Tortorella: Canucks Are Getting Old

[oldnews]

Just answer the question in post 173 of this thread. For like the 5th time.

Or don't but then don't bother responding again. It will just waste both our time. It's astounding the lengths you're going to not answer the question. I feel like I'm having a conversation with Smurf or Nino about Luongo at this point.

And can you think of a good reason why how a player plays doesn't or shouldn't dictate their ice time?

What I said from the presser was his explanation of it.

As for the last part that's fine I'm just giving you what I'm interpreting. I'm seeing a lot of arguments we used to see about AV being made about torts. Not necessarily the same substance of the arguments just the same tactics.

A player's play is a good way to dictate their ice time.

A coaches' coaching - a good way to dictate whether the coach returns next year.

Further: players' play under coaches' coaching...another good indicator of coaches' coaching.

[nuck nit]

I agree with this... with the way the team is constructed he's forced into trying to play with a stale core that isn't good enough to compete anymore. It's lose-lose at the moment.. easy to sit back and cherry pick the mistakes with 20/20 vision but I don't think there was a chance this year.

The core has to have legitimate support or this team will stay as stale as 14 day old bread.

Garrison and Stanton are not Ehrhoff and Salo.

The team was successful at puck possession and defensive contributions on offense.

That was Gillis' last rallying cry but the Aqua and Tootsie men had turned their backs on him.

[NucksCup2015]

A player's play is a good way to dictate their ice time.

A coaches' coaching - a good way to dictate whether the coach returns next year.

Further: players' play under coaches' coaching...another good indicator of coaches' coaching.

so when do we finally fire the players?

seems like 2 coaches isn't enough for the angry mob here

Is it 3? 4? before people want to accept this team is not the right mix? FOR ANY COACH

Oh the following players say hi - if you're going to say the players didn't play well, or insinuate (which it seems like you may have been saying, not sure)

kassian

biekda

hammer

santorelli

richardson

lack

tanev

stanton

booth second half

kesler had a decent year

hi

[oldnews]

The core has to have legitimate support or this team will stay as stale as 14 day old bread.

Garrison and Stanton are not Ehrhoff and Salo.

The team was successful at puck possession and defensive contributions on offense.

That was Gillis' last rallying cry but the Aqua and Tootsie men had turned their backs on him.

Sami Salo is 39 years old and Ehrhoff signed a 10 year, 40 million deal.

The sentiments here are nice and everything (I love Sami Salo too) - but no GM or owner can simply stop time from rolling on.

Moreover, Sami had 17 points to Stanton's 16 this year, while both Garrison and Ehrhoff had 33, so if we're looking in the present. I'm not sure you have that much to protest about and not only that, but if you're talking puck possession and underlying numbers, Stanton and Garrison are certainly no slouches relative to those two.

[EmployeeoftheMonth]

A player's play is a good way to dictate their ice time.

A coaches' coaching - a good way to dictate whether the coach returns next year.

Further: players' play under coaches' coaching...another good indicator of coaches' coaching.

Sure so we can say that prior to the new year the coaches coaching and the players playing were both getting the job done. We can argue (or agree) about the GM's GMing later but lets use this as the cornerstone of the discussion.

Now I'd hate to imply this has anything to do with AV but in your list you stated that Torts used the Sedins more to kill penalties than Hansen. What's the problem with that? Also we're talking about an average of 10 seconds more per game. 10 seconds!!! Also I'm sorry to say but Hansen wasn't really earning it this season. I'd say the same for Hammer in the first quarter of the season but that's nothign to do with this.

Using Edler as a shutdown D man is what he should be. He's either got to put up points or he's got to defend. Edlers problems didn't start this season, they've been here for a while. Whether he's used as a PMD or a shut down guy he's not up to where he should be for what he's being paid. AV tried to use him the same ways Torts did. He hasn't worked anywhere terribly well. I'm not one of those Edler sucks guys but I don't know what can be done with him.

The Sedins ice time: You may want to take a look at the game logs before the new year. They had some bigger nights than they did Under AV but it's not that different overall and it certainly wasn't 24 minutes a night. In fact it only hit that mark 9 times before the new year for Dan. I assume it's similar for Henrik.

Your 5th point I more or less agree with. Not completely but I think you make a good point there.

Edler and Bieksa played together under AV as well but I also wouldn't have labelled those two as the shutdown pair on this team. I think you're misrepresenting what they were which was just a poor pairing. Hammer Tanev was usually the shutdown crew though weren't they?

[oldnews]

so when do we finally fire the players?

seems like 2 coaches isn't enough for the angry mob here

Is it 3? 4? before people want to accept this team is not the right mix? FOR ANY COACH

You can characterize a lack of endorsement of Tortorella in straw man "angry mob" terms all you like - however, if you want to take issue with any of the reasons/concerns I've stated regarding Tortorella's actual decisions, we might have grounds for a discussion.

Some credit where it's due on the matter of the Canucks being old - Tortorella did his part imo with respect to one position - he helped keep the ball rolling where getting younger at the goaltending position is concerned, by starting Eddie Lack in the Winter Classic. Who can deny that helped precipitate a Luongo deal? Perhaps my favorite personnel decision of his this season.

But overall, when it comes to whether or not we want to see him stay another year - my personal opinion really has nothing to do with being 'angry' with him, or whether or not I like or dislike him. I just don't agree with a number of aspects of his coaching strategy, the way he utilizes players, or his overall systems approach. Regardless of the makeup of the roster, there are imo more problems there than answers, and if we factor in the relative performance of the players and team under him this year....it's a results oriented business, and it's very hard to pump tires based on the results.

[oldnews]

Sure so we can say that prior to the new year the coaches coaching and the players playing were both getting the job done. We can argue (or agree) about the GM's GMing later but lets use this as the cornerstone of the discussion.

Now I'd hate to imply this has anything to do with AV but in your list you stated that Torts used the Sedins more to kill penalties than Hansen. What's the problem with that? Also we're talking about an average of 10 seconds more per game. 10 seconds!!! Also I'm sorry to say but Hansen wasn't really earning it this season. I'd say the same for Hammer in the first quarter of the season but that's nothign to do with this.

Using Edler as a shutdown D man is what he should be. He's either got to put up points or he's got to defend. Edlers problems didn't start this season, they've been here for a while. Whether he's used as a PMD or a shut down guy he's not up to where he should be for what he's being paid. AV tried to use him the same ways Torts did. He hasn't worked anywhere terribly well. I'm not one of those Edler sucks guys but I don't know what can be done with him.

The Sedins ice time: You may want to take a look at the game logs before the new year. They had some bigger nights than they did Under AV but it's not that different overall and it certainly wasn't 24 minutes a night. In fact it only hit that mark 9 times before the new year for Dan. I assume it's similar for Henrik.

Your 5th point I more or less agree with. Not completely but I think you make a good point there.

Edler and Bieksa played together under AV as well but I also wouldn't have labelled those two as the shutdown pair on this team. I think you're misrepresenting what they were which was just a poor pairing. Hammer Tanev was usually the shutdown crew though weren't they?

If we proceed based upon the idea that a player determines their ice time based upon performance, it's a mystery to me how Edler became the big minute blueliner on this team for the majority of the season, facing a stronger quality of competition than his team-mates - and like you, I am not an Edler hater by any stretch of the imagination. He's just not that guy, and never was used that way in the past. Edler faced middle range competition and had a far more offensively oriented role in the past. Pairing him with Bieksa was an experiment that was abandoned rapidly in the past. This year, down the stretch however, that has become a staple - a real mystery considering how good Stanton and Bieksa were together early in the season. I never referred to that pairing as the shutdown crew - Edler was used in that capacity for the first half of the season - the Bieksa/Edler pairing has emerged in the second half, and why is has persisted, who knows? I like them both a great deal - but together...?

People have different opinions about using guys like the Sedins to kill penalties. First off, they may only have slightly over a minute per game pk to Hansen's 48 seconds - the difference would be that Hansen is down from over two minutes a game previously, whereas Hank and Daniel scarcely ever drew those duties. Did the powerplay suffer because the Sedins were spent playing harder minutes? Did 5 on 5 production decrease because of it? Was playing the fourth line 3, 4, 5 minutes a night sustainable? It's not just the number of minutes, but the type of minutes, combined with the schedule and the expectation that they continue to carry the club offensively as ppg players all at the same time. Completely unrealistic. Was the result of the schedule, the back to backs, the Olympics forseeable? It was a live issue/caution that didn't simply creep in as a result of hindsight. The team never looked as stale, old and lifeless as the second half of this season. The depth and role players needed to be used more - something that didn't just emerge with injuries - it was the case in October.

The systems questions are a whole other debate - I've posted a number of times that I think there are serious problems with Tortorella's systems only highlighted by the fact that he seemed to expect his old stale core to perform for 82+ games like young, unstoppable horses in his very physically intensive systems style. Did he have the horses to go with an aggressive 2-1-2 forecheck and depend so heavily upon it to generate offense? It did well for a few months, but what happened when teams adapted and started to break down their forecheck? How did the team perform in transition back to defensive zone coverage coming out of that aggressive two-man in forecheck which also depends on a significant amount of blueline pinching to sustain the forecheck? How did it transition again from the collapsing zone to breaking out and generating a transition game? Is this the type of team to use a great deal of stretch passing effectively? How effectively did it score off the dump and chase?

How did the coaching adapt when it all stopped working?

How was depth an issue to be commented upon publicly by the coach, but then style of play an internal matter?

How is does all this talk about a lack of depth and an old, stale core serve the franchise? I can't imagine that will do anything to win Tortorella favour with whomever remains in that room.

I'm not surprised the team looked so fragile and lacking confidence - the coach evidently lacked confidence in them. So much for the "stiffness" and mental toughness. The Tortorella-effect didn't seem to pan out that way.

I personally see more than a significant amount of bad fit and failed experiment - and a very good case for resetting the coaching position to go with the President and the GM.

[Sergei Shirokov]

Even last year, when the team didn't have Kesler in the lineup for most of the season, AV still found a way to distribute the minutes around the lineup.

If the team is getting older, it simply is not good management of your resources to play your aging forward 22-25 minutes a game.

The coaching staff played our top players in the ground. Tortorella talked about getting youth in the lineup, but Kassian, Schroeder, Dalpe, and Corrado were hardly given serious chances to play big roles on this team.

Many people

[NucksCup2015]

You can characterize a lack of endorsement of Tortorella in straw man "angry mob" terms all you like - however, if you want to take issue with any of the reasons/concerns I've stated regarding Tortorella's actual decisions, we might have grounds for a discussion.

Some credit where it's due on the matter of the Canucks being old - Tortorella did his part imo with respect to one position - he helped keep the ball rolling where getting younger at the goaltending position is concerned, by starting Eddie Lack in the Winter Classic. Who can deny that helped precipitate a Luongo deal? Perhaps my favorite personnel decision of his this season.

But overall, when it comes to whether or not we want to see him stay another year - my personal opinion really has nothing to do with being 'angry' with him, or whether or not I like or dislike him. I just don't agree with a number of aspects of his coaching strategy, the way he utilizes players, or his overall systems approach. Regardless of the makeup of the roster, there are imo more problems there than answers, and if we factor in the relative performance of the players and team under him this year....it's a results oriented business, and it's very hard to pump tires based on the results.

please walk us all through his system that you so dislike

you have no clue what his system is and all the armchair coaches in here think they do

even the players say they didnt play his system the second half, and the first half they played great

so, you know more than the players? wow

have you been in the video room with the team? have you been on the ice? have you heard him talk to his players about how they should play?

answer to all that is no, therefore you have no clue, nor do I or anyone what his system is, you have an opinion grounded in the failure of the players to do their jobs.

[oldnews]

please walk us all through his system that you so dislike

you have no clue what his system is and all the armchair coaches in here think they do

even the players say they didnt play his system the second half, and the first half they played great

so, you know more than the players? wow

have you been in the video room with the team? have you been on the ice? have you heard him talk to his players about how they should play?

answer to all that is no, therefore you have no clue, nor do I or anyone what his system is, you have an opinion grounded in the failure of the players to do their jobs.

k

no one grasps the genius of John Tortorella.

/discussion.

[Cold Hard Truth]

This is just another 'pile on' torts attempt by weak minded media

There is no need to accept it. if people want to hate on Torts, fine, hate on him for his record and legitimate issues, but don't accept contrived, stupid ideas as facts, when they are not.

#KeepTorts

[Ben Kenobi]

Torts isn't the problem. The team had difficulty scoring before he came in.

[oldnews]

"I don't buy that the core is too old." Bieksa.

The core is old. stale and trending. Tortorella.

My money is on Bieksa.

[Fozzy]

"I don't buy that the core is too old." Bieksa.

The core is old. stale and trending. Tortorella.

My money is on Bieksa.

But they are stale. Even you must admit that after the last two seasons. There is also a definite trend here and you never answered my previous question. Surely Mike Gillis must take some of the blame for the downfall of this team.

He had three years to get Kesler a team mate on his line- Fail

He had two years to get a PMD as we could all see how Erhoff leaving has affected this team especially the PP- Fail

He was too focused on project bottom six players, we never had a stable 4th line-Fail

He completely changed the dynamic of this team, let's get bigger he said but he didn't try hard enough to keep Raffi Torres, this team had everything in 2011 but he didn't have a clue about what identity to form. Firstly we were modelling ourselves on Detroit then we lose (and only by injuries) to Boston so he decides to follow that model.

How about having our own identity.

Now I am not saying it is ALL his fault. Torts should take some blame, I believe he shouldn't of played the twins on the PK but put them in situations that hurt other teams. Daniel Sedin had a run of 1 goal in 25 games how is this team supposed to succeed when a top line forward does that?

[nuck nit]

The core is legitimately relevant as per the first 40 games of this season.

The ability and excuses to support the core was stale and done.

[Absent Canuck]

The core is legitimately relevant as per the first 40 games of this season.

The ability and excuses to support the core was stale and done.

Not to a contending level that can honestly compete for 16 playoff wins its not. Now without Luongo its not even a remote possibility.

Instead of hoping against hope for a first round playoff team with some additions, lets rebuild it with high end youth.

[hockeywoot]

I sort of agree. Not the old part, but the stale part.

Similar to how AV was let go. Not a bad coach, but time to move on. Time to move on from some of these players.

The reason they typically fire the coach, before attempting a roster overhaul, is because its much easier to do.

[EmployeeoftheMonth]

The core is legitimately relevant as per the first 40 games of this season.

The ability and excuses to support the core was stale and done.

That's not what you were saying at the start of the year. You kept going on about the team not scoring enough and not being able to beat the top teams.

[oldnews]

But they are stale. Even you must admit that after the last two seasons. There is also a definite trend here and you never answered my previous question. Surely Mike Gillis must take some of the blame for the downfall of this team.

Not sure if you're serious here. Mike Gillis was fired. That is pretty much the apex of being held accountable. Apparently, if we listen to the owner, in large part for hiring John Tortorella.

There have literally been hundreds of threads to debate the job Gilis did.

This one is about Tortorella - and his perception of the core.

My own focus here is on the coaching aspect of the job that Tortorella did, and I have to question to what extent Tortorella is burning this roster at both ends - the depth and the core. Those players had him at 25-11 before they hit nosebleed (Quinn's word) levels of exhaustion, injuries and downrigh horrible fortune.

There are a couple things about the interview that I obviously find unconvincing.

First, in response to Gillis' 1040 comments, he avoided hockey questions about the team's style and systems on the grounds that they were "internal' matters. However, he has already publicly commented about lacking depth - essentially a shot at his GM - before that Gillis 1040 interview - if the on ice product is an "internal" matter, then being 'honest and realistic' about the "depth and the old, stale, trending core" would seem to be a matter best expressed internally to his (next) GM and/or President. Instead he delved deeply back into that.

The problem with making these comments in a high profile context. First of all, he's devaluing players at both ends of the roster - expressing a lack of confidence in his depth and his core players - without real limits to where his comments about lack of depth and a stale, old, trending core begin and end.

I highly doubt that wins him a whole lot of favour in the locker room.

Second - it's the age old Mike Keenan approach of devaluing your players publicly before you go about moving them - obviously a horrible asset-value approach. How does a coach being 'honest and realistic' help his next GM get his job done and get value for those players if in fact that is something they agree needs to bed done.

Second, if it's Tortorella vs the depth and the core, there are simply far too many players on this team that I like, appreciate and identify with to give a controversial, first year coach carte-blanche. Tortorella grew on me more than I'd expected, but this kind of 'honest, realistic' thing is self-serving no matter how he tries to slice it, and imo it damages the team both internally and externally. Been there, done that, not interested in the rerun, and thanking gawd that Trevor Linden is the guy in a position to sort that one out.

Some things might be better left unsaid - particularly when they regard someone else's job, when you're on the hot seat yourself for a whole range of your own decisions, most of which have been sidestepped with cliches imo. Some folks may accept the lack of "pushing", "strictness", "banging away" cliches as 'accountability' - some of us want to here answers more related to hockey questions, systems, personnel decisions, etc, and in the absence of those, are uneasy about endorsing another year of the same approach, particularly when the coaches' perception appears to be that it's not changes that are necessary, but even more of the same. The mistake was not enough Tortorella? Not sure I find that very reassuring.

[aGENT]

I'll grant him that the team is on the more stale side of the "freshness scale".

That requires some quality youth coming in from below that simply was largely not available this year to help prop up the aging core (see: San Jose).

There is nothing wrong with the core as it is. The Sedins, Kesler, Bieksa and Hamhuis should and likely will all be retained (short of Kesler ACTUALLY wanting out which I very much doubt). What is and has been lacking is quality, young players on ELC's, bridge contracts etc to give quality depth around those players and cap space to sign/trade for players we may lack in our own prospects. Those guys need to play with and learn from the current core in order to become the next one.

Thankfully for Linden (and us fans) Gillis had already started down that path with moving Corey/Roberto, restocking the prospect cupboards the last couple years and structuring contracts set to expire over the next couple seasons.

Frankly the forwards are easy to "fix". Buyout (or if possible trade) Booth, likely trade Hansen, re-sign Santorelli and our RFA's and you've opened spots for youth and gained back assets or cap space. Kassian keeps improving, Jensen or another prospect makes the jump full time to the top 6, Horvat makes the team on the third line...maybe we sign/trade for a top 6 forward and *poof* a far better team and depth than this season with far more quality prospects (Gaunce, Cassels, Fox, Shinkaruk, Zalewski, Kenins etc) in Utica to call up in case of injuries.

IMO, Trev's hardest work (and one of Gillis' errors) lies in fixing the logjam of 2-4 D (with no true #1, PMD or big, mean crease clearer in the lot). Not to mention the young guys who are going to start to need playing time at this level soon (Stanton, Corrado) and in the coming 3+ years (Blain, Tommernes, Hutton, Suban, Cedarholm etc). Someone is going to have to be convinced to waive their NTC. Perhaps playing next season on the bottom pairing/pressbox helps encourage that...?