[Cali Panthers Fan]

Reasons why they aren't as good this year:

1) Hangover. It's a real thing and they're most definitely suffering from it.

2) Voynov debacle. Both on and off the ice, this has been a big detractor from the team.

3) Declining veterans. We all know about Mike Richards, but Dustin Brown and Justin Williams have been slowly declining in production for the past couple of years. Not to mention Stoll and Regehr who look to be nearing the end.

4) Mediocre Quick. They've always needed him to be superb to win a lot, so a .910 Sv% isn't going to cut it.

Some of those are fixable. You can replace Brown and Williams with Toffoli and Pearson and probably not miss much of a beat except for the experience level. Voynov's future is up in the air, so it's not certain how that gets fixed. Quick is having a below average year for him, so he should be back to form next year. If they don't make the playoffs, they'll have plenty of time to rest up and have no playoff hangover whatsoever.

They still have lots of playoff calibre pieces, but might need a tweak or two in the off-season to get back on track. Most of this is performance based and an aberration.