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[RS] (#19) Rangers vs. Boston Bruins // Looks Like Bear's Back on the Menu


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It’s quite possible that the both of you are right though. Just taking the D itself and forgetting the forward crop and a point can be made either way in my opinion. Fox has developed under Quinn. No brainer. He’s on pace for about another 45 point season.

 

Miller has but it’s been way too early to call a success and he’s also sort of regressed a bit in recent games as bigger minutes have been given. He’s young though.

 

Now Trouba. Has he regressed as a player or developed since he got here from Winnipeg? I’d say regressed even if we are talking purely offensively. Obviously part of that is from lesser pp minutes but he does not look like even the same person mobility wise in his breakout. He honestly looks like a 32 or 33 year old Girardi rather than a guy that just turned 27 in his prime. If this is his prime then holy shit. I know it’s more on Gorton for the trade but Quinn hasn’t exactly gotten the best out of him. 3 points in 14 games. Three ! My god.

 

That’ll bring us lastly to our favorite non Ranger member of the club in ADA. The easy thing to say is he flourished because well, last year. Wouldn’t be a bad point either. And yes he does have attitude problems and is temperamental. He still was and is their best offensive defenseman though and went into this year, settled out of arbitration, during the few days of camp publicly said he wanted to play either side L or R to just do whatever is best for the team, then got thrown under the bus for an entire dogshit team performance on opening night. ADA then went straight downhill. I don’t see many other players held accountable for stupid penalties. He then got further sat, and was removed day 1 of his return from pp1 where likely it’s the only place he truly is worth his money all while literally being paired with, statistically, one of the worst defensemen in the entire league. That’s not putting someone in a position to succeed either so for whatever thriving ADA did under Quinn was ripped apart right then and there. If you have a pp specialist then by god use him that way. I know Fox is good and is a much better well rounded player but he’s not Superman either. Can’t run him into the ground. Point is, you can make an easy case in my mind ADA hardcore regressed as well. I think that’s on both player and coach. Not excusing ADA at all, but I think it’s more than just Tony being Tony.

 

All have been given offensive opportunities. None have been punished for exhibiting offense. The Dude said:

 

Well Quinn said something a week or so ago in the likes of "we wish Libor saw himself in the way we see him as a player". Which to me translates into "we want to change his playing style and he doesn't seem to agree with it". Hajek liked to shoot and carry the puck more than he was a defensive type. That was his game. Not that he was terrible in his own end, but he definitely had shown offensive instincts. In typical Quinn fashion, it seems he is concentrating on the players short comings, rather than using a player based on what they actually do good.

 

Quinn didn't coach the offense out of Fox. Nor DeAngelo. Miller has shown small flourishes so far. Lindgren is getting more involved. Trouba has struggled to replicate his 50 point play but I think that season may just be an outlier. He's more of a 30-35 point defenseman. It's not as though he hasn't had the opportunities to produce here, he's just shown that he doesn't really have the offensive skills.

 

Hajek was struggling defensively and had reported issues with his confidence. He's clearly grown defensively and is starting to translate confidence from that into taking offensive risks. That's how it should be. He's a defenseman and his role is to play defense. Hajek has never been a dynamic offensive player from the backend to get away with suspect defense. Credit to Knoblauch and Murphy for working out the kinks that made him fall behind Lindgren and Miller on the depth chart over the last two seasons. He's earned Quinn's trust to remain in the lineup over veteran options now that he's shown what he can do at the NHL level despite the Dude's claim that he'd defer to veteran options. He's had a veteran option the last two games in Bitetto and yet he still sat him while Hajek played.

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All have been given offensive opportunities. None have been punished for exhibiting offense. The Dude said:

 

 

 

Quinn didn't coach the offense out of Fox. Nor DeAngelo. Miller has shown small flourishes so far. Lindgren is getting more involved. Trouba has struggled to replicate his 50 point play but I think that season may just be an outlier. He's more of a 30-35 point defenseman. It's not as though he hasn't had the opportunities to produce here, he's just shown that he doesn't really have the offensive skills.

 

Hajek was struggling defensively and had reported issues with his confidence. He's clearly grown defensively and is starting to translate confidence from that into taking offensive risks. That's how it should be. He's a defenseman and his role is to play defense. Hajek has never been a dynamic offensive player from the backend to get away with suspect defense. Credit to Knoblauch and Murphy for working out the kinks that made him fall behind Lindgren and Miller on the depth chart over the last two seasons. He's earned Quinn's trust to remain in the lineup over veteran options now that he's shown what he can do at the NHL level despite the Dude's claim that he'd defer to veteran options. He's had a veteran option the last two games in Bitetto and yet he still sat him while Hajek played.

All fair points, but in just saying I think there is a bit of truth in both sides. At least the part about guys regressing or progressing. It's hard to say Trouba's prior success is an outlier and Quinn is absolved but then say Quinn has a part in why ADA flourished last season. It's kind of playing both sides to a degree. When a player succeeds it's a sign of Quinn helping and if they regressed, it's on player or previous success being an outlier.

 

I think no conclusions can be made on Miller or Hajek for quite a while. Way too early in. I don't t think Lindgren has shone any improvement really in his offensive game but he's not an offensive defenseman. I didn't see any progression with Skjei when he was under Quinn. I still think ADA is part on Quinn. I think the point is further cemented if you thrn do take into how little most forwards have been progressing outside of u guess a guy like Strome and Panarin with Ziby I guess being there too?

 

Anyway, let's go Rangers lol

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Skjei- had to make sure he was still in the league :) , but he is, no goals since he left NY in 35 games. Maybe safe to say he is just more or less a stiff no matter who's coaching. Sometime you can't get water out of a rock not matter who's coaching. Lias says he agrees too.
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All fair points, but in just saying I think there is a bit of truth in both sides. At least the part about guys regressing or progressing. It's hard to say Trouba's prior success is an outlier and Quinn is absolved but then say Quinn has a part in why ADA flourished last season. It's kind of playing both sides to a degree. When a player succeeds it's a sign of Quinn helping and if they regressed, it's on player or previous success being an outlier.

 

I think no conclusions can be made on Miller or Hajek for quite a while. Way too early in. I don't t think Lindgren has shone any improvement really in his offensive game but he's not an offensive defenseman. I didn't see any progression with Skjei when he was under Quinn. I still think ADA is part on Quinn. I think the point is further cemented if you thrn do take into how little most forwards have been progressing outside of u guess a guy like Strome and Panarin with Ziby I guess being there too?

 

Anyway, let's go Rangers lol

 

Trouba is 35 point career average to this point over 7 seasons and then some. I think it's a little more than fair to say that 50 point season may have been an outlier considering the immediate regression. Maybe he just isn't that guy? I also don't see how Trouba's regressing to his mean is a fault of Quinn besides giving DeAngelo what was originally Trouba's powerplay time. There's no disputing DeAngelo was the superior offensive player who fit that top unit more. Maybe Trouba lost some points by not being on the top unit, but he wasn't in Winnipeg either. I can't say whether or not Quinn has had a negative effect on Trouba. He regressed to his average last season and the entire roster has struggled offensively this season. I think Trouba just is what he is and it's not Quinn's fault that he can't make a 27-year-old more.

 

ADA played himself off two other teams without Quinn's help. Maybe Quinn contributed, but it's not as though Tony needed help. Gorton seemed to be in agreement there too. Can't blame everything on Quinn.

 

I have my qualms with Quinn, Boudreau is my avatar for Christ's sake, but I understand some of what he's doing through his execution is inconsistent and imperfect. I think his treatment of Lafreniere has been inconsistent with his other personnel choices. I think Lafreniere has been bad. I think he's looked lazy and I hate how often he's coasting and how seldom he makes a move for a loose puck. Lafreniere still gets time on the second powerplay unit. He still gets his average of 14.5 minutes per game with mostly appearances on the top two lines. If he were anyone else he'd be seeing time on the 4th line. Quinn says he's pleased with Laf's play. That's something I don't get. His treatment of Kakko, though, falls in line with someone like Buchnevich. Kakko was outright bad last season and I don't think that's on Quinn especially given the Kakko we saw of late prior to his Covid absence. Kakko just wasn't ready for the NHL level last season given his skating and timing. Quinn could've given him more opportunities, but seeing what we saw last season, do we really think he'd have just played himself to another level because of more minutes? He needed an off-season to work on his skating. Quinn wanted him to simplify his game and figure out the North American game first. I think that was a fair ask. It seems like he's accomplishing simpler plays that were much harder for him last season. That's progress, no? Buchnevich was in Quinn's doghouse from the getgo and now he's one of Quinn's trusted defensive forwards and hasn't sacrificed offense in doing so.

 

I think Quinn sucks as a tactician, is inconsistent as a communicator, and is a relatively poor evaluator, but I do think he's consistent in what he asks for.

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Trouba is 35 point career average to this point over 7 seasons and then some. I think it's a little more than fair to say that 50 point season may have been an outlier considering the immediate regression. Maybe he just isn't that guy? I also don't see how Trouba's regressing to his mean is a fault of Quinn besides giving DeAngelo what was originally Trouba's powerplay time. There's no disputing DeAngelo was the superior offensive player who fit that top unit more. Maybe Trouba lost some points by not being on the top unit, but he wasn't in Winnipeg either. I can't say whether or not Quinn has had a negative effect on Trouba. He regressed to his average last season and the entire roster has struggled offensively this season. I think Trouba just is what he is and it's not Quinn's fault that he can't make a 27-year-old more.

 

ADA played himself off two other teams without Quinn's help. Maybe Quinn contributed, but it's not as though Tony needed help. Gorton seemed to be in agreement there too. Can't blame everything on Quinn.

 

I have my qualms with Quinn, Boudreau is my avatar for Christ's sake, but I understand some of what he's doing through his execution is inconsistent and imperfect. I think his treatment of Lafreniere has been inconsistent with his other personnel choices. I think Lafreniere has been bad. I think he's looked lazy and I hate how often he's coasting and how seldom he makes a move for a loose puck. Lafreniere still gets time on the second powerplay unit. He still gets his average of 14.5 minutes per game with mostly appearances on the top two lines. If he were anyone else he'd be seeing time on the 4th line. Quinn says he's pleased with Laf's play. That's something I don't get. His treatment of Kakko, though, falls in line with someone like Buchnevich. Kakko was outright bad last season and I don't think that's on Quinn especially given the Kakko we saw of late prior to his Covid absence. Kakko just wasn't ready for the NHL level last season given his skating and timing. Quinn could've given him more opportunities, but seeing what we saw last season, do we really think he'd have just played himself to another level because of more minutes? He needed an off-season to work on his skating. Quinn wanted him to simplify his game and figure out the North American game first. I think that was a fair ask. It seems like he's accomplishing simpler plays that were much harder for him last season. That's progress, no? Buchnevich was in Quinn's doghouse from the getgo and now he's one of Quinn's trusted defensive forwards and hasn't sacrificed offense in doing so.

 

I think Quinn sucks as a tactician, is inconsistent as a communicator, and is a relatively poor evaluator, but I do think he's consistent in what he asks for.

I’m mostly in agreement with you, especially with the examples of Buch. ADA. Well that ship has sailed regardless but I just think Quinn this year was a bad fit with Tony for a few reasons and that’s one of my biggest problems with the Gorton/ Quinn pairing. They just don’t seem to be on the same page. When you have a GM bring him back only to have a coach bench him periods into game 1, there is some head scratching and co fusion to me. But anyway, it’s not worth the discussion really because we are where we are and neither of us really cares for Quinn. We just have different paths to bring us there lol.

 

Trouba is a difficult one to figure out. But 50 points at 24 in the peg is still 50 points. It was 5th on that team and lead all D there. Plus the eye test of how he’s just not the same looking guy all around to me. It’s definitely a lot more difficult though to know if it’s just that Trouba overachieved or Quinn hinders. Hell, it could be Trouba in NY and his gf, distractions, whatever. Big buff kind of made Trouba take a backseat too until his departure. However I’m not seeing anything with him that makes me say “ok, Jacob is really buying in. He’s co,imo into form.”

 

As for what Quinn is good at, I agree. He’s good at consistency in what he asks for. He sucks at all you mentioned and also for how he treats who doesn’t deliver on that and ignores his message. I think he’s in way over his head. I don’t care how likable he is around the organization. Santa Claus is likeable. I don’t want him coaching my team. I think he’s gotten the bare bones minimum out of the roster result wise for far too many large stretches of the season and that 6 week or so period we had from mid January 20- covid strike in March masked an otherwise shitty coaching job.

 

The weird thing is, his message is north south, strong D, contain, lock things down. Whatever you want to call it. However, that glorious stretch we had last year where from around Jan 7th u til covid hit, we have a lot of games where we score let up 3 goals but score 4+ goals. That’s not a tight defensive style grind things out type game or team. Those are run and gun open hockey games and we thrive with that. I wonder how we would do if we were allowed to be that team again and embrace the actual type of players we have even without kicking the 4th or 5th leading offensive defenseman off the team.

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I can't believe we're still litigating the ADA situation.

 

No, me didn't get blamed for a loss where everyone played badly.

 

No, he wasn't benched for one stupid penalty one game into the season.

 

We need to stop repeating these misrepresentations.

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Trouba is 35 point career average to this point over 7 seasons and then some. I think it's a little more than fair to say that 50 point season may have been an outlier considering the immediate regression. Maybe he just isn't that guy? I also don't see how Trouba's regressing to his mean is a fault of Quinn besides giving DeAngelo what was originally Trouba's powerplay time. There's no disputing DeAngelo was the superior offensive player who fit that top unit more. Maybe Trouba lost some points by not being on the top unit, but he wasn't in Winnipeg either. I can't say whether or not Quinn has had a negative effect on Trouba. He regressed to his average last season and the entire roster has struggled offensively this season. I think Trouba just is what he is and it's not Quinn's fault that he can't make a 27-year-old more.

 

ADA played himself off two other teams without Quinn's help. Maybe Quinn contributed, but it's not as though Tony needed help. Gorton seemed to be in agreement there too. Can't blame everything on Quinn.

 

I have my qualms with Quinn, Boudreau is my avatar for Christ's sake, but I understand some of what he's doing through his execution is inconsistent and imperfect. I think his treatment of Lafreniere has been inconsistent with his other personnel choices. I think Lafreniere has been bad. I think he's looked lazy and I hate how often he's coasting and how seldom he makes a move for a loose puck. Lafreniere still gets time on the second powerplay unit. He still gets his average of 14.5 minutes per game with mostly appearances on the top two lines. If he were anyone else he'd be seeing time on the 4th line. Quinn says he's pleased with Laf's play. That's something I don't get. His treatment of Kakko, though, falls in line with someone like Buchnevich. Kakko was outright bad last season and I don't think that's on Quinn especially given the Kakko we saw of late prior to his Covid absence. Kakko just wasn't ready for the NHL level last season given his skating and timing. Quinn could've given him more opportunities, but seeing what we saw last season, do we really think he'd have just played himself to another level because of more minutes? He needed an off-season to work on his skating. Quinn wanted him to simplify his game and figure out the North American game first. I think that was a fair ask. It seems like he's accomplishing simpler plays that were much harder for him last season. That's progress, no? Buchnevich was in Quinn's doghouse from the getgo and now he's one of Quinn's trusted defensive forwards and hasn't sacrificed offense in doing so.

 

I think Quinn sucks as a tactician, is inconsistent as a communicator, and is a relatively poor evaluator, but I do think he's consistent in what he asks for.

Mostly spot on.

 

What I will say is when they play the way he asks, they get Friday. When they don't, we get Sunday. Why can't he get them to play at a consistent level? That's by biggest issue with him.

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Mostly spot on.

 

What I will say is when they play the way he asks, they get Friday. When they don't, we get Sunday. Why can't he get them to play at a consistent level? That's by biggest issue with him.

 

The crux of things. Quinn never fails to mention competing, winning puck battles, going north and south, going to the net. And yet there are games when looks like the message isn't getting through at all. Whether that's on him failing to make his point clear or players who don't listen, ultimately that's for Gorton to decide. Any coach is going to have a shelf life with a group. Tortarella over the weekend said exactly that; he will coach CBJ or any team until they tell him he's done.

 

In fairness to Quinn, this team has been without ADA completely(simple fact, not an argument), and Trouba and Panarin for significant time. every time Kakko looks ready to break out, he's on the COVID list. Colin Blackwell has contributed more than Zib. The goaltenders have been spotty. They have defined inconsistent. And yet they're still a decent streak away from a playoff berth. Not saying it's given, but not out of the question either. This squad is not a Cup contender , but there's some progress.

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With COVID continuing to be around for quite some time, and Kaako being a risk factor, is he ever going to play? lol It's frustrating considering how much more confident he's looked this year and it's hard when you're going back and forth playing for a bit, and then sitting for a bit.
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As for what Quinn is good at, I agree. He’s good at consistency in what he asks for. He sucks at all you mentioned and also for how he treats who doesn’t deliver on that and ignores his message. I think he’s in way over his head. I don’t care how likable he is around the organization. Santa Claus is likeable. I don’t want him coaching my team. I think he’s gotten the bare bones minimum out of the roster result wise for far too many large stretches of the season and that 6 week or so period we had from mid January 20- covid strike in March masked an otherwise shitty coaching job.

 

 

Agreed. Quinn is definitely someone I'd have a beer with, a Sam Adams I guess because I assume that's all he drinks. He definitely is a personable dude and it's obvious to me that he cares for his players. I had the opportunity to meet him two years ago and had a really nice conversation with him. I gave him a thousand-yard-stare by just mentioning Zuccarello who Quinn apparently misses terribly. It got really awkward. I thought he was gonna cry. That said, crying over lost players and being a nice guy aren't qualifications for being a coach. The Rangers have plenty of development personnel to help usher along their young players. Quinn is just too incapable of helping take NHLers to another level. He's good at preaching fundamentals and knows what makes an NHLer successful but he doesn't know how to pull any strings.

 

 

The weird thing is, his message is north south, strong D, contain, lock things down. Whatever you want to call it. However, that glorious stretch we had last year where from around Jan 7th u til covid hit, we have a lot of games where we score let up 3 goals but score 4+ goals. That’s not a tight defensive style grind things out type game or team. Those are run and gun open hockey games and we thrive with that. I wonder how we would do if we were allowed to be that team again and embrace the actual type of players we have even without kicking the 4th or 5th leading offensive defenseman off the team.

 

I think the difference in defense can be explained by a change of system and personnel. Ruff's style is more run-and-gun while Martin's is about keeping distance and forcing shots to the perimeter. I don't think the offense has necessarily struggled in part because of some new defensive focus. I'd prefer they score more goals, however, it's not as though they're not attempting the same types of plays last season that made them successful. They're just not capitalizing or making much sloppier attempts. I think another part of it is they're not adaptable, and that's on Quinn.

 

Mostly spot on.

 

What I will say is when they play the way he asks, they get Friday. When they don't, we get Sunday. Why can't he get them to play at a consistent level? That's by biggest issue with him.

 

Right. Continuing from above, Quinn lacks the ability to prepare his team for games and subsequently adapt in-game. The Rangers play one style of game, their game. They live and die by it. Play them with any system that works counter to theirs and you win. He says the right things. The players say the right things. No one turns it into practice. There's a serious disconnect.

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I can't believe we're still litigating the ADA situation.

 

No, me didn't get blamed for a loss where everyone played badly.

 

No, he wasn't benched for one stupid penalty one game into the season.

 

We need to stop repeating these misrepresentations.

 

Yes he was. Quinn also said anyone else besides DeAngelo would have gotten benched for it too, if you believe that.

 

https://nypost.com/2021/01/16/tony-deangelo-not-in-rangers-lineup-for-game-vs-islanders/

 

Asked if he would scratch any other player in the lineup if they conducted himself the way DeAngelo did Thursday, Quinn said he would and that it didn’t have anything to do with the fact that it was a repeat offender in DeAngelo.

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Sounds to me like you all want Coach Bombay and you've got Coach Orion.

 

The expectation that an offensively anemic team would be fixed with one or two players because of their draft position - doubly so with both coming off exceptionally odd circumstances prior to their selection - is utterly bizarre. Expecting an 18 or 19 year old to step onto a team that hasn't got a top 6 spot for them, hasn't got a special teams spot for them, and light it up is just...weird. The last player who landed in that kind of spot right out of the draft was Steven Stamkos (center, with Lecavalier and Richards clearly ahead of him on the depth chart).

 

The pattern emerging that offensively gifted youngsters seem to be struggling is worth noting, even though Kakko and Chytil have been significantly better, and Lafreniere does appear to be showing the flashes more consistently. Quinn does not seem to accept "cheating" the offense unless you generate a high quality chance (and/or are named Artemi Panarin) - he wants these kids to play strong defense. There's nothing wrong with that so long as the offense starts to come soon.

 

And enough with the ADA relitigation. Quinn didn't kick him off the team. Gorton did, and if he was really the player you all think he was, perhaps he would have been traded for or grabbed off waivers instead of being the 25 year old house pro at a rink in Sewell, NJ, showing up a bunch of Bantam players.

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Sounds to me like you all want Coach Bombay and you've got Coach Orion.

 

The expectation that an offensively anemic team would be fixed with one or two players because of their draft position - doubly so with both coming off exceptionally odd circumstances prior to their selection - is utterly bizarre. Expecting an 18 or 19 year old to step onto a team that hasn't got a top 6 spot for them, hasn't got a special teams spot for them, and light it up is just...weird. The last player who landed in that kind of spot right out of the draft was Steven Stamkos (center, with Lecavalier and Richards clearly ahead of him on the depth chart).

 

The pattern emerging that offensively gifted youngsters seem to be struggling is worth noting, even though Kakko and Chytil have been significantly better, and Lafreniere does appear to be showing the flashes more consistently. Quinn does not seem to accept "cheating" the offense unless you generate a high quality chance (and/or are named Artemi Panarin) - he wants these kids to play strong defense. There's nothing wrong with that so long as the offense starts to come soon.

 

And enough with the ADA relitigation. Quinn didn't kick him off the team. Gorton did, and if he was really the player you all think he was, perhaps he would have been traded for or grabbed off waivers instead of being the 25 year old house pro at a rink in Sewell, NJ, showing up a bunch of Bantam players.

 

ADA will be an ongoing theme this year because of the lack of emotion and consistency exhibited by the team. What happened to start off the season with ADA will be intertwined all year because he was one of their better offensive players, the team looks like dog shit for half the games, and they are forced to ice AHL defensemen in his wake.

 

When the team starts showing up to more games, starts winning more games, and more players start to look like they give a shit on a daily basis, then the talk will naturally die off.

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"Enough with the Deangelo stuff, now just let me get in one last snarky word devoid of any facts, or reality"

 

If you'd like to point out which part of that isn't a fact, be my guest. There's a clear difference between being snarky and presenting facts that you just flat out don't like.

 

I'll look forward to your pointing out the non-factual elements.

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ADA will be an ongoing theme this year because of the lack of emotion and consistency exhibited by the team. What happened to start off the season with ADA will be intertwined all year because he was one of their better offensive players, the team looks like dog shit for half the games, and they are forced to ice AHL defensemen in his wake.

 

When the team starts showing up to more games, starts winning more games, and more players start to look like they give a shit on a daily basis, then the talk will naturally die off.

 

Yes, and DeAngelo — who was giving up a goal 75% of the time he was on the ice, statistically — was a major reason why. He had one point — an assist — through six games. He was a collective minus-six. Coming out of DeAngelo's final game against Pittsburgh (a minus-three performance), the team were 20th in GA/GP (3.00), tied for 19th in goal differential (-3), and 21st in GF/GP (2.75). Since then, they're ninth in GA/GP (2.68), 14th in goal differential (-2), and 26th in GF/GP (2.58).

 

Given that DeAngelo was clearly not helping out on offense, I'm having a really difficult time buying the argument that his absence is somehow responsible for the slip in production, or the team's overall woes, considering the massive improvement in scoring against when he's not in the lineup.

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ADA will be an ongoing theme this year because of the lack of emotion and consistency exhibited by the team. What happened to start off the season with ADA will be intertwined all year because he was one of their better offensive players, the team looks like dog shit for half the games, and they are forced to ice AHL defensemen in his wake.

 

When the team starts showing up to more games, starts winning more games, and more players start to look like they give a shit on a daily basis, then the talk will naturally die off.

 

Is it honestly fair to expect a young team like ours to be consistent? Even with our relative youth nonwithstanding - we're missing three of our top six forwards, one of our top defenders, and Mika's colder than a witch's tit at Lake Vostok. That we're even treading water missing this many key players is borderline miraculous. What team survives losing half their top 6?

 

The saving grace here has been that our defenders have really stepped up. Nobody out there looks out of place. Miller looks like a grown ass man already. Fox and Lindgren look great. Dare I say it - Johnson and Smith look competent (and yes, Pete, when Johnson keeps this up, you may serve my crow). Hajek looks absolutely fine. Bitetto has been more than acceptable. We're not exactly struggling back there right now.

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Yes, and DeAngelo — who was giving up a goal 75% of the time he was on the ice, statistically — was a major reason why. He had one point — an assist — through six games. He was a collective minus-six. Coming out of DeAngelo's final game against Pittsburgh (a minus-three performance), the team were 20th in GA/GP (3.00), tied for 19th in goal differential (-3), and 21st in GF/GP (2.75). Since then, they're ninth in GA/GP (2.68), 14th in goal differential (-2), and 26th in GF/GP (2.58).

 

Given that DeAngelo was clearly not helping out on offense, I'm having a really difficult time buying the argument that his absence is somehow responsible for the slip in production, or the team's overall woes, considering the massive improvement in scoring against when he's not in the lineup.

 

This whole season can be described as "expectations and reality often don't align". In sports and politics, folks often incorrectly place blame on either leadership or hindsight. Leadership is Quinn - who, bluntly, I think is doing quite a bit with what he's given even if he's not getting the offense from some key places. Hindsight is DeAngelo.

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ADA will be an ongoing theme this year because of the lack of emotion and consistency exhibited by the team. What happened to start off the season with ADA will be intertwined all year because he was one of their better offensive players, the team looks like dog shit for half the games, and they are forced to ice AHL defensemen in his wake.

 

When the team starts showing up to more games, starts winning more games, and more players start to look like they give a shit on a daily basis, then the talk will naturally die off.

 

ADA will be a theme this year because he's a Trump supporter and there's (another) conspiracy theory among Trump supporters that he got kicked off the team because he supported Trump.

 

Not because he was immature and couldn't keep his mouth shut or temper in check.

 

Let's be honest about what's actually happening and don't act like it's hockey-related, because ADA had been abjectly terrible on the ice this season.

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Yes, and DeAngelo — who was giving up a goal 75% of the time he was on the ice, statistically — was a major reason why. He had one point — an assist — through six games. He was a collective minus-six. Coming out of DeAngelo's final game against Pittsburgh (a minus-three performance), the team were 20th in GA/GP (3.00), tied for 19th in goal differential (-3), and 21st in GF/GP (2.75). Since then, they're ninth in GA/GP (2.68), 14th in goal differential (-2), and 26th in GF/GP (2.58).

 

Given that DeAngelo was clearly not helping out on offense, I'm having a really difficult time buying the argument that his absence is somehow responsible for the slip in production, or the team's overall woes, considering the massive improvement in scoring against when he's not in the lineup.

 

I'm not sure when it became acceptable to use 6 games as a legitimate sample size to evaluate a player, especially after the numbers he put up last year. Not to mention, when he was booted off PP1 after less than a game which was his bread and butter last season, though I'm not sure that would have mattered with how Zibanejad alone has dragged down the entire PP1 anyway. Perhaps DeAngelo would have eventually helped get him going there, who knows. We won't know now. You are usually reasonable when it comes to recognizing small sample size, so why are you jumping through hoops to make it work in this case?

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