Line Combos: HFBoards Decides: Opening Lineup - Olli Maatta

[Randy Butternubs]

Time to get started on the defense.

Some assumptions, as of 8/24/2015:

• Fehr will not start the season.
• David Perron is a left winger.
• Scuderi is staying. So is Lovejoy.
• Dumoulin would not survive waivers and will stay in the NHL.
• Clendening, Erixson, and Andersen have a chance to pass through waivers and one will be the 6th or 7th defenseman.
• Sundqvist has a chance to start in the NHL.
• Fleury is the starting goalie.
• Letang is on the first D pairing on the right side.
• Maatta will play on the left side of whatever pairing he is on.

I will add more assumptions as the HFBoards lineup is decided. You don't like these assumptions? Too bad.

On defense, we will now decide where Maatta plays. Which pairing does he play on? The top one with Letang? Or have him anchor his own pairing?

Voting for this one shall last for two days.

Objections?

Current HFBoards Lineup:

XXX-Crosby-Hornqvist
XXX-Malkin-Kessel
XXX-XXX-XXX
XXX-XXX-XXX

XXX-Letang
XXX-XXX
XXX-XXX
XXX

Fleury
XXX

Should've done this during the Bylsma years and sent it to him.

Click to read more...

 

[xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

With Letang. I'd rather have one very strong (hopefully) pairing than two pedestrian pairings with our best d-men being dragged down by their partners.

 

[Randy Butternubs]

Oh. I should note that if Maatta is not on his own pairing, Ian Cole will automatically be placed on the second pairing. I'm having some trouble remembering, but he plays on the left side, correct?

 

[Klifton]

Maatta should play with Letang. We need to go into the season with at least ONE D pairing that isn't a ?.

 

[Burgs]

Määttä needs to play with Letang because that should be our top pairing for the next seven years. Might as well start now, and keep them together through whatever growing pains there may be. But I think they will complement each other extremely well given their respective skillsets and attitudes. About the only big thing missing between these two is a great slap shot.

 

[Zero Pucks]

Put him with Letang. Probably should have at least one defensive pairing that isn't going to suck complete balls.

 

[Jacob]

I'd rather not put all my eggs in one basket.

 

[DegenX]

Oh. I should note that if Maatta is not on his own pairing, Ian Cole will automatically be placed on the second pairing. I'm having some trouble remembering, but he plays on the left side, correct?

Lefty who plays on the right side.

 

[Shady Machine]

I'm torn on this one. Ideally Letang and Maatta should anchor their own pairs. I just don't know if we have anyone else good enough to play 20 minutes ES with Letang.

So I guess I'll vote with Letang, but tinker later on in the season and hopefully someone emerges so they can be separated for the playoffs.

 

[Asuna]

Does anyone think in the future, Pouliot-Letang would be a good pairing?

 

[systemsgo]

With Letang. We have to have a "safe" pairing on the team that can eat the toughest minutes.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

They need to anchor their own pairs.

The concerns about complementary players floundering on the 1st pairing confuses me, because they'd be more sheltered playing with Letang than they would be if you put two of them together to be exposed on the 2nd pairing.

Our 2nd pair invariably looks like garbage no matter what combination we throw out there if Maatta and Letang are together.

Further, Maatta's too good to be relegated to "Letang's stay at home partner".

 

[Shady Machine]

Does anyone think in the future, Pouliot-Letang would be a good pairing?

No. I think their styles are too similar. Maatta-Letang is the best fit of what we have. If Cole can take the next step, I would be comfortable with him there. Possibly Dumo.

 

[Penguinator]

I'm torn on this one. Ideally Letang and Maatta should anchor their own pairs. I just don't know if we have anyone else good enough to play 20 minutes ES with Letang.

So I guess I'll vote with Letang, but tinker later on in the season and hopefully someone emerges so they can be separated for the playoffs.

Pretty much this for me too but i'll wait for more input from others before voting.

If one of either Pouliot or Dumoulin steps up i'd be inclined to seperate Letang from Maatta without a second thought.

 

[Shady Machine]

They need to anchor their own pairs.

The concerns about complementary players floundering on the 1st pairing confuses me, because they'd be more sheltered playing with Letang than they would be if you put two of them together to be exposed on the 2nd pairing.

Our 2nd pair invariably looks like garbage no matter what combination we throw out there if Maatta and Letang are together.

Further, Maatta's too good to be relegated to "Letang's stay at home partner".

I understand your points, but disagree on two fronts. 1.) Do you really think playing upwards of 20 minutes ES ice time against the other team's top offensive players is sheltered? I'd rather Cole, for example, play 15 minutes ES with Pouliot or even Lovejoy against 2nd and 3rd offensive lines (in terms of being sheltered, at least).

2.) Why does playing Maatta 25 minutes a night mean that he is relegated to "Letang's stay at home partner"? Teams play their top 2 guys together all of the time and one of them isn't just chilling at the redline the whole time. Lidstrom-Rafalski, Suter/Josi-Weber come to mind.

IF Cole can hack it with Letang, I want Maatta on his own pair for balance sake. I guess I just think Cole with Letang is a bigger risk to him getting exposed by playing too much than the alternative.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

I understand your points, but disagree on two fronts. 1.) Do you really think playing upwards of 20 minutes ES ice time against the other team's top offensive players is sheltered? I'd rather Cole, for example, play 15 minutes ES with Pouliot or even Lovejoy against 2nd and 3rd offensive lines.

2.) Why does playing Maatta 25 minutes a night mean that he is relegated to "Letang's stay at home partner"? Teams play their top 2 guys together all of the time and one of them isn't just chilling at the redline the whole time. Lidstrom-Rafalski, Suter/Josi-Weber come to mind.

1. Nobody on this team averages 20+ ES minutes per. Letang was the highest last year at 18:54. Assuming Maatta takes over the bulk of Martin's workload, our #3 and #4 defensemen will probably both see something in the 17 minute range no matter how they're configured.

2. Letang's a very good defenseman, but he's clearly more of a riverboat gambler than the #1s mentioned here. That necessitates somebody willing to stay back on those frequent up-ice rushes.

 

[Zero Pucks]

Does anyone think in the future, Pouliot-Letang would be a good pairing?

Why would we put our two best puck movers on the same line?

 

[Asuna]

Why would we put our two best puck movers on the same line?

Dunno, it was just a thought.

 

[Speaking Moistly]

I love that gif, so Penguins it hurts and Maatta's reaction is golden.

Either, neither will end up working badly. ML gives you a great 1st pairing with a questionable 2nd pairing. Splitting them up spreads the wealth but the 1st pairing won't be as great. This isn't something that they can get horribly wrong.

If only they hadn't traded that awful fat guy. Hopefully Maatta spent some of the offseason working on his skating.

Does anyone think in the future, Pouliot-Letang would be a good pairing?

No. I think that Letang tends to freak out when he's expected to do the lion's share of something and Pouliot would force him to do that with defense. Plus those two are something that should be split up to spread the wealth and to allow both of them to play their game. Unless they're both wingers on the same line...

 

[Jacob]

The Blackhawks just won the Stanley Cup with 4 1/2 d-men and they did it by separating their two best guys almost entirely. Though their secondary guys in Oduya and Hjalmarsson are better than ours, Cole or Lovejoy/Dumoulin/Gonchar.

 

[systemsgo]

The Blackhawks just won the Stanley Cup with 4 1/2 d-men and they did it by separating their two best guys almost entirely. Though their secondary guys in Oduya and Hjalmarsson are better than ours, Cole or Lovejoy/Dumoulin/Gonchar.

I don't want to make it sound like I'm majorly pimping Hjalmarsson yet again, but he completely outplayed Seabrook last year. It's why he was moved up and Seabrooks moved down. They did not split their best guys up, in fact they made a switch mid-season to make sure their best guys played together.

Don't believe me? Check out their best player votes yourself: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showthread.php?t=1936483

 

[The Greatest 101]

The hawks reunited Keith and Seabrook in the finals though.

 

[PensBandwagonerNo272*]

I'd like them seperated at least to start the season just to provide some balance throughout the pairings. There is going to be a lot of inexperience on the blue line at the start so even though Olli isn't a vet or anything he has the poise of a vet and can anchor his own line.

Maatta - Letang is our #1 pair in general for a long time though.

 

[Shady Machine]

1. Nobody on this team averages 20+ ES minutes per. Letang was the highest last year at 18:54. Assuming Maatta takes over the bulk of Martin's workload, our #3 and #4 defensemen will probably both see something in the 17 minute range no matter how they're configured.

2. Letang's a very good defenseman, but he's clearly more of a riverboat gambler than the #1s mentioned here. That necessitates somebody willing to stay back on those frequent up-ice rushes.

Good call on the ES numbers. I was just approximating. I do think with Martin and Ehrhoff gone, Letang's ES ice time will increase.

I just don't know that I trust Cole or Dumo to play that many minutes with Letang.

That said, I don't have a strong preference either way, so it's a toss up to me.

 

[PensBandwagonerNo272*]

I think Cole - Letang could be really good.