Pittsburgh Penguins have no D

[kirmit129]

Prior to the season, when Mario Lemieux announced that his Penguins can very well challenge for the Stanley Cup this year, I remember thinking: "Yeah lots of stars but this team is concentrating too much on offence." Offence is entertaining but it does not win games if you allow more goals than you score. That's what's happenning this season. The penguins score 6, the opposition score 7. The penguins try to be more consevative and score 3 and, guess what, the opposition score 4. At this rate, they'll have trouble qualifying for the playoffs let alone challenge for the Championship.


On a side inquiry, I would like to know what you guys would prefer to have on your team: A 60 goal scorer who is -20 for the season or a 30 goal scorer who is +20 for the season?

The reason I'm asking the above is coz I once told my friend that Pavel Bure is overrated. Yeah, he scores a lot of goals. However, he is on the ice for a lot of goals that is scored against his team. I used to think(and still do) that he's one of those players that plays for breakaways and neglects the defence.

 

[spiff]

No D

Please,

They have Jackman.....

LMAO

 

[Ranger68]

If I had 12 forwards who all scored ten goals, but finished the year +20, I'd win the Cup.
That's because plus/minus is partially (mostly?) a team stat, and combines offense and defense equally.
You're only as good as your differential. If all of your lines score more than they allow, you're golden. If one line consistently gives up more than it scores, you should remove them from the ice as much as possible.
When Bure was scoring in the neighbourhood of 100 points, I'm sure he was doing his team good. When he wasn't, I'm not so sure.

 

[kirmit129]

Please,

They have Jackman.....

LMAO

This guy has a career of -36 in 141 games playing for good teams in Dallas(38 games), Boston(2 games) and Toronto(71 games). In none of his seasons did he ever finish in the +ve. I hope that you are being sarcastic....

 

[kirmit129]

If I had 12 forwards who all scored ten goals, but finished the year +20, I'd win the Cup.
That's because plus/minus is partially (mostly?) a team stat, and combines offense and defense equally.
You're only as good as your differential. If all of your lines score more than they allow, you're golden. If one line consistently gives up more than it scores, you should remove them from the ice as much as possible.
When Bure was scoring in the neighbourhood of 100 points, I'm sure he was doing his team good. When he wasn't, I'm not so sure.

But would you pay a 50 goal scorer(100 points man) with a -10 more than a 25 goal scorer(75 points man) with a +20?

 

[21pro]

it comes down to chemistry.

they do have plenty of offensive talent and good, not great, defensive talent.

now, they have to settle all the egos they have and develop some sort of chemistry... very hard to do imho with a team full of all stars and failing to win... kinda like the U.S. Mens Hockey Team in Nagano in '98... Perhaps they could do it if they had leadership from a coach such as Quinn. can Olczyk be a Quinn? nope.

 

[21pro]

IMHO Olczyk is Lemieux's puppet. .

agreed.

 

[kirmit129]

He may not be the best defensively but in 30 games as a Penguin he has 29 points. I agree he sucked prior to going to pittsburgh, but he has done good offensively since being traded. http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/players/1970
Pittsburgh did sign + re-sign some good defencemen in Tarnstrom, Gonchar, Jackman and Odelein it is just too bad they can't play defence in this new system (and not saying that they could in the old either). I am just hoping things flip soon, they won 2 stanley cups with no defense (good offensively again ex: Coffey) and a garbage goalie (Barrasso) by just plainly scoring more goals then the opposition.

They won 2 Stanley Cups when it was the high scoring era. At the time, everyone wanted to follow the example of the Edmonton Oilers. However, something happened after that. Jacques Lemaire and the Devils won the cup with the neutral zone trap. After that, everyone started to use the trap. Especially the expansion teams that knew that they did not have the players for an offensive minded game. There were more teams added(expansion) and some team noticed that they have a chance to win with defence so they adopted this defence first mentality. (and that's only some of the reasons why it shifted from offence to defence)

 

[shack]

On a side inquiry, I would like to know what you guys would prefer to have on your team: A 60 goal scorer who is -20 for the season........

And how many times in the history of the NHL has this ever happened? Probably zero, which renders it a moot question.

 

[kirmit129]

And how many times in the history of the NHL has this ever happened? Probably zero, which renders it a moot question.

Well I guess you did not understand the purpose of the question. Those numbers were just for argument sake. I wanted know what people would rather have: A player who scores a lot but is a defensive burden or a player who has a balance of offence and defence? I do not know if anyone ever scored 60 goals and wound up with a -20. Hence I'll ask the same question with more realistic numbers if it'll make you feel better.

What would you guys prefer to have on your team: A 60 goal scorer who is -2 for the season or a 30 goal scorer who is +40 for the season?

(I remember a season when Pavel Bure scored 59 goals for the Panthers but ended the year at -2)

 

[A-ROD]

Back to the original topic.. Pittsburghs Defense; I think the biggest effect of the new rules have had on the game affect the defensemen, for this reason I will reserve judgement until they have had a chance to learn. I believe Pittsburghs bigger worry will be in goal. I am not sold on Mr Fleury as a frontline NHL goalie. He doesn't seem to come up with big saves when the game is on the line.. just my opinion
Also note Crosby's attitude, everytime somthing goes wrong he smashes his stick, IMO this is akin to throwing your golf club after a bad shot, not the attitude I want on my team they better nip it in the bud.

 

[the_big_E]

I knew along the Penguins D would stink...

as for players scoring goals and being a minus...look at Kovalchuk

2002: 38 goals, -24
2003: 41 goals, -10

So he's getting better, but if Atlanta keeps playing they have been the last 2 games, on pace for another minus season on top of all his goals.

 

[shack]

What would you guys prefer to have on your team: A 60 goal scorer who is -2 for the season or a 30 goal scorer who is +40 for the season?

It's probably analogous to what Ozzie Guillen recently said, he'd rather have four 20 homer guys than one 60 homer guy. In almost every team sport you're probably better off having a balanced attack (and defence as well). That way there are less weaknesses for the opposition to attack. If someone is good both offensively and defensively there's no liability as there would be with a huge scorer who doesn't know what his goalie looks like.

 

[Ranger68]

But would you pay a 50 goal scorer(100 points man) with a -10 more than a 25 goal scorer(75 points man) with a +20?

Of course not.
So?
Remember what I said - plus/minus is a team stat, and reflects offense and defense in equal measure. If you had a line with three 50-goal guys, there's NO WAY they'd all be minus-players, unless they all had half their points on the PP. Not in the real world.

You have to compare individual plus-minus with team plus-minus to have any idea of relative defensive merits of players. Even then, the play of everyone else on the ice with you (including, most importantly, the goaltender) will reflect on YOUR plus-minus. Really, plus-minus is a VERY difficult stat to interpret properly.

 

[Ranger68]

Jackman has notched about 2/3 of his points with the Penguins on the PP (six of eight goals, and twelve of 21 assists).
Take that production with a grain of salt. Hey, it's good to score on the PP, but that doesn't say ANYTHING about your defensive play.
His plus-minus this year, in a small sample, is in about the middle of the D. I think it's unclear, just from the numbers, how well he's playing defensively. Gonchar has clearly been playing like crap. The goaltenders, by Save Percentage, have all been miserable. This is contributing to relatively poor performance (and plus-minus for the rest of the team).
I think it's still to be seen how well this team will play in front of the goalies - who, nevertheless, need to play MUCH better.

 

[Hard Idle]

Unless the NHL changes the rules to the point where temas can just take turns letting their all stars go 4-on-none against the goalie, the Pens aren't going to make the playoffs. In fact they might be the least likely of all the teams that didn't make it the past two seasons.

All I heard about was how the Pens did this or that before the season began, but the only change to their League-worst backline is the soft & mistake prone Gonchar. Up front too, it's more of the same: goal hogs & front runners.

Teams will eventually get their game sharpness back after a one year layoff, and they will adjust to the new rules. The game might look a little different, but by February it will still be hard work scoring goals and team defence and a competent blueline will still separate winners from losers.

 

[kirmit129]

Man oh man, at this rate, the Penguins are not even going to reach 20 wins. They are(again) trailing 6-2 and it's barely 2 minutes into the third. I just realized something. The penguins are the new New York Rangers. Lots of star players with shit to show for it...

 

[the rusty tromb]

Would be hilarious/awesome if Crosby pulled a Lindros and demanded a trade.

 

[kirmit129]

Would be hilarious/awesome if Crosby pulled a Lindros and demanded a trade.

I doubt it. If that happens, he'll be labelled a whining hypocritical spoiled brat by the fans and the media. His reputation will be hit and I think his sponsorships will go down if that happens.

 

[the rusty tromb]

I doubt it. If that happens, he'll be labelled a whining hypocritical spoiled brat by the fans and the media. His reputation will be hit and I think his sponsorships will go down if that happens.

I know it would never happen.Just saying it would be hilarious if it did.

I'm sure Crosby is much happier that he's living up to expectations even though his team sucks, instead of him being on a good team and not living up to the hype.