Where are the Fire Hakstol chants now?

[ruxpin]

18 minutes ago, Samifan said:

Of that group, I agree with Q and Trotz. I would pass on all others.

 

If...IF...we fired Hak and Q was available, that's the way to go.    If Quenneville gets fired, I'm not firing Hak just to bring him in.   We've already seen that Quenneville hasn't proven any better than Hak when anchored down by a flawed roster of overpaid space-fillers and subpar goaltending.   Maybe he's still able to work with a bunch of kids, but at 60 I'm suspicious.  Some may be awed by the name so that would help, but I'm thinking he'll have to have a really strong set of younger assistants.

 

I would not hire Trotz.  I would have in a New York minute after his time in Nashville.  I didn't agree with his firing there.   I was wrong.  I guess get strong in the regular season and then worry about the playoffs, so Trotz would be good there.  But he doesn't impress me as someone who can get his team to play when the chips are down.

 

Of the list, though, I agree these are the only two that get a second thought.

[brelic]

7 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

Who is responsible for that?   TK and Provy are finishing their 2nd years and Patrick his first.  Ghost 2 1/2.  And they're playing like vets?  I agree.   But at what point does the coach get some credit for that?

 

Can he also do it with the plethora of kids still coming?  Personally, I think it's worthwhile to wait and see.      Maybe if the Blues had waited with Coach Q they'd have a couple of banners.    Quenneville will be 60 before next season starts.   He has some years left in him, of course, but I'd like to see this coach grow with his players and see what he does when he has more of the kids and some decent goaltending and less of the fat geriatrics and drunk goalies.

 

Hak absolutely gets credit for helping the young guys along. I think he's handled them well. It's the NHL - there's no such thing as 'treat every player the same way.' That's for the everyone-gets-a-trophy crowd. 

 

And in that aspect, he's done well. 

 

 

[brelic]

5 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

If...IF...we fired Hak and Q was available, that's the way to go.    If Quenneville gets fired, I'm not firing Hak just to bring him in.   We've already seen that Quenneville hasn't proven any better than Hak when anchored down by a flawed roster of overpaid space-fillers and subpar goaltending.   Maybe he's still able to work with a bunch of kids, but at 60 I'm suspicious.  Some may be awed by the name so that would help, but I'm thinking he'll have to have a really strong set of younger assistants.

 

I would not hire Trotz.  I would have in a New York minute after his time in Nashville.  I didn't agree with his firing there.   I was wrong.  I guess get strong in the regular season and then worry about the playoffs, so Trotz would be good there.  But he doesn't impress me as someone who can get his team to play when the chips are down.

 

Of the list, though, I agree these are the only two that get a second thought.

 

Agreed on Trotz. He's kind of a Bruce Boudreau, isn't he? Strong regular seasons, underwhelming when it counts in the playoffs.

 

[flyer4ever]

He has done well with the tools he has in the tool box. Some questionable time out none calls and calls, some iffy challenges, but not all that bad in the big picture. Hard to be a great coach when you have to choose an east coast league goalie every night.

[ruxpin]

1 minute ago, brelic said:

 

Hak absolutely gets credit for helping the young guys along. I think he's handled them well. It's the NHL - there's no such thing as 'treat every player the same way.' That's for the everyone-gets-a-trophy crowd. 

 

And in that aspect, he's done well. 

 

 

 

I knew I was preaching to the choir with my post.  

 

It's actually been an evolution of thought on him for me.  Or devolution depending upon where one stands on this.     I've moved from "I'll pack his bags for him and drive him to the airport" to "something is working with the kids and more are coming, so let's just put this firing thing on hold for a bit."

[ruxpin]

1 minute ago, flyer4ever said:

He has done well with the tools he has in the tool box. Some questionable time out none calls and calls, some iffy challenges, but not all that bad in the big picture. Hard to be a great coach when you have to choose an east coast league goalie every night.

 

Short, sweet, and summarizes it nicely.   Couldn't agree more.

[murraycraven]

2 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

I knew I was preaching to the choir with my post.  

 

It's actually been an evolution of thought on him for me.  Or devolution depending upon where one stands on this.     I've moved from "I'll pack his bags for him and drive him to the airport" to "something is working with the kids and more are coming, so let's just put this firing thing on hold for a bit."

 

I am definitely not sold on Hak and some of his in-game decisions are mind boggling.   With that said you can't take away the positives that he has brought.   I really want to see how he handles things next year provided he has some more talent to work with.

 

Again, he is still on the proverbial leash for me but he also working with less than superb pieces.  Can he better?  Absolutely and hopefully with more talent we see some of the ice time shifting to players that can contribute.

[mojo1917]

22 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

Personally, I think it's worthwhile to wait and see.      Maybe if the Blues had waited with Coach Q they'd have a couple of banners.

so you're coming from the "don't bring your bucket in before it rains" theory...because no one knows the future; that is one of the tougher choices.  sometimes you wait and all you have is an empty bucket, sometimes it fills nicely.  when does one make "the move" such a tough question.

[ruxpin]

30 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

so you're coming from the "don't bring your bucket in before it rains" theory...because no one knows the future; that is one of the tougher choices.  sometimes you wait and all you have is an empty bucket, sometimes it fills nicely.  when does one make "the move" such a tough question.

Oh, completely agree.  To stick with my example, I wasn't critical of the Blues when they let him go. Only in hindsight.  And I actually don't think he wins a cup if he stays in St. Louis.  It's hard to say and we'll never know. 

 

I guess I understand your bucket motif, but I think it's more that I think such things are simply an intersection of ingredients at the right time at the pro level (college bb and football, etc are a little different).  Not simply happenstance, but a convergence of things not always intrinsically connected. 

 

(kind of borrowed from a Longue Duree view of history. Napoleon didn't happen just because of Napoleon. The build and flow of history created a convergence that brought about his emergence. Had it not been Napoleon, it would have been some guy named Bob). 

 

A GM brings players in. Sometimes it's a couple different GMs. A coach, having very little control over his roster, has the right message for the right group of players at the right time who face the right opponents at the right moment and bam, a championship.  

 

I guess what I was getting at was that Q wasn't the "right" guy in St. Louis. Maybe he would have been had he stayed, but we'll never know. Maybe he assessed what he did wrong in St. Louis. Maybe it waa a change that required starting over. Who knows?  But he obviously was successful in Chicago.  He also obviously hasn't been with a meh roster. 

 

I don't know that bringing him here gets you the results he had in Chicago (or even which results) or St. Louis.  IF you're firing Hak already independent of whoever is available (performance, etc.) and Q becomes available, it's worth finding out the answer to that question.  

 

But if Chicago fires Q, I don't fire Hakstol just to go get Q to find out.  I'd rather find out about what we already have. 

[Samifan]

If the Flyers hired Trotz, at least Philly could celebrate a couple President’s trophy’s before being swept in the 1st round. 

[elmatus]

2 hours ago, brelic said:

 

I'm thinking Quenneville will be available. Maybe Boucher out of Ottawa? McLellan? Vigneault? Maybe Trotz if the Caps are a one-and-done?

 

Out of those, I'd take Q and Trotz for sure. Don't know about the others. 

 

 

Like many others here, I think it's only logical at this point to start looking at what factor the coach has been in the team's overall output this season. That is as applicable to the early 2018 winning streak as to the much more problematic string of games we were privy to both before and now after that streak.

 

Frankly, I'm just not sure he's got what it takes. I do get the idea of bringing up a successful college coach to see if he can adjust to the big game, but in doing so we have to understand there is a solid chance he simply isn't up to snuff. There needs to be a limit to how many chances he gets, and it seems entirely logical to me that his coaching ability be called into question in all accounts.

 

Here's how I take it: Though the season has been a rollercoaster, it's quite evident to me that we have some very talented players on the roster. In many cases, these players seem to will victories whenever we get them. When we don't win, it's usually because these players couldn't play the hero that night. We rarely seem to win based on game structure or team play. We win if Giroux proves he's one of the best going, or if TK makes half the opposing line his collective b****, or if Voracek stumbles his way into position and magically gets a lucky bounce. Add Patrick and Ghost, and you have what is essentially our formula for winning.

 

Now you could say that's true of any team, but I don't think it is. I think there are many many teams in the league who have far fewer high level players and who manage to play more consistently to get wins. These are teams that play as a team with a proper structure that makes individual ability less of a factor. This year's Flyers are just not that kind of team. If no one plays hero, we don't win. That's a problem.

 

Is it a coach problem? I do think it starts there. We have a weak bottom six, fine, but so do many other teams. We have a mediocre defensive core, fine, but many other teams are even worse off than us. Good coaches are those who win with the cards their dealt, not those who win because they happen to have Crosby, Malkin, Kessel, and Letang.

 

Bottom line: This team should be playing better than it is. When we first started looking at what this team could achieve, it was based on a much weaker Giroux, Voracek, and no emergence of Couturier. It was based on a loose understanding that TK was probably pretty good, and that Ghost may not be as great as his rookie season would suggest. Instead of all that, we've had tremendous play from all of those guys, which is not something any of us expected when we said: "We're probably looking at a bubble playoff team".

 

I believe all those guys are elite level (and I haven't mentioned Provo in there). That means we effectively have six elite level players. That's six players who can play at a level generally above most NHL players. That's a lot. A lot a lot. If I had that info to start the season, I would consider this team a lock for the playoffs. Who wouldn't? That's more firepower than many if not most other teams who have better records.

 

So what else could it be? Goaltending? Yeah, for sure. Mrazek keeps getting tossed under the bus, and for good reason, but the truth is none of the goalies we've had this year have been anywhere close to good. Full stop. Clearly, that doesn't help cultivate a winning record. That said, much as you pointed out, it isn't all about them either. When we talk about defensive breakdowns and forwards who don't play the back side of the puck well, that to me is a coaching problem.

 

Should Hakstol be fired? They have the talent and ability to be better than they've shown for much of the season. They shouldn't require heroics to win games. To me, that problem is on the coach.

[brelic]

1 hour ago, elmatus said:

Now you could say that's true of any team, but I don't think it is. I think there are many many teams in the league who have far fewer high level players and who manage to play more consistently to get wins.

 

So in the interest of science -

 

1. Who are these teams that win consistently with far fewer high level players?

2. How do you define consistency? 

 

I'm not saying I doubt you, only that I want to know that we're talking about the same things

 

 

[mojo1917]

1 hour ago, elmatus said:

That said, much as you pointed out, it isn't all about them either. When we talk about defensive breakdowns and forwards who don't play the back side of the puck well, that to me is a coaching problem.

I read a great Meltzer blog post that talked about execution.

http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=92059&blogger_id=45

This was explaining the PK but it applies every where to everyone.

While hockey is a bottom-line business and the Flyers overall PK success rates in recent years have been below average, the "Lappy simply can't coach a PK" narrative would need to account for why the team was at 84.8 percent on the penalty kill his first year and 83.1 percent in the second half of 2015-16 (80.5 percent for the fill season, due to a rough first half). Either he's randomly known and then forgotten -- and then briefly recalls again only to forget anew-- how to coach a PK or it's primarily a matter of personnel not executing. 

For example, in the recent game in Dallas, Gudas had a cross-ice pass threaded right between his feet from Tyler Seguin to Alexander Radulov and then, seconds later neither budged Brett Ritchie from his position in front of the net (tough to do against Ritchie even for the bearish Gudas) nor established any sort of stick position. This was NOT a coaching failure or a systemic issue. It was an failure of one-on-one basics that any NHL penalty killer knows he has to accomplish. 

Likewise, executing clearing opportunities with the puck isn't a coaching issue. It's a matter of personnel bearing down and getting the job done, as Matt Read very nicely did about 4-5 times in Sunday's game against the Bruins. One can question the choice of personnel and sticking with players who aren't getting the job done but the specific breakdowns that most frequently have hurt the Flyers on the PK have been more about the personnel not executing than how they've been coached. 

 

If your guy Hagg isn't all the way healthy or Gudas is showing better than player X ...what is there to be done?  If player Y represents the best option on a particular night but fails to execute ? Other than sitting player Y what recourse is there ? Even when you do send the non-executing player to the press box for an evening who then takes his place ? A player that was behind player Y on the depth chart.

I don't know if I think or can buy into the narrative "breakdowns are a result of poor coaching" exclusively. 

 

 

[mojo1917]

3 hours ago, ruxpin said:

I don't know that bringing him here gets you the results he had in Chicago (or even which results) or St. Louis.  IF you're firing Hak already independent of whoever is available (performance, etc.) and Q becomes available, it's worth finding out the answer to that question.  

 

But if Chicago fires Q, I don't fire Hakstol just to go get Q to find out.  I'd rather find out about what we already have.

This, nicely said.

 

You also mentioned Q's age, at 60 how hot is the fire burning ? He could be in cashing them checks mode ala Don Nelson in his last few years with the Mavericks (after they didn't sign Steve Nash).

 

Any way to pry Jon Cooper out of Tampa ? Truth be told I like the way Sullivan coaches in Pgh too...don't tell anyone *shifty eyes*

[AJgoal]

Here's the thing that bugs me. And it's not something I'm sure he'll ever grow out of.

 

Yes, he has some middling-poor players on the team.

 

He doesn't have to ice them, at least not in critical situations. But he does. Consistently. Could anyone not see that game-tying goal by the Bruins coming, even before MacDonald iced the puck? Filpulla is the least effective forward at killing penalties after Leier. Yet he's played the second most PK minutes. Lehtera is next, but he's stapled to Filpulla on the second PK unit. Laughton has a much better GA/60 rate, but he doesn't see the ice in PK situations anymore. Simmonds was one of the top PKers on the entire team, but he's not playing there, either. You can try guys like Patrick, Konecny, Lindblom, Sanheim late in games. Maybe they surprise you. You're not likely to get worse results. If the vets have proven they can't do it, give the kids a chance to prove that they can.

[Pucked in the head]

There's a train leaving 30th St station at 7:15  who cares where it's going just put him on it ! 

[elmatus]

4 hours ago, brelic said:

 

So in the interest of science -

 

1. Who are these teams that win consistently with far fewer high level players?

2. How do you define consistency? 

 

I'm not saying I doubt you, only that I want to know that we're talking about the same things

 

 

 

I'm not sure how detailed you want to get. I know you like stats, so let's start there. I'll pick some comparables first: say NJ (similar record) and Tampa (much better record).

 

50+ PTS (Primary scoring)

PHI: Giroux (97), Voracek (83), Couturier (72), Ghost (62)

NJD: Hall (93), Hischier (51)

TBL: Kucherov (98), Stamkos (86), Point (65), Gourde (61), Hedman (61)

 

30-50 PTS (Secondary scoring)

PHI: TK (47), Simmonds (46), Provo (39), Filppula (33)

NJD: Palmieri (44), Butcher (44), Bratt (35)

TBL: Johnson (49), Killorn (44), Sergachev (39), Palat (33)

 

A quick look at just this tells me the Flyers have far more scoring ability than NJ. As far as Tampa goes, the teams are much closer. TBL is better, but not nearly as much as we might think if we just looked at league standings. In many ways, I would expect both teams to have similar records based on scoring alone, but we all know this isn't the case at all.

 

Of course, there's more to hockey than scoring. Defence is harder to gauge, but let's try some combination of:

 

Shots Against/GP

PHI: 5th overall

NJD: 16th overall

TBL: 22nd overall

 

Faceoff Win Percentage

PHI: 2nd overall

NJD: 30th overall

TBL: 22nd overall

 

Takeaways

PHI: 27th overall

NJD: 7th overall

TBL: 18th overall

 

Three comparisons. We could do a bunch more, but I think this makes sense. We've been significantly better than both NJ and TB in preventing shots against; in fact, we've been near the top of the league all year in this. We win more faceoffs than almost anyone, and far more than the other two. We don't have nearly as many takeaways, which seems odd when considering the first stat, but is largely explained when looking at the second one in the list. As the old saying goes: When you win the faceoff, you don't have to chase it.

 

For fun, let's look at goaltending:

 

PHI: Elliott (41 GP | .908%sv% | 29 SA/GP), Neuvirth (22 GP | .915sv% | 24 SA/GP), Mrazek (17 GP | .891sv% | 26 SA/GP)

TBL: Vasilevsky (64 GP | .921sv% | 32 SA/GP)

NJD: Kinkaid (40 GP | .911sv% | 29 SA/GP), Schneider (39 GP | .909sv% | 31 SA/GP)

 

What does this tell us? Well, for starters it reinforces the defensive trends in that the Flyers allow far fewer shots against per game in many cases. Only Elliott has faced a similar number of shots to the TBL and NJD goalies. Neuvirth and Mrazek have both faced a good amount less. Despite this, Mrazek in particular has the worse sv% by a considerable margin. Vasilevsky is outplaying everyone. Elliott and the NJ duo are largely a wash in this regard.

 

What does all this mean? Well, it paints a fun picture to me in that our top players are actually strikingly similar to Tampa Bay and are markedly better than New Jersey; however, our record places us almost identical to NJ and far below TB.

 

Obviously there must be more to take into account. Stats only give us so much. For actual systems and the like, we would need other measures (or the good ol eyeball test).

 

[OccamsRazor]

10 hours ago, elmatus said:

Despite this, Mrazek in particular has the worse sv% by a considerable margin.

 

Didn't need all those fancy stats to know he is hot garbage...just watch him play.

 

10 hours ago, elmatus said:

 

Obviously there must be more to take into account.

 

Yeah so who are the Bolt's and Devil's Lehterrible/Filpukka types they skate out there after scoring a huge goal, there i'm sure is the true difference makers...

 

[Bertmega]

All I have to say is G is suck. 

[brelic]

Not sure where to put this, but I couldn't pass up posting it. Things could always be worse lol.

 

 

 

Adam Gretz@AGretz

 

I don't mean to keep hitting this dead horse but of the top-25 scorers in the NHL only 7, at any point in their career, have been traded.

Four of them were traded by Peter Chiarelli.

8. Taylor Hall
9. Phil Kessel
11. Blake Wheeler
25. Tyler Seguin

That's not just bad luck.

11:39 PM - Mar 27, 2018

[elmatus]

2 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

Yeah so who are the Bolt's and Devil's Lehterrible/Filpukka types they skate out there after scoring a huge goal, there i'm sure is the true difference makers...

 

Very good question. Let's try looking at TOI/GP*:

*I've excluded most players (one exception) who split time between teams, mostly cause I'm not going to dig for separate stats per team. I think we can do without just fine for our amateur purposes.

 

13:00+ TOI/GP - Forwards (excluding all those mentioned above)

PHI: Filppula (16:29), Lindblom (14:32), Patrick (13:37), Raffl (13:14)

NJD: Zajac (17:54), Johanssen (15:59), Gibbons (14:23), Zacha (14:19), Coleman (14:19), Stafford (13:52), Boyle (13:19), Quenneville (13:17), Noesen (13:14),

TBL: Peca (13:40), Callahan (13:17), Cirelli (13:00)

 

16:00+ TOI/GP - Dmen (top pairing included for comparison)

PHI: Provo (24:10), Ghost (21:28), MacDonald (19:50), Hagg (18:08), Manning (17:56), Gudas (17:04)

NJD: Vatanen (22:42)*, Greene (21:05), Santini (20:16), Moore (19:59), Severson (19:39), Lovejoy (16:36), Mueller (16:26)

TBL: Hedman (25:48), Stralman (21:26), Girardi (17:21), Dotchin (16:29), Coburn (16:09)

*Vatanen wasn't with NJ all year, but he is their top dman, so I felt it needed to be noted. It's likely his TOI/GP is similar to Greene. McDonagh was left out because his TOI is harder to figure out. He plays a lesser role in TB than he did in NY, where he was essentially their no.1 guy. If he had played this role with TB all year, he'd likely be similar to his 2nd pairing partner (Girardi).

 

So a straight look at TOI/GP tells us NJD runs a much longer bench than either us or TB. Looking at these numbers, it definitely seems like we and TB favour playing our top six a majority of the time, while NJ rolls their bottom six much more regularly. The situation is similar for second and third pairing dmen. Both we and TB seem to rely more heavily on our top two than NJ who seems to spread the ice time more all around.

 

To answer your initial question, who would these teams have to compare to someone like Lehtera and Filppula?

 

Lehtera

30 yrs old, highest pts in a season = 44

2017-18: TOI/GP 10:30, 8 PTS

 

Filppula

34 yrs old, highest pts = 66

2017-18: TOI/GP 16:29, 33 PTS

 

Stafford

32 yrs old, highest pts = 52

2017-18: TOI/GP 13:52, 15 PTS

 

Callahan

33 yrs old, highest pts = 54

2017-18: TOI/GP 13:17, 17 PTS

 

This is probably the closest we'll get to comparables. They're all about the same age. Honestly though, both Stafford and Callahan are better players than Lehtera by any metric I've looked at in their NHL careers. The best we can say as far as comparing goes in this case is that neither TB nor NJ have a "Lehtera".

 

As far as Fil goes, the opposite is also true. He's been a more effective player than any of the others in his career, and there's a solid argument to be made he's still the best of the bunch this season.

[mkscrewy]

this maybe shouldn't surprise anyone here, but here's an excerpt from Charlie O'Connor regarding our loss to the NYI

 

 

[mkscrewy]

2 hours ago, brelic said:

Not sure where to put this, but I couldn't pass up posting it. Things could always be worse lol.

 

 

 

Adam Gretz@AGretz

 

I don't mean to keep hitting this dead horse but of the top-25 scorers in the NHL only 7, at any point in their career, have been traded.

Four of them were traded by Peter Chiarelli.

8. Taylor Hall
9. Phil Kessel
11. Blake Wheeler
25. Tyler Seguin

That's not just bad luck.

11:39 PM - Mar 27, 2018

 

oof!!!

[brelic]

1 hour ago, mkscrewy said:

 

oof!!!

 

Exactly. I don't understand how that man has a job with any professional hockey team. 

[murraycraven]

21 hours ago, AJgoal said:

Here's the thing that bugs me. And it's not something I'm sure he'll ever grow out of.

 

Yes, he has some middling-poor players on the team.

 

He doesn't have to ice them, at least not in critical situations. But he does. Consistently. Could anyone not see that game-tying goal by the Bruins coming, even before MacDonald iced the puck? Filpulla is the least effective forward at killing penalties after Leier. Yet he's played the second most PK minutes. Lehtera is next, but he's stapled to Filpulla on the second PK unit. Laughton has a much better GA/60 rate, but he doesn't see the ice in PK situations anymore. Simmonds was one of the top PKers on the entire team, but he's not playing there, either. You can try guys like Patrick, Konecny, Lindblom, Sanheim late in games. Maybe they surprise you. You're not likely to get worse results. If the vets have proven they can't do it, give the kids a chance to prove that they can.