Chicago Blackhawks – Page 57 – Faxes from Uncle Dale

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History Is Told By The Winners

By Sam Fels October 17, 2018 2309 0

It’s not that it matters much, because it’s so far in the past. Doing revisionist stuff isn’t really healthy or prudent, but sometimes I can’t help it. And however it went down, the Blackhawks hiring of Joel Quenneville will go down as a seminal moment in Hawks history. It clearly could not have worked out better, no matter what our complaints and grievances have been along the way.

But I gotta tell ya, this “Oral History Of Quenneville’s Hiring” by Scott Powers is hilarious in parts. And that’s no fault of Scott’s, who is a friend and supporter of ours. He’s just recording what people said. What those people said though is just…oh my god, I can’t even.

Let’s go through some of it, shall we?

John McDonough, Blackhawks president: I can’t recall exactly, but I didn’t think we had a great camp. I don’t think I was alone in that thinking.

Right here, second quote of the article. I nearly fell off the couch reading this. Remember that when John McDonough was hired, which was less than a year before Savard’s firing and Q’s hiring, he made it clear he was not part of hockey operations. That wasn’t his duty or bag. He wanted you to know that. He would leave that to the hockey people.

So now all of the sudden he thinks the Hawks are having a bad camp? I mean, yeah, sure, he’s in the building and he’s watching practice and games I guess but…HOW THE FUCK WOULD HE KNOW?! What’s he comparing it to? He’d been in the job less than a year! What, did he do what he did for the Hawks game presentation and go around to every other team’s training camp and rip off what they were doing?

Again, this worked out incredibly well. But either McDonough is again trying to throw himself all over the credit for this hire, and/or he’s lying to you now or he was lying to you then. Or both! I just couldn’t let this one go.

Whenever something has gone right on the ice, McDonough does a reasonable impression of Usain Bolt to get in the way of any praise. This reminds me of the video of their second Cup win, when everyone is being interviewed about the 17 seconds. And McD is there to tell you the Bruins should have taken a timeout after Bickell’s goal. Oh, you think so, Toe McDonough? Your advanced hockey mind told you that?

Dale Tallon, Blackhawks general manager: It was kind of the end of the year and moving into the summer and into training camp, you hear things, and you develop and gather information and you go from there. It’s a day-to-day situation in our business. You’re only as good as your last game it seems.

You can see where Tallon knew he was fucked. Read between the lines here and what he’s saying is that McDonough and Rocky Wirtz hired Scotty Bowman as a consultant, because neither of them knew hockey from their ass, and essentially what Bowman told them was I can’t tell you what you’ve got on your roster until you’ve got a real coach running a real system, something Savard wasn’t and wasn’t doing. Oh and my son happens to be in the front office…

Remember that Tallon was also kind of forced to have Savard replace Trent Yawney. Savard was foisted upon SEVEN DIFFERENT COACHES as an assistant by Bill Wirtz. He was the pet project. When Tallon wanted to fire Yawney, Wirtz wasn’t about to pay two separate head coaches, so it was finally time to anoint Savvy. I’m not sure it was Tallon’s first choice, but it was his only choice. But it was yet another thing they could cuff to him when it came time to torpedo him a year later.

Brent Seabrook, Blackhawks defenseman: I remember playing like, I think Dunc (Duncan Keith), Soupy (Brian Campbell) and myself we all played 30 minutes a night the first three games and one of those was back to back. I remember being exhausted. So I don’t know if that was anything or what it was. It was probably nothing, probably just trying to win games.

You can see the problem. Also, under Savvy a lot of other teams thought the Hawks were horribly conditioned. You might recall a lot of blown leads the season before.

Stan Bowman, Blackhawks assistant general manager: The vibe that I remember was this didn’t have a feel like it was going to work in terms of Savy’s strengths as a coach, and I had known him for a long time because he had been with us for a while as an assistant coach. I just think sometimes your strength as an assistant doesn’t always translate over into being a strength of a head coach.

“I thought he was an idiot, so did everyone else, and I certainly wasn’t going to work with him when they gave me this job, which was going to be pretty soon.”

Bergevin: I said to him in the meantime, I said, “Joel, would you like to do some scouting?” He said, “I don’t want to travel, but I could watch games.” He loves hockey obviously, he loves watching games. I said, “That’s perfect. We have a kid in college, playing for CC (Colorado College), I believe, fast guy, I can’t remember his name, winger, left winger (Billy Sweatt).” He said, “I’ll watch some games in Colorado. If Dale wants that, I’ll just be like a part-time scout.”

I love this. They hired Joel Quenneville. To scout Bill Sweatt. Bill Sweatt. This is the story they’re giving you. They want you to believe this. Sidenote: Bill Sweatt just replaced the oil on your car.

Hmmm… I wonder what else might have happened in the fall of 2008 to keep the Hawks from making this move before the season started? What could it be? Just can’t put my finger on it…

To be fair, this arrest was already after camp had begun for the Hawks. So maybe this was the plan all along. But…come on. Look, the Hawks had a buzz, even after missing the playoffs the year before., Everyone around town knew big things were happening. And they were terrified of any bad buzz encroaching upon it. So maybe firing your coach who was the team’s most popular player for a decade and a half wasn’t something they had the total stomach for. Replacing him with someone who just had a DUI would have made it worse. They didn’t want anything to ruin the momentum.

But I’ll let you decide what you believe more.

Brent Sopel, Blackhawks defenseman: Having Joel on the staff, you knew something was going to happen at some point and time. You don’t bring Joel Quenneville, a guy who had been around the league and was known for what he had done all those years, you don’t put him on a staff. I felt at some point and time he was going to be the coach. When that was? Was that going to be in two weeks, two months, two years? But that was the feeling that I got.

Torchetti: I think we kind of got our ears up. I think everybody knew that.

Now here are two people giving you the straight dope.

McDonough: I think it was a combination of both. I think the decision that we were going to do this, this was imminent, but it helped that we felt we had somebody that would be a good fit. We did not plan on going the interim route, bringing somebody in as a temporary. We thought we had the right guy. I think history now says we do have the right guy and it’s worked out.

Don’t pull a muscle patting yourself on the back there, McD.

I mean, this tells you everything you need to know, doesn’t it? We’re not going the interim route? You wouldn’t hire a guy you’re going to keep around for years on the fly. You would have done your research. This was the plan.

Rick Dudley: There’s a couple things I believe. I believed we all believed Savy could be successful in the National Hockey League. I believe Dale did. I believe all of us believed that.

How’s that working out?

None of this really matters. It worked out. It was the right move. And maybe one day, 10 years from now, we’ll get the real story and a bunch of other real stories about what really went down with this team. It’s just kind of amazing they’re still pushing the super polished version of events.

But hey, when you do what they’ve done, you get tell your story how you want it.

Everything Else

Angry At Numbers: Throwing Ducks At Balloons And Nothing Is The Way It Seems

By Sam Fels October 16, 2018 1809 0

You’ll call me the height of an analyst, and maybe even possibly a genius, when I tell you the Hawks season has been really weird. Five straight games into overtime, none to a shootout. The Hawks can’t play defense, but they’ve somehow suckered every team they’ve played into not playing defense either. It’s made for mindless, senseless fun.

When you dig into the analytics, not only do you cause some of Eddie Olczyk’s hair to shift back down toward his neck where it came from, but you see that the Hawks are only weirded. And probably tiptoeing on a high wire with very high winds that’s not going to work out well.

For instance, the Hawks only have eight skaters that are below water in Corsi-percentage. And three of them have only played one or two games in John Hayden, Andreas Martinsen, and SuckBag Johnson. The Hawks boast seven players who are above 55%, which is a mark of dominance (the top line, the top pairing, and Artem Anisimov and Chris Kunitz and no I don’t understand either but that’s kind of the point of all this).

And yet when it comes to expected-goal percentage, the Hawks only have three players above water (Marcus Kruger, Artem Anisimov, and David Kampf). So much like last year, the Hawks spend a good portion of the time in the right end. They generate more attempts than their opponents most of the time. But when the play gets into their defensive zone, suddenly it’s Freeswim For The Ritalin Crowd and they give up far better chances in less time than they get with more time in the offensive zone.

Brandon Saad’s 39% xGF% sticks out, but Nick Schmaltz is right down there with him at 41% and Saad’s replacement on that line, Alexandre Fortin, is at 42%. We’ve known that Schmaltz’s line tends to get run over in the d-zone, despite however good he might be at stealing pucks. Keep in mind that Schmaltz is getting blasted in terms of chances and types of chances despite starting 82% of his shifts in the offensive zone. That’s…a problem.

Meanwhile, Marcus Kruger continues to be a unicorn in usage and production, and is going totally French hipster by being the opposite of his team.

“Marcus Kruger you must do this!”

“Well I’m not gonna. I’m gonna have a sandwich.”

Kruger has started 5% of his shifts in the offensive zone. I think that’s probably like one or two so far this season. He has a shitty Corsi of 41%, which isn’t hard to understand given where he’s starting. And yet he has an expected-goals percentage of 52.1%. So even though he’s starting in his own end, and even though he’s spending a majority of his time there, the chances the Hawks get when he’s out there are far better than the ones they’re surrendering when he’s out there. Which makes it curious that he’s not getting even 20% of the ice-time at even-strength. But again, nothing about the Hawks really makes sense.

As a whole team, it’s kind of the same story as last year. They’ve got the ninth-best team-Corsi, and the seventh-worst expected goals percentage. They’re shooting 9%, which is just a shade north of average, and they’re getting a .916 save-percentage at evens, which is a touch below average. All of that flattens out to a 100.6 PDO, meaning the Hawks really haven’t been lucky or unlucky in those terms. Which probably explains why they have five glorified ties to their name.

Going a little further into it, the Hawks xGA/60 is 2.88, one of the worst marks in the league. They’ve actually only surrendered 2.71 GA/60, so they’re getting by there. Their xGF/60 is 2.34, but their actual GF/60 is 3.2. Now, that’s not all luck, as we’ve discussed the idea of “bad shot-makers” on this team for a while. At least Patrick Kane and Alex DeBrincat can score from places that are less likely than most, Toews is capable, and so is Schmaltz. But that doesn’t account for all of that.

However, fear not, as the Hawks’ difference between their expected goals and actual goals is only fifth-biggest in the league. So they won’t be alone when that bill comes due.

Or maybe hockey’s weird and they’ll just be like this for a while because sometimes that happens. It’s what we have to hope for.

Everything Else

Atop The Sugar Pile – 10/15

By Sam Fels October 15, 2018 1865 0

Time for our weekly review of who’s gettin’ it done, who ain’t, and who’s just there like the dead skin on my left thumb. To it!

The Dizzying Highs

Alex DeBrincat

Only two games this week, so there isn’t much to choose from. But when you pile in four goals in two games, one of which should have been a game-winner, one that was a game-winner, and another that tied a game you were trailing in the third, it makes the pick pretty easy.

Top Cat is pacing the Hawks with nine points in five games, and is a big reason why Jonathan Toews doesn’t need Paul Bearer following him around at all times (not that I would complain if this were to happen, if Paul indeed were still with us. SKY POINT). He’s been showing off his all-around game as well, as there was a fear he might just be a one-dimensional sniper (which has worked out pretty well for Phil Kessel, but that’s another story for another time). Top Cat has showed off his vision and passing skills, and has been far more hellacious on the backcheck than anyone would have guessed for someone of the Lollipop Guild.

I’m going to spend all season giddily laughing about the “scouts’ take” article from Scott Powers about how DeBrincat would top out as a 25-goal, 45-point guy. He’s already a fifth of the way to both and the Hawks have played five games. No, he’s not going to continue his 98-goal, 144-point pace he’s on now (BUT WHAT IF HE DOES?! THAT WOULD ASSUREDLY MEAN THE END FOR US ALL!!!). But yeah, I’m totes excited to see where this goes.

The Terrifying Lows

Brandon Saad

We’re going to be the last on the Knives-Out-For-Saad tour, but this is getting a little worrisome. Demoted to the fourth line on Saturday night and barely getting five minutes of even-strength time. And perhaps more upsetting, he doesn’t seem all that fazed by it. He did manage an assist, but Brandon Saad should not be on the fourth line in this or any other universe.

Perhaps Q needs a different method than the “tough love” one, as it’s never really been something Saad has responded to. Ask John Tortorella. Actually, don’t, because there are far better uses of your time, but you get the idea. Something is amiss, and if the Hawks have any hope of actually turning this start into something prolonged, they’ll need Saad to be what he’s promised on the good side of the spectrum, not the glorified Patrick Maroon on the bad one.

The Creamy Middles

Cam Ward – wait, huh?

Yeah, I know that sounds strange, and he let in a bad one on Saturday night when he and Brandon Manning decided to rehearse their “Who’s On First” reenactment on the ice. Still, Ward was the only reason the Hawks got a point in Minnesota and had to be just about as good in the last half of the game against the Blues. It’s not winning the Hawks much but it’s giving them a platform. In those two games his SV% is .916, which will work just fine as a backup. Which he very well might be starting as soon as Thursday. The Hawks schedule picks up after that though, so it’s likely he’ll be splitting starts with Crawford to start. If he can give the Hawks .910 or so, you’l settle.

Everything Else

Absolut Duncan

By Sam Fels October 12, 2018 2389 0

Let’s continue Duncan Keith Week with a video:

I could talk about this goal for hours, probably. One, I’m not sure I’ve ever yelled louder at a sporting event than this one, and you can ask former editor Matthew Killion to confirm. There was a lot going into this night for all of us, and me especially, but we don’t have to get into that here. Surface level, the Hawks had a chance to clinch the Cup at home for the first time since dinosaurs roamed the Earth. A scoreless first period only built up the tension, and the fact that much like the rest of the series, the Hawks were kind of outplayed up to this point. Corey Crawford had to stop Steven Stamkos twice on the same breakaway, they didn’t create much, and slowly what seemed a certainty began to be a question.

And much like the rest of that run, Duncan Keith decided he’d simply had enough. Usually, when there are four opposing skaters back in the zone is not the time to go shotgunning up the ice if you’re a d-man. But Keith has never continually bent to logic, and what made his game so special is that he didn’t and it usually worked. After all, Kane had the puck, so if he could find a pocket of space, chances are Kane would find him.

Maybe my favorite part of this is Keith simply streaking around Cedric Pacquette for the rebound, as Pacquette didn’t shut his yap for the first half of the series amidst all the press about how he was the ultimate checking center and pest, especially after the Lightning’s Game 3 win. They didn’t win another game and we didn’t hear much from him after that. Keith left him with his dick in his hand and that’s all he’d win after this.

In the building, it happened in slow motion. The rebound we never expected to see lying there, practically teasing everyone, because Keith’s initial shot wasn’t all that strong. The arc he took around Pacquette at a speed that didn’t seem possible, and the realization, “He’s going to get there.” And that he would have an open look from three feet (and one you’ll recall he whiffed on in 2011 against the Red Wings that would have gotten the Hawks into the playoffs, which they backdoored into anyway). It’s the amount of separation he gets from everyone else at this moment. No one would have caught him with a jet engine up their ass.

One of the few things Eddie Olczyk and I agree on is that the United Center has never been louder than when this puck flipped up over Ben Bishop. Sure, it was only the second period, but the Hawks weren’t giving up that lead. The catharsis at the moment in that building was real. Clawing back a dream we’d had all our lives. Mostly because they had Duncan Keith and the Lightning didn’t.

That 2015 run is not only Keith’s masterpiece, you’d be hard-pressed to find another playoff performance in this city anywhere that doesn’t involve the words “Jordan.” Both the Cubs and Sox World Series runs were basically team-efforts. The Hawks’ two previous runs were the same, though Keith was among the standouts in those. I guess we’ll have to wait until Khalil Mack’s 10-sack run to the Super Bowl sometime soon.

He scored three goals in that run. One was the OT winner in Game 1 against Nashville. The second was the series clincher against the Predators, and the Hawks desperately needed both or at best they would have been facing a Game 7 on the road. The third was this. That’s certainly making them count.

In between, Keith averaged 31 minutes a night. He gobbled up 44% of the team’s even-strength time, a number only topped by Kris Letang in ’16 for a team that went beyond the second round in the last seven years (fun note: the hightest TOI% of a playoff year is also Keith’s, which was 47% in 2016’s first round). His relative-corsi in the spring of ’15 was +5.4. His relative-xGF% was an unholy +8.7. When Keith was on the ice the Hawks were dangerous and dominant. When he wasn’t, they were clinging with their nails to the side of the dock.

You don’t need the numbers to know how good he was that spring. Thanks to Kimmo Timonen being dead and Michal Rozsival’s ankle becoming a modern art piece against Minnesota, the Hawks only had four d-men for the last two rounds. They had to survive them, and I’m not quite sure how they did other than Bruce Boudreau’s team playing with both hands around its neck again when the lights were brightest and Keith and Crawford at their best in the Final. If it seemed like Keith was never off the ice in the last 13 games, it’s because he wasn’t. The least he played in the last two rounds was 27:23 in Game 5 against the Ducks. Against the Bolts it was never less than 29 minutes. And again, he was utterly dominant in those.

It was barely controlled fury. It was more than the usual Keith-stepping-up-into-the-neutral-zone shit. He was on both sides. He was up the ice and then back. He was stripping someone behind the net, calling Kesler a fuckwad, and then joining the play, seemingly in one motion. You can only play four d-men in a game if on is insistent on being two or three at the same time.

This goal was kind of a microcosm of all 23 games. Keith deciding he’d had enough, streaking somewhere you never figured him to be and no one able to get in his way. Whether it was a goal to be scored or a forward to be dispossessed, Keith was on it like a pissed off bowling ball. Keith basically decided the Hawks were going to win a Cup. And then he did almost all of the heavy lifting.

We know that Keith will never do that again, and maybe that tapped all the reserves for good. I know it was worth it.

Everything Else

Game #4 – Hawks vs. Wild Preview: And A Fool In The Mirror

By Sam Fels October 11, 2018 1903 0

vs.

RECORDS: Hawks 2-0-1 Wild 0-1-1

PUCK DROP: 7pm Central

TV: WGN

SO THEY PHONED IT IN, END OF STORY: Hockey Wilderness

The current Circus Of The Western Conference rolls into St. Paul, Minnesota tonight, as the Hawks seek to continue their “points streak” against the Wild. That’s what it is, right? I mean, technically the Hawks have lost. But it was in the carnival game that the NHL calls overtime. So that doesn’t really count. Whatever. The Hawks have been fun, and they have an excellent chance of keeping it rolling tonight. And they’ll find the same thing they’ve found at the X for just about four seasons running.

Let’s start with the Westside Hockey Club. A couple changes look likely tonight. One, Alexandre Fortin, whom the Hawks have been trying to promote for about two seasons now, will make his NHL debut tonight. This is definitely in the can’t-hurt-could-help category. He’ll slot in next to Artem Anisimov and on the opposite side of Chris Kunitz, which has actually been a pretty effective line in highly-sheltered use.

That will slot David Kampf to the fourth line, which it probably could use. Marcus Kruger moves back into the middle, in yet another victory for logic. Either SuckBag Johnson or John Hayden will sit, and I would guess the former. The fourth line could certainly use the injection of speed that Kampf has and certainly Kruger’s brain in the middle. Sure, SuckBag was fast but it doesn’t really matter if you’re fast if you have no idea where you’re going. You just get nowhere faster.

Still appears that Cam Ward will play, and Brandon Davidson will continue to enjoy the popcorn. They’re going to make this Brandon Manning thing work if it kills them. Or the Jan Rutta thing. And either or both could.

Things aren’t nearly as rosy in the Land Of 10,000 Lakes, where the Wild have basically gotten pummeled in two games so far. They were able to scratch out a point against the Knights Who Say Golden thanks to Devan Dubnyk making 41 saves. They didn’t even crack a 40% share of attempts in either game, nor have they been above that mark in expected-goals percentage for those two games. It’s a whole lot of not pretty so far.

The Wild have a few problems causing that. One, Ryan Suter is not Ryan Suter. The ankle injury he suffered that ended his last season early have not cleared up yet, or at least are hampering him. And Matt Dumba just hasn’t been able to pick up the slack. A 33% CF% against the Knights would be the opposite of picking up the slack. That would be taking the slack and trying to fashion a belt-tie combo while you’re climbing partner plummets to death or serious injury.

Normally, Jared Spurgeon does some heavy lifting from the second-pairing, but that hasn’t happened either. Compounding that is the fact the Wild haven’t really upgraded their forwards in any way in like four seasons. They brought Eric Staal back, but he was there last year. They re-signed Jason Zucker, who will assuredly score tonight against the Hawks because that’s a thing that he does, but he’s not someone you build a team around. He’s also not going to shoot 15% again, or at least likely isn’t to.

Mikko Koivu is old. Joel Eriksson Ek, while sounding like a rare disease, isn’t going to pull any Atlas act. Mikael Granlund is just enough to break your heart. Nino Neiderreiter is marauding on the third line for some reason. Jordan Greenway is still figuring out how to fit his gangly frame into an NHL game. It’s not that they lack firepower at all. It’s just that they don’t have advanced weaponry.

You could get away with these forwards if you had a stellar blue line. You could carry that blue line if you had a crew of fast, skilled forwards on lines one through four. The Wild don’t have the two things that need to made up for, not either of the things that do the making up.

So basically, once again, they’re good enough to let Devan Dubnyk carry them into the playoffs if he has another .920 season. He’s more than capable of that of course, but the Wild won’t go anywhere if he doesn’t. That’s not really enough in this division which is The Unblinking Eye.

For tonight, the Hawks just need to keep running n’ gunning. The Wild can’t really do it with them, and then you’re just up to the whims of Dubnyk. You can past this blue line. You can catch back up to these forwards. Let’s have some fun.

Game #4 Preview Suite

Lineups & How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

If They Won’t, We Will: Duncan Keith’s 1000th Game

By Sam Fels October 10, 2018 17531 0

Let’s jump ahead about two and a half years or so. Basically, the ’20-’21 season. It doesn’t really matter what the Hawks fortunes are then, though it will have an influence. During that season, barring a major injury before, both Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane will play their 1,000th regular season game.

Now imagine the build-up to both. How long do you think it is? A week? Maybe more? Certainly more than a few days. Clearly, a couple national publications will get in on the fun. There will be reminiscing of the Hawks’ glory days, and a rehashing of the debate about where they rank in the pantheon of all-time great teams. Certainly it will be an event, two of them actually, and assuming you can ignore the particularly grossness of one of them, you won’t be able to miss it. The team’s best ever winger and perhaps it’s second or third greatest center getting a silver stick.

So why isn’t there more of a buzz about the player who was more important than both of them?

Duncan Keith will play his 1,000th game on Saturday night. He is the best Hawks d-man of all-time. Of this there can be little debate. Two Norris Trophies, a Conn Smythe (unanimously won, and really should have been a second for him after 2010), two gold medals. There is no Hawk who can come close to matching this haul of silverware. Three rings to go along with it, as well, and a couple more Conference Final appearances.

You could only make an argument for Chris Chelios, really. Two Norris Trophies as a Hawk, a World Cup winner’s medal, one Conference Final appearance and one Final appearance. And folks, let me tell ya, Chris Chelios is not Duncan Keith.

Some may bristle at the notion that Keith was the most important Hawk. You can if you’d like, except you’d be wrong. When Keith was good, the Hawks were good. It was that simple. When he was quite simply Daredevil right in front of his blue line, the Hawks did no worse than a conference final in ’09, ’10, ’13, ’14, ’15. When his play dropped off, so did the Hawks’. Patrick Kane has played his best hockey the past three seasons. The Hawks have three playoff wins. When Keith played his best hockey, they were at least in touching distance of the Cup.

I know why Keith hasn’t gotten even the buzz that Seabrook did. Seabrook’s night came at the end of a lost season, and the Hawks needed anything to glom onto to make fans feel good. Keith’s night comes at the beginning of the season when the Bears are still very much on everyone’s mind and interest in the team is low overall.

Seabrook has always been more media friendly than Keith. Keith has been prickly at times, outright dismissive at others, and is still the only Hawk who has occasionally raised a middle finger to John McDonough’s media policies (such as always wearing a Hawks hat during scrums, and this only endears him to me even more). Keith has a couple ugly suspensions on his record (he should have gotten way more than he did for trying to behead Charlie Coyle). Though I suppose Seabrook trying to turn David Backes into plaster in ’14 is a blotch as well (though it’s something we’ve all dreamed of, and strangely led to the best two games of Sheldon Brookbank‘s career. The world is indeed strange).

We probably can’t ignore that Keith was somewhat front and center of the first off-ice controversy of this Hawks run, you may remember it as “Patrick Sharp And His Lack Of Traveling Pants,” though he was more an innocent bystander. Tellingly, it was Seabrook who took the lead on trying to quash that in the dressing room. Keith remained silent, which is basically how he’s always preferred it.

Keith has never been the pivot in the Hawks’ ad campaigns or marketing drives. He’s left that to Toews and Kane or Sharp. It just hasn’t mattered to him. He’s had his charity and his fundraising nights, but even those were a little more underplayed than Brian Campbell‘s or others’. That’s another reason you don’t hear as much as you might think about his upcoming milestone.

But on the ice, Keith was the Hawks when they were rolling over the league night-in and night-out. It was his ability to step in front of traffic before the line that was the root of their entire game. To turn around the play before it ever got dangerous, and get the puck quickly to the forwards in space and with the opposition caught.

Keith’s unnatural quickness and physical condition allowed him to do things no other d-man could get away with, and to do it for 25 minutes a night at least. He could travel outside the circles to dispossess a forward or chase behind the net, because A. he was on them so quickly he almost always won the puck before anyone had time to calculate what to do and B. he could recover in time to get away with not doing so. Those skills have gone now, but they were vital to everything the Hawks did.

What’s funny about Keith is that he’s not nearly as talented as some. He’s never been a great passer. He’s nowhere near the puck-handler that Karlsson or Subban are. You know about his shooting skills. He’s not particularly big, though he’s far stronger than you’d think. What he was wasn’t just fast, but fast-twitch like no one else. Keith’s entire game, his instincts, were basically a constant, “Fuck it, I’m going.” And he’d get there. Every damn time.

He was the anchor for the only three Cup teams almost all of us have ever known. The picks and development of Henri Jokiharju, Adam Boqvist, Nicholas Beaudin…are all meant to try and replicate what Keith was.

And it’s not like Keith’s dead. He’s looked better given a partner who can do some of the stuff he used to, when it’s not dependent on only him to do it. He’s 35 now, and while he’s always been a conditioning freak, who knows how much longer he wants to do this. He’s backed off his claims of wanting to play until he’s 45, though given his fitness he probably could have made a run at it.

Perhaps the most rewarding thing for fans is that we got to watch the whole arc of Keith. He didn’t come up anywhere near the finished product like Toews or Kane or even Seabrook was close to being. Those first two years under Trent Yawney or Denis Savard, it was like watching Nightcrawler on a coke binge (what can I say? I’m in a Marvel mood. Blame the Spider-Man game). He was flashing everywhere, and most of the time is was where he wasn’t supposed to be. And he was doing it in front of no one. You’d see an amazing play about once per game, and then he’d spend the next period on the wrong side of the ice pointed the wrong way and all four of his limbs flailing away like he was drowning in sewage. Which he mostly was.

Given a real coach though, who only had to put light harnessing on it all, and Keith took off. Suddenly that raw power and speed was pointed in the right direction, without taking away from it, and no one could live with it. We saw the whole arc. Keith went from uncontrollable, festering energy to the league’s best. So did the whole team.

Keith’s the best to ever do it in the Red and White from the blue line. He doesn’t chase or probably want the acclaim. But he’s going to get it here. He should be getting it from everywhere.

So thank you, Duncs. None of this happens without you, whether you care or not if anyone knows that.

Everything Else

Let’s Just Go Straight To The Load Jokes

By Sam Fels October 9, 2018 2055 0

It’s just easier that way.

It would be silly to draw any massive conclusions from just three games. Even 10 wouldn’t be nearly enough. We don’t know anything about the Hawks yet, except that they’ve been entertaining as hell, and Brandon Manning and Cam Ward are terrible. The first is something of a surprise. The latter two are depressingly not.

But one thought I’ve had over these three games, pretty much thanks to the bonkers trio of efforts that Jonathan Toews has been able to put together, is that when the Hawks’ top six is out there, or the top-pairing (usually at the same time), the Hawks aren’t a bad team. Their underlying numbers are simply surreal, they’re scoring almost all of the goals, and they’ve been fun to watch.

What’s clear is that so far, Joel Quenneville knows this as well. Which is why he’s basically only used his fourth-line when he absolutely has to, and even then we can be pretty sure his ass is puckered up tight. I can’t say I know that, because quite frankly I don’t want to be considered an expert on the state of Joel Quenneville’s ass-elasticity.

It’s a sound strategy, because the fourth line has been getting their dicks knocked in the dirt on the reg. While every other forward on the roster has gotten at least 35 minutes of ice-time in the three games, none of the players who are on the fourth have gotten even 25.

This has always been a debate in hockey lately. With TV timeouts as they are and the shape players are in, can you ride your better players more and leave the fourth-line to be something you only close your eyes, point at to go out there, and tell your assistants to tell you when it’s over? Sure, it’s a real advantage when you can use your fourth-line for real purposes, and a staple of past Hawks’ champions was that their fourth-line was actually taking checking line duties thanks to the unicorn nature of Marcus Kruger. Well, he’s on a wing now staring at SuckBag Johnson quizzically, so that’s not an option at the moment.

The defense has been more spread out. In terms of percentage, only Seabrook and Manning are getting less than 30%, with Keith and Jokiharju gobbling up the extra at 37% and 35%k respectively. This is mostly due to Seabrook and Manning getting the dungeon shifts, as they’ve only started a third of their shifts in the offensive zone and mostly have been restricted to their own. And while it might not seem like it, the Hawks have been starting most shifts in the other end. No, I don’t get it either.

The forwards are a little more skewed in percentages, as you might guess. As a frame of reference, obviously your pivot points is 25%, if you were to divide all even-strength time into quarters, one for each line. Well, Kane and Schmaltz are at 34% and 31%, with Saad at 29%. Toews and DeBrincat are at 28% or thereabouts, as Dominik Kahun has gotten some shifts off here and there. The third-line is right at the 25% mark, or just a tick below, and the fourth-line is all below 20% of the time at even-strength possible.

The Hawks are top-heavy. We know this. What I was curious about is how teams that have just accented to their top six as much and how they’ve done while doing so.

Last season, in terms of time-on-ice-percentage (again, the portion of even-strength time available given to a certain player), Connor McDavid was the leader at 33%. This isn’t a huge surprise, given that he’s the league’s best player and all. The problems there is that the Oilers sucked. After him it was Henrik Zetterberg. And yep, the Wings sure did suck as well. Up next was Alex Radulov. And the Stars might not have sucked, but they probably had the “S,” “U,” and most of the “C” in “suck” lined up. Anze Kopitar was next on the list, and though the Kings did actually make the playoffs for four minutes, they weren’t any good either. Patrick Kane is after that, and well, we don’t need to finish this thought.

Rounding out the top-10 last year in TOI% are Artemi Panarin, Sidney Crosby, Nikita Kucherov, Rickard Rakell, and Sasha Barkov. All of those players are on good teams! All of the top-10 clicked in at 31% or more.

Going back two seasons ago, Patrick Kane led the league in TOI% at 33.8%. McDavid was next, followed by Mark Scheifele, Ryan Getzlaf, Zetterberg, Jack Eichel, Taylor Hall, Vincent Trochek, John Tavares, and Nikita Kucherov. Some duds in there, but mostly playoff teams.

Of course, this really only tells us what happens when a team leans on one or two players a ton and not a top six. But clearly these players are bringing top six lines along with them for their extra shifts.

A quirk of this category is that in the past five years, Patrick Kane owns the three of the five largest percentages. The fourth-largest share of shifts was given to Jonathan Marchessault last year, which made sense because all that line did was score.

We’ll have to dive deeper into this as the season goes on and Joel Quenneville’s strategy becomes clearer. What’s obvious is that having to basically get your top six out there as much as possible isn’t ideal, but you can be a playoff team with it. What you probably can’t be is a Cup team, but no one’s expecting that around here.

Everything Else

Game #2 – Hawks at Blues Preview: The ‘This Year’s Different’ Cup

By John Pullega October 6, 2018 1922 0

at St. Louis City Hall

RECORDS: Blues 0-1-0 Hawks 1-0-0

PUCK DROP: 7:00 p.m. Central

TV: NBCSCH

IT’S NOT HIS FAULT HE CAN’T READ: St. Louis Game Time

The NHL decided to kick off a weekend of inferiority complexes early, as the Hawks took I-55 south to practice in an abandoned fucking mall because St. Louis is less a city than it is a cluster of trash piled together by no fewer than five rat kings. If there’s one good reason to watch, it’s that the Blues managed to do one thing right for the first time in team history for tonight’s game, choosing to don the powder blue uniforms that might deceive the undiscerning eye into thinking this is a team that chooses not to employ players who drink rainwater from the rafters for sustenance. And yet . . .

The first game of the “This Year’s Different” Cup couldn’t come quickly enough for the Blues, who had a mudhole stomped in their asses by Winnipeg in the season opener. Trash City hung with the Jets for an entire two periods, presumptively because no one in St. Louis can count higher than two, before giving up three goals in just under two minutes in the third. It’s once again the Blues’s woeful defense and goaltending that will keep it from ever doing anything worthwhile.

Year in and year out, the Blues try to convince everyone that Alex Orange Jello and Jabe O’Meester are not only not dead but also top-pairing guys. And they’ll do it again tonight, mostly because there’s nowhere else to go for them on the blue line. Vinny Dunn and his gabagool-stained sweater will likely pair with Colton Parayko, and these two can move the puck if nothing else. And let us assure you, they can’t really do anything else. In the season opener, Dunn–Parayko had CF%s under 25%, despite the Blues having a 54+ CF% on the game and despite those two starting in the offensive zone more than 70% of the time. You have to try to be that bad. Behind them is the Cronenberg pairing of Chris Butler and Jordan “The Lesser” Schmaltz, which might be worse than anything the Hawks throw up on the ice today. That’s a real commitment to sucking.

All of this makes you wonder just how long Jay Gallon can go before having a complete mental breakdown. As the perennial presenter of the “This Year’s Different” Cup, Jake Allen has seen this movie play out, and it never ends well. And lo, Thursday saw him toss a .800 SV% up, including a short-handed goal, despite his strong first 40 minutes. At some point the Blues will have to admit that Gallon probably isn’t the guy to get them to the WCF, let alone past it, but that day is not today. He’s likely to get the start, but if humanoid marital aid Mike Yeo gets itchy, it’s possible to see Chad Johnson take his first start for the Blues. Johnson is about as much of “a guy” as you can find, right down to his frathouse-appropriate name.

Even with all the dreck on the back-end, the Blues do have dangerous weapons up front. Ryan O’Reilly and Vladimir Tarasenko have all the skill to be a holy terror, provided the aptly named Patrick Maroon doesn’t trip over his own dick too often and kneecap them. You can count on him getting into at least one fight tonight for HOCKEY REASONS, and god willing it’ll be with Brandon Manning and result in match penalties for both.

Behind them is the quick and crafty line of Jaden Schwartz, Brayden Schenn, and Jordan Kyrou. Kyrou is just 20 years old and stands as a beacon for St. Louis’s future offense, as he’s fast and has outstanding hands and vision. With most teams looking to blanket the O’Reilly–Tarasenko line, this is where you figure the Blues can do the most damage. Bozak is on the third line where he belongs, but slotting him in with Steen and alleged-living-person David Perron as the Blues’s version of a dungeon line is going to have him wondering what the fuck he was thinking signing in STL. The Ivan Barbashev–Rob Thomas–Sammy Blais line rounds it out. Thomas (20^th overall in 2017) and Blais are both supposed to be a thing for the Blues.

As for the Hawks, the song remains mostly the same. Cam Ward will try to build off a decent performance against the Senators, assuming the Hawks don’t fart and belch their way through their own zone like they did on Thursday. The Hawks had a hard time fending off pressure from Ottawa’s crashing defensemen on Thursday, which simply doesn’t bode well against a team with better weapons like the Blues do.

There are no changes for the Hawks defensively. Duncan Keith and Henri Jokiharju will have their work cut out for them against either the O’Reilly or Schenn line, and this will be HJ’s first real test of his defensive awareness and abilities. Erik Gustafsson and Jan Rutta will keep doing whatever it is they’re supposed to do, and this game is set up to allow Cowboy Gus to be an aggressive bum slayer. The shutdown pairing is Manning–Seabrook, which is fucking hilarious because the only thing Manning has ever shut down is any hope that the Hawks’s pro scouting department has any idea what a hockey player is, let alone what a passable hockey player looks like. Brent Seabrook did look better than expected on Thursday, but whether that’s per se or resultant of playing next to Manning remains to be seen. If God were merciful, you’d have Davidson rotate in for Manning, but alas.

Before I digress into another fit about Manning, let’s get to the forwards. The only change that might be made is subbing in John Hayden for Andreas Martinsen on the fourth line. We still aren’t sure why Moonface Luke is playing center over Kruger. The Toews line figures to carry most of the momentum in this game, and if the Hawks can get more than just 10 minutes of giving a fuck out of the Kane line, there are plenty of advantages to take against the Imo’s Pizza that is the Blues back-end. We’ll likely see Kunitz–Anisimov–Kampf out for far too long against Tarasenko, because it’s completely fucking normal for a team with playoff aspirations to have line like that as their third. Truth be told, that line was the most dominant in possession on Thursday, but the Blues are much, much better than the Senators you assume, so there might be a violent regression here.

The more they say things will be different, the more they stay the same.

Let’s go Hawks.

Game #2 Preview Suite

Lineups And How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

Game #1 – Hawks vs. Senators Preview: Unto The Breach

By Sam Fels October 4, 2018 1948 0

vs.

PUCK DROP: 6:30pm Central

TV: WGN

S-E-N SPELLS SEN: Silver Seven Sens

Whether you like it or not, the Hawks will kick off their season tonight. For better or worse…and it’s worse. It’s already worse, as #3 goalie Anton Forsberg–who would have backed up Cam Ward tonight and probably had a decent shot of usurping him to get some starts before Crawford returns–went TWANG! at the morning skate and now Collin Delia is currently on his way to Ottawa. That’s how you kick this pig!

There’s really no way to mask this anymore: The Hawks lineup sucks. The top-six you could make a case for, and I’ll admit to being awfully interested in seeing what Alex DeBrincat can do with Jonathan Toews, and what this Brandon Saad – Nick Schmaltz – Patrick Kane line can do. That could be fun! Maybe Dominik Kahun is more than just a German Tony Salmaleinen? We’ll find out. Toes has needed a playmaker for a while now and we know Top Cat can do that. If Kahun is anything, and that’s a pothole-filling “if,” that line could surprise. Saad and Kane have torn a hole in the Earth together before, but that was a long time ago now. But hey, I love things that are old. Except myself.

But after that? You would read the names of these two lines to a misbehaving kid to punish him. “If you don’t start paying attention in physics I’m going to list out the Hawks’ bottom six repeatedly!”

“NO! NO! I promise I will! I love Newton’s third law! I’m totally gonna opposite reaction in this bitch!”

Artem Anisimov and Chris Kunitz on the third line is aching to be scorched. But then again anytime Arty is on a line that doesn’t include Patrick Kane it’s the same story. For some reason Marcus Kruger has moved to a wing to accommodate Luke Johnson. Q is moving a favorite toy so make way for SuckBag Johnson. Let’s all think about that for a minute and then die. David Kampf and John Hayden are here because the rules state someone has to. This is the second straight season that Hayden has “looked great in camp,” so his seven goals on the year will be even more special this time around.

As for the blue line…I mean do you want us to? Fine. Duncan Keith and Henri Jokiharju are the top-pairing. It really could be anything. The fading star and the possibly-overmatched-but-exciting kid. Keith has never been apt to be the more conservative partner in a pairing, and I’m not sure he has to be here. Maybe let both of them do their thing and just see what the hell happens. What do you have to lose? We’ll see how Keith takes to it but it would be a first if he were to rein his game in to let someone else be the aggressor. But hey, stranger things have happened…is what I’m contractually obligated to say here.

Beyond that…well, Erik Gustafsson and Brent Seabrook are the second-pairing. If this was Seabrook five years ago, you’d be about that. But now he can’t cover for Cowboy Goose and Seabs himself has some cowboy leanings that his sloth-like foot-speed hasn’t dissuaded him from. Goose showed something toward the end of last season, and of course he has the lucky charm of the “Fels Motherfuck” (TM) which should carry him to a Norris, obvi. Still, the Hawks haven’t given up on him even though he’s 26 now and we’ve seen them discard a host of prospects before reaching that age so they must think there can be a middle-pairing puck-mover in there somewhere.

As for the third pairing…

Luckily, the Senators are not a team that’s going to make anyone pay for their various roster misdeeds. Anyone who’s worth anything is either a neophyte (Brady Tkachuk, Thomas Chabot), or a veteran who is simply waiting for his cell to ring to tell him he’s been released from this hockey malebolge (Matt Duchene, Mark Stone). Put it this way: Zack Smith was on waivers two weeks ago and is now the #2 center. That’s a life lesson right there, mister man.

Clearly, it’s going to be a long damn season in Ottawa, which just about no one is going to notice in retaliation against the owner/avoiding the trip to Purgatory-In-Reality Kanata. And the hockey will be even more boring as Guy Boucher is only going to be more convinced to trap even more given the talent discrepancy he’ll face on most nights. Most Senators games are going to look like what Steelers-Ravens games will look like in three years. You’ve had booster shots you enjoyed more.

The Senators will hope to get a promising season out of Thomas Chabot, a step from Ryan Dzingel (LOCAL GUY), and basically hope a couple other veterans can spasm a few goals to be trade bait at the deadline. But hey, they’re one of the few teams to figure out that you have to bottom out on purpose to get back up the mountain.

So I suppose it’s the perfect starting point for the Hawks. They can rack up a win and at least feel like maybe they could start to build some momentum before some very tough games this weekend. If the Hawks were to start 0-3, and you never know, then they’ll already be feeling like they’re fucked without any of the usual fun and Joel Quenneville will be facing questions about his job before he’s even through a week. Let’s try and put that off as long as we can, even though we know it’s coming.

Game #1 Preview Posts