Speculation: Offseason coaching thread: Should they stay or should they go?

[Darren McCord]

McCann never sucked here. He was pushed out. Sprong? Mishandled from the start and took a while to figure things out. You can even point to Blueger as being impacted by injuries his final year here.

This is the bigger issue and its either with Hextall or Sullivan or it was both. They pushed out good depth over the years. I don't know who had more power or impact on it but they clearly had no joint vision.

McCann
Erod
TB
Freddy
Matheson

 

[DesertedPenguin]

View attachment 867995
Heinen year 2 in Pittsburgh How horrible!!!

Only triple the rate of 2023-24 Harkins and more than double of Carter, Acciari and Bemstrom.
When you average 2 mins per game less than the previous year and get healthy scratched for a big block of games, you generally generate fewer points.

Sigh. Your takes suck.

Hard to take your takes seriously when you only believe in points/60, which provide an incomplete and often inaccurate evaluation of a player.

Edit - Any data point that has Josh Archibald as a Top 10 point producer has serious fundamental issues.

 

[DesertedPenguin]

This is the bigger issue and its either with Hextall or Sullivan or it was both. They pushed out good depth over the years. I don't know who had more power or impact on it but they clearly had no joint vision.

McCann
Erod
TB
Freddy
Matheson

This is where I am. There is an evaluation issue that was at hand for a while, and that includes figuring out what to do with McCann, as @Empoleon8771 noted.

Sullivan is not blameless in this. But player evaluation and development is an organizational issue, not just a coach or just a GM.

Letting Gaudreau go, protecting Carter over McCann, dumping Matheson for a much older Petry...those are big, big organizational misses. You do it once or twice, you can survive. You do it consistently and it costs dearly.

 

[AuroraBorealis]

Hard to take your takes seriously when you only believe in points/60, which provide an incomplete and often inaccurate evaluation of a player.

Edit - Any data point that has Josh Archibald as a Top 10 point producer has serious fundamental issues.

Hard to take your takes seriously when you ignore points relative to usage, like it's meaningless.

"Inaccurate"... coming from the guy weighing guys' production who average 6 mins the same way as those who average 15mins.
"In X games"... stfu The coach controls their output you moron.

 

[AuroraBorealis]

Heinen's 5v5 points rate only improved by like 5-6% in Boston. What changed is the minutes and game count.
They started using him on the PK.
He's the same guy. He just got a better coach is all.

Sullivan cannot get out of his own way with bottom-sixers. He has no idea how to manage them and which ones to deploy.

 

[Darren McCord]

This is where I am. There is an evaluation issue that was at hand for a while, and that includes figuring out what to do with McCann, as @Empoleon8771 noted.

Sullivan is not blameless in this. But player evaluation and development is an organizational issue, not just a coach or just a GM.

Letting Gaudreau go, protecting Carter over McCann, dumping Matheson for a much older Petry...those are big, big organizational misses. You do it once or twice, you can survive. You do it consistently and it costs dearly.

Also resigning Kap for 2 years over Erod when it was clear sullivan didn't want Kap.

Erod fit this team like a glove and actually would have help the pedestrian powerplay.

 

[AuroraBorealis]

Also resigning Kap for 2 years over Erod when it was clear sullivan didn't want Kap.

Erod fit this team like a glove and actually would have help the pedestrian powerplay.

McCann was helping PP1 too.

 

[TheGoldenJet]

There is 0% chance Keefe is not the coach of the Pens by 2026-2027. It makes too much sense.

- The Fenway boys love Sullivan
- The core loves Sullivan
- Sullivan is under contract for two years
- Keefe is getting free money for two years
- The only coach Dubas has ever hired is Keefe

Strap in.

Yep. Not to mention this team’s downward trajectory. Why bring Keefe in now when you can accumulate a couple solid first round picks for him to work with in 2-3 years’ time.

Hopefully Keefe gets here quicker though, I’d love to see Sullsma get the boot ASAP.

 

[Darren McCord]

McCann was helping PP1 too.

right i included him before.

 

[Gurglesons]

The player evaluation issue is and always has been Mike Sullivan.

We’ve had DOC and Puustinen NHL ready for a year +, Poulin too.

Yet Harkins persists.

Weird how when we finally moved Guentzel and Ruhwedel the coach was forced to get creative the roster suddenly looked good again…

 

[AuroraBorealis]

Yep. Not to mention this team’s downward trajectory. Why bring Keefe in now when you can accumulate a couple solid first round picks for him to work with in 2-3 years’ time.

Hopefully Keefe gets here quicker though, I’d love to see Sullsma get the boot ASAP.

The real problem is we need someone who works with the Forwards better. That's Vellucci's job, and he's staying.
If Keefe is coming here now, he's replacing Reirden's role most likely, which means he's in charge of the blue line.

But he may at least be able to help the Power Play and Karlsson.

 

[Gurglesons]

Seems like Keefe is getting way too much interest to settle here unless we fire or Mike Sullivan decides to leave.

 

[Fordy]

pens should be a sought after coaching job, who else gives you this kind of job security?

 

[Jaded-Fan]

No earth moving conclusions here. But a good realistic article that encapsulates my feelings about the current version of the Pens and what they should, and shouldn't, do this off-season and going forward.

Four Things Penguins Should Not Do Before Next Season

Kyle Dubas, the Pittsburgh Penguins’ president of hockey operations and general manager, undoubtedly has a lengthy to-do list for this offseason. After all, transforming an aging team that has missed the Stanley Cup playoffs for two years in a row and hasn’t won a series since 2018 into a...

pittsburghhockeynow.com

 

[Jacob]

Didn’t realize Dean Evason was a teammate of Sullivan’s a couple times. Might be a candidate.

 

[Empoleon8771]

This is the bigger issue and its either with Hextall or Sullivan or it was both. They pushed out good depth over the years. I don't know who had more power or impact on it but they clearly had no joint vision.

McCann
Erod
TB
Freddy
Matheson

Yeah and this is exactly what I'd criticize Sullivan for as well, especially McCann and ERod. I don't think Sullivan pushed out Blueger, Matheson or Gaudreau, but I absolutely think he pushed out McCann and ERod. Hell, you can throw Ian Cole on that list as well as another good player Sullivan wrongly pushed out.

Imagine this team right now with McCann on Malkin's LW, ERod jumping around the top-9 and Cole as Letang's partner (more in the 2019-2022 window than now). I think they'd be far better off than what they ended up getting for those guys when they left.

 

[Gurglesons]

Didn’t realize Dean Evason was a teammate of Sullivan’s a couple times. Might be a candidate.

Would be a fan of that.

 

[ThosePuckingPenguins]

Didn’t realize Dean Evason was a teammate of Sullivan’s a couple times. Might be a candidate.

Dean Evason would also a pretty big “better coach this team better or you’re done” hire by Dubas.

 

[Jacob]

Would be a fan of that.

Yeah he got way more out of the Wild than he should’ve. Errey always praised him when we played them.

 

[Darren McCord]

Yeah and this is exactly what I'd criticize Sullivan for as well, especially McCann and ERod. I don't think Sullivan pushed out Blueger, Matheson or Gaudreau, but I absolutely think he pushed out McCann and ERod. Hell, you can throw Ian Cole on that list as well as another good player Sullivan wrongly pushed out.

Imagine this team right now with McCann on Malkin's LW, ERod jumping around the top-9 and Cole as Letang's partner (more in the 2019-2022 window than now). I think they'd be far better off than what they ended up getting for those guys when they left.

ya forgot about the cole one too

 

[BrookswasHere44]

No earth moving conclusions here. But a good realistic article that encapsulates my feelings about the current version of the Pens and what they should, and shouldn't, do this off-season and going forward.

Four Things Penguins Should Not Do Before Next Season

Kyle Dubas, the Pittsburgh Penguins’ president of hockey operations and general manager, undoubtedly has a lengthy to-do list for this offseason. After all, transforming an aging team that has missed the Stanley Cup playoffs for two years in a row and hasn’t won a series since 2018 into a...

pittsburghhockeynow.com

Oh good. Another Sully propaganda piece?

 

[Jaded-Fan]

Oh good. Another Sully propaganda piece?

Really? You came to that conclusion from this?

If Dubas concludes that someone else could get more out of this group than Sullivan, it’s incumbent on him to make a change, even if that entails the franchise eating some or all of Sullivan’s three-year, $16.5 million contract that’s about to take effect.

But that’s the only valid reason for putting someone new in charge of the bench. Change for its own sake — or even to just shake things up or placate some of the ticket-buying public — is not what the franchise needs now.

Seems pretty balanced and reasonable. The rest of the article is similarly avoiding extremes either way.

 

[BrookswasHere44]

Why does everyone think Rod is so good? Get annihilated every year

 

[BrookswasHere44]

Really? You came to that conclusion from this?


Seems pretty balanced and reasonable. The rest of the article is similarly avoiding extremes either way.

I guess that last paragraph annoyed me. Sully has... Well.... Should have basically zero goodwill remaining. He's been an absolute failure for far too long here. It's certainly not all his fault but at some point you try something different. He's on his 3rd!!!! GM

 

[Andy99]

Really? You came to that conclusion from this?


Seems pretty balanced and reasonable. The rest of the article is similarly avoiding extremes either way.

No, not reasonable…it would be reasonable if this were the first or second season of Sullivan’s failures…eight years with one playoff series win and last two years of no playoffs is worse than Keefe…and yet everyone lauds how that was the move Toronto needed to make and yet here we are still tip toeing around Sullivan