I hope to see Lou and Marty retire this summer.
If Brodeur is willing to act as a backup, then he can stay but if he thinks he's here to fight for the #1 job, he can sign elsewhere or just retire. He's been THE best goaltender for the past two decades but he's no more then a "ok" backup as we speak.
Regarding Lou, the man just has to go. He's dead set on "rebuilding on the fly" and his band-aid signing aren't getting us anywhere. Screw all that noise and the multiple signings of misfits left and right, wich isn't doing us any good ATM and it's basically saying to our rookies that they'll have to wait yet another year cause we'd rather dress Olesz, Barch, etc... over promising young and upcoming players. We had a surplus of blueliners last year and we can all agree that it turned out as a massive nightmare. What does our Gm do during the offseason... Give our HC a surplus of forwards
Despite having a coaching caroussel over the past 8 years, our PP has been hot garbage despite the fact that we probably had a different "setup" from coach to coach. Yet, with different ideas coming from all our head coaches, we still managed to ice one of the worst PP in that time frame. Who's to blame here... the 6 or 7 different coaches or the same personnel that was given to those same coaches? I'd go with option B and it's pretty obvious to see as well. We haven't had a solid blueliner with a sniff of offense and creativity to his game since forever and no Zidlicky doesn't count cause yes, he does have a legit shot but isn't a PP Qb IMO. He doesn't lead the charge and doesn't take control. He'll shoot if he has a open lane but doesn't create anything on his own.
The reason we're in this mess ATM is mostly because our blueline is built to play prior to the lockout. If you can't play as a 5 men unit in all 3 zones, you're bound to struggle and that's exactly what we can't do.
Lou will leave this team bone dry, mark my words. We don't have a 1st this year (probably top #5 pick), I don't see Schneider resigning, Elias isn't getting any younger, our rookies are getting a raw deal and aren't living up to expectations and we have one of the oldest rosters out there.
The future just looks horrible for this once proud franchise.