop pass to enter the zone it will be too soon

Our zone entries aren't bad because Hall is the one carrying it in. Hischier tries to on PP2, but it looks disjointed.

PP1 would be effective if Palmieri got off of it. He's not a good PP guy and I've commented several times "Palmieri is dumb". Not saying there's any objectivity to my comment, but he's 2 thoughts behind on the PP. We don't have a "big shot" anymore, and won't until the best shot on the team (Zacha) get his development together.

 

[Emperoreddy]

The zone entries are terrible because they keep doing the drop pass and all 5 guys bunch up at the line.

They never just carry in.

 

[OmNomNom]

The zone entries are terrible because they keep doing the drop pass and all 5 guys bunch up at the line.

They never just carry in.

our 18th place PP% masks a lot of issues.

 

[Zezel22]

I personally don't think firing Hynes is the solution. I think the Devils have had a great year on the WHOLE and are ahead of their pace in the rebuild. However the difference is they are paying the price for some terrible personnel decisions, mostly from the past staff, and I do think with the way the season has ended here you need to look into changes on the staff.

This team would look entirely different if the Zacha and McLeod picks went a different way. Entirely different. If you add ONE of the several defensemen that were available in either of those years to this team over the players drafted - Werenski, Provorov, McAvoy, Chychrun... this team and program is different - and thats before speculating on what ifs with the likes of Barzal, Connor, Boseser etc. Thats hurting them badly and will continue to. And, of course they invested into a money goaltender with documented anxiety issues in big games and the guy can't hack it. That's a big issue now.

But Hynes has instilled a program that has proven successful. Hall seems to be a buyer which is extremely important. One thing he has to do is make Hall his captain and establish some locker room accountability. But a complete tear-down at the HC spot is likely not going to be productive and will be very risky with Hall.

 

[Azathoth]

I think Hynes is probably fine as a coach with the caveat being what kind of role do the assistants play in the overall game strategy? Is is Nas and Ward's job to implement what Hynes' vision of defensive zone and/or PP strategy or are they free to more or less implement the game plan they see fit?

 

[Wingman77]

If the playoffs are missed, it wouldn't be unreasonable if some of the assistants were changed out. Hynes would and should have a shorter leash, but he'll be around pretty much no matter what to start next season.

 

[NJDevs26]

If the playoffs are missed, it wouldn't be unreasonable if some of the assistants were changed out. Hynes would and should have a shorter leash, but he'll be around pretty much no matter what to start next season.

Put it this way, if Terreri got the axe cause of Cory last year than either assistant should be fair game this offseason with how the young defensemen regressed under Nas and how much of a dumpster fire the Ward PP is.

 

[Wingman77]

Put it this way, if Terreri got the axe cause of Cory last year than either assistant should be fair game this offseason with how the young defensemen regressed under Nas and how much of a dumpster fire the Ward PP is.

Not necessarily though. Terreri was a carry over.

Ward and Nas could have longer leashes because they are Hynes guys that he brought in and upper management may be more willing to have a longer leash to fit the vision and plan Hynes is trying to implement. Also have to look at who was brought in to replace Terreri - a guy Cory was familiar with and worked well with. Bit of different circumstances.

That aside, I do agree as mentioned that regardless of tenure or who was brought in under who that there should be some evaluation especially if the playoffs are missed.

 

[FooteBahl]

I personally don't think firing Hynes is the solution. I think the Devils have had a great year on the WHOLE and are ahead of their pace in the rebuild. However the difference is they are paying the price for some terrible personnel decisions, mostly from the past staff, and I do think with the way the season has ended here you need to look into changes on the staff.

This team would look entirely different if the Zacha and McLeod picks went a different way. Entirely different. If you add ONE of the several defensemen that were available in either of those years to this team over the players drafted - Werenski, Provorov, McAvoy, Chychrun... this team and program is different - and thats before speculating on what ifs with the likes of Barzal, Connor, Boseser etc. Thats hurting them badly and will continue to. And, of course they invested into a money goaltender with documented anxiety issues in big games and the guy can't hack it. That's a big issue now.

But Hynes has instilled a program that has proven successful. Hall seems to be a buyer which is extremely important. One thing he has to do is make Hall his captain and establish some locker room accountability. But a complete tear-down at the HC spot is likely not going to be productive and will be very risky with Hall.

Way too early to make this statement. Give it a few years. Its a marathon. Not a sprint.

 

[Bleedred]

I feel like Nas is Hynes right hand man. He’s like the Jay Woodcroft to Todd McLellan for Hynes.

I’m not sure Hynes gives a shit about Ward personally. If I’m Hynes I want him gone, as he makes me look worse at my job. If I’m Hynes I’m wondering what’s gonna get me fired first. Ward or the frickin goaltending.

 

[Combat Koala]

Personally I'd like to see Ward and Nasreddine gone. The special units just are not what I feel like they should be and during the time they have been here I really haven't liked their body of work. I have no idea who we could replace them with, but I'm confident we'd find someone to do their jobs with better results.

I'm willing to give Hynes at least one more season after this, regardless of making the playoffs or not. What I dislike about Hynes the most is his line shuffling (which has not been as bad this year as it was before) and lack of a working d-system. He's also kind of slow to react and change things before it's too late. I don't know if it's just me but it looks like that every year we seem to have a somewhat working system but halfway through the year things seem to go mildly chaotic on the ice. Of course with the injuries and Cory's less than stellar performance after December it's hard to say how things would look if neither of those would have happened. I'm really annoyed that we never really had a long stretch of MoJo in the lineup and I also feel bad for him. He could have been an important piece during this final stretch for the playoffs. f*** Marchand.

I think Hynes is a pretty straight forward guy and I like how he holds even the veterans accountable. He has his quirks but I'd rather see what he can do next year with a sophomore Nico, Bratt and Butcher than switch to a new coach. We really need a top 4 LHD.

E: I also want to say that I did not expect us to be in playoff contention at this time of the season and I'm happy for the progress they have made as a team. I always viewed this as a developmental season but it's also great to see us fighting for a spot in the playoffs.

 

[Darkauron]

Again I think Rollie is not really helping as a goalie coach at all. Would probably do wonders if he was on the bench like terreri did to help calm the goalies down on the bench or remind them about little things to do or chance during the game. I hate the whole hands off approach Rollie does.

And again everyone knows how much I hate Nas and Ward are. Really if you surround yourself with coaches that are your good friends and buddies that dont challenge you or give you different opinions doesn't help anything

 

[hidek91]

I'll play the devils' advocate here:

We need to fire Hynes. He's a complete joke. I never thought I'd miss DeBoer, but I would take him any day over Hynes.

The dip**** thinks the forward lines are the problem. Not the defensive pairings.

We wouldn't need to be a high scoring team every night if the defense wasnt a ****ing **** show and that wasn't made worse by inconsistent to **** goaltending.

He stinks

Few years ago, there were people on this board criticizing DeBoer THE SAME WAY Hynes is criticized now. Few years later? DeBoer has 2 runs to the finals (how many active coaches have that under their belt?), despite having bad rosters for half of his career. It's not the Hynes that is the problem, it's the personnel. He's in the playoff position with a roster that was expected to finish in bottom five. People here expect coach to be some kind of the god who will achieve 120+ points without legitimate contender roster, people fetishize youth (remember discussions about Josefson)?

The truth about this roster is:
1) Schneider declined quited badly and Kinkaid is inconsistent. If Schneider doesn't bounce back we will start the next season with 2 backups.

2) Our LHD depth is awful, Greene isn't top4 d-man anymore (yet he plays on our top pair), Moore is a sloppy second from NYR and ARZ. Butcher is doing surprisingly OK for a rookie but he isn't top4 d-man this season (I think he will be in 1-2 years from now). RHD is a little better but Vatanen wasn't here for the whole season, Severson is sometimes a liability defensively and that makes him very low-end top4 d-man, Lovejoy and Santini are OK as bottom-pair d-men but that's it, those guys are dime a dozen in this league. Mueller gambles offensively way too much. This defence group is very bad, remember that our savior, Sami Vatanen, wasn't even top d-man for Anaheim.

3) Our wingers are actually OK with Palmieri, Hall, Bratt, Gibbons, Wood and Johansson but remember that under different coaching Palmieri wasn't the player he's under Hynes. Hall is having career season under Hynes. Johansson was injured a lot but I tihnk that his high point totals in WSH were caused by playing with the stars that Capitals have. Now, if Hall was 100 points player that declined here, you could make a point that Hynes is a bad coach but that's not the case. Those guys weren't better under different coaches.

4) Our center depth is another abysmal thing. Hischier (our #1C) has 46 points in 73 games, gets outmuscled a lot and I remember rankings before the season of teams' #1 centers and we were dead last. You can't expect 18 year old to be your savior (unless he's McDavid). After that we have Zajac, Zacha, Coleman and Boyle, every single one of them is liability offensively if you put them as #2C. Sure, we have bottom six centers (one of them even has 5.75M contract but it's a different story) but it's as easy to flood your team with bottom six forwards as it is to flood it with bottom pairing d-men.

With roster like this, guy is in a play-off spot in the late March, yet people bash him just like they bashed DeBoer without realizing that, on paper, our roster is bottom 10 (as it was since 2014). Coaching isn't the problem, the roster is. If your brothel doesn't generate much income, then maybe you have to look for better prostitutes.

I think that both Hynes and DeBoer are good coaches.

 

[Peter Sidorkiewicz]

Nasareddine should be gone because Severson is just not improving. His defensive play is still not good and his offensive play has somehow gotten worse.

I want Scott Stevens back and its got nothing to do with being an all time Devils great. It has got to do with the improvement we saw Adam Larsson achieve in his last season as a Devil.

Severson looks as lost as what Larsson did. And we need him to get smarter and tougher defensively.

 

[Cult of Hynes]

Nasareddine should be gone because Severson is just not improving. His defensive play is still not good and his offensive play has somehow gotten worse.

I want Scott Stevens back and its got nothing to do with being an all time Devils great. It has got to do with the improvement we saw Adam Larsson achieve in his last season as a Devil.

Severson looks as lost as what Larsson did. And we need him to get smarter and tougher defensively.

I think Stevens could help every d man on the team and the overall team defensive strategy more than Nasreddine.

 

[Bologna 1]

I think hynes is a pretty decent coach. But I think the assistants should all be sent packing assuming they don't make playoffs

 

[OmNomNom]

bumping for chaos purposes

he done good the last 2 games

 

[BenedictGomez]

Nasareddine should be gone because Severson is just not improving. His defensive play is still not good and his offensive play has somehow gotten worse.

I agree there's much to blame on coaching for the recklessness with which Severson plays, but the fact is he's a selfish, risky player. He's not even REMOTELY good enough offensively to justify the riverboat gambling risks he takes every night. And leaving John Moore to "cover" when said risks go bad (and they often do) is a recipe for disaster.

The only thing Severson has going for him right now is he's a "young" defenseman, so there's time for improvement, but as you noted, there's been absolutely no improvement in his game during his 23 year, and this is extremely concerning. I'd be looking to trade him after this season were I Sherro, as I do not think the upside we all hoped for is going to happen, and at this point I believe the "hope for Severson's improvement" is likely larger than the reality of what his actual upside improvement from here will be (i.e. he has some trade value).

If only you could transplant Andy Greene's brain into Damon Severson's head, you might have a pretty decent #3/#4 NHL defenseman.

 

[NjDevsRR]

I do not mind Hynes at all, I think he does a good job with the players but it would be nice to get some new life on the bench with different assistants. I do not see the value of Nas or Ward.

 

[markog]

No fanis ever happy with their coaches even if they win every game. In Chicago after 3 cups and 10 straight playoffs they want to hang Quenneville, even last year when they had like 112 points before they got killed by Nashville. I see in Tampa a lot of fans not happy with Cooper.

 

[Devils090]

Ward def needs to go, that power play is mind numbing most of the time.

Hynes is fine, he gets a ton of respect from his guys and around the league so I really don’t see everyone’s issue with him, guy deserves credit for where we are regardless of how you feel about him.

Nasseddrine is meh for me, we have zero talent on our blue line aside from Vats, Butcher and Severson when he’s not in la-la land and forgetting how to play defense. Greene is a corpse on skates, Moore is a forward masquerading as a d-man and Mueller is finally getting back in so let’s see what he can do. LJ is our token 7th d-man which he’s been fine at doing so nothing really else to say about him. Santini is still developing but he’s still not ready imo. I too think Stevens is way better but i also don’t think he wants to coach right now.

 

[devilsblood]

I'll play the devils' advocate here:







Few years ago, there were people on this board criticizing DeBoer THE SAME WAY Hynes is criticized now.

And people were killing Deboer when the team was lousy for the first time in forever. This is the first good team we've had in 6 years.

DeBoer also was criticized for his handling of young players, namely not playing Lars, while continuing to roll out the old timers. Hynes has young guy up and down the lineup.

 

[NJDevils17]

Hynes reminds me of Coach Cal at UK. Great motivator and teacher, good at bringing along young guys but I don’t think he’s a good Xs and Os guy. He strikes me as a coach who will be really good once he’s been in the league for a long time because I think he’s a really smart guy.

 

[Nubmer6]

Hynes reminds me of Coach Cal at UK. Great motivator and teacher, good at bringing along young guys but I don’t think he’s a good Xs and Os guy. He strikes me as a coach who will be really good once he’s been in the league for a long time because I think he’s a really smart guy.

My opinion is that the head coach should be more of a motivator, while the assistants should be more X's and O's. I definitely have more issues with the assistants than the Hynes.

 

[devilsblood]

Hynes reminds me of Coach Cal at UK. Great motivator and teacher, good at bringing along young guys but I don’t think he’s a good Xs and Os guy. He strikes me as a coach who will be really good once he’s been in the league for a long time because I think he’s a really smart guy.

I don't know if I see Hynes as a motivator as much as I see him as someone who encourages effort and fast play. His style of play, which we could say are his x's and o's, are what motivates his guys.

He's certainly does not strike me as someone who will come down on his players though. I think he tries to keep a very positive environment.