glenngineer
Registered User
Can't really reasonably respond point-by-point, since most of it is leaning on "101 made a bad assertion; all I did was refute it". I'm not disputing that, but there is a wider narrative going on here that I'm attempting to address.
I guess what it ultimately comes down to is that you seem to have two beliefs here:
1) this downslide is going to continue regardless, and
2) a changing of the guard will help with offense drafting and development.
I am not at all convinced of #1; I think it's appeared that way because Poile did badly this offseason, but that doesn't make it a perpetual thing. As for #2, I think that's potentially too extreme of a move, that Poile has managed to do that sort of thing before (it hasn't worked out in Nashville yet, though, admittedly), and that unless he's significantly regressing in performance (which he might be - this past offseason was a big fat warning bell) tossing him out in the hopes that we get someone much like him but better with forwards and smart enough to recognize the situation (a HUGE "if") is doing too much for too little potential return.
Not sure where I had put my beliefs in there and how you came to the two you did but I'll explain my point very simply.
1. You can't compete for the Cup in today's NHL without top talent up front. See past Cup winners.
2. In 15 years of drafting and developing forwards, the best the Preds have done has been Legwand, Erat and Hornqvist.
3. If you take what I said in points 1 and 2, do either of those match up? No.
4. Every person in charge of drafting, developing and coaching has been given more than enough time to prove their worth. We are great at G and D, we suck at F, in the drafting and development aspect of upper end talent. This has to change in order for us to get better.
I look at our team as a roller coaster, never gets too fast because we don't get high enough and the curves aren't really scary at the bottom because we never get too low. If you look at a scale of 1-10 we are right in the point of being a 3-7. We never suck enough to get high picks and we never are good enough to make a push in the playoffs. We never find that gem of a forward later in the first round or later in the draft.
So all that said, the current regime has been unable to get us there for whatever reason. Time to move on.