revisionist history at its worst...
fact remains, the core he started with, with nothing but minor depth tweaks, managed seasons of 63pts (in 48 games, =to a 107pt season), 100pts and 110 pts... playing in 34 playoff games, with 17 po wins while winning 3 playoff series.
this site gave us the 8th best prospect pool in the fall 2012... i've seen a top-5 ranking by another publication in 2014...
Since then... we've had two of the worst seasons in franchise history, won 1 playoff round in 5 years, missing the PO's alltogether in 3 of the past 4.
Once his moves, and prospect development started to slowly pick apart that solid core he inherited, we started to decline... only 2 players remaining from when he started with the org at this point... and very few of the picks he used in his first few seasons working out (only galch & lek becoming NHL regulars from 3x 1st, 5x 2nd & 4x3rd round picks in his first 3 drafts).
Your memory appears to be either highly selective, or perhaps failing
in complete contrast to your misguided rant, last year's outcome was precisely predicted by several of us last fall... Good enough to just miss or just make the PO's if everything goes largely in our favor... which it did. We were exactly who many of us thought we were "best non-playoff team" was the predictable worst-case scenario that was strongly likely given our roster situation.
While you may prefer the "everything is awesome" head-in-the-sand approach, some of us prefer to discuss and debate what's actually happening with the organization. No one will be bang on all the time in their forecasting, nor do most posters posture that way to my experience.
MB's tenure happens to be a textbook case of poor management practices... applicable to most industries really... even if we ignore the terrible results, especially since his stamp has fully marked the roster, the litany of ex-employees with negative things to say (which, in pro sports, is a very bad sign as athletes and coaches largely tend to shy away from burning bridges because of the very public scrutiny). No hfboard made up these comments, though some fans seem very content to ignore them.
appreciating or understanding nuance surely doesn't mean turning a blind eye to things... after 8 years, MB has established through his actions and behaviors that he is not suited to be an NHL GM. No amount of "nuance" can erase the body of work.
It doesn't "need" to be any way...
just like any industry or pursuit, there are best practices. they don't guarantee success, because life doesn't work that way in any arena, but there are things organizations can do to improve the odds of success, and there are things organizations can do that erode the odds of success.
the issue isn't whether or not to trade Price, or Weber. It's not whether this trade or that trade was a win/loss. It's not whether player X that i like/dislike gets traded or re-signed... Habs need to decide what they want, define a strategy to get there, and then show the discipline and courage to follow it (whether they publicly share it or not). That's what I'd like to see, and i recognize that many other posters feel the same way.
I'd personally like the sport franchise I cheer for to be committed to building a winning team, one that can go on a run of several years where they are a strong favorite to reach the cup finals. That's the goal i'd like to see the team prioritize. How they then decide to pursue that will never fit exactly to how I or any one person thinks is "best", and that's not cause for criticism.
This bs one-foot-in/one-foot-out approach, on the other hand, definitely is imo. It is cowardly, inept, and reflects a leadership group that doesn't know how to achieve success, or worse, thinks that being in the job that they are in and keeping it IS the success they are after... either way, it shows in their approach and in the results... and that's why there's been a lot more, and steadily growing negativity on the boards. More of a "critical" consensus than I have seen since i started posting here (far too long ago lol)
The Gainey era (of which personally I wasn't a big fan) had supporters and detractors and to my recollection, it was at best split if not slightly more people feeling positive about his tenure at the time... The Gauthier stint soured many (and that mostly due to his personality & association to the pro scouting that landed us Gomez rather than any significant reflection on his tenure... it was too short for that) but MB's arrival was met with pretty consensus optimism... optimism that persisted even when he brought in Therrien, whom most of us knew was destined to fail. IMO, even though i disliked the Therrien hiring, MB's first summer of roster moves was excellent (despite not getting the top-6 & top-4 upgrades that we needed to set us up to cup contend)... he "overpaid" for Prust, but at the time, Prust was exactly what our roster needed and I'd argue strongly that it remains one of his best signings/roster moves. Armstrong and Bouillion weren't game changers, but a GM that manages to add to veteran guys that have a strong relationship with his new coach was an excellent management decision... supporting MT in establishing his culture (for better or worse). At the time, I happily posted my support as such.
I started to see MB's lack of competence as a GM by his second summer... and by the third it seemed pretty clear he was out of his league. Given that the on-ice immediate results were still very positive (riding on the coattails of PK, Price & the rest of the core inherited), the vast majority of this board stayed quite supportive through that time... i was regularly bombarded with opposition anytime i posted a critique of his decisions... FFWD a few more seasons of the same incompetence, and now were at a point were there is a pretty large segment of the board that has had enough...
You can call that lack of nuance... I call it delayed realization/awareness... but don't worry, if Molson keeps it up, you'll have another 4-5 years to come around, and surely once he's messed up the current "top-10 prospect pool" and "great young core", even his staunchest fans will have to face the reality of his limited capabilities.
