News Article: News and Notes XXXV - schedule's out, bring on the Central.

[emptyNedder]

I get what you are saying, but it’s not a very apt example imo.

The “view” on the two teams was vastly different going into the season

Tampa was a contender. Two players who had never played in the NHL (Verhaeghe and Stephens) combined for 90 games. Compare that with Luostarinen, Bean, and Geekie who combined for 10 games. Five fewer than Gibbons.

 

[LakeLivin]

I like how they've handled Bean so far. I think he needed at least a full season in the AHL. I do wish they would have given him more of a look last season after all the injuries, but the Canes' front office certainly knows more than I.

He's now overripe with no spot, so I still think he should be traded. It's not his fault the CAR blueline is so deep. So the choice, to me, is to trade him now or early on this season or give him spot duty throughout the season only to watch him or Fleury be plucked by Francis. I'd entertain a Roslovic type roster player or preferably expansion exempt prospect/player in exchange for Bean, and think that'd be best for everyone involved. Barring injury or a phenomenal camp, Bean is not likely to leapfrog Ryan as the plug-in/7D.

I suspect that Bean didn't get more of a look because we were right around the playoff cut line for almost the whole season. I'm guessing that Rod's voice was one of most influential on The Committee when it came to getting Bean NHL experience, and he seems really conservative when it comes to d-man experience.

Still one of my biggest outstanding questions regarding the Canes future; how do we integrate our prospects, especially d-men, as they approach the NHL level? Hopefully going forward we'll be well enough positioned so there's a lot more flexibility than in we had in the past.

 

[LakeLivin]

With Ryan Murphy and Jamie McBain on our team, we by golly knew how to let our D men fail.

 

[Big Daddy Cane]

The price paid for Skjei doesn’t necessarily shed light on how he’s viewed internally. Look at the alternatives in the market at that time. The Caps gave up a 2nd and 3rd for a rental Dillon. In order to retain him in the offseason, they had to make a $3.9 mil x 4 commitment, which was not a bargain. Vegas gave up 2 2nds for Martinez, who had an extra year of term left on his contract. If the Knights let him walk, that’s a couple high picks for ~1.25 years of the player. Skjei came with ~4.25. The thought process could have easily been to give up the higher pick now, but get some of the value back a year or so later, when he would be less needed.

Losing Skjei in the expansion draft is recouping assets. Getting Francis to pass on Fleury or Bean will likely require a good pick or prospect. I don’t think they would feel any remorse giving up a 1st if they end up getting ~1.25 years of Skjei and keeping both Bean and Fleury for it.

 

[A Star is Burns]

The price paid for Skjei doesn’t necessarily shed light on how he’s viewed internally. Look at the alternatives in the market at that time. The Caps gave up a 2nd and 3rd for a rental Dillon. In order to retain him in the offseason, they had to make a $3.9 mil x 4 commitment, which was not a bargain. Vegas gave up 2 2nds for Martinez, who had an extra year of term left on his contract. If the Knights let him walk, that’s a couple high picks for ~1.25 years of the player. Skjei came with ~4.25. The thought process could have easily been to give up the higher pick now, but get some of the value back a year or so later, when he would be less needed.

Losing Skjei in the expansion draft is recouping assets. Getting Francis to pass on Fleury or Bean will likely require a good pick or prospect. I don’t think they would feel any remorse giving up a 1st if they end up getting ~1.25 years of Skjei and keeping both Bean and Fleury for it.

Very good analysis. I think the Skjei move came down to several things. You have the looming expansion draft. You have the looming contract situation with Dougie. You have the fact that we were decimated with injuries and saw the importance of making the playoffs, but still not being at the point where it made sense to go all-in for guys with no term. You have the fact that Gardiner, while improved in the second half of the season (looked better and was tied for 4th in points from Jan 1 on) hadn't worked out as well as expected in the first year. You have the fact that Edmundson and TVR were UFAs and weren't particularly amazing. You have the fact that Fleury hadn't (and really still hasn't to me as he is still inconsistent) shown that he's the answer (I hope and expect we'll see more of what we saw down the stretch this year). You have the fact they are looking for a guy that fits well with Pesce in the short term and possibly the long term if Dougie is retained (we now have Fleury, Skjei, and Gardiner to find that guy). You have the fact that the first was kinda like a bonus so it may not have hurt them as much to give it up.

Now, Skjei of course has his own negatives. He has never consistently put it all together in spite of having some nice tools. He's prone to brain farts. His underlying numbers with the Rangers weren't always great, whether as a function of his skills or the team around him or both.

I do think he looked better in the bubble than he did in his short regular season audition. We have to hope that he continues to improve as his role and partners are more defined and steady. The good news is I think toolsy guys like him will always be able to be moved. We weren't even the only team sniffing around him supposedly. So, he either works out or he probably still gets moved. If his legacy ends up a couple of playoff runs and then we move on from him via not losing somebody we like better to the expansion draft or we trade him for some other asset of interest going forward, it didn't work out too awful bad even if not ideal.

I'm still at the point of giving the front office, ownership, and coach the benefit of the doubt on these things. They are far from perfect, but they have built on the foundation that Francis left and put us in a fairly good position. Yes, there are things we might wish had worked out better or differently, but a lot of the moves seem like reasonable risks. After this season, I would not be surprised if many of them end up looking a lot better than they do at the moment. I wouldn't be shocked if they are roughly the same, but luckily nothing seems to be crippling as we saw the worst of a lot of it last season and were still a good, competitive team.

Perhaps loading up on these guys, and then keeping them around and seeing which work out best, will end up being a really smart move if we lose Dougie for nothing or prospects and another dman to expansion.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Tampa was a contender. Two players who had never played in the NHL (Verhaeghe and Stephens) combined for 90 games. Compare that with Luostarinen, Bean, and Geekie who combined for 10 games. Five fewer than Gibbons.

Here's my view on that:
1) Those players backgrounds aren't really comparable.
Verhaeghe: 4 AHL seasons prior to this past season and getting a chance at the NHL level and playing 52 games at a 4th line TOI
Stevens: 2 AHL seasons prior to this past season and getting his chance at the NHL level for 38 games at a 4th line TOI
-------
Luostarinen: 0 AHL seasons prior to this past season
Geekie: 1 AHL season prior to this past season
Bean: 1 AHL season prior to this past season

The two guys you mentioned had more development in the AHL prior to getting the trust of their coach.

2) The Canes had Martin Necas who is younger than both the guys you mention and had fewer AHL seasons play 64 games for them this year and Haydn Fleury play 45. Other than draft pedigree, how is that different? Removing draft pedigree, the prior season, the RBA played both Lucas Wallmark (2 AHL seasons) and Warren Foegele (1 AHL seasons) for the full season. I won't use Svech as he's a 2nd OA pick so it's a different scenario.

3) For parts of this season, the Canes were healthy scratching a legit NHL player for games and other than a couple of short stretches for Martinook and Haula, the Canes forwards were completely healthy.

4) Over the years, this fan base has complained about a couple of things.
- We rush prospects
- Coaches call prospects up and then don't give them meaningful minutes and stick them on the 4th line.
- We don't properly develop and "ripen" our prospects.

Using Bean, Geekie and Luostarinen seems like an odd choice to push a narrative about RBA/Canes not trusting younger guys. IMO, the Canes letting those guys get more meaningful minutes in the AHL was the right call.

I won't deny that ALL coaches have favorites and/or need to trust a guy to play him and RBA does this also. He is no different IMO. I also can understand the view that Fleury should have gotten more of a look, but I can see it both ways as he never really impressed me in the chances he did get (although he was great in the RTP).

I do agree that keeping Skjei and Gardiner may hamper their chances going forward though, but that's not the same as a "RBA doesn't trust them" issue.

 

[Unsustainable]

Can we change the name of our division to South Central

 

[bleedgreen]

Here's my view on that:
1) Those players backgrounds aren't really comparable.
Verhaeghe: 4 AHL seasons prior to this past season and getting a chance at the NHL level and playing 52 games at a 4th line TOI
Stevens: 2 AHL seasons prior to this past season and getting his chance at the NHL level for 38 games at a 4th line TOI
-------
Luostarinen: 0 AHL seasons prior to this past season
Geekie: 1 AHL season prior to this past season
Bean: 1 AHL season prior to this past season

The two guys you mentioned had more development in the AHL prior to getting the trust of their coach.

2) The Canes had Martin Necas who is younger than both the guys you mention and had fewer AHL seasons play 64 games for them this year and Haydn Fleury play 45. Other than draft pedigree, how is that different? Removing draft pedigree, the prior season, the RBA played both Lucas Wallmark (2 AHL seasons) and Warren Foegele (1 AHL seasons) for the full season. I won't use Svech as he's a 2nd OA pick so it's a different scenario.

3) For parts of this season, the Canes were healthy scratching a legit NHL player for games and other than a couple of short stretches for Martinook and Haula, the Canes forwards were completely healthy.

4) Over the years, this fan base has complained about a couple of things.
- We rush prospects
- Coaches call prospects up and then don't give them meaningful minutes and stick them on the 4th line.
- We don't properly develop and "ripen" our prospects.

Using Bean, Geekie and Luostarinen seems like an odd choice to push a narrative about RBA/Canes not trusting younger guys. IMO, the Canes letting those guys get more meaningful minutes in the AHL was the right call.

I won't deny that ALL coaches have favorites and/or need to trust a guy to play him and RBA does this also. He is no different IMO. I also can understand the view that Fleury should have gotten more of a look, but I can see it both ways as he never really impressed me in the chances he did get (although he was great in the RTP).

I do agree that keeping Skjei and Gardiner may hamper their chances going forward though, but that's not the same as a "RBA doesn't trust them" issue.

While it’s easy to point to a couple of guys, Rod definitely has shown a capacity to not trust young guys. Even in the choices to call guys up. From the first year we had scorers available and defensive types have been called up pretty frequently as Rod has shown us his style of moving guys like McGinn up and calling up fourth liners to replace HIM instead of replacing the scorer. That’s a reward system for vets but also shows a preference to not training kids on the job.

Necas has always been a poor choice for you with this argument. He’s clearly part of the core and the future. At the beginning he and Svech were it for top six guys. It’s clear the mandate from the get go was that Necas plays after he got some seasoning, and that he plays a real role. He was drafted as center and outside of his initial interview with Rod he hasn’t touched center since. That to me is Rod drawing the line on his Necas trust.

I really love how you suggest he trusts Fluery purely by games played. Cmon man. We all
know Fluery to a huge back seat to vets the second Rod arrived. That he has always had a tight leash. If you’re referring to games played why not peak back one year before the change? Yes we had more defensive depth after the change, but Fluery was a developing first rounder and we deferred to TVR. Yes you can say vet preference over distrust of youngsters but they go hand in hand.

Every few months someone points out Rod distrusts kids and you valiantly defend him on this point. He’s clearly shown a preference to vets. He clearly would prefer to move his guys up the lineup than give a role to youngster that just showed up. You may call it vet preference but like I said it’s hand in hand with distrust. The “we used to complain we didn’t develop enough” argument doesn’t make sense to me as the reasons for that changing are obvious. Francis preferred to let kids develop but couldn’t always with holes in the roster and budget limits. We aren’t over developing our kids now, we just have depth and a coach who prefers the guys who earn the job in camp.

Bean isn’t in the minors so long because we want to develop him. We’re hiding him until we figure out if Rod will ever play him. Which seems unlikely.

 

[Navin R Slavin]

All coaches trust the players who are most likely to help the team win games in the NHL. Usually those are the players who have actually won games in the NHL.

Rod is no different.

 

[MinJaBen]

Bottom 7 start training camp today.

We aren’t starting training camp today.

 

[hblueridgegal]

 

[TheReelChuckFletcher]

All coaches trust the players who are most likely to help the team win games in the NHL. Usually those are the players who have actually won games in the NHL.

Rod is no different.

As much as I love young players like Bean, fans of contending clubs need to be extra-patient with their favorite prospects, because generally speaking, the veterans on a good team are still going to be way better. Never underestimate how good an NHL veteran on a 4th line or a 3rd pairing is at stickpuck. If a young gun plays well enough to beat out one of them in camp for a roster spot, then great! Is it likely, though? No. On great teams, the "veteran scrubs" can do this if you give them too much space:



And your 3rd pairing scrubs (how Pionk was perceived just 2 years ago) can do this:

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

While it’s easy to point to a couple of guys, Rod definitely has shown a capacity to not trust young guys.<SNIP>

I had a much longer (believe it or not) winded point by point response to this, but it's like arguing politics where it won't change anything so I'll stick to three things:
1) I'm not saying that Rod doesn't prefer vets or youngsters who play a more well rounded game, he certainly does. My point is that he's no different than any other coach in the NHL in that regards. If you disagree, that's fine but that's how I see it. There's ZERO doubt that unless a player is a great scorer, they are going to have to show Rod they can be trusted in all zones or their chances are going to be limited. And I'm fine with that approach. Guys like Wallmark and Foegele earned that trust and got chances. Necas didn't earn the trust in year 1 and got sent down. Even in year 2, his defensive game was better, but still needs a lot of work so he was more sheltered.
2) I find it funny that you, of all people, are talking about someone else "valiantly" defending something on HF. One of the things I like about your posts is that YOU valiantly defend things, even if they are unpopular. You are consistent in that regard and do it frequently. I don't mean this as a dig at all, I really do enjoy that about your posts, whether I agree or disagree with them.
3) I still think you are speaking out of both sides of your mouth a bit. You have been the leader of "let them over-ripen" in the AHL for years (and I agree with your premise). Guys like Bean, Luostarinen and Geekie etc...had 1 AHL season before this so complaining about them not getting a shot this past season seems odd.

Like I said in my last post, I can understand the comments about Fleury not getting a chance. Whether you want to call it trust, or Rod no liking something in his game, I don't care, but it's clear he wasn't getting the minutes (although I personally wasn't overly impressed on a consistent basis with him in his chances, except for RTP). And my "games played" statement wasn't about Rod's trust in him, it was to show that the number games played with 4th line minutes by Verhaege and Stephens isn't necessarily a statement of trust from their coach either.

That's it for now. I'm sure I'll weigh in again when I disagree with your view (or someone else's), much like you would mine, which is what makes HF fun.

Happy new year.

 

[hblueridgegal]

2020-21 Training Camp Roster
Forwards: Sebastian Aho, Jeremy Bracco, David Cotton, Jason Cotton, Ryan Dzingel, Jesper Fast, Warren Foegele, Morgan Geekie, Seth Jarvis, Steven Lorentz, Jordan Martinook, Stelio Mattheos, Max McCormick, Brock McGinn, Martin Necas, Nino Niederreiter, Jamieson Rees, Sheldon Rempal, Drew Shore, Spencer Smallman, Jordan Staal, Andrei Svechnikov, Teuvo Teravainen, Vincent Trocheck
Defensemen: Jake Bean, Haydn Fleury, Gustav Forsling, Jake Gardiner, Dougie Hamilton, Joey Keane, Brett Pesce, Joakim Ryan, Brady Skjei, Jaccob Slavin
Goalies: Antoine Bibeau, Petr Mrazek, Alex Nedeljkovic, James Reimer

Training Schedule

 

[the halleJOKEL]

that is a list that contains names of ice hockey players that i want to watch play ice hockey

 

[WreckingCrew]

that is a list that contains names of ice hockey players that i want to watch play ice hockey

And Jason Cotton and Antoine Bibeau

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

And Jason Cotton and Antoine Bibeau

Antoine Bibchuk

 

[WreckingCrew]

Antoine Bibchuk

Or Antoine Dubibeau?

 

[HisIceness]

that is a list that contains names of ice hockey players that i want to watch play ice hockey

We've come a long way from the days of thinking Jeremy Welsh was going to be a game-changer.

 

[MinJaBen]

I guess all that talk of the World Juniors giving those players a leg up doesn’t mean a whole lot if you are too busy there to earn a camp invite. None of our guys in Canada are invited.

 

[TheReelChuckFletcher]

We've come a long way from the days of thinking Jeremy Welsh was going to be a game-changer.

He certainly was a game changer...for the Canes' AHL affiliate.

 

[spockBokk]

I guess all that talk of the World Juniors giving those players a leg up doesn’t mean a whole lot if you are too busy there to earn a camp invite. None of our guys in Canada are invited.

I suppose it makes sense for them to not be “invited”, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Suzuki is a late add. Gunler and Nybeck can go back to the SHL and Ponomarev can go back to the Q, since those leagues are actually playing. The OHL and WHL, of course, have no set date to start so it makes sense for Rees and Jarvis to be with the big team for camp (also gives them a reward for signing their ELCs).

The only reason I can think for them not to bring Suzuki in after the WJCs is for quarantine reasons. There’s probably some sort of mandated quarantine for him joining the team or taxi squad, and there’s the 2 week quarantine he may have to face one top of that if he doesn’t make the team and heads back to Canada.

I still somewhat expect the Canes to attempt to bring him over, just like Jarvis and Rees. It’s not like he’ll be playing competitively anywhere else any time soon.

 

[Canes]

We've come a long way from the days of thinking Jeremy Welsh was going to be a game-changer.

This is the future of Pittsburgh fans and I'm all for it

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

Or Antoine Dubibeau?

Wade Dubibeau used to be the backup for the Islanders.

 

[raynman]

Wade Dubibeau used to be the backup for the Islanders.

Indubitably