The Issue with Rebuilds

[BenG]

When did the 'scorched earth' approach to selling off almost all assets except rookies/prospects come about?

This is a terrible way to run a franchise and end up causing more long-term damage to a franchise that can last decades. Teams would be much more successful if they chose to sell/trade expiring contracts for futures while keeping cores in tact. This would help insulate younger players, keep your team 'competitive', while still ensuring you get a high draft pick with upside. Not to mention having higher tickets sakes and remaining an attractive option for your RFAs/FAs.

These types of players can take 2-3 years to recoup via drafting if you are lucky. While younger players are making a more immediate impact, drafting on the whole seems to remain a crapshoot.

Do you think the pro's outweigh the con's? Any examples of this working out?

Click to read more...

 

[amnesiac]

Sabres thought Jeff Skinner was a core player.... I mean core players can turn out to be great for longterm building or not at all.... Kane and Seabrook come to mind.

Theres no perfect formula. To me you need at least an elite centre and 1D to start. The rest is chemistry and coaching.

 

[Gjman2019]

Are people forgetting how ugly it was in Chicago and Pittsburgh (and L.A. to a bit lesser extent) before they combined for 8 championships ?

If it's impossible to recover from years of losing how do they combine to win that many championships ?

This whole argument about not being able to recover from a losing culture in easily disproven with very obvious evidence....

 

[Gjman2019]

Sabres thought Jeff Skinner was a core player.... I mean core players can turn out to be great for longterm building or not at all.... Kane and Seabrook come to mind.

Theres no perfect formula. To me you need at least an elite centre and 1D to start. The rest is chemistry and coaching.

The rest is chemistry and coaching.

You forgot goaltending.

 

[GOilers88]

I'm of the opinion the ever present 'scorched earth' idea is something fans on the internet came up with because they don't understand things like chemistry, personal, and professional relationships exist in sports.

I agree with you. It's f***ing stupid.

 

[Dumpster Flyers]

People react to whatever narrative is trending right now, but really there's not one single way to build a contender. Currently, people are looking at this string of disappointing 1st overall picks and are down on tanking, but as soon as another McDavid/Matthews type breaks in, the narrative will change. It all comes down to smart pro and amateur scouting, effective player development, and coaching. The problem with so many "rebuilds" is they dump their veteran players for picks but retain the same idiotic staff that failed them in the first place, and I'm not just talking about the coach and GM.

 

[MadLuke]

Do you think the pro's outweigh the con's? Any examples of this working out?

There is many depending on the criteria, Pittsburgh (internal cap issue forced their hands there maybe), Nordique tanking for Lindros, Senators, Chicago and a long list of failure as well.

keep your team 'competitive', while still ensuring you get a high draft pick with upside

That seem to make it trivial, sure if you could have good draft pick and be a playoff team at the same time that would be nice, but you cannot be competitive and be sure to have high draft pick at the same time, in the nhl the quality of the draft drop really really fast:

If we zoom in on the top 60 pick

Drafting top 5 is really desired and at least top 7

Making having an effective high draft pick something only non competitive team really have.

 

[RalphKing]

The earliest instance I can remember is the Penguins tanking to get Mario. It was very obvious they were trying to suck and lose games to ensure they got that first overall pick. Of course, it did end up working out, but I also recall that Mario was quite pissed off about it and initially didn't even want to go to the Penguins because of those shenanigans. I don't think it's guaranteed to work. Lots of teams attempt it but few pull it off.

 

[Uncle Scrooge]

The reality is nothing is perfect, every method can work or fail.

Go the "scorched earth" route, hit some homeruns with your high draft picks and utilize your free cap space well and things can turn around completely. But if you don't draft well, get unlucky with lotteries and develop a losing culture then you're stuck in a dumpster fire.

Go the "stay competitive" route, your core players keep the team afloat while you do a good job with the assets you manage to squeeze out from spare parts, make some smart signings to boost the depth while slowly integrating younger players into the lineup and the team can get better while never really sucking. But if your core players get worse during this time and/or you sign the wrong players who just end up eating cap space, you end up frustrated in mediocrity where you're not bad enough to get the best picks but also don't have meaningful success on the ice.

I would say the Rangers are the most recent example of blowing things up and things not looking to bad moving forward. The only guys they have left from 17/18 are Zibanejad, Kreider, Buchnevich, Smith and Georgiev. Technically Chytil too but he wasn't a regular that year. I wouldn't call that a core.

Obviously they have the benefit of attractive location and all that so for a team like NY the scorched earth definitely works better. Depends on the team i guess.

 

[Saitama]

Scorched earth is only fun when you`re playing franchise mode in an NHL video game.

 

[amnesiac]

You forgot goaltending.

helps, but weve seen teams win with mediocre goaltending in the past decade.... no Conn Smythe winner since Quick

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

Comes with a hard cap league. Not like you can just go write a blank check to get talent anymore.

The draft is the only real way left for a bad team to acquire elite talent.

 

[Gjman2019]

helps, but weve seen teams win with mediocre goaltending in the past decade.... no Conn Smythe winner since Quick

I guess..

When the Hawks won their 3rd cup i remember Crawford being terrible early in the playoffs and then he recovered in the 2nd round....Would have to look into it a bit more to find more examples....

It's still huge in my opinion though......

 

[EbonyRaptor]

It sounds good in theory to say keep the core together and swap out non-core players with expiring contracts but it's near impossible in practice with the salary cap because those core players get paid more as they become more successful and come off their ELC and second contracts. The Hawks had to trade a lot of key players from their 1st Cup win in 2009/10 through their 3rd Cup win in 2014/15 to stay cap compliant. The salary cap eventually takes you down from the mountain top and the thing you don't want it to end up in "no man's land" between legitimate Cup contender and bad team that gets top-5 / top-10 draft picks. Being in that middle tier might get you into the playoffs every now and then but you won't be good enough to win 4 series against the top teams in the league. Once the Cup window has slammed shut the best option to rebuild is to do it through the draft and the best way to do it through the draft is to draft in the top-5 / top-10 multiple times over a 4-5 year period.

 

[Paperbagofglory]

It this is a serious question?

Look at the history of all the cup winners in the modern post original 6 era. All the teams were bad for years on end. You can't win a championship by being a middling team and drafting in the middle of the pack year after year. Sure you can have a feel good story about battling for the 7th or 8th playoff spot every season, but in the end you are doing it wrong.

Rebuilding is risky and you need to hire the right people. But every successful franchise were some of the worst clubs in NHL history. The Penguins of the early to mid 80's were historically bad. The Penguins of the late 90's were historically bad, The Oilers of the late 2010's were historically bad, not just for a few season but for a freaking decade. You don't draft those guys unless you are very very bad.

Also consider the law of averages, there are realistically 2 or 3 contenders every season, lets be generous and say 5. That would leave you with 15 average teams and another 10 that are the bottom of the league. Those 10 bottom of the league teams don't just all happen on person because of some grand master plan of tanking. Clubs just hire the wrong people, draft wrong, scout wrong and approach the game all wrong and it happens all at once in most cases. So if you look at these clubs that are this bad, the opportunity to finish last is more difficult because 1 or 2 clubs have to be even worse then the garbage teams, so this is where strategic tanking happens.

Its not near as often as people think. There is no grand plan most times, there must always be garbage in a dumpster.

 

[ESH]

The Flames have always refused to go scorched earth, and they’ve been stuck in mediocrity for 30 years

 

[Aurinko]

There are some current rebuilds that seem quite fast and successful. I feel like Wild, Rangers, Canadiens for example have all managed a decent rebuilds without wasting too much time.

 

[mriswith]

Scorched earth is almost always the 2nd consecutive rebuild.

The first rebuild that comes before scorched earth fails because the executives are bad.

So after bad executives fail the first rebuild, then bad executives pivot to a second rebuild where they're forced to go scorched earth.... the bad executives tend to also fail the scorched earth rebuild.

The lesson is that scorched earth rebuilds are a sign that you need to go scorched earth on your management and leadership team and your owners are doing something wrong related to that.

The lesson is not that scorched earth rebuilds don't work... it's that even the best players in the draft can't save bad management teams and bad ownership.

 

[ClydeLee]

Are people forgetting how ugly it was in Chicago and Pittsburgh (and L.A. to a bit lesser extent) before they combined for 8 championships ?

If it's impossible to recover from years of losing how do they combine to win that many championships ?

This whole argument about not being able to recover from a losing culture in easily disproven with very obvious evidence....

Im with the OP here. People see those terrible teams... but they didn't rise out of a tear down rebuild.

You have this frequent narrative now that teams need to blow it all up and trade any piece who will be 30 and up by the time you extinction to win a Cup. Like Mario shouldn't of played with Sid but been traded off, they should of got rid of Scuderi by these peoples standards because they won't win a Cup until a guy like that's 30. These are the tear it all down ideas becoming more common now by people here, on Twitter, or Ryan Lambert types of people.

But it's bit based on anyone's actual success. It worked for Lemeuix Penguins, but these other teams the CHI, LA, Pitt, etc. Did not build up by a tear down/climb back up motive.

 

[Groo]

Scorched earth is only fun when you`re playing franchise mode in an NHL video game.

Or shooting the shit on HFboards

 

[Bloomberg]

You need to get top-end talent. It's really difficult to acquire top-end talent without picking high in the draft. So if a bad team starts to sell and you a similar bad team doesn't, then you remain in mediocrity. Hence tank races and adjustment of the draft lottery to not have tank races.

 

[Dumpster Flyers]

It this is a serious question?

Look at the history of all the cup winners in the modern post original 6 era. All the teams were bad for years on end. You can't win a championship by being a middling team and drafting in the middle of the pack year after year. Sure you can have a feel good story about battling for the 7th or 8th playoff spot every season, but in the end you are doing it wrong.

Rebuilding is risky and you need to hire the right people. But every successful franchise were some of the worst clubs in NHL history. The Penguins of the early to mid 80's were historically bad. The Penguins of the late 90's were historically bad, The Oilers of the late 2010's were historically bad, not just for a few season but for a freaking decade. You don't draft those guys unless you are very very bad.

Also consider the law of averages, there are realistically 2 or 3 contenders every season, lets be generous and say 5. That would leave you with 15 average teams and another 10 that are the bottom of the league. Those 10 bottom of the league teams don't just all happen on person because of some grand master plan of tanking. Clubs just hire the wrong people, draft wrong, scout wrong and approach the game all wrong and it happens all at once in most cases. So if you look at these clubs that are this bad, the opportunity to finish last is more difficult because 1 or 2 clubs have to be even worse then the garbage teams, so this is where strategic tanking happens.

Its not near as often as people think. There is no grand plan most times, there must always be garbage in a dumpster.

Any team has been "bad" in their history, but you can't draw a really direct line from a "blow-it-up" strategy and Stanley Cup. Is that why the Blues won in 2019? Or the Bruins in 2011? Also, exactly what steps did the Penguins take pre-04 that contributed to their future success besides suck?

 

[Drake1588]

A total rebuild can serve as a viable roadmap for the future, but a number of things need to go right... which is to say, there's a lot more to a successful rebuild than a decision to trade everything not nailed down. You need to:

• At the ownership level, settle in for a few years of pain. Ownership needs to be driving the bus on that initial decision, or it won't work. If the GM has to twist arms, if ownership doesn't have the stomach for a good five years of sub-.500 results, then don't do it. Better not to dabble in half measures, because it will not work if the owner is going to meddle after two years and sign an expensive UFA. This is a plan that will take 5+ years and commitment.
  
• That behind you, do well with your initial trades (securing high picks, good to very good prospects). Invest a lot of resources into amateur scouting, including a balance of in-person scouting and analytics staff. The draft is about to be very important to your future.
  
• Draft well with the picks that you get.
• Engage regularly and constructively with younger prospects as they mature in Junior/college/Europe.
• Invest in pro development and make a strong effort to guide young players along. This is a great time to prioritize the building of a winning program at the AHL level for several years into the future. That takes financial outlays by the big club on AHL vets. Success at the AHL level will serve your top prospects well and turn some of your B/C prospects into useful NHL depth players down the line.
  
• Decide how you want to play. Start working on building a team identity and associated systems, which you then proliferate across your AHL and NHL clubs. Prospects will reach the NHL already knowing how you play from their time in the American league.
  
• As your prospects make the big club, make sure that you have built a sound structure to cushion them. You don't need, or indeed want, to win a lot of games for those first few years as you are stockpiling high draft picks. Yet you do want to bring in respected second/third-tier NHL veterans who can mentor younger players. It's enough if they just serve as a positive influence on impressionable young players.
• Plan for the club to show steady, incremental progress as the team's core prospects mature. Set reasonable and achievable goals. Avoid sudden changes in strategy and implementation. Take the long view and be patient.

The decision to rebuild is just the first part of a chain of events that are part and parcel with a total rebuild. Giving away good players, and intentionally losing to get high picks, is the easy part. It's s easy not to win when everyone else is trying to eke out victories. It's the hard work of actually rebuilding and improving that many teams fail to pull off with aplomb.

All of LA, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and Washington went through total rebuilds and it gave each club 15 years of an elite plateau. It has defined the post-lockout NHL.

 

[Swervin81]

Are people forgetting how ugly it was in Chicago and Pittsburgh (and L.A. to a bit lesser extent) before they combined for 8 championships ?

If it's impossible to recover from years of losing how do they combine to win that many championships ?

This whole argument about not being able to recover from a losing culture in easily disproven with very obvious evidence....

Yeah, but how many players from the 2004 Pens or Hawks were still around for their cup run? Virtually nobody.

The losing culture problem comes when you already have the young pieces in place, up with the big club, and are still sucking. That's the situation Buffalo is in.

2014 Sabres - could come flying out of the hole with the right pieces and moves in the next 2-3 years.

2020 Sabres - not so much.

 

[Aceboogie]

I have been saying similar things since 2015. Back when everyone wanted these strict rules to prevent tanking.

Opposing fans should be big fans of tanking and the rules should be loosened to do so

By tanking:
1.you remove most of the good vets from the team (sold for futures), you remove the mentorship and leadership from the team and this causes prospects to come up in a worse environment.
2.Your prospects then turn out worse as a whole. You make your team become a much less desirable UFA spot, so you essentially have to pay a premium to get anyone
3. Overall the team morale just tanks and this lack of team morale can take years to fix

Sure you might get a few shiny top 5 picks. But those picks are coming up in a worse environment and likely won't turn out as well. You also cause long-lasting damage to the team and thatll take many years to fix