Hockey

Systems, Weirdness, Toews…A Grab Bag

By Sam Fels 1585 0

Some things to clean up on a much less busy week for the Hawks. Or at least before they head to Vegas and Nashville, where things have not exactly gone well in recent trips. Anyway…

-I guess let’s be positive at the top. There’s a lot of talk lately about the Hawks changing how they’ve attacked teams the last three games. Here’s some. Here’s some more. And I guess it’s a step in the right direction that anyone’s talking about it at all, given how hockey coaches and players used to put all information on lockdown and how hockey media rarely bothered (and some appreciation for the Sun-Times Ben Pope who really seems to want to get to the bottom of this consistently, making him truly unique).

And I also suppose that we have to give Jeremy Colliton something for showing some flexibility in his plans, and realizing what wasn’t working and deciding to try something else. There are a lot of coaches who wouldn’t.

Now that we’ve done that…what was exactly the point of MAGIC TRAINING CAMP if most of the tenets are getting scrapped just 15 games in? And why was this roster ever thought of as one that could play a defense-first game without just straight-up trapping? And who plays a defense-first game these days anywhere else? The Islanders and that’s kind of it, and they probably don’t have a choice. That’s not the key to success. Vegas, Nashville, Tampa (at least last year), Boston, teams that have been consistently at the top of the standings the past two or three years are trying to get out and up as quickly as possible and play in space. Why would the Hawks think they could do anything else, given their set?

Also, I’m not convinced it’s made that much difference the past three games, and we’re looking at the record and mistaking correlation for causation.

It depends on where you look. The Hawks didn’t generate that many more attempts the past three games, with 38 against the Leafs, 40 against the Pens, and 47 against the Canucks who played one of the stranger defensive games you’ll see against what the Hawks had been struggling to do (though maybe some of that was caused by a more aggressive gameplan from the Hawks). But the Hawks had generated over 40 attempts in plenty of games before, Some of that was score-effects as they were chasing plenty of games and had to throw a lot of rubber in any direction to catch up, so fair play.

Chance creation is slightly better I guess, depending on your metric. The Hawks had 1.98 xGF against the Leafs, which was the most they’d managed since their win over the Kings at home at the end of October. Some of that is the Leafs complete ignoring of defense as they attempt to get Mike Babcock fired, but hey, can only play who’s on the schedule. But before that the Hawks had created xGF totals over two and had just gotten stonewalled by goalies on the Caps or Hurricanes. Again, some of these totals were inflated by having to catch up and having to get more aggressive, but still there isn’t a sea change. At least not yet.

If you go by straight scoring chances, then you see a difference. The Hawks created 24 and 25 of those this weekend, respectively, which are season highs except for a 36-scoring-chance performance against the Caps that they were unlucky to come out of with nothing. The 12 high-danger-chances they created against the Leafs were also higher than what they’d been doing, so I guess that’s something.

Still, this seems an overreaction to the game in San Jose where the Sharks, desperate for points remember, just trapped the hell out of the Hawks and there was no choice but to dump the puck in. Which is something the Hawks were never built for. They’re just not fast enough.

Still, it’s worth keeping an eye on. The Hawks have talked a lot about transition in the past couple days, but this is still a team that will get little to no transition from its defense. Adam Boqvist can do it and that’s about it, and he’s on third-pairing minutes right now. Seabrook could facilitate it with his passing if ever could open up space for himself, which he can’t. Gustafsson thinks he can but joining the rush from behind isn’t the same thing, which is more his thing. So the forwards have to do everything, and I’m all for them having license to get creative between the blue lines and carry pucks in. But that also gets easy to counter, as the Sharks showed you.

I will say on Sunday it was more noticeable how quickly the d-men were joining the rush and getting ahead of Leafs forwards up the ice. If that’s a major change, fine, though it’s going to lead to a lot more high-event hockey. Which is what the Hawks were destined for anyway, and they’ll face teams way more interested in getting back than the Leafs are at the moment.

-A strange quirk of Sunday’s game was though the Hawks gave up 57 shots, they only gave up four high-danger chances against and actually dominated the high-danger chance count and expected-goals one. It’s hardly prudent to give up 25 shots in a period, and the Hawks simply are not equipped to protect a lead in any fashion. Still, we’ll settle for them being able to keep things to the outside. For now. This is a trend I’d definitely want to see more of, just not quite in this volume.

-One problem Colliton is going to have to solve is what to do with Jonathan Toews. We’ve remarked all season that Toews is no longer a do-it-all player, and the Hawks have to pick a lane. It might be it’ll be picked for them because Toews hasn’t proven he can handle going up against other #1 or even #2 centers this year.

He got domed by Auston Matthews all night on Sunday. He was better in the previous two games when either Colliton or the opposing coach (in this case Mike Sullivan in Pittsburgh) didn’t really bother to match up that much. Logan Couture didn’t have much problem with him in San Jose. It was fine in Southern California, and ugly in Nashville.

Obviously, David Kampf can’t face everyone, and even if Colliton tried to get Kampf out against Matthews every shift there’s still the John Tavares problem (though with his slower speed that’s probably a better matchup for Toews). It may be time to view Toews as just a scoring center, and perhaps use Kampf and Carpenter as defensive specialists? That would move Dach to a wing, but that might not be the worst idea at the moment. Anyway, Vegas and Nashville are the kind of challenges we’re worried about, so we’ll reconvene after those.

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks vs. Hawks Preview: It’s Only Nostalgia Week For Us

By Sam Fels 1414 0

vs.

RECORDS: Canucks 9-3-3   Hawks 4-7-3

PUCK DROP: 7:30

TV: NBCSN Chicago

THEY FILMED DEADPOOL THERE: Canucks Army

We’ve had to do this the past couple years now. Whenever the Hawks meet up with the Kings or Canucks, we have to do something of a “Remember when these mattered?” comment. This used to be the the fiercest rivalry in the league. That stopped some seven years ago. With the Kings and Hawks, there just isn’t much more to discuss because both teams are lying face down in the muck. Sadly, that might not be the case for the Canucks anymore.

The Canucks find themselves one point out of the lead for the Pacific Division, behind the Oilers and one ahead of the Coyotes, just to let you know how backwards everything is and how many different teams seem to have better ideas than the Hawks right now.

Is it real? The numbers suggest it might be. The schedule does not. The Canucks have seven regulation wins, and they’re over the Sharks at home (some teams can do that, in fact a lot of them have), the Kings twice (some teams do that), the Red Wings twice, the Rangers, and over the Panthers at home. Only the last one is a team that’s probably good and playing well at the moment. But hey, you can only play whom the schedule says you do, and the Canucks have made hay against that.

And they haven’t just squeaked by, as their metrics are pretty glowing. They’re one of the best teams in the league in terms of Corsi and expected-goals, and they’re doing some explosive work in the offensive end. Most of that comes from the top line of WHO WANTS TO WALK WITH ELIAS?-JT Miller-Brock Boeser. They’ve combined for 52 points in 15 games, with Elias Pettersson on track for a 109-point season. That’ll play.

Coach Travis Green has taken the training wheels off this line, starting them in any zone against any opponent, and pretty much doing the same with his second line centered by Bo Horvat. This has freed him up to put his plugs in more advantageous spots, which is maybe why you’ve seen scoring spikes from the likes of Brandon Sutter and Tim Schaller. What a time to be alive…to cut yourself.

That doesn’t mean Lady Luck isn’t waving her ass a bit at the Canucks, too. Again, the soft schedule helps, and they’ve ground up the chuck they’ve been served (is that how that works? Let’s just go with it). But this is a team with a 102 PDO that’s getting a .918 from Jacob Markstrom and a .938 from Thatcher Demko. The latter has been the hope for the future for what feels like 17 years now, but he’s not a .938 goalie. The Nucks are also shooting at a team-rate of 9.4% at evens, and while Pettersson and Boeser are most certainly top-level scorers, the rest of this outfit most certainly is not.

That said, they’re a top-10 specials teams outfit on both sides, with an excellent penalty kill, and with the possession they’ve gotten at evens and what they’ve done with it, you can’t really ask for any more.

And they have hope on the blue line. Somehow, and this for sure won’t last, Tyler Myers has been a possession-driving monster, with a Corsi of 56.5% while just shading most of his zone starts in the defensive zone. Should you expect that to continue? Cue Russell Westbrook:

Still, nice to have for now. That has freed up Quinn Hughes, who is going to be a thing, to take easier assignments, and he’s dinging opponents upside the head to the tune of a 57 xG% while getting third-pairing minutes and 67% of his shifts in the offensive zone. Must be nice to be able to bed in a young, dynamic d-man like that so easily. We’re looking longingly at Vancouver, folks. Eat Arby’s, puke it up, and then eat that.

Right, the to Hawks. Corey Crawford will rotate back in to the starter’s net after Lehner once again did enough to keep the Hawks from getting utterly embarrassed. This is starting to be like the end of “Little Miss Sunshine,” where Paul Dano is trying to convince Toni Collette that she has to keep Abigail Breslin from getting embarrassed by the actual pageant girls. I think Lehner is Collette in this metaphor, but I’m not entirely sure as the Hawks have basically broken my brain.

Coach Kelvin Gemstone, in his infinite wisdom, has decided to scratch one of the Hawks’ best two-way and fastest forwards tonight in Dominik Kubalik to give us more Zack Smith. Because all the kids out here with their skateboards and backwards hats have been demanding more Zack Smith. The world needs more Zack Smith. Zack Smith is the key to salvation…

…

…

…I’ve just had a brain bubble.

Everything is fucked.

Anyway, the Canucks can do pretty much whatever they want here. They can try and out-skate the Hawks, which they can. They probably have the defensive structure to use the “advanced trap,” that the Sharks used to strangle the Hawks into paste, which is just a trap but ahead of the red line. Or anything in between. And the Hawks will probably still try and dump the puck in and get it back with their not-fast-enough and not-strong-enough forwards.

I’m going to go look for a strong tree branch. You folks enjoy the game.

 

 

Hockey

Angry At Numbers – The First Month

By Sam Fels 1596 0

I guess it’s the first month. We’re through the first week of November now really and the season started in the first week of October, so let’s just go with that. Anyway, time for us to look at some numbers, and then beyond that to the meaning of the numbers, and then decide the numbers have no meaning.

60.3/2.66

That’s the Hawks Corsi-against per 60 minutes at even-strength, and their expected-goals-against per 60 this season. The first is the third-worst mark in the league. The second is the second-worst. And both are either worse or exactly the same as last season. I’m going to get more heavily into this when we record the podcast tonight (so tune in! promotion!), but clearly this is not what’s supposed to happen. The acquisitions of Calvin de Haan and Olli Maatta were specifically to keep this from happening. And it hasn’t happened. There are reasons for this, and again, podcast tonight we’ll get into the nuts and bolts of it. But this isn’t the sign of a team moving forward. And this isn’t a team adapting to a new style again, because as we all know at this point…MAGIC TRAINING CAMP. This is just who they are, which is a team that essentially never has the puck and is giving up not just a lot of attempts but a lot of good ones as well.

Now, these numbers will calm down shortly because October hockey is very open while everyone establishes position and then it calms down when everyone gets bored. But still, fresh out of camp this is not what anyone thought we would see, at least inside the building.

52.8/2.15

And these are the “for” numbers in the same category, which are both down from last year. And again, this is October when things are more open and offense should be easier to find. You can find all sorts of mitigating factors here, but I would pin this on Jonathan Toews being a ghost most of the season, mismatched lines every game, and the lack of any puck-moving d-men now that Erik Gustafsson isn’t sort of pretending to be one anymore (more on him in a second). We accepted long ago that the Hawks wouldn’t be good defensively, but we thought it might be ok, or at least entertaining, because they would create a lot, too. But they don’t. They’re a middling offense in these terms. And I guess we’re starting to see that last year’s offense was more the product of individual brilliance from Kane, Top Cat, and Toews, than anything structural. Which we already kind of knew but tried to be in denial about. Well, Toews and DeBrincat haven’t been at that level, and here’s what you get.

+4.3/+3.95

Those are Duncan Keith’s relative marks in Corsi-percentage and expected-goals percentage, which are miles above what he’s been the past four seasons. The first mark would be the best of his career in fact, though a large part of that is due to the Hawks being a so much worse even-strength and possession team now. It’s hard to be that far above the mark when your team is at 55%-58% as the Hawks were once upon a time. Same with the xG% as well.

Still, Keith has done this with a variety of partners as we’ve seen, and it was fair to question if he still could or if he still even wanted to.

The problem is that Keith is averaging more than a minute at even-strength more of time than he has since 2012 (!) and overall is averaging more than two minutes per game than last year. Yes, we all know about Keith’s freakish physical endurance but he’s still 36. This can’t really continue.

46.1/41.7

This is where I really get frustrated with the analytic community. There was some cry from them when Jeremy Colliton scratched Erik Gustafsson in Los Angeles. Garbage like this:

The above numbers are Erik Gustaffson’s CF% and xG% this year, which are terrible. And yes, if you were to blend them with all 82 games from last year, his numbers would still look good compared to the rest of the defense. Because that was 82 games of sample and this was 11. And yet anyone who has actually watched Gus this year knows he’s looked a lot like that campsite after the Pikers leave in Snatch.

Secondly, you have to take all of these numbers with a grain of salt, because hockey analytics has yet to weight these things with zone starts. Or they haven’t in a way I’ve seen, and feel free to show me on Twitter. Gustafsson started 60% of his shifts in the offensive zone last year. Same as this year. It’s actually harder to give up more chances and attempts against that way, because of the distance you’d have to travel.

Sure, winning faceoffs and the type of forechecking forwards who are there play into it as well, but the numbers on Gus don’t tell the whole story. Watching him, you know he doesn’t get you from one zone to the other, at least the right way. He’s too slow. He’s a decent passer, but rarely can open the space up for himself to do that. His skill, at least from dim memory, is making things happen when you’re already in the offensive zone. And that has value, but it’s not the same as being a puck-mover.

This is not a “WATCH THE GAME, NERDS” decree, but it becomes rather obvious when you’re not watching the games at all. Yes, their arguments would be that 11 games this year shouldn’t outweigh the 82 from last year because one suggests more what the player Gustafsson is. But how many games does a coach need to wait before officially confirming his player is playing like horseshit? 15? 20? To me, Gus was that bad and his scratching totally justified.

We can blend our stats and our eyes, people.

Hockey

Game #14 – You’re So Very Ordinary, You’re So Very Lame. Tastes Like Whiskey On Your Lips And Earthworms Rule Your Brain – Hawks 2, Sharks 4

By John Pullega 2051 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Corsica

When you pine for Marc Crawford to release you from the genital vise that is Blackhawks hockey, it’s safe to say the goddamn plane has crashed into the mountain. Fire everyone.

– Going into this game, the Sharks were the worst team in the West. They had lost five in a row. Martin Jones had a sub .900 save percentage. Through the first two periods, the Hawks managed eight (8) shots on goal. They had a 29+ CF%. McClure summed it up best:

The Hawks managed 14 shot ATTEMPTS against the team with the third worst overall goaltending in the league solely because DeBoer has strangled their transition. That’s a competent coach masking deficiencies against someone he knows will not have a strategy to counter. –@Matt_McClure_

Once again, Jeremy Colliton has shown that when the going gets tough, he gets his ass paddled red. Only this time, he doesn’t have the cover of saying, “Well, it was the Predators.” This was the worst team in the West completely annihilating whatever it is that Jeremy Colliton thinks is a strategy.

The Hawks gathered just three of eight points on this road swing. Fine, the Predators are good. But they also played the Kings, a team that should be relegated and is now officially the worst in the West; the Ducks without John Gibson; and the Sharks, the former worst team in the West before tonight. And they managed just three points. Embarrassing and unacceptable for a win-now team.

– Robin Lehner at least kept it close for as long as he could again. The first two goals were hardly his fault. On the first, a bad bounce off Maatta’s skate led the puck directly to Timo Meier, who ricocheted a shot off Patrick Marleau’s skate. There’s not a ton Seabrook could have done to prevent that, aside from beating Marleau to the inside and keeping him entirely out of the crease, but if you’re counting on that, you might be Staniel Bowman or Jeremy Colliton, and if so, please resign.

On the second, an unfortunate bounce over Adam Boqvist’s stick at the blue line gave Evander “The Other Huge Piece of Shit” Kane a shorthanded breakaway.

Lehner probably could have had the third goal, but given everything he’s had to put up with over the last week, I’m not going to rag on him too much. Can you imagine this team without him right now?

– The Sharks crushed the Hawks in any sort of transition they tried to make. It’s remarkable that the Hawks are both too slow and too lithe to dump and chase, but boy did they ever try. This is the Colliton offensive system. For fuck’s sake, this team finished in the top 10 in goals scored last year. Without the happenstance two-goal wet dream the Hawks managed to fart out at the end of this farce, Colliton is facing down a shutout against Martin motherfucking Jones.

Perhaps worst of all his Colliton’s stringent adherence to the drop pass on the PP. In the second period, with a defender draped all over him, Adam Boqvist tried a drop pass at neutral ice. He was actively looking for someone behind him, which indicates that this was drawn up. Rather than giving your 18-year-old, fast, dynamic D-man a chance to shove the puck up an equally slow team’s asshole, Colliton wants his team to do drop passes. How progressive and forward thinking of this fucking wiener.

– Did you know that Andrew Shaw leads the team in hits, and that matters about as much as how long your foreskin is? If Colliton is still somehow the coach for this team on Thursday, you better bet your ass he’s going to be on the top line, because he happened to be on the Toews–Saad line for the Hawks’s first goal. Super glad he’s back to contribute exactly dick to whatever this year is supposed to be.

– Before anyone adheres to the inevitable DEY BADDLED BACK FROM DA JAWS OF DEFEAT MY FRENTS narrative that Coach Gemstone will rely on to keep his job in his next press conference, keep in mind that the Sharks had given up five goals in each of three of their last four games. And that Martin Jones, again, had a sub .900 save percentage going into it. This isn’t battling back. This is exploiting a bad goaltender whose coach put them in the prevent defense. As any football fan can tell you, prevent defense prevents wins.

– Although Boqvist couldn’t catch Piece of Shit Kane II on the breakaway, he did manage to pull of a nice shimmy shot late in the third. The kid’s got wheels and a wicked wrister. He ought to be playing more time than all of Gus, Seabrook, and de Haan, who each had more TOI than him.

– Reminder that the Hawks could have traded Erik Gustafsson at any point during the off-season and didn’t.

– I would like to hear more of Patrick Sharp talking about “hard dumps” and “hard rims” during each intermission.

At the very least, Jeremy Colliton should be out on his ass by Christmas. His systems (if you can call them that, and I assure you I don’t, because I call them wet dogshit) don’t fit the personnel. Likewise, Bowman needs to be on his ass no later than the end of the year. He put this team together to win this year, and the best hope they have is winning the lottery.

Fire everyone. Start over.

Beer du Jour: Bulleit, Maker’s Mark, and High Life

Line of the Night: “They’re just skating all over the ice not getting much accomplished.” –Patrick Sharp

Hockey

Game #12 – Hawks vs. Kings Preview: A Lovely Bunch Of Coconuts

By Sam Fels 1462 0

vs.

RECORDS: Hawks 3-6-2   Kings 4-9-0

PUCK DROP: 9:30

TV: NBCSN Chicago

BLEW INTO TOWN ABOUT AN HOUR AGO: Jewel From The Crown

We’ve remarked on it the past couple years when these two met, but it’s hard to believe that in just over four seasons, these two went from playing possibly the best and highest-paced seven-game series in recent NHL history to a game the rest of the league laughs at and scalpers take the night off. These have been two of the worst teams in the West, two of the worst in hockey, and they’ll get together tonight to do…something at Staples Center. The league is probably delighted this will take place in the dead of night and in the weird shadows where no one might just happen by it.

First the Hawks, who will at least be having a New Toy Night. Adam Boqvist will make his NHL debut, and the Kings are about as soft of a landing as you could ask for one. Many have remarked that there’s at least least an air of desperation about his promotion, if not a full-blown air-raid siren. And there is. But the thing is, the Hawks have to be desperate. Were they two whiff this road trip, the season might be over before Veteran’s Day. And while there might be one or two other d-men in Rockford who can provide more mobility (then again, any glass blower regularly makes products that would) and skill to the Hawks’ blue line, none of them have anywhere near the upside that Boqvist does. None are going to give you anything more than a third-pairing boost. If all the stars were to align for Boqvist, he can be so much more.

He could also be so much less. We don’t know, they don’t know, but the Hawks have played themselves into Hail Mary territory. That doesn’t mean that Jeremy Colliton can’t throw one in the wrong direction or take a sack, which he seems intent on doing with his lineup from practice yesterday. Keith is hardly a babysitter type, and asking him to clean up Boqvist’s messes won’t go well, and it’ll go worse if it has to go the other way. He has two, left-sided d-men who are perfect free safeties for a player like Boqvist in de Haan and Maatta, and has decided to pass on that for what’s behind Door #Stupid.

It gets better, as Patrick Kane is now a third line player and we’ve of course never seen him turn his nose up at such an assignment, and rightly so. The thing is this set-up isn’t too far from being pretty good, if Dach and Shaw were slotted up with Kane and Kubalik-Kampf-Caggiula can be a hybrid 4th line/checking line. We might get all that by the 2nd period.

Anyway, Brent Seabrook is back, and you can probably expect him to be until Connor Murphy returns. What that pairing with him and de Haan is supposed to do besides be an informercial for windburn balm…well, you figure it out.

Luckily for the Hawks, they’ll be playing as big of a mess as they are, if not bigger. Coach Todd McLellan called out his team after they got clubbed by the Hawks last weekend, and they responded by giving up 49 shots to the Canucks and their four players. So yeah, not great. They’ve also had a reshuffle, and McLellan tried to put everyone on notice by scratching deadline fodder Tyler Toffoli. He’s back, probably reminded he’s trying to cash in a big check next summer. Which will make his reaction to Ilya Kovalchuk‘s blank expression and koala-like effort something worth watching.

Despite their shit record, the Kings have actually pushed the play pretty ok this year, as McLellan teams do. They haven’t gotten a save from either Quick or Campbell all season, which has undone whatever good work they’ve produced. And considering the hair ball the Hawks just coughed up and how they’re being aligned tonight, don’t be surprised if the Hawks lose this possession battle. And badly. And if they don’t get some saves from Crawford that they did get from Lehner the past two games… well, you can probably start the foreboding organ music.

Saturday night’s all right for fighting…is it all right for whatever this is?

Hockey

“How To Set Your Own Face On Fire: Vol. 486” – by The Chicago Blackhawks

By Sam Fels 3133 0

There are two things that are true about Brent Seabrook. Two things that you have to keep in mind simultaneously. And two things the Hawks have not been able to square away in their heads simultaneously, and they’re the only ones.

Brent Seabrook is a Hawks legend who was an integral part of their three Cup wins and will most likely one day have a dual number retirement ceremony with Chris Chelios.

Brent Seabrook is no longer one of their six best d-men, and possibly not even an NHL defenseman anymore.

For at least two seasons now, the Hawks have used the first statement to blind themselves to the second. And now apparently, they’re using the second statement to blind themselves to the first.

I want to get this upfront. If Seabrook plays last night, the Hawks still get torched. I have no idea if that kind of effort has anything to do with a dressing room in turmoil or not, because the Predators are that much better, and more to the point, that much faster. So I’m not making that connection.

That said, the way the Hawks and Jeremy Colliton, or how they’re making it look like Jeremy Colliton, have handled this Seabrook thing this week is unacceptable. And it was so easy for it not to be.

Oh, and let’s put this at the top too:

So either someone is lying, or Jeremy Colliton quite simply is a coward. Joe Quenneville could get away with this kind of thing, and sometimes did, because he had the rep and it was clear what he wanted out of practice and games. He had other things to do than explain every detail of what was missing from someone’s game (not that I always thought this was a good policy, especially with younger players).

Colliton has none of this. To boot, Seabrook was his ally in that dressing room last season when veteran players were rolling their eyes, given their past relationship. It’s probably why the front office bent over backwards to make sure Seabrook would have a roster spot this year, because they knew how tenuous Colliton’s hold was on the team and how much Seabrook’s voice was worth.

So much for that:

This isn’t necessarily a “Come and get me!” plea. But it isn’t not one either, and it’s generally how they start. Now you’ve got an angry and respected vet publicly rebelling against a coach I’m fairly sure isn’t equipped for this and then getting your ass waxed to for the second time in four games. There are better looks.

Is scratching Seabrook a necessity? It surely was going to be whenever Adam Boqvist is ready. And on the second of a back-to-back at home, that’s actually not a bad time to introduce it. It gives you the cover of “rest,” and even if no one buys that (no one did) everyone can kind of just pretend they do and move along. This is a fanbase and media that saw it enough with Marian Hossa, an actual contributor, in his last couple years to get it. Considering how Seabrook had gotten his doors blown off in Carolina, no one would rock the boat on that. If it was preparing the field, it was about the only way you could do it.

Doing it a second straight game, after Seabs would have had two days off, blows off that facade we were all doing our best to hold in place. Now you’re embarrassing him, somehow more so than his play has, and he apparently had no indication this is how it would go.

We and many others laid out how to handle this during the offseason. The front office needed to go to Seabrook and tell him how much he’s meant to the team, the organization, and the fans, and how his name will pretty much live on forever in Hawks history. But they also needed to make it clear where they thought he stood in the pecking order, and how they needed to start to turn their blue line over. They needed to say to him, “You’re going to be #6-#7, if that, and you’re going to spend more than a smattering of nights in the pressbox. If that’s not ok with you, we will do our best to find you a solution that is, even if it means eating half your salary. If you feel you can come into training camp and prove us wrong, ok. But this is where we have you now and that’s the risk you’ll take.”

And maybe they did, because the feature of that method is to keep it quiet and everyone gets to save face at the conclusion. But I tend to doubt it, because the trade of Henri Jokiharju sure seemed like it was made to keep Colliton from having to make any hard decisions. And again, Seabrook is claiming he’s never heard anything.

Again, this was always going to happen. But when you’re scratching a guy with a rep and voice that Seabrook has so you can keep Dennis Gilbert or Slater Koekkoek or Erik Gustafsson (who’s been worse this year and not by an eyelash) in the lineup, and you’re doing it without being open to the player, that’s a slap in the face to a player who deserves much, much better no matter what his performance has been.

It feels like the Hawks wanted to avoid going down this road as long as possible, and were just hoping that an injury or divine providence would help them avoid it altogether. Boqvist and Mitchell are arriving one day soon, possibly March or April. That’s when all the bills were coming due. They’ve sped up the process now. But not on purpose.

Nothing the Hawks seem to do these days has a purpose. Or a plan. So you get not even sniffing the playoffs for a third straight season, and no discernible map on how they plan to correct that in the future.

Hockey

Game #11 – You Made Me Sleep and Uneven and I Didn’t Believe Them When They Told Me That There Was No Saving You– Hawks 0, Preds 3

By John Pullega 2696 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Corsica

Christ. Fire them all.

– The Official Marc Crawford Watch begins now. Jeremy Colliton is entirely out of his element. His systems have all the connectedness of a 3:30 a.m. Crave Case fart after a 6-hour GG Allin tribute concert.

I’m not even sure where to begin. The Hawks were outshot 40–14 through two periods. At no point did they ever lead the possession share. Their xGF% was 22+%. If not for the Kings, who have all the panache and verve of a gangrenous scrotum, the Hawks would have two goals over the last five games. Seven in five is bad enough. The Hawks were a team that finished in the top 10 in goals scored last year. Colliton has managed to take the one thing the Hawks could do well and bury it under his throbbing Genious Brain.

Then there’s the defense. It’s truly a work of art that Colliton could manage to scratch Seabrook incorrectly. Dennis Gilbert, Slater Koekkoek, and Erik Gustafsson all proved tonight that scratching your 7th D-man is pointless if the guys you’re playing ahead of him are 8th, 9th, and 10th D-men themselves.

This is after training camp. This is after Colliton had an entire off-season to implement his system. This is what it produces.

All of the Core guys—Toews, Kane, Keith—looked lost tonight. None of them were effective, and they all looked to drag. And given the overall effort, it isn’t hard to think that Colliton has completely lost his Core. If you manage to lose Toews, and it sure looked like Toews was lost tonight (28+ CF%, 22+ xGF%), what are you even doing here?

Then there was Colliton’s galaxy brain just prior to Bonino’s first goal. At about 16:40 in the first, the Preds had just finished applying a bewildering amount of pressure on the Hawks to the tune of three or four good shots on goal that Lehner miraculously turned away—including a post-to-post save—which all started because of some lazy coverage by Toews at neutral ice. After the TV timeout following a Lehner freeze, Colliton CHOSE to ice DeBrincat–Strome–Carpenter Gustafsson–Gilbert. In the defensive zone. Against a team that was outshooting them vastly. After six or seven shots (that’s not hyperbole), the Preds scored because, get this, EXACTLY ONE OF THOSE GUYS IS EVEN PASSABLE IN THE DEFENSIVE ZONE.

This is what a moron does. Jeremy Colliton is a moron. Even if his GM is a bigger moron, this kind of decision makes it clear that Colliton is out of his element.

There’s no structure to anything the Hawks do at all. It’s a lot of flotsam floating and true talent rolling their eyes. If Colliton makes it to Christmas—hell, Thanksgiving even—we can only assume that the league has contracted back to six teams and every other coach has been Poochied away.

– Robin Lehner prevented that game from being 8–0. If Stan Bowman makes it to the end of this year, it’ll be solely because Lou Lamoriello had no more use for Lehner. Falling ass backward into a talented goaltender will stay his execution longer than Colliton’s. Whoever’s the GM this off-season better pucker up their ass-kissing lips, because Lehner’s got to be looking for the nearest exit.

– This game should reinforce the fact that the Blackhawks have absolutely no idea how to scout defensive talent. Dennis Gilbert is not an NHL player, no matter how many times he leads the game in hits. The only thing I can say for sure about him is that he’s slow. I want to say he’s clueless too, but Colliton’s ass-blood scheme would make Paul Coffey look like Dennis Gilbert, so I can’t say that with any confidence.

– The Blackhawks could have traded the Erik Gustafsson formerly known as a 60-point D-man before the draft or at any point in the off-season. Never forget that.

– Jonathan Toews looked horrible tonight. He looks like he’s given up, and I can’t blame him. Colliton replaced Toews with Saad on the PP1 late in the first period. Yes, Saad was the best forward up to that point, but he’s never been much of a producer on the PP. This reeks of a coach who’s lost his best players trying to prove a point nobody cares to hear anymore.

– I guess if you’re looking for a positive outside of Lehner, maybe there were two. Dach made a couple of heady plays in the first. The first was a dump in that was out of Rinne’s reach, which led to a DeBrincat stuff attempt. The other was a good-idea-not-so-good-execution play on a 3-on-2 with Saad. Dach glided up the near side and tried to feed a streaking Saad for a tip, just missing him. He’s got a feel for the right ideas, which is nice. It’s really gonna suck when they send him back to the WHL next week.

The other was that late in the third, 11 games into the 2019–20 season, Colliton finally put DeBrincat–Strome–Kane together. They immediately produced a strong scoring chance before Kane got a hooking/unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. The fact that the one line that should have been a given going into the year is together only after more than 13% of the season is finished is lamentable.

– I don’t give a fuck that DeBrincat and Strome were statistically awful tonight. This putting-them-on-the-fourth-line horseshit is unacceptable. It was cute when they played the Kings, in the same way that a toddler screaming “God dammit” in a church is cute. Only after letting his team get thoroughly embarrassed did Colliton put them with Kane—which is where they should be at all times, defense be fucking damned—and what do you fucking know? They finished with a 100 CF% and a 78+ xGF%. Get fucked, Jeremy.

This team is lost. Its identity has been reduced to off-ice soap operaisms and leading the fucking league in hits. It’ll be hard for them to do worse than they did tonight, but as long as Colliton and Bowman are calling the shots in any capacity, they sure as shit are going to try.

Start over.

Beer du Jour: Craggenmore 12 and High Life

Line of the Night: “PK Subban wasn’t even in their top three defensemen.” Eddie O on the Preds

Hockey

Game #9 – Hawks 0, Hurricanes 4: Ok, Here’s What I Think Happened…

By Sam Fels 1938 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Shift Charts

 

Well, it was better? I’m not sure what else to say. If effort was indeed the problem on Thursday, and you won’t convince me that’s the only answer, the effort was better here. But teams that bitch about effort, and then think effort will cure all, simply don’t have enough talent. Look across the ice. The Hurricanes were barely out of second gear all afternoon, and they were never threatened. They never looked like this game would be a contest for them. The Hawks did work hard, and did about everything they could. They didn’t score.

Usually in these recaps, I would point to the possession-share and point out the Hawks had the better of it. Or that the second period was pretty good, as they controlled the play pretty well. But we are in an age now where we’re moving beyond that, and we now know that the Hawks’ possession wasn’t worth shit. They didn’t create many chances, and even with limited time the Canes created better ones, hence their advantage in the expected goals count and of course, the real goals.

The Hawks just don’t have enough dash. We haven’t even gotten to the defensive problems, but at the other end, who really is going to conjure something? Especially with DeBrincat fighting it and Kane not at his best either. Saad and Kampf and Dach are doing their best, but one’s a second line winger at best, one’s a checking center, and one’s barely beyond puberty in his fourth NHL game.

Anyway, there’s more I want to get to so let’s get to the bullets, shall we?

The Two Obs

-Let’s start here: Can anyone tell me what in the ever living fuck this means?

And credit to Ben Pope for the long-forgotten art of a follow-up question.

It seems odd that after he made a special point of ranting after Thursday’s loss that the line combos weren’t to blame, he immediately switched them. Did the players ask for this? Did he not believe his own words? I don’t know, but the whole thing smacks of someone who is out of answers. If he had them in the first place.

-And while the combos were better and the top six really has needed Brandon Saad (and really Kubalik too) to start to open space for people, that doesn’t mean they were perfect. Then again, with this roster, there probably isn’t a perfect set-up. What I do know is that Dylan Strome has done nothing to deserve being demoted to a fourth-line winger, and the Hawks offensive woes aren’t going to be solved like that. That’s not why the Hawks lost, and it borders on minor, but it’s still weird.

-And none of this matters, because Brent Seabrook was on the ice for all four goals, and you could argue he was responsible for three of them. No, he didn’t take the penalties. But on the first goal, yes Maatta is in the way too (and that honeymoon is over), Seabrook comes out past the circles. That’s needless. But he then lets Svechnikov find a lane that’s the opposite one from where Crow was looking, leaving the shortside all the way open and one a sniper like Svechnikov isn’t going to miss. It’s dogshit defending.

The second goal was the same goddamn thing. Yes, he was tired after an extended shift after losing his stick. Yes, Maatta should have never passed him the puck to start the scramble. But again, Crow is covering the far side of the net because from his view, Seabrook is in the lane anywhere else. A simple move fakes Seabrook out of most of his gear, now the whole thing is open, and Crow has to slide to cover the shortside quickly that he thought was covered. Niederreiter isn’t going to miss that either.

The fourth one, well he simply loses a battle behind the net to Aho, who either batted Seabrook’s stick so that he ended up making a perfect centering pass to Svechnikov again, or Seabrook did it under pressure, Either way, it’s not strong enough.

The third goal is Maatta, who goes chasing out to the corner on the kill and leaving that passing lane open for Staal to charge through.

Brent Seabrook is not an NHL player anymore. Olli Maatta is no more than a third-pairing d-man, and I question that as the Penguins just made a get-the-fuck-off-my-roster trade of Erik Gudbranson, whom they played ahead of Maatta last year. We’ll call this season a win if the Hawks realize this by the end of it.

-Speaking of defending, here’s another thread for you…

This happens every game. The Hawks aren’t always punished for it. I don’t know if the message is getting through or the players are just ignoring it, but it’s not good enough.

-Let’s do some pluses before we move on with our Saturdays. Kirby Dach was very effective, though it’s still bewildering how he doesn’t get a look on the 2nd power play unit. Unlike most of his teammates, Dach seems to get that the game is about taking the puck and getting up the ice as soon as possible. He’s not afraid to carry into and through the neutral zone and make a man miss to open up things. At least in the first half of the game, he made an effective play pretty much every shift.

The only debate about whether he should stay has to do with what the Hawks actually think this season is about, not what they’re telling you it’s about. If it’s just about him, it’s clear he’s good enough to develop here.

-Alex Nylander also was very straight-lined today, which is good. The Hawks need more of it.

I don’t know how it gets better. It might not.

Onwards…

 

Hockey

Dear Jeremy Colliton, You Haven’t Earned The Right To Bus Toss Your Players

By Sam Fels 2812 0

Dear Jeremy Colliton,
We don’t know each other. Likely won’t. That’s cool. Anyway, I was at the game last night. Surely wasn’t inspirational. Truly impotent, in fact. I came home to find you bus-tossing your players in the press. Interesting move. We’ll get to why in a sec.

I want to be fair to you, Jeremy. So I’d like to list the obstacles put in front of you that either aren’t your fault or have nothing to do with you. It’s actually pretty long. So your job is hard. Very hard, in fact. Perhaps too hard for someone with your experience. You might never have had a chance. But again, let’s get to that a little later. So here they are.

-You’re not the GM. So hence, you didn’t put together this blue line that simply has no one with plus-speed. And other than one doofus who has completely reversed, it doesn’t have anyone who can actually handle the puck all that well (though Maatta has been better at that than anticipated). You have no transition game because of this. Not much you can do.

-You’re not the GM, so you didn’t put together a forward grouping that also simply isn’t fast enough and is a bit mismatched. It doesn’t really have enough forecheckers. You didn’t bring back Andrew Shaw to sell tickets (even though they’re also all sold? Weird that, no?) when what you really needed was an Erik Haula-type (he’s got seven goals already, by the way), A whole lot more speed to go with his puck-winning abilities.

-You’ll never convince me that even your entrenched veterans didn’t know it was time for a change behind the bench and actually welcomed it. But you still followed a legend, which means you had little chance of winning over the fanbase and your leash with the “Core Four” was always going to be short. They were open to new ideas and new ways, but they also weren’t going to be all that patient given what they’d known. That’s hard.

-Your best d-man is made of duct tape and boogers.

That’s a lot actually, Jeremy. You probably have every right to be frustrated, because in your first NHL job you shouldn’t have to deal with that. Especially when you were shotgunned into the position before you could have reasonably expected to be so. So…okay fine.

But Jeremy, you’re not doing anywhere near enough with what you can control, and your play of putting it on your players has little chance of working.

Here’s the thing, JC: this isn’t the doldrums of February. This isn’t when any regular season gets boring, long, and repetitive. Last season, your front office and even some of your players (almost certainly at the front office’s behest) wheel-posed to make it clear how hard it is to make changes without a training camp. This ignored that you had five months, and also ignored that this is hockey and you’re not trying to switch from a 4-3 to a 3-4 or something like that. But that was what everyone wanted the fans to know. You needed a training camp.

Well, you got one. It was only three weeks ago, in fact. Should still be pretty fresh. And that’s when you’re supposed to instill belief, get guys to see what it is you’re trying to do, and get them to believe it will take them where they want to go. Make it clear that it will work if they are fully committed to it and get them to do that. That excitement should be clearly evident a mere eight games into the season. It should still be fresh in their minds. These new ways and ideas will work and they should be excited about it, if for nothing else that it’s still top of mind.

If they already think it’s bullshit, that’s on you, friendo. You had your chance to make it clear why this is the way forward without any distraction. Judging by introducing your players to the bus bumper eight games in, you borked it.

And is effort really the problem here? It can look like that, sure. But are you putting your players in the best spots to succeed?

This Strome-Dach-Kane line…what’s that supposed to do exactly? First of all, there’s nothing about Strome’s game that suggests it will adapt well to a wing. And he hadn’t really played bad enough to be “demoted,” and yet he’s been moved from his favored spot and off the first power play for Alex Fucking Nylander. You really expect him to play with verve after that? Or maybe play like he has no confidence?

Second, that line has no puck-winner, isn’t fast at all, and has three guys who all probably need the puck. Nothing about any of their games suggest they can flourish playing away from it and seek out space for the others. So what’s it supposed to do?

Your first line…again, you’re hampered by the fact that Andrew Shaw is a half-step slower than he was and also doesn’t seem clear on what it is he does that actually helps a team. You’re probably not helped either by the fact that it looks like Jonathan Toews when from 30 to 38 on his last birthday so far. But you still seem to think Toews is a do-it-all center. He’s not. And if there’s one set of skills that’s definitely at the bottom for him, it’s playmaking. He’s not going to get the puck to DeBrincat. He’s not a set-up guy, never really has been. So how does that work? Toews and DeBrincat worked ok last year at times, but they had a hard-worker next to them like Kahun when they did. And Toews’s most goals came with Kane and Caggiula. Now, I know that a team with real aspirations would never have Drake Caggiula on the top six. But hey, he knows what he is and does what he does, which is open up space for those who need it. You can’t seem to get Andrew Shaw to do that.

And it’s still your defensive system, Colly. You’re bottom five in the amount of attempts, shots, and expected goals you surrender. Again, that has something to do with talent on hand. But just last night, I counted at least three times where one of your d-men was just standing in between the circles not doing anything in particular. Either that’s the way you want it, which doesn’t make any sense, or your players still don’t get what it is you want. What happened to MAGIC TRAINING CAMP?

How many odd-man rushes did you give up last night? Eleventy-billion? That’s being shitty with the puck, and also a result of your forwards having to do everything, the latter of which isn’t on you. But still, being focused and smart with the puck…that comes from you. And why are you still trying to play a high-pressure game with a blue line that can’t move?

Oh sure, you can hang out Erik Gustafsson to dry again. That’s easy. That doesn’t impress anyone. That doesn’t grab anyone’s attention. He’s a third-pairing player who’s gone in a year at most anyway. So who are you talking about? Are you talking about Toews and Kane? No one’s really questioned their desire in a very long time, and only the latter’s which was some eight years ago. Anyone who’s seen what his offseason training program looks like would be hard-pressed to claim he doesn’t care.

Seabook? We’ve been down this road. You know what you have to do but are terrified of doing it. And it doesn’t matter until Boqvist is here anyway. You really want to  do something impressive? March upstairs and tell Stan to get his tiny Swedish ass up here so you can have at least one d-man who can initiate a transition game.

Keith? He looked pretty inspired next to Murphy, and he’s been your biggest critic. So whom are you aiming at?

Your team looks like it’s not working hard because other teams know they just have to clog the neutral zone a bit and prevent your forwards from carrying the puck the whole way, which they have to. It’s why only your third line looks good because it’s the only one that can do it at what is now NHL speed. Force the Hawks to dump it in, and they simply don’t have the forecheckers or speed to get it back. That’s not about effort, and that’s not really on you.

Who looks like they’ve improved from last year? Kubalik wasn’t here. This is what Kampf has been and is. Anyone? Maybe Maatta? That’s on you too, bud. Ask Matt Nagy about players not improving and who gets blamed for that.

But if you think they’re uninspired, well…you’re supposed to do the inspiring. And you’re not supposed to use the press to do it until you’ve tried everything else. This is kind of the last chord to pull. If it doesn’t work, where are you?

Sincerely,
A Functional Alcoholic in Section 320

Hockey

What If Kirby Dach Were To Debut On The Wing?

By Sam Fels 2247 0

Normally, I make a pretty awkward, and sometimes even grotesque, face when a player is moved from center to wing or vice versa. Perhaps it’s the PQSD (Post Quenneville Stress Disorder) and the memories of Patrick Kane or Andrew Shaw at center and the counter of Patrick Sharp or Teuvo Teravainen not. When you’ve been around this long, the ghosts and memories are never far from the surface due to sheer volume.

To draw any conclusions about the Hawks lineup after four games, or Kirby Dach’s ascension after just two in the AHL, is obviously silly. There could be injuries or drastic changes to how players are playing, and that’s just in the next 10 games, much less over the next couple months. But hey, the obviously silly is what we specialize in.

Still, what’s obvious is the Hawks want to give Dach a run out at the top level, and they would actually prefer it if he proved to deserve to stick. Hence, it would behoove them to give him the best chance to succeed in however many games it’s going to take to prove that he belongs or he doesn’t. Obviously, skating him on the fourth line between say Ryan Carpenter and Zack Smith really isn’t going to do much for anyone. Then again, this is the Hawks and that’s exactly what might happen so they can turn their palms out and say, “Well, it’s clear he’s just not ready to be in the NHL with a couple of fourth-line stiffs that don’t suit his game in the least.”

The problem is where to fit him in the top nine isn’t so obvious.

Most of that is due to the opening play of the Brandon Saad-David Kampf-Domink Kubalik line. Again, four games, but from opening returns the Hawks might have their own version of the 3M Line in Calgary. A hybrid checking line that can also dominate possession and generate offense from a spot you wouldn’t normally count on it. It would take some convincing to break that line up in the next few games, when Dach’s conditioning stint would be over.

There is an argument for sticking Dach between Saad and Kubalik. Both those wingers are defensively responsible and fast. Both can be one-man breakouts to help get Dach out of the zone. Both have offensive instincts to get to the open spots and open up space for Dach (at least Kubalik has flashed that). Saad’s habit of holding onto the puck for long stretches might not mesh well with Dach. But Dach might also be better off the puck than advertised, at least offensively.

The issue there is that you could no longer use that line as a checking line. You want Kampf doing that, and while I wouldn’t give up on the idea that Kampf with Carpenter and Caggiula/Perlini/Smith could perform much of the same defensive duties from the fourth line as the third line is now. You just wouldn’t get any offense. And maybe you don’t need it.

But say Jeremy Colliton doesn’t want to break up his third line just yet, as they’re quickly turning into something of a binky. Fair enough. Except there’s not really another center spot to put Dach. You’re not moving Strome or Toews to a wing, though at times last year the former was so. We’re beyond that now.

I’ve floated the idea, one that Colliton almost assuredly does not have the stones to try, that Toews could slot down between Saad and Kubalik, and attempt to replicate what that line is doing with Kampf in the middle. Whether Toews is up for the checking duties at this point in his career is a debate we’ve been having for a couple years. And even if he is, can he still provide some scoring juice? Might be worth a look, but we have no idea.

That would leave Dach open to play with Kane or DeBrincat or both, or one of them to slot down with Strome and then make up the other winger through some combo of Shaw and Cagiulla and maybe Nylander or Perlini or whatever else you want to throw to the wall. It would also give you two lines you can start in the defensive zone to give you the flexibility to have two lines who need some hammock shifts, which Dach is almost certainly going to need. But again, I don’t think Colliton has the tires to tell Toews he’s on a third line and if he does I definitely want video of that conversation.

So if that’s not a possibility, what’s left? It would seem an apprenticeship on the wing is all there is. Dach didn’t play wing in junior, so you might actually be stunting his growth by asking him to do it. If he does have it in his locker, then he can be something of a playmaker on a line with Toews and whoever else that it lacks when Toews isn’t playing with Kane. Or he can finish off whatever Daydream Nation create. Or both. It’s not a perfect fit, but it might be the only option.

I have a feeling the Hawks might try all of these for a period over five games with Dach, without ever settling on one. What we can be sure is that the Icehogs have a double-date with the Wolves this weekend, and you can be sure almost all the brass will be in attendance for both to see where Dach is (wouldn’t hurt for Boqvist to light it up either).

The Hawks have a mismatched roster at forward at the moment, and Dach’s presence might not clear it up. It would take some imagination, but it feels like the answer is there.