Proposal: Fire DJ Smith

[Alf Silfversson]

TSN1200 just had a Devils reporter on. She said that she looks at the Senators as "a couple of years behind" where the Devils are today.

That was depressing to hear.

If I'm on a 6 game losing streak this is, sure as shit, bulletin board material.

Hopefully the boys come out flying.

 

[swiftwin]

What's he supposed to do with that defensive group and goaltending?

Sens are actually playing really well. The underlying numbers are good. Just can't keep the puck out of their net.

IMO, the problem is not personnel. We have players like Chabot, DeBrincat, Stutzle, Brannstrom making boneheaded stupid passes and stupidly risky plays.

At a certain point, you have to question how those players are being held accountable. The players need to fear the coach more than they fear losing when they make those kinds of plays. I'm starting to think DJ is too well liked. DJ has no problem getting the team working hard. This is undoubtedly the hardest working Sens team we've ever had.

 

[DaveMatthew]

IMO, the problem is not personnel. We have players like Chabot, DeBrincat, Stutzle, Brannstrom making boneheaded stupid passes and stupidly risky plays.

At a certain point, you have to question how those players are being held accountable. The players need to fear the coach more than they fear losing when they make those kinds of plays. I'm starting to think DJ is too well liked. DJ has no problem getting the team working hard. This is undoubtedly the hardest working Sens team we've ever had.

That's a real stretch. I guess if you started watching in 2014 that could be true.

This is a team that has talent and would be great at pond hockey. They love to score. But it's not a team that works hard at the details. The not-so-fun parts of the game, like back-checking (and I'm directing this at our top players, like Tkachuk, Stützle and Batherson). They routinely take entire periods off.

 

[swiftwin]

I think many on here were unrealistic about the state on our defense. It has been obvious in each of the past 5 off seasons that the D wasn’t good enough. We still had people setting themselves up for disappointment thinking it would improve.

It was been crystal clear that this team needs to add a top four defenseman (or more) since Marc Methot left the team.

Five years of needing to add top 4 defense and only Zub and now Sanderson have been added in that time.

NJ added Hamilton and Graves last season and Marino this season. Three top 4 D added in two years. It’s obvious why NJ has taken the next step.

Dorion has shown he can’t build a proper defensive core and he has to go.

.

A top 4 that includes Chabot, Zub and Sanderson should be enough, especially with our forward core. Hamonic is not great, but he's good enough to hold the fort until JBD/Thompson are good enough to step up, either later this season or next season. The problem during this losing streak is that Chabot is not playing like a top 4, and Zub is hurt. We went from 3 top 4 defensemen to 1 top 4 defenseman.

 

[Bileur]

That's a real stretch. I guess if you started watching in 2014 that could be true.

This is a team that has talent and would be great at pond hockey. They love to score. But it's not a team that works hard at the details. The not-so-fun parts of the game, like back-checking (and I'm directing this at our top players, like Tkachuk, Stützle and Batherson).

Even if you only go back to 2014, the 2017 playoff run team was extremely hard working.

This team is still wildly inconsistent and regularly no shows for periods. It’s not even close to the hardest working Sens team we’ve ever had.

 

[Alf Silfversson]

IMO, the problem is not personnel. We have players like Chabot, DeBrincat, Stutzle, Brannstrom making boneheaded stupid passes and stupidly risky plays.

At a certain point, you have to question how those players are being held accountable. The players need to fear the coach more than they fear losing when they make those kinds of plays. I'm starting to think DJ is too well liked. DJ has no problem getting the team working hard. This is undoubtedly the hardest working Sens team we've ever had.

Honestly I don't think the players (the good ones anyway) are held accountable. Agreed there.

I also think that our break out and neutral zone schemes are not good. Way too many stretch passes that just get tipped into the offensive zone. Things are too spread out. Our D have very little support and options on the break out. All of our LD can make nice stretch passes as well as Zub but those should not be the norm, they should be something catches the opposing checkers by surprise.

Without the puck we don't seem to attack the puck until it is deep in our zone. Zub (Brannstrom when we're pushing to tie sometimes) is really the only D that takes away space consistently from attacking forwards in the neutral zone. That is not how you play defense in 2022.

As for the hardest working team I would say that is not even close, IMO. We had a team that had Marian Hossa, Daniel Alfredsson, Zdeno Chara, Mike Fisher, Chris Neil and Chris Kelly. Those are some of the hardest working players of the last 30 years. If the current group can come close to the work ethic of that team we'll have a solid foundation to build on.

 

[sensens]

Sens are 2-6 in games they score 1st.

... and 1-7 when they give up more than 2G
... and 1-8 when they don't score 5G or more

That said, they're top-10 in GF/GP and faceoffs, around the league average in shots for/against, around the league average in PP/PK, and around the league average in goal differential. But the sum of those parts just isn't winning hockey games, and that's a hard pill to swallow when you see obvious coaching mistakes, and other teams overtly capitalizing on questionable roster decisions.

If nothing else, the rope should be very short at this point. If they have anything close to an equivalent record at the first quarter mark (i.e. 7-14-0), then I think you have to pull the trigger. That means winning more than 3 of their next 9 games, pure and simple. If they honestly can't manage that, then they need someone who can actually get win/loss results from this roster.

 

[L'Aveuglette]

I think many on here were unrealistic about the state on our defense. It has been obvious in each of the past 5 off seasons that the D wasn’t good enough. We still had people setting themselves up for disappointment thinking it would improve.

It was been crystal clear that this team needs to add a top four defenseman (or more) since Marc Methot left the team.

Five years of needing to add top 4 defense and only Zub and now Sanderson have been added in that time.

NJ added Hamilton and Graves last season and Marino this season. Three top 4 D added in two years. It’s obvious why NJ has taken the next step.

Dorion has shown he can’t build a proper defensive core and he has to go.

.

All true and I was adamant all summer long that it didn't matter how much offensive talent we added if we went in with the same defense plus Sanderson, but watching them play through 12 games it becomes clear adding a top-4 D wouldn't matter much unless they started playing a more structured brand of defense.

So imo DJ has to go first and foremost before we even think of bringing in outside help. Hopefully both of these things happen soon.

 

[Hale The Villain]

Dorion's love for DJ will end up being his downfall once we get new ownership, if his own abject failure as GM doesn't do it.

 

[sensens]

A top 4 that includes Chabot, Zub and Sanderson should be enough, especially with our forward core. Hamonic is not great, but he's good enough to hold the fort until JBD/Thompson are good enough to step up, either later this season or next season. The problem during this losing streak is that Chabot is not playing like a top 4, and Zub is hurt. We went from 3 top 4 defensemen to 1 top 4 defenseman.

The decline in Chabot's play is concerning, and may be the natural by-product of playing multiple years of irrationally high minutes. Having an injury to Zub shouldn't end their season, but it may very well have done just that because it forces DJ to revert to over-playing Zaitsev and Brannstrom instead of developing younger players like Bernard-Docker and Thomson. Honestly, did anyone look at last night's game and blame Bernard-Docker? Pretty sure it was Zaitsev & Brannstrom on the ice for that terrible last-minute goal in the 1st period... Zaitsev & Hamonic getting caught mid-change for the 2nd period goal to give up the lead, and then Chabot & Brannstrom giving up that incredibly ugly goal to offset Stutzle's 3rd period goal. And that was despite the fact that Bernard-Docker actually played more ice time than either Zaitsev or Brannstrom... as a rookie AHL call-up in his first NHL game of the season.

If Bernard-Docker can just walk in and be that much of a better top-4 option than those two, then he should be playing regular games in the NHL, not the AHL. He plays with a defence-first mindset, plays with a relatively calm demeanor, and despite whatever physical strength issues he may need to work on his results are pretty clear with a +14 in 66 AHL games, and +3 in 14 NHL games. He'll have some tough games along he way, but at least it will contribute to his development... whereas I have absolutely no idea why Zaitsev is playing NHL games at his point.

 

[Union2017]

I was listening to a Team1200 about 2 hours ago, and they did an interview with Chris Neil (it was good to hear some of the stuff he said about the team/city and his career). After that, they did a quick interview with the Devils reporter Amanda Stein. First of all, she is so eloquent and such a great reporter (Bruce, if you could be just 40% like her, that would be awesome). Second, she really talks highly about their D (and management group) and how they got Marino in and it changed everything. Makes me feel like punching somebody for not going after Marino.

 

[Micklebot]

I was listening to a Team1200 about 2 hours ago, and they did an interview with Chris Neil (it was good to hear some of the stuff he said about the team/city and his career). After that, they did a quick interview with the Devils reporter Amanda Stein. First of all, she is so eloquent and such a great reporter (Bruce, if you could be just 40% like her, that would be awesome). Second, she really talks highly about their D (and management group) and how they got Marino in and it changed everything. Makes me feel like punching somebody for not going after Marino.

The problem is we don't know that we didn't go after him. Maybe we got scared by his term, maybe we didn't like him as much as we should have or maybe Pens just prefered what NJD had to offer. Nobody but the parties involved really know.

 

[swiftwin]

The decline in Chabot's play is concerning, and may be the natural by-product of playing multiple years of irrationally high minutes. Having an injury to Zub shouldn't end their season, but it may very well have done just that because it forces DJ to revert to over-playing Zaitsev and Brannstrom instead of developing younger players like Bernard-Docker and Thomson. Honestly, did anyone look at last night's game and blame Bernard-Docker? Pretty sure it was Zaitsev & Brannstrom on the ice for that terrible last-minute goal in the 1st period... Zaitsev & Hamonic getting caught mid-change for the 2nd period goal to give up the lead, and then Chabot & Brannstrom giving up that incredibly ugly goal to offset Stutzle's 3rd period goal. And that was despite the fact that Bernard-Docker actually played more ice time than either Zaitsev or Brannstrom... as a rookie AHL call-up in his first NHL game of the season.

If Bernard-Docker can just walk in and be that much of a better top-4 option than those two, then he should be playing regular games in the NHL, not the AHL. He plays with a defence-first mindset, plays with a relatively calm demeanor, and despite whatever physical strength issues he may need to work on his results are pretty clear with a +14 in 66 AHL games, and +3 in 14 NHL games. He'll have some tough games along he way, but at least it will contribute to his development... whereas I have absolutely no idea why Zaitsev is playing NHL games at his point.

Brannstrom easily #1 for the loss yesterday. Not just the giveaway, but he was also soft in front of the net. Hamonic was not too far behind. That being said, I felt that was Hamonic's first truly bad game of the season.

So far, Hamonic has ranged from below average to average in most other games this season, which is fine when he's paired with the beast that is Sanderson.

Zaitsev really hasn't been that bad, for a 6-7 defenseman. One thing's for sure is that he wouldn't get bullied off the puck like Brannstrom and Hamonic did yesterday.

When fully healthy, we can go back to Chabot-Zub, Sanderson-Hamonic, and a rotation of Holden-Zaitsev-Brannstrom (Brannstom really needs a game in the press box right now). But I'd greatly reduce Chabot's minutes and increase Sanderson's.

Chabot's regression is 100% mental IMO, and he's crumbling under the pressure. The best way to solve that is to drop his minutes a ton (give them to Sanderson) and show him that he doesn't need to be "the guy". Take some of the load off his shoulders and make him feel supported. Right now he probably feels like he needs to do everything and needs to be perfect in order to win a game because the weight of the team, the weight of the rebuild and the weight of the first 5 years of his career are fully on his shoulders with all the minutes he's getting. DJ needs to take pressure off of him. I have no doubt Chabot can play these minutes under normal circumstances, but right now, I guarantee Chabot is putting waaaay too much pressure on himself, and DJ is just happy to keep heaping more on top of him. His handling of Chabot is easily my biggest criticism of DJ right now.

 

[DaveMatthew]

Brannstrom easily #1 for the loss yesterday. Not just the giveaway, but he was also soft in front of the net. Hamonic was not too far behind. That being said, I felt that was Hamonic's first truly bad game of the season.

So far, Hamonic has ranged from below average to average in most other games this season, which is fine when he's paired with the beast that is Sanderson.

Zaitsev really hasn't been that bad, for a 6-7 defenseman. One thing's for sure is that he wouldn't get bullied off the puck like Brannstrom and Hamonic did yesterday.

When fully healthy, we can go back to Chabot-Zub, Sanderson-Hamonic, and a rotation of Holden-Zaitsev-Brannstrom (Brannstom really needs a game in the press box right now). But I'd greatly reduce Chabot's minutes and increase Sanderson's.

Chabot's regression is 100% mental IMO, and he's crumbling under the pressure. The best way to solve that is to drop his minutes a ton (give them to Sanderson) and show him that he doesn't need to be "the guy". Take some of the load off his shoulders and make him feel supported. Right now he probably feels like he needs to do everything and needs to be perfect in order to win a game because the weight of the team, the weight of the rebuild and the weight of the first 5 years of his career are fully on his shoulders with all the minutes he's getting. DJ needs to take pressure off of him. I have no doubt Chabot can play these minutes under normal circumstances, but right now, I guarantee Chabot is putting waaaay too much pressure on himself, and DJ is just happy to keep heaping more on top of him. His handling of Chabot is easily my biggest criticism of DJ right now.

Uh oh. I guess you didn't hear that he was waived right after you posted this...

 

[swiftwin]

Uh oh. I guess you didn't hear that he was waived right after you posted this...

Dorion probably feels that JBD should be getting a better shot.

 

[DaveMatthew]

Dorion probably feels that JBD should be getting a better shot.

And knows that Zaitsev is awful but his coach is too tempted to keep dressing him. He wasn't even kept around for the road trip that Zub can't go on.

 

[Bileur]

A top 4 that includes Chabot, Zub and Sanderson should be enough, especially with our forward core. Hamonic is not great, but he's good enough to hold the fort until JBD/Thompson are good enough to step up, either later this season or next season. The problem during this losing streak is that Chabot is not playing like a top 4, and Zub is hurt. We went from 3 top 4 defensemen to 1 top 4 defenseman.

As I said in the offseason, it’s completely irresponsible for a team aiming to compete for the playoffs (or to compete to play “meaningful games” whatever that means) to go into the season with only two proven top four defensemen. I had little doubt Sanderson would get there but it’s putting way too much responsibility on a rookie. He is playing great now but he may well hit a rookie wall.

That’s the exact reason going into the season with Chabot, Zub and Sanderson as your top 4 options isn’t enough. There is zero depth. One injury to one of those guys and the team is sunk.

 

[LuckyPierre]

We should let go of DJ and promote Dave Smart on an interim basis in a Ted Lasso-esque move.

Motivate the boys for the remainder of the year, and trust smart hockey tacticians to draw up some proper structure.

Then allow the new ownership group to go full clean slate.

 

[Gil Gunderson]

Dorion probably feels that JBD should be getting a better shot.

You always seem to point to analytics about the team’s play, but the analytics also show that Zaitsev is not an NHL player.

 

[swiftwin]

You always seem to point to analytics about the team’s play, but the analytics also show that Zaitsev is not an NHL player.

Agreed. That's why I call him a 7th defenseman.

 

[sensens]

Dorion probably feels that JBD should be getting a better shot.

JBD should be getting a better shot, and that was clear in training camp. I suppose they might have been sheltering Sanderson from pressure, but he's more than ready. In fact, Sanderson is already one of the team leaders in % d-zone starts, while having the most points, a team-best +/-, and virtually the same Corsi/Fenwick as Chabot. Meanwhile, a Holden-JBD 3rd pairing would be far better at defending leads and handling d-zone starts when Sanderson/Hamonic weren't available.

 

[GermanSpitfire]

I’d bring in John Quennville or Mike Babcock

 

[Ice-Tray]

Wait a minute. It used to be "Who cares if the team is a tire fire off the ice and ownership/management is a disgrace. I'm just happy to watch kids play hockey." Now it's "Who cares if the coach sucks, the players are lost and we can't win a game. I'm just happy that so much fun stuff is happening with ownership."
?????
You can't be from this planet.

I’m always happy to watch interesting stuff surrounding the team, who doesn’t?

I’m not sure I’ve said any of those things about the team, coach, or management. Those are your views on everything, strapped to me ‘enjoying watching hockey’. What a weird way to package my post. I’m enjoying watching the kids play AND intrigued about the off ice ownership stuff. As usual, I simply don’t care about freaking out about stuff on the internet.

It’s ok for you to do you though buddy, I’m not asking you or anyone else not to be furious, frustrated, and whatever else folks need to do. Be the fan you want to be my man, I will too.

Perhaps I’m simply not a sports fan like you, or perhaps anyone else in here, but I’m ok with that. With all of the ups and downs of pro sports, and this team specifically, I simply have no interest in riding that wave. I think I’ve been pretty consistent in finding my own ways to enjoy watching the team, because when I cease to enjoy it, I won’t do it anymore.

Try not to focus your frustrations at me, I’m not the source of your ire, nor am I interested in changing your ways, or anyone else’s. Carry on doing you!

 

[Back in Black]

I've got nothing bad to say about our Coach, but getting an experienced coach is overdue. No more rookie, AHL, or assistant coaches..... Been there done that for 30 years now!

Jacques Martin was the closest we got to a great coach.

 

[Union2017]

IMO, the problem is not personnel. We have players like Chabot, DeBrincat, Stutzle, Brannstrom making boneheaded stupid passes and stupidly risky plays.

At a certain point, you have to question how those players are being held accountable. The players need to fear the coach more than they fear losing when they make those kinds of plays. I'm starting to think DJ is too well liked. DJ has no problem getting the team working hard. This is undoubtedly the hardest working Sens team we've ever had.

Wait, weren't you saying yesterday that DJ should not get fired? Or did I mix that up? Just wondering if it was you and if now you changed your mind. Although it could be me, this entire loosing streak is messing with my head LOL