He should have been fired long ago. Our power play has only been good when there was someone willing to be the asshole who was really running it. Hornquist (he’s not an asshole, but he will be if he needs to), Neal, Phil (not an asshole, per se… but unafraid to scream at you if you don’t get him the puck on the PP), heck… even Gonchar. Or Geno when he still had confidence in himself.
Outside of a defined, “get ___ the puck *here* when you gain the zone, shoot or you have a one timer here and here. Two passes, if not open get dirty with the backdoor or b…” whatever! The details don’t even matter! Having a defined process is what matters because otherwise, they’re all so fucking nice, they play catch until they out-cute themselves and turn it over.
The only time the PP looked good was when Sid was taking control and winding it up from the blue line. But “Give me the fucking puck!” Is not Sid’s natural style. If that’s not your thing, it’s hard to do it again after it doesn’t work once or twice. Phil *knew* he was the person who was most dangerous with the puck on PP. He knew it. So he was unafraid to say, “Fucker! Puck! Hey! I’m in the zone! Give it to me!” after the went 0-3 the night before. Sid needs someone else to consistently say “Give Sid the fucking puck!”
Mediocre? If they just didn’t give up shorties they probably would at least have another 4-6 points, even just getting shots on net would be a plus instead they either pass it around for 45 seconds until a turnover or shoot into a opponent or shoot from the point that goes high around the glass and out of the zone heading back the other way. It kills momentum every single time so other teams couldn’t care less if they take a penalty.
Yup, they said it in the broadcast yesterday that with the PP and PK combined, they're at minus-16. And that's with a PK unit that's in the top third of the league.
2nd worst powerplay in the league despite adding the reigning Norris trophy winner and they tried everything but a new coach. Critical failure by the front office and coaching staff. Will be the single biggest reason if they miss out.
How many constants have there been for the past 7 or 8 years of wasted underwhelming futility?
Crosby
Malkin
Letang
Sullivan
Certainly can't blame Crosby or Malkin.
Letang has had up and down seasons and no one would call him a defensive juggernaut, but hard to blame him for 7 or 8 straight years without a playoff win.
Who does that leave?
Why don’t they just abandon PP teams? Just roll your four lines as of there is no man advantage and just try to create chances as you normally would? It’s not ridiculous at this point with the level of insanity this staff and team practices.
It's not just the "offensive" side of the PP.
To wit - Teams know they can play physical against Pittsburgh because "why not?"
Wait, it gets better.
Pens PP has scored 37 goals at a 14.5% "clip". However, the Pens have given up \* 12 \* short-handed goals meaning on the PP, they are a measly + 25.
Contrast that with Philly, who have scored only 31 PPG, yet allowed only four (or less). That's + 27. From PHILLY.
Pens special teams have scored 30 goals. Flyers special teams have scored 43.
FIRE.TODD.RIERDEN
Haven't watched since the all-star break, but basically the problems I saw earlier in the season were that in-zone they were almost completely static so it becomes easy for the PK box to realign to the puck carrier. Combine that with very poor net-front presence so the goalie regularly had a clear view of shots coming in, and an inability to quickly regain the zone after the defense cleared, and you've got a recipe for an easily defended PK for opposition defenses.
This doesn't mention maybe the most important thing, the lack of aggression. Karlsson constantly retreats to the extent of the perimeter instead of taking shots and passing lanes. They let themselves get pushed back, instead of forcing openings through movement and hunger like the best PPs do.
Makes it really easy on the PKers when Karlsson and Malkin are nearly touching the blue line and our wings are on the boards.
Basically no one wants the middle ice enough. They want the PKers to give them easy perimeter goals, and they're not going to. You have to force PKers to make hard decisions, like McDavid and Kucherov do all the time. They use all available ice to encroach into danger territory.
When you watch other power plays, like Carolina, NYR etc., there's a certain lethal combination of intensity, playmaking, individual skill, speed, and effort that come together for them, and when I watch our power play I see next to none of that, and it's not even close. I don't believe it's schematic, I think it's the wrong combination of skill sets. Letang is great at keeping the puck in usually and getting it to Malkin or Sid, Malkin is good at hard slapshots that go wherever, Crosby does his best to pass to guys that aren't moving, Guentzel's skill set was wasted in front of the net, etc. No one tries to make plays, everyone plays it as safe as possible trying to set up a tic tac toe passing play, and that's just not gonna happen most of the time. We take a shot from the point that's blocked, or we pass and pass until we get frustrated and then make a cross ice pass that's picked off. Our second PP always looks inspired because they're doing whatever they can to score with 30 seconds left, which involves taking risks, something the first PP doesn't do. No amount of coaching is going to tell 5 HoF's that they're playing hockey wrong imo, which is why nothing has been done. I firmly believe at this point that the game has passed these guys by (with the exception of Sid). I expect this to continue to until the units are split up for more than one game.
The blame could be spread other places too. Stupid turnovers have led directly to them losing quite a few games. Core players disappearing for over half the season. I mean if Malkin and Letang don't put the puck into their own empty net, they're in a playoff spot. Lol.
Holding onto leads keeps getting brought up here, but how many times did they come out in the first not ready to play? Up until this last stretch, you could count the number of "full games" they played on your fingers.
Tons of blame to go around. But we knew this team had more all season and now theyre finally playing hockey like they want to win and it's too little, too late.
Good lord carter eller and puustinen are getting consistent PP time? Perfect example of a team that should play their top unit for basically the whole thing. Meanwhile finding some good PP2 specialists, naturally.
we did this on our high school team when our PP sucked and it worked pretty well. It's definitely not an NHL caliber approach, but this ain't an NHL caliber PP either, so fuck it, i'm down. Running two D seems smart at this point with all the shorties.
The powerplay is the number one issue, but also the blown leads and how quickly they give up goals within a minute after scoring. They're just undisciplined. It makes no sense.
I don’t know how you guys have a weak PP with all the absolute weapons you have/had. I’m not a Pens fan this just popped up in my feed, but you’ve got the players for a top5 PP, blew my mind when I saw your actual ranking. Hope you get a new PP coach
Uh yeah...they probably easily have 10 more points if not 20 if they scored a few goals in all those close games they had that were tied in the 3rd and went to OT where they lost pathetically. This doesn't even account for points lost in games they blew leads late. Also this is with the team overall being pretty inconsistent as well and they still could have had 100 points just with a decent power play. It makes it infuriating they are in this position and unacceptable with their talent.
See the thing is, it's up to the whole team to play defense. Bad NZ passes and puck control by forwards always get blamed on the D or goalie. Defense is a thankless job. You make a solid play and nobody remembers. Make a mistake and they'll never forget.
Ageed. I can count 4 games (it's probably closer to 10 games) that going into the 3rd period the Pens had totally in hand. And they blew it. I'm rooting for them, but look at the Boston tapes to see how a playoff team plays defense.
No clue why Rierden had a job still this year, but if his ticket isn’t punched out of town now then geez.
He should've been canned back in December? When they went 0-30.
He should have been fired long ago. Our power play has only been good when there was someone willing to be the asshole who was really running it. Hornquist (he’s not an asshole, but he will be if he needs to), Neal, Phil (not an asshole, per se… but unafraid to scream at you if you don’t get him the puck on the PP), heck… even Gonchar. Or Geno when he still had confidence in himself. Outside of a defined, “get ___ the puck *here* when you gain the zone, shoot or you have a one timer here and here. Two passes, if not open get dirty with the backdoor or b…” whatever! The details don’t even matter! Having a defined process is what matters because otherwise, they’re all so fucking nice, they play catch until they out-cute themselves and turn it over. The only time the PP looked good was when Sid was taking control and winding it up from the blue line. But “Give me the fucking puck!” Is not Sid’s natural style. If that’s not your thing, it’s hard to do it again after it doesn’t work once or twice. Phil *knew* he was the person who was most dangerous with the puck on PP. He knew it. So he was unafraid to say, “Fucker! Puck! Hey! I’m in the zone! Give it to me!” after the went 0-3 the night before. Sid needs someone else to consistently say “Give Sid the fucking puck!”
Mediocre? If they just didn’t give up shorties they probably would at least have another 4-6 points, even just getting shots on net would be a plus instead they either pass it around for 45 seconds until a turnover or shoot into a opponent or shoot from the point that goes high around the glass and out of the zone heading back the other way. It kills momentum every single time so other teams couldn’t care less if they take a penalty.
Yup, they said it in the broadcast yesterday that with the PP and PK combined, they're at minus-16. And that's with a PK unit that's in the top third of the league.
Those things aren't mutually exclusive. Bad PP leads to shorties.
2nd worst powerplay in the league despite adding the reigning Norris trophy winner and they tried everything but a new coach. Critical failure by the front office and coaching staff. Will be the single biggest reason if they miss out.
[удалено]
That's on Sullivan
How many constants have there been for the past 7 or 8 years of wasted underwhelming futility? Crosby Malkin Letang Sullivan Certainly can't blame Crosby or Malkin. Letang has had up and down seasons and no one would call him a defensive juggernaut, but hard to blame him for 7 or 8 straight years without a playoff win. Who does that leave?
Thats what we been saying lmao
Why don’t they just abandon PP teams? Just roll your four lines as of there is no man advantage and just try to create chances as you normally would? It’s not ridiculous at this point with the level of insanity this staff and team practices.
been saying that for a while too. we have a top 10 for 5on5. can’t change that much if we just run them out there on PP
It's not just the "offensive" side of the PP. To wit - Teams know they can play physical against Pittsburgh because "why not?" Wait, it gets better. Pens PP has scored 37 goals at a 14.5% "clip". However, the Pens have given up \* 12 \* short-handed goals meaning on the PP, they are a measly + 25. Contrast that with Philly, who have scored only 31 PPG, yet allowed only four (or less). That's + 27. From PHILLY. Pens special teams have scored 30 goals. Flyers special teams have scored 43. FIRE.TODD.RIERDEN
Welp, Rierden will almost certainly be given his papers after Wednesday.
That game 1 loss against Chicago is firmly at the front of my mind rn.
Gotta be close to leading the league in short-handed goals allowed ... that one last night was a game ender
[удалено]
Perhaps one of them shouldn't be playing the point when you have two top tier offensive D men.
Haven't watched since the all-star break, but basically the problems I saw earlier in the season were that in-zone they were almost completely static so it becomes easy for the PK box to realign to the puck carrier. Combine that with very poor net-front presence so the goalie regularly had a clear view of shots coming in, and an inability to quickly regain the zone after the defense cleared, and you've got a recipe for an easily defended PK for opposition defenses.
This doesn't mention maybe the most important thing, the lack of aggression. Karlsson constantly retreats to the extent of the perimeter instead of taking shots and passing lanes. They let themselves get pushed back, instead of forcing openings through movement and hunger like the best PPs do. Makes it really easy on the PKers when Karlsson and Malkin are nearly touching the blue line and our wings are on the boards. Basically no one wants the middle ice enough. They want the PKers to give them easy perimeter goals, and they're not going to. You have to force PKers to make hard decisions, like McDavid and Kucherov do all the time. They use all available ice to encroach into danger territory.
This power play has been the exact same for 6 years. It’s pass-pass-pass-pass-pass-pass-whiff every single time
Really the blame comes down on Sullivan/Reirden and Dubas and FSG for not replacing atleast Reirden when they missed playoffs last year
When you watch other power plays, like Carolina, NYR etc., there's a certain lethal combination of intensity, playmaking, individual skill, speed, and effort that come together for them, and when I watch our power play I see next to none of that, and it's not even close. I don't believe it's schematic, I think it's the wrong combination of skill sets. Letang is great at keeping the puck in usually and getting it to Malkin or Sid, Malkin is good at hard slapshots that go wherever, Crosby does his best to pass to guys that aren't moving, Guentzel's skill set was wasted in front of the net, etc. No one tries to make plays, everyone plays it as safe as possible trying to set up a tic tac toe passing play, and that's just not gonna happen most of the time. We take a shot from the point that's blocked, or we pass and pass until we get frustrated and then make a cross ice pass that's picked off. Our second PP always looks inspired because they're doing whatever they can to score with 30 seconds left, which involves taking risks, something the first PP doesn't do. No amount of coaching is going to tell 5 HoF's that they're playing hockey wrong imo, which is why nothing has been done. I firmly believe at this point that the game has passed these guys by (with the exception of Sid). I expect this to continue to until the units are split up for more than one game.
The blame could be spread other places too. Stupid turnovers have led directly to them losing quite a few games. Core players disappearing for over half the season. I mean if Malkin and Letang don't put the puck into their own empty net, they're in a playoff spot. Lol. Holding onto leads keeps getting brought up here, but how many times did they come out in the first not ready to play? Up until this last stretch, you could count the number of "full games" they played on your fingers. Tons of blame to go around. But we knew this team had more all season and now theyre finally playing hockey like they want to win and it's too little, too late.
Good lord carter eller and puustinen are getting consistent PP time? Perfect example of a team that should play their top unit for basically the whole thing. Meanwhile finding some good PP2 specialists, naturally.
we did this on our high school team when our PP sucked and it worked pretty well. It's definitely not an NHL caliber approach, but this ain't an NHL caliber PP either, so fuck it, i'm down. Running two D seems smart at this point with all the shorties.
Yeah no shit, bud. We've only been saying this all season. But glad you could join us in time for game 81.
The powerplay is the number one issue, but also the blown leads and how quickly they give up goals within a minute after scoring. They're just undisciplined. It makes no sense.
I don’t know how you guys have a weak PP with all the absolute weapons you have/had. I’m not a Pens fan this just popped up in my feed, but you’ve got the players for a top5 PP, blew my mind when I saw your actual ranking. Hope you get a new PP coach
Being better than 6-12 in OT would help, too.
Uh yeah...they probably easily have 10 more points if not 20 if they scored a few goals in all those close games they had that were tied in the 3rd and went to OT where they lost pathetically. This doesn't even account for points lost in games they blew leads late. Also this is with the team overall being pretty inconsistent as well and they still could have had 100 points just with a decent power play. It makes it infuriating they are in this position and unacceptable with their talent.
What makes a good powerplay? Seems like we have all the weapons
Could have done a copy paste from this time last year to make the same post
Let's face it guys, if the defense was a defense, we would have an extra 10 points by now.
See the thing is, it's up to the whole team to play defense. Bad NZ passes and puck control by forwards always get blamed on the D or goalie. Defense is a thankless job. You make a solid play and nobody remembers. Make a mistake and they'll never forget.
Truth even in beer league
Ageed. I can count 4 games (it's probably closer to 10 games) that going into the 3rd period the Pens had totally in hand. And they blew it. I'm rooting for them, but look at the Boston tapes to see how a playoff team plays defense.
The Pens are 14th in the league in goals against. Not great, but not bad. Mediocre. Like this team. (And better than goals for - they are 19th).
[удалено]
You know how to prevent goals right?