The 5 tanks are back at it!

[Tawnos]

You are, for some reason, equating "celebrate" with "being satisfied" and they are very critically not the same thing.

Not winning a cup despite a sustained peak is NOT something to celebrate. The Sharks didn't win the cup and I do not celebrate that result. But I am still satisfied because of how the Sharks finished relative to the pack and i'm not a psycho who ties my existence into a sports team i have no control over. My team was great but not good enough, for an entertainment product I'm ok with that because I got most of what I want out of it, but that doesn't mean i celebrate it or think of it as a success. I don't work/play for the team.

This isn't that hard to comprehend.

Winning the cup is hard and is unlikely to happen for any given team every year. Fans should have that expectation. But that doesn't change the fact that it is the ultimate goal every team works towards and not meeting that goal is a failure.

Yeah, I still say that only maintaining a single definition of success worthy of celebrating is the true loser mentality. Your point-of-view is not hard to comprehend at all, but it's also easy to criticize because it's patently absurd. The fact that you don't work/play for the team should make this easier, not harder. People seriously looked at Ricky Bobby in Talladega Nights saying "if you're not first, you're last" and nodded their heads along as if Will Farrell wasn't patently making fun of it (he both starred in and wrote the movie). As if that wasn't the mentality of assholes. As if it wasn't a toxic trait. Obviously, no one is saying that the celebration of a great team that didn't win the Cup is going to be on the same level as if the team won. But successes can be celebrated even if they aren't ultimate successes. And you know what? The Sharks are already doing it. Marleau's number is retired and Thornton's is about to be. That's an example of celebrating those successes that the team had.

People can think what they want, and you will of course. So will I, and I'm likely of the minority opinion on this. That's ok.

 

[PredsV82]

Nashville has to many good player to be at the bottom for the whole season.

We have a dogshit awful coach. Talent doesn't matter at this point

 

[rahad]

We have a dogshit awful coach. Talent doesn't matter at this point

It does. It will be the difference between finishing in the bottom 5 vs finishing in the bottom 10. Most of the team in the bottom 5 is a mix of bad coaching and lack of talent in the team.

 

[Howboutthempanthers]

Tanking has proven to be more unsuccessful than successful over course of the post-lockout era. MacKinnon and Ekblad are the only #1 picks since 08 #1 Stamkos to win the cup. ~10 years for each of them to win. For reference, Malkin/Crosby were drafted in 04/05 and won in 09, Toews/Kane drafted in 06/07 and won in 10. This kinda of turnaround doesn't happen anymore.

In that same window 2008-present window:

• #2 Barkov, Hedman, Doughty, Landeskog all won with their draft teams, Eichel and reinhart after trades, and Seguin on his draft team(but the Bruins didnt tank to get him).
• #3 Bogosian won with not his draft team and in a bottom pair role
• #4 Byram, Makar, Pietrangelo are the only winners with their draft team, Bennett won on his 2nd team. Critically, Makar and Byram were drafted 6 and 8 years, respectively, after Landeskog, who was 2 years AFTER Duchene and O'reilly were drafted.
• #5 Schenn bros are the only to win, both not on their draft teams.

Thats 17 players across 7 cup winning teams, over 16 years and 90 top 5 picks.

Point being, tanking isn't a guarantee for success and even if it is, the teams who have proved it works took a decade to make it happen AND got arguably their most important pieces years after tanking a top pick (Rantanen/Makar, Kucherov/Vasi, Tkachuk/Bob).

Ducks and Habs are a great example of why tanking is a risk, and as a Sharks fan i'm definitely nervous about the next few years. Nothing is close to a guarantee

I think a team rebuild gets a bum rap because it has a title to it. But it's the best odds to win a cup. Other teams builds have no title, so no one can really focus in on them. And no one really notices how low of a success rate, and how long teams go through non rebuild without winning a cup.

 

[Viqsi]

You are, for some reason, equating "celebrate" with "being satisfied" and they are very critically not the same thing.

Not winning a cup despite a sustained peak is NOT something to celebrate. The Sharks didn't win the cup and I do not celebrate that result. But I am still satisfied because of how the Sharks finished relative to the pack and i'm not a psycho who ties my existence into a sports team i have no control over. My team was great but not good enough, for an entertainment product I'm ok with that because I got most of what I want out of it, but that doesn't mean i celebrate it or think of it as a success. I don't work/play for the team.

This isn't that hard to comprehend.

Winning the cup is hard and is unlikely to happen for any given team every year. Fans should have that expectation. But that doesn't change the fact that it is the ultimate goal every team works towards and not meeting that goal is a failure.

Of course one can strive for better. Saying you "shouldn't celebrate", though, is tantamount to shaming people for that appreciation. Maybe you would celebrate more if they won a Cup, but that doesn't mean the lack of same should also lead to the total absence of celebration. It's the same sort of attitude that has decided the Jackets' simultaneous first ever playoff series win and historic sweep of the Presidents' Trophy Lightning is meaningless, valueless, and should never have been seen as anything worthwhile or worth being a part of because It Wasn't The Cup. That's not a world I want to live in, nor do I think it a healthy one in general. And I absolutely cannot stand it when folks start coming out and accusing me of having a "loser's mentality" because, G-d forbid, I actually enjoyed watching that series (as did many other hockey fans) and considered it a major historical moment for my team that has had precious little of anything at all to be happy about pretty much ever.

So, yeah. First World Problems.

 

[Howboutthempanthers]

Tampa Bay traded their first the year before they drafted Stamkos. Colorado traded their first the year before drafting MacKinnon and had 112 points the season after. Florida won the division the year before they took Barkov.

They all made moves at various points to make their current roster worse for future assets. They were nowhere near the teardown rebuilds we see today.

That was a complete fluke. They were definitely still in a rebuild after the 2012 division title.

 

[tiburon12]

Of course one can strive for better. Saying you "shouldn't celebrate", though, is tantamount to shaming people for that appreciation. Maybe you would celebrate more if they won a Cup, but that doesn't mean the lack of same should also lead to the total absence of celebration. It's the same sort of attitude that has decided the Jackets' simultaneous first ever playoff series win and historic sweep of the Presidents' Trophy Lightning is meaningless, valueless, and should never have been seen as anything worthwhile or worth being a part of because It Wasn't The Cup. That's not a world I want to live in, nor do I think it a healthy one in general. And I absolutely cannot stand it when folks start coming out and accusing me of having a "loser's mentality" because, G-d forbid, I actually enjoyed watching that series (as did many other hockey fans) and considered it a major historical moment for my team that has had precious little of anything at all to be happy about pretty much ever.

So, yeah. First World Problems.

I'm not saying it's a loser mentality for the fans, I'm saying it's a loser mentality for the Org not to strive for the cup. When challenged why i said a rebuild is judged on if you win the cup or not, i pointed out that organizations (not fans) calculate every move in pursuit of winning the cup. If they don't (i.e. their long-term goal is to sell tickets and keep the business healthy as opposed to winning) then that is a loser mentality. Fans who also cheer for that i'd blanket in too, but i doubt those fans are on HF.

But fans aren't players or in the org, so they have different standards. To the Sharks example, I as a fan am satisfied with the 2010s even though we didn't win. The org and players were not satisfied because they failed at winning. Thus, the Sharks of the 2010s, relative to their goal of winning, shouldn't be celebrated as a successful organization around the league. Fans, I included, have great memories and had fun in that window. All of those things can be true without infringing on the others.

As fans of teams that don't win, we often look to the winners and hope our org tries emulate what they did. No fan or organization is looking at the 2010 Sharks and thinking, "This is the blueprint". But they were looking at the Pens, Hawks, Kings for the blueprint etc. This is why i'm saying they aren't celebrated.