Should we consider a philosophical shift with how we play/construct defense?

[HockeyinHD]

So if our draft strategy is BPA... and that strategy never yields defenseman... Do you change the strategy? Or are you bad at evaluating defenseman?

It's mostly draft position, though. There are always going to be more 'best player available' guys at forward than at D when you're late in the first. It's not like there have been a whole bunch of drafts lately where there were 15+ strong blueline prospects around so the Wings could land one at 20 or something.

All the "sure thing" guys go early, and then you're looking at the usual mosh pit of fairly similar talents.

How many dmen taken late 1st end up being top 3 guys? One every other year, at most?

 

[InjuredChoker]

You've forgotten the era of the Left Wing lock, I see. And all the other trapping teams that won. Oh well.

trapping doesn't mean your main focus isn't to play puck possession focused game. it can actually support that. it can hinder the oppositions ability to carry the puck in and force them to dump it in instead. if you have mobile skaters who are smart and have pucks skills, they can retrieve it before other teams forwards get to them and have it quickly going the other direction either by skating out or quick outlet passes to other D or forwards.

there isn't a NHL team that doesn't use some sort of neutral zone trap these days.


if/as you're referring to prelockout bowman and devils teams, no i haven't forgotten. have you forgotten the rule changes that have made since then and how the game has changed? including that every cup winner since ´07 has been good to great puck possession team.

No, that's false. If a weakly talented team tried to run a more possessive system they would get routinely destroyed. That's why weakly talented teams run defensive systems. They suppress scoring chances, keep games closer, and allow more opportunity to be in games late.

possession focused teams can be low event teams (in terms of overall shots and scoring chances etc). carolina focused heavily on that last season and they didn't get destroyed. they were usually the better team on the ice. they just had crappy goaltending and lacked scoring talent.

Defensive in effect, offensive in nature.

not necessarily if their intention is to keep it low event hockey. few scoring chances and shots both for and against.

How many dmen taken late 1st end up being top 3 guys? One every other year, at most?

from 2003 to 2010 i count 8 guys who are top guys or more (taken between picks 15-30). one of them is maybe little generous. some drafts had 3, some had zero. one might still turn out one (pysyk).

so pretty much 1 per draft on avg.

 

[Frk It]

It's mostly draft position, though. There are always going to be more 'best player available' guys at forward than at D when you're late in the first. It's not like there have been a whole bunch of drafts lately where there were 15+ strong blueline prospects around so the Wings could land one at 20 or something.

All the "sure thing" guys go early, and then you're looking at the usual mosh pit of fairly similar talents.

How many dmen taken late 1st end up being top 3 guys? One every other year, at most?

So what you're saying is... we need to draft higher?

 

[jkutswings]

So what you're saying is... we need to draft higher?

Sounds like Top 5 to me.

 

[HockeyinHD]

So what you're saying is... we need to draft higher?

To land a quality dman prospect with a greater degree of reliability than playing Keno? Obviously.

 

[HockeyinHD]

trapping doesn't mean your main focus isn't to play puck possession focused game.

Please don't employ pedantry. We know what trapping hockey looks like. We've seen teams use it against the Wings for years, to good effect. We understand the separation between Detroit's talent level and those other clubs.

The 'but it doesn't always have to be 100% precisely trapping hockey' stuff is febrile obfuscation.

there isn't a NHL team that doesn't use some sort of neutral zone trap these days.

Everyone throughout all of recorded history has employed the existence of the blue line (and before that the two line pass) as a function of their defensive posture. That fact does not mean all those teams have played a trap. A trap is a very specific (and extreme) application of those principles.

if/as you're referring to prelockout bowman and devils teams, no i haven't forgotten. have you forgotten the rule changes that have made since then and how the game has changed?

No, because that was my point. Defensive styles of hockey were so easy to implement and be effective with that the NHL had to legislate them as much out of the league as they could in order to salvage the leagues ability to have anything remotely resembling an offensive structure.

Even post two line the reasons defensive hockey are easier to implement successfully remain, albeit mitigated to a small degree by the expansion of the defensive zone.

from 2003 to 2010 i count 8 guys who are top guys or more (taken between picks 15-30). one of them is maybe little generous. some drafts had 3, some had zero. one might still turn out one (pysyk).

so pretty much 1 per draft on avg.

"I'm picking late in the first round of our 30 team draft this year."
"You are? Bummer. Where?"
"15."
"..."

 

[Frk It]

"I'm picking late in the first round of our 30 team draft this year."
"You are? Bummer. Where?"
"15."
"..."

Are you trying to say we pick late in the 1st? Because that's past tense.

Out draft position based on finish the last 3 years is 16, 19, 15. And we're not heading back to late 20's anytime soon.

 

[InjuredChoker]

Please don't employ pedantry. We know what trapping hockey looks like. We've seen teams use it against the Wings for years, to good effect. We understand the separation between Detroit's talent level and those other clubs.

The 'but it doesn't always have to be 100% precisely trapping hockey' stuff is febrile obfuscation.

there are varying forms of trapping teams. teams can use trap and play puck possession game. prelockout devils had some very talented teams. they also used the trap on many of those years when they were running for cups. they didn't have wings-like focus on puck possession but they were a damn good possession team too.

i have no idea what you mean with pedantry here nor why did you ignore the rest of the post.

Everyone throughout all of recorded history has employed the existence of the blue line (and before that the two line pass) as a function of their defensive posture. That fact does not mean all those teams have played a trap. A trap is a very specific (and extreme) application of those principles.

every team uses some sort of neutral zone trap or system in which they try to slow down the opponent and prevent them for carrying the puck in to the zone. which usually get more extreme later in the game when defending the lead.

"I'm picking late in the first round of our 30 team draft this year."
"You are? Bummer. Where?"
"15."
"..."

teams are allowed to trade up and wings have been picking closer to 15th than 30th in recent years.