Do we have a developmental problem? A futile look.

[CommaSynapse]

In all the years I've been here, I'm pretty sure this is maybe the second thread I've ever made. Slow days at work this week, and I have some burning questions.

In a lot of threads, either here on HFNYR, on Twitter, or on the main boards, I've seen a lot of mentions of the Rangers appearing to have a developmental issue with our First Round forward prospects over the last 4 years. We draft supposedly high-value players, and they have thus far struggled to pan out. To my recollection, we haven’t really had a forward step in to the NHL and immediately contribute at a significant level since Derek Stepan. So what's going on?

I wanted to look at statistics to try to notice any obvious issues. We’ll jump to the stats in a minute, but I’ll put out the main hypotheses that I wanted to consider based on these conversations.

• The Rangers are ruining their players. Or, in less reactionary terms, they are deploying their first round forwards incorrectly.

Even when the rebuild was announced, I doubted it was going to see a real, from-the-ground-up rebuild. We don’t need to go about it that way. Players want to play here, and we have an owner who is not gun-shy with his wallet nor shy about seeking out star power either by signing or trade.

That said, with a roster including Panarin, Kreider, Zibanejad, the pleasant surprise that ended up being Ryan Strome, and an at-the-time emerging Pavel Buchnevich, we did not have the “luxury” of, say, Ottawa, where Tim Stutzle entered the lineup into top-6 minutes, playing 15:44 per night last year and 17:44 thus far this year with generally-offensive deployment. In the two years, he has had 242 power play minutes.

In his 82-game career, Stutzle has accumulated 16 of his 44 points on the power play. Take those away, and you have numbers more in line with Kakko and Lafreniere who are getting inconsistent PP minutes at best.
We’ll compare Laf to the other FRFs from the 2020 draft that have successfully made their teams. We’ll also add the second year stats for Andersson, Chytil and Kakko (also same age) for an additional look at NYR deployment for first round forwards entering their second year.

I have divided PP time by number of games so that we can get a bit of a level playing field. I also wanted to consider P/60. I left out Chytil’s points, as it was across a much larger sample size.

Name	GP	Team	EV Time	PP Time (divided based on GP)	Oz% starts	Points -PP	Even Strength P/60
Alexis Lafreniere	37	NYR	13:29	54 (1.45)	56	11	1.5
Anton Lundell	32	FLA	16:43	17.2 (0.53)	41.7	18	2.5
Dawson Mercer	37	NJD	16:20	79.8 (2.15)	60.8	17	2.0
Tim Stutzle	29	OTT	17:44	89.8 (3.1)	58	8	1.1
Lucas Raymond	38	DET	17:52	100 (2.63)	55.1	24	2.5
Trevor Zegras	33	ANA	17:13	82 (2.48)	77.4	20	2.5
Chytil (2nd yr)	75	NYR	13:47	109.9 (1.46)	55.4	N/A	1.0
Lias Andersson (2nd yr)	42	NYR	10:43	2.3 (0.05)	43.4	6	0.7
Kakko (2nd yr)	48	NYR	14:21	65 (1.35)	62.3	14	1.3

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Ice time is the most obvious difference here, and we might be able to chalk that up to the differences in power play time.

If it was just one or two of our players, you could argue being a matter of individual development and not being ready, but across four players, two of whom were expected to very much be NHL-ready, and Lias supposedly being one of the more NHL-ready in his class, it makes me wonder.

The deployment, aside from Zegras and Lundell, is generally fairly even across the board. I expected to see less favorable starts for our players, but, aside from Lias, that was not the case.

So I wanted to try a different approach and look at common line mates.

Name	Most common line mates at EV	Percentage of EV time with Linemates	CF%
Alexis Lafreniere	Julien Gauthier - Filip Chytil	28.4	50
Anton Lundell	Sam Reinhart - Carter Verhaeghe	13.1	48.2
Dawson Mercer	Jesper Bratt - Andreas Johnsson	31.3%	55.3
Tim Stutzle	Nick Paul - Connor Brown	29.1	51.5
Lucas Raymond	Tyler Bertuzzi - Dylan Larkin	51.7	49.9
Trevor Zegras	Rickard Rakell - Sonny Milano	35.1	57.7
Chytil (2nd yr)	Kreider - Hayes	9.32	Not Available
Andersson (2nd yr)	Nieves - Strome	9.16	Not Available
Kakko (2nd yr)	Artemi Panarın - Ryan Strome	22.0	53.2

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Aside from Raymond and Kakko, none of the other players are getting significant time with their team's best players. Still, these forwards with their most consistent line mates have generally performed well, with Zegras being the most significant (positive) outlier.

Finally, I wanted to try to find a quality of competition and quality of teammates statistic to try to get a more objective measure.

Based on the data, Lafreniere is generally facing the easiest competition of the group, but he also has had the lowest quality of teammates. While this doesn't look like a significant variance, the TOI%QOC range is generally, I believe, about 24-31%). McKegg's number, for example was 27%.

So what do I take from this?

• Our last four first round forwards have tended to get less time on average, anywhere from 3-4 minutes less than other top prospects. However, PP time was also less than average, and that can add up to the difference.
• Lundell is especially impressive.
• Our first round forwards have had roughly similar oz% starts to the average, though Lundell and Zegras are outliers.

Click to read more...

 

[egelband]

The rangers didn’t really commit to a rebuild. They kept trying to win while rotating our old players for new.
I heard a quote from the basketball coach John Thompson who once said something to the effect of, ‘developing is losing’. Meaning you’ve got to really commit to playing inexperienced players, giving them the experience, and losing a lot in the process. We don’t do that.
My hope - and I think it stands to reason - is that player development in the rangers case is slower but not totally hopeless.

 

[bbny]

The biggest things I take away from stuff like this is how many hoops need to be jumped through to try and paint Lafreniere and Kakko as something other than disappointments relative to their draft position and pedigree. They get a few minutes less ice time and not as many looks on the PP, yes, but for me it's not all about production. They simply don't stick out enough on a consistent basis, and they are invisible too often. They can still turn into very good players as they are young, but they have seen their value decline tremendously since draft day.

 

[egelband]

I still think it’s a matter of when, not if, with Kakko, Lafreniere, Miller, Lundkvist, Schneider, Jones, even Georgiev. Less confident in Chytil and Gauthier and Hajek. Andersson was a bust but begat Cuylle, at least. Kravtsov is a question mark. Too early to tell with the others but there’s a good deal of promise overall. I’m not discouraged.

 

[Row I Goon]

The fact that threads like this exist tells one a LOT about just how some of our top picks are “progressing”……

 

[17futurecap]

Kakko had 3 shots on goal over the 4 game west coast trip, he's basically unwatchable at this point.

When he was on the ice with the net empty vs the Kings he was firing the puck away as soon as he got it on his stick, his confidence just seems shot.

There have been points this season he has looked confident, playing with Strome and Bread, but it's few far and between.

5 goals this season, 2 against Arizona, and then 1 each vs Buffalo, Montreal and the Devils.

It is also good to remember he is just turning 21 in February, but it really would be nice to see him have a big 2nd half.

 

[Bacon Artemi Bravo]

I think with patience this will all change. Not saying every single one will hit their potential, but majority will. It’s an odd scenario, as you point out, where top picks from a couple of drafts go to team where they are buried in the lineup. Usually lottery teams are ready to accept those players into a top 6 role immediately. It sucks waiting for these guys to hit, and I know it causes a lot of anxiety on the fans. Just have to continue to be patient. There are some star forwards who came up in the Rangers system, Kreider, Miller, Stepan to name a few.

 

[Shesterkybomb]

We rush our players but they still develop in the end, it's just more obvious when they struggle to score when they are in the nhl instead of the minors. Stepan, Kreider, Callahan, Staal, Dubinsky, Callahan, Anisimov, Fast, Hagelin, etc etc are aĺl players that developed here, i would argue that some of those guys may have turned into better players they weren't expected to be. If i was to point out a problem here its the fans patience to see something through. Its pretty obvious to me that this team isn't quite ready and won't be until Kakko, Lafreniere, Miller, Schneider, Robertson/Jones are all finished products. Playoffs and a possible first round win is and should be the expectation this year, and then start moving from there next season.

 

[CommaSynapse]

The rangers didn’t really commit to a rebuild. They kept trying to win while rotating our old players for new.
I heard a quote from the basketball coach John Thompson who once said something to the effect of, ‘developing is losing’. Meaning you’ve got to really commit to playing inexperienced players, giving them the experience, and losing a lot in the process. We don’t do that.
My hope - and I think it stands to reason - is that player development in the rangers case is slower but not totally hopeless.

I agree. Our "rebuild" was really more of a retool than anything. And I do think it's good that we're in a team/system where there is a next man up mentality. Against LA, we saw that with Greco and Brodzinski stepping in and adding.

As I mentioned, the hypothesis doesn't pan out, but I really wanted to take a look at what we could parse from some of the data and see if there's anything objective we could see as an issue. With this data, I didn't see much other than PP time, but the thing that's not in the stats is that we are not needing our players to be "the guy" for the team, and that can be a real shift in mindset for a player who spent their younger years in that position.

And I think the second component is that our first rounders are generally entering into the middle-6 of the lineup where they may be asked to play more of a two-way game, and the level of having done this varies from one to the other. My hope is that we're rounding out their game first and the points will follow, but I do wonder if this method may be shaking their confidence.

This is mostly anecdotal, so I am curious if the stats nerds among us may be able to look at some other datasets that I'm not as knowledgeable about. What I gather is that we are deploying our players differently, but not necessarily incorrectly. The larger sample size will ultimately see how it pans out, though.

 

[CommaSynapse]

Thanks for the replies, everyone. Enjoying this conversation as I'm practicing and getting to know Tableau.

The biggest things I take away from stuff like this is how many hoops need to be jumped through to try and paint Lafreniere and Kakko as something other than disappointments relative to their draft position and pedigree. They get a few minutes less ice time and not as many looks on the PP, yes, but for me it's not all about production. They simply don't stick out enough on a consistent basis, and they are invisible too often. They can still turn into very good players as they are young, but they have seen their value decline tremendously since draft day.

I absolutely agree. The conclusion I came to going through this is that ice time and deployment is not really the issue. Our players don't have the PP time, sure, but at even strength, with similar line mates, their production is still significantly lower than their fellow touted prospect peers at the same ages.

However, since we did have 4 first round players, 3 of whom were expected to be NHL-ready, it does make me wonder if there is something more than just bad luck at play, and this is where I think the mentality of the player may come into things, where the player is entering more of a support role than a top role.

I still think it’s a matter of when, not if, with Kakko, Lafreniere, Miller, Lundkvist, Schneider, Jones, even Georgiev. Less confident in Chytil and Gauthier and Hajek. Andersson was a bust but begat Cuylle, at least. Kravtsov is a question mark. Too early to tell with the others but there’s a good deal of promise overall. I’m not discouraged.

I agree. It's a very small sample size and definitely not indicative of an overall career. I'm no scientist by any means, but I'll still publish my failed experiment just so we can talk about some of it. It's nerdy, for sure, but I find it interesting to apply numbers to a game that is comprised of roughly 12 individual human being on the ice at any given time.

I wanted to try to look at something objective to see if there is something specific that might be different with how we are using our players compared to others, but I don't think it's objective deployment. I do wonder if it is more from top-players entering the middle-6 of a team that is more or less retooling and then expected to play a support role.

The fact that threads like this exist tells one a LOT about just how some of our top picks are “progressing”……

The P/60 is the most level indicator, though there are still some positive prospects here. They are behind their peers, but it is still a very small sample size in the early days of a career. Not too many of the 2020 picks have played yet, but this was more out of curiosity than anything. With their line mates, the players are at least not awful in terms of generating chances, but they're still not "standing out" in the way we would hope for players of their pedigree.

The data doesn't show it (or at least I'm not familiar enough with it to find it), but we're in a very different position than most of the other teams, maybe with the exception of Lundell, and he is doing well in tough spots. But he was also expected to have a good two-way game, so his role is playing to his strengths, too.

Kakko had 3 shots on goal over the 4 game west coast trip, he's basically unwatchable at this point.

When he was on the ice with the net empty vs the Kings he was firing the puck away as soon as he got it on his stick, his confidence just seems shot.

There have been points this season he has looked confident, playing with Strome and Bread, but it's few far and between.

5 goals this season, 2 against Arizona, and then 1 each vs Buffalo, Montreal and the Devils.

It is also good to remember he is just turning 21 in February, but it really would be nice to see him have a big 2nd half.

I'm not soured on them by any means. I'm very optimistic about our players, but I definitely want to see the flashes become consistencies.

The reason I compared all the players in their second year (and at the same age) from the 2020 draft is because I wanted to try to not worry so much about age being the factor. But I'm not a stats expert. This was just a way for me to have a bit of fun in learning tableau and looking at data for my job.

Our prospects are producing less, and I think they are entering the lineup into different roles than they may have played before. The data doesn't show it as much, at least not here. Comparing the pNHL scores, our prospects saw a significant decrease entering the NHL whereas many of the comparable players here stayed relatively level.

However, as we mentioned, we're in a different position than many of these teams. We're looking to compete, and so our prospects are getting more middle-6 roles. Lundell would maybe the closest comparable in terms of team position, and he's doing quite well given his deployment, but he was expected to have a good two-way game to begin with.

I think with patience this will all change. Not saying every single one will hit their potential, but majority will. It’s an odd scenario, as you point out, where top picks from a couple of drafts go to team where they are buried in the lineup. Usually lottery teams are ready to accept those players into a top 6 role immediately. It sucks waiting for these guys to hit, and I know it causes a lot of anxiety on the fans. Just have to continue to be patient. There are some star forwards who came up in the Rangers system, Kreider, Miller, Stepan to name a few.

I'm with you. The data set is small, and we're in a unique position. We're not failing forward in development as so many teams do. We're "in media res" and asking them to learn on the job. The numbers do look okay as far as things like corsi goes, so I'm hopeful the play and points will follow.

I'm not anxious about it, personally. I'm working on developing skills with Tableau for my job, so this was just a way to practice and get to know the program better while having a bit of fun and getting to talk hockey.

Kreider and Miller both went up and down with Hartford and struggled with gaining Torts' confidence. But Zuccs did, too. Pavel also had those question marks. I remember a ton of conversations about all of them struggling early on in their careers. They all eventually panned out, for sure.

I think Stepan was the last forward we had in a while who entered the lineup and produced straight away.

We rush our players but they still develop in the end, it's just more obvious when they struggle to score when they are in the nhl instead of the minors. Stepan, Kreider, Callahan, Staal, Dubinsky, Callahan, Anisimov, Fast, Hagelin, etc etc are aĺl players that developed here, i would argue that some of those guys may have turned into better players they weren't expected to be. If i was to point out a problem here its the fans patience to see something through. Its pretty obvious to me that this team isn't quite ready and won't be until Kakko, Lafreniere, Miller, Schneider, Robertson/Jones are all finished products. Playoffs and a possible first round win is and should be the expectation this year, and then start moving from there next season.

Definitely. The players need experience, both individually and as a team. I do think the fact that we have guys from Hartford coming up and stepping in relatively seamlessly is a good indicators of a cohesive strategy throughout the organization, at least.

In a market like New York, the fans tend to be awfully impatient. The eye test shows that these players are facing some difficulties, but I find the flashes very promising and am optimistic they'll still work it out.

I think one difference is that Stepan, Cally, Dubi, Fast, Hagelin, etc. all ended up with more of a well-rounded game. Kreider and Anisimov maybe a bit less so, but they all broke in to middle-6 roles like our guys now are doing. But at least as far as most of those guys go, they didn't have the first-round pedigree. Of the group you mentioned, only Kreider did.

 

[Tob]

You have to really hand the reigns over to the young players and embrace losing. It's the psychology and mentality of the entire franchise that is destroying our development at F. We can develop D real well and G. But in NY, you need to have the Panarins, Zibanejads, Kreiders, hell, even the Stromes being the ticket sellers and headliners. It starts from the top down. Dolan was never okay with rock bottom for several years while the Islanders are going to ECFs. If you don't get out of the way of the kids, they'll never be able to develop into big time players unless they're just that good. It's no joke when we say "If you put Zegras in our lineup, he'd be a 30 point player." The team revolves around Panarin and Zibanejad. f***ing Zibanejad couldn't even move Panarin off of his spot on the PP. Mika gets his PP spot back due to Panarin's COVID/injury and BAM! He's a 40 goal scorer on a hot streak again. If Mika can be felled by the stars and business ahead of the best on ice product mentality, then what chance does Kakko and Lafreniere have?

 

[Bacon Artemi Bravo]

You have to really hand the reigns over to the young players and embrace losing. It's the psychology and mentality of the entire franchise that is destroying our development at F. We can develop D real well and G. But in NY, you need to have the Panarins, Zibanejads, Kreiders, hell, even the Stromes being the ticket sellers and headliners. It starts from the top down. Dolan was never okay with rock bottom for several years while the Islanders are going to ECFs. If you don't get out of the way of the kids, they'll never be able to develop into big time players unless they're just that good. It's no joke when we say "If you put Zegras in our lineup, he'd be a 30 point player." The team revolves around Panarin and Zibanejad. f***ing Zibanejad couldn't even move Panarin off of his spot on the PP. Mika gets his PP spot back due to Panarin's COVID/injury and BAM! He's a 40 goal scorer on a hot streak again. If Mika can be felled by the stars and business ahead of the best on ice product mentality, then what chance does Kakko and Lafreniere have?

Yep, this is so true. It is insane how much better Zibby is when Panarin is out of the lineup. Like, stunning, noticeable difference.

 

[Peltz]

Look at how long it took Kreider to put it all together. Look at Zibanejad.

I think any worry of our 20 year old players is premature to be honest. Not everyone bursts onto the scene with game breaking impact like Fox or Shesterkin. The team isn't lean like most others who get 1st and 2nd overall picks who will lose with those picks for the first few years. So yea, PP opportunity for these kids is scarce right now.

Would you rather win like this or lose like Buffalo with a elite star they had like Eichel?

Furthermore, the team doesn't need these players to be the absolute best in the league to win in the playoffs. We just need them to be good forwards that turn into great ones. The team has other offensively gifted stars locked up for a few years to win.

With kids this age, it's going to be 2 steps forward, one step back for a while. Kakko looked like a beast earlier in the season then cooled off. It happens to kids.

You have to really hand the reigns over to the young players and embrace losing. It's the psychology and mentality of the entire franchise that is destroying our development at F. We can develop D real well and G. But in NY, you need to have the Panarins, Zibanejads, Kreiders, hell, even the Stromes being the ticket sellers and headliners. It starts from the top down. Dolan was never okay with rock bottom for several years while the Islanders are going to ECFs. If you don't get out of the way of the kids, they'll never be able to develop into big time players unless they're just that good. It's no joke when we say "If you put Zegras in our lineup, he'd be a 30 point player." The team revolves around Panarin and Zibanejad. f***ing Zibanejad couldn't even move Panarin off of his spot on the PP. Mika gets his PP spot back due to Panarin's COVID/injury and BAM! He's a 40 goal scorer on a hot streak again. If Mika can be felled by the stars and business ahead of the best on ice product mentality, then what chance does Kakko and Lafreniere have?

Yep, this is so true. It is insane how much better Zibby is when Panarin is out of the lineup. Like, stunning, noticeable difference.

Agreed. It's actually a good problem to have. This is how you build depth and find multiple ways to win. It would be nice if the Rangers blew out every team with elite play of all our forwards, but I really have no complaints right now with how this team is finding ways on a consistent basis to pull out victories in tough games.

They're character building wins. I'll take that every time. Some nights, Panarin will destroy you. Sometimes it's Kreider. Occasionally, it's our third line that dominates and is difficult to handle.

It's not all of them all at once, sure. But that's okay. Having that depth makes us hard to match up against.

My only worry about this team is the lack of more even strength goals. We are far too reliant on using our depth to generate power play opportunities rather than 5v5 goals. That's fine for now. But could murder us come playoff time when penalties are less often called. It's nice to have such a lethal power play after all these years of not having one. But the rangers are only at .500 when they don't score a PP goal in a game. I'd like to see a bit higher of a record there for the tight slog that is coming their way.

 

[Peltz]

I'm not anxious about it, personally. I'm working on developing skills with Tableau for my job, so this was just a way to practice and get to know the program better while having a bit of fun and getting to talk hockey.

Where do you get usually get data for this? I actually am very well versed in tableau and powerBI for work and would love to start making analytics for hockey.

 

[CommaSynapse]

You have to really hand the reigns over to the young players and embrace losing. It's the psychology and mentality of the entire franchise that is destroying our development at F. We can develop D real well and G. But in NY, you need to have the Panarins, Zibanejads, Kreiders, hell, even the Stromes being the ticket sellers and headliners. It starts from the top down. Dolan was never okay with rock bottom for several years while the Islanders are going to ECFs. If you don't get out of the way of the kids, they'll never be able to develop into big time players unless they're just that good. It's no joke when we say "If you put Zegras in our lineup, he'd be a 30 point player." The team revolves around Panarin and Zibanejad. f***ing Zibanejad couldn't even move Panarin off of his spot on the PP. Mika gets his PP spot back due to Panarin's COVID/injury and BAM! He's a 40 goal scorer on a hot streak again. If Mika can be felled by the stars and business ahead of the best on ice product mentality, then what chance does Kakko and Lafreniere have?

Definitely. With our situation, these players aren't given the same leash because the Rangers organization (and media/fans) expects results. Players are quickly held accountable for missteps.

Star power is much more available at forward than it is at defense or in goal, so the log jams are less likely. With defense, even your 3rd pairing guys are likely getting more minutes in different situations.

However, even for these other players with similar quality of line mates, they are still producing at a higher even strength P/60 clip, so is there a point at which we do want to look at things a bit differently for our prospects?

Is PP time a difference between confidence and doubt?

 

[CommaSynapse]

Where do you get usually get data for this? I actually am very well versed in tableau and powerBI for work and would love to start making analytics for hockey.

A lot of the data I was looking at is available on hockey-reference.com, and I organized it to the charts you see above.

I'm not the best person to answer. I'm honestly brand new to this, so I'm looking to organize and put stuff in manually, working to standardize data, etc. My job just started using Tableau for education management, and the people the directors have leading the team are older and have no background in mathematics or data, so I think we're missing a lot in the numbers they're showing and how they are presenting the data. I'm no expert by any means, but I can see we're missing an opportunity, so I've really wanted to dive in to see what Tableau can do and what we can gather from it.

I imagine there is a MUCH easier way to automatically scrape data from Hockey Reference than what I did for this post.

@TomasHertlsRooster has a lot of awesome stuff over at https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/topdownhockey and may be able to answer your questions.

 

[Tob]

Definitely. With our situation, these players aren't given the same leash because the Rangers organization (and media/fans) expects results. Players are quickly held accountable for missteps.

Star power is much more available at forward than it is at defense or in goal, so the log jams are less likely. With defense, even your 3rd pairing guys are likely getting more minutes in different situations.

However, even for these other players with similar quality of line mates, they are still producing at a higher even strength P/60 clip, so is there a point at which we do want to look at things a bit differently for our prospects?

Is PP time a difference between confidence and doubt?

I am a subscriber to the day-by-day getting better notion that Schneider is also a believer in. Confidence and being excited and happy every game and every day at 18, 19, and 20 years old IS development. All of our F prospects have been clinically depressed at various points.

 

[HockeyBasedNYC]

Kreiderman made a solid point that a majority of the ranger rookie forwards in the past that have met their potential or overachieved when reaching the big club were “developed”, at least partially (at a young age of 18-22) at the college ranks or elsewhere.

I think that combined with the state of the world and the economics of it (ticket sales), the AHL not being a realistic option at times, the rebuild forcing the youth up to big club, and lofty expectations have forced them to play up, when maybe the best way to start off was with the Pack.

But the Rangers brass is not innocent here either. I can’t speak to what goes on behind the scenes but it’s obvious they haven’t been the best at developing young offensive talent. The results speak for themselves

 

[ETTER DE]

Maybe the pressure of playing in New York is harder for the young players we expect to be stars? And if that is the case, would it have been better to just rely on them and let them carry the load of the rebuild on their shoulders? Absolutely not. Maybe drafting in the top six is overated? Of the 72 players that have been drafted in the top six since 2010, only two have won a Stanley Cup I believe. Seguin and Connolly. And none were at the time the biggest stars of their teams.

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

Yes we do.

Its a combo of lack of patience, spending big money on vets which takes ice time and opportunities away from younger players and also entrusting a big chunk of the rebuild process to a moron like David Quinn.

We have arguably the worst player development in the league.

 

[jay from jersey]

Yep, this is so true. It is insane how much better Zibby is when Panarin is out of the lineup. Like, stunning, noticeable difference.

This is a big reason why I want strome gone at the end of the season. He’s a band aid that’s kind of preventing progress.
Zibby and Panarin are signed. We have to live with that now. Fine.
Put them together on one line and let the 2nd line be driven by LaF/Kakko/And whoever they trade for.
Give them the top 6 minutes warts and all.
And for god sakes get 1 of them on the 1 PP.
It might be a 1 step back to go 2 steps fwd type situation.
But if you have a good 1st line, and an experienced/ good 3rd/4th line it’s not like the team will be a bottom feeder.
Not with shesty and our Blue line.

quinn kind of half assed it. He stuck them with chytil ( who isn’t a playmaker/not great ice vision) but he gave them minimal minutes and cut out their legs when they made a mistake.

maybe start next season with a year more mature LaF/kakko with this type of line up.
Panarin-Zibby-Kreider
LaF-Trade-Kakko
Goodrow-Barron-Blais
Hunt-Rooney/UFA vet-Reaves
Ex Gettinger/someone who can give you an honest 4th line shift ( someone that can spell Reaves who’ll be 35)
Lindgren-Fox
Miller-Trouba
Jones-Schneider
Vet/Nemeth

Shesty
Halak/Greiss

a guy like chandler Stephenson would be great in that 2C role imo

 

[HFsNumber1Heel]

Yes we do.

Its a combo of lack of patience, spending big money on vets which takes ice time and opportunities away from younger players and also entrusting a big chunk of the rebuild process to a moron like David Quinn.

We have arguably the worst player development in the league.

At top six, not overall

 

[Peltz]

This is a big reason why I want strome gone at the end of the season. He’s a band aid that’s kind of preventing progress.
Zibby and Panarin are signed. We have to live with that now. Fine.
Put them together on one line and let the 2nd line be driven by LaF/Kakko/And whoever they trade for.
Give them the top 6 minutes warts and all.
And for god sakes get 1 of them on the 1 PP.
It might be a 1 step back to go 2 steps fwd type situation.
But if you have a good 1st line, and an experienced/ good 3rd/4th line it’s not like the team will be a bottom feeder.
Not with shesty and our Blue line.

quinn kind of half assed it. He stuck them with chytil ( who isn’t a playmaker/not great ice vision) but he gave them minimal minutes and cut out their legs when they made a mistake.

maybe start next season with a year more mature LaF/kakko with this type of line up.
Panarin-Zibby-Kreider
LaF-Trade-Kakko
Goodrow-Barron-Blais
Hunt-Rooney/UFA vet-Reaves
Ex Gettinger/someone who can give you an honest 4th line shift ( someone that can spell Reaves who’ll be 35)
Lindgren-Fox
Miller-Trouba
Jones-Schneider
Vet/Nemeth

Shesty
Halak/Greiss

a guy like chandler Stephenson would be great in that 2C role imo

I mean... this is exactly why we traded Buch too.

Strome is in a similar situation Buch was in, but the difference is that we are very light at center and we had more options at wing to replace Buch.

 

[HFsNumber1Heel]

This core started younger than the last one did. All are 18-20 while those guys were 20-22. That's a huge difference.

This fanbase also needs to "develop" a little more patience. You can't kill Miller for two turnovers or be upset that Lundkvist (who I believe is going to be one of the dealt DMen) isn't a PP stud. Rebuilds used to take around five years in the pre-internet pre-what have you done for me lately? days.

But I will ask again; root cause. What is it and how do you fix the issue? Well I'm going to offer actual ideas and not just complain. Skating and lower core are essential for both Kaako and Laf. There is plenty of time, but to unlock the full potential. It's why last game Greco or out of nowhere if Berrard were to show up and play tonight (obviously that's not happening), they're more impactful because better skaters.

Laf's and Chytil could both stand to improve their passing. The best way to do that is repetitions first while not skating, and then incorporate it while they are skating.

Another video coach should be hired to break down tape or occurrences and go over them first off the ice and then on the ice.

Finally, poach someone from Tampa, LA, STL and add them to the development program here.

 

[HFsNumber1Heel]

Can we all just agree the Quinn was a bad NHL coach and while we all generally liked Gorton, there was a lot of stuff going on in the organization under his tenure that needed fixing which were never addressed and probably the real reason Dolan was pissed.