Here’s the thing. Waiving Tolvy just highlights the core problem with our team. We no longer have anyone on-the-rise. We have bigger, slower, grinders who will never be more than average-to-below-average, vets who are overpaid and under-performing, and NOBODY getting better with a hope of being a star. Think early-to-mid 2010’s: Suter, Weber, Josi, Eck, Forsberg, Arvy, Fiala, etc. They were good, with signs of great. All of them became good, and some, great.
This roster has zero players in that category. There’s little Hope. At least Tolvy was False Hope. You felt like if they just kept playing him, at worst you had a solid bottom-sixer with a shot, and at best he figures it out and becomes good. You can play all our bottom sixers all you want, but nobody has promise.
Guys like Trenin and Jeanot looked to be in that category, but they lack speed and skill. They’re bigger and tougher, but don’t have scoring touches and don’t have passing skills. Our best guys have peaked and may be regressing. Every major player we were counting on from last year is underperforming, some significantly, including Saros. He’s way off his Vezina stats and doesn’t appear to be getting any better. He’s good, and the least of our problems, but he’s not great.
The Admirals are killin’ it, but not the way we need it. Afanasyev has 11 points in 23 games, Tomasino has 11 points in 15 games. John Leonard has 1 goal in 23 games. Luke E. has 17 points, but only 4 goals. Their leader is Tommy f’n Novak with 10 goals and 22 points. I like Novak but he’s a bottom-sixer. One emerging bright spot is Askarov. After a slow start, he’s played 16 games and gone 11 – 4 with a 2.42 GA and a .918 Save %. If Saros is as good as he’s gonna get, Yaroslav is one of the few players I’d come to watch in a Pred uniform if we sucked otherwise.
If our Top Six guys don’t wake up, we’ll all be rooting for draft positioning. With the injuries at D, are we bringing up anyone interesting, like Nurmi (17 points and 6’6” tall)? Nah. We’re going with McKeown (2 goals and 8 points) and Kevin Gravel (0 goals, 6 points) to wow us. Guess they “earned it”.
Oh and just to add to the storm clouds, attendance is sucking. Saturday afternoon’s game was subsidized with freebie fans. The ticket market is soft. The resiliency of our fanbase may be tested as much as our players.
And the next Great-Gold-Hope, Parissinen, has come back down to earth and a few nice games. I like him, he gives me hope, but right now, it seems everyone sucks.
As for Hynes, Poile replaced the play-fast Lavy roster with the bigger-slower-“identity” roster for Hynes. If we fire Hynes and hire a play-fast coach, we don’t have the roster.
Ugh
