One freaking game. They just about won last night vs WPG, arguably a better team than TOR last night.
Hey, that's all I meant was he is not the only problem. No doubt the Blues played better in that one game without him. But the team stats weren't anything to blow your socks off. TOR was straight BAD in that game. They really were terrible. Blues dominated them as much as they lost that game themselves.
I am not saying JBo should be in every game and get top-line minutes. I feel like he can still play and he's not the worst player ever. He should however get a LOT less minutes, play on no special teams and not even touch the 1st or 2nd D-pairs. His experience and knowledge is valuable though. I agree he's just about done in this league. I just don't put EVERYTHING on him. Schwartz got worked over in OT in the corner that directly led to the Blues losing, lots of guys took dumb penalties last night, Allen was his below-average self and the gameplan wasn't working. Can't blame JBo for everything.
I think we're generally in agreement then that the Blues face multiple issues.
Bouwmeester simply can't play at this level anymore even in a limited capacity and based on what you've said I see we disagree here. Limited minutes will still be exposed by teams with strong forward depth and Yeo can't seem to control himself in terms of managing Jay's ice time correctly.
Last night was a perfect case in point of Yeo leaning heavily on Jay to the point of detriment in a game where doing so immediately gave the Jets life and a clear target to attack. Putting Jay out that much also has the disadvantage of giving Dunn and his high tempo offensive game less minutes and downgrading the ability to attack. It's a drastic shift in quality of player to swap Dunn out for Jay and stylistically makes it easier to attack the Blues. And all that because Yeo panicked after 2 mistakes by Dunn towards the end of the 2nd period. That's on Yeo, Jay is just trying to play hockey (I can only assume he's trying but honestly it's hard to tell) and shouldn't be faulted for sucking.
I'm no fan of Jake Allen at all but he got screwed twice last night (once on the OT goal) and another when Jay let his assignment go. Both goals were easy tap ins that never would have happened with smarter decisions by the D.
So no it isn't all Allen, it isn't all Jay, isn't all Yeo, the other players making key mistakes, etc....it's all of it put together. All they can do is address the issues to the extent they can in season. Benching Bouwmeester is imo an obvious easy move to make towards that end.