So can we ever disagree with a coaching decision? Please let me know when it is acceptable, otherwise according to you every decision and gameplan is fully optimal and no criticism can ever be made.
It’s bananas to believe that NHL coaching and franchises are well-oiled machines beyond reproach, yet at the same time the NHL league office and the DOPS is filled with incompetent boobs and should never be trusted.
This is false dilemma crap. "Either everything is up for 100% debate or nothing is". Uh huh.
The very fact that you think things work that way shows what you DON'T know. Your argument is 10,000 years older than sand. Everyone's heard it by now, even if it seems new to you.
Nobody has EVER said we can "never" criticize coaching decisions. But some common sense and experience and intelligence is required to determine what's a known unknown, or unknown unknown, and what's really within the realm of possibility.
For someone who likes to fiddle with numbers and probabilities you sure seem to be having a hard time grasping the basic concept here. How likely is it that YOU sitting at home looking at publicly available data are somehow more clued than the best in the world who do this for a living every day and have tens of thousands more hours of experience interpreting ALL the data, than you? Add in their access to the game/players/unknowns that you don't have....
I'm sorry I can't quantify the probability there, but it's going to be very, very, very small.
So the upshot here is there's a lot you can criticize about coaching decisions. Line combinations, choices to deploy those combos, coaching methods...just about any DECISION is up for debate to SOME degree. But if you think a person like yourself who admits to being a horrible judge of hockey based on observation is going to consistently second guess the premiere experts on the topic simply based on that data you pore over as your hobby....fat chance.