Late last night after news of Michel Therrien's firing as head coach of the Pittsburgh Penguins was announced, NHL Network ran an extended excerpt of a conference call with Pittsburgh general manager Ray Shero. For the most part, his comments were pretty much the same thing you hear from GMs after they kick a head coach to the curb. There was one exception, and that was when Shero mentioned that it seemed as if the Penguins had fallen prey to a common phenomenon that we've seen in the NHL over the years -- that the team that loses the Stanley Cup Finals disintegrates on the ice during the following season.
Certainly that seems to have been the case in every year following the lockout, as Edmonton, Ottawa and now Pittsburgh seemed to run out of gas less than a year after thrilling their fans with a run to the Finals. Then again, isn't it the case that the team that took to the ice for Saturday night's 6-2 loss in Toronto was missing more than a few critical players who helped the team get to the Finals in the first place last Spring?
When you look at it that way, perhaps it isn't quite so surprising that Pittsburgh has struggled this season. Keeping teams more or less in tact from year to year is a next to impossible job, but it can be done -- just take a look at the Detroit Red Wings. But it's impossible to give Therrien's performance an honest review without noting that the franchise lost Marian Hossa, Ryan Malone, Ty Conklin and Gary Roberts to free agency this past offseason.
That's a boatload of offense, tons of grit and an insurance policy against Marc-Andre Fleury that all disappeared in the blink of an eye. In response, all Shero could scrape from the bottom of the free agent barrel were Ruslan Fedotenko and Miroslav Satan. With all due respect to both of those NHL veterans, there was a reason that their services were available at the end of last season. On top of that, it's impossible not to recall that two of the team's most important defensemen -- Ryan Whitney and Sergei Gonchar -- started the season on the injured list, with Gonchar only getting back on the ice in time for Saturday's debacle against Toronto.
So what will new Pittsburgh head coach Dan Bylsma be able to do that Therrien couldn't with this roster? Outside of the immediate boost that firing a head coach always seems to have on a team, I'm at a loss to say. If you ask me, the real problem in Pittsburgh is that the team has roughly $26.4 million in salary locked up in just four players -- Evgeni Malkin, Sidney Crosby, Jordan Staal and Fleury.
Those contracts are all long-term and so are their consequences. Like it or not, if you want to succeed in the NHL, a general manager needs to continually produce players who contribute far in excess of the number that serves as the bottom line on their contracts. Today in Pittsburgh, there simply aren't enough of those players to make a difference. And for that, you can't blame Michel Therrien.
Every Monday morning The Ice Sheet will take a close look at everything that's happened in the NHL since Friday night at 5:00 PM -- or if need be, anything else the author wants to bleat about. To read them all, click here.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-16-2009 @ 3:30PM
catspikes3 said...
no, therrien was nothing more than a whiner. there was no way that crosby or malkin could become mature players with therrien around.
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2-16-2009 @ 10:16PM
codkfy said...
sid and gino learned bad lessons from therrien .. players left that orginzation from the media circus . pens dont make playoffs period
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2-17-2009 @ 2:58AM
Jim Jacobs said...
The issue with the Pittsburgh Penguins' latest troubles does NOT lie at Coach Michel Therrien's feet. Let me count the ways: 1. The "captaincy" awarded to Sidney Crosby was undeserving. Just because Sid was anointed the savior according to the NHL commish, Gary "Butt"Man, it does NOT mean he deserved to be the captain. If anything the captaincy should have gone to Petr Sykora..a former winner of the Lord Stanley Cup with the New Jersey Devils. He has experience, and knowledge of how things should be done. Remember Petr Sykora, and Miroslav Satan were former teammates in a now disbanded IHL league with their very first professional team called the Detroit Vipers. Their first coach was Rick Dudley, a very well respected former NHL player. They won the division in 1994, in their year of the club's existence. That's what leadership is all about. Granted, Wayne Gretzky had to open his mouth and exclaim Sidney Crosby's the best...and Commish "Butt"Man is now trying to market that whole hyperbole to it's extreme. Granted if you look at the Penguins statistics, we see Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby is 1-2 in the scoring category. But when will teams ever ever ever realize that it's not just a 1-2 punch that gets teams the coveted Lord Stanley Cup? When Coach Bowman came to the Detroit Red Wings, he had to sell the team on the "team concept" that being a great player is not just about the "me, myself, and I"...and roll 4 good capable lines of scoring game winners every game night, without having to heavily depend on Hossa, Lidstrom, Zetterberg, and Datsyuk. I could go on and on and on, but you get the idea. TEAMWORK works! When a team embraces the concept and disregards the dirty tactics of "punching a player in the butt and groin area" such as Crosby has done in a very famous "youtube.com" video...then the light will definitely shine at the end of the tunnel when everyone realizes that is the way to go...ditch the "Me, Myself, and I" concept...and the NHL will be much better for it. One more thing: Bettman needs to go. Replace him with Mickey Redmond. He would definitely bring the spirit and the oomph of a combination of old-time and modern-hockey back without ticky tack crap.
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2-17-2009 @ 3:12AM
Jim Jacobs said...
This is why I say Petr Sykora should have been the captain of the Penguins: Statistics do NOT lie!!!!! Sykora Won Stanley Cup with New Jersey in 1999-2000 and reached Finals three other times – New Jersey 2001-02, Anaheim 2002-03 and Pittsburgh 2007-08
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