Just An Opinion After Another Penguin Loss

On November 11, 2015, our Pittsburgh Penguins lost to the Columbus Blue Jackets. It was the 16^th game of that season. After that loss, the team’s record was 10-6-0. Mike Johnston was the Coach of that team.

All through the end of the previous season and through the first part of that 2015-2016 I was beating the drum for a change in Coaching. Everyone whined that I was crazy. Johnston was a good Coach. “And besides who would the team get to replace him?” they demanded.

Just a short 12 games later, the 28^th game of the that season, on December 11, 2015, Jim Rutherford pulled the trigger and Johnston was fired. The team’s record at that point was 15-10-3.

This season, after 16 games, Mike Sullivan has our hometown heroes 1 game below 0.500 at 6-7-3, 5 points below Mike Johnston’s team. For Sullivan to at least tie Johnston’s record, the record that got that Mike fired, he would have to go 9-3-0 over the next 12 games.

There are teams that could possibly manage to go 9-3-0 or even 9-2-1 or better. However, it is hard to imagine this team running off a 12-game stretch at that level of play.

Even harder to imagine is a team as old as our favorite fightless, flightless fowl having anything left in the gas tank come March to make a stretch run if they can only eke out a 6-7-3 record in the first 16 games, when their legs are far fresher.

I have been back on my drum since Sullivan’s 2^nd round loss to the Washington Capitals in 2018 when said Coach disrespected his GM (Rutherford) who said that Phil Kessel was injured throughout the playoffs. Sullivan vocally refuted that statement in the media. I have continued to proselytize the winds of change ever since

• When Penguins got swept by the New York Islanders, in the first round, (which I predicted that sweep) and Sullivan even admitted none of the players wanted to play for him in the media after that debacle.
• When Sullivan lost to the 24^th ranked Montreal Canadiens in the bubble qualifying round.
• When Sullivan suffered another 1^st round loss to the New York Islanders again the next season, after the loss to the Canadiens.
• And when Sullivan lost to the New York Rangers last season.

Even in the throes of defeat, my call for change was shouted down, often rudely by fans not willing to critically look at the team. Even after the team’s 4^th consecutive 1^st round loss, many, many fans and even the current GM, Ron Hextall were unwilling to look closely at our seafaring Sphenisciformes. Hextall gave Sullivan a 3-year extension and I have heard many fans advance the idea of Sullivan for the Jack Adams award. Wow

The only Jack I can associate with our Penguins’ Coach is the medicinal Jack Daniels, required to get a fan through the third period of game he is coaching the team he built.

The team Sullivan took to the Stanley Cup was built by a combination of Ray Shero, Dan Bylsma, Jim Rutherford, Jason Botterill, and Mike Johnston. It takes more than a season or 2 for a Coach to make a team HIS TEAM. The team that lost last night was pretty much the team that Sullivan wanted to come out of the preseason with. This is now HIS team [Sullivan’s], a team struggling to play 0.500 hockey.

It has been obvious to anyone willing to look, the Black and Gold has needed a change behind the bench for the last 4 seasons. How many more seasons will this organization waste toiling under a failing, falling, backward looking vision, a vision that has taken steps backward for at least 4 season and now is in danger of missing the playoffs if left unchecked? How many more seasons will this organization wait before they adopt a new vision, a growing vision, a forward moving vision?

I don’t have a problem with Hextall keeping the “Core” intact. Nor do I have a problem with this team losing, even with the “Core”, if they are losing while developing kids (Sorry, Pierre – Olivier Joseph is not who I mean. Joseph is still too light to play in this league. He gets his head handed to him in front of his own Goal by every opposing Forward).

What I have a problem with is seeing a foundering Coach not making any changes and expecting different results.

Mixing up line combinations and defensive pairings is not change. This team is too old to play a high tempo, high energy fore-check. This team needs a Coaching staff that knows how to coach the team it has not the 2015-2016 team or a team they wish they had. This team needs a Coaching staff willing to play the best players in the organization, not their favorite players. This team needs a Coaching staff that knows how to identify the strengths of the players they have and develop strategies to exploit those assets. This team needs a Coaching staff that can take an honest look at the players weaknesses and come up with tactics that hide or insulate their players from those limitations. This team needs a Coaching that staff that isn’t too lazy to coach and develop young players and not so inert that they have to find and rely on aging veterans that they assume don’t need coaching.

Deck shuffling card sharps with two aces in the hole (Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in their prime) may get away with dealing from the bottom of the deck to win a couple of Cups. However, the last thing this team needs is a mountebank who now lacks a true pair of aces, trying to bluff his way to a pot without enough chips to cover the bet.

If the Coach doesn’t change – change the Coach