Kanucklehead10 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 The most surprising thing was the post game after we played against the kings and even though we were offensively shut down the whole game, the players seemed pretty proud about "standing up for themselves". Sure, when you act recklessly and take someone's feet out from under them, have Sestito acting like a goon and assaulting a player (that doesn't want to fight), you try to prove yourself that you aren't going to accept being pushed around. Honestly, the kings probably couldn't care less about how the canucks responded since they WON the game, especially after Brown (who fought Kesler and hit Luongo in the previous game) scores the GWG and rubs it in. If this is the case and you feel content after a loss; that's not an NHL team. You get revenge by winning the freaking game, not by assaulting your opponents. In Anaheim when you go into the game having that same mentality of trying to "prove your physical dominance" and have the same ref calling the shots, you don't do anything stupid. Sestito, being already warned, goes out and yet again does something stupid. A couple canucks are out of the game, and the ducks are toying around with us the whole time.. it was simply boys playing against full-grown adults. The Canucks are becoming a mess with what seems to be their new mentality of having to be that big, tough "boston-like" team, that they now seem to struggle in scoring goals because they focus on showing other teams that they are "big boys". The greatest game this season was when we destroyed the bruins 6-2 and we did through a BALANCE of physicality and scoring goals. Not one or the other. To say that "we can't score" is BS. We put 6 by one of the best defensive lineups in the game and also arguably the best goaltender in the game today with THIS same roster (excluding Sestito that specific game. Ironic). The identity crisis comes in because Gillis wants to create a tough, "Boston-like" team with the wrong players. Boston had core offensive guys like Horton, Lucic, Bergeron, and Marchand who all can score AND play a physically imposing game as well. LA, San Jose, Anaheim are no different with their big, core players. MG has obviously already chosen his core guys for the long term with the likes of Burrows, the Sedins (new contracts), and Kesler who all have more of a finesse-focused game, and MG wants to create a "Boston-model" out of these guys? If you want to make a new team identity, it all starts with the types of players you have in your core. Looking at the big picture, the Canucks are struggling because MG doesn't realize that he already has the luxury of skilled players that already play a certain style and he needs to build around that team image rather than trying to force a team to play another style of game that the core just isn't built for. If you look at the Blackhawks and their offensive core, with the likes of Kane, Toews, Hossa, Sharp, who are not physically imposing and yet they have won 2 Stanley cups the past 4 years because they are confident in their style of game and they are well supported by their GM to acquire and draft players fitting to the team identity. I believe that if MG desires a different team image, the only way he can do that is through a roster shakeup rather than forcing players to play a certain way. If he wants to keep this same Canucks core, build around it, don't change it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shiznak Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 OP pretty much said, Gillis frack up big time when he traded in skill for toughness. End of story. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rainism Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Webster6 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I'd say the OP nailed it pretty well here. You did a good job of helping me view the problem from an objective angle and what you're saying makes sense. I think we just need physicality in the bottom 6. And if/when we do get a top 6 goal scorer, things will turn around. As knee jerk as most Canucks fans like to be whenever team is playing this poorly, i'm still quite optimistic for the future. Besides, we're not Edmonton Oilers bad who have seen little improvement after three 1st overall picks were added to the lineup. We're not gonna win the cup this year, and probably not next yea either. But i like the general direction the franchise is headed. So everyone needs to calm down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
si robertson Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Certain players need to step it up. The sedins need to play better then they have been. As a whole this team needs to find a balance between physical, & offense. What they really really need to do, and I've said it numerous time, crash the ???? net!!!! Jam away in the blue, have @ least 2 players go to the net whenever a shot is fired, or in close proximity because I don't know how many times I've seen a big juicy rebound with no one their to pop it in for an easy goal. Pisse me off when I see crap like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nux4lyfe Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Our top players just can't perform any more, The twins used to disappear in the playoffs even though they used to have great regular seasons, but now they're bringing their playoff act into the regular season now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DownUndaCanuck Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Gillis went to trade for toughness over skill, but how could he not? He just watched the most skilled team in DECADES (since the Habs really) get embarassed by a team full of goons. Hindsight is everything, but Chicago proved that skill and SPEED can beat big hulky toughness, we just didn't have much speed in 2011 (Sedins were slow, Kesler was playing on an injured hip so much slower, Samuelsson was slow etc.) The sorts of teams that are winning right now are big, physical teams with skill and speed mixed throughout the lineup. Take the Kings, Ducks and even Blackhawks and Bruins. They all have giant forwards up in their top 6 like Brown/Kopitar/Perry/Getzlaf/Hossa/Lucic, but their top-6 also has some purely skilled guys like Williams/Selanne/Kane/Krejci and a LOT of speed in their bottom-6 instead of useless checkers or goons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghostsof1915 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I hate saying this. But if the guys who are supposed to score are our core players, and they aren't getting it done. Does that mean they really shouldn't be our core players? I'm ok with staying the course until we develop/trade some pieces to get back on track. But at what point do you get to before issues like the Canucks fragile mental state, sloppy play start showing signs we're turning into the Calgary Flames from a few years ago? It's a fine line. If we wait too long we'll get nothing for our assets. If we make moves too early then we might as well rebuild the team. Tough call. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJDDawg Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Pretty well sums it up OP. The reason I have little confidence in Gillis is that he seems to be chasing playing styles, but it's starting to look like a dog chasing its' own tale. Boston won the Cup, but for MG it was a one-off because of our injuries. When the Kings won the Cup, he decided to start dismantling our skill and speed team. Then the Hawks win the Cup by using their skill and speed to their advantage over these big, heavy teams. Now here we are, sort of stuck in between styles now. We're neither the speed & skill team we were just three years ago nor the big, heavier team that can grind out wins with the heavyweights in the league. MG may desire a different team identity, but in trying to change what we really were, he's given us a team with no identity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-DLC- Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 As much as the team's a mess, this situation was created by a league that's a mess. Of course there's an identity crisis...how can you play in a league that has different sets of rules on a nightly basis? Explain to me how Hanzal gets away with a two hander in Booth's face? A guy who's got some history. A 6'6" lumberjack? Yet Tom's a boxing hobo? At least "boxing" is fighting and, with that, offers a fair chance to "fight back". Turtling vs fighting back is a choice and Nolan chose not to (fight). A cross check in the head doesn't afford for options. I'm almost done with this league...will support my team, even through the struggles, but tell me how the team can identify a model to play under when there is no structure here? Two years ago most were whining that they were soft and had to toughen up. They're doing that, and this is how it goes. Can't have your cake and eat it too. Yeah, I'm mad...but let's look at how we got here, not just that we are here. The NHL is getting worse, not better. Ha, what a joke...since Bertuzzi, what have we learned? Our injured guys speak to: nothing. This league's learned nothing except to provide lip service and timely decisions (not consistent, across the board ones...ones that suit the agenda). They still don't know their butts from a hole in the ground and I'm losing patience when I see a game like last night, where a goon can cross check the night away. Yes: scoring is our issue and nothing the refs/league can do will fix this. Except that, if they provide a level playing field our guys can focus more on the skill end of things without having to weave a guy like Tom in just to be able to offset the crap. We weren't supposed to have to go that route, remember? After Bertuzzi, the crap was going to be weeded out. Do I give the team a free pass? Absolutely not. But I look beyond that something is happening and tend to question why. Sure, all the armchairers have the solutions but, really, I find the problem is a league that doesn't know which way to go more so than the teams trying to adjust to it. It makes me frustrated. Almost done with it (caring that is). Will always watch the team, but have pretty much resorted to we can't/won't win in this gong show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pianoman13 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I will say thought that the LA game was good for the team to have, I really do. It would have been nice if they could have channeled that a bit bitter the next game though.... Also the beginning of the Anahiem game was wide open and almost the opposite. There were lots of chances at both ends. Its easy to look at the score and forget about the fact we actually outshot them (I know they outchanced us though), and then after things were already going downhill they reverted back to the LA way, but not for the right reasons like they had done against LA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maniwaki Canuck Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I think Gillis, probably like most fans, has overestimated the offensive ability on this club since 2010-11. That year Kesler and Daniel had career years, Burrows and Henrik were still in top form, and we had secondary scoring after that, so we were the best offensive team in the league. It was a perfect storm in a good way, but our top forwards are older now and have either returned to career average form (Kesler and Henrik) or dipped below it (Daniel and Burrows). Up until Henrik's breakout Hart year in 2009-10, we didn't have an identity as a club that could score. For a couple of years afterwards we did, but it was always a fine line. Now we're back to where we were before. Some adjustments in how we play could improve results with the group we have, but basically we need to get some new talent into the lineup and find a new style that fits our strengths. Things are going to be in flux for a couple of years is my guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elvis15 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 This has little to do with Gillis, who has tried to add some toughness to the team but certainly hasn't tried to turn us into Boston. He is just looking at more of a balanced approach. One game of rough and tumble hockey is more a results of (as was said) trying to show we can stand up to people taking liberties during a game. That comes from the players and the coaches, not the GM. And it doesn't mean we always have to play like that. We do want to be a team that blocks shots and hits when appropriate, but also want to play with skill and use that to win games. Our skill is falling short for us now though, so players are trying to start with the basics and playing physical. But then this isn't anything that hasn't been said in other threads on the subject. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kanucklehead10 Posted January 17, 2014 Author Share Posted January 17, 2014 @debluvscanucks You can argue that Hanzal basically got away with murder last game, but it doesn't justify Sestito's actions. If there is truth to this made up conspiracy that the league and its officials are against the Canucks, it's best not to play on the borderline, but rather to play according to the rules. 29 other teams fanbases can make the same argument of the "wrongdoings" committed against them. "Standing up for ourselves" doesn't matter if we don't win games and it won't help the cause of the league hating on us if we respond by acting like goons ourselves. I don't believe that "getting bigger" was the philosophy we should've went by. The media went too deep in this concern. We were one win away from the Stanley cup and we were successful all season through our offence-focused game. Gillis, convinced that we need to get big, tough, gritty guys, tried exchange original philosophy to adopt a new one with the same core. He tried to fix an unbroken formula and now in result he has broken the team. You look at the past two years in which we tried getting bigger in exchange for our offensive philosophy and in result there is two straight 1st round exits (1-8). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maniwaki Canuck Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 @debluvscanucks You can argue that Hanzal basically got away with murder last game, but it doesn't justify Sestito's actions. If there is truth to this made up conspiracy that the league and its officials are against the Canucks, it's best not to play on the borderline, but rather to play according to the rules. 29 other teams fanbases can make the same argument of the "wrongdoings" committed against them. "Standing up for ourselves" doesn't matter if we don't win games and it won't help the cause of the league hating on us if we respond by acting like goons ourselves. I don't believe that "getting bigger" was the philosophy we should've went by. The media went too deep in this concern. We were one win away from the Stanley cup and we were successful all season through our offence-focused game. Gillis, convinced that we need to get big, tough, gritty guys, tried exchange original philosophy to adopt a new one with the same core. He tried to fix an unbroken formula and now in result he has broken the team. You look at the past two years in which we tried getting bigger in exchange for our offensive philosophy and in result there is two straight 1st round exits (1-8). I don't think Gillis attempted a radical overhaul after the 2011 loss. He just wanted some of the skill to come in bigger packages like Booth and Kassian, and to have some reliable size on the bottom 6. He even let Torres go because he realized that we didn't need the drama of the Seabrook and Horton hits (Rome, I know, but he's gone too). All of this is perfectly reasonable, even the parts that didn't work out that well like Booth. Sestito is the only goon on the team, and has set the tone only recently. To say that Hanzal's actions don't justify Sestito's may be right in some technical way, but utterly fails to address Deb's point about the underlying and non-random unfairness in NHL refereeing. People can dismiss it with labels like "conspiracy" or downplay it as "inconsistency" all they want, but it doesn't change the fact that certain NHL referees have vendettas against us. In case their actions aren't clear enough, there are the things that Auger and Devorski have said on the ice. There really isn't much ambiguity here. And it creates a real dilemma for this club, something that justifies having a nuclear option like Sestito, even though it clearly doesn't solve the problem. Like Deb, I am essentially done with the league, but can't let go of the club. The next time the players get locked out, I hope a new league forms to replace the NHL because it stinks. This from a fan who has been watching for 50 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-DLC- Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 @debluvscanucks You can argue that Hanzal basically got away with murder last game, but it doesn't justify Sestito's actions. If there is truth to this made up conspiracy that the league and its officials are against the Canucks, it's best not to play on the borderline, but rather to play according to the rules. 29 other teams fanbases can make the same argument of the "wrongdoings" committed against them. "Standing up for ourselves" doesn't matter if we don't win games and it won't help the cause of the league hating on us if we respond by acting like goons ourselves. I don't believe that "getting bigger" was the philosophy we should've went by. The media went too deep in this concern. We were one win away from the Stanley cup and we were successful all season through our offence-focused game. Gillis, convinced that we need to get big, tough, gritty guys, tried exchange original philosophy to adopt a new one with the same core. He tried to fix an unbroken formula and now in result he has broken the team. You look at the past two years in which we tried getting bigger in exchange for our offensive philosophy and in result there is two straight 1st round exits (1-8). I liked Stestito's actions. It's how it has to be...if we're not "protected" as we should be by the league, damn straight we'd better have guys in place to take care of that end of things. To set it straight. Playing by the rules? When there are different sets of them on any given night, that's rather tough. I believe our team HAS to continue to play this way...whether it be dirty, tough or whatever you call it. At this point, go down swinging. Don't kid yourself...the league will scramble if all of a sudden our guys are doling some out. They (the league) will, by way of having to address our actions, be forced to look at all of it...it'll be more exposed this way. The other way (looking to the refs...waiting for calls...playing like good boys), makes it too easy for them to move on past by ignoring things that should be addressed. This brings it into the forefront. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joel Heyman Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 (Quoted post from HF for samethread) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niklas Jensen Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 At the end of the 2011 season, Gillis traded what got us to game 7 of the finals FOR...a partial reason of why we loss game 7 of the finals. Enough said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gumballthechewy Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 OP pretty much said, Gillis frack up big time when he traded in skill for toughness. End of story. It's funny, pretty much every single person on CDC wanted Gillis to do exactly that after 2011.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henrik Kesler Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 OP pretty much said, Gillis frack up big time when he traded in skill for toughness. End of story. Yes, but immediately after the Finals, everyone was clamoring for more goonishness, not more skill. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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