Everything Else

I ain’t here for dinner, I want my tank!

By Adam Hess 2334 0

The Blackhawks are now 51 games into their season and they’re currently in 19th place in the NHL standings. They’re five points back of Colorado – let that one sink in for a second – for the second wild card spot, and the Avs still have a game in hand. And last night they played the Canucks, who are currently the second worse team in the West, and they looked pretty terrible. The fact that it came just one game they were stride for stride with the Predators basically shows that any hope you may get for this team moving forward is ever-fleeting.

The Blackhawks right now are basically in the same boat as the Indianapolis Colts are in the NFL – their best player is hurt and no one really knows what the situation is, because the team won’t say anything; with said star player, they’re probably a playoff team, but without him, they’re a bottom feeder. The Colts have a top-3 pick in the NFL draft in April, and the Blackhawks are looking like they’re going to have a good shot at one. And maybe they should start doing whatever they can to maximize that potential.

The Crawford situation has become a lose-lose for the Blackhawks. Crow’s health is obviously the most important thing, and you don’t want to rush him back and risk anything going wrong in the future because he is going to be the key to this team contending in the years to come. And we’re seeing how well things are going without him – you have two dudes who never spent significant time in the NHL trying each game to not play as bad as they did last game. So you don’t want to rush Crow back, but without him you’re up shit’s creek without a paddle.

Then you also have the question of whether Crawford coming back this year at all is really even worth it, even if you don’t rush it. We’ve already seen reports that he might miss the whole season, so it may not be a stretch to say that the Hawks bringing him back at all could be a form of rushing him back. And even if he does come back and squeeze you into a playoff spot, is it really going to be worth playing those extra games just to more than likely get bounced by Nashville or God forbid WINNIPEG? Even if your draft lottery odds are the longest shot, that’s better chance at the apparently generational talent of Rasmus Dahlin than zero.

And really, Dahlin is probably the kind of player that can get the Blackhawks back to where they want to be. The podcast crew discussed this week how the future at forward is looking fine, but there is absolutely no help coming on the back end. A lot of reports seem to indicate Dahlin is the best blue line prospect to be in the draft in a long fuckin’ time. He won’t fix all of their issues, but he’d be an instant jolt to a blue line that needs one badly, and if everything works out, he’s your next Duncan Keith. So it’d make a lot of sense for Stan to look at doing whatever he can to increase his odds of landing that kind of player.

Yeah, tank is a dirty word, but that strategy probably makes the most sense for the Blackhawks for the remainder of this season.

The problem is that, even if that was a route Stan wanted to go, he pretty much has no way of doing so. He has no tradeable assets that he’d be willing (or allowed) to part with. The only player that it could make sense to move and that might bring anything resembling value in return is Anisimov, but he has a full NMC. I guess the only good news on this part of it is that the roster they have at present has been bad enough to get them where they are already, so there’s no reason they can’t just keep spiraling.

But then there is the issue of the coach, who wouldn’t agree to participate in a tank if you held a gun to his head. For better or worse, winning is what Q does, and all he wants to do. He doesn’t even have the kind of Mike Babcock patience to let one year go to shit in hopes of the next several being significantly better. It’s not within his nature to do that. So in order to pull off a tank job, Stan would have to fire Q, and you know McD isn’t about to let that happen.

So you just have to hope now that the Hawks show enough patience and sense with Crawford as to not bring him back unnecessarily. And maybe in doing that, they generate their own form of an internal tank. And then we put our all of our hopes and dreams on the outcome of several ping pong balls. It’s the good ol’ hockey game.

Everything Else

Atop the Sugar Pile – 1/29

By John Pullega 2229 0

Since the last time we did this, the Hawks have gone 1-2-1 with a -3 goal differential. Things got progressively better after the “slam all of your fingers in a car door during a -10 wind chill” effort against the Islanders, so let’s see if we can suss out what’s going on here.

The Dizzying Highs

Anthony Duclair: The points have only just begun to come, but Duclair is yet another example of Arizona being the place where good hockey goes to die. Over the past four games, Duclair’s 5v5 CF% has never dipped below 58, and he’s sporting a four-game average of 64. Playing with DeBrincat and Toews has done him good, with the glut of his Blackhawks points coming in the Motor City Massacre last Thursday. Duclair’s speed is what sets him apart most, and it makes sense that having a playmaker like DeBrincat playing with him has begun to unlock his scoring potential. When the only thing you haven’t mastered is the breakaway backhander, you’re in a good spot.

Alex DeBrincat: Top Cat has trended similarly to Duclair over the last four games, with a 55+ CF% overall at 5v5. He’d hovered around 50 combined against New York and Tampa, until grouping with Toews and Duclair, which over two games has returned a 58+ CF%, four points, and a hat trick. It seems that DeBrincat and Duclair make each other better, as in the limited time they’ve had together, they’ve posted a 55 CF% with Toews and an astounding 70 CF% without Toews. (Don’t tell the good folks at Twitter dot com about that last part, lest you want to hear a Master’s length thesis about how the Hawks should trade Toews, an idea so profoundly offensive that even Zappa wouldn’t argue with Tipper over it.) Keeping the DDT line together is now a must, thanks in part to DeBrincat’s vision.

The Terrifying Lows

Joel Quenneville: We’ve covered several reasons why we’re all starting to get itchy with Quenneville. From the confusion he’s brought on himself about what this team is this year, to the fact that one of his scattershot solutions to a woeful Hawks offensive effort was to put Patrick Sharp on a Top Six line with Schmaltz and Kane, Quenneville’s Jeff Skilling-esque accounting for the Hawks’s poor play has made him look less like the tinkering madman we know and love to poke fun at, and more like a coach born on third with no idea how to transition his younger guys into the NHL properly. But most egregious has been his handling of the defensive pairings. The Forsling–Rutta fiasco. Scratching both Murphy and Kempný in New York. These are the kinds of things that make the FIRE QUENNEVILLE jalopy run, and he’s only got himself to blame for it.

With Forsling retooling in Rockford and Rutta breaking in his press box suit, we may have turned a corner, but that it took this long is an affront. For now, the key will be keeping the lines and pairings as-is and not getting too cute by swapping in spare parts for things that work.

Forsling–Rutta: Thankfully, it looks like this botched experiment is finally over. They were abysmal together against the Islanders, a game in which Rutta was on the ice for seemingly every single goal. After their woeful performance, Forsling got sent down and Rutta got sent up to the press box.

It’s not entirely fair to pin the blame on these two for their poor performances, Forsling in particular. For the second straight year, Forsling’s had to go back to work on his confidence, this time because of mismanagement from Quenneville and supposed Defenseman-Whisperer Ulf Samuelsson. Rutta had a nice run at the beginning of the year, but the Hawks already have a right-handed guy who sort of does the stuff he’s supposed to do in their older, balder, fatter son, Brent Seabrook, so it’s hard to figure out what Rutta does anymore that Murphy, Kempný, or even Oesterle or Gustafsson can’t do better.

The Creamy Middles

Jeff Glass: It doesn’t have to be pretty to work, and giving up two regulation goals against each of the Lightning and Leafs (for a combined 93.9 SV% against 68 regulation shots) is impressive. Since swapping in for Forsberg in New York, he’s managed a 92.2 SV% over 77 shots in regulation, which you’ll take all day from a backup. The rebound control and crease awareness are still a circus, but given the lack of puck luck the Hawks have had this year, I’m not going to discount what we’ve gotten out of him. He’s not a long-term solution, but he’ll do for now.

Erik Gustafsson: In supplanting CONNOR MURPHY as Seabrook’s babysitter, Gustafsson has looked anywhere from good to unnoticeable, which is all you can ask. He came out scorching against the Islanders because we all said he wouldn’t, and since then has been quietly alright, with CF%s of 61+, 43+, and 57+ while riding shotgun with Porkins.

Most interesting is that Gustafsson’s CF%s have been staggeringly higher away from Seabrook than with him: In his four games up, Gustafsson has played with Seabrook for about 54 minutes at 5v5, for a CF% of 46+. He’s been away from Seabrook for about 12 minutes at 5v5 and has a CF% of 65+ in that time. Small sample sizes, but this could tell us that Gustafsson might be a serviceable third-pairing D-man on his own.

Vinnie Hinostroza: Or Kris Versteeg II, if you prefer. Vinnie’s produced a goal and an assist over his last two, and looks right at home with Jurco and Kampf, both of whom have the wheels (and maybe even the vision in Kampf’s case) to keep up. I don’t particularly hate him on the power play either, as long as he stays away from doing the Versteegy things we all grew to hate.

Everything Else

Before Firing Q, Ask The Right Questions…Then You’ll Probably Fire Q

By Sam Fels 4045 0

For the first time, I’ve seen a real wave of sentiment that the Hawks need to make a major change behind the bench. Some have suggested in the front office. We joke about it here a lot, and we certainly criticize the decorated Hawks coach more than most. But it’s never so simple, and before the Hawks or anyone could conclude that this would be the right course of action one has to figure out what the intent of this season and what is really going on here first.

As we’ve talked about at length on the podcast, it’s hard to know what to think when we don’t know what exactly what Stan Bowman had in mind for this season. If the Hawks thought they could or were in any way inclined to be as transparent as other teams in town, what would they have told us before the season? I can’t take credit for the idea, it’s Fifth Feather’s, but there’s two ways this could have gone.

One is that this is truly a transitional season for the Hawks. One they probably should have embarked on a year ago or maybe even right after the last Cup, but that’s another discussion. That if they’d said while they wish to be competitive and make the playoffs, the main objective of this season was to bed in Schmaltz, DeBrincat, Forsling (whoops), now Duclair, Murphy, and let’s throw in Hinostroza and Sikura at the end for funsies (Kampf too if you want). That really what they wanted to get these players reps, ingrained, evaluated, and then have whoever makes the cut ready for one last assault on the summit next year, which is all you’re going to get with the aging “Core Five.”

And on that level, some of the decisions make some sense? I have to put a “?” there because I’m not really sure. If you wanted to see how Forsling and Rutta would do in the deep end, you’d give them the most d-zone starts of everyone. Which Q did. I guess if you squint you’d see if Murphy can play both sides, which he’s proven he can. But that seems a stretch. You’d try Top Cat as a playmaker on a lot of lines instead of a finisher…maybe? This is Schmaltz’s first real run at center, which you’d definitely do.

But on this level, the mistakes are greater than that. It was clear early on that Forsling wasn’t built to start so much in his own end, and a player who openly talked about losing confidence last year was having his ravaged again by such usage. He was booted off the power play even though that should be something he specializes in. Top Cat set all kinds of records playing the left side in the OHL, and has played there for about 12 minutes here. Isn’t it more prudent to build a player up in the softest spot to have success when he’s 19? And then see what his flexibility is? You could argue it took far too long to let Schmaltz just stay in the middle.

The handling of Murphy is the real red X here, and once again speaks to discord from front office to behind the bench which is the same shit we’ve talked about for years that the Hawks were talented enough to play over in the past but aren’t now. His scratches are simply petulant, given that he’s been the Hawks best d-man over the season. This is Q still bitching that his toy in Hammer–his declining, aging, slowing toy that was about to be more expensive–was taken away. While he’s certainly within his rights to be cranky, did Stan and Q never have a meeting after last season where it was laid out what the plan was? Should your coach be so gobsmacked at a trade as Q clearly was last summer? While we’ve seen the problems when Q gets a say in player decisions, or anyone above Stan does as well, I’m not sure that he should be in the dark either.

The more I watch this team the more I think this really was the plan, because everything Stan has done has been to get younger, faster, cheaper, and open up more space for his draft picks which hasn’t always been the case. And maybe if this team is ready to “go for it” next year (highly debatable what that would actually result in), you’d want Q there because that’s what he does. He’s just not the best for development, and that ignores whether or not some of the veterans have tired of his voice (which we’ll never prove).

If you take the other tack, that this year was about “ONE GOAL” as it always is, it’s gets murkier. There isn’t much Q can do to overcome the loss of Corey Crawford. Q can’t make Toews and Saad score. But even before that, if the goal was to amass as many points as possible. then why were Forsling and Rutta in the d-zone so much and on the kill? Why is Patrick Sharp anywhere near the top six? How can you have this power play? And how can it change personnel and tactics seemingly every opportunity? The scratching of Murphy makes even less sense in this context. Gustafsson and Oesterle going from either the minors or pressbox straight onto both special teams is confounding. If it was about development, it would make slightly more sense, but wouldn’t at least Oesterle have played from jump street?

These are all answers we won’t get because I don’t know what the long term or even short term goals were here. The simplest explanation is that Stan is remaking the entire roster under that “Core Five” (yes, Seabrook doesn’t really count anymore but he’s not going anywhere) either to give them one last chance either next year or preparing the ground for when they aren’t the front of this team anymore. But it doesn’t seem like his coach is playing the same game, once again.

And if that’s going to be the case going forward, one has to go. And Stan’s never gotten to hire a coach before.

 

Everything Else

Game #46 – Islanders vs. Hawks Preview/Pinball Repair: You’re A Big Man But You’re In Bad Shape

By Sam Fels 2340 0

 vs. 

RECORDS: Islanders 23-20-4   Hawks 22-17-6

PUCK DROP: 7:30pm

TV: NBCSN

NO ONE ESCAPES THE ISLAND: Lighthouse Hockey

Not that the Hawks are allowed the luxury of excuses anymore, but another one has fallen out of the way as the bye week is over. The Hawks can’t claim fatigue, they can’t claim they’re already on a break, they can’t claim… well, shit. It’s time to call for battle stations, as the Hawks are simply out of time to reach a level that simply might not be there if they’re going to play beyond the already scheduled slate.

They couldn’t ask for a much better dance partner coming out of the break than the Islanders. While they’re not terrible, the Isles are an open team that gives up a ton of shots and chances and don’t have a goalie that can stop waving at pucks and turning around the wrong way. Then again, the Wings gave up a ton of chances and had a terrible goalie heading in the UC and the Hawks had all their organs fall into their legs.

The Isles also happen to be in a bad way, coming into this one off a 5-2 tonking at the hands of the Bruins on Thursday at home when the Bs were on the second of a back-to-back. That was their fifth loss in the last eight and seventh in the last 10, and they are simply bleeding goals profusely. They’ve given up 30 in their last eight games, and the Rangers are the only ones they’ve held under four in that time.

It’s not just the goalies, of course, and the other thing bending the Hawks way is the Isles are somewhat beat up. On the blue line, both Calvin de Haan and Johnny Boychuk are out, and what remains has basically been Wendell Kim (sky point) at their own line. Nick Leddy put up a -15 in December and a -9 in January and while +/- is basically a bullshit stat, it gives you some idea of how everything has quaked for them recently. Leddy shouldn’t ever be taking on a top pairing assignment, and now he’s doing that while playing babysitter to Scott Mayfield. The Isles have a couple other kids back there in Adam Pelech and Ryan Pulock, and the growing pains are there for all to see.

But this is burying the lede somewhat, as the Isles do boast one of the more exciting players to come in the league in Mathew Barzal and his missing “T.” Barzal is the runaway leader in the Calder race and with good cause. He even exhumed Andrew Ladd before Ladd got hurt, and he and Eberle have torn defenses apart all season. There are going to be some shifts tonight where they simply dance around whatever goof the Hawks have out there on defense, and you should prepare so you don’t pass out.

Their threat has loosened up the top line of Anders Lee-John Tavares-Josh Bailey. Bailey missed a couple weeks and returned on Thursday and the other two were something of a mess without him. Both Tavares and Bailey are in a contract drive this year, which doesn’t have Isles fans chewing on towels, drywall, their own skin at all. The top six here is one of the more threatening around, and has kept the Isles in touching distance of the Eastern playoffs. Good thing the Hawks will try and counter that with their best d-men, huh?

Oh right, that. The Hawks return from the break but Joel Quenneville’s brain is still out in Colorado or wherever he spent the bye. The Hawks best d-man this year, Murphy, and the mobile one they need, Kempny, are being scratched. In their place comes in Erik Gustafsson for…oh jesus I don’t fucking know, because he’s there? He’ll play his first game this year with Brent Seabrook who for sure won’t be turned into paste by either of the Isles top lines. Or they could look to shield them and have Rutta and Forsling deal with the Isles top six, which will go… well you know how that will fucking go. This is the good stuff here, people.

As far as the forwards, Anthony Duclair will move up with Toews and Saad, though he’ll be playing the right side where he, y’know, has barely ever played in his career. Vinnie Smalls slots down to the third line with Kampf and Top Cat, which is at least worth a look. The other two lines remain the same. Does anybody remember laughter?

Whatever the lineup, whatever their coach’s delusions, whatever their starting goalie’s condition, this is kind of it now. The Hawks blew the easier portion of this homestand, and now they’ll get the at least explosive Isles, the unholy force of the Lightning, and the malfunctioning Death Star that the Leafs are right now. Whatever the degree of difficulty, if the Hawks are going to be anything it has to start now. Otherwise, there should be some really tough questions asked.

 

Game #46 Preview

Preview

Spotlight

Q&A

Douchebag Du Jour

I Make A Lot Of Graphs

Lineups & How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

The Secrecy To Nowhere Leads To Me, Q, Kid Rock, Why Hockey Is The Circus Clown Of Sports

By Sam Fels 2516 0

Took a few days off myself during the bye and let the proletariat handle it. So clearly there’s some stuff to get through since if you give the Hawks enough time without any games they probably will trip over their own dicks.

-I can’t add too much to what Pullega and Rose have put up over the past couple days about Corey Crawford. It’s once again proof that trying to shroud yourself in secrecy just isn’t going to work.

Some people want to claim that the Hawks and really most NHL teams’ sprint to the stronghold of information blackouts springs from the NFL’s. NFL coaches are a poisonous combination of paranoid to the point of tin foil chapeaus, while also convinced of their own genius that their systems and gameplans should be studied at Wharton if not The Louvre for generations (though a fun game might be getting NFL coaches to define The Louvre, if not spell it). This is what happens when you give guys a full week of nothing to do but convince themselves of threats as they work 19-hour days and can’t remember the names of their daughters.

I don’t think hockey’s comes from that. It’s part that, sure, but hockey coaches and execs have always been too dismissive/stupid/mealy-mouthed to actually share information. The fear has always been that if you announce a player has an ankle problem, every player on your next opponent is basically going to do everything up to and including chair-shots on said ankle. Hockey being hockey, this isn’t totally far-fetched.

But with the Hawks, they should have learned long ago that if you have a period of silence, anything and everything is eventually going to fill up that void with all sorts of noise and you’re going to end up speaking about it anyway. And that’s where the Hawks find themselves.

I don’t know what they hoped to gain by plugging their fingers in their ears and shouting the chorus to “Caravan” as a team policy. This was always going to happen. Maybe they feared exposure of once again not handling a head injury correctly. Here’s an idea, and I know this is totally out there but maybe next time just handle the head injury correctly?

-This Crawford stuff has buried another nugget from Hawks fans’ favorite radio host Dan Bernstein on 670 The Score. While discussing the Crow weirdness he also let it be known that behind closed doors Joel Quenneville is still seething about the trade of Niklas Hjalmarsson. I couldn’t help but joke in my head that when the discussion on the afternoon show turned to whether or not Hawks fans watched other teams that maybe they should ask if the coach does as well.

By any measure, Hjalmarsson has been bad on a really bad Coyotes team this year. And if you were paying attention you saw a precipitous decline in the second half of last year. While his shot-blocking certainly got the most slobber treatment from Eddie O and apparently Q himself (and this is something that really needs to stop because you shouldn’t aim to be blocking shots as a go-to), that was far from Hammer’s most important attribute. While he was a stay-at-home d-man, he had greater mobility than most who fit that role. Which meant much like Keith and Oduya and even Seabrook back in the day, he could step up at his line and squeeze the space for opponents while not having to fear being beat to the outside. In addition, there may not have been a better Hawk d-man at making that 5-10 foot pass under duress, often blind, from the corner or below the goal line to the front of the net to a waiting Hawks center to release all the pressure and get the Hawks out of the zone.

Well, Hammer lost the step that allowed him to step up at his line. He lost the half-step to make that and other breakout passes as often as he could. And that’s not going to get better.

But it certainly explains the Connor Murphy scratchings at the slightest misstep #5 makes. It would hardly be the first time that Q has tried to either make a point to his GM, or simply stick it to him. Brad Richards starting behind Andrew Shaw on the center depth chart to start a season comes to mind, as does Steve Montador starting a season on the wing or Antoine Vermette playing a wing after arrival. There are others. Murphy is being held to an at-times unfair scale simply because his coach cries on a framed picture of a certain Swede before going to bed at night. Even with that, he’s been the Hawks best d-man by some distance this season.

This is where you wish the Hawks though they could be as transparently operated as both baseball teams in town are at the moment. Because if Stan truly envisioned this as a “transitional” season, and his quotes suggest he very well might have, he’d finally have a cudgel over his coach. If this is about getting the Schmaltzes and DeBrincats and Forslings of the world grounded, as well as getting Murphy into the Hawks’ “Martz-ian” system, Stan would have evidence to take to his bosses/fans about how his coach is getting in the way. And it would keep Q in line or maybe Stan would finally get to hire his own coach that he actually has a relationship with.

Instead, we get more of the same push and pull between coach and GM, and at this point it’s tiresome for all.

-I don’t know there’s much more I can add to the hysterical-if-it-wasn’t-sad choice of Kid Rock to perform at the All-Star game. The best case scenario for the NHL is that they’re just wildly ignorant, which isn’t encouraging. The simplistic explanation is that someone simply saw a google photo of him in a Red Wings jersey at a game and thought that was enough. Does he still do that now that they suck? Or is he more in the CM Punk fashion where he’s only around if it helps his brand?

Once again hockey has quivered in fear of a portion of the fanbase it would actually probably rather do without, and that’s the old angry white guy. And yes, if you listen to Kid Rock you’re old now. Sorry. You also suck, and I would gladly trade my life to bring Warren Zevon back to his only long enough so he could impale Kid on a flaming spear for stealing his song.

It’s that fanbase that keeps hockey from banning fighting which it would really like to, or enforcing the rules even harder to open up the game, or heavily suspending players for hits to the head/dirty play. But no, the NHL is terrified that the angry white dude who measures his own dick by how “tough” he perceives the sport he watches to be we’ll up and leave if they ever did any of this. You and I both know he won’t, because he has nowhere else to go (unless they did all this and Vince McMahon was convinced he could start an XHL and oh god this is going to happen isn’t it?), but the NHL has always operated out of fear and ignorance. Which is why they won’t backtrack on this either, although they’ll continue to celebrate Will O’Ree and Hockey Is For Everyone and You Can Play right along with it. Good stuff there.

Which is why it will always be a joke to most everyone else.

 

Everything Else

Just Tell Us

By Sam Fels 3607 0

Been stewing over this one since Friday night. It’s no secret that we are not huge fans of Eddie Olczyk’s analysis work here at the FFUD labs. While I’m tempted to give him a break this season due to his current health struggles and stop-start schedule, this particularly angle is one that demonstrates not just his shortcomings in the booth, but the inaccessibility of hockey coverage as a whole. I’m sure Eddie is having to put forth a huge effort just to get through a game these days, and I salute him for it. This is just a nugget in a much larger problem.

In the 3rd period of Friday’s loss to the Knights Who Say Vegas, Pat and Eddie began to discuss Connor Murphy. Of course, nowhere was it mentioned that Murphy has been the Hawks best d-man for about two months, which of course didn’t stop him from being scratched yesterday because TREE CUPZ. Anyway, they were discussing his transition to the Hawks and settling in with a new team.

During the discussion, at least twice and I think three times, Olczyk said, “The Hawks have a complicated system.” At no point did Eddie dare to explain what was so complicated about it, what was so different about it from the one Murphy played in Arizona, or what specifically Murphy struggled with at first. All we got was basically Lewis Black’s, “It’s really hard. Makes me wanna go poopy!”

This is the problem with hockey analysis everywhere. Either all analysts assume we’ll never understand, or they’re full of shit and they don’t really have any idea what they’re watching anyway. So how exactly is anyone supposed to learn anything about the game they’re watching and become more attached.

Here’s the thing, and Fifth Feather is fond of when we say this, but no hockey system is The Mike Martz Route Tree. There are differences with each team, but no one’s doing anything revolutionary here.

Maybe there’s more nuance to the Hawks’ tactics, but would it have been so hard for Olczyk to point out that the Hawks like to have their d-men step up at both blue lines whenever possible? That they rely on back pressure from the forwards to do that? That they’d rather cause turnovers in the neutral zone or in the offensive zone then force dump-ins to their own zone as a lot of teams, like the Coyotes, do? Would it have been so hard to explain that the Hawks want their d-men to be able to make that five-to-ten foot pass to a waiting center in front of their net when under pressure below the goal line and/or in the corner? Hawks fans have watched Keith, Seabrook (he did once, I swear), and Hjalmarsson make that play for about a decade now. Would it have been so impossible to explain that on breakouts, the Hawks like their d-men to hit a curling forward in between the circles, and on the move, and if that’s not there to use the forward on the boards who will then hit said curling forward out of the zone? If you’re talking to a Hawks audience, we’ve all seen that. And if you have a new fan, isn’t that something they’d want to watch for?

One of the problems hockey has in attracting new fans is that to a lot of them it just looks like a mad scramble. And if you’re watching the Hawks in their own zone this year, it really looks like a mad scramble. It could only help if everyone had a clearer idea of what teams and players are actually trying to do.

But you never get that. I’m not a huge NBA fan, though getting bigger, and yet I can tell you how Tom Thibodeau teams play a pick-n-roll or how the Warriors move the ball or how James Harden does what James Harden does. Because they take the time to tell you. Fuck, aren’t we all NFL experts on how to run an offense (except for Dowell Logains, of course)? Hockey doesn’t even give you the depth of knowledge that would allow you to know the difference between a 4-3 and 3-4 defense.

It would hardly kill NHL analysts to show us how maybe one team covers the front of the net with the weakside d-man for the most part, though some want both their d-men chasing the puck and cover the routes to the net with forwards.

Because there aren’t nearly the variables in how to run things in hockey as there are in other sports. Maybe that’s a lack of new ideas but it’s the reality.

And yet we just get, “It’s a complicated system.” Which basically hangs Murphy out to dry because barely anyone can understand what he’s trying to adjust to. Or could it be these guys just don’t know and take Q’s words for it? That might explain why Olczyk wasn’t much of a coach, though that can’t be it. Or at least all of it, for sure. Fuck, we knew why the Mike Martz Route Tree was so fucking hard because it took so long to develop and also nearly got Jay Cutler killed.

It just can’t be that hard to find someone who can do that. It’s not Olczyk, and it isn’t Pierre McGuire who I’m sure doesn’t know the difference because he’s too busy memorizing OHL stats from 1997. Which means less people will know what they’re watching, which means they’ll be less inclined to do so, and who does that help?

Everything Else

Game #39 – Hawks vs. Rangers Preview/Track Mastering: You Can’t Get A Joint in Times Square So Who Cares?

By Sam Fels 1998 0

 vs. 

RECORDS: Hawks 18-14-6   Rangers 21-13-5

PUCK DROP: 7pm

TV: NBCSN – It’s Rivalry Night, don’t ya know?

NEW YORK MIGHT BE THE WORST ST. VINCENT SONG EVER: Blueshirt Banter, @HockeyRodent

It’s not officially cold until it gets cold in New York, which it has been now, and you can hear their bitching about it from Oregon. Meanwhile this is par for the course for us, but who gives a shit when we’re here in the middle, busy sending all of our creative talent there to do the work they take credit for? Exactly. Anyway, it’s rivalry night apparently and I guess this counts because it’s two Original Six teams, though you’re forgiven if you forgot that the Rangers were an O6 teams because really… what’s Rangers tradition?

BUT THAT’S NOT WHY YOU CALLED.

The Hawks wrap up this weird six-game trip that’s bounced from Texas to the East Coast, to Western Canada, back to the East Coast, rippin’ and rompin’, North Cak-a-laka and Compton (not actually Compton). It wrapped around Christmas so the Hawks didn’t have to do it all in one, but it also makes it seem like it’s gone on forever. The fact that the Hawks piled up only one win during it, three terrible losses and one credible point I guess in Cal And Gary only made it seem longer. Which leaves us in this state of ennui we currently find ourselves.

As far as on the ice. there will be more changes. Because of course there will. Once again, Richard Panik goes from top line to pressbox in Q’s Rotation Of Confusion, with Vinnie Smalls getting a chance to do whatever it is he does with Toews and Saad. Patrick Sharp comes back from exile (handsome exile!) to be on the other side of David Kampf from Top Cat, forcing Top Cat back to the right side because whatever Baby Sharp wants Baby Sharp gets, I guess.

It spreads to the defense as well, where Gustav Forsling will slot back in to pair with Cody Franson, which won’t have the Rangers forwards giggling until they foam up at the mouth or anything. Personally, I can’t wait for Forsling to get horsed in the corner, the puck making its way to the slot and Franson kind of staring at it with a bemused expression as one might a squirrel dragging a too big piece of food up a tree. After starting the shift in their own end, of course.

Jeff Glass gets his third straight start, as horse-player Q thinks this is finally the Pick 3 he’s going to hit. This is simply asking for trouble, as the “spark” Q was looking for by starting this good story has not materialized, and has in fact has had his skaters playing terrified and panicked in their own zone as Glass spits up another rebound. It has the double effect of fucking with Anton Forsberg’s head, and with Corey Crawford nowhere on the horizon that seems a real problem. Glass is going to give up a touchdown somewhere around here, because he’s not Tim Thomas, and it’s going to be in a game the Hawks can’t really afford to just punt. Forsberg has had his spotty games for sure, but also has the better chance of holding a team below two which he’s done as well. But Q gets to play his hunches because fuck you.

To the Rangers, who are one of the weirder statistical teams you can find. They’ve fallen six points behind the division leading Caps, but have two games in hand. What’s bewildering about the Rangers is that they’re one of the worst possession teams in the league, and yet they create the best chances out of the limited attempts they take. They’re #1 in expected goals at evens per 60 minutes, even though you’d be hard pressed to find a genuine first-liner anywhere on this team. They give up a lot of attempts as well, but not that many great chances.

It also helps that Henrik Lundqvist went a bit bonkers in December, with a .936 SV%. So that talk of him being finished in October seems to have dried up a bit. That helped the Rags to a 7-3-3 record in the month, and they’ll be coming off a truly inspiring OT win in the Winter Classic against the modern day irresistible force that is the Buffalo Sabres.

The Rangers are a little beat up at the moment, as Chris “I Still Give Guys Swirlies” Kreider is out indefinitely with a blood clot in his arm, and so is Jesper Fast. The Rangers weren’t blessed with a huge amount of depth, so it’s kind of stripped their second line. Unless a troika of Buchnevich-Desharnais-Vesey scares you. The top unit of Alleged Wiener Tucker and The Two Z’s has been dynamite possession-wise but not a whole lot of end product yet. It’s the bottom six where the real threat lies, with Michael Grabner and 18 goals, Captain Stairwell, and J.T. Miller always possible to pop up with a goal. There are no big names–Nash really isn’t a top line player any more–but the foot soldiers have gotten enough done.

They’ve had problems getting Kirk ShattenKevin to fit in all season, and he’s currently on a third-pairing with worst player in the world Brendan Smith. Most of their push comes from Chance-Made-Me-Famous Brady Skjei (and the funny thing about that sketch is that Skjei is American). McDonagh and Holden take the human shield assignments, and expect Schmaltz and Kane to see them every shift.

Feels like every time I show up here and say the Hawks need to kick it into gear and blah blah blah, Kesha. Perhaps it’s just not going to happen and this is what they are. The Hawks are going to pack in the games now before their bye week, with seven games in the next 12 days. It is likely that when we get to the end of that stretch, we’ll know if the rest of the season is worth any give-a-shit or not.

 

Game #39 Preview

Preview

Spotlight

Q&A

Douchebag Du Jour

I Make A Lot Of Graphs

Lineups & How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

Game #39 – Hawks vs Rangers: Spotlight – Alain Vigneault Is In The Wrong Sport

By Sam Fels 1830 0

Hang on, let me get my “30 For 30” voice on here. Ahem…

What if I told you that Alain Vigneault had more wins since Joel Quenneville took over the Hawks than Joel Quenneville? It’s true. Vigneault teams, and there’s two of them, have piled up 438 regular season wins while Q’s Hawks have piled up 431 in that time. He’s got far more wins than Claude Julien in that time. More then Ken Hitchcock. More than Mike Babcock. You can’t find an active coach who has won more games than Vigneault since he took over the Canucks in 2006-2007. No Vigneault-coached team has won less than 40 games (or at that pace in the case of 2013), except for his 2007-2008 team which won 39. When you hear it like that, it’s quite striking.

Vigneault has two years after this one on his contract with the Rangers, and if he were to serve it out, he would probably land around #7 all-time in wins. Clearly, the shootout and overtime rules are different now, but that puts him amongst names like Arbour, Hitchcock, and Quinn. When you hire Vigneault, there’s clearly a very high baseline you’re going to get.

And yet, talk to any NHL fan or observer and mention his name and you’ll probably get a smirk and a scoff. “What does it all matter,” they’ll probably say, “when you haven’t won the big one?” No sport puts more value on players and coaches than whether you’ve had a day with a big silver chalice.

Vigneault’s playoff record isn’t nearly as glittering. He’s been to a Final twice, and other than that there’s only been a handful of trips to the second round. And with that against his record, that’s always a blotch he’s got to get around.

But still, aside from Quenneville, is his playoff record that much worse than those considered he best in the game? Mike Babcock has three trips to the Final, two of which with a loaded Red Wings roster. Only one Cup. His teams haven’t seen past the second round since they lost that Final in ’09 to the Penguins. Ken Hitchcock has only seen the conference Final once in over a decade.

So what would be the perception of Vigneault if Roberto Luongo’s intestines didn’t turn to paste in Boston in ’11? Is that Vigneault’s fault? You really going to pull a goalie switch in the middle of a Final? What if those earlier Canuck teams didn’t run into that juggernaut Hawks team, quite possibly still the most talented team of the post ’05 lockout? Either the ’09 or especially the ’10 Canucks team was good enough to get to a Final and win it.

Yes, the Canucks did lose in the first round the next two years. But one of them was to a Kings team that no one could get beyond five games (except for the Devils who had the benefit of the Kings being too drunk for Games 4 and 5 in that Final). And then he shows up in New York, and immediately takes a limited Rangers team to a Final and then a conference final.

If he were a baseball manager, he’d be pretty well liked. Think Dusty Baker or Ron Gardenhire or whoever else. It’s still mentioned, but their regular season wins are not ignored. It would be the same in football, though in the football world every coach is a genius. Maybe basketball it would be the same case, and perhaps that’s the sport a coach has the most control over. Or the least, as you’re not going anywhere if you don’t have a genuine star or two (Tyron Lue has a ring, folks).

Vigneault is going to end up in the Hall of Fame one day, and when he does there will be a fair measure of chuckles. Maybe they’re justified, maybe they’re not. But the Canucks haven’t even sniffed a series win since he left. The Rangers probably won’t either. Teams notice when he’s gone.

 

Game #39 Preview

Preview

Spotlight

Q&A

Douchebag Du Jour

I Make A Lot Of Graphs

Lineups & How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

Game #37 – Hawks 3 – Oilers 3 (Hawks win Quarters): They Don’t All Have To Hang In The Louvre

By Sam Fels 1888 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

So no need to intro this. Shared a few thoughts on Twitter last night so a couple new ones and expounding on what we talked about before. Sorry for the delay. Technology is not my friend.

-We bitched about Duncan Keith’s lackluster effort on Thursday in Vancouver. And apparently he wasn’t pleased with it either, or got the message that his coaches weren’t. However, Duncan Keith trying to do everything is only slightly better than Duncan Keith doing nothing. He makes things happen, like Top Cat’s power play goal by standing up at the blue line that was vintage Keith. He also leaves his partner out to dry a few times. Or he doesn’t make the simple play like in the last minute when he was a foot from the red line and could have just dumped the puck into the Oilers’ zone.

You can see the thinking. If Keith can successfully cycle back into his own zone and hold onto the puck they kill more time. But it could also lead to what it did, which is a scramble, a turnover, and then a goal you can’t give up.

Keith has been put in a tough spot all year, as the only player that can play with him and allow him to do all the things he’s done is Connor Murphy, and that would frontload the defense too much. So he’s having to make up for all sorts of deficiencies. And I guess we’d rather have the super locked in and super hyper Keith than the one that’s just kind of there.

-I guess I could warm up to Jordan Oesterle’s “KEEP FIRING, ASSHOLES!” approach to the game in the offensive end. The Hawks lack any sort of threat from back there now that Seabrook can’t move and Forsling is usually in quicksand in his own end. And Oesterle usually gets his shot through. It would be better served on a third pairing. But then again, we can say that of six of the eight d-men on the Hawks right now.

-Michal Kempny once again had a 60+% Corsi. I’m sure he’ll sit on Sunday so we can see more of Cody Franson pinching in the neutral zone to a puck he won’t get within five feet of.

-As I said last night, I’m sure a lot of people expect me to point out that Jeff Glass’s rebound control was awful. Or that he lost his net too many times. Or that his glove seemed to be made of superballs. But let’s leave that aside. At the age of 32, he won his first NHL start. He spent seven years in Russia for this. Sometimes, it’s just a good story.And this one is. There’s certainly a place for it, and it’s one of the big reasons we love sports. Let’s just hope the coach doesn’t fall in love with it.

-That said, in the pregame they had a clip of Q’s pregame presser where he said he hoped that it would cause a spark and the team to rally. Clearly he wasn’t thrilled with the team’s effort in games this year. But I don’t think he’s talking to the kids. Forsling’s problem isn’t he isn’t playing hard enough. Neither is it Rutta’s. Certainly not Schmaltz’s or Top Cat’s. So where do you think that was aimed?

-Still, Q didn’t do Glass or his team any favors again. Three times in just the 1st period, he sent Schmaltz out for a defensive zone draw. You know McDavid is coming out for those. Yeah, sometimes the rotations don’t leave you much choice. But two of these were after TV timeouts. Is that a matchup you really want? Thankfully it didn’t result in any goals.

Anyway, onwards…