When your only defense of a coach is what he did 4 and 5 years ago and recent history doesn’t back him up, it might mean his expiration date is close, or has already gotten here
Thanks for Everything, Sully
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When your only defense of a coach is what he did 4 and 5 years ago and recent history doesn’t back him up, it might mean his expiration date is close, or has already gotten here
Night Shift
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You can’t just look at two of Sully’s years here, guy. His recent track record is something even Dan Bylsma would be embarrassed by. If Sully can’t get this team out of round one, he HAS to go.
This isn’t back to the future, bud. We can’t live in 2016.
I think we should fire the terrible fans and not thank them on the way out.
You guys all like comparisons...the only way Sullivan gets fired is if we implode like we did against the Flyers years back.
I mean Trotz and Julien are really good coaches too. Chances are whoever you get instead of Sullivan isn't going to be better than those guys.
It is just fans being mad just to be mad again. So spoiled. All these millennial fans expect to win every year. Immature and amateur.
You guys all like comparisons...the only way Sullivan gets fired is if we implode like we did against the Flyers years back.
I mean Trotz and Julien are really good coaches too. Chances are whoever you get instead of Sullivan isn't going to be better than those guys.
It is just fans being mad just to be mad again. So spoiled. All these millennial fans expect to win every year. Immature and amateur.
Honour Over Glory
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This is where I think this train of thought is asinine. I applaud Sullivan for finally showing some mental chess this season with his coaching but only a few things were good, the team was still a disaster defensively with consistency and remains an issue while teams with even lesser defense seem to at least be able to sort that out more often than the Pens have shown.
Also, what's the end game here mate?
So you want Sullivan to waste 7 years in the playoffs before you consider him worse than Bylsma? This core is not young, even 2 early exits (not making to the ECF with Sid, Geno, Letang, and Jake is a failure IMO) is already too much when you automatically ignore that it's been 3yrs now.
2018 - They lost to the Caps in Round 2.
2019 - They were swept by the Islanders in Round 1.
2020 - They were knocked out by the Habs in the "Playoffs" but technically, they were booted in the play-in "playoffs" and didn't even realistically make the playoffs, but it's considered one.
So 2021, you've already set the low bar at "Well, as long as we are out in the 2nd only..."
Here's something I will agee on.
Dan Bylsma was awful in the playoffs.
But a lot of you blokes already have excuses made. So you want to pump Sullivan's tires? He did great without Malkin and some others. So given that, he should still do well with or without them because he has shown he can. The Islanders have an inferior Roster and lost their Captain for the season. To me, if Hextall sees this team barely beat the Islanders and then they're out in the 2nd, it tells me the window is barely open and you need to make a move fast and it has to be coaching - This team has moved Kessel, Hornqvist, etc, those are big names. This team is pretty deep on 4 lines whether people want to admit it or not.
This should be an ECF team. If this team isn't in the final 4, they've failed and keeping Sullivan on a 5th year o fail once more solves nothing. Sullivan is a good coach, but his innovation with this core can only be fresh for so long.
See above.
Night Shift
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Mike Sullivan is a Hof coach before coach clown Tomlin is. Sullivan had less years to put together 2 runs. Clown was gifted a SB because the Cardinals D let up at the end
( we didn't think that way then because we thought Clown was a great coach)
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Gurglesons
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winning no playoff games in two years for a win now franchise is unacceptable.
Honour Over Glory
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None of what you said makes any sense to the point of this thread.
To not make it to the ECF in 4yrs with Sid at 33 going on 34 and Malkin going on 35 in the Summer is an issue. Joel Q won 3 cups in 6yrs and then followed it with two 1st round exits and then missed the playoffs and was fired in his 4th year after his last cup going 6-6-3.
Joel is a HHOF coach.
Somehow this board is dong the same thing with Sullivan as they did Bylsma back in 2009-10 (before the playoffs) and can't even see it.
3 more yrs down the line of 1st-2nd round exits, the same faction of blind Sully followers will say "BUT HE WON BACK 2 BACK!! HEXTALL BETRAYED HIM"
What magical cap does this fan base want Hextall to conjure up to add to this team? Guentzel, Letang, Crosby, Malkin, all take up a massive chunk of it and the GM has to add to that while also needing to pay young talent to keep them and the lack of that young talent is an issue. So what, they should keep pumping Sullivan's tires while the team keeps failing in the playoffs to meet expectation with an aging core? If they want to keep Sullivan and don't make the finals this year they need to blow it up.
Honour Over Glory
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I just want to correct one thing...
Last 3yrs, failing to make the Eastern Conference Finals.
Last 2yrs, not winning a single round.
Also last 2yrs, being swept in the first round.
Last year, not even making the traditional playoffs.
But..."Sullivan is amazing." We've been told.
The Sullivan haters are all the worst posters here. The true keyboard experts.
Sad and mad fanboys who never blame the stars.
Sad and mad fanboys who never blame the stars.
Sidney the Kidney
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The star haters are all the worst posters here. The true keyboard experts.
Sad and mad fanboys who never blame the coach.
Sad and mad fanboys who never blame the coach.
Coastal Kev
There will be "I told you so's" Bet on it
Honour Over Glory
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I am more than happy to eat my words when I'm wrong. But the hypocrisy of the Bylsma hate and the blind Sully cult is documented in my bookmarks as well mate...
And to be clear I don't like Bylsma now but at the time I liked what he did with the team when it was decimated and I liked Sullivan and his changes after MJ but both after their successes, failed to keep the momentum going and Sullivan hasn't after his second cup.
In any case I want to see Sullivan figure it out and go deep with this roster this year. I think he has to or he has a very short leash next year and if he doesn't then I 100% question Hextall and his ability to access performance.
You can't allow 5yrs of no eastern conference finals at the least. You just can't. If this year is a fail then it's 4...
People think it's an indictment on Sullivan as a coach. But fail to recognize that Trotz left Nashville and won. Joel left the Blues and Avs and won 3 in 6yrs with Chicago. Sullivan himself was fired from Boston and won with us. Heck, Bruce Cassidy was fired by the Caps and is probably one of the best coaches in the league right now.
Coaches get stale. I find it rather odd people refuse to admit or see it here until it's too late then it's the hindsight bitching that's so f***ing popular here it might as well be our signature.
HandshakeLine
A real jerk thing
Lol at people engaging a formerly notorious poster's new alt in good faith.
Sidney the Kidney
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I don't get why anyone would do that. Did they make such a fool of themselves under their previous username that they figure starting over is the only way anyone will hopefully take their idiotic points seriously?
Gurglesons
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Coastal Kev
There will be "I told you so's" Bet on it
Gurglesons
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I changed my name to trick you into being my friend..............
Weird. I always laugh at you and @Terrapin's agenda of physicality. I guess that makes us friends.
One never knows for certain, but in this case, the more likely (although not definite) answer is . . .
1. As @HandshakeLine will attest, it's a Leskyian tradition.
OR
2.
You know, it's not even that you (or I) would take it to the extreme that @Terrapin or @Coastal Kev might, but it's pretty clear there needs to be a balance and it's even more clear that the Pens have gotten further from rather than closer to it over the last 4 years.
As an aside, @HandshakeLine and I have been talking for a while that one thing this team also desperately needs is a Ruutu style predator . . . someone to go after the other team's top players from pre-game warm up on, because every second the other team spends trying to kill that guy is one less they spend trying to kill Sid, Geno, or Letang.
BUT, Sullivan has as little use for that type of player as he has for the toughness/physicality in general.
Honour Over Glory
Fire Sully
- Jan 30, 2012
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Honour Over Glory
Fire Sully
- Jan 30, 2012
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- 42,447
Mate remember when I said we needed a certain type of ornery player and we didn't get him?
I liked Hartman and Cousins for that. Blokes that are solid at both ends and can contribute but also play in your face and do a generally great job of pissing the other team off into having to penalty kill against us.
I would think Hextall would see that. It's why I was a big fan of Tanev joining but he's literally it and Blueger tries and then Lafferty sort of does but generally sucks at everything. Angello would be intriguing from within as he does use his size more than Lafferty does.
We lack a Ruutu type for sure, a Cooke and Kennedy type etc as well.
Ps - Jankowski is still garbage.
Honour Over Glory
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Gurglesons
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I trolled you into that name and you think I am being trolled.
Most accurate statement in this thread.
Gurglesons
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It's why you look into trading Rust for something that fits better in the top six.
I think people underrate Kapanen and how he plays too.
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