Around the NHL 11 - 2023/24

[Buffdog]

The Stars once had Benn and Seguin as their top talent. Their coaching staff was clever enough to bump them down from their top units to give ice time to guys like, you know, Hintz and Robertson - that's the talent that is now making way for the Johnstons and Stankovens of the world. Nobody there is playing 20 a night, which helps them accommodate their talented youth into a role where they can actually make a difference. Aside from Heiskanen (who's a defenseman anyway), nobody is playing anywhere near "too much".

When you compare that to our system of two scoring lines, the Lowry unit and table scraps, you'll see the difference. We could incorporate new talent, but we're making it damn difficult for ourselves by not opening up the spots for our guys.


Not angry (fortunately), but it's getting rather tiresome to see the same people pushing the same excuses for the same things that the organisation handles poorly in the same fashion.

I don't think that people expressing views that you don't share are necessarily making excuses. They're just disagreeing, and believe it or not (gasp), YOU could be wrong

Here is the fundamental flaw in your logic...

The Jets doesn't achieve their desired outcome: true

The Jets didn't integrate youth into the line up: also true

Therefore, the Jets didn't achieve their desired outcome BECAUSE they didn't integrate youth into their line up: false, and unprovable

You're mentioning Dallas a lot as a team that had success with youth in their line up, but why aren't you focused on teams that also integrated youth into their line up but had POOR outcomes? The reality is that the Jets possibly could have been worse had they stuck with Perfetti when he was on his cold streak and/or brought Heinola up after his injury (Moose coach said that it took him until the end of the season to get his skating back up to pre-injury levels). We'll never know

 

[RustyCat]

Different people can have different takes on it. I know a guy who was pivotal in starting the nar-anon program in Manitoba years ago. His view was that recovery starts with ownership of one's actions. I guess this could devolve into a discussion about the concept of free will, but that's WAY off topic.

Personally, I come from a family history of alcoholism. When I choose to drink, I often find myself asking why I'm doing it, since I know it's terrible for me. I then have all the justifications. But there's definitely an inner dialogue

I also recognize the addictive nature of my genes and that's led me to make certain decisions, too. I watched how my parents were slaves to their cigarettes and vowed to never end up like that. That's why I never even tried smoking. I was always afraid I'd like it, and never be able to stop. Same with recreational drugs and painkillers (through multiple severe injuries and surgeries).

So Stumby does have a point in that whatever substance(s) you've struggled within the past, the first time you dabbled in them WAS your choice. That's not to say that getting clean is as easy as just making that choice either. It's obviously a complex and nuanced conversation that recognizes that everyone's biochemistry and learned experiences are different

I hear you and appreciate the response. I would suggest a big difference is your own awareness of your circumstance that it may lead to an issue. Good on you for recognizing that because you may have been 100% correct. But most do not have this awareness and yes they make a choice to drink or ingest, but very much unaware of the how and why. I have friends exactly like you that have that awareness and choose not to because they will go down the rabbit hole. And for them, they are probably right. But overwhelmingly most do not and enter into an escapism that tracks to wreck everything you know. I was one of those people. And it is very hard to get out of once you are into it.

 

[surixon]

I don't think 4th line minutes is the only way to bring in young players. We talk about rewarding Perfetti's play in the 1st half when the team's reward for putting him in that spot was next to no production for 20+ games. The way the Jets are constructed they can't really hide that drought in the top 6 and still succeed. When you have forwards like Hintz, Pavelski, Benn, Robertson, Faksa, Seguin, even Duchene this year, you can afford to give more responsibility to the younger guys. Lowry's line doesnt score. The 4th line doesn't score.

Harley can get minutes when his partner is someone like Suter or Heiskanen, or even recently Tanev, and not Neal Pionk.

Fortunately, as of now it looks like there'll be some opportunity in the top 6 next season.

That was still the choice of the org to go with the setup they did. Perfetti's drought in the top 6 was only 11 games. The rest happened on the fourth line where as you pointed out nobody scored. So it's a bit disingenuous when people keep bringing it up like it was all in the top 6.

Also once we got said vets are you telling me we didn't have enough talent to spread out the scoring? A roster with 7 top 6 talents and a border line one in Name should have been able to dress three talented lines that could score. We just chose to stubbornly stick to a top 6, checking, and energy setup.

 

[gojetsgo]

also guess people are forgetting that pefetti wasn't even the 1st person taken out of the top 6 when we acquired monahan...

 

[Adam da bomb]

I can do that, but I am going to address this. I doubt it will change your mind but maybe someone reading can get some perspective.

You need to understand that the overwhelming majority of people who are addicts, booze drugs or otherwise, are wired long before they ever encounter the substance or behaviour. Addiction has been directly linked to historical and childhood trauma - if you need you can look into Dr. Gabor Mate's work on this. He is regarded as the world's leading physician on addiction, and just happens to be Canadian as well. The pathology is linked far before someone encounters a substance and is strongly influenced by environmental factors, especially as impressionable ages. This is the case for most addicts, not all, but most. I have met hundreds and hundreds of people in recovery programs and this is uniformly across the board. And just to confuse you even more, the substance or behaviour (ie: gambling or other process addictions) has nothing to do with the addiction. Thats why the irony of programs like AA is that is has nothing to do with alcohol recovery. It is because the essence of addiction has nothing to do what you take or when you take it, it has to do with how it has manifested in ones life and why they take it.

So did he know the consequences? Probably so. Was he powerless against the addiction and doomed to repeat it again and again and again? 100% he was with out proper supports and a solid recovery program. Every single person I know in recovery came to a point where they did not want to use or drink, but they did anyway. I woke up some days dead set on not drinking that day but would wind up, every single time, drinking. It is powerful beyond measure and there are no sufficient mental faculties to take it on by yourself. It is irrelevant on your gender, creed, ethnicity, profession, religion, or income - if you have some serious underlying trauma(s) that predispose you to be a significant risk, the you might be in a heap of trouble.

This is one of the most misunderstood diseases out there and the stigma out there is really bad. Because to a person, every person I know in recovery would loved to have had the choice to say no. It is far more complex that people think and it is not as simple as not taking a drug or a drink. The roots are much, much deeper and the current research supports that.

So you may say f*** this guy and put me on ignore, and that is fine. But I am going to continue to do what I usual do and that is to challenge the mainstream narrative and address misconceptions. And provided someone isn't a total ignorant asshole, I will gladly partake in a discussion.

I would imagine that the team would hire someone to support him. They’d try to get him to meet with the team therapist who they have on retainer and all the players meet with to get a psychological edge.
It’s an interesting question how much is on the individual once friends and family try to put supports in place. For instance, if he is sneaking out to drink it is impossible for people to watch him 24/7 or put him under house arrest. I dont know how much support the avs gave him, no one does, but, that would be ridiculous if they didn’t try to put supports in place considering how much they have invested in him.

 

[Maukkis]

I don't think that people expressing views that you don't share are necessarily making excuses. They're just disagreeing, and believe it or not (gasp), YOU could be wrong

Here is the fundamental flaw in your logic...

The Jets doesn't achieve their desired outcome: true

The Jets didn't integrate youth into the line up: also true

Therefore, the Jets didn't achieve their desired outcome BECAUSE they didn't integrate youth into their line up: false, and unprovable

You're mentioning Dallas a lot as a team that had success with youth in their line up, but why aren't you focused on teams that also integrated youth into their line up but had POOR outcomes? The reality is that the Jets possibly could have been worse had they stuck with Perfetti when he was on his cold streak and/or brought Heinola up after his injury (Moose coach said that it took him until the end of the season to get his skating back up to pre-injury levels). We'll never know

Because we're discussing the Jets and the Stars, probably. If you want to provide some other point of view into the mix, go ahead and do it yourself.

 

[surixon]

The biggest challenge is the third line checking line be all end all.... Johnston, Stankoven got their feet wet on the 3rd line and then moved up... Dallas rolls four lines because they dont have top tier talent - Jets need to do the same

This season it really was 2nd line or 4th line as the options not just for rookies... I really liked Bones but that was far too rigid. Lowry is a bit of a problem because he's a very very solid player with meat hands - how do you play him without just calling it a shutdown line

That's the crux of the issue. But one solution would be to take 2 and a half minutes from the overplayed Scheifele line and give it to the "fourth" and have it be a third scoring line.

 

[Adam da bomb]

That's the crux of the issue. But one solution would be to take 2 and a half minutes from the overplayed Scheifele line and give it to the "fourth" and have it be a third scoring line.

Is the 1st line overplayed or do schief and kc extend their shifts. How much of a fight do you want to get with your #1 centre?

 

[Orrrules]

Nuke was leading the playoffs in goals that is a huge loss for the Avs.

However, if you watch the Stars defend they always have 3 guys sometimes 4 in the NZ stalling the Avs before they can get up to speed....duh.

 

[WolfHouse]

Is the 1st line overplayed or do schief and kc extend their shifts. How much of a fight do you want to get with your #1 centre?

I think this is a huge issue... as the season progressed, our top line started cheating more and more on their shifts and their changes... but Bowness didn't have to shorten his bench for his 'all-star' line that never worked either.

 

[surixon]

this is literally the lamest excuse I have ever read... perfetti struggled because his coach didn't believe in him!

That's fine. I'm just presenting another viewpoint. But it is certainly easy for him and his agent to look around the league at his peers and see how they are being utilized for similar performance.

These players were also on playoff teams like Byfield, Jarvis, Johnston, Lafreniere etc. Not that difficult to see a difference in treatment.

Be honest, how happy would you be if you saw your comparables at different orgs being treated much better then you? You'd likely hand in your resignation and go work somewhere else.

There is a reason that we heard about his ice time from the press early.

 

[Adam da bomb]

I think this is a huge issue... as the season progressed, our top line started cheating more and more on their shifts and their changes... but Bowness didn't have to shorten his bench for his 'all-star' line that never worked either.

Coach could have done a lot different. Look how kc responded when he got called out. Will change last, would it have helped calling him out earlier?

 

[surixon]

Is the 1st line overplayed or do schief and kc extend their shifts. How much of a fight do you want to get with your #1 centre?

It's the coaches job to manage that and if players where extending he needed to reign it in.

If Mark is that difficult a player then we never should have brought him back.

 

[Buffdog]

Because we're discussing the Jets and the Stars, probably. If you want to provide some other point of view into the mix, go ahead and do it yourself.

The reason the Stars are part of the discussion is because they've been cherrypicked as a success of how to integrate youth. As I've said, they DID do a good job with Johnston and Stankoven (although I posted a week or so ago how Stankoven never went through a dry spell even close to as long as Perfetti's... who knows how they would have handled a 3A in 23GP stretch)

Sabres had alot of youth in the past few years. Same with the Ducks. In fact, aside from the Stars, how many other teams left in the playoffs have young players playing meaningful roles?

 

[Adam da bomb]

That's fine. I'm just presenting another viewpoint. But it is certainly easy for him and his agent to look around the league at his peers and see how they are being utilized for similar performance.

These players were also on playoff teams like Byfield, Jarvis, Johnston, Lafreniere etc. Not that difficult to see a difference in treatment.

Be honest, how happy would you be if you saw your comparables at different orgs being treated much better then you? You'd likely hand in your resignation and go work somewhere else.

There is a reason that we heard about his ice time from the press early.

Is comparing laf and Byfield to perfetti fair? I mean they were picked in top 2 and laf has been so far down the line up ppl thought he was a bust.
A better comparison is Lindell and Jarvis, but, doesn’t change your point.

 

[gojetsgo]

That's fine. I'm just presenting another viewpoint. But it is certainly easy for him and his agent to look around the league at his peers and see how they are being utilized for similar performance.

These players were also on playoff teams like Byfield, Jarvis, Johnston, Lafreniere etc. Not that difficult to see a difference in treatment.

Be honest, how happy would you be if you saw your comparables at different orgs being treated much better then you? You'd likely hand in your resignation and go work somewhere else.

There is a reason that we heard about his ice time from the press early.

did his comparable also go 23 games with a single point? because you always seem to ignore that and come up with every excuse of why that doesn't matter and why he should be gifted top line minutes

 

[Buffdog]

That's fine. I'm just presenting another viewpoint. But it is certainly easy for him and his agent to look around the league at his peers and see how they are being utilized for similar performance.

These players were also on playoff teams like Byfield, Jarvis, Johnston, Lafreniere etc. Not that difficult to see a difference in treatment.

Be honest, how happy would you be if you saw your comparables at different orgs being treated much better then you? You'd likely hand in your resignation and go work somewhere else.

There is a reason that we heard about his ice time from the press early.

To be fair, both Laf and Byfield went through stretches just like Cole did at his age and were demoted/scratched

 

[surixon]

The reason the Stars are part of the discussion is because they've been cherrypicked as a success of how to integrate youth. As I've said, they DID do a good job with Johnston and Stankoven (although I posted a week or so ago how Stankoven never went through a dry spell even close to as long as Perfetti's... who knows how they would have handled a 3A in 23GP stretch)

Sabres had alot of youth in the past few years. Same with the Ducks. In fact, aside from the Stars, how many other teams left in the playoffs have young players playing meaningful roles?

I think there is a difference between wanting a full youth movement and integrating good young players into a good team to push it forward are different things.

Having good young players on ELC's provide value to cap teams trying to compete. This org is no exception to this as we had JoMo, Laine, Ehlers, KC all on elc's supporting an established core of Schiefele, Wheeler, Buff, Little etc achieve are greatest run.

I think what I'm trying to get at is of you have some good young players performing well, then properly reward it instead of playing mediocre players more.

I'm not advocating a full blown youth movement or trading established good players to fit prospects in. But I'd rather play a prospect like Ville over a fading vet like Schmidt.

 

[gojetsgo]

did we not integrate pefetti into the lineup? am I mistaken or was he not part of the top 6 to start the season? did we not leave him in the top 6 when we got monahan? did he not only have his minutes cut because he only had 1 point in 23 games?

 

[Buffdog]

I think there is a difference between wanting a full youth movement and integrating good young players into a good team to push it forward are different things.

Having good young players on ELC's provide value to cap teams trying to compete. This org is no exception to this as we had JoMo, Laine, Ehlers, KC all on elc's supporting an established core of Schiefele, Wheeler, Buff, Little etc achieve are greatest run.

I think what I'm trying to get at is of you have some good young players performing well, then properly reward it instead of playing mediocre players more.

I'm not advocating a full blown youth movement or trading established good players to fit prospects in. But I'd rather play a prospect like Ville over a fading vet like Schmidt.

I agree 100%

I think Ville was penciled into the line up until he broke his leg

Perfetti was top 6 until he went ice cold. That forced chevy's hand. Had he kept producing, there's no chance he would have brought Toffoli in. You couldn't leave that production black hole at 2RW when at the time the Jets were looking like legit contenders. If you're going to reward young players for producing, then you HAVE to hold them accountable if they don't.

So it's not like the org has an aversion to doing what you're advocating for. It just didn't work out that way this year

 

[WolfHouse]

Coach could have done a lot different. Look how kc responded when he got called out. Will change last, would it have helped calling him out earlier?

I remember how badly benching Scheifele for ONE PERIOD turned out last year... I still think he has more pull in that room - for his linemates - than the actual coaches... the pressure for Scheif to be Hawerchuk for TNSE's legacy is real.

I think Connor-Monahan or Lambert-Perfetti would be a phenomenal line and Nino or Barron should absolutely be driving the net on a Scheifele line... but I'd be surprised if the next coach doesn't mysteriously revert to CSV for 90% of the season

 

[RustyCat]

I see the Jets interviewed Berube for HC. I wonder how he would address the youth in the line up? Seems like the type to hold the vets accountable as well. And the SC pedigree might be a missing link that moves the yards sticks for the club. Who knows.

 

[NA Hockey]

The reason the Stars are part of the discussion is because they've been cherrypicked as a success of how to integrate youth. As I've said, they DID do a good job with Johnston and Stankoven (although I posted a week or so ago how Stankoven never went through a dry spell even close to as long as Perfetti's... who knows how they would have handled a 3A in 23GP stretch)

Sabres had alot of youth in the past few years. Same with the Ducks. In fact, aside from the Stars, how many other teams left in the playoffs have young players playing meaningful roles?

Patently untrue about Stankoven. Take a look at his game logs to end the the season and start the playoffs.

Stankoven had 1 goal in the last 18 regular season games and zero goals in the first 9 playoff games. That is a stretch of 27 games with one goal. In that time he was never demoted, sent to the press box and didn’t have his ice time decreased. They stuck with him and it is paying off.

@surixon

did we not integrate pefetti into the lineup? am I mistaken or was he not part of the top 6 to start the season? did we not leave him in the top 6 when we got monahan? did he not only have his minutes cut because he only had 1 point in 23 games?

He got demoted after an 11 game cold stretch and the rest was from the 4th line where no one scored.

 

[Buffdog]

I remember how badly benching Scheifele for ONE PERIOD turned out last year... I still think he has more pull in that room - for his linemates - than the actual coaches... the pressure for Scheif to be Hawerchuk for TNSE's legacy is real.

I think Connor-Monahan or Lambert-Perfetti would be a phenomenal line and Nino or Barron should absolutely be driving the net on a Scheifele line... but I'd be surprised if the next coach doesn't mysteriously revert to CSV for 90% of the season

Like it or not, we live in a world where the 20-30 year olds have to be treated differently than many of us did at that age

During Bones' exit presser, he talked about how proud he was of the rapport he built with the players. Someone else recently expressed dismay because so many coaches are being fired before they can properly build relationships with players because that's the most important thing these days

What I'm getting at is that if your 1C likes playing with someone, they'll probably get their way. I mean look at the Oilers... they went out and hired Mcdavid's junior coach FFS.

Anyone who is in a management position that deals with young people as employees these days will know what I'm talking about

 

[surixon]

did his comparable also go 23 games with a single point? because you always seem to ignore that and come up with every excuse of why that doesn't matter and why he should be gifted top line minutes

Mercer went 20 with 4 points including 0 in his first 10 in the top 6. No demotion or loss of ice time.

Lafreniere had a stretch of 6 points in 20 games playing on their top line and didn't see a demotion. (Had a number of 11 game blocks where he put up 3 or 4 points)

Byfield scored 2 goals his last 23 games and never lost his ice time.

Simply put players slump at times. Everyone of his contemporaries had a rough 11 games in the top 6 like him. None where demoted to the fourth line due to it.

Also quit confusing goals and points. His slump in the top 6 was one assist in 11 games. Similar to Byfields 1g 1a in 11 games, Mercers 0 points in 11 games and Lafs 3 assists in 11 games cold spells. Hard to compare fourth line production with any of those players as he was the only one marooned there.

Also if we want to compare to other Jets. KC had an equally cold 2 points in 10 games but kept getting 20 minutes a night this past year.