Post-Game Talk: We suck (Well, the Players, coaches, management, Ice Caretakers)

[Sens1Canes2]

I don’t think our defensemen are particularly bad at breaking the puck out. Slavin is about as sure-handed as it gets when making the first pass, barring a once-a-week brain fart. Hanifin has the athletic ability to skate it out by himself, even though he doesn’t often do it for “system” reasons. TVR is good with the puck for a bottom pair guy. Faulk has average ability but questionable hockey sense. Only Pesce and Fleury really seem below-average at breakouts, from an athletic/brains standpoint.

The problem is up front, IMO. We flat out don’t have forwards who can skate with the puck. Aho is pretty good and at least an intelligent player, TT is probably the best on the team in terms of athleticism. After that? Skinner and his endless turnovers, Williams who is crafty but limited in his abilities, Staal who is just a mule offensively, Ryan who’s effective in a very limited role, Lindholm who’s becoming anonymous very quickly, and then a bunch of guys whose best role is looking for opportunities on the forecheck.

So, basically, there are two guys who can reliably handle a breakout pass and skate it into the zone without a turnover. And those guys play on the same line. Who can blame the defensemen for being hesitant and trying to slow down the play? The alternative, from their standpoint, is to watch Rask make his 18th turnover and then have 3 opposing forwards coming over the red line at full speed. I wouldn’t make that pass with confidence either if I were them. Dump and chase, thank you very much.

This is one of those areas where I’m not sure whether it’s on Peters or not. On one hand I don’t think this team can be successful if they don’t play with tempo. They are not built to win a grinding, slow paced game. On the other hand, they don’t have the horses to win a track meet. The talent just isn’t there. What they’re trying to do is meet in the middle, playing an up-tempo dumping game that creates turnover chances off the forecheck. I don’t think that’s a terrible strategy for the team we have, but at the same time it’s brutal to watch Slavin stand there and wait 5 seconds for everyone to get ready, just to set up a tip-in at the red line.

I’m going to simply, respectfully, disageee. There’s just not enough offense coming from the back end and the D doesn’t scare anyone into backing off and opening up the neutral zone.

The forwards are limited. I agree with that. But it starts with the D in my opinion. It was ok when they were playing their best defense, mostly at points last year, and we were all very excited about the defense corps as a whole...but now that they’ve seemingly regressed, their lack of offensive abilities are really glaring.

 

[Anton Babchuk]

Victor Rask is the biggest problem with the team. The second biggest problem with the team is Peters refusing to bench Rask and continuing to give him top 6/top 9 minutes with powerplay time. Getting a center who can just make a simple play and be able skate at an NHL level instead of Victor Rask's constant turnovers/whiffs would make a huge difference; they don't even have to provide offense, just not be a black hole sucking away offense from everyone else.

 

[Joe McGrath]

Victor Rask is the biggest problem with the team. The second biggest problem with the team is Peters refusing to bench Rask and continuing to give him top 6/top 9 minutes with powerplay time. Getting a center who can just make a simple play and be able skate at an NHL level instead of Victor Rask's constant turnovers/whiffs would make a huge difference; they don't even have to provide offense, just not be a black hole sucking away offense from everyone else.

Ryan isn’t any better. Or Krueger. They have 1 very good 2C and 3 terrible centers. That’s the problem.

 

[MinJaBen]

Victor Rask is the biggest problem with the team.

He's not great, for sure. But if we want to single out players that are the "biggest problem" (I think the biggest problems are in coaching and management...nepotism, cough..cough) than it would be Darling or Faulk. He can't/won't skate anymore, makes bad decisions and has lost his shot. I'd frankly rather play Dahlback on his natural side than stick Faulk out there most nights.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I’m going to simply, respectfully, disageee. There’s just not enough offense coming from the back end and the D doesn’t scare anyone into backing off and opening up the neutral zone.

The forwards are limited. I agree with that. But it starts with the D in my opinion. It was ok when they were playing their best defense, mostly at points last year, and we were all very excited about the defense corps as a whole...but now that they’ve seemingly regressed, their lack of offensive abilities are really glaring.

I think if you look around the league at various defensive groups, ours is as capable as almost anyone’s of putting opponents back on their heels in transition. Their lack of contribution to the offense is largely by design, at least as far as breakouts are concerned (their lack of in-zone offense is a more concerning issue IMO, but different from what we’re talking about here).

The thing is, if we tell them to open up the throttle and start skating the puck out, other things start changing as well. Do we have the forwards to support them offensively and take advantage of that extra man in the zone before the other team retrieves the puck? When things break down, are we confident that our goalies can handle more odd-man breaks coming back the other way? I don’t think we can really say “yes” to either of those questions.

So Peters is in a position where he kind of has to keep the defensemen in a conservative posture. That means their assists are going to depend heavily on the forwards having success offensively, which as we know is not happening. It’s kind of a circular problem from a strategic perspective, and the only sustainable solution is to go find better hockey players.

 

[Joe McGrath]

So far we’ve identified the following issues:

Center depth
Goaltending
Coaching
Management
Historically good players playing terribly (Skinner & Faulk)
Defense doesn’t contribute enough offense
Offense doesn’t contribute enough defense
No leadership
Wrong leadership
No heart
No talent

No particular order on those. Did i I miss anything?

And yet they are still only 1 point out of the playoffs. You can be a deeply flawed team and still make the playoffs. Unless you are the Hurricanes apparently.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Of that list, I’d say center depth and goaltending are completely beyond question as core issues.

Coaching and management is a matter of opinion and philosophy, and we don’t even have particularly good insights into why things happen on that front.

Bad seasons by good players. That happens. At least they’re not injured. Teams have to be able to withstand this.

Defense/offense not contributing at the other end of the ice... you can say that about every mediocre team. I’d look at center depth as the driving issue here.

Leadership. I guess that goes back to the whole thing about not knowing the whole story. But having co-captains, and one of them having a horrible year, isn’t a good place to start.

No talent. Pretty much. I don’t think anyone looks at this lineup and sees a top-16 team in terms of talent. We need better players, period. I will fight anyone who disagrees

 

[MinJaBen]

In Luke's article, he quoted Peters saying "They let each other down, too, in the room. That's not right.”" What does Peters mean here? If he means what I think he means, then we may need to move a few letters around.

 

[JCLA]

I took it as finger pointing has started in the locker room

 

[Joe McGrath]

Of that list, I’d say center depth and goaltending are completely beyond question as core issues.

Coaching and management is a matter of opinion and philosophy, and we don’t even have particularly good insights into why things happen on that front.

Bad seasons by good players. That happens. At least they’re not injured. Teams have to be able to withstand this.

Defense/offense not contributing at the other end of the ice... you can say that about every mediocre team. I’d look at center depth as the driving issue here.

Leadership. I guess that goes back to the whole thing about not knowing the whole story. But having co-captains, and one of them having a horrible year, isn’t a good place to start.

No talent. Pretty much. I don’t think anyone looks at this lineup and sees a top-16 team in terms of talent. We need better players, period. I will fight anyone who disagrees

A lot of these issues intertwine, but no talent I think could be mitigated by having actual good centers.

Aho-TT
Skinner-Stempniak
McGinn-Williams
Nerdy-Lindholm

That’s not bad at all.

It’s unbelievable to me that Francis has allowed this to happen when he knows better than anybody how important having center depth is.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I wouldn’t go so far as finger pointing. I took it as, the players talked among themselves about this being an important time to show up with their A game, then let each other down.

 

[tarheelhockey]

A lot of these issues intertwine, but no talent I think could be mitigated by having actual good centers.

Aho-TT
Skinner-Stempniak
McGinn-Williams
Nerdy-Lindholm

That’s not bad at all.

It’s unbelievable to me that Francis has allowed this to happen when he knows better than anybody how important having center depth is.

I’d agree with that assessment, and also Nerdy is a better name than Nordy.

Without going through 30 other rosters to confirm, I’d have to think Staal-Rask-Ryan-Kruger is the worst center group in the league. If that’s not accurate, I truly feel bad for whoever’s below us.

 

[JCLA]

That's not letting each other down in the room though.

That's letting each other down on the ice. The fact he said in the room too, means to me, that something happened in the locker room

 

[MinJaBen]

I’d agree with that assessment, and also Nerdy is a better name than Nordy.

Without going through 30 other rosters to confirm, I’d have to think Staal-Rask-Ryan-Kruger is the worst center group in the league. If that’s not accurate, I truly feel bad for whoever’s below us.

Would you take Montreal's center group for ours, straight up? I wouldn't.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

In Luke's article, he quoted Peters saying "They let each other down, too, in the room. That's not right.”" What does Peters mean here? If he means what I think he means, then we may need to move a few letters around.

I don't think he meant anything other than it's a team, and guys not playing hard are letting themselves and their teammates down. I think it's a pretty common type of statement and even players say things like "we let each other down, etc.."

I don't see it as finger pointing or anything like that.

 

[StiffSquid]

I say bring both Finnish Kids up from AHL , also that big Russian kid Zykov. And Foegele. Let's see what they have. Can't do much worse lol.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

A lot of these issues intertwine, but no talent I think could be mitigated by having actual good centers.

Aho-TT
Skinner-Stempniak
McGinn-Williams
Nerdy-Lindholm

That’s not bad at all.

It’s unbelievable to me that Francis has allowed this to happen when he knows better than anybody how important having center depth is.

Do you think that draft of Necas and how good he looked somehow made him feel like he didn't have to make a move for the short term? More likely PK didn't want to spend any more money so "sign derek ryan for cheap" was the solution.

 

[vorbis]

I think we've got plenty of data to show the coach's effect on play. the team has actually been rather consistent during Peters' tenure. it's just consistently disappointing in similar, I would say predictable ways.

 

[Vagrant]

it doesn't feel right to me to put this at the feet of victor rask. he's not in charge of his deployment or the lack of depth that prevents us from surrounding him with better options. he's a team best among forwards at +6, he's winning 53.9% of his draws. there's no major considerable difference between what he's doing and what lindholm is doing. skinner has 31 points and a -24 on the year. this whole scapegoating thing has just got to go and we have to realize that it's not an individual player problem but rather a lack of depth to put these players where skill dictates and not have to count on them for slot production when it's not something they can bring. it's like we are comfortable with the idea of having 12 or 13 nhl forwards and we're just jamming them into the lineup awkwardly and thinking that's the only requirement for a good forward group. there's only so many ways you can try to make chicken salad out of chicken shit and peters has reached his logical end of trying to make it work. this sounds like a plea to the front office to do something to provide this team with the top 6 forward that will slot everyone down a peg and maybe make us competitive up front.

additionally, we're not getting enough by way of offensive support from our back end. faulk is having a down year to say the least. slavin hasn't taken the next step in his development and it could be argued that he has taken a step back offensively. hanifin has been so inconsistently reliable with his offense. pesce is a non-entity in the offensive end. fleury has been worse. we can't work high to low because most of these guys have no desire to be anything but strong in the defensive zone. when was the last time you saw a hurricanes defenseman shot fake and take the puck to the middle of the ice to try to make something happen? mostly the points are used as a means of last resort to quickly dump the puck back in and restart the cycle at even strength.

 

[NotOpie]

I don't think he meant anything other than it's a team, and guys not playing hard are letting themselves and their teammates down. I think it's a pretty common type of statement and even players say things like "we let each other down, etc.."

I don't see it as finger pointing or anything like that.

I think it might be a little more like, "....shut the f*** up, either let your play do your talking, or quit bullshitting your teammates". As in somebody isn't living up to the things they are saying in the room.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Just for reference, here's the goals/point projections for each player if they remain on the same pace they've been on.

Teuvo Teravainen	20	63
Sebastian Aho	30	64
Justin Williams	14	51
Jordan Staal	22	50
Jeff Skinner	23	48
Elias Lindholm	22	44
Derek Ryan	17	41
Noah Hanifin	11	39
Victor Rask	19	31
Brock McGinn	12	30
Justin Faulk	6	28
Jaccob Slavin	6	20
Brett Pesce	2	16
Trevor van Riemsdyk	2	14
Josh Jooris	6	12
Haydn Fleury	0	10
Marcus Kruger	2	10
Lee Stempniak	4	16
Joakim Nordstrom	3	6

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

I think it might be a little more like, "....shut the **** up, either let your play do your talking, or quit bull****ting your teammates". As in somebody isn't living up to the things they are saying in the room.

Maybe, but nobody is, other than maybe Aho, which is why I don't think it's pointed at 1 or 2 guys. The team, to a player including super leader Justin Williams, has said "Our playoffs started in Montreal" and "We gotta start on time" and other such stuff, yet have played 4 entirely uninspiring games at home. They were lucky enough to get good goaltending and play against a couple of bad teams in MTL and OTT.

 

[NotOpie]

Just for reference, here's the goals/point projections for each player if they remain on the same pace they've been on.

Teuvo Teravainen	20	63
Sebastian Aho	30	64
Justin Williams	14	51
Jordan Staal	22	50
Jeff Skinner	23	48
Elias Lindholm	22	44
Derek Ryan	17	41
Noah Hanifin	11	39
Victor Rask	19	31
Brock McGinn	12	30
Justin Faulk	6	28
Jaccob Slavin	6	20
Brett Pesce	2	16
Trevor van Riemsdyk	2	14
Josh Jooris	6	12
Haydn Fleury	0	10
Marcus Kruger	2	10
Lee Stempniak	4	16
Joakim Nordstrom	3	6

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

....and Sebastian Aho, with his career to date 43 goals and 89 points still can't hold Mitch Marner's 28 goal, 97 point jock strap.

 

[MinJaBen]

Just for reference, here's the goals/point projections for each player if they remain on the same pace they've been on.

Teuvo Teravainen	20	63
Sebastian Aho	30	64
Justin Williams	14	51
Jordan Staal	22	50
Jeff Skinner	23	48
Elias Lindholm	22	44
Derek Ryan	17	41
Noah Hanifin	11	39
Victor Rask	19	31
Brock McGinn	12	30
Justin Faulk	6	28
Jaccob Slavin	6	20
Brett Pesce	2	16
Trevor van Riemsdyk	2	14
Josh Jooris	6	12
Haydn Fleury	0	10
Marcus Kruger	2	10
Lee Stempniak	4	16
Joakim Nordstrom	3	6

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

The problem is not that these guys are bad, the problem is that they are all slotted one line/pairing too high. We lack top end talent. If we had a first line, then the TSA line becomes a brilliant 2nd line.

I hope Dundon and Francis can buy some talent in free agency, because we aren't going to get it in trade and we aren't bad enough to get it in the draft.

 

[NotOpie]

Maybe, but nobody is, other than maybe Aho, which is why I don't think it's pointed at 1 or 2 guys. The team, to a player including super leader Justin Williams, has said "Our playoffs started in Montreal" and "We gotta start on time" and other such stuff, yet have played 4 entirely uninspiring games at home. They were lucky enough to get good goaltending and play against a couple of bad teams in MTL and OTT.

Without a doubt we don't know what was said and by whom, but when Peters references the "room" convos, it just feels like it is a little more pointed....maybe not at one guy, but it felt like to me, it's a targeted few.