Honour Over Glory
Fire Sully
- Jan 30, 2012
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I don't really like to credit or blame a coaches system for a players performance.
You can take a look at the pens team right now and find some players who have played better under DB, and there are some who have played better this year under MJ.
And that's a highly unfair criticism to Mike Johnston in my opinion.
You have a coach that had 4+ years to implement his system vs a guy that has had under 50 games to. Results won't fully show right away, the Canucks with Desjardins (because WD could have been a coach here) are a unique case because they had Torts for a year then a new coach again, Vigneault's system has long since been purged from their minds. Pens went from a long tenured Bylsma straight to a new Coach and people expect them to forget everything they learned under Bylsma that frustrated them. I see Bylsma tendencies on this team still, I don't know how any one can watch this team often this year and not. The players revert back to it and things look like a mess. When they play to MJ's system, they look solid. When injuries struck hard, the team went back and forth to DB's system tendencies it seemed. Forcing dump ins, looking sloppy in the neutral zone with stretch passes, not rushing up the ice as a unit...etc.
DB's is still fresh in this team's minds.
MJ isn't even getting a fair shake by people here at all, expecting miracles like players are a white board where you can wipe off the past and start fresh right away, not always the case.