luby3131
Registered User
I'm taking a page out of Omar Kelly's book on this one. For those of you who are not local or unfamiliar, Kelly is a writer for the Sun-Sentinel and covers the Dolphins. About two years ago, he put out a series of articles titled "The Kraken" unleashing on the mistakes made by the Bill Parcels-Tony Sparano-Jeff Ireland, adivisor-coach-GM tri-fecta.
I'm making this post to do the same on the Florida Panthers, specifically Dale Tallon. Why? Well, I'm tired of seeing Tallon get a free pass around here based on his success with the Chicago Blackhawks. Back in the Summer of 2010 when the Panthers hired Dale Tallon and all of you were littered with excitement, I was more than a little disappointed.
I was a very big supporter of Randy Sexton and the job he had done from the time he took over on. For those with short memories, Sexton orchestrated the Jay Bouwmeester deal while being backed into a wall, managing to get out respectable value for a player who was leaving no matter what (Jordan Leopold and a 3rd round pick used to select Josh Birkholz). Sexton did a tremendous job in that draft, selecting Dmitri Kulikov out of Drummondville at #14, then orchestrating a last minute agreement to buy him out of his KHL contract in order for him to be able to join the team as an 18 year old rookie. He selected Drew Shore from the NTDP U18s with his next pick, and continued to draft 5 more players who are all still currently playing in either the AHL or the ECHL (Josh Birkholz, Garrett Wilson, Corban Knight, Wade Meghan, and Scott Timmins). Sexton also made two shrewd dumpster diving pick ups in Dennis Seidenberg and Dominic Moore on the cheap, eventually flipping both for 2nd round picks around the deadline. He also signed free agent to be Jordan Leopold after the Bouwmeester trade and flipped him for a 2.
Out of the blue on one of the last days of the season, the report came out that Dale Tallon would be taking over as the new GM. In the weeks after the announcement, the Chicago Blackhawks team Tallon had built (only to be fired over some paper work mistakes with restricted free agents) would win the Stanley Cup. Excitement reached an all-time high with Tallon promising a five year blue print to turn this team around. He started off with a bang, trading Nathan Horton and Greg Campbell to Boston for a package including a 1st as well as trading Keith Ballard and Victor Oreskovich to Vancouver for a 1st, Steve Bernier and Michael Grabner. Tallon used the three first round picks on players to fit his bigger and faster vision- Erik Gudbranson, Nick Bjugstad, and Quinton Howden. He used his first two 2nd round picks on the disappointing John McFarland and the promising Alex Petrovic. The last 8 selections he made are players who are anonymous to all but the die hards. In free agency, Tallon would add Mike Weaver and Chris Higgins to the mix. To this point, Tallon was doing a very good job.
Then came the infamous Michael Grabner mistake. You all know the story by now. Grabner was disappointing in training camp, Tallon waived him expecting nobody to claim him, and the rest is history. As bad as this looks in hindsight, he won't be bashed for this. The other major mistake was the Erik Gudbranson contract fiasco, where Gudbranson was told he had made the team but Tallon could not get a contract done with his agent in time. It's tough to say whether the extra year in junior helped or hurt Gudbranson's development thus far. Still, it was a terrible job by Tallon not getting the contract done. The 2010-2011 team sputtered, as expected, and when the deadline came Tallon surprised a few, not with the moves he made, but with the ones he didn't. The most notable and surprising trade was moving Michael Frolik to Chicago for former Tallon pick Jack Skille and prospect David Pacan. Considering Frolik has a Cup ring and is still playing in the NHL, while Skille is on a two-way deal in Columbus, I'll chalk that deal up as a loss. Tallon would ship out scraps in Dennis Wideman, Radek Dvorak, Bryan Allen, and Chris Higgins for nothing prospects and an array of mid-round draft picks. He surprisingly kept free agents to be Tomas Vokoun and Marty Reasoner, as well as not as surprisingly keeping Stephen Weiss and David Booth, who were under contract for the next season. The moves left the Panthers with $40 million in cap space, which leads us to the 2011 offseason...
The on-ice disaster of 2011 left the Panthers with the prize of Jonathan Huberdeau, an electric- albeit, skinny- winger who just carried his team to a Memorial Cup. Tallon also selected an electric 5-6 forward by the name of Rocco Grimaldi, who is one of the best players in college hockey at the moment. Tallon also made his best pick as the Panthers GM, selecting Vincent Trocheck in the 3rd round. Trocheck was last season's OHL MVP and is currently tearing up the AHL. His other three 3rd round picks, Jonathan Racine, Logan Shaw, and Kyle Rau, are all signed to pro contracts or will be soon (in the case of Rau). The only issues I had with that draft were not selecting a goalie and the Rasmus Bengtsson pick, which looks even worse now than it looked then. Again, at this point, Tallon was still doing well.
Free agency 2011 was the climax of Tallon's tenure this far. It all started with the draft day trade for Brian Campbell, which is still an absolute steal. Then he brought a lot of excitement to the team, doling out big contracts to free agents Tomas Fleischmann, Sean Bergenheim, Jose Theodore, Scottie Upshall, Tomas Kopecky, Marcel Goc and trading for Kris Versteeg. This was all on the heels of hiring Kevin Dineen as the new coach. Tallon had completely remade the roster, hoping to bring success early, which strayed from his original 5 year plan. The off-season was not without mistakes, however. Letting both Tomas Vokoun and Marty Reasoner walk after preaching at the deadline that they were part of the future was a mistake. He should've shipped them off for value when he could of. Not a major issue, but a bit troubling. Tallon also made a difficult, but smart, decision in sending Jonathan Huberdeau back to juniors. The kid clearly needed to bulk up to handle a full NHL season.
When the team got out of the gate slow, Tallon made a major shake-up trade, shipping out a player who clearly didn't fit in fan favorite David Booth and acquiring veteran Mikael Samuelsson. This trade was a big win for the Panthers. The perfect storm hit that season- Washington and the rest of the division struggled early, the Panthers reeled off a few wins on the backs of at first the Fleischmann- Weiss - Versteeg line and then the backs of the Bergenheim - Goc - Kopecky trio all while getting good goaltending from Jose Theodore and Scott Clemmensen. The season was filled with positives and good feelings, as the team made the playoffs for the first time in a decade. This, unfortunately, will be the last time I praise Dale Tallon.
When the 2012 draft came along, it appeared to me that Tallon had gotten a little bit complacent. Outside of 1st round pick Michael Matheson, and maybe even 4th round pick Alexander Delnov I believe that this draft was atrocious. All 5 draft picks are still early in their careers, but I'll stick to my convictions that he did a pretty awful job. The real issue I had was free agency 2012. Everyone knew Jason Garrison was leaving for Vancouver. So what does Dale do? He overpays for Filip Kuba, who just had a monster season while being paired with Norris Trophy winner Erik Karlsson. The team was still in desperate need of primary and secondary scoring. So Tallon dumpster dives for Peter Mueller and Alex Kovalev, all why putting high expectations on rookie Jonathan Huberdeau. His most puzzling decision might have been re-singing Scott Clemmensen to a 2 year deal. He over-paid for an average at best goalie, for too long, all while infuriating his goalie of the future, Jacob Markstrom. I said before the season that I thought this team was worse than last years team. Tallon completely swung and missed on the 2012 off-season.
To the disappointment of a fan base who apparently was napping during the off-season, the team was atrocious in the lockout-shortened 2012-2013 season. The lone bright spot was the play of the rookies Jonathan Huberdeau and Drew Shore. Huberdeau was the clear choice for the Calder, and Drew Shore was our 2nd or 3rd best forward on most nights while battling an injury for most of the season. Fans gave Tallon and Dineen a mulligan on the year, citing the injury bug. Fair I guess, but this was Tallon's third year at the helm. Shouldn't he have acquired more depth by now? I let the season slide, but was very curious on what Tallon was going to do in the 2013 offseason.
The 2013 draft is where I officially jumped off the Dale Tallon bandwagon. I'll start with the issue of pending free agent Stephen Weiss. A lot of people on these boards were in a fantasy world, expecting Weiss to resign here. It was clear he was a goner in my eyes. Tallon should've traded his rights at the draft. Then came the Aleksander Barkov selection. I like Barkov, and think he's going to be a very good player in this league. Problem is, I think Seth Jones will be a great one. Tallon made a mistake good GMs don't, and that's drafting positional need over best player available. We'll see what happens as the years go on with the Jones vs Barkov debate. I also had a problem with the rest of the draft though. Tallon got some solid prospects in guys such as Ian McCoshen, Matt Buckels, and Michael Downing. Problem is, he played the draft too safe. I'm not going to get into details on what I would've done, but I would've rather gotten guys with more upside than we did in rounds 3-7 (save for maybe Mackenzie Weegar out of Halifax). Tallon very well could have selected 4 NHLers in this draft. The problem is we won't know until 5-6 years from now because the best prospects he selected are all taking the 4 year college development route. Bottom line is, this draft was just Tallon trying to buy time with "the best prospect base in the league".
The rest of the 2013 off-season is a mess. Tallon starts out preaching the "we're going young" approach, which is fine, especially because he was apparently told not to spend until a new owner is found. So all off-season long, fans are expecting a team lead by the young core, a glimpse into the future if you will. All of a sudden, training camp hits, and over the hill vets such as Brad Boyes, Tom Gilbert, Ryan Whitney, and Timmy Thomas start popping up on PTOs. A new owner is appointed and all of a sudden Tallon shifts his strategy from "going young" to "being competitive as possible". So instead of doing something similar to Buffalo and letting our young guys get NHL time to develop, we decide we're better off trying to compete with Boyes, Gomez, Gilbert, Gilroy, Whitney, and Thomas on the roster rather than giving spots to young guys with pro experience such as Howden, Shore, Petrovic, Robak, and giving Markstrom a shot as the #1 from the beginning.
So what does this all mean? Where is this all going? Well, I'm sorry my friends, but Tallon is going to sink this ship if some of these "Rumor has it's" come true. Tallon is going to do the wrong thing in attempt to save his job. He's going to fire Dineen (although, that is well deserved), make a couple of minor shake up trades, and then attempt to trade a chunk of his young talent for proven players to try and salvage the season. The correct course of action for this franchise is to ship off the vets for assets, bring up the young guys to see what you really have, and gear up for a massive draft... kind of like what Randy Sexton did before him.
Fire Dale Tallon
I'm making this post to do the same on the Florida Panthers, specifically Dale Tallon. Why? Well, I'm tired of seeing Tallon get a free pass around here based on his success with the Chicago Blackhawks. Back in the Summer of 2010 when the Panthers hired Dale Tallon and all of you were littered with excitement, I was more than a little disappointed.
I was a very big supporter of Randy Sexton and the job he had done from the time he took over on. For those with short memories, Sexton orchestrated the Jay Bouwmeester deal while being backed into a wall, managing to get out respectable value for a player who was leaving no matter what (Jordan Leopold and a 3rd round pick used to select Josh Birkholz). Sexton did a tremendous job in that draft, selecting Dmitri Kulikov out of Drummondville at #14, then orchestrating a last minute agreement to buy him out of his KHL contract in order for him to be able to join the team as an 18 year old rookie. He selected Drew Shore from the NTDP U18s with his next pick, and continued to draft 5 more players who are all still currently playing in either the AHL or the ECHL (Josh Birkholz, Garrett Wilson, Corban Knight, Wade Meghan, and Scott Timmins). Sexton also made two shrewd dumpster diving pick ups in Dennis Seidenberg and Dominic Moore on the cheap, eventually flipping both for 2nd round picks around the deadline. He also signed free agent to be Jordan Leopold after the Bouwmeester trade and flipped him for a 2.
Out of the blue on one of the last days of the season, the report came out that Dale Tallon would be taking over as the new GM. In the weeks after the announcement, the Chicago Blackhawks team Tallon had built (only to be fired over some paper work mistakes with restricted free agents) would win the Stanley Cup. Excitement reached an all-time high with Tallon promising a five year blue print to turn this team around. He started off with a bang, trading Nathan Horton and Greg Campbell to Boston for a package including a 1st as well as trading Keith Ballard and Victor Oreskovich to Vancouver for a 1st, Steve Bernier and Michael Grabner. Tallon used the three first round picks on players to fit his bigger and faster vision- Erik Gudbranson, Nick Bjugstad, and Quinton Howden. He used his first two 2nd round picks on the disappointing John McFarland and the promising Alex Petrovic. The last 8 selections he made are players who are anonymous to all but the die hards. In free agency, Tallon would add Mike Weaver and Chris Higgins to the mix. To this point, Tallon was doing a very good job.
Then came the infamous Michael Grabner mistake. You all know the story by now. Grabner was disappointing in training camp, Tallon waived him expecting nobody to claim him, and the rest is history. As bad as this looks in hindsight, he won't be bashed for this. The other major mistake was the Erik Gudbranson contract fiasco, where Gudbranson was told he had made the team but Tallon could not get a contract done with his agent in time. It's tough to say whether the extra year in junior helped or hurt Gudbranson's development thus far. Still, it was a terrible job by Tallon not getting the contract done. The 2010-2011 team sputtered, as expected, and when the deadline came Tallon surprised a few, not with the moves he made, but with the ones he didn't. The most notable and surprising trade was moving Michael Frolik to Chicago for former Tallon pick Jack Skille and prospect David Pacan. Considering Frolik has a Cup ring and is still playing in the NHL, while Skille is on a two-way deal in Columbus, I'll chalk that deal up as a loss. Tallon would ship out scraps in Dennis Wideman, Radek Dvorak, Bryan Allen, and Chris Higgins for nothing prospects and an array of mid-round draft picks. He surprisingly kept free agents to be Tomas Vokoun and Marty Reasoner, as well as not as surprisingly keeping Stephen Weiss and David Booth, who were under contract for the next season. The moves left the Panthers with $40 million in cap space, which leads us to the 2011 offseason...
The on-ice disaster of 2011 left the Panthers with the prize of Jonathan Huberdeau, an electric- albeit, skinny- winger who just carried his team to a Memorial Cup. Tallon also selected an electric 5-6 forward by the name of Rocco Grimaldi, who is one of the best players in college hockey at the moment. Tallon also made his best pick as the Panthers GM, selecting Vincent Trocheck in the 3rd round. Trocheck was last season's OHL MVP and is currently tearing up the AHL. His other three 3rd round picks, Jonathan Racine, Logan Shaw, and Kyle Rau, are all signed to pro contracts or will be soon (in the case of Rau). The only issues I had with that draft were not selecting a goalie and the Rasmus Bengtsson pick, which looks even worse now than it looked then. Again, at this point, Tallon was still doing well.
Free agency 2011 was the climax of Tallon's tenure this far. It all started with the draft day trade for Brian Campbell, which is still an absolute steal. Then he brought a lot of excitement to the team, doling out big contracts to free agents Tomas Fleischmann, Sean Bergenheim, Jose Theodore, Scottie Upshall, Tomas Kopecky, Marcel Goc and trading for Kris Versteeg. This was all on the heels of hiring Kevin Dineen as the new coach. Tallon had completely remade the roster, hoping to bring success early, which strayed from his original 5 year plan. The off-season was not without mistakes, however. Letting both Tomas Vokoun and Marty Reasoner walk after preaching at the deadline that they were part of the future was a mistake. He should've shipped them off for value when he could of. Not a major issue, but a bit troubling. Tallon also made a difficult, but smart, decision in sending Jonathan Huberdeau back to juniors. The kid clearly needed to bulk up to handle a full NHL season.
When the team got out of the gate slow, Tallon made a major shake-up trade, shipping out a player who clearly didn't fit in fan favorite David Booth and acquiring veteran Mikael Samuelsson. This trade was a big win for the Panthers. The perfect storm hit that season- Washington and the rest of the division struggled early, the Panthers reeled off a few wins on the backs of at first the Fleischmann- Weiss - Versteeg line and then the backs of the Bergenheim - Goc - Kopecky trio all while getting good goaltending from Jose Theodore and Scott Clemmensen. The season was filled with positives and good feelings, as the team made the playoffs for the first time in a decade. This, unfortunately, will be the last time I praise Dale Tallon.
When the 2012 draft came along, it appeared to me that Tallon had gotten a little bit complacent. Outside of 1st round pick Michael Matheson, and maybe even 4th round pick Alexander Delnov I believe that this draft was atrocious. All 5 draft picks are still early in their careers, but I'll stick to my convictions that he did a pretty awful job. The real issue I had was free agency 2012. Everyone knew Jason Garrison was leaving for Vancouver. So what does Dale do? He overpays for Filip Kuba, who just had a monster season while being paired with Norris Trophy winner Erik Karlsson. The team was still in desperate need of primary and secondary scoring. So Tallon dumpster dives for Peter Mueller and Alex Kovalev, all why putting high expectations on rookie Jonathan Huberdeau. His most puzzling decision might have been re-singing Scott Clemmensen to a 2 year deal. He over-paid for an average at best goalie, for too long, all while infuriating his goalie of the future, Jacob Markstrom. I said before the season that I thought this team was worse than last years team. Tallon completely swung and missed on the 2012 off-season.
To the disappointment of a fan base who apparently was napping during the off-season, the team was atrocious in the lockout-shortened 2012-2013 season. The lone bright spot was the play of the rookies Jonathan Huberdeau and Drew Shore. Huberdeau was the clear choice for the Calder, and Drew Shore was our 2nd or 3rd best forward on most nights while battling an injury for most of the season. Fans gave Tallon and Dineen a mulligan on the year, citing the injury bug. Fair I guess, but this was Tallon's third year at the helm. Shouldn't he have acquired more depth by now? I let the season slide, but was very curious on what Tallon was going to do in the 2013 offseason.
The 2013 draft is where I officially jumped off the Dale Tallon bandwagon. I'll start with the issue of pending free agent Stephen Weiss. A lot of people on these boards were in a fantasy world, expecting Weiss to resign here. It was clear he was a goner in my eyes. Tallon should've traded his rights at the draft. Then came the Aleksander Barkov selection. I like Barkov, and think he's going to be a very good player in this league. Problem is, I think Seth Jones will be a great one. Tallon made a mistake good GMs don't, and that's drafting positional need over best player available. We'll see what happens as the years go on with the Jones vs Barkov debate. I also had a problem with the rest of the draft though. Tallon got some solid prospects in guys such as Ian McCoshen, Matt Buckels, and Michael Downing. Problem is, he played the draft too safe. I'm not going to get into details on what I would've done, but I would've rather gotten guys with more upside than we did in rounds 3-7 (save for maybe Mackenzie Weegar out of Halifax). Tallon very well could have selected 4 NHLers in this draft. The problem is we won't know until 5-6 years from now because the best prospects he selected are all taking the 4 year college development route. Bottom line is, this draft was just Tallon trying to buy time with "the best prospect base in the league".
The rest of the 2013 off-season is a mess. Tallon starts out preaching the "we're going young" approach, which is fine, especially because he was apparently told not to spend until a new owner is found. So all off-season long, fans are expecting a team lead by the young core, a glimpse into the future if you will. All of a sudden, training camp hits, and over the hill vets such as Brad Boyes, Tom Gilbert, Ryan Whitney, and Timmy Thomas start popping up on PTOs. A new owner is appointed and all of a sudden Tallon shifts his strategy from "going young" to "being competitive as possible". So instead of doing something similar to Buffalo and letting our young guys get NHL time to develop, we decide we're better off trying to compete with Boyes, Gomez, Gilbert, Gilroy, Whitney, and Thomas on the roster rather than giving spots to young guys with pro experience such as Howden, Shore, Petrovic, Robak, and giving Markstrom a shot as the #1 from the beginning.
So what does this all mean? Where is this all going? Well, I'm sorry my friends, but Tallon is going to sink this ship if some of these "Rumor has it's" come true. Tallon is going to do the wrong thing in attempt to save his job. He's going to fire Dineen (although, that is well deserved), make a couple of minor shake up trades, and then attempt to trade a chunk of his young talent for proven players to try and salvage the season. The correct course of action for this franchise is to ship off the vets for assets, bring up the young guys to see what you really have, and gear up for a massive draft... kind of like what Randy Sexton did before him.
Fire Dale Tallon
