The president of the Pittsburgh Penguins, the colorful Brian Burke, has just vilified the organizations which would have in the idea of tanker, that is to say sink in the classification, to rebuild.
Posted at 10:23 a.m.
“Is this an effective way to rebuild? Yes, absolutely, if totally lacking in integrity and character, because you’re attacking the very essence of the sport, he told fellow ESPN colleague Greg Wyshynski this week.
Burke took the opportunity to throw a point at his former team, the Toronto Maple Leafs. “Everyone was rubbing their hands like children at Christmas during the draft lottery,” he recalls. Aren’t we rather humiliated? Isn’t this the most humiliating moment of the year for a club? I was mortified…”
Burke’s nobility can be hailed here, but it is important to make an important distinction between tanker and rebuild.
Asking a coach or players to voluntarily lose games to increase their chances of winning the lottery would challenge honesty and ethics. And it would be extremely surprising if it hadn’t already happened on a major professional sports team.
On the other hand, amassing draft picks and prospects for several seasons at the start of a new cycle, when your current roster does not even allow you to hope for a place in the short and medium term, remains intelligent management.
In June 1999, moreover, after a miserable season, which had given the Vancouver Canucks the 26e and second-to-last in the NHL, Burke traded one of his best defensemen, then 24-year-old Bryan McCabe, to the Chicago Blackhawks for their fourth overall pick, and thus, with two picks in the top fivegive themselves the means to fish out the twins Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
The following season, in March 2000, he was going to trade one of his stars, Alexander Mogilny for two young players, Denis Pederson and Brendan Morrison, and was not going to retain his great leader Mark Messier, who had become a free agent.
A few weeks earlier, three veterans, Bill Muckalt, Dave Scatchard and Kevin Weekes were traded for goaltender Felix Potvin and second- and third-round picks.
Burke was not willing to voluntarily sink in the standings, but rather shrewdly maneuvered at the end of a cycle with an aging club.
Of his first ten counters in 1999, only two remained, Markus Naslund and Mattias Ohlund, two years later.
The Vancouver Canucks made the playoffs 10 times in 12 years between 2001 and 2013. They reached the Finals in 2011. Although he was the driving force behind that revival, he never got to enjoy it, as he was fired in 2004.
The Arizona Coyotes and Chicago Blackhawks have a slightly more aggressive approach. They ripped hearts from their core to hoard choices and hopes.
They know they wouldn’t stand a chance of eventually competing with the NHL’s top teams by looking for short-term fixes, especially in this era of salary caps.
The crestfallen expression of coach André Tourigny after his Coyotes’ net defeat at the Bell Center last week spoke volumes.
The Chicago Blackhawks, even having exchanged several important elements of their team during the off-season, surprise at the start of the season with a record of 4-3.
Anyway, the rules of the lottery no longer allow dunces to win the jackpot easily. Since 2013, all clubs excluded from the playoffs have had the chance to win the first overall pick. Between 1995 and 2012, the lottery winner could not advance more than four ranks.
In 2000, for example, the lowest ranked club had a 25% chance of winning the lottery, compared to 18% today, but like the other teams ranked between 6e and the 15e rank had no hope of getting their hands on the first pick even winning the lottery (maximum four ranks), the last-place team had even more chances of picking first.
So much the better if chance makes it possible to obtain a high choice. The Crosbys, McDavids, Matthews and MacKinnons don’t grow on trees, after all.
The Canadian is under reconstruction. Jeff Gorton and Kent Hughes did not hide it. Ben Chiarot and Tyler Toffoli were traded for prospects and picks. We made room for young people in defense instead of acquiring veterans. We beg for patience and we will accept one or two more difficult seasons. But we don’t want to voluntarily sink in the standings. This is a healthy and honorable reconstruction.
Profitable line changes
The trio made up of veterans Christian Dvorak, Brendan Gallagher and Evgeni Dadonov was finally dismantled by Martin St-Louis on Tuesday night in Buffalo. These three players did not lack intelligence or experience, but the lack of speed of the three together paralyzed this trio. The three had one point in total since the start of the season, a Gallagher goal.
The Canadian coach transferred Dadonov to the fourth line and placed a fast, dynamic and robust attacker, Josh Anderson, with Dvorak and Gallagher. The results were not long in coming. They were the most threatening line offensively with two of the team’s three goals, those of Gallagher and Anderson. Dvorak also earned his first point of the season.
Poor Dadonov, taken in from the Vegas Golden Knights in order to get rid of Shea Weber’s salary, reminds Alexander Semin and Ales Hemsky more and more of their short experience in Montreal. Great offensive careers, but at the end of their tether in their thirties. Dadonov was once again cleared. He is the only CH striker to have played eight games without getting a single point. He played 11:55 on Tuesday, the team’s lowest total. Will he pay for the return of Joel Armia and Juraj Slafkovsky? The decision seems logical.
Do not miss
- Alexandre Pratt immerses us in the beginning of the 20e century, at a time when baseball was even more popular than hockey in Quebec, it seems. A very enjoyable and essential read!
- Guillaume Lefrançois is in Arizona to show us the modest home of the Coyotes, and to gather the echoes of last week’s match between CH and the Coyotes. Xhekaj won admirers, not Slafkovsky…
- The former young star of the Montreal Impact, Ballou Tabla, once considered as a possible international star in the same way as Ismaël Koné, has made a niche for himself in Ottawa, with Atletico. Portrait of Sylvain St-Laurent, of Right, on the eve of their final in PLC (Canadian Premier League). Over 12,000 fans are expected Sunday at TD Place against Hamilton’s Forges FC.