Post-Game Talk: Game IX Loss to Quacks: We didnt deserve to win that

[AuroraBorealis]

Wish we coulda stolen Ullmark.

 

[Super Duper]

1. Teach EK to play defense "the right way"
2. Have the same excuses for reporters after every loss, they always buy into it
3. Every goalie we play is Vezina calibre
4. Power plays are for losers, don't score on them.
5. Rakell belongs on Pp 1 and a line with Malkin, nobody Is allowed to say otherwise or else
6. Our goaltending is shit but who cares, we have high xGF%
7. Carter gets far more play time than he deserves
8. Evgeni Malkin gets to shoot every power play. Pass until he gets a clear shot.
9. Screening the opposing goalie is not allowed, it's not very nice
10. Scoring should only come from top 2 lines, and that's okay. Depth is for squares.

Sullivan's guide to success for the team. We just need to TRUST.

 

[LOGiK]

1. Teach EK to play defense "the right way"

Have to stop you at number one...
old dog, new tricks and all that.

 

[Super Duper]

Have to stop you at number one...
old dog, new tricks and all that.

No no, EK obviously doesn't know how to play defense properly, trophies or not. Sully will show him

 

[LOGiK]

No no, EK obviously doesn't know how to play defense properly, trophies or not. Sully will show him

Sully will.... sully will.... hehe....
Sully will *insert _anything_* and I gotta
Man I haaaaaaaate that guy =]

 

[Honour Over Glory]

The only team that deserves to win is the one that wins and the Pens are not deserving of the sympathy bullshit regardless of how much we like some of the players and bitch about the ones that are more affected by the shitty coaching than the elite talent that is still surviving regardless of it.

Defense sucks cry cry cry
Goalies suck cry cry cry


The f***ing coach actually sucks, that's the main fact anyone should be focused on but Pens media would have you believe it's the players 6yrs straight that are to blame because common denominators are where you lean hard into the ignorance.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Wish we coulda stolen Ullmark.

Vejmelka + Schmaltz for Granlund, Pickering and the 2023 1st. That would have been dope.

 

[AuroraBorealis]

Vejmelka + Schmaltz for Granlund, Pickering and the 2023 1st. That would have been dope.

Hell, I'd add a few pieces to swing that one.

 

[Zbynek]

Vejmelka + Schmaltz for Granlund, Pickering and the 2023 1st. That would have been dope.

That was the asking price on Vejmelka alone basically (factoring in the cost of shipping out Granny). But yea, Pens should have coughed up assets on a goalie.

 

[JTG]

This team still has no identity. You have 4 old stars and then a bunch of boring.

 

[DearDiary]

I just want to drop this quote by the Ducks head coach in regards to the Pens

"Their power play is red hot. I don’t want to give them a power play."

 

[Zbynek]

Geno is too obsessed with being the top dog. He has to let EK QB the power play.

This is the worst post in the whole thread. Where is your brain my Swedish friend?

 

[molon labe]

At least Geno looks to be trying. Cranking shots even when they're not good ones. He appears to care.

Letang looks like he's out there every shift trying to prove that he can also do what EK can do (when he can not). System is garbage for this roster and the roster is garbage after the top 6. Several additional moves need to be made and it just makes you wonder whether they'll even bother.

TSN making fun of Dubas in the most passive aggressive way and it doesn't seem to bother him. Talking about blowing up the roster and the core being old - the same old narrative from people who don't watch the Pens. Sid/Geno are literally the only reason this team isn't going for a new NHL record in losses.

Jarry and Sully are a match made in heaven.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

If Geno were obsessed with being the top dog, he'd have left the organization about a dozen years ago.

 

[Coastal Kev]

Following the model of the Red Wings team that refused reality and ended up with a dozen year rebuild that's just now starting to make headway. Can't wait!

There was someone who drew this comparison in 19………oops it was me!! I’m so pretty

 

[Sidgeni Malkby]

I think every other goalie the Pens have had, including Zatkoff would have stopped that breakaway goal last night. We had Murrs glove hand and Fleury's snow angels...but at least they could make the big stop or breakaway stone cold. Jarry is just the definition of unclutch. Can't make a single big save. All the tie goals and backbreakers are always 1 on 1 with clear lanes. I'm not going to outright blame him for that breakaway goal but my goodness he can't make a damn stop (earlier) to keep us in a sloppy game. How many times did we say this before? If all he was ever going to be was an average guy who just plays to the team in front of him, why the F did we lock him up? We literally need a guy who can make a big save when our old team plays bad. He had/has zero body of evidence to support a single iota of clutch. Getting embarrassing.

I brought this up during his signing.

Consensus was Jarry has NEVER won a BIG game in his career. We need Nedel to come back and hopefully take the reigns like Samsonov did in TO.

Liverpool is up and in the running for top 4 finish this year.... FA/europa as well...
Penguins are a little different situation than they were in though.

Penguins got EK.... and for the life of me, it was THE WRONG MOVE...
Needed a goalie, needed youth.... needed a few things and were not addressed.

Did talk about getting Hellebuyck over EK. Issue was Winnipeg wasn't really going to trade him. Besides that who else do you think they could have realistically gotten?

I definitely would have preferred signing Jarry on a "prove it to me" deal with enough room to get 2 other backups fighting (aka a Samsonov). Dubas basically Murray-ed us with Jarry.

We did try and get Chychrun last year. Maybe Dubas would have made it work vs Hextall.

Youth...
- You can't get a 21-26 as they are all RFA, and very difficult to trade for.
- The UFAs were all you can get are 27+. I get Tyler Bertuzzi could have been an option over Smith, but then again, Smith isn't a problem here.
- The last option was the draft, but then we would have to wait 2-3 years for them to become viable players, which ultimately means after Sid/Geno/Letang retire. At that point, we might as well have sold them all off.

So I don't know how you were expecting us to get youth.

It's astonishing how mentally weak the Penguins are. I understand them being outskated, outhustled, outcompeted, outmuscled, etc. You know, the usual stuff with aging teams. But a team that has so many veterans, people with Cup rings and tons of clutch playoff performances shouldn't fall apart at the first signs of adversity time after time. I get that having a goalie like Jarry can be deflating but it's not just that, the offense is also just as un-clutch as the defense and the goaltending.

That's almost Penguins DNA at this point. I don't remember a time when we weren't mentally weak.

 

[Tender Rip]

This team still has no identity. You have 4 old stars and then a bunch of boring.

Anything you can state that succinctly IS an identity.

 

[LOGiK]

I brought this up during his signing.

Consensus was Jarry has NEVER won a BIG game in his career. We need Nedel to come back and hopefully take the reigns like Samsonov did in TO.


Did talk about getting Hellebuyck over EK. Issue was Winnipeg wasn't really going to trade him. Besides that who else do you think they could have realistically gotten?

I definitely would have preferred signing Jarry on a "prove it to me" deal with enough room to get 2 other backups fighting (aka a Samsonov). Dubas basically Murray-ed us with Jarry.

We did try and get Chychrun last year. Maybe Dubas would have made it work vs Hextall.

Youth...
- You can't get a 21-26 as they are all RFA, and very difficult to trade for.
- The UFAs were all you can get are 27+. I get Tyler Bertuzzi could have been an option over Smith, but then again, Smith isn't a problem here.
- The last option was the draft, but then we would have to wait 2-3 years for them to become viable players, which ultimately means after Sid/Geno/Letang retire. At that point, we might as well have sold them all off.

So I don't know how you were expecting us to get youth.


That's almost Penguins DNA at this point. I don't remember a time when we weren't mentally weak.

We need youth. Trust in my process... that is all you need to know.

 

[JTG]

Anything you can state that succinctly IS an identity.

Right now our identity is purely perimeter. That's all I got. We aren't tough to play against. We don't punish teams whatsoever. Even if this team were success in the regular season, they'd get smoked in the playoffs.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Team's just cooked, man. They have been for years. Can't get much worse than the bottom of the conference. That's the way it goes when your scouting/drafting/development has been as piss poor as it's been since 2016, and there's a constant mentality of "win now at all costs, f*** tomorrow"--which is probably the correct approach when you have a Crosby and Malkin in your organization, but not when the guy's you're targeting with reckless abandon are Kap, Zucker, Brassard, etc. Spending futures to maximize the era is one thing, hemorrhaging assets chasing 3rd liners is something else entirely.

So there's no reason *not* to just swing wildly and change shit up. Fire Sullivan, even if it's after the season. Actually be f***ing proactive for once instead of hanging on to a guy for too long and move Jake after working the phones for a few months to find the best possible deal for a team in this position (rebuild kicking down the door, no chance at ever competing again in the Sid/Geno era, etc). Continue to remove and replace scouts at both pro and amateur levels to weed out the people responsible for this team's drafting and FA signings/trades for the last however long.

I'm not worried about the post-Sid years. This team's already f***ing miserable, and anybody who thinks they're still able to contend--even with changes--is just drunk on the Penguins brand Kool-Aid. I've watched the post-Jagr/pre-Sid Penguins and it was hilarious and charming in its own way, even if it sucked. Shit, it was easier to root for a buncha schlubs who gave it their all but sucked at hockey than it was to get invested in this group of arrogant, unlikable robots from FSG to the coaching staff.

Bring on the rebuild. Start things off by trying to fleece somebody in a Jake trade.

 

[LOGiK]

Right now our identity is purely perimeter. That's all I got. We aren't tough to play against. We don't punish teams whatsoever. 1 Even if this team were success in the regular season, 2they'd get smoked in the playoffs.

1, It used to be the concern was being good enough to go deep into the post season.
2, Now, concern is flat out not even being good enough to make the postseason.

 

[Dennis Reynolds]

1. Teach EK to play defense "the right way"

Sully routinely says stupid things. We're all used to them after every loss. But this one actually made my jaw drop.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Sully routinely says stupid things. We're all used to them after every loss. But this one actually made my jaw drop.

Dude, reading it, I thought it was a satire from somebody in here. It's unfathomable to me that a coach, even Sullivan. would take one of the best offensive/transition d-men of all time and think he could improve or fix his game. Just an unreal amount of ego, enough to rival Jagr's.

 

[LOGiK]

I've watched the post-Jagr/pre-Sid Penguins and it was hilarious and charming in its own way, even if it sucked. Shit, it was easier to root for a buncha schlubs who gave it their all but sucked at hockey than it was to get invested in this group of arrogant, unlikable robots from FSG to the coaching staff.

Bring on the rebuild. Start things off by trying to fleece somebody in a Jake trade.

That was a different era of hockey.
Hard nosed, physical, and survival instincts.
The NHL was a much different sport 25 years ago.

Dude, reading it, I thought it was a satire from somebody in here. It's unfathomable to me that a coach, even Sullivan. would take one of the best offensive/transition d-men of all time and think he could improve or fix his game. Just an unreal amount of ego, enough to rival Jagr's.

what did he say, and did anyone call him out on it?

 

[Dennis Reynolds]

what did he say, and did anyone call him out on it?

https://kuklaskorner.com/kuklas-korner-hockey/morning-line-mike-sullivan-on-erik-karlsson

"I think there are areas of his game where we can help him and challenge him to grow defensively." -- Sullivan

It's like - just f*** off, you arrogant moron.

If you're a coach and your team acquires the Norris winner who just put up the most points by a defenseman in 30 years or whatever, you ask him how he wants to play. You don't change one iota of his game.

And we've already seen the results of Sullivan's coaching. Karlsson's creativity looks more neutered every game.