People also forget that. These boards wanted Hitch’s head because he couldn’t adapt and respond as well as Yeo did. That Wild team was all over us that year, but they were also buoyed by Dubnyk’s crazy sv%. We still don’t have any shooters outside of Tarasenko who can beat a hot goalie like that confidently.
Official Darryl Sutter for Blues coach bandwagon thread
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People also forget that. These boards wanted Hitch’s head because he couldn’t adapt and respond as well as Yeo did. That Wild team was all over us that year, but they were also buoyed by Dubnyk’s crazy sv%. We still don’t have any shooters outside of Tarasenko who can beat a hot goalie like that confidently.
Halak Ness Monster
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When did the league change exactly? Because he beat the Hawks and Stars en route to the Western Conference Final in 2016 after collecting 107 points.
It was our best season since 1986 in terms of distance from Cup Final.
Also, I don't blame Hitch for losing to LA and CHI three straight years. You'll notice the only teams to beat LA and CHI those years we lost to them were: LA and CHI
I also don't blame him for Minnesota because Jake Allen was tremendously atrocious in Games 5 and 6.
We had flawed teams that lacked high impact talent.
There's a reason that coaches are trying to switch to this man to man system. We saw Hitchcock try it, and now Yeo. These are both smart guys. I appreciated the Athletic article, but it was very one-sided and failed to look at why a team may go through the pain of struggling with a change before mastering this new system. What does it look like when it works?
It appears to be failing now, and it ultimately did in Hitchcock too. Maybe its not going to happen. But what's the upside? Why would a coach risk this? There must be some fundamental advantages that make it worth the gamble.
Halak Ness Monster
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What I remember from that series was Game 5 at home. We absolutely dominated Minnesota in the 1st period and came away tied 1-1 because of a soft goal let in by Jake Allen. It completely took the wind out of our sails in the 2nd and we played terrible. Allen let in 1-2 more softies after that.
I also remember Hitchcock's look of disgust when Allen let in the first of two tremendously soft goals in Game 6. I also remember how fast Hitch pulled Allen after his 2nd softie. The two goals he let up in Game 6 were so incredibly bad.
Overall we dominated Minnesota in that series outside of Games 1 and 3. I remember Hitchcock made some great adjustments for Game 4. Also Game 5. Jake Allen just sunk us.
Oh well, we got them back two years later. They dominated us and Jake Allen made up for it!
Halak Ness Monster
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Hitch took a 79 point Stars team that had no clue how to play defense under Lindy Ruff(29th in goals allowed) and turned them into a 92 point team that was 7th in goals allowed.
Right now the Stars are 3-3 and 16th in goals allowed.
The Stars have had a flawed roster that is lacking in defensemen for awhile. Hitchcock did better than I expected with that group.
Halak Ness Monster
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Completely agree. Way too many people fault him for losing to far better hockey teams.
I knew those people were nuts when they started missing Quenneville. They forgot he had the exact same results in STL that Hitchcock did.
Quenneville's problem in STL was the same as Hitchcock's: his roster was always around 3rd-5th best in the West. He got help for that problem in CHI.
As I said, I don't think Dallas is a good example. That's a flawed team that challenged for a playoff spot under Hitch. They were terrible the year before Hitch arrived under Lindy Ruff. They are just 3-3 to start this year and don't appear to be special at anything.
PiggySmalls
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I was very happy to see Blues make a deep run, but I also saw a team squeak by a Dallas team that was without Seguin. If I have to give the Blues an honest assessment on that series I don't think we make it past them with their #1C actually playing the whole series.
When Hitch went to Dallas last year, he dropped the man 2 man system he tried to implement here and went back to his system he has used for the past ~23 years. I don't have any doubt that if he was still the bench boss today for STL and was running his zone system that the Blues would be better than 1-2-2. But we already know how this song plays out and it is not a successful one.
Halak Ness Monster
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Good point. Very possible. Seguin was a huge missing piece for them.
However, we did blow them out by 3+ goals in 3 of those games. Their goalies and defense stunk.
mw2noobbuster
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The Blues almost choked a 3-1 series lead to the Blackhawks that series and played a Seguin-less stars team and barely got out of it alive. They still played very well of course. I get what you're saying, but the team never would have made it over the top with Hitch.
You can review Blackhawks and Kings cup runs and recast series wins in exactly the same way. Good grief, look at Washington last season. That's what Cup winners do. They survive close series, and manage to do it multiple times usually. The Blues were awfully damn close that year.
And before the 79 point season they had 109 points, 92 and 91.
It's not like Hitchcock transformed a bottom feeder into a good team.
In fact they should have made the playoffs but had an absolutely awful end of the year collapse. He didn't do well.
Good point. Likely the 109 and 79 point seasons were both largely flukes and they would have been around 92 last year with Ruff too.
Halak Ness Monster
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So they were pretty much the 2013-2014 Avalanche. One great year where they played over their heads playing shootout hockey. Although the Avs kinda played defense. Dallas didn't until Hitchcock came back.
You can be underwhelmed by the job Hitchcock did in Dallas. That's cool. I'm not. That's not a great team. Many in Dallas recognize that. I thought his system got the most out of them.
This comes back to what Hitchcock style hockey can do. It provides structure to teams that lack it like the 2016-2017 Stars did. This is why Darryl Sutter isn't a bad choice IF IF IF he's not completely done coaching. The Blues lacked structure under Davis Payne and Hitch brought it to St. Louis. Sutter could do the same for this team if the next week or so shows us we still need it.
EastonBlues22
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Hitchcock hockey wasn't just about defensive play. He had offensive philosophies as well, and I believe that's generally where most of the complaints about him lay.
Structure can either nurture offensive creativity or neuter it. In Hitchcock's case, it was more the latter, and we saw the effects of that when more creative players began to chafe at the restrictions (and some were even shipped out).
IMO, the talent on this roster is not a particularly great match for his offensive philosophies, nor do I think his offensive philosophies are a great match for the current state of the league. His defense will always play, but that's just not enough nowadays.
Structure can either nurture offensive creativity or neuter it. In Hitchcock's case, it was more the latter, and we saw the effects of that when more creative players began to chafe at the restrictions (and some were even shipped out).
IMO, the talent on this roster is not a particularly great match for his offensive philosophies, nor do I think his offensive philosophies are a great match for the current state of the league. His defense will always play, but that's just not enough nowadays.
Halak Ness Monster
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Explain this further please.
-Tarasenko blossomed into a 40 goal scorer under Hitchcock. His worst season was under Yeo last year.
-Backes, Oshie, Steen had no problem becoming very good 55-60 point NHL forwards under Hitch. Oshie has pretty much been the same forward in WSH that he was in STL. Steen took off under Hitch. Backes was pretty consistent under Murray, Payne, and Hitch.
-Schwartz broke out a little more last year with Yeo but he was great in 2014-2015.
-Perron really broke out last year with Vegas for a career high 66 points but his second best year by points per game was under Hitch. Not Edmonton or Pittsburgh.
-I don't think Shattenkirk has proven to be any better after leaving Hitchcock.
-Chris Stewart kinda struggled under Hitch but he only got worse after leaving. He was pretty good in the lockout year.
Who's offensive creativity was really neutered under Hitchcock in St. Louis?
EastonBlues22
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I didn't say that Hitchcock was where all things related to offense went to die. Saying his system favors one type of player over another isn't the same thing as saying all players who don't fit his ideal will suck.
He favors simple, direct, north-south plays. Backes and Steen are quintessential north-south players, so it's not exactly surprising to see them thrive in that atmosphere. Perron and Oshie were like cramming square pegs into round holes. They did their best, and they still put up decent numbers because they're talented, were playing with talented players, and were getting PP time on productive units, but Hitchcock's offensive system was clearly not a natural fit for them. Both have looked better in different systems. Same can be said of Stastny, to some extent.
Schwartz is so well rounded that he can look natural playing any number of ways. Tarasenko is basically a one-man show when it comes to creating his own offense, or he was, so it didn't really matter. He wasn't relying on East-West plays to set him up because he was creating his own shots at ES, and he sure wasn't benefiting from (or contributing much to) Hitchcock's north-south game plans. He was just doing his own thing, and talented enough to produce anyway.
North-South play has its benefits, especially defensively, but the weaknesses were routinely and thoroughly exposed in the playoffs when good teams would overload defensively and the Blues would struggle to break the pressure. They weren't fast enough to simply out-skate the other team up and down the ice, and their philosophical aversion to East-West play made them predicable and easy to counter when teams could really focus on game planning against them.
When I look at a team with Tarasenko, Schwartz, ROR, Schenn, Steen, Perron, Bozak, Maroon, Fabbri, Kyrou, Thomas, Blais, etc., I see a roster capable of exploiting East/West play, with most of the above being naturally predisposed to playing that sort of game. They don't need to be the 90's Red Wings, but there shouldn't be a philosophical aversion to it, either.
I'm firmly convinced that a coach like Quenneville could get more out of this roster than Hitchcock.
mw2noobbuster
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Washignton won their Stanley cup final 4 games to 1 and their first 2 series 4 games to 2. Though they did very well coming back against the Jackets.
Halak Ness Monster
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I don't know, man/ma'am. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on Hitch and his days with STL.
You said Hitch's structure "neutered" offensive creativity. I really don't think there is much evidence of this. Like I said, Oshie, Perron, Stewart, Shattenkirk were not really better elsewhere consistently. And I think they all went to more east-west offensive systems. Meanwhile, pretty much all of those guys plus Steen, Petro, Backes, Tarasenko, Schwartz all became or remained very impressive offensive players under Hitch.
As for the current roster, I think they'd work great under Quenneville or Hitchcock. This is a versatile group. That's why I don't mind if we bring in a Tippet or Sutter.
EastonBlues22
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Neutered, as in less potent, not crippled/hamstrung. You make it sound like playing in a sub-optimal system can prevent talented players from being good at all. That's just not true. People become (and remain) good players in less than ideal situations all the time. Likewise, someone talented "doing well" in a situation is also not evidence that said situation is getting the most out of them.
I think it's pretty easy to make a convincing argument that Hitchcock didn't get the most of of Oshie and Perron. There's also lots of direct evidence that Oshie and Perron were not considered good fits here under Hitchcock, regardless of production, and you don't just have to take my word for it. The actions of the organization ultimately speak for themselves.
If you think this roster would work great under Hitchcock, I'll just strongly agree to disagree. I'm thought he did good things for the Blues while he was here, but I think he overstayed his welcome by a year or two and I'm happy he's gone.
Halak Ness Monster
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Neutered legit means to clip off testicles. Another top definition is "render ineffective"
You clearly made it sound like Hitch's system prevented players from being offensively creative. By definition. That's why I asked for clarification.
Again, you aren't selling me on your defense of that belief. The only one I might agree with is Perron. I thought Oshie was very good here and isn't playing much better with some fantastic forwards in Washington that he didn't have in St. Louis. The actions of the organization say a lot of things other than "not a fit for Hitch". It's difficult to base this debate on the implied meaning of their actions.
I've considered your point of view and suggested we agree to disagree. I continue to do so.
mw2noobbuster
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EastonBlues22
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I said Hitchcock's system neutered offensive creativity, not offensive effectiveness, though I do think the former played into the latter's struggles during the playoffs. Creativity and effectiveness are not directly interchangeable concepts.
Anyway, Hitchcock's system does neuter offensive creativity. He actively suppressed East/West play, and actively encouraged "safe" plays at the lines. He wanted the puck to move north, get in the zone quickly, move N/S within the zone, and for players to get to the net. Oshie and Perron were both actively chastised at various times for pulling up in the zone, trying to make plays at the lines, passing E/W in the offensive zone (passing up shots), etc. If that's not clamping down on offensive creativity, what is?
Perhaps you don't remember those traits being actively discouraged? I can't "prove" it, but they absolutely were.
Anyone can still be productive even within those restrictions, but some players are more inclined to it than others (in terms of effectiveness, intuitively executing, and willingness to stick with it long-term). Those that aren't inclined to it are apt to get frustrated at some point, especially if they or the team is struggling. Frustration isn't generally a good thing to have in the locker room.
Oshie was traded because he ultimately didn't fit that style for a guy that did (Brouwer). Perron was also traded, not to mention left exposed during the expansion draft. Message there seems pretty clear to me.
Oshie "isn't playing much better" is something I just flat don't agree with. He looks much better with them in general, and his effectiveness in the playoffs...well, there's just no comparison between the two. And it wasn't his linemates carrying him, either. I have watched almost every playoff game Washington has played since Oshie was traded to them, and Oshie wasn't being carried by anyone.
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Don't want Sutter. Don't want Hitch back. AV would be my first choice I think. Beyond him, Tippet I could do. And Tyler too. Ok there isn't really a Tyler, but the history buff in me couldn't resist the old slogan.
