Bennett

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Bingo

To me he's just not getting it done.

I don't think he's as bad as his detractors think, but he hasn't taken the opportunity and ran with it once again.

An off camp had him start on the fourth line. A terrible start for the third line had him promoted ... and there it was a chance. Playing with Backund and Mangiapane is all he could ask for. He didn't produce.

I like him at center too, but I like the Flames having a solid top six more, and the Tkachuk/Lindholm thing is working meaning there's no room at center.

But Bennett has had 4 1/3 games with players that he should be able to work with, and he's not producing. Is Backlund off to a slow start? That's probably part of it. But it's a show me league, and Bennett hasn't shown much.

This has been the argument for 3 years now.

Yet there has been a LOT of denial of said argument. It was always mitigating factors instead, many simply untrue or irrelevant.

Its almost assured he is what he is, and has been, then, now, and going forward.


So to me the bigger question is what you do with him after the season if he isn't dealt beforehand which i doubt happens. Unless part of something bigger than a 1 for 1 deal im guessing they would want to see if he activates again for the post-season.

Exposure to the expansion draft is a given...but if Seattle doesnt bite, then what?

What do you pay a guy like that? Do they even qualify him at 2.5M?

He has arb rights as well.

There is a real possible scenario that he could walk for nothing and it may be the right choice for the team both short and long term to do so.

[FusionX]

I think he himself knows they call the game differently during the regular season and thus plays hesitantly, but still ends up getting called for, let's face it, bad penalties. It's almost as if he feels unleashed to play his game simply because the whole atmosphere around the playoffs is different. Obviously it doesn't work if he's playing the way he was for the full regular season but he seems a shell of what he was in the playoffs, barely even finishing checks now.

For me, I'd love to just see him play the way he does in the playoffs, penalties be damned. Just get in there and put the other team on notice.

Otherwise, I am still a huge proponent of separating Monahan and Gaudreau. I know there's a nice thread about them playing better and yes, they have points but for parts of the last game, I thought they were the worst line on the ice 5 on 5 (that's my eye test, I may be shown wrong through analytics). It's more difficult now that Lindholm is playing so well at centre but I'd love to give Bennett one last crack at centre with an emphasis on scoring:

Gaudreau - Bennett - Dube

The question then becomes where to you put Monahan and previously I would have said with Tkachuk and Lindholm and perhaps this could still be entertained but with Monahan as a winger? Regardless, let this line go for a bit, see what happens and once and for all, put the Bennett thing to bed. One other downside is I'm not sure how defensively sound this line is but hey, I'd like to see it.

[Bonded]

Originally Posted by FusionX

Gaudreau - Bennett - Dube
.

I was big on separating Gaudreau and Monahan but they are rocking right now and the division will be tight to get into playoffs.

Why break up a line that is working to give Bennett a chance when he is not doing so great right now. Last game on 5v5, Bennett was one of the worst and Monahan and Gaudreau were good.

Bennett can't 'unleash' in the regular season because if he does he gets multiple o-zone penalties.

[CSharp]

Originally Posted by New Era

I agree, there are two Sam Bennetts. There's the one his fans and defenders see (40-50 point top six Bennett) and then there is the reality of Sam Bennett.

The reality about Sam Bennett is he has become the sum of his parts. Sam is not a top six player nor is he a player with any upside. What you see is what you get. Sam does not excel in any part of the game. NONE. He is an average skater. He's a below average puck handler and passer. He possesses a shot that struggles to break cellophane. He doesn't display a high level of instincts for the game and does not have a high hockey IQ. Sam doesn't use his line mates worth a damn and doesn't help them by making open ice. If we're being honest, Bennett peaked at 17 and has played at or below that level his whole career. The only reason he's been given opportunity is because of his draft pedigree.

Sam Bennett is not a good hockey player. Forget all the excuses and just look at the results, Sam is not a good player. He doesn't produce when played with skill players. He can't play a defensive role, because he's smart like potato. That's actually leads to a place where Sam is a clear leader. He's continually a leader amongst the forwards for the team's green jacket. The only area of the game he excels in is running around and hitting people, a role his body can't seem to take. He's been surpassed by other players on the depth chart and has watched his opportunities plummet. Sam is what Sam is, and it isn't a good player. I'm sure he's a fine upstanding citizen, a good team mate, and a genuinely good human being, but he is not a good hockey player.

I agree with your third paragraph. Bennett is, however, not a sum of his parts and what I see is not always what you get out of him. I'm just surprised he's gotten so much support over the years as some of you are actually making excuses for him to be a top six forward, which he isn't. It's like these threads on Bennett is like Ground Hog Day - we keep seeing his name come up over and over. Until that changes, it keeps coming back until one day, it's a brand new day!

[Bonded]

Originally Posted by CSharp

I'm just surprised he's gotten so much support over the years as some of you are actually making excuses for him to be a top six forward, which he isn't. !

If Bennett was a late first pick or something then there wouldn't be

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by transplant99

So to me the bigger question is what you do with him after the season if he isn't dealt beforehand which i doubt happens. Unless part of something bigger than a 1 for 1 deal im guessing they would want to see if he activates again for the post-season.

Exposure to the expansion draft is a given...but if Seattle doesnt bite, then what?

What do you pay a guy like that? Do they even qualify him at 2.5M?

He has arb rights as well.

There is a real possible scenario that he could walk for nothing and it may be the right choice for the team both short and long term to do so.

I don't think you can afford to pay a fourth line guy $2.5M + ... so I agree.

And that's the rub. What is the guy? If he's a contributing third line player he can make in and around $3.5M and be fine.

That kind of player though is a 1.55 pts/60 player. Bennett through his career is 1.41 which puts him at a $3.25M player.

So honestly it comes down to what you see. His production is third line if you look at five on five players and ice time. But if you think he's a fourth line guy you'd better trade him because he's too expensive to play on the fourth line.

[btimbit]

I want Bennett to succeed so much that I'm just left bitter and frustrated when he doesn't. The dumb penalties, the junior plays leading to turnovers.... I'm pretty much over it.

I still love the guy but I've accepted that he's a third liner

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by btimbit

I want Bennett to succeed so much that I'm just left bitter and frustrated when he doesn't. The dumb penalties, the junior plays leading to turnovers.... I'm pretty much over it.

I still love the guy but I've accepted that he's a third liner

I agree - and unless he changes the trajectory - right now he's the guy that you would expose to Seattle and likely the guy that gets picked.
Dube and Eat Bread are significantly ahead at this stage
(Backlund is the other consideration)

[N-E-B]

I don’t disagree that the organization shares some of the blame but I think the majority of the blame is on Bennett himself. Can anyone honestly say Sam has earned himself a chance to play top line minutes? He’s largely invisible for most of the 82 games of the season. Showing up in the playoffs is great but the regular season matters too.

He takes dumb penalties. That stuff drives coaches nuts. It makes sense to me why he’s been stapled to the third line and has had limited power play opportunities. Sam Bennett is his own worst enemy.

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Bingo

I don't think you can afford to pay a fourth line guy $2.5M + ... so I agree.

And that's the rub. What is the guy? If he's a contributing third line player he can make in and around $3.5M and be fine.

That kind of player though is a 1.55 pts/60 player. Bennett through his career is 1.41 which puts him at a $3.25M player.

So honestly it comes down to what you see. His production is third line if you look at five on five players and ice time. But if you think he's a fourth line guy you'd better trade him because he's too expensive to play on the fourth line.

If he just had ONE skill that he was great at...like PK, or some offense on the PP2....then he would be so much easier to make an argument for, but he isnt or hasnt shown that proclivity thus far.

As to the bolded...im not sure there is any more arguments that can be made that he is that.....but better as well.

He's a tweener...not AHL but 3rd or 4th line NHL.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by transplant99

If he just had ONE skill that he was great at...like PK, or some offense on the PP2....then he would be so much easier to make an argument for, but he isnt or hasnt shown that proclivity thus far.

As to the bolded...im not sure there is any more arguments that can be made that he is that.....but better as well.

He's a tweener...not AHL but 3rd or 4th line NHL.

And that doesn't get me going ... all good.

It's the replacement level argument that just drives me nuts.

If you want to bring the team into it ... he's a 7-8 guy on the average NHL team for his career in production / minute but hasn't gotten the minutes to push his total numbers up.

But then he takes penalties, and is inconsistent so they don't want to jack his minutes. But would he be more consistent if he had more minutes? Total chicken and egg.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by transplant99

So if I am reading this correctly:

He was really good for a month over 3 years ago, and it was because of him.

All other times for 5 years, when he has been mediocre to awful, its the organizations fault. Wrong line mates and bad coaching.


Seems likely.

Please stop hyperbolizing what I said.

He's shown that confident play for periods every season.

And yes, starting your season flanked by Lucic and Norstrom is a confidence killer, that line was buried in the defensive zone and then the coach who said "Sam Bennett is a center" changed his mind and put Sam Bennett on the wing only ONE period later. You can defend all these no name head coaches who have come and gone all you want, and you can defend our rookie head coach too. End of the day, the team results will be the same, and the player results will be the same. The only coach with guts that we've had was the one Treliving inherited from the previous regime.

Nor has that line improved with the removal of Bennett. It's still a disaster with "super high IQ vet center Derek Ryan" centering it.

I want him to be more consistently confident. But some players respond poorly to being chucked around the lineup, chucked around special teams etc.

I know all your rebuttals so don't bother. I'm exhausted of talking about Bennett with you to be honest. It's as if you think it's in the team's best interest for the player to fail. Good for you, but I disagree. End of story.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

Please stop hyperbolizing what I said.

He's shown that confident play for periods every season.

And yes, starting your season flanked by Lucic and Norstrom is a confidence killer, that line was buried in the defensive zone and then the coach who said "Sam Bennett is a center" changed his mind and put Sam Bennett on the wing only ONE period later. You can defend all these no name head coaches who have come and gone all you want, and you can defend our rookie head coach too. End of the day, the team results will be the same, and the player results will be the same. The only coach with guts that we've had was the one Treliving inherited from the previous regime.

Nor has that line improved with the removal of Bennett. It's still a disaster with "super high IQ vet center Derek Ryan" centering it.

I want him to be more consistently confident. But some players respond poorly to being chucked around the lineup, chucked around special teams etc.

Are there other players in the NHL who have a similar level of psychological fragility?

The reason I don't buy this line of argument is because this exact same thing happens to dozens of young players on every NHL team every single season, and yet there are lots of them who manage to do precisely what Bennett has never done: work their way up from possession black-holes to secure better spots in the lineup. There are also plenty who never get there, and that's fine. I am comfortable with the fact that Bennett will never get there, because he lacks the skills to do so.

I know all your rebuttals so don't bother. I'm exhausted of talking about Bennett with you to be honest. It's as if you think it's in the team's best interest for the player to fail. Good for you, but I disagree. End of story.

Now that is just patently unfair. Yeah, there are certainly some posters like New Era who seem pretty pleased with themselves about the fact that Bennett has not panned out to be anything more than a bottom six grinding forward. But I think the vast majority of us who remain unconvinced that he is just hard done by because of line deployment and coaching decisions—that he somehow is what he is after five years—are also not happy about it. Some of us are actually just tired of seeing others constantly blamed for Bennett's ever-present shortcomings. At what point can we all just admit that he is not a top-six talent who has been destroyed by bad coaching?

[Bonded]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

Are there other players in the NHL who have a similar level of psychological fragility?
At what point can we all just admit that he is not a top-six talent who has been destroyed by bad coaching?

Yup, Mangipane and Dube have basically pushed themselves past him on the depth chart.

The thing with Bennett that annoys me is that people think that he is better than Monahan but hasn't been given the chance to succeed. Monahan started on the 3rd line and continued to progress. Bennett flatlined.

Bennett is a good playoff performer like Joel Ward and Justin Williams, great to have on the team, but he isn't hard done by in the regular season.

[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by Bingo

It's the replacement level argument that just drives me nuts.

It drives you nuts because it is hard to defend. When you get past the "counting stats" and actually look at what he produces and how the team is forced to play him, the replacement argument is right on the money. Bennett is a 4th liner based on his abilities and production. He is not capable of playing and producing at the third line level with any consistency, so he get's 4th line minutes. What he does do is over-produces for a 4th line player, and by a small margin, so that makes people believe he can be a third line player with opportunity, except that when given opportunity he fails time-after-time. So that makes him a high producing 4th liner, but a 4th liner with a $2.55M price tag. That makes him grossly overpaid for what he brings.

If you want to bring the team into it ... he's a 7-8 guy on the average NHL team for his career in production / minute but hasn't gotten the minutes to push his total numbers up.

Except that he isn't. The coaches can't trust him with the playing time you're suggesting, and when he does have it gifted to him he continually ####s the bed and does nothing. So he really isn't a 7-8 guy. He's a 9-12 guy with a huge price tag.

But then he takes penalties, and is inconsistent so they don't want to jack his minutes. But would he be more consistent if he had more minutes? Total chicken and egg.

Doesn't matter if it is eggs or chicken fingers, Bennett is not filling the belly and is way too expensive on the menu. I got slammed pretty hard when I suggested last season that Bennett was on his way out of the league, even when I explained that his contract was going to work against him. I said unless Bennett turns this around quickly and starts producing, there is no way the Flames qualify him. That makes him a UFA and teams will look at that lack of production and only bring him in on a league minimum "prove it" contract, a la Mark Jankowski. He'll be on a very short leash and will have to produce, or he's going to be waiver wire material and done for in short order. This is reality staring him in the face. He could be Brett Ritchie this time next year. This is playing out as expected.

[bubbsy]

Bennett sucks.

In the playoffs, he plays extremely hard, physical, which lead to scoring chances.

He can't play 120%, balls to the wall, type hockey in the season (no player can) but his try, compete, and drive go down to 50%. His skill, skating is pretty average, so he becomes a 3rd, 4th line player at best. I also think he mopes about his utilization and lack of results so it's jyst a constant negative feedback loop (I can't score/contribute because of utilization and linemates, I can't change my utilization and linemates cus I can't score/contribute ).

He's done in Calgary. He has reached the highest of his ceiling/peak here. They should cut bait,and trade him. He may reach a higher ceiling elsewhere too.

Signed,
An ex-Bennett fan club member

[vinny93]

Originally Posted by Bonded

Yup, Mangipane and Dube have basically pushed themselves past him on the depth chart.

The thing with Bennett that annoys me is that people think that he is better than Monahan but hasn't been given the chance to succeed. Monahan started on the 3rd line and continued to progress. Bennett flatlined.

Bennett is a good playoff performer like Joel Ward and Justin Williams, great to have on the team, but he isn't hard done by in the regular season.

You should look on Dobbersports about the usage between 23 and 93, their rookie seasons are almost identical, then look at the linemates that both of them get, check out TOI, PPTOI, after the first season, it is drastically different, 23 gets 13, basically the best playmaker on the team in years, 93 gets 36, an older Versteeg and a broken 68, with a consistant 77, if 23 was put in the same position, he would have failed as well, yes there is an onus on Bennett, I've never said that, but when his role is defined, and he plays with similiar skilled, fast players, he can and has been a force

[Harry Lime]

I'm not sure why there is no talk of Ryan being moved to Backlund's RW. Ryan is the definition of a solid player, and would carry some of the defensive load, allowing Backlund and Mangiapane to play more freely.

Lucic-Bennett-Phillips

Is Phillips as good as Dube? No. But he plays a similar game, and size problems are not an issue with his fearlessness getting to the front of the net, and Lucic to make sure advantage is not taken.

And we get to see if the positional change matters, as it did with Backlund, concerning Bennett, under a pretty low risk scenario.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

Are there other players in the NHL who have a similar level of psychological fragility?

I would say we've got one such player on our roster. Mikael Backlund.

When he's on his game, he's an extremely potent top six forward, as we saw in the second half of last year.

When he's off his game, or being used out of position, he's ineffective, as we saw in the first half of last year, and so far this year.

Backlund didn't find his "footing" until the Flames were really, really bad in 2014. Then he suddenly got an opportunity to center a guy like Cammalleri, and from then on was solidified as a top six forward on our roster in coming years, with all the ice time that matches.

You may feel differently, but I think confidence can affect even the best of players. I'll never forget how badly Sidney Crosby was playing in 2015. Then the coach got fired and he suddenly became... Sidney freakin' Crosby.

I think all hockey players are pretty inconsistent. The ones with a regular spot on the PP, especially the first PP, usually don't have as low lows because they get their touches there and don't see the same extended scoring slumps, even when their ES play is lacking.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by vinny93

You should look on Dobbersports about the usage between 23 and 93, their rookie seasons are almost identical, then look at the linemates that both of them get, check out TOI, PPTOI, after the first season, it is drastically different, 23 gets 13, basically the best playmaker on the team in years, 93 gets 36, an older Versteeg and a broken 68, with a consistant 77, if 23 was put in the same position, he would have failed as well, yes there is an onus on Bennett, I've never said that, but when his role is defined, and he plays with similiar skilled, fast players, he can and has been a force

No. This is wrong. Sean Monahan played his rookie season in 2013–14. He played 74 games before Gaudreau even had a NHL contract. Gaudreau did not play his first NHL game until 13 April 2014.

Also, you would do well to introduce some periods to your writing.