OT: If Dallas Upsets Colorado, Does Jim Nill Get Some Credit? (mod note post #8)

[MBH]

If Dallas upsets Colorado and makes the final four, does Jim Nill get some credit?
In recent years, I and other people who were Nill fans when he was in Detroit have soured on his performance in Dallas.
Clearly, Nill has some flaws.
His drafting hasn't been very good at all.
Outside of Heiskanen, it's hard to find a good first round pick by Nill. Gurianov is kind of debatable, despite a good playoff.
We've yet to see him have a late-round pick go gold, either.

And yet, here they are potentially going to the final 4.
They've made the playoffs 4 of 7 years. They've only had one really awful regular season and they turned that into Heiskanen.
This is their 3rd time in the final 8 in the last five years.

Everyone talked about Nill as a drafter. But really, he seems to have found his niche finding veterans who fit in and keeping his useful guys around.
Among the veterans? Perry. Pavelski. Radulov. Comeau.
Khudobin looks like a starter after having a long journeyman-like career.

I don't know. You look at this lineup, and it just doesn't look like a team built to win.
When they signed Pavelski and Perry, it just seemed like desperation. And yet, here they are.

Click to read more...

 

[Ghost of Ethan Hunt]

I'm not an X's & O's guy, but is it a matter of Dallas playing well or Avs crapping the bed, or some combo of both? Just a bad matchup for COL? Dallas' defensive system too much?

I've never gotten the scary team to play against vibe vs. Dal, not since late 90's, but even then we were better. 3 great F , 2 good young D + Bishop would normally seem like a good core to build around, but Benn, Seguin & Rads aren't exactly known as character/team guys.

 

[deca guard]

If Dallas upsets Colorado and makes the final four, does Jim Nill get some credit?
In recent years, I and other people who were Nill fans when he was in Detroit have soured on his performance in Dallas.
Clearly, Nill has some flaws.
His drafting hasn't been very good at all.
Outside of Heiskanen, it's hard to find a good first round pick by Nill. Gurianov is kind of debatable, despite a good playoff.
We've yet to see him have a late-round pick go gold, either.

And yet, here they are potentially going to the final 4.
They've made the playoffs 4 of 7 years. They've only had one really awful regular season and they turned that into Heiskanen.
This is their 3rd time in the final 8 in the last five years.

Everyone talked about Nill as a drafter. But really, he seems to have found his niche finding veterans who fit in and keeping his useful guys around.
Among the veterans? Perry. Pavelski. Radulov. Comeau.
Khudobin looks like a starter after having a long journeyman-like career.

I don't know. You look at this lineup, and it just doesn't look like a team built to win.
When they signed Pavelski and Perry, it just seemed like desperation. And yet, here they are.

concerning nill as a good drafter : tell me one nhl media member that criticizes ANY nhl brass member ? according to nhl media every gm , coach , scout is a genius . nill drafted like hell forever in detroit but all the buzz was hes a great scout . the press in this kingdom has become a joke , a completely controled propoganda machine of the ruling class . look at all the nhl media in detroit , do they ever criticize anybody ever ?

 

[MBH]

concerning nill as a good drafter : tell me one nhl media member that criticizes ANY nhl brass member ? according to nhl media every gm , coach , scout is a genius . nill drafted like hell forever in detroit but all the buzz was hes a great scout . the press in this kingdom has become a joke , a completely controled propoganda machine of the ruling class . look at all the nhl media in detroit , do they ever criticize anybody ever ?

The press
1) Want access.
2) Want to keep options open to work in PR departments if their newspaper lays them off
3) Are busy working with teams/players/coaches/GMs on books and don't dare jeopardize those relationships.

I had hope for The Athletic.
But it's turned into a pile too.

 

[Ghost of Ethan Hunt]

Tale of the tape:

 

[Unfriendly Ghost]

Heiskanen has really upgraded that team. Defense was a weak point of theirs, suddenly a #1 all situations guy pops right into their laps. He's been incredibly productive this postseason, too.

 

[Winger98]

Mod Note

We've already had this discussion way too many times to merit. If you want to gripe about the athletic paywalls, go find a forum dedicated to it and do it there because this isn't the forum for it. Nothing comes of it. If you want to discuss any article, I would suggest quoting a relevant section (not the whole thing and not several sections), to go with an opinion of the article. Enough for folks to know what you're talking about, which is pretty doable. Most articles can be boiled down to a paragraph, and that's about the length that would probably be considered acceptable for copy/pasting from another site (pay or not) and posting to another forum.

Also, have a link. If you want to mention if it's a paysite or not, mention it, but there is no reason for it to be a considerable portion of your post.

 

[Lil Sebastian Cossa]

If Dallas upsets Colorado and makes the final four, does Jim Nill get some credit?
In recent years, I and other people who were Nill fans when he was in Detroit have soured on his performance in Dallas.
Clearly, Nill has some flaws.
His drafting hasn't been very good at all.
Outside of Heiskanen, it's hard to find a good first round pick by Nill. Gurianov is kind of debatable, despite a good playoff.
We've yet to see him have a late-round pick go gold, either.

And yet, here they are potentially going to the final 4.
They've made the playoffs 4 of 7 years. They've only had one really awful regular season and they turned that into Heiskanen.
This is their 3rd time in the final 8 in the last five years.

Everyone talked about Nill as a drafter. But really, he seems to have found his niche finding veterans who fit in and keeping his useful guys around.
Among the veterans? Perry. Pavelski. Radulov. Comeau.
Khudobin looks like a starter after having a long journeyman-like career.

I don't know. You look at this lineup, and it just doesn't look like a team built to win.
When they signed Pavelski and Perry, it just seemed like desperation. And yet, here they are.

“if a team makes it to the conference finals, should the guy that built the team get credit?”

What? That’s the way sports goes. Coaches, GMs, execs? They get far too much credit for wins and far too much blame for losses.

I don’t understand the premise of this topic. The draft isn’t the only place you get players. You can trade for them or sign them and if you get a good mix of young and old, it doesn’t matter how you do it.

 

[Lil Sebastian Cossa]

Also... what does the media criticizing the team accomplish? You get to satiate your hate boner for a second? I mean, I would lose any respect for any franchise that materially shifts their plan because a media blowhard like Drew Sharp (RIP) or Carlos Monarrez wanted to yell at them.

I always go back to Mike Valenti’s talk about the Lions when they were angry he was ripping them. “If you play well or do good things , I say nice things. If you do poorly or do nasty things, I say mean things.”

E: Respect to Drew Sharp. His writing was an act he played up. He loved being the villain. Kind of like Skip Bayless, where they say/said stuff that clearly they don't believe just to stir shit up.

 

[Henkka]

Jim Nill was lucky to win his Conn Smythe winner Heiskanen in a lottery.

***

But one interesting thing is goaltendeing coach.

Jim Bedard left Red Wings after 2015-16.

After one off-year as Windsor coach, he joined Dallas Stars at 2017-18 and has been there for 3 years.

Highest save Percentages from last 3 seasons combined (over 100 NHL starts)

1. ARI, Darcy Kuemper .924
2. DAL, Ben Bishop .923
3. DAL, Anton Khudobin .922
4. TBL, Andrei Vasilevskiy .921
5. WPG, Connor Hellebuyck .919
6. BOS, Tuukka Rask .919
7. BUF/NYI/CHI/VGK, Robin Lehner .919

 

[Rzombo4 prez]

Heiskanen has really upgraded that team. Defense was a weak point of theirs, suddenly a #1 all situations guy pops right into their laps. He's been incredibly productive this postseason, too.

Go figure

 

[FabricDetails]

Of course the teams that weren't looking so hot during the restart (Stars and Bruins) are now looking really good.

 

[Henkka]

Of course the teams that weren't looking so hot during the restart (Stars and Bruins) are now looking really good.

I saw this that their systems are more complicated and it takes more time to get the chemistries working again.

Simple hockey ruled at first. But you don't win 4 playoff rounds just being simple. Some other teams always smarter/better coached.

 

[GMR]

Not really an upset.

Dallas has a better lineup top to bottom than Colorado. Also, a better mix of veterans and young players. They pushed the Blues to seven games in last year's second round, losing in double OT. They underachieved a bit before the stoppage, but on paper they're a formidable opponent.

Let's hope MacKinnon wants out and we can get him for Abby, Helm, Zadina, and a pick.

 

[Bench]

They have a sneaky great blueline outside of Miro, and that's really been the difference.

Signing Klingberg very early to his contract was brilliant. He's way outperformed that deal. It was a risk at the time, but Nill seemed to know what he had. All eyes are on Miro, but Klingberg is really the 1B on that roster.

And then you have Lindell as probably one of the most underrated defenders in the league. He's basically everything we wanted DeKeyser to be.

You combine a great blueline with great goaltending and then if Jamie Benn decides to show up they can beat any team in the league. But you know, Benn deciding to show up is always a dubious prospect.

Jamie Benn is the reality of how some of you guys viewed Franzen. Literally the most frustrating player I've followed in a long time.

 

[Henkka]

Jamie Benn was just earning 13 million per year. His salary drops to 9M at next season.

 

[MBH]

“if a team makes it to the conference finals, should the guy that built the team get credit?”

What? That’s the way sports goes. Coaches, GMs, execs? They get far too much credit for wins and far too much blame for losses.

I don’t understand the premise of this topic. The draft isn’t the only place you get players. You can trade for them or sign them and if you get a good mix of young and old, it doesn’t matter how you do it.

The premise is simple.
Do you believe in this team build by Nill?
Does he deserve credit for it?

Or is this just some last gasp of a dying team that's going to flounder for a long time because of Nill's poor drafts.

 

[Bench]

The premise is simple.
Do you believe in this team build by Nill?
Does he deserve credit for it?

Or is this just some last gasp of a dying team that's going to flounder for a long time because of Nill's poor drafts.

He's been GM there for over 7 years. He's fully responsible for their fate.

He's done a good, not great job. Goaltending was fixed in his tenure. The blueline is great. He's added impact players to the forward group as needed.

But most of the issues the Stars have are that their best two players are Benn and Seguin. You could not create a more mentally fragile and immature dynamic duo if you tried. Incredibly talented but lack all of the drive, effort, and subsequent polish that made Datsyuk and Zetterberg special.

If I was him, I would have at least tried to move one of them previously. You can bear one of those guys, but not two as your pillars.

 

[Lil Sebastian Cossa]

The premise is simple.
Do you believe in this team build by Nill?
Does he deserve credit for it?

Or is this just some last gasp of a dying team that's going to flounder for a long time because of Nill's poor drafts.

He built the team that is doing this. Of course he should get credit. And if the team gets stuck in the morass from his moves, he should get credit for that too.

I neither believe nor disbelieve in the Stars. I couldn’t give a f*** less about the Dallas Stars. I know that for a team that is supposedly staring a morass in the face, they’ve sure got a lot of young to youngish talent (Seguin, Klingberg, Lindell, Heiskanen) along with some currently pretty good veteran guys (Radulov, Benn)

With the realities of the cap... you’ve got a window to make noise of about 5 years. Then, you’ve got major retooling to do even if you’ve done a good job building a contending roster. I guess I just wonder about what fixating on what a guy who hasn’t done a thing for the Red Wings in 7 years has to do with anything.

 

[MBH]

He's been GM there for over 7 years. He's fully responsible for their fate.

He's done a good, not great job. Goaltending was fixed in his tenure. The blueline is great. He's added impact players to the forward group as needed.

But most of the issues the Stars have are that their best two players are Benn and Seguin. You could not create a more mentally fragile and immature dynamic duo if you tried. Incredibly talented but lack all of the drive, effort, and subsequent polish that made Datsyuk and Zetterberg special.

If I was him, I would have at least tried to move one of them previously. You can bear one of those guys, but not two as your pillars.

Pavelski is a monster right now.
He always is in the playoffs.
But honestly, moving Seguin (Benn has made himself untradeable)... what do you have left?
Credit to Bowness too... He was just supposed to be some hapless old guy, according to the scuttlebutt I heard after Montgomery was removed.

Some of these guys have it too good, maybe. The lifestyle is just too easy.

 

[MBH]

He built the team that is doing this. Of course he should get credit. And if the team gets stuck in the morass from his moves, he should get credit for that too.

I neither believe nor disbelieve in the Stars. I couldn’t give a f*** less about the Dallas Stars. I know that for a team that is supposedly staring a morass in the face, they’ve sure got a lot of young to youngish talent (Seguin, Klingberg, Lindell, Heiskanen) along with some currently pretty good veteran guys (Radulov, Benn)

With the realities of the cap... you’ve got a window to make noise of about 5 years. Then, you’ve got major retooling to do even if you’ve done a good job building a contending roster. I guess I just wonder about what fixating on what a guy who hasn’t done a thing for the Red Wings in 7 years has to do with anything.

You are always so hostile.

Nill has a long history in Detroit. Just like we were always interested in Tampa when Yzerman was there.

I'm curious what people think of the job he's doing.

For a long time, he benefitted from the "grass is always greener" mentality that others, including me, use.
But I honestly thought he was flailing in the last offseason with his acquisitions to an aging team. I look at his draft history and I see miss after miss.
And yet, I see a half-decent record and a team 2 wins from final four.

It's just interesting to me.

 

[DetroitRed]

Dallas has certainly come a long way in the last couple of seasons even if they don't pull off the upset. I was marveling over that last night, so I'm glad you brought it up. I wouldn't be surprised to see the Stars in the conference finals.

I always felt like it wasn't so much Nill alone or Holland alone over here, but the combination of the two which led to success. Likewise, I do believe Nill has been a part of Dallas' recent progress, but I don't think anyone would credit him with more than that, partly for reasons you mentioned. Also though, Dallas has gone through a rocky phase recently, which is somewhat why so many people find their new success remarkable. I'm glad to see Nill get it straightened out, though.

 

[PullHard]

I think he's been very human and you could probably write an essay about all of his misfires, but a lot of this roster is his work, as has been stated he's been there for over 7 years - he absolutely deserves the lion's share of the credit

 

[OgeeOgelthorpe]

Jim Nill was lucky to win his Conn Smythe winner Heiskanen in a lottery.

***

But one interesting thing is goaltendeing coach.

Jim Bedard left Red Wings after 2015-16.

After one off-year as Windsor coach, he joined Dallas Stars at 2017-18 and has been there for 3 years.

Highest save Percentages from last 3 seasons combined (over 100 NHL starts)

1. ARI, Darcy Kuemper .924
2. DAL, Ben Bishop .923
3. DAL, Anton Khudobin .922
4. TBL, Andrei Vasilevskiy .921
5. WPG, Connor Hellebuyck .919
6. BOS, Tuukka Rask .919
7. BUF/NYI/CHI/VGK, Robin Lehner .919

...Shit.

Howard's goaltending has kind of been in the trash since Bedard left. It didn't even occur to me that Bedard leaving may have played a part in it.

Where do the Wings rank on that save percentage list over the last 3 years? And where did they rank the last 3 years of Bedard's stay in Detroit? I think that would be pretty telling.

 

[Henkka]

...Shit.

Howard's goaltending has kind of been in the trash since Bedard left. It didn't even occur to me that Bedard leaving may have played a part in it.

Where do the Wings rank on that save percentage list over the last 3 years? And where did they rank the last 3 years of Bedard's stay in Detroit? I think that would be pretty telling.

After Jim Nill went to Dallas:

Stars general SV% (from 2013-14 season to 2016-17) 90.09% (NHL-worst on that period)
Jim Bedard joins...
Stars general SV% (from 2017-18 to 2020) 91.74% (NHL-best for last 3 seasons, first season is average, huge results after 1 year of development)

Red Wings general SV% (from 2013 season to 2016) 91.03% (18th-best 13th-worst on that period, kind of NHL-average)
Jim Bedard leaves...
Red Wings general SV% (from 2016-17 to 2020) 89.87% (NHL-worst for last 4 seasons)

So, in a nutshell:

- Bedard leaving dropped Red Wings SV% from average to worst. Why does Jeff Salajko still have a job? Or is he the real tank commander?
- Bedard joining the Stars raised them from worst to best. This is huge job no one is talking about.

Of course there's something else on the play, like regressing team and raising/in-prime team with defensive problems. But still, that from_worst_to_best is really something.