Funny how Panther's fans don't even care that there GM is stupid enough to trade (2) almost P.P.G. Forwards .... FOR A 4TH ROUNDER!
That 81 Point Season the previous regiment had was due to injuries of key players. How stupid can you be? A lot of the 'old' GMs are getting fleeced by 'new' GMs. 'New' GMs use stats and analytics to find players who are 'GEMS'.
It's quite obvious a lot of people on HF have no idea about hockey analytics.
The injuries played a significant part, but it wasn't the only thing:
- the firing of Gallant and replacing him with Rowe - can't stress out enough how
spectacular disaster that was. He completely allienated the players, got the team quit on him, endangered Ekblad's future by tossing him in despite having a concussion days before... You can blame the Computer boys or Vinnie Viola for firing Gallant(there's some argument as to who actually was behind the firing) but the move was undeniably bad.
- Demers and the reconstruction of the defence - Yandle, the Gudbranson trade, Pysyk for Kulikov are all moves I can get behind, but we needed a shutdown 4D (at worst) to complement the group; instead we got Demers. Tallon moved Demers out (very meh trade from the value-standpoint but absolutely the correct move for the team), but that shutdown-Dman hole is still here and needs to be fixed this offseason
- the disastrous relationships with players, awful PR, firing the equipment guys, the "military takeover" - all that after a very successful 2015-16 season left sour taste for the players and the fans. Relationships and emotions matter; it should have been handled better.
- the reconstruction of our farm - strictly speaking, it was a good and necessary move long-term. We had a lot of older prospects in the AHL whose upside was "that fringe guy who doesn't hurt you
too badly when you call him up for 4-10 games but doesn't do anything for you either". We replaced them with younger, more promising kids - and that's great, but suddenly we had the second youngest farm in the league and once the injuries hit, we didn't even have the fringe guys to fill in, we had a handful of AHLers and a few 19-20 year old prospects who should have been nowhere near the NHL but well there you go.
The analytics movement has done many things right, some that will benefit us long-term - but they've made some serious mistakes too, same as Tallon. To blame it all on injuries is a cop-out.