Do the Canucks need a shakeup?

[VanTampaFan]

Yes. We need to convert some of our wingers into a legitiate top 6 scorer that can carry the 2nd line. Getting the rest of our second line back would be pretty useful too.

 

[DustyMartellaughs]

I can't believe 65 people voted NO!!!

 

[vanuck]

Shakeup? Looking more like a breakup than anything now (with a certain someone).

 

[StIllmatic]

I voted no, the day this poll took place. If it is possible, I would like to change my vote only because I want to see AV fired.

 

[PG Canuck]

I can't believe 65 people voted NO!!!

That was back when there wasn't need for a full panic mode. If you redo this poll, guarantee it drastically changes in votes.

 

[7thGuest]

Cam Charron from Canucks Army wrote an excellent article to address this. Take a look and may be you will feel better

http://canucksarmy.com/2013/3/19/in-praise-of-the-process-and-the-vancouver-and-san-jose-models

 

[Virtanen2Horvat]

The only way this team is gonna wake up is if they start losing bad. They need a new coach that's going to get in there face and wake them up. Gillis needs to do something at the deadline.

 

[Snatcher Demko]

Cam Charron from Canucks Army wrote an excellent article to address this. Take a look and may be you will feel better

http://canucksarmy.com/2013/3/19/in-praise-of-the-process-and-the-vancouver-and-san-jose-models

This is a great article.

And I agree with most of it. No need to blow up the core. But we do need some minor tweaks to get players that properly complement that core.

But the article stops short of endorsing AV (stays quite neutral for him, other than to say that the Caps blew it by firing Boudreau and changing their game completely).

Charron also talks about the Red Wings, but IMO they are a bit of a special case because:

1. They did have many players who had won a cup previously.
2. They had Lidstrom.

Also, I stand by my assertion that it's AV that needs replacing, by also using Detroit - they lost in the first couple of years since they hired Babcock, but they still dominated in the regular season. IIRC they won the Cup in his 3rd year. AV OTOH has been here for 7 years, long in the tooth by most standards.

Of course injuries have been huge this year.

But to me (and others) the team has struggled to score for well over a year now, relying on elite goaltending, and were completely outclassed by the Kings in the playoffs. Add in head-scratching personnel decisions, and going back to the same breakouts even when we don't seem to have the personnel to successfully implement it......

Perhaps if we can add a guy like Visnovsky who has a great hockey IQ, when this team gets healthy it can do better under AV's system and we can take a decent run at it before throwing in the towel on him.

 

[vanuck]

I don't know if it was completely neutral. It's a nice article but his presupposition that firing the coach plus trading away the big contracts on D might leave us in an even worse position is a bit of a strawman. Why do they both have to happen? Seems a little disingenuous to me.

Edit: I think it gets even clearer what he thinks when you see comment #10.

 

[Royal Canuck]

A small shake-up, a 3rd Line Center.

 

[BoHorvatFan]

Cam Charron from Canucks Army wrote an excellent article to address this. Take a look and may be you will feel better

http://canucksarmy.com/2013/3/19/in-praise-of-the-process-and-the-vancouver-and-san-jose-models

Cam Charron had 30,000 posts on CDC. His opinion is completely irrelevant.

 

[Tiranis]

Cam Charron knows very little about the stats he loves to use so much so it's hard to take his opinion on anything else seriously. Especially when for all the word-count it's an incredibly shallow article.

 

[vanuck]

Cam Charron knows very little about the stats he loves to use so much so it's hard to take his opinion on anything else seriously. Especially when for all the word-count it's an incredibly shallow article.

Having read his stuff in the past and the way he uses numbers to support his opinions I'd say he has been guilty of not seeing the forest for the trees.

 

[BoHorvatFan]

Cam Charron knows very little about the stats he loves to use so much so it's hard to take his opinion on anything else seriously. Especially when for all the word-count it's an incredibly shallow article.

He tries really hard I'll give him that. But for those of us that have seen him post on hockey forums for many years we know he's just an internet forum poster like the rest of us, he admitted he never played a single game of hockey at any age or level. Not that it matters but he has no idea what actually goes on from ice level and anyone can manipulate some numbers on an excel sheet.

I've read some of his stuff and i've never been intrigued or seen anything I didn't already know. I think he'd be better at writing about baseball tbh, a sport where advanced stats actually matter.


I still haven't seen any advanced stats that I would want to use to compare two players from different teams that play different systems. Zone time and possession don't even matter if you don't have the skill to finish, as we're finding out this season.

 

[VeteranNetPresence]

advanced stats are no where near as useful as they are in baseball because there is so many more variable's and unlike baseball it's not a 1v1 situation. you could fire a prayer shot from the half boards and it would count towards a positive corsi

 

[BoHorvatFan]

advanced stats are no where near as useful as they are in baseball because there is so many more variable's and unlike baseball it's not a 1v1 situation. you could fire a prayer shot from the half boards and it would count towards a positive corsi

Yeah there are FAR fewer variables in baseball than in hockey and a lot of the advanced baseball stats aren't even close to being perfect.

 

[Tiranis]

advanced stats are no where near as useful as they are in baseball because there is so many more variable's and unlike baseball it's not a 1v1 situation. you could fire a prayer shot from the half boards and it would count towards a positive corsi

Corsi is a possession stat so I'm not quite clear on what's wrong with that. More and more research is being done into better ways to analyze hockey, which there's some posts on in another thread.

 

[NoRaise4Brackett]

Move AV before anything major. I don't care if Garrison took a few games to get used to a new team, he has an absolute bomb, and it took AV over 25 games to finally let him fire away on the top unit - something that should have only taken a few practices to get him involved like he was in the last game. Especially considering the 0-for-36 PP, and what Garrison did last year with his shot. AV should have been running plays for Garrison's point-shot a long time ago.

AV says Shroeder needs to produce, then he lines him up with Sestito and Weise... and expects production?

I like AV, but his style seems to have gotten stale, like the Canucks have learned everything they can from him (which was substantial)and have hit a wall, or just tune him out now. The defensive breakdowns are brutal and happen way too often. They are well past the point of blaming it on rustiness or having no preseason. I don't think a trade will help much if at all (see Pahlsson), we need more out of the guys we have (which are fully capable of better play) and AV just isn't getting it done. We have a solid veteran team that plays defence like a bunch of rookies, guys standing around watching the puck - leaving guys wide open in our slot when its 5-on5. Guys are busy diving for PP's instead of actually drawing penalties with hard work.

 

[VeteranNetPresence]

Corsi is a possession stat so I'm not quite clear on what's wrong with that. More and more research is being done into better ways to analyze hockey, which there's some posts on in another thread.

but my point is you can't accurately quantify any of these at the moment

“It’s funny because our game looks at numbers just like other games,” says Red Wings general manager Ken Holland, “but as much value as we assign to puck possession and how essential it is to winning, we really don’t have a numerical value for it that everyone can agree on. Remember when [A's general manager] Billy Beane started emphasizing on-base percentage in baseball? It wasn’t just a curious number; it changed the game. It redefined the type of player you wanted on your team. It’s coming in hockey; we just have to figure out how.”

-ken holland on the stats.

 

[Tiranis]

ken holland on the stats.

But as Holland said, it's coming. For now, you have to do with a combination of stats and watching the game, but if you think the stats are useless then you're kidding yourself.

 

[vanuck]

I've read some of his stuff and i've never been intrigued or seen anything I didn't already know. I think he'd be better at writing about baseball tbh, a sport where advanced stats actually matter.

Really now? You being honest? 'Cos I'm not sure you'd be complaining about Booth as much as you do if you had...

 

[NYVanfan]

Honestly, is anyone really that surprised at where we are?

I'd say the team is performing right on expectations overall. The injuries have put us behind where we would have been, which is leading a weak division, but with still lingering scoring depth question marks.

Goalies have alretnated playing above par with below (more of the former), and in all have performed as billed.

D is coming around -- I'd say they've been below expectations as a group, but closing the gap. Edler, Hamhuis and Bieksa have been up & down, tanev has been above expectations and Garrison started slowly but is looking good now.

F, i dont know who I'd call out ...maybe Lapierre for inconsistency and stupid penalties, or Burrows for lagging in the scoring pace..? But Raymond, Higgins and Hansen have been at or above expectations (Hansen has been above)

Really dont know what you'd expect from a shakeup -- they've been working pretty hard, and are performing as expected for a solid but shorthanded team that had scoring deficiencies coming in.

 

[Shanaban]

We lack a top-six forward (Kesler) at the moment, but our lines seem to be getting comfortable without him. (Offtopic)

Back on topic, the Canucks need to keep playing the way they have been for the past five seasons, because the team is in its prime right now, and our veterans are not getting any younger. May as well take advantage of the Sedins consistency before their biological clocks hold them back.

 

[oyvey]

Thinking in the long term, I'd say no, you don't commit to a shake while a piece as important as Kesler is sidelined.

 

[Scurr]

Having read his stuff in the past and the way he uses numbers to support his opinions I'd say he has been guilty of not seeing the forest for the trees.

I agree. He seems to form an opinion and then work the stats to justify it, rather than stepping back and looking at the stats to help form his opinion.