The 5 tanks are back at it!

[belfour30]

It took the Avs 6 years after drafting MacKinnon to build a contender.

 

[ItWasJustified]

Will Anaheim add some decent vets from free agency? If not I am not sure when things start to click for them.

They've already added veterans in free agency for the whole rebuilding process though. Vatrano, Strome, Gudas, Killorn, McGinn and Dumoulin have all been signed in the past 3 seasons.

I'm sure he'll still flirt with 100 points with some talent around him but he's not pulling a team out of the basement alone.

There's not a single hockey player that can do that. It's not that kind of sport.

 

[Bouboumaster]

Race to the bottom is ON!!

 

[Crow]

Idk the NFL seems to have the same teams at the bottom every year too. Jacksonville, Jets, used to be the Lions, Giants

Dont forget about the browns. Man they were awful forever

 

[SingDomestica]

Every single one of these teams tried to improve this offseason, they're just bad.

Anaheim and Montreal really have no excuse to be this bad. Columbus shouldn't be this bad but at least they have an excuse. Chicago signed a bunch of bad players hoping they would fix the team and it hasn't panned out. And the Sharks are in a strictly developmental year with their teenage rookie centers going through their expected growing pains.

Anaheim’s issue is the coaching. They tried to sign Stamkos and Marchessault, and reportedly offered more money than Nashville, but ultimately the players don’t want to come here. Why would they want to come and play for a coach that has not achieved ANY success at ANY level prior to coming to the NHL? His lifetime coaching record is abysmal. Like poster above mentioned, they basically get dominated every game. You can see the low morale on the team, just difficult to watch.

 

[Beukeboom Fan]

Points to watered down league when pretty well 20% of the teams tank each season.

Throw the Pens in this year - Albeit Dubas unintentional Tank.

Can you remind me when there weren't bad teams in the NHL?

 

[NVious]

Will never happen but I would love to see a total change in drafting position. Non-playoff teams with the best record get the best odds for first overall. This tank stuff is totally against the honesty and integrity of the game. No NHL game, season or partial season should be played with the intention to lose. It's dishonest and rewarding teams that tank promotes this dishonest behaviour.

All teams tank, this is just a part of the life cycle of sports in general.

 

[Crow]

They've already added veterans in free agency for the whole rebuilding process though. Vatrano, Strome, Gudas, Killorn, McGinn and Dumoulin have all been signed in the past 3 seasons.

Most of these guys don’t really meet my definition of decent. Maybe decent isnt the word I should have used.

 

[PaulD]

Can you remind me when there weren't bad teams in the NHL?

I didn't say bad teams. Neither did the thread title.
I commented on the 5 teams "tanking" again.
Like the thread title stated.

 

[Leonardo87]

Regardless, I refuse to have a tank thread in the Ducks forum. Enough is enough already. After missing out on the 1stOA several times now it's just not worth it to have a tank discussion mentality. Plus rooting for your team to lose just seems wrong.

Can't even be excited to see if they can pull away from the bottom this year because they have Greg Cronin at the helm. If your team has already played Anaheim this year, you know what I mean. Ducks goaltending has kept them in games, but that is going to start wearing out soon.

 

[thedjpd]

The word "tanking" has become so overused that many people don't know there's a difference.

Maybe, but tanking is also a means to an end. Most of these teams have been crap for 5-ish years plus now with not an end in sight. The assimilation of all these top picks is to trigger a turnaround in a few years; and they’re still at the same spot before acquiring all these supposed high level players.

It's because none of those teams have actually, truly, committed to a rebuild and still ice teams of overpaid, overvalued, and underperforming veterans. Those teams all missed the boat on when to start their rebuild.

I don't follow this, they've been in the bottom 5 for 3+ years, and crappy even before then. Is that not commitment?

 

[BLNY]

It's because none of those teams have actually, truly, committed to a rebuild and still ice teams of overpaid, overvalued, and underperforming veterans. Those teams all missed the boat on when to start their rebuild.

Who's gonna take the Anderson or Gallagher contracts? Teams only have 3 retention slots. Two currently in use for Petry and Allen. Alzner was occupying one until end of last season iirc.

Armia, Dvorak, and Savard are in the last years of their deals. They'll get middling picks for Armia and Dvorak. Savard is tbd. Even with those 5 players, Habs are one of the youngest teams in the league. HuGo have to ride out some of the damage done and you can't do that without some vets.

 

[qc14]

It took the Avs 6 years after drafting MacKinnon to build a contender.

They had 112 points his rookie year. There's a massive difference between the early 2010s Avs and what current teams are doing now.

 

[Juxtaposer]

Anaheim’s issue is the coaching. They tried to sign Stamkos and Marchessault, and reportedly offered more money than Nashville, but ultimately the players don’t want to come here. Why would they want to come and play for a coach that has not achieved ANY success at ANY level prior to coming to the NHL? His lifetime coaching record is abysmal. Like poster above mentioned, they basically get dominated every game. You can see the low morale on the team, just difficult to watch.

Do the Ducks not have control of their coach? That's not an excuse. The Sharks jettisoned David Quinn even though they could have easily ridden him to another last place finish and then heaped all the blame for why the team was bad onto him. Instead, Grier took accountability and fired him. The team is still bad because of the youth and lack of talent, but they're infinitely more fun to watch and there is something there.

 

[Beukeboom Fan]

I didn't say bad teams. Neither did the thread title.
I commented on the 5 teams "tanking" again.
Like the thread title stated.

You insinuate that every bad team is tanking. IMO - tanking is making your team worse in the goal of maximizing your chance for an early draft pick. The Hawks & Ducks have added guys to try and help the team be more competitive, it just hasn't worked. The Jackets had unfortunate set of circumstances with Laine deciding he needed a change in scenery and the terrible JG situation. MTL was counting on improvement in the young core, along with Laine who immediately got hurt, to take the next step. I don't think that any of those teams are "tanking" this year.

IMO - it's really hard to turn a losing organization around in the NHL. This isn't just a case where "theoretical talent = wins".

 

[Enga Olly]

All teams tank, this is just a part of the life cycle of sports in general.

yeah - the point is to discourage not encourage tanking. A person buys a ticket to a game, they are entitled to a fair and honest competition - if you're tanking basically the match is fixed. I don't want to watch WWE or crooked boxing - I want actual competition in sports

 

[thefutures]

In the mix!!

 

[Goptor]

Its just that tank rebuilds take 8-9 years now instead of the commonly said 5 year plan from 20 years ago.

The Ducks are close to getting out of their bottom 5 stage and entering the Buffalo/Ottawa/Detroit bottom 11 position and the Penguins will take over the bottom 5 spot for the next 4-5 years.

 

[bossram]

FWIW, though the bottom-tier of teams is mostly the same, just by eye (catching some of their games), most of the tanking teams at least look more competitive.

CBJ and CHI are legitimately trying. The players are playing hard. They're not exactly easy outs. The Sharks are also better, though it was pretty much impossible for them to be worse. ANA is still a disaster though - Cronin is determined to ruin every young player in their system.

MTL also has a path to pretty rapid improvement. They just need to fire MSL, who appears to be the worst defensive head coach in the cap era.

 

[shaner8989]

5 horrible teams
5 teams with zero upwards trends
5 teams going nowhere
5 team who won’t be relevant for a long ass time

 

[ClydeLee]

Tanking often takes a long time. Mario Lemeuix made the playoffs 1 time his first 6 seasons.

You insinuate that every bad team is tanking. IMO - tanking is making your team worse in the goal of maximizing your chance for an early draft pick. The Hawks & Ducks have added guys to try and help the team be more competitive, it just hasn't worked. The Jackets had unfortunate set of circumstances with Laine deciding he needed a change in scenery and the terrible JG situation. MTL was counting on improvement in the young core, along with Laine who immediately got hurt, to take the next step. I don't think that any of those teams are "tanking" this year.

IMO - it's really hard to turn a losing organization around in the NHL. This isn't just a case where "theoretical talent = wins".

The blackhawks additions were not to not be bad or be competitive. The sensible takes were they're jumping 20 pts of standings... which you may say is a lot. That would of pushed them from 2nd last to still 4th last based on last years standings.

They're still pushing rebuilding to be bottom 5. Just not, we are striving for bottom 2 push from the gm. It's still apart of the tank.

 

[WarriorofTime]

In a 21 team league, if you finish last, pick first, acquire the first round pick of a team that makes the conference finals, have your own second round pick and add a mid second round pick as well, you’re picking 1st, 18th, 22nd and 32nd.

Do the same things in a 32 team league, you’re picking 1st, 29th, 33rd and 48th.

The logic is the same for why you do it but it really puts a lot more strain on your draft picks as the margin of error shrinks considerably.

 

[Crow]

5 horrible teams
5 teams with zero upwards trends
5 teams going nowhere
5 team who won’t be relevant for a long ass time

I think you are kidding yourself if you don’t think at least one of these teams will be competitive in a few years.

 

[FiveTacos]

Well some of those teams ARE rebuilding but are just really young.

For example, Anaheim has had between 3 and 4 first or second year dmen in the lineup *every night* thus far, plus several young forwards who are still wet behind the ears themselves. That is not a recipe for success, especially when your veterans are more the "support" types than the heavy lifters.

Very few young dmen, even ones who become really excellent, are truly great until they're approaching 24-25. Forwards maybe a little sooner, but even there you see some guys take until their mid 20's to fully hit their stride. For a lot of the guys playing for these teams, it'll mostly be flashes of talent, coupled with stretches of ineffectiveness or mistakes. If they were on a good team on a 3rd line or 3rd pairing, their invisible stretches would be glossed over, but on bad teams where they're playing top minutes it's glaring.

Improvement for teams like this is often not linear. You have to hit a "critical mass" of impact players (not just talented but still developing players) ... but once you hit that you see teams make fairly significant jumps. Just a question of who's going to have 2-4 guys develop into stars first.

 

[HeadLiceHatty]

The Flyers will be back in the hunt soon, they suck too.