Around the League - Pre-Season 2024-2025

[LiseL]

The problem with Ottawa is their coach.

He doesn't trust his players to transport the puck up the ice effrctively. So they rely heavily on the stretch pass for zone exits and dump ins for entries. It's almost like he wants to eliminate the neutral zone.

If the Leafs play "keep away" the Senators are playing "hot potato".

I had high hopes for Ottawa until they hired Green. The only reason he got the job is because the NHL thinks retired players make good coaches. If you played the game you’re apparently smart enough to be gifted a role behind the bemch.

The whole league is a closed inbred society.

Ottawa regurgitating Green as one of the best thirty two coaches in the world tells us that. He has no record of success at the NHL level. There's hundreds of professional leagues with thousands of coaches all over the world.

For a team looking to turn it around they should have tried anything but proven badness.

As a Sens fan, I was discouraged when I read your post about Green because that sounds a lot like DJ Smith coaching which we endured for 5 years: forwards cheating for offence, dump the puck in but rarely win the puck battles, stretch passes that almost always resulted in turnovers, one and done shots on net, etc. Then when the forwards did try to help out in the D zone, it was clear they didn't know what to do as it was mostly puck watching. At some point, I had to start laughing at their play otherwise I'd cry. I'd rather they play some form of the trap in the neutral zone and wait for their opportunities than go back to that style of play.

When Jacques Martin replaced DJ last year, he started teaching them how to play away from the puck, play as a 5 man unit, play more north/south. There were a lot of bad habits to break but we did start seeing some improvement. Now, during pre-season, I'm getting deja vue. Why would Staois hire a coach with the same structure as DJ and not someone like Jacques Martin?

Here's hoping that this is just them getting used to the new system and new faces in the line-up, otherwise, it's going to be a very long season (again).
.

 

[Menzinger]

Swayman sounds like he was a little naive.
All for one, one for all ...
He probably thought it was a negotiation.

Team held the hammer, and he was the nail.

Arbitration always is a double edged sword. The team did what they had to do keep that number low. And it's came back and burned them in the next deal.