Proposal: Fire DJ Smith

[ReginKarlssonLehner]

We win, we love him. We lose, we fire him.....

Speak for yourself.

I gave him 20 games at the beginning of the year. He failed. Should have been gone then.

 

[BankStreetParade]

At this point, it's a pity firing waiting to happen. I honestly feel bad for this guy, he slogged through years of increasingly awful rosters to only get 6 games with a lineup that actually had decent talent and potential.

 

[Tuna99]

At this point, it's a pity firing waiting to happen. I honestly feel bad for this guy, he slogged through years of increasingly awful rosters to only get 6 games with a lineup that actually had decent talent and potential.

When they lost their first game to Buffalo it set the tone for the season - DJs team isn’t ready to play, doesn’t have any consistency to their game and the coach doesn’t have a structure to make a team with limited talent better.

 

[OD99]

We win, we love him. We lose, we fire him.....

What gave you the impression people love him (besides a few) after wins?

The team has short runs of success but they follow it up with awful outings.

To me the team is trending the wrong way now and has been for a few weeks. The effort is not there and they look disjointed most of the time. I daresay he is in the dangerous area of losing the room.

 

[NHLInjuryViz]

Right. So I was responding to a post about the Leafs having lost all four top 4. What you've posted is numbers that lack context. For starts you've got 7 guys listed. With those 7 guys, who are the top 4. It's certainly not Been and Mete who'd both likely not be dressed if the Leafs were healthy. And imo it's likely not Muzzin if they were healthy. Have you seen Muzzin play the past two years? Their top 4 at this point is some combo of Gio, Brodie, Rielly, Sandin and Liljegren. It certainly isn't Muzzin. Those injuries add to 45. Amongst 5 guys.

Quite happy to add some context.

I'd disagree with the premise that any injury outside the top 4 is automatically worthless (same for any injury to a player promoted to play in the top 4 when a top 4 goes down). Especially if you're then going to argue in favour of placing weight on a player now in the AHL being hurt but not out injured (or to not extend the same argument to Muzzin's declining performance being impacted by playing hurt, for example).

Anyway, those bottom pairing players will naturally be more likely to have lower cap hit, lower ATOI, lower WAR. Weighting the total D absences by any of those and there is still a gap between the Leafs and Senators.

If you want to limit it to the games missed by Rielly, Brodie, Sandin and Liljegren against those by Chabot, Zub, Zaitsev and Bernard-Docker:

Total MGL: TOR 45 vs 50 OTT
$-weighted (AAV/82 x games missed): TOR $2.5m vs $1.8m OTT
TOI-weighted (ATOI x games missed): TOR 930 vs 992 OTT
WAR-weighted (3+ year weighted WAR per 60 x ATOI x games missed): TOR 1.13 vs 0.55 OTT

Won't disagree with an argument that equivalent "value" absences might hurt the Senators more if their actual replacements are weaker than those of the Leafs, but tough to objectively quantify that without trying to measure the value/performance of every replacement player (theoretically possible but beyond the amount of work I'm prepared to put in) and could argue that's a failing of organisation depth or teams being on a different development cycle as much as anything.

 

[HSF]

We win, we love him. We lose, we fire him.....

Lmao who loves him except like 2 people on these boards

 

[JD1]

Quite happy to add some context.

I'd disagree with the premise that any injury outside the top 4 is automatically worthless (same for any injury to a player promoted to play in the top 4 when a top 4 goes down). Especially if you're then going to argue in favour of placing weight on a player now in the AHL being hurt but not out injured (or to not extend the same argument to Muzzin's declining performance being impacted by playing hurt, for example).

Anyway, those bottom pairing players will naturally be more likely to have lower cap hit, lower ATOI, lower WAR. Weighting the total D absences by any of those and there is still a gap between the Leafs and Senators.

If you want to limit it to the games missed by Rielly, Brodie, Sandin and Liljegren against those by Chabot, Zub, Zaitsev and Bernard-Docker:

Total MGL: TOR 45 vs 50 OTT
$-weighted (AAV/82 x games missed): TOR $2.5m vs $1.8m OTT
TOI-weighted (ATOI x games missed): TOR 930 vs 992 OTT
WAR-weighted (3+ year weighted WAR per 60 x ATOI x games missed): TOR 1.13 vs 0.55 OTT

Won't disagree with an argument that equivalent "value" absences might hurt the Senators more if their actual replacements are weaker than those of the Leafs, but tough to objectively quantify that without trying to measure the value/performance of every replacement player (theoretically possible but beyond the amount of work I'm prepared to put in) and could argue that's a failing of organisation depth or teams being on a different development cycle as much as anything.

So I didn't say an injury outside the top 4 is useless

I responded to a post about Toronto having a worse injury situation and being without 4 top 4 D. I think we've both established that's not really true.

I think what we've also established here is Toronto's high number of man games lost has been racked up by less significant players and that Toronto has more organizational depth.

 

[BoardsofCanada]

I do like DJ and have defended him this season. But after last night's game in Denver, I am losing faith.

It's strange because last season, with less talent, DJ had them playing hard. They were winning games by out working better teams. No one enjoyed playing the Sens in the second half last year.

This season, with more talent, they look pedestrian and easy to handle.

That said, I still like DJ and blame the inconsistent goaltending and blueline. You can put Scotty Bowman behind our bench and they would still be a 500 team. No team is going to succeed without steady goaltending and defense.

 

[HSF]

I do like DJ and have defended him this season. But after last night's game in Denver, I am losing faith.

It's strange because last season, with less talent, DJ had them playing hard. They were winning games by out working better teams. No one enjoyed playing the Sens in the second half last year.

This season, with more talent, they look pedestrian and easy to handle.

That said, I still like DJ and blame the inconsistent goaltending and blueline. You can put Scotty Bowman behind our bench and they would still be a 500 team. No team is going to succeed without steady goaltending and defense.

difference between working hard and working smart as a unit

no structure and not making players accountable.

they don' t even know how to unlock to the true potential of DBC

this defense should not be as bad as it has shown and these young forwards have no idea how to play defense and have not been given support on how to do it

 

[Pierre from Orleans]

The type of coaching you'd expect when you shop at a buck or two.

 

[Mark Stones Spleen]

We win, we love him. We lose, we fire him.....

There are like two people that love him here and they're probably related to him. Their motto is "we win because of DJ, we lose because of the players".

Everyone else wants this guy gone at this point, win or lose.

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

 

[Burrowsaurus]

Zaitsev right back with Chabot in practice.

DJ is truly just bashing his head against the wall wondering why his teams aren’t winning. I do almost feel bad for him.

 

[Ouroboros]

Sounds like the ship has been righted and DJ will have boys absolutely buzzing tomorrow.

Now you shouldn't expect too much because it's not like DJ has talent like Balcers or Tolvanen available to him, but I feel like good things are coming.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Zaitsev right back with Chabot in practice.

DJ is truly just bashing his head against the wall wondering why his teams aren’t winning. I do almost feel bad for him.

Sounds like Zub might be injured, heard nothing after he left the game., other than lower body. You must of heard he’s fine, if your posting that.

Not a Zaitsev fan, but was fine after getting called back up.

 

[Burrowsaurus]

Sounds like Zub might be injured, heard nothing after he left the game., other than lower body. You must of heard he’s fine, if your posting that.

Not a Zaitsev fan, but was fine after getting called back up.

I don’t care who is hurt…you don’t put Zaitsev on your top pairing with your struggling 8 million dollar d man

 

[SensHulk]

Lack of accountability is what will ultimately sink DJ. How many top players have been benched? Everyone can see now this is a glaring problem. No wonder the players like him…

 

[Golden_Jet]

I don’t care who is hurt…you don’t put Zaitsev on your top pairing with your struggling 8 million dollar d man

So you didn’t think he was fine when subbing in for Zub last time, when we did well in December without Zub.

Edit: didn’t think Zaitsev was ready yet.

 

[swiftwin]

Lack of accountability is what will ultimately sink DJ. How many top players have been benched? Everyone can see now this is a glaring problem. No wonder the players like him…

I've long said this is a weakness of DJ. Not his systems.

 

[xVolchenkov]

I've long said this is a weakness of DJ. Not his systems.

His systems also suck

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

I've long said this is a weakness of DJ. Not his systems.

We are still waiting for you to give us a run down of the systems DJ uses and why they are effective.

 

[JD1]

I don’t care who is hurt…you don’t put Zaitsev on your top pairing with your struggling 8 million dollar d man

Well, somebody has to carry his ass, why not Zaitsev

 

[Neil Patrick Harris]

I've generally come to terms that both Smith and Dorion will be out the door this offseason once the team is sold. Four missed seasons for Smith, six missed seasons for Dorion... I don't see a scenario where a new ownership group steps in and doesn't clean house.

 

[LevelingSolo]

Lmao who loves him except like 2 people on these boards

SensChirp does

 

[swiftwin]

We are still waiting for you to give us a run down of the systems DJ uses and why they are effective.

Already did, two pages ago. Try to keep up:

You can't really compare Boucher to DJ. Boucher was way too strict and rigid with his system. The whole left side / right side thing was a byproduct of his 1-3-1 NZ Trap which is a pretty unique and rigid system that can't be adjusted easily. After Boucher was fired, Anderson said to the media “We didn’t show the ability to change it or try something new,” and “Over time, the system gets exposed and then you have to adapt your system . . . as the years went on, we kind of got stuck in that rut and didn’t try to adapt,”. (source) When your goalie is the one complaining about your systems, you know you done f***ed up. Boucher was a one trick pony.

The vast majority of teams don't run unbalanced systems that lean more on the left vs right. What I see in our system is pretty straightforward. Our weakness is undeniably our defense. One our biggest strengths is the work rate and tenacity of our forwards on the forecheck. On breakouts, the solution to that is what we're doing right now: Instead of expecting our defensemen to come up with magical breakout plays all the time, we get our defensemen to just clear the puck (assuming there's no easy breakout play) and have a forward at the red line chip it to negate the icing. It doesn't allow for too many rush plays and odd-man rushes in our favor, but it does play right into one of our biggest strengths, which is our forecheck. Just like that, we kill two birds with one stone.

Once we have the offensive zone, we aim to keep possession by play high to low hockey. I forget who, but I believe it was Chabot who spoke specifically about how we want to play high to low in the offensive zone. That means retrieving the puck down low, then cycling it to the point, and lots of play around the net. Here's an article about this. This is what I believe that Nashville assistant means by "making scramble plays". We smother them with a ferocious forecheck, then cycle the puck and score on scramble plays by throwing puck on net. It's not structural in the sense that we play some sort of structured neutral zone trap to generate offense on the counter. To quote General Patton: “A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed at some indefinite time in the future.” Also note that the article is a few years old, and talks about how the Kings metrics were very good (they were usually 1st in the league in those days), but they failed to make the playoffs. It was out of this deficiency in those metrics (corsi) that the newer xGF/xGA metrics were born to also show the quality of shots taken. Either way, we're still 7th in xGF/60, which is pretty good. In the defensive zone, we're 17th in xGA/60 which is dead middle average. That's why I don't believe our systems are the problem.

Then if you go over to the PP, it becomes very clear how well our systems are working. We play a low 1-3-1, where most of the play is driven at the half boards by our most skilled players like Stutzle, DeBrincat and Giroux. From the half boards, we can either go for a fast bumper play or a cross-crease to the other side. Chabot at the point is just a relief valve. Which is also why I don't understand why the outcry to take Chabot off the PP. He does a very good job at keeping things simple, making simple passes, and not giving the puck away, especially since he's the only one back there. Chabot giveaways from the point on the PP are very rare. That's all you need from the pointman in this PP scheme. You don't need a booming shot or dazzling dancing at the blue line. The magic happens at the half boards, not the point.

I'm not super familiar with PK schemes, but from what I see, it looks like some sort of 2-1-1 where the two forwards are constantly circling and rotating. Either way, it appears to be working because we have the 5th best PK in the league.