Knoblauch was the big, exciting coaching prospect when he was running those star studded Erie teams. He's lost a bit of the shine, since. But he's been paying dues and gaining experience the whole time.
He joined in September of last year, so hard to say. He's been responsible for the powerplay and defensemen. Both haven't been good in general. Some of it might have to do with the huge layover between seasons for non-playoff teams from last year coming into this season. The powerplay has gone down a few percent, and is still pretty low overall. They've given up the 3rd most goals each of the past two seasons, so no change there. One caveat might be that half of this season has been their new goalies, so Korenar, Melnichuk, and now-Avalanche Dubnyk, and none of them provided +.900 save percentages. I don't think it's a lot more goals allowed, but maybe you'd say their defense is better. I haven't looked at shots and such, but this is just cursory stuff and I don't want to dive deeper now.
Ok, I did a little bit more diving. The powerplay hasn't gotten better by month, in fact it's gotten a little worse, probably not a statistically significant difference, but the trend doesn't look great. So I don't think it's a case of he needed time to get things adjusted if we're holding him as the ultimate arbitrator of success there. Similar results for goals allowed. They started the season right at the bottom third point and gotten slightly worse over time and end up bottom 3.
Very interesting. If they hire Leaman, I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. But I won’t like it at all. He’s never been a professional player or coached professional players. Not at any level in any capacity. That’s just not going to be enough for me. I know he’s elite in his world. But I wouldn’t even consider him. He’s on my Do Not Draft list. Haha.
It’s one season where the bottom completely fell out on that core. Their top players look one hundred years old all of a sudden. Thompson might be a terrible coach. I really don’t know. But I can’t really look at the one year in San Jose for conclusions.
Yeah, one year, unfortunately it's the recent one is all. There are many more metrics to look at and I'm sure the interviews aren't just with the candidates, so I think I was more just hoping to find a continuation of good trends for him. Instead we can just disregard this as it doesn't fit the agenda.
He is saying what everyone wants to hear, that's all. He said he wants a young coach, but he left out "cheap" in that statement.
I don't believe that. They might not be able to pay Toronto type of money but I don't think "cheap" will be the priority when hiring a new coach.
Are you saying we are going cheap? We are going cheap and young. Not sure what BA means when he said "young coach". Does he mean someone in their 40's?
Seriously? It’s reporter kibble. A quotable with no meaning. As if he might have said he wants a disorganized unstructured coach who has no plan and doesn’t hold anyone accountable.
