I’ve been battling through a heavy dose of Amoxicillin over the last couple of days, so I’m not as plugged into the Red Wings’ blogosphere, Facebook, Twitter or talk radio conversations as I’d like to be…
But I know how the story has probably gone for the criticism of the 7-9-and-2 team. Detroit sports fans are wonderfully passionate and sometimes quite thoughtful, but they’re also particularly predictable.
As such, I’m guessing that fans have already sent Derek Lalonde to the guillotine, to be replaced by, in no particular order, Sergei Fedorov (not gonna happen), Gerard Gallant, Joel Quenneville, Jim Montgomery, and a cast of dozens.
Again, I’m of the mind that the Red Wings should be patient and deliberate here, utilizing the 5-of-the-next-6-games-at-home schedule as runway with which to truly assess the team by giving the players and coaching staff enough leeway with which to determine the real course of the ship.
I also believe that the concept that a coaching change is going to fix everything is something of an overreaction.
I’m not about to suggest that y’all don’t have a point here, but I didn’t think that this team was going to do anything less than be inconsistent over the course of the early part of this season…
And I worry about what might happen if the team simply lops off the head of its coaching staff without having a serious battle plan for whatever comes next. It’s not as if the team should simply fire everyone and promote Dan Watson to coach, and it’s certainly not realistic to assume that this team is going to shoot off the launch pad like a rocket simply due to a coaching change.
The more I think about it, the more I believe that the players haven’t delivered in terms of attempting to replace the goals and leadership lost over the course of last summer’s free agent period. The more I think about it, the more I have come to believe that this team, when properly coached by its incumbent staff, should be able to get itself out of the worst of its early-season funk organically.
Meaning that, at least in theory, the team should be able to sort itself out over the next 6 games. I’m not saying that this Red Wings team doesn’t need reinforcements over time, but I’m saying that this roster should be able to bounce back from the losses of David Perron, Shayne Gostisbehere and Daniel Sprong without significant intervention from the management group.
The players certainly haven’t delivered as of yet. There’s an onus on them to get their collective and individual shit together in order to start rowing their stuck-in-neutral ship out of the whirlpool of mediocrity that they’ve become stuck in. And over the next 6 games, I believe that the management team is going to receive enough data with which to determine whether the coaching and player personnel departments require significant outside intervention.
Put bluntly, nobody’s going to be lining up to help the Red Wings in terms of player trades. And when you chop a coaching staff’s systems of play from a team, you have to engage in a “mini rebuild” as acclimation to and learning from the new coaching staff are necessary in order to truly overhaul the team’s drive-train.
And any moves in terms of the coaching staff 1. Will require a learning period and 2. Probably won’t entirely address the player personnel issues in terms of the newcomers not having completely “gelled” with the 2024-2025 Red Wings team, and the incumbent Red Wings players not having delivered as expected.
In plainer English, if the coaching staff is fired, it’s gonna take time to adjust to new systems of play. And a coaching change wouldn’t entirely address the fact that the “new guys” haven’t effectively replaced Perron, Gostisbehere or Sprong’s offense, affording Detroit at least enough goal-scoring “pop” with which to out-score their persistent defensive mistakes.
I still think that GM SY and the management team need to sort out the player personnel, perhaps importing another goal-scoring forward in addition to the physical, shut-down defenseman which I believe the team already knows it has to bring in to spare Moritz Seider and Simon Edvinsson the lion’s share of difficult defensive minutes. And I still believe that it may take until the 2024-2025 season’s trade deadline to fully address these issues.
As such, aside from making some minor moves in terms of recalls or demotions from and to Grand Rapids, I have a feeling that the team’s player personnel is on its own for now, and I have a gut feeling that it’s going to take time and patience in order to find new ways to give the players opportunities to succeed.
Long story long, the sound and fury regarding making massive changes to the coaching staff as the sacrificial lamb with which to ransom the course of the 2024-2025 season…It’s mostly a bunch of pucks made from road apples.
It’s fans and so-called experts flexing their rhetorical muscles, it’s people who don’t understand how hard it’s going to be for the Red Wings to make change arguing for change for change’s sake.
Making change, when and if the Red Wings’ management chooses to do so, isn’t going to be easy, and it isn’t going to solve everything. If the team were to replace its coaching staff, it’s going to take time for the players to learn the new systems and expectations which they need to acclimate to. And the onus is still mostly going to be on the current player personnel, or something very close to the current roster, to get its shit together and perform.
We’re not going to be talking about a massive coaching change and massive player personnel changes all at the same time. It’s not that easy to make–this is not fantasy hockey or EA Sports’ NHL 25 here–and it’s not that simple in terms of remedying the Red Wings’ problems overnight.
This team is still in the middle of a rebuild. And just as changing the coaching staff has drawbacks as well as appealing effects, and just as changing the player personnel willy-nilly is a horrible management of assets that would have to be utilized to overpay for change for change’s sake…
The absolute worst thing the team could do is fire the management team.
Yes, it’s fully acceptable and correct to place some of the blame for the team’s performance on GM SY.
Erik Gustafsson is no Gostisbehere. Vladimir Tarasenko is just starting to come alive offensively, and he’s doing so with a player the team didn’t know it needed in Marco Kasper. Lucas Raymond’s goal-scoring slump, despite his point-per-game performance, is puzzling. Alex DeBrincat’s been very good, but not great. Just as Dylan Larkin’s goal-scoring pace is admirable, his lack of assists is as puzzling as Raymond’s lack of goal-scoring. Patrick Kane’s had a “meh” season thus far. Mo Seider isn’t really able to concentrate on generating offense (role on the power play included) because he’s expending his energy on those defensive match-ups. And the goaltending tandem of Cam Talbot and Alex Lyon hasn’t delivered as often and/or bailed out the team as much as necessary.
All of that is on the GM as well as the coaching staff. 100%.
And all of that can’t be remedied with one sending Derek Lalonde to the gallows and making two trades, as much as I’d love to tell you otherwise.
The rumblings and ramblings and rhetoric over the last couple of days aren’t going to change the fact that this team more or less “is what it is” for this season, a couple of meaningful additions excluded, nor is it going to change the fact that a coaching change is not going to rectify everything wrong with the roster.
It sucks to say this, but, to some extent, all of us who care about the Detroit Red Wings have to be a little more patient with the situation as it is. I’m not saying that criticism isn’t warranted, nor warranted in spades, after an incredibly disappointing start.
But I think that the expectations made for this team as it is currently coached and currently instructed need to be adjusted a bit. And the reality of the situation is that whatever changes the organization makes to the coaching or player personnel aren’t going to “take” immediately.
So all of the above words mean that all of us who care about the Detroit Red Wings performance and trajectory might have to be a little more patient than we thought we would have to be with this bloody 8-to-10-year rebuild, and we may have to understand that change is going to be slower and more difficult than we ever expected for a team whose identity is still under construction.
Change can be a good thing. But change takes time, change takes assets to make, when we’re talking about player trades, and change is not going to completely rectify the Red Wings’ struggles by itself.
So take some deep breaths, watch the next 6 games, and I think that on December 2nd, after the Red Wings’ home game vs. Vancouver, we’re going to really know for sure what this team is, and I think that on December 2nd, we’re going to have a better idea of the changes that are necessary in order to shift the trajectory of Detroit Red Wings’ collective ship back into a fully “forward” course.
