GDT: #36 ⋅ NJD @ ANA ⋅ 5:00 PM PST

[Frosted Tips]

Based on the highlights that looked like a game I didn't want to miss. Happy New Year Ducks fam!

 

[Trojans86]

anyone else starting to get concerned about leo?

No, his line mates are horrible

 

[Oresy]

No, his line mates are horrible

And his coach sucks the life out of the offence. Not a coincidence that you are seeing offensive guys like Carlsson, Mintyukov, Zellweger, Zegras, Gauthier etc all struggling to produce.

 

[Kalv]

anyone else starting to get concerned about leo?

Yep. Sure there's sophomore slump and he could have better linemates, but he sometimes takes poor decisions(including putting himself into position to get hurt), his magical takeaway skills seems to be vanished along with his production, and I don't trust his coach in developing his offense.

He will be a good player most likely, but seeing him last year made me believe he could be a superstar. I'm much less convinced this year.

 

[Leonardo87]

anyone else starting to get concerned about leo?

No, Cronin has not put him in the best position to succeed, so not at all.

Killorn is cooked , and Leason is a 4th liner. He is playing well most games but cannot sustain offense because of those two.

Still 3rd on this team in goals, with missing 6 games and leaving two of them early, so that should say a lot, and his assists are down because of line-mates not able to finish.

Also to add, his ES ice time and line mates basically say he is no longer the 1C , his line is actually the 3rd line now. So yeah….doesn’t matter how good of a game he has when his line mates can’t sustain offense it’s hard to produce.

 

[Ducks DVM]

 

[WhatTheDuck]

 

[Mr Rogers]

Watching the replay of the Fabbri goal, Dumoulin makes a really nice play to start it.

Cutter is such a thoroughbred, I could see him really taking off the rest of the way. His passing has really impressed me as well - I wasn’t really expecting that tbh.

 

[Zegs2sendhelp]

Watching the replay of the Fabbri goal, Dumoulin makes a really nice play to start it.

Cutter is such a thoroughbred, I could see him really taking off the rest of the way. His passing has really impressed me as well - I wasn’t really expecting that tbh.

Ya I love cutters game/build

He’s pretty much what I thought mctavish was supposed to be

 

[LuGBuG]

This team in a nutshell

Ya I love cutters game/build

He’s pretty much what I thought mctavish was supposed to be

Cutter is very fast, looks bigger then he is, shoots a ton and has a laser. He is going to be a very very dangerous player with our playmakers

I know it’s doom and gloom on here half the time about players but us adding Sennecke and Cutter in the past year is going to make us extremely scary moving forward. There is still a shit ton to be optimistic about.

 

[Zegs2sendhelp]

I know a lot of people make up reasons as to why we are competing with good teams

back up goalie, b2b for other team or whatever…. But the team has played pretty solid over the last 2 weeks or so against some pretty good teams.

 

[Leonardo87]

View attachment 954425

This team in a nutshell


Cutter is very fast, looks bigger then he is, shoots a ton and has a laser. He is going to be a very very dangerous player with our playmakers

I know it’s doom and gloom on here half the time about players but us adding Sennecke and Cutter in the past year is going to make us extremely scary moving forward. There is still a shit ton to be optimistic about.

You think this is doom and Gloom? You should read the Rangers forum. lol

Seriously though I just want the best development for these players. Cutter being taken off the PP, Leo stapled to two wingers who he has no chemistry with and one is a 4th liner , 13th forward type. So it’s the little things like that I see in a rebuilding team.

If not for Dostal in that 1st period think it’s a different outcome. Devils likely got frustrated and lightened up on shots but still were able to get 2 through. Strome last min heroics saved the day. But why blow the lead in the first place?

If this team is going to start competing for playoffs in the next couple of years the bar needs to be raised. So the criticism will be a little stronger as they transition from a rebuilding to contending team.

 

[WhatTheDuck]

I know a lot of people make up reasons as to why we are competing with good teams

back up goalie, b2b for other team or whatever…. But the team has played pretty solid over the last 2 weeks or so against some pretty good teams.

Beating the Jets, Oilers and Devils within a two week span - definitely an accomplishment for this group no matter how they got there. Those are all teams that expect to wipe us. Add in the comeback against Utah etc...much more fun hockey than recent years at least

 

[robbieboy3686]

View attachment 954425

This team in a nutshell


Cutter is very fast, looks bigger then he is, shoots a ton and has a laser. He is going to be a very very dangerous player with our playmakers

I know it’s doom and gloom on here half the time about players but us adding Sennecke and Cutter in the past year is going to make us extremely scary moving forward. There is still a shit ton to be optimistic about.

My hot take is that sennecke will end up being the greatest duck ever.

 

[caliamad]

Credit where credit is due. It’s been an amazing few weeks and it’s lovely to watch high level hockey in games that matter. I know playoffs are long shot but I love this progression.

Having said that I think we got pretty fortunate last night. A lot of odd man rushes were broken up by pure luck. We got a lot of flukey calls that messed up their momentum. Easily could have turned out like Vegas game.

Carlson concerns me and I know it’s mostly his linemates. He is losing confidence. They definitely need speed on that line because Gleason and killorn can’t skate, the forecheck is non existant and they can’t sustain any pressure. Problem is I don’t want to mess the other lines because they are rolling. I’d rather they bring in a fast skilled winger from minors until zegras is healthy.

I like Trouba with Lacombe as our shutdown pairing. I’d like to see Gudas sheltered a little more and paired with zellwegger. So then that leaves Dumo and Minty on our third pairing. Helleson needs more time but should replace dumo at the deadline.

I’d love to see anyone in over Johnston on the 4th, Gleason, Harkins, Lundy, McGinn, Coangello. They could be much more effective if he wasn’t a black hole there. He should only play if there is a legitimate heavy weight goon in the other teams lineup.

 

[Dr Johnny Fever]

I know a lot of people make up reasons as to why we are competing with good teams

back up goalie, b2b for other team or whatever…. But the team has played pretty solid over the last 2 weeks or so against some pretty good teams.

You're not getting off that easy. It's because Fowler is gone and you know it!

 

[Zegs2sendhelp]

You're not getting off that easy. It's because Fowler is gone and you know it!

I just laid out the facts, they made excuses to avoid blaming the obvious underlying factor

 

[ohcomeonref]

As good as the team has been playing lately, I echo the sentiment that we need to spark Leo somehow. Decent linemates would help

 

[Zegs2sendhelp]

As good as the team has been playing lately, I echo the sentiment that we need to spark Leo somehow. Decent linemates would help

without zegras idk that it’s possible without hurting others in the line up

 

[ScarTroy]

As good as the team has been playing lately, I echo the sentiment that we need to spark Leo somehow. Decent linemates would help

Yeah in a vacuum, there’s not much terribly wrong with how Leason and Killorn are playing, but just not with Leo. That doesn’t work at all. Unfortunately think we just need to wait until Z gets back because those other 2 lines are clicking pretty well.

 

[Deuce22]

To be clear, I’m not a fan of a lot of things Cronin is doing. Favoring vets over young players in a rebuild, doing nothing to address the sorry PP, playing Johnston. But the reduction in shots against and penalties taken are positives. When Ducks play well and the explanation is always “the goaltending,” the critics lose me. I hope Cronin isn’t the coach moving forward because his style doesn’t fit our young talent, but he is doing what I think he was hired to do. Instill a disciplined, defense oriented system.

 

[Ducks DVM]

To be clear, I’m not a fan of a lot of things Cronin is doing. Favoring vets over young players in a rebuild, doing nothing to address the sorry PP, playing Johnston. But the reduction in shots against and penalties taken are positives. When Ducks play well and the explanation is always “the goaltending,” the critics lose me. I hope Cronin isn’t the coach moving forward because his style doesn’t fit our young talent, but he is doing what I think he was hired to do. Instill a disciplined, defense oriented system.

It isn’t always the case, but it absolutely was a huge percentage of the win yesterday. Ducks were outshot 34-26. Ducks blocked 22 shots vs the Devils 12. Devils missed 19 shots to the Ducks 11. Ducks had 19 giveaways and 1 takeaway, Devils 7 and 6. The better team did not win, the Ducks were badly outplayed by a team the coach said played their two worst periods of the season. Without Dostal making some very unexpected saves, that could easily have been a 6-3 game.

Yes, the Ducks are playing better. No, you don’t get to be the fresh team against the road team on a back to back in the playoffs, so saying that doesn’t matter and the Ducks are playing like a playoff team is also not taking reality into account.

We are getting scoring right now from notoriously streaky players. It’s fantastic when they score, and it’s not historically sustainable for them, so I’m not going to expect that it remains a thing.

Pointing these things out is not “making things up”. It also doesn’t mean that the team hasn’t improved from “laughingstock” to “below average”, which is still a good thing. Rah rah is fun, but perspective doesn’t mean “hater”.

 

[Deuce22]

It isn’t always the case, but it absolutely was a huge percentage of the win yesterday. Ducks were outshot 34-26. Ducks blocked 22 shots vs the Devils 12. Devils missed 19 shots to the Ducks 11. Ducks had 19 giveaways and 1 takeaway, Devils 7 and 6. The better team did not win, the Ducks were badly outplayed by a team the coach said played their two worst periods of the season. Without Dostal making some very unexpected saves, that could easily have been a 6-3 game.

Yes, the Ducks are playing better. No, you don’t get to be the fresh team against the road team on a back to back in the playoffs, so saying that doesn’t matter and the Ducks are playing like a playoff team is also not taking reality into account.

We are getting scoring right now from notoriously streaky players. It’s fantastic when they score, and it’s not historically sustainable for them, so I’m not going to expect that it remains a thing.

Pointing these things out is not “making things up”. It also doesn’t mean that the team hasn’t improved from “laughingstock” to “below average”, which is still a good thing. Rah rah is fun, but perspective doesn’t mean “hater”.

I wasn’t addressing “perspective,” I was addressing those who want Cronin gone and can’t acknowledge any improvement in the Ducks’ play.

 

[Ducks DVM]

I wasn’t addressing “perspective,” I was addressing those who want Cronin gone and can’t acknowledge any improvement in the Ducks’ play.

Fair enough.

The defense has absolutely tightened up, but I think he’s crap at game management when the other team makes adjustments, and I think it takes him 3-4 weeks to make adjustments that are obvious to everyone else.

On a personal note, sitting through his games is like watching paint dry when the team plays the dump and chase style he prefers.

 

[Deuce22]

Fair enough.

The defense has absolutely tightened up, but I think he’s crap at game management when the other team makes adjustments, and I think it takes him 3-4 weeks to make adjustments that are obvious to everyone else.
On a personal note, sitting through his games is like watching paint dry when the team plays the dump and chase style he prefers.

Completely agree. But Verbeek didn’t hire a guy like Cronin to make the Ducks more fun to watch.