Let's Go Blues

I was reading Bernies article about how its the players failing that has caused this team to play mediocre thus far. But I was looking at all the players he named and it just seems that when your entire team is under performing then it there has to be more than just individual performances.

I decided to break down each player's average points per game this season and compare it to their career PPG:

(this season) (career)
0.71 0.53 Erik Johnson
0.62 0.54 David Perron
0.65 0.90 Keith Tkachuk
0.68 0.69 Andy McDonald
0.57 0.75 Brad Boyes
0.38 1.02 Paul Kariya
0.38 0.35 Jay McClement
0.62 0.37 Carlo Colaiacovo
0.47 0.63 T.J. Oshie
0.25 0.54 Patrik Berglund
0.19 0.22 B.J. Crombeen
0.40 0.24 Barret Jackman
0.19 0.50 David Backes
0.19 0.17 Roman Polak
0.27 0.28 Eric Brewer
0.19 0.39 Darryl Sydor
0.29 0.28 Alexander Steen
0.33 0.30 Tyson Strachan
0.13 0.18 Brad Winchester

So 11 guys under performing and 8 guys over performing (these numbers are off, as it's an average of the averages and not a cumulative average):
0.33 0.52 - average for guys in red
0.49 0.40 - average for guys in blue

But our guys underperforming are doing much worse than the plus guys are in evening the team out.

I just don't see how the entire team's underperforming can be attributed to individual play. So is it coaching? (i've never been a believer that a coach can influence a team to this extent), poor scheme/strategy, a huge regression to the mean? I honestly have no idea how this many players can be playing this bad offensively.

Regardless of what the actual reason is for the team's struggles, you have to replace the coach because you can't replace half of the roster.
And the sooner you replace him, the better.
I think everyone agrees that this team should be much better than their record...so the coach has to go. That's just the way it works.

Fixing the power play would fix a lot of things.

TheoSqua wrote:I was reading Bernies article about how its the players failing that has caused this team to play mediocre thus far. But I was looking at all the players he named and it just seems that when your entire team is under performing then it there has to be more than just individual performances.

I decided to break down each player's average points per game this season and compare it to their career PPG:

(this season) (career)
0.71 0.53 Erik Johnson
0.62 0.54 David Perron
0.65 0.90 Keith Tkachuk
0.68 0.69 Andy McDonald
0.57 0.75 Brad Boyes
0.38 1.02 Paul Kariya
0.38 0.35 Jay McClement
0.62 0.37 Carlo Colaiacovo
0.47 0.63 T.J. Oshie
0.25 0.54 Patrik Berglund
0.19 0.22 B.J. Crombeen
0.40 0.24 Barret Jackman
0.19 0.50 David Backes
0.19 0.17 Roman Polak
0.27 0.28 Eric Brewer
0.19 0.39 Darryl Sydor
0.29 0.28 Alexander Steen
0.33 0.30 Tyson Strachan
0.13 0.18 Brad Winchester

So 11 guys under performing and 8 guys over performing (these numbers are off, as it's an average of the averages and not a cumulative average):
0.33 0.52 - average for guys in red
0.49 0.40 - average for guys in blue

But our guys underperforming are doing much worse than the plus guys are in evening the team out.

I just don't see how the entire team's underperforming can be attributed to individual play. So is it coaching? (i've never been a believer that a coach can influence a team to this extent), poor scheme/strategy, a huge regression to the mean? I honestly have no idea how this many players can be playing this bad offensively.

Shouldn't there be a +/- 5% margin? If so, several players are where they should be. Someone like Tkachuk can't be expected to get a point per game at this point in his career. It's guys like Boyes, Kariya, Berglund, and Backes that are a problem. Do you blame the coach for problems with a streaky goal scorer (Boyes), a player coming back after missing a season (Kariya), a sophomore (Berglund), and a guy coming off what might have been a career year (Backes)? When these guys aren't scoring goals, there are less assists to go around too.

Also, Polak and Strachan should be blue, not red.

Boyes looks better in the list then he should too, because he has a bunch of assists... but he's not paid to get assists, he's paid to get goals.

The bottom line is that either 90% of our scoring forwards are all slumping, at the exact same time... or something is very wrong with our offensive system.

And it's kinda unfair to be basing performance strictly on points.

EJ is playing out of his mind right now, and while our defense was anemic in the scoring department last season I would take every single defensemen being held scoreless as long as we kept every team to 1 or 2 goals a game all season if that's what it took.

It's all a complex combo of things but enough players are sucking it for it to be something beyond just "having a bad year," like you said.

Yeah i didn't really make this to be perfectly accurate. And I considered making a gray area for the players who are playing up to their standard ppg (McDonald, Steen, Polak, etc.)

But really, you expect some decline. Tkachuck is no longer a PPG player, and apparently neither is Kariya. But their decline should be balanced with an increase in production from our younger guys. But outside of Perron, none of them have really stepped up.

My point was that the offensive issues isn't just caused by a hand ful of players who are on the Power Play suddenly not being productive, it's essentially the entire team has gone cold simultaneously. I think it's really rare that this would be purely due to luck.

As far as im concerned, Perron has not stepped up. With a different coach he would have 14-15 goals by now.
Murray is the problem. The system sucks. Im tired of saying this crap in every thread.

Krigloch the Furious wrote:As far as im concerned, Perron has not stepped up. With a different coach he would have 14-15 goals by now.
Murray is the problem. The system sucks. Im tired of saying this crap in every thread.

The know what the answer is then, don't you?

j/k- couldn't pass up the opportunity.

it's simple: either Murray sends them out there with explicit orders to goon in the hell up or he should be fired.

CASE FRANKING CLOSED.

not only are they losing, but they're BORING. that's worse because come on.. we all know they won't win the damn cup, um, ever.