We praise the team when it's warranted, we criticize the team when warranted. We are all, ultimately, just passionate fans who want to see the team and the players succeed. Putting lipstick on a pig serves no one.
90% of the dog piling you describe is people just joking around.
I agree we should praise and criticize when it is warranted. I just don’t think Cronin and Verbeek deserve as much FIRE them they suck as they get almost everyday on this sub. And I don’t think most people are joking, I wish people were joking when they got mad at Verbeek for not getting Montgomery….. when no one knows if he tried, if he wanted to l get him, if anyone but the Blues had a serious chance.
I am not putting lipstick on a pig, but I can see the vision and the long term plan. We have people on this sub who want to say GC is ruining player development, when every Avalanche fan said once we signed him as our HC that his specialty is player development. The NHL is not supposed to be a development league, alas it’s what we are doing. Do I think Cronin is more or a less a stop gap to instill a hard work ethic, personal accountability, and a hockey is first and foremost a business type attitude, while also being hard on players for making mistakes, and yet allowing them some freedom to make them. (Zelly fumbling that puck leading to the game tying goal and being out there the next faceoff, comes to mind). This is a gradual process, and I think we need a kind of carrot or stick HC currently in our developmental stage.
I hope and pray Cronin leads us to the playoffs, I’m not holding my breath, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think he can serve a very valuable purpose for our rebuild, like Mark Jackson and the warriors.
Then with Verbeek, everyone says he doesn’t make any moves. Well, f***ing duh, we gutted the roster his first season to embrace the true rebuild. Iced an AHL defense his second year to try and get Bedard, and then iced the youngest Defense probably in the league last year, with 3 rookies making the opening night roster (2 of which were 20 or younger) and Zelly making the later in the year. Those are the years to sell at the deadline. He tried to add during FA this year and failed (honestly probably for the better), if we continue to play winning hockey the next couple months, I will be upset if he doesn’t add for a playoff push, but we haven’t been in a playoff push position, so we don’t know what he will do.
All I’m saying is player development isn’t linear, and a lot of the times don’t show up in the box score right away. I am a fan of both Verbeek and Cronin, and hope they can get us into the wagon I could see us becoming. I hope Cronin is along for the ride, but if he’s not, I still think he did job in terms of player development.