Management Discussion | Just Have a Plan

[rypper]

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

Well he’s listed as a consultant. Seems like the other dr is the guy running the show.


Well let’s see where we end up by end of the year. I don’t think they planned for the team to be this bad. But now that the team is doing this bad, they haven’t done anything to stop it.

Sure but they are still holding on to the delusion that we somehow make the playoffs, we won't trade players for picks either, this is not tanking it's just plain stupidity.

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

You're responding with emotion and it's clouding your judgment (and I get it, we're all pissed off).

I never said it's just goaltending and coaching, nor did I say that with good goaltending and coaching we would be a contender.

But it's not as bad as it looks. It is bad, but it looks like we're close to the tier of Chicago or Anaheim. We're not. We're being cratered by goaltending and coaching to go from being a mediocre capped out team with no prospects to looking like a dire team that's capped out with no prospects.

Yah I disagree, our goaltending isn't winning as many games for us, but that's more indicative of how awful our d is, than how bad our goal tending is, look at LA, awful goal tending but they still make the playoffs, our blue line is/has/ and will continue to be our biggest problem. Coaching is far from it, even if we had a more defensive coach we still lose these games it's just 2-1 rather than 5-4, that's hardly better in fact the team is boring to watch.

We're not as bad as Chicago or Anaheim, sure, totally agree, but my judgement isn't clouded, I wish we would embrace a direction like Anaheim or Chicago, instead we choose to remain mediocre for the foreseeable future, no direction and no hope, clinging to some ridiculous idea of a re-tool predicated on some pretty extreme luck that never comes to fruition.

 

[Peen]

Isn't it weird how all those goalies play on teams that are garbage defensively?

Why would the worst goaltenders just happen to be playing on the worst defensive teams in the league? Odd...

I may or may not have dm'd woodley about the last few pages of talk a few hours ago

He actually responded so credit to him. Won't say what the entire response was but a funny tidbit is that Delia has one of the best adjusted save percentages in the league right now

HE HAS A .895!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And that literally makes total sense because Delia has looked totally fine this season.

 

[kanucks25]

Honestly it feels like most of the forwards on this team are just playing to pad their stats, either that's somewhat true or they're just brutal defensively and lack hockey sense. EP is the one guy who constantly plays hard at both ends, the rest of the top 9 forwards all have disconnected controller and blowing the zone early moments. Even a guy like Mikheyev who was brought in as a defensive forward

This is what happens when you have shoddy leadership. If the guys wearing the letters (Bo, Miller, OEL, etc.) cheat and don't put in full effort all the time, the shit will roll down hill.

With Bo likely gone, I think it's imperative that management and the new coach wrangle JT in. I don't care how much everyone says he "cares" or is "competitive" because he swears and yells and pouts and slams his stick. Him doing all that garbage but then also constantly being lousy defensively just does not compute.

Holding him accountable makes it much easier to hold everyone else accountable.

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

Yeah, this isn't some uniquely unlucky team. It's not that the goaltending is failing the team. It is much more that the team is failing the goalies and creating a horrific defensive environment.

The recent game against PIT was literally the worst defensive performance of any NHL team this year, per NST. Worse than even any ANA or CHI game. Like, this team is putrid. They're 4th worst in high-danger chances against at 5v5, per NST. We all know how bad the PK is. CSA is private, but in public appearances from Kevin Woodley, he readily admits how awful defensively they are.

The team's results are deserved. They are not close to any semblance of being a contender. There is no use trying to resuscitate this roster.

Exactly, all those saying goal tending and even coaching being the problem aren't paying enough attention to this. THE REAL ISSUE.

 

[me2]

I know people are mad but this is absolutely correct. Especially when Benning did not appear at all for the final year after he spent everything to build the final version of his masterplan.

If the Canucks struggle for another 4 or 5 years let's see how eager they are then. Linden and Benning were more active during the early days too.

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

Now now, Brock has had a hard year every year since years became official.

Yah, what a wuss, his dad died he should have just gotten over it like nothing right?.......

 

[MarkusNaslund19]

Yah I disagree, our goaltending isn't winning as many games for us, but that's more indicative of how awful our d is, than how bad our goal tending is, look at LA, awful goal tending but they still make the playoffs, our blue line is/has/ and will continue to be our biggest problem. Coaching is far from it, even if we had a more defensive coach we still lose these games it's just 2-1 rather than 5-4, that's hardly better in fact the team is boring to watch.

We're not as bad as Chicago or Anaheim, sure, totally agree, but my judgement isn't clouded, I wish we would embrace a direction like Anaheim or Chicago, instead we choose to remain mediocre for the foreseeable future, no direction and no hope, clinging to some ridiculous idea of a re-tool predicated on some pretty extreme luck that never comes to fruition.

The part of this I disagree with, is that people point to our team's save percentage, and then point to other, better teams, who are built very differently as if it's apples to apples.

Saying, "Our save percentage isn't much better than X, and they're better" ignores that we knew our D was bad, and were expecting elite goaltending.

If we were thriving based on goaltending, and L.A's D was shitting the bed, it wouldn't make sense for their fans to say, "look how well Vancouver is doing and their D is as bad as ours" because we know L.A. to have less than stellar goaltending and better D.

Put another way, we have more goals than Carolina. But their D far outshines ours. We know this, and they're a far better team so comparing directly doesn't make sense since the build is so much different.

I think this is getting glossed over a lot on these boards right now amidst all of the chaos of such an awful and unfun season.

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

The part of this I disagree with, is that people point to our team's save percentage, and then point to other, better teams, who are built very differently as if it's apples to apples.

Saying, "Our save percentage isn't much better than X, and they're better" ignores that we knew our D was bad, and were expecting elite goaltending.

If we were thriving based on goaltending, and L.A's D was shitting the bed, it wouldn't make sense for their fans to say, "look how well Vancouver is doing and their D is as bad as ours" because we know L.A. to have less than stellar goaltending and better D.

Put another way, we have more goals than Carolina. But their D far outshines ours. We know this, and they're a far better team so comparing directly doesn't make sense since the build is so much different.

I think this is getting glossed over a lot on these boards right now amidst all of the chaos of such an awful and unfun season.

I think my main point stands though, our blue line is the biggest problem, not coaching, not goaltending. Expecting our goalies to play lights out all the time to make up for that is completely unrealistic, just as much as saying it's the coaches fault when he is given an absolute shit roster of dmen and is somehow expected to turn things around.

 

[MarkusNaslund19]

I think my main point stands though, our blue line is the biggest problem, not coaching, not goaltending. Expecting our goalies to play lights out all the time to make up for that is completely unrealistic, just as much as saying it's the coaches fault when he is given an absolute shit roster of dmen and is somehow expected to turn things around.

I think we're talking past each other here.

Our D is a massive and fundamental problem. It's the primary reason that we absolutely are not contenders and that our 'real level' is probably battling for 3rd in a weak division, or just inside/outside the wildcard. That's true, and it's a serious serious issue and it's not temporary barring some serious ingenuity.

But our goaltending and coaching (in terms of fit, where evidently our team needs coaches who hold their hands to hold them accountable, whereas Boudreau seems to promote player accountability like AV did, which works with a good leadership core like the Sedins, but isn't working now), are absolutely sewering us. Taking us from a team with a lot of skill who would be kneecapping themselves out of contention with bad D, to a team that looks like it doesn't belong on the same ice as a professional team.

Water finds its own level, and ours is mediocre due to the core problems of our D. But having horrendous goaltending, and coaching that doesn't fit and is being undermined by our management is making a mediocre team look appalling.

It behooves us to make decisions while being mindful of that distinction.

You are 100% entitled to still maintain that we should try to enter a 10 year rebuild, just as I'm entitled to disagree. But we aren't the San Jose Sharks, even though we look like them right now.

 

[PuckMunchkin]

I may or may not have dm'd woodley about the last few pages of talk a few hours ago

He actually responded so credit to him. Won't say what the entire response was but a funny tidbit is that Delia has one of the best adjusted save percentages in the league right now

HE HAS A .895!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And that literally makes total sense because Delia has looked totally fine this season.

Suprised that its that good, but not suprised its good.

The chances we give consistently, publicly available models are not built to account for.

 

[PuckMunchkin]

If that's true then that's a failure of statistics.

There's no doubt that are problems our a lot deeper than just goaltending and our D is entirely too permissive.

But we have had Demko play terribly and then get hurt, and then have been employing two goaltenders who weren't even employable in this league until last year.

It's really interesting to see @MS do a big about face in terms of what he wants to do, because he's become more conservative with regards to rebuilding than I am. But he's not wrong that there's a loooot going wrong here, but goaltending and coaching are making this look a lot worse than it is, and we're all pretty emotional about it.

The Devils last year had an appalling save percentage and used like 8 goalies and it netted them the 2nd overall pick. This year, Vanecek is giving them .914 and they are a toppish team in the league.

People who didn't play don't understand how bad goaltending affects a team. It's not a bunch of automatons who play the same way and the results are different. When you don't trust that you will get saves, you start trying to prevent any kind of shots at all, and putting increased pressure on yourself to score, which makes you useless because you're trying to do too much.

The way management kneecapped Bruce means there's not much systems buy-in either.

I think we need to move on from Bo and get what we can for him, bottom out this year, and retool. So basically a hard rebuild for the next 8 months, and then start building in earnest again. MS is correct that no team is going to dump Petey and Hughes and Demko so they can be pathetic for 8 years, it just doesn't make sense.

That is the exact opposite of what the Canucks are doing.

 

[Nucklehead Supreme]

I think we're talking past each other here.

Our D is a massive and fundamental problem. It's the primary reason that we absolutely are not contenders and that our 'real level' is probably battling for 3rd in a weak division, or just inside/outside the wildcard. That's true, and it's a serious serious issue and it's not temporary barring some serious ingenuity.

But our goaltending and coaching (in terms of fit, where evidently our team needs coaches who hold their hands to hold them accountable, whereas Boudreau seems to promote player accountability like AV did, which works with a good leadership core like the Sedins, but isn't working now), are absolutely sewering us. Taking us from a team with a lot of skill who would be kneecapping themselves out of contention with bad D, to a team that looks like it doesn't belong on the same ice as a professional team.

Water finds its own level, and ours is mediocre due to the core problems of our D. But having horrendous goaltending, and coaching that doesn't fit and is being undermined by our management is making a mediocre team look appalling.

It behooves us to make decisions while being mindful of that distinction.

You are 100% entitled to still maintain that we should try to enter a 10 year rebuild, just as I'm entitled to disagree. But we aren't the San Jose Sharks, even though we look like them right now.

When did I ever push for this? Make smart trades, shore up the prospect pool, don't spend to the cap when your a mediocre team, all things I would push for, all things this team is incapable of, rebuilds don't take 10 years either, just look at the avs.

​

 

[gringo]

He lost me at sitting Boeser was a bad thing. This list sucks.

 

[m9]

You know we had 3 goalies last year right?

We are talking year-over-year defense and Halak isn't on the team this year so I'm not sure how he factors into the comparison.

 

[racerjoe]

We are talking year-over-year defense and Halak isn't on the team this year so I'm not sure how he factors into the comparison.

Maybe I misunderstood, but it sounded like you were trying to show how two goalies shined last season, and that just wasn't' the case at all. Demko was lights out, what we expected. Halak was absolute garbage, and lucky to get back above 900 SV% played the second most games for us, and then Martin was on a crazy heater.

 

[rypper]

He lost me at sitting Boeser was a bad thing. This list sucks.

On hockey fights cancer night. After his dad had a long losing battle with cancer. Scratch him any other night. Scratch him the rest of the season for all I care.

 

[BrentSopelsHair]

He lost me at sitting Boeser was a bad thing. This list sucks.

Sitting Boeser hasn't been a bad idea this year. Sitting Boeser on Hockey Fights Cancer Night was extremely unnecessarily callous, and its good that it didn't end up happening in the end. Just adds to the serious of bad looks this year, and adds to the evidence that this is an unprofessional, unserious organization

 

[gringo]

On hockey fights cancer night. After his dad had a long losing battle with cancer. Scratch him any other night. Scratch him the rest of the season for all I care.

His agent played hardball, he demanded that contract. He didn’t play anywhere near that level. He looks out of shape and slow. This is all on him.

 

[tradervik]

Hh

Half the list is about things on the business side (which is FAQ) or non-hockey ops and not in any way the "new regime".

For pure hockey ops, the fundamental error is that they badly misjudged how difficult it would be to fix their cap situation. Everything else attributable to hockey ops is highly debatable (and has been debated a lot here).

 

[gringo]

Sitting Boeser hasn't been a bad idea this year. Sitting Boeser on Hockey Fights Cancer Night was extremely unnecessarily callous, and its good that it didn't end up happening in the end. Just adds to the serious of bad looks this year, and adds to the evidence that this is an unprofessional, unserious organization

I don’t think that Bruce has that reputation around the league. If anything, the organization going over Bruce’s head and demanding he insert Boeser back in the lineup for pure optics is the look of a sad sack organization.

 

[bossram]

I may or may not have dm'd woodley about the last few pages of talk a few hours ago

He actually responded so credit to him. Won't say what the entire response was but a funny tidbit is that Delia has one of the best adjusted save percentages in the league right now

HE HAS A .895!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And that literally makes total sense because Delia has looked totally fine this season.

Yeah. The narrative some have here that the Canucks' record is owing to just cratered goaltending is completely false.

The raw goaltending numbers are bad because the team is bad. They hemorrhage high-danger chances left and right. The fact that a Vancouver goalie has a positive dSv% with an .895 is absolutely hilarious.

Hh

Half the list is about things on the business side (which is FAQ) or non-hockey ops and not in any way the "new regime".

For pure hockey ops, the fundamental error is that they badly misjudged how difficult it would be to fix their cap situation. Everything else attributable to hockey ops is highly debatable (and has been debated a lot here).

That's a pretty critical error and should be grounds for resignation. Anyone with a brain and an internet connection could've come to the right conclusion. The fact that JR couldn't look at VAN's CapFriendly page before taking the job is evidence he's not fit to do it.

 

[Breakers]

Hh

Half the list is about things on the business side (which is FAQ) or non-hockey ops and not in any way the "new regime".

For pure hockey ops, the fundamental error is that they badly misjudged how difficult it would be to fix their cap situation. Everything else attributable to hockey ops is highly debatable (and has been debated a lot here).

Misjudged?

They ain’t innocent.

 

[credulous]

For pure hockey ops, the fundamental error is that they badly misjudged how difficult it would be to fix their cap situation. Everything else attributable to hockey ops is highly debatable (and has been debated a lot here).

this is the most important part of their job though. if you were extraordinary at cap management and mediocre to average at every other part of the job you'd probably be a perennial playoff team