I always joke that just when you think you've seen it all, this team finds a new way to break your heart.
So I probably should've seen something like this coming, but I didn't. After all those years of quick fixes and bandaid solutions, it seemed they finally tried to do it right.
They fired everyone from the old regime, committed to a rebuild, hired a superstar head coach, got lucky with the ping pong balls, drafted a generational level 1C (long the missing piece), kept their high picks and seemed to hit on all of them, established a culture that emphasized player development, brought in a GM who seemed to get it (valuing high end skill), stocked the front office with cap wizards, and finally looked like they were becoming the kind of annual contender we all hoped for, just needing to get over the hump of the Bruins.
So to see them fall so spectacularly, it's heartbreaking.
Maybe they flip a switch when Babcock gets fired (a matter of "when" now, not "if"). But what if they don't? They're so locked into this core, which is showing itself to be rotten, overpaid and underachieving. They can make changes, but then do we need to wait for that group to get it together, find the right mix, that takes time. And with so much of the cap tied up in a few guys, there will always be major surgery being done to the roster--will we ever be able to expect continuity?
And in the meantime we have to figure out how to extend Rielly, replace Andersen, rebuild the defense. By the time they figure it out, Matthews, Marner could be into their late 20s and looking to cash in again.
Man. It wasn't supposed to be like this.
