2018 NHL Off-Season Thread

[Jason]

[Troy McClure]

Didn't even let the season truly end.

[SaintAngerBH]

AV's arrogance over the last couple of days probably didn't help matters.

He sounds delusional.

[ToddM]

I believe this mean no NHL coach was fired during the actual season. That's probably a first.

[Knives Out]

There hasn’t been a single in-season NHL head coaching change this year for the first time since 1966-67.

[ToddM]

Hockey wasn't even invented until 1999.

[slaps]

You mean defense.

[Jason]

[Knives Out]

Blolz. It's actually 53 losses.

[ToddM]

That was Montreal's problem. Not enough kitten-themed motivational posters in the lockeroom.

[Knives Out]

RE: Ryan O'Reilly

If he really cared that much about winning then he wouldn't have signed a 7-year contract extension with the Sabres after being traded to them. Instead he went for the money. We're talking about the same guy who drunkenly crashed his truck into a Tim Hortons and then fled the scene. Anyways, he just set the record for most faceoff wins in a single season (1,269) so he would be extremely valuable to a contender, BUT AGAIN, he chose to waste his prime years with the friggin' Sabres.

[Knives Out]

That was Montreal's problem. Not enough kitten-themed motivational posters in the lockeroom.

Drouin not asked to play for Canada at the World's LOL.

[Jason]

“The reasons I have seen include, misuse of players, inability to adapt, refusal to accept statistical analysis, and, finally, his inability to accept creative young playmakers who invariably make mistakes.”

More on how Vigneault isnt good

[ScubaSteve]

Sounds like a perfect fit for Dallas.

[ToddM]

If Nill wants to get fired a year from now, he should totally get AV.

[wonko80]

So AV = Hitchcock - 200 lbs

[ToddM]

Both also relied heavily on world-class goaltending for pretty much all of their success.

[slaps]

Both also relied heavily on world-class goaltending for pretty much all of their success.

Good thing Kari Lehtonen, a #2 overall pick and a franchise goaltender, is available as a free agent.

[#JTONTFJTGM]

Both also relied heavily on world-class goaltending for pretty much all of their success.

Which of the following goaltenders Hitch had since Ed Belfour would you consider to be world class?

In his first season coaching the Flyers he got to the second round of the 2003 playoffs with Roman Cechmanek.

He coached the Flyers to Game 7 of the 2004 Eastern Conference Final with Robert Esche.

He made the playoffs coaching a terrible Blue Jackets team in 2009 with 20-year-old Steve Mason.

He coached the Blues to Game 6 of the 2016 Western Conference Final with Brian Elliott and had the NHL's second-best record to the Penguins during his six seasons in St. Louis with this group:

Elliott

Jake Allen

Ryan Miller, who was 33 when Doug Armstrong traded for him at the 2014 deadline and put up save percentages of .903 in his 19 regular season starts and .897 in his six playoff starts.

Jaroslav Halak, the best of the bunch who started only two of the Blues' nine playoff games in 2012 because he couldn't stay healthy.

[ToddM]

Exactly. Unless Hitch has Belfour in his prime or AV has Luongo/Lundqvist, neither of them can win for *poo poo*.

[#JTONTFJTGM]

Exactly. Unless Hitch has Belfour in his prime or AV has Luongo/Lundqvist, neither of them can win for *poo poo*.

If winning the Stanley Cup is your requirement for determining coaching success then Vigneault wasn't successful with Luongo and Lundqvist.

[Jason]

Both also relied heavily on world-class goaltending for pretty much all of their success.

With the Rangers he relied on Tortorella's defensive system that was built up for years for the first couple years. Then the more he implemented his own system, the more they were terrible defensively. Gives up tons of great scoring chances. So basically Ruffs system defensively.
Under Tortorella they didn't blow a third period lead for like 129 or 139 games, that changed to regularly blowing leads under AV.
The player usage is terrible, hopefully Nill stays away from him this time. If Hitchcock is moved to advisor role.

[ToddM]

Exactly. Unless Hitch has Belfour in his prime or AV has Luongo/Lundqvist, neither of them can win for *poo poo*.

If winning the Stanley Cup is your requirement for determining coaching success then Vigneault wasn't successful with Luongo and Lundqvist.

My base line for "great coach" is someone who can make it past the second round of the playoffs relatively often. Hitch did it twice with Dallas, when he was indeed a "great coach." But he hasn't done much damage in the playoffs in the 17 years since then, so I'd downgrade him to "above average."

AV made it once with Vancouver/PrimeLuongo and once with NY/PrimeLundqvist, if my memory is correct. But the rest of his playoff coaching career has been meh, including a handful of first-round upsets.

I'd lump both in with coaches like Tippett and Trotz, who can win in the regular season but have abysmal playoff records.

"Great" coaches might have a few first-round flameouts here and there, but overall they take care of business in Rounds 1-2 and then either win or lose to another elite team. Coach Q fits that description perfectly. Mike Sullivan, in a really small sample size, looks like he's turned around a Penguins franchise that was burning through coaches every two years and losing to vastly inferior teams in the early rounds. Babcock started out "great" but is slowly drifting into Hitchcock territory: once great, but not much to write home about lately.

That's basically why I'm not really emotionally broken up about missing the playoffs. This current team wasn't going to do any damage --especially in a first-round matchup against Nashville or Winnipeg-- so just re-rack in the offseason and try again. But with a different, non-mediocre coach.

[Troy McClure]

I'd say a great coach can get the most out of their roster. There's no way you can say that about Hitch's work this season.

Now, great coaches have losing seasons. It happens. Bad luck. Injuries. There are always reasons. No coach goes deep in the playoffs every year. But we have Hitch having a bad season his first one on the job. This wasn't even a case of them starting bad and falling short at the end despite looking better the longer Hitch was coaching them. This team collapsed. They got worse as the season went along. The more Hitch coached them, the worse they played.

[SaintAngerBH]

Great coaches win. Bad coaches lose.

[B Kat]

A good coach does get the best out of his roster. Like Tippett. But a coach is only one component of a good or great team. And it's not just one kind of coach that can be great, it's the right kind that works with the players the team happens to have. And then a lot of other stuff. Health, luck, situation, personalities. It's a crap shoot, even if you have a lot of the components.

We're just mad at their epic collapse and would like to pin the why on something.

[#JTONTFJTGM]

Exactly. Unless Hitch has Belfour in his prime or AV has Luongo/Lundqvist, neither of them can win for *poo poo*.

If winning the Stanley Cup is your requirement for determining coaching success then Vigneault wasn't successful with Luongo and Lundqvist.

My base line for "great coach" is someone who can make it past the second round of the playoffs relatively often. Hitch did it twice with Dallas, when he was indeed a "great coach." But he hasn't done much damage in the playoffs in the 17 years since then, so I'd downgrade him to "above average."

AV made it once with Vancouver/PrimeLuongo and once with NY/PrimeLundqvist, if my memory is correct. But the rest of his playoff coaching career has been meh, including a handful of first-round upsets.

I'd lump both in with coaches like Tippett and Trotz, who can win in the regular season but have abysmal playoff records.

"Great" coaches might have a few first-round flameouts here and there, but overall they take care of business in Rounds 1-2 and then either win or lose to another elite team. Coach Q fits that description perfectly. Mike Sullivan, in a really small sample size, looks like he's turned around a Penguins franchise that was burning through coaches every two years and losing to vastly inferior teams in the early rounds. Babcock started out "great" but is slowly drifting into Hitchcock territory: once great, but not much to write home about lately.

That's basically why I'm not really emotionally broken up about missing the playoffs. This current team wasn't going to do any damage --especially in a first-round matchup against Nashville or Winnipeg-- so just re-rack in the offseason and try again. But with a different, non-mediocre coach.

Quenneville has coached in a Conference final six times in 19 full seasons. The only non-playoff team of the three he inherited was the 2008-'09 Blackhawks he was hired to coach four games into that season after they'd had an 88-point season in 2007-'08. Patrick Sharp was 26 years old and coming off a 36-goal season, Brent Seabrook was in his fourth season, Duncan Keith was in his third season and Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane were in their second seasons when Quenneville was hired.

Hitch has coached in a Conference Final five times in 17 full seasons and spent two of them and parts of two others coaching the Columbus Blue Jackets who had never appeared in the playoffs before he got there and had topped out with a 74-point season in 2005-'06 and had 12 points in 20 games when he was hired during the 2006-'07 season.

Hitch coached the Stars past the second round of the playoffs in 1998, 1999 and 2000. And the main reason he hasn't been able to do it more often after that is because of the quality of the teams he's coached relative to that of the teams he's lost to in the playoffs, with the exception being the 2015 Minnesota Wild who weren't built better in any significant way.

But following that loss Hitch knocked Quenneville out of the first round of the 2016 playoffs when Quenneville was coaching the better built team, the defending Stanley Cup Champions who weren't missing any of their players.

Can you really be so ignorant about how sports works to believe that Hitch was a great coach from 1997-2000 but wasn't again until 2003-'04 then wasn't again until 2015-'16 and then wasn't again?

The man has been one of the greatest coaches this league has ever seen since his first full season coaching the Stars in 1996-'97 and he's gotten better since then, making every team he's coached better than they were the season before he arrived, which was why Jim Nill hired him and why he'll be inducted into the Hall of Fame when he's done coaching.

[SaintAngerBH]

Hitch got better? Winning the cup early in your career and then not making it past the 2nd round more than a couple of times during the rest of your career does not equate to becoming "better since then."

[slaps]

Hitchcock may have once been a great coach (and may still be a good one), but the game has passed him by. You don't need to look any further than his player usage this season to see that.

[mookie1010]

Hitchcock may have once been a great coach (and may still be a good one), but the game has passed him by. You don't need to look any further than his player usage this season to see that.

He might talk about using kids, and earning ice-time, etc, but in the end, he is inherently and genetically risk averse, which I don't think works in the game today.