Speculation: D.J. Smith

[h2]

Yeah, I guess he should trash them, and blame everything negative on them, as that would be great for team building.

Or just not play them in the matter which he has.

Never said anything like you are alluding. Thanks for contributing.

 

[Alf Silfversson]

If they were dynamite, they would be in the lineup

No kidding. But them sucking is in no way a positive.

If they're good you have options. When they suck you don't. You have to play the kids and the vets are dead weight.

 

[Very Stable Genius]

I would definitely take Claude Julien over D.J.

 

[swiftwin]

I would definitely take Claude Julien over D.J.

I would not

 

[Big Muddy]

Wow.

I think it's the opposite. He's doing well despite the poor play of the veterans.

If you think a 19 year old kid playing in his first year in North America doesn't appreciate having guys on the team and his line with experience, you're insane.

Maybe Brady is the "vet" they are talking about? BT & TS live together and seem to have a chemistry and joke around a lot.

 

[Joeyjoejoe]

I would definitely take Claude Julien over D.J.

Better coach yes but he isn't the coach to develop young players. He has had issues with young players wherever he went. There is a reason why the Habs young players played their best hockey in the bubble when he wasn't behind the bench.

 

[Micklebot]

Wow.

I think it's the opposite. He's doing well despite the poor play of the veterans.

I think the implication is the vets are metoring and supporting him off ice. Just like a coach can suck at playing the sport but be effective in mentoring young kids at it, so can vet players.

 

[foggyvisor]

I know we canned DJ 10 games into the season, but he's been doing well so I think it's time we hired him back.

 

[Big Muddy]

="Micklebot, post: 176087125, member: 102018"
2. Aside from Coburn and Paquette, who I think we were paid a 2nd to take on, why are we shipping out assets, even low cost ones like 4th and 5th round picks, for vets that we don't want to perform?
3. We crowded out some reasonable prospects like Balcers with all these vets, who is now playing in a top 6 role over in SJ and looking good doing so.
4. Lets say Galchenyuk regained his form, could we not push out Stepan or Paquette, If Coburn played well, not really a bad thing since Wolanin hasn't played well and is getting scratched anyways, Reilly is not in the long term plans, we could still run with Chabot, Brannstrom and some hypothetical good version of Coburn. Who would Paquette be pushing out if he was a staple on the 4th line? Anisimov or the human thermostat Haley?

Some people like to kowtow to authority without asking questions, even when's obvious that questions should be asked. I think its just part of the personality of some people.

That's what the Milgram experiment was all about.

Milgram experiment - Wikipedia

 

[Big Muddy]

If they were dynamite, they would be in the lineup

or on another team

LOL.

 

[coladin]

No kidding. But them sucking is in no way a positive.

If they're good you have options. When they suck you don't. You have to play the kids and the vets are dead weight.

Oh, I think it totally is positive that the vets are sucking.

What if , after the start Stepan had with Takchuk, that he pushed Norris down?

This forces management to play the kids, and that is ultimately what we want. Personally, having guys like Coburn and Brown for depth are A OK in my books. Up front, Stepan was rounding into being quite useful before the injury and Anisimov is looking grumpy and uninspired when playing now...almost malignant which is opposite of what a veteran should be.

 

[Alf Silfversson]

Oh, I think it totally is positive that the vets are sucking.

What if , after the start Stepan had with Takchuk, that he pushed Norris down?

This forces management to play the kids, and that is ultimately what we want. Personally, having guys like Coburn and Brown for depth are A OK in my books. Up front, Stepan was rounding into being quite useful before the injury and Anisimov is looking grumpy and uninspired when playing now...almost malignant which is opposite of what a veteran should be.

This is taking spin to a new level.

If the vets are good but so are the prospects, you evaluate whether Norris could fill in for Stepan / Anisimov and you trade the vet for something useful. Franchises do it all the time, it's called dealing from a position of strength. Instead we have our kids playing (yes that is good) but we have nothing good to deal to fill holes on the roster (that is bad).

 

[coladin]

This is taking spin to a new level.

If the vets are good but so are the prospects, you evaluate whether Norris could fill in for Stepan / Anisimov and you trade the vet for something useful. Franchises do it all the time, it's called dealing from a position of strength. Instead we have our kids playing (yes that is good) but we have nothing good to deal to fill holes on the roster (that is bad).

Not spinning anything. That is simply how I see it. The vets have been pushed out by young guys and we all know if a coach feels he can win with a certain lineup that has more vets...they will always dress them.

Happy that Ottawa is not in that scenario. I think Norris overachieving was unexpected. We all knew Stutzle was going to be great, but just in case , Galchenyuk was brought in.
I just see it as being over cautious and planning for every scenario

 

[Sun God Nika]

ewwwwwww

 

[Crosside]

Smith: Life is so much bigger than sports; condolences to the entire Fraser family

 

[Dan Patrick]

I said giving DJ the benefit of the doubt was likely the right call and im glad the team did. Small adjustments and choices aside he has mostly let the good players play and he kept the group positive through a brutal stretch of games. Better teams have completely collapsed because of bad runs of games like the sens had and DJ deserves a ton of the credit for keeping the guys ready for the next game.

 

[swiftwin]

I'm getting Ted Lasso vibes from DJ Smith. He's clearly not an X's and O's guy, but he kept things light and positive, while still holding players accountable during the bleak times of the losing streak. Now we're reaping the benefits. I'm guessing the assistants (Jack Capuano) are the ones doing the nitty gritty X's and O's.

He's exactly the kind of coach we need right now at this stage of the rebuild.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

I'm getting Ted Lasso vibes from DJ Smith. He's clearly not an X's and O's guy, but he kept things light and positive, while still holding players accountable during the bleak times of the losing streak. Now we're reaping the benefits. I'm guessing the assistants (Jack Capuano) are the ones doing the nitty gritty X's and O's.

He's exactly the kind of coach we need right now at this stage of the rebuild.

One of da beauties of DJ is he keeps very very simple messages to players and repeats repeats repeats and then practices same plays over and over and over again ... until they get it ... when you listen to da boys talk they are now all singing from exact same song sheet ... DJ's song sheet

 

[Alf Silfversson]

The early season lineup was god awful. Smith should answer for that.

But those issues have mostly been resolved (albeit some not of Smith's doing) and the team is competing hard. Credit where it is due.

One can't help but wonder where we might be if we'd sent out last night's lineup from the get go. Who knows? The team is fun to watch now though so hopefully the young guys keep improving.

 

[2CHAINZ]

Elite people make adjustments and adapt. DJ has done that and has earned my praise. Props DJ I know you read HF so just wanted you to know.

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

He deserves credit for giving Stutzle lots of rope, not putting too much on him and just letting him play. You can tell he's been harder on Batherson and Norris and rightly so.. I think the balance he shows with the young players is good. I don't agree with benching Brannstrom after he was beat the other night but he may have left that in game to Capuano .. don't know; and don't know if the same situation had been discussed with the player before that one play. He's done a good job at slotting players and establishing roles for the most part.

He definitely made some real eyebrow raising decisions coming out of camp but .. that seems to have work itself out.

 

[aragorn]

The early season lineup was god awful. Smith should answer for that.

But those issues have mostly been resolved (albeit some not of Smith's doing) and the team is competing hard. Credit where it is due.

One can't help but wonder where we might be if we'd sent out last night's lineup from the get go. Who knows? The team is fun to watch now though so hopefully the young guys keep improving.

Goaltending hurt the team in the early stages too, even in some games where the team looked like they were playing well either Murray or Hogberg let in a number of stinkers. No team is going far in the NHL with crappy goaltending as we saw last night with Calgary. Hopefully, Murray has played himself out of it, but we are still waiting to see which backup will end up sticking & playing well if Hogberg can't.

 

[Alf Silfversson]

Goaltending hurt the team in the early stages too, even in some games where the team looked like they were playing well either Murray or Hogberg let in a number of stinkers. No team is going far in the NHL with crappy goaltending as we saw last night with Calgary. Hopefully, Murray has played himself out of it, but we are still waiting to see which backup will end up sticking & playing well if Hogberg can't.

Definitely. It's hard to say how well we would have performed with how bad the goaltending was. At the same time it's hard to accurately assess your goaltending when your defensive play is a complete tire fire 90% of the time. Chicken or egg?

Progress is being made it seems, so as long as we continue to improve I'm good with some glitches. For example the breakout still leaves the players confused more than is normal, but they're battling through it.

 

[Answer]

Hot take coming in...

He is still a bad Coach. He at times still seems stubborn. Most of his changes and adjustments are after the fact, when he could've made them way earlier.

Only thing positive about him is (not even sure if I should call this a positive) the fact that he falls under the "better late than never" category, rather someone who refuses to change his ways.

 

[OD99]

Hot take coming in...

He is still a bad Coach. He at times still seems stubborn. Most of his changes and adjustments are after the fact, when he could've made them way earlier.

Only thing positive about him is (not even sure if I should call this a positive) the fact that he falls under the "better late than never" category, rather someone who refuses to change his ways.

My opinion on this hasn't changed as I don't think that DJ is a blind idiot.

His boss brought in a bunch of vets, far too many for some reason, and gave up assets to get them. He was somewhat forced to play these guys early in the season to appease his boss but once he proved they were not going to be positive contributors he inserted the youngsters more and more and now we are here.

Stepan was improving and in a tough situation with his family not being here so I expect he gave him time to get his head together - now he had his D sorted out and with Stepan gone we may see Logan get his shot. If he shows some compete and flashes his skill I anticipate he gets an extended look.

If he doesn't compete then I am ready to cut bait.

Either way, I think DJ ultimately played his hand well and hopefully he now gets even more support from GMPD.