Huberdeau's agent: "Negativity sucks the joy right out of players"

[redmile04]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

Come on now. Kadri is above his career average.

Is this post trying to be funny?

Exactly, that's on the flames/ certain fans for thinking Kadri would duplicate ONE season ( last season) Kadri has been what I and most expected.

[ComixZone]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

Come on now. Kadri is above his career average.

Is this post trying to be funny?

Yeah, we can debate what we paid Kadri to be - but he's the highest paid forward on the team this year. Is he living up to that? He was brought in because he was a winner - is that making any sort of impact on this team?

Even if you ignore Kadri, there's still Mangiapane, Huberdeau, Vladar, Markstrom, and Weegar. Two of your three top paid forwards, your #1 and #2 goalie, and your soon to be most expensive defenceman - we shouldn't be acting like that is insignificant and that this is exclusively on Huberdeau/an issue exclusive to Huberdeau.

[Bonded]

Originally Posted by redmile04

Exactly, that's on the flames/ certain fans for thinking Kadri would duplicate ONE season ( last season) Kadri has been what I and most expected.

If Kadri was expected to repeat that season consistently he would have got 9

[HighLifeMan]

It's not even Kadri's production that's been disappointing. It's his game to game, and shift to shift effort levels. I think out of anyone on this roster he has shown the least amount of willingness to buy into a team game and consistently tries to do everything himself - especially recently. A lot of selfish plays offensively, lazy defensive coverages/backtracks, and a consistent tendency to whine about officiating which reflects poorly on the team.

He can be a hell of a lot better, that's for sure, but again he's certainly not alone in that.

[Saqe]

Originally Posted by Burning Beard

That is the story of the season right there. Despite what everyone else is trying to make it.

If Huberdeau's pro rated 50 points or so for the season isn't a story then I don't know what a story is.

[Manhattanboy]

Just listened to Bruce Boudreau on Sirius NHL. Briefly:

- doesn't like the Walsh tweet. Suspects Walsh has watched every game and is just expressing frustration
- certain guys and teams have off years, it just happens; lots of change in Calgary so this is not unexpected, but acknowledges that Huberdeau's point decline is really concerning
- referred to Mangiapane's point decline as well
- Darryl is an excellent coach, knows what he is doing and has the best read on the team of anyone
- Flames were very scary to play against last year - could score quickly, almost at will and then lock it down defensively (I would have liked if he would have discussed the playoffs last year but he didn't)
- this year the Flames are not nearly as scary with the loss of Tkachuk who was "always in the mix"
- but he likes the current make up of the team, thinks we have lots of pieces, they are just not gelling right now
- however thinks Calgary will make a run and be in the playoffs over Minnesota (although he said he would not pick a team that fired him)
- in the East, thinks Florida will be in the playoffs- referred to Tkachuk again, thinks things are coming together there

[Cowboy89]

Walsh is a professional agent who earns a living off his clients. He doesn't spout off random crap reacting to things on twitter that could put his clients in a tough spot without thought out intention from both client and agent. Anyone who has worked in a PR type setting understands how things work behind the scenes and how all forms of communication embed some underlying meaning.

Huberdeau clearly wants the situation to change and having just signed an 8 year extension has minimal power to enact that change personally. I imagine that Huberdeau and Walsh sense changes coming after the season with the Calgary Flames due to the lack of team success in a year following winning the division and considering themselves preseason Stanley Cup contenders. With the approaching trade deadline, the team fading out of playoff contention, Huberdeau struggling, and Treliving being without a contrect and not seeing eye to eye with Sutter, now's as good a time as any to send that message publicly which is:

The Darryl Sutter relationship with Hubredeau is not going to work out - know this now and act accordingly - either move Huberdeau out, or move Sutter out.

Having Walsh do it gives Huberdeau plausible deniability and cover with the media to pretend it was not his words. It also has the double impact of pissing off Sutter enough that if Murray Edward's next play is to harken back to the nostalgic days of 2004 and kick Darryl upstairs to be GM, he will be gunning to run Huberdeau out of town. In that scenario (Sutter staying) that would be what Huberdeau wants.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

I would have liked if he would have discussed the playoffs last year but he didn't.

Personally, I don't even think that the playoffs are worth dwelling on. What happened was Markstrom sucked and there were a couple of game changing calls that went against the team that shouldn't have. And as much as people don't want to hear it, McDavid and Draisaitl are game changers who can carry a team through a series. McDavid's performance in that series was probably his peak performance to date. Not much Sutter or anyone else could have done about that.

[Teroy]

Originally Posted by HighLifeMan

It's not even Kadri's production that's been disappointing. It's his game to game, and shift to shift effort levels. I think out of anyone on this roster he has shown the least amount of willingness to buy into a team game and consistently tries to do everything himself - especially recently. A lot of selfish plays offensively, lazy defensive coverages/backtracks, and a consistent tendency to whine about officiating which reflects poorly on the team.

He can be a hell of a lot better, that's for sure, but again he's certainly not alone in that.

He's a puck hog.

[Classic_Sniper]

Originally Posted by ComixZone

Weegar, Vladar hasn't grown at all, Kadri's PPG has dropped from 1.23 to 0.73

Huberdeau, Kadri, and Mangiapane - your three highest paid forwards, are all not performing.

Your #1 goalie is legitimately bad, and the backup isn't really any better. Your soon to be highest paid defenceman has gone from 0.55PPG to 0.3PPG.

This is not a problem isolated to Huberdeau.

I'm not sure this is 100% fair though. The following players have experienced their best career season under Darryl Sutter:

Johnny Gaudreau
Matthew Tkachuk
Elias Lindholm
Andrew Mangiapane
Rasmus Andersson
Noah Hanifin
Dillon Dube
Oliver Kylington
Chris Tanev
Nikita Zadorov
Erik Gudbranson
Jacob Markstrom
Tyler Toffoli
Blake Coleman (on pace)

Mikael Backlund could easily be on this list too as he's having a monster season. But as everyone can see, whether it was this season or last season, Darryl can help players achieve great results, he's not some offensive blackhole here. Also, it's probably not fair to expect everyone to replicate their career years last season, there's a reason why they call them career years, because they only happen once.

[Flamesfan05]

Kadri wasn’t paid for his career year last year

But nobody would pay the normal Kadri 7 years @ 7M at 32 yrs old

He got paid somewhere in between

His numbers looks Ok because of a good start

Lately he sucks ass. I would say lately he is more of a problem than Huberdeau

Kadri is not getting a pass from my perspective

[zamler]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

- Darryl is an excellent coach, knows what he is doing and has the best read on the team of anyone

Wonder what this team would look like under a poor coach.

[Badgers Nose]

A lot of guys on this team are good when they keep it simple. But they don't. It must drive Sutter nuts.

[ComixZone]

Originally Posted by Badgers Nose

A lot of guys on this team are good when they keep it simple. But they don't. It must drive Sutter nuts.

This doesn’t track for me.

The entire team is keeping it simple. That’s how they’re accomplishing their shot volumes for and against.

This team is playing brain dead hockey, it can’t get any more simple than what it is.

[Flamesfan05]

Sutter is a great coach. He is missing a Kopitar, Iglina, Marleau or at least a Gaudreau/Tkachuk

He is stuck with a floundering Huberdeau

Nobody is stepping to score the important goal when he needs it

[Lanny'sDaMan]

Hahahaha Hubie's a funny guy. That media scrum there should pretty definitively show Walsh went ahead on his own. Taking his word at face value he had no idea and then called Walsh to say, that ain't cool man. His comment "Oh so we're gonna win tomorrow then. Is that what your saying?" Cracked me right up.

[SuperMatt18]

Even the defensive zone structure is how they are supposed to play...they just aren't executing well.

They are asked to put lots of pressure on the puck in a man-to-man structure.

But problem is if you get beat it can lead to scramble play in the defensive zone, and a five alarm fire.

It's why there is rarely middle ground with the team defense IMO. It's either a play that was quickly eliminated with little threats, or "Holy crap it's a tire fire".

It's effective when executed well, but risky, and I think teams might be starting to figure out ways to exploit it a bit too to generate quality over volume against us.

[InternationalVillager]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Even the defensive zone structure is how they are supposed to play...they just aren't executing well.

They are asked to put lots of pressure on the puck in a man-to-man structure.

But problem is if you get beat it can lead to scramble play in the defensive zone, and a five alarm fire.

It's why there is rarely middle ground with the team defense IMO. It's either a play that was quickly eliminated with little threats, or "Holy crap it's a tire fire".

It's effective when executed well, but risky, and I think teams might be starting to figure out ways to exploit it a bit too to generate quality over volume against us.

Right because professional athletes tell the media exactly what they think.

[Bill Bumface]

I remember our Powerplay for the first few games of the season looking lethal, largely with Huberdeau pulling the strings with some crazy passes. I don't get what happened to these guys since those initial games. They showed the ability to play together, then it went poof.

[Flamesfan05]

Oh forgot, he is also missing a Nakokov, Quick or Kipper

Other than that his team is as expected lol