Olli Maatta Appreciation Thread

[mpp9]

I legit hope Maatta catches on in Chicago and becomes one of their go-to guys, and I think he will.

His only deficiency is skating, and yeah it's a big one, but I think on literally any other team that provides even a modicum of puck responsibility and back pressure from the forwards it won't be an issue. Most teams don't turn pucks over in dangerous areas and leave their blueliners out to dry like we have in the last few years. Hopefully he won't have to deal with some speed demon coming at him at Mach 1 while he's either standing still or moving up ice as much as he did here.

Seems like him and Jokiharju is a great match.

Hawks are worse than us defensively.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

The greatest day drink pass out by any Penguin of all time.

OF ALL TIME.


Olli, you were good until the NHL got faster, then you weren't. Go be what you can be, in the slower west.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

Hawks are worse than us defensively.

We weren't that bad defensively, Hawks were actually legit terrible defensively. Penguins were nowhere near as bad as people want to make it out to be.

Teams that were worse than us defensively?

Winnipeg Jets
Colorado Avalanche
Washington Capitals
Vancouver Canucks
Anaheim Ducks
Toronto Maple Leafs
San Jose Sharks
Los Angeles Kings
New York Rangers
Buffalo Sabres
Edmonton Oilers
New Jersey Devils
Detroit Red Wings
Florida Panthers
Philadelphia Flyers
Chicago Blackhawks
Ottawa Senators

Penguins were 14th best defensively. Bold are the teams that made the playoffs. As a fun fact - Pens allowed 18 more goals against than the Blues, but also were 6th offensively. You know why we suck? Because when it came to crunch time, the team and the staff shat the bed, just a big giant juicy dump.

Under Bylsma/Johnston the Pens were a top 10 PK team, but with Sullivan, the Pens have been routinely in the bottom 10 defensively, what changed is the insane lack of support by the forwards on defense, in 2015/16 the pens were still fairly good defensively, but it could have been a mix of Bylsma/MJ and then Sullivan tweaking things, but after that the more in place Sullivan's system got, the PK just got worse and worse. Martin was also a part of some of those good, very good PK's...so what changed? We've had worse defense than this with better results.

But people have their narratives, actual facts don't seem to matter anymore. Good teams find a way to adapt and evolve, Pens won 2 cups in a row, got cocky, then leaned hard on excuses.

 

[Smasher]

Thank you Olli! Will feel strange to see him wearing red.

View media item 2247

 

[Ozz]

Thanks for everything; shame he had his issues leading to the steps backward.