Quote:
Originally Posted by monkeyman
I'm not sure how anyone can watch this team and come to the conclusion, yeah, GG is a great coach, lets just keep doing what were doing. Instead, lets blame the complete melt downs and inconsistent play on; the entire team, on bad luck, on goaltending, on the assistants, on the GM, on the fourth line, on the first line, on the third line, on the refs... at some point you have to stop and ask yourself, why is this team consistently inconsistent and why are they subject to so much bad luck? Bad luck, bad calls, bad play, inconsistent performance, is all a manifestation of bad preparation, unclear assignments, slow, lazy practice.
So you can watch the game and ask yourself, how do you blame GG for last nights debacle of major proportions, but you have to look deeper and ask yourself why so many professionals, who have been successful on so many levels are suddenly, all making the same stupid, bad, undisciplined plays? It's all about the direction they've been given, the preparation of the team, and the habits they've developed in practice. Which is well documented as being slow and casual, just like what we see in the games. Who's fault is that?
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I'd also ask yourself why those that want Gulutzan gone so bad have this obsessive need to make everyone agree with them?
Teams are prepared to play a certain style within a certain structure.
My opinion is you fire a coach if his system doesn't work, and you can fire a coach if his utilization doesn't work. I personally wouldn't fire a coach with a good system and solid utilization with a team that brainfarts their way to losses.
That's just me though, you can be as upset as you want to be.
They are outplaying teams and they've done so for almost three months. To me that's the aim of the season, get a team with a structure that is sustainable and let the results come. So he gets a check mark for me in the most important area.
Utilization is another thing. I've had issues with Gulutzan on utilization and have been pretty up front about it. He's hand cuffed on some of them (Brouwer), and maybe he's giving too much responsibility to Cameron for the powerplay (not using Hamilton, players on their true sides), but the big one for me was the use of the fourth line to start periods, or after goals, and he's cleaned that up quite a bit.
So if I'm the GM I see element one is going well, element two is coming along, but the players are finding a way to lose despite being put in a situation to win.
I don't fire a coach for that.
I do sit down with Gulutzan and Giordano and ask about leadership and how to get the team some fortitude.