Exactly, what do people here complaining about Molson want him to do? be more activist on hockey ops, hire some new president who will be? You're basically asking for someone to undercut the GM. That always goes so well, having a vaguely defined decision making hierarchy. You're basically asking for Edmonton Oilers style dysfunction.
The major problems on the team come from the drafting drought of 2009-2015, this is not something Geoff Molson has much say in (nor should he). For whatever reason Timmins was kept on, and so was Bergevin instead of being fired in say 2018. The team is now one of the youngest in the league, a lot of U23 talent, all we can do is hope some of them take big steps (like Suzuki) to becoming impact NHLers over the next 1-2 year and things should improve.
Except Bergevin never showed any vision, or ability to actually build a team. So why should we want HIM leading that? Also blaming poor drafting after 7 years at the helm and having 2 3rd OA picks available during your tenure (and another top 10) can't just fall on the previous guys at some point. Good for Bergevin to have failed hard enough that we now have a young team with some talent in it (considering we are failing miserably at both the NHL and AHL level though, this amount of talent might not be as high as some make it out to be around here either). Now put someone better at the helm so that he can do something with a decent foundation. Or are we only supposed to change the GM when the team is in such a state that nothing he can do with it will matter for the next 3-5 years? Bergevin started with a 3rd OA pick and a roster that had a Vezina winner, a Norris winner and a star winger in it. He was weak at center, but he started with a very decent foundation to work with. He failed. Let the next GM start with something half-decent at least.
Subban: How so, please explain. Seems like a good old reach.
Domi's still much better than Galch at the moment, if we had Galch now we'd be in a worse position.
Paccioretty was criticized a ton, he was pissed and he wanted out. He was alright, but his last season was terrible because he wanted out.
He did bad with losing Radulov as a FA, yes. Otherwise I mean it's still the players decisions, can't force anyone to come if they don't want to.
We have a very weak LD, which got very slightly better this year with Chiarot and which should be better next year or the year after with Romanov.
I'm pissed too about the fact that the team has been middle of the pack for awhile. I think, and basically I'm betting, that we're turning a corner next year or the year afterwards with all our prospects coming in and most of our core still ready to play.
No one that knew a bit about hockey expected us to do anything else than try for a 8th place this year with only the addition of Chiarot and Suzuki. We're exactly where most fans envisioned us at the start of the year. If the team can't compete either next year or the one after than we could say the thing failed.
What you and many talking about his "winning trades" seem to be missing, is that if you're looking at improving the team, nearly none of those trades matter.
Pacioretty for Suzuki + Tatar is an excellent trade. This one I'll 100% give him. Tatar is mostly filling Pacioretty's role AND we added real talent at center. Great trade. He deserves props for it. The other one that I believe he deserves props for is Danault. He went and got real talent (ok, not a #1 center, but certainly a decent piece to have in a contending team, be it as an elite shutdown 3rd line center or serviceable #2 center that you can send vs opposition's top line) for picks.
But Subban vs Weber? Ok, Weber might be better than Subban now. But look at the team before, with Subban as an elite #1 D (he did win Norris and was nominated again, hard to argue with that), to with Weber now, who is a solid #1 D although regularly hurt. Is the team better now than it was before the trade because of it? No.
Galchenyuk vs Domi. If you look at LAST year, ya it would have been an improvement. If you look at this year, well Galchenyuk when he was with us was a 40-50 pts winger-center with flaws. Domi is pretty much that right now. Is our team improved? No.
Sergachev vs Drouin? Personally I think it's just a loss because Drouin doesn't look like someone who will ever be consistent, and winger is the least important position in the team while a strong LD is something we so desperately need. Is the team better now because of the trade? No, our LD is the biggest hole in our entire system and our PP struggles mightily, 2 things Sergachev would have helped with a lot more than Drouin.
Most of the "great trades" are simply "maintenance" trades. He traded a player for another one filling mostly the same role, that might be better one for one now (I'd rather have Domi than Galchenyuk currently, and as much as it pains me to say it, probably Weber more than Subban also although this might change year to year because of the age gap) but they did not make the team better than it was before the trade, it only prevented it from degrading. Comparing only the 2 players involved in a trade and saying "our player X is now better than the other team's player Y that we had before" is all nice and good and you can say we "won" the trade! But the team as a whole doesn't improve unless what you get after the trade makes the team better than what you had BEFORE the trade, not what you would have now if the trade was never done. So those trades might have been good and necessary to prevent the team from degrading, but not for improving it.
So if your trades aren't good enough to improve the team, it will improve through draft or UFA/signings. Bergevin did 1 amazing signing in Radulov. Let him go "not to overpay" because clearly we needed the cap space. Which we never used. It was stupid then, I was seriously annoyed by the non-signing (and I do not care if he signed for the same amount in Dallas, we should've overpaid if necessary to keep him. You don't go cheap with your talent, you go cheap with your filler roles. Letting Radulov go to save 1-2M, replacing him with Drouin and losing all our depth at LD in the process, and then turning around to pay 5M for Alzner is exactly what I call a lack of vision. We have worse D and worse winger for more $ in the end). As for draft, we're hoping that 7 years in we're starting to have decent players coming up. 7 years in is a very long time though. And while there's a lot of hype, player development hasn't exactly been a success for a long time. I'd much rather see someone else try to do something with the upcoming talent and start with some sort of foundation than look at MB squander it again and then leave the next guy with a total mess.
