Sunday, January 4, 2009

Your Springfield FAILcons


13-19-4-1 after 37 games, 87GF 119GA, Last place in the Atlantic Division, 3 points behind Lowell (who by the way have 3 games in hand). 2-9-2 in their last 13 games, and 4-14-2 in their last 20 games. They were outscored 22-46 and 43-73 in their last 13 and 20 games respectively.

The PP is putrid, the PK is worse, Sebastien Bisaillon cannot find an every day spot despite having a cannon from the point that could be helping the PP, the defense plays a conservative game despite the fact that the Falcons offense has been anemic, many more players are under performing than performing up to snuff.

I for one feel that a coaching change is in order, but let's look at the whole picture.....

#1-Player Callups
Liam Reddox and Gilbert Brule are both solid forwards at the AHL level and would probably be 2 of the teams top 4 forwards or at worst 2 of their top 6 forwards.

#2-Injuries
JF Jacques has yet to play a game, Slava Trukhno was under performing prior to his injury but still added a secondary scoring threat. Jake Taylor has been out for some time, and could be a stabilizing force on defense, however with both Mathieu Roy and Taylor in the lineup there'd be less developmental time for the teams young defense.

#3-Stagnated Development

Most of last years players haven't taken the next step in their evolutions as players. O'Marra, Trukhno (prior to injury), Spurgeon, Sestito, McDonald, they've all hit snags.

#4-Leaders On Ice

Schremp, Peckham, and Dubnyk have all had really good stretches, but they have all been guilty of having poor stretches as well. Schremp was superb until just after returning from Edmonton. Much like the way that Nilsson was last year and then his play tapered off and he was a HS before being recalled to Edmonton. Peckham hasn't been nearly as physical, and Dubnyk has been hot and cold.

#5-Coaching Decisions
A lack of strategically placed timeouts, sending out his checking line for offensive zone draws, his scoring lines for defensive zone draws, poor choice of special teams personnel, poor line combo's, the list goes on and on.

#6-Some Top Prospects Of Age Are In The NCAA/Europe
Jeff Petry, Chris Vande Velde, Linus Omark, all 3 players could be contributors this year but are unavailable. They along with Riley Nash could still be unavailable next year although Omark has hinted at coming over next season. This does not help the Falcons cause.

#7-Poor Drafting

Colin McDonald (2nd rounder) and Geoff Paukovich (2nd rounder) are both non-factors on most nights and are routinely outplayed by players drafted way after them or who weren't drafted at all. Add in Ryan O'Marra (drafted by the NYI) and you've got 3 hight draft choices that bring little to the rink.

#8-Under Achieving Rookies

Chorney, Wild, and Hrabal have all been disappointments to varying degrees. Chorney has failed to live up to his potential thus far, Wild hasn't been as much of a factor offensively as he could be, and Hrabal should head back to Europe at years end.

#9-Under Achieving Veterans
Roy, Corrazini, Bekar, all 3 of these guys haven't gotten the job done as well as they should. Especially the first 2.
#10-Under Achievement In Every Sense Of The Word
Truitt has not gotten the best out of his players, it is time for him to be replaced.

12 comments:

oilerdago said...

You could also add in the complete mismanagement of the goalie situation. Dubynk is over / misused as well.

The goal of an AHL team is development but that sure does not seem to be the case here.

Have to wonder what things would look like with Rob Daum running things down in Springfield. Can't be any worse.

oilerdiehard said...

Hrabal has looked that ineffective? I hardly ever hear anything about him. Thanks for passing that along.

LT gives me a hard time now and then with Chorney (not without reason). But he was calling for Hrabal before the season to be 1st or 2nd call up with Peckham on D.

I seen Hrabal was not doing much offensively but I assumed he was at least solid on the defensive side of things. I guess he does have the smaller ice surface adjustment to make. But we are 30 games in at this point so it should be coming along in a noticeable way by now.

I just double checked his point totals. Wow 1 point in 17 games in the AHL (I guess he did pick up 4 points in the ECHL though)? Remember when Guy Flaming and LT to a lesser extent were kind of knocking down Grebs by comparing him to (in order to prop him up) Hrabal's numbers. Basically seeming to imply it was evidence he was as good or better than Grebs. Grebs had about 50 points in the AHL when he was 2 years younger than Hrabal is now.

I recall Guy making this comparison to KP and he sort of blew it off basically saying Hrabal is not as good as Grebs. I guess KP was right about using those numbers (7 points in 20 games in the RSL) as the following season Hrabal had 13 points in 56 games.

On a side note we signed Hrabal to a 2 year, 2 way deal so I am guessing he will be around for another season. Hopefully he can pick up a bunch and turn himself into a player.

Jonathan Willis said...

#1-Player Callups

Liam Reddox and Gilbert Brule are the only players on the team that play tough opposition and add offensive presence. Sestito and Spurgeon play the toughs, and Schremp and Potulny add scoring, but Reddox and Gilbert are the only guys who do both.

#3-Stagnated Development

The only guy I'll disagree on is Spurgeon - a healthy season from him qualifies as development ;)

#8-Under Achieving Rookies

Chorney's been a disaster - that's the only word for his season (-21 with marginal offense) so far. Hrabal is at least holding his own against the toughs, while Cody Wild keeps getting scratched for reasons that I can't begin to understand (particularly when Chorney and Roy play every game).

oilerdiehard said...

Hrabal has been playing tough comp? That is the first I heard of that. I know early on he definitely was not but I have not been following the match ups and pairings very closely lately. So you may be right on that for all I know. But no mention of his marginal offense as you did with Chorney? We all have our favourites I guess. :)

Bryanbryoil said...

"Liam Reddox and Gilbert Brule are the only players on the team that play tough opposition and add offensive presence. Sestito and Spurgeon play the toughs, and Schremp and Potulny add scoring, but Reddox and Gilbert are the only guys who do both."

Really Jonathan??? According to who??? Truitt would match the Potulny/Schremp line against anyone
in all situations and they saw tougher opposition than Brule's line.

Not sure about Hrabal playing tough minutes either. Tough minutes defenders have been Roy, Peckham, Chorney, Wild, and Bisaillon. Now Young and Gabinet are in that category of late.

However the way that this coach changes up d pairings. pretty well everyone has faced tough minutes at some point including Bina and Hrabal. Primarily they haven't been.

Jonathan Willis said...

Right here, BBO. Schremp, as an example, has 17 events against top-line players, 16 events against second line players, and 39 events against low-tier players. That ratios out to be near the bottom of the pack, which makes a ton of sense given how the Oilers have used him.

Jonathan Willis said...

ODH: That's because Hrabal's even with marginal offense. Chorney's -21 with marginal offense; there's a huge gap there. Offensively, Hrabal's definitely been a disappointment.

oilerdiehard said...

Jonathan - Well let us hope in a couple more seasons. When Chorney is as old and has as much pro experience as Hrabal has now. That he will be able to handle top pairing AHL minutes too and provide more offense than Hrabal does now. :)

Bryanbryoil said...

Thanks for that link Jonathan. My questions are....
#1-are those all ES #'s or do they take into account special teams?
#2-does it take into consideration of teams trying to take advantage of lesser lines?

I have seen the Schremp/Potulny line go head up with the opposing top lines and come out on top or at least at a draw.

If you can elaborate on the exact basis of the stats, it would make the picture a little clearer. Thanks for the work, I'm sure that it took a great deal of time to collect the data.

Jonathan Willis said...

BBO - it's even-strength numbers only, both goals for and against. I'm working on a second set of numbers that will split up the GF and the GA, so we can see who players are scoring against, and who they're getting scored on by.

Of course, players that run against a checking line (which seems likely for Potulny/Schremp) will be penalized because checkers don't generally put up a ton of points (hello, Tim Sestito) so this gives more context to plus-minus than offense (or lack thereof).

Bryanbryoil said...

Thanks Jonathan. Truitt really runs his lines 1 after another. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to his coaching in terms of matchups.

That could really cloud the perspective. If other teams are matching up against him and he's just rolling 4 lines pretty evenly, the opposition chooses the matchups at home or on the road.

IMO the numbers could show a poor coaching job more than anything.

hunter1909 said...

I can understand why Schremp isn't playing lights out hockey after getting turned over by MacFuck.

He's only human. Also, he's got supreme talent levels, which the stupid Oilers don't seem to understand.

He might as well float for as long as he feels like, since it's obvious that there's no way MacFuck is going to be asking for him.

Then at the end of the season, he's a RFA and someone is going to make an offer sheet for him.

Joke of the year so far: The way everyone is creaming themselves over Eberle - ala Gagner, ala Schremp, ala Comrie, ala every bloody half assed prospect since this sad sick management circus rolled into town.