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Monday, December 1, 2008
Undoing The Un-Good
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Last summer during the town hall meeting with season ticket holders, John Anderson indicated that playing time would be determined by who was playing hard and producing on the ice. Work hard, play hard…more ice time would be awarded. The opposite, of course, applies as well.
Well, true to his word, he has made some adjustments in regards to the forward lines and special teams. I’m quite sure he is trusting that these adjustments will take place in attitudes as well.
Most notably, Ilya Kovalchuk, will play this week in Montreal and Ottawa on a lower line along with Marty Reasoner and Chris Thorburn. Kovy’s play seems to be off of late and, at times, he appears to be lost and/or unmotivated. Reasoner has played most of the season as the third line center and hasn’t done a bad job there, IMHO…and I like coach’s decision to put Thorny opposite of Kovalchuk.
As for your top three forwards…it’ll be made up of the line that has been the most consistent and productive so far. White, Kozlov and Little will remain together and simply move from the second to first line. Again, hard work and results will be rewarded.
Jason Williams…who has been somewhat of a disappointment thus far…will center the new second line with Christensen and Armstrong. The fourth line will be constructed from Slater centering Crabb, Perrin or Boulton.
But the changes don’t stop there. According to Mike Knobler…Reasoner, XLB, Perrin and Oystrick practiced the penalty kill together, (Hainsey out) and the other PK line consisted of Enstrom, Havelid, Crabb and Slates. The top power play unit, it seems, will be made up of the White line with Kovy and Hainsey on the point.
So, why do we have an overhaul of the current cast of characters? Well, simply put, John Anderson is efforting to undo several un-good aspects of this team. Let’s look at the numbers, shall we?
Atlanta’s penalty kill is a league-worst 73.8% effective. Un-good!
In 19 of the 23 games so far they have let up at least one power play goal. Un-good!
The Thrashers 27.3 S/G is 27th in the league. Un-good!
Their 33.3 SA/G is 28th in the league. Un-good!
The 3.56 GA/G is better only than Dallas’ 3.65. Un-Good!
Since winning five straight, they’ve gone a miserable 1-5-1 in their past seven. Un-good!
After beginning November 5-1-0, they finished 6-6-1 for the month. Un-good!
And the most un-goodest of all…Atlanta is sitting at the bottom of the NHL standings with 19 points.
But what Anderson is attempting to undo here goes beyond simple statistics. As he pointed out Sunday, the Thrashers have a bad habit of “not competing”. It’s one thing when a team gets beat…it’s quite another when the desire to compete is not on display 100% of the time. That’s when players get moved down in the lineup…off the lineup all together…then off the team.
To Anderson’s point about “not competing”…
Of the five regulation loses in the past seven games, two have been by one goal, another two were within a goal until empty-netters padded the margin. The Washington loss was by a pair of goals.
Outside of two games in which they were blown out, the Thrashers have had it within their reach to come away with points in just about each game. The difference has been thiiiiis much in many of the losses. And thiiiiis much is normally the difference created by that extra bit of hustle and effort. That extra hustle and effort…or lack thereof consistently… is apparently what John Anderson is unhappy about.
Something else to digest…Last year after 23 games, the Thrashers were 11-12-0 for 22 points…this season they’re 8-12-3 for 19 points. The difference? The overtime losses. Last year had won all five played in the first 23 games played, this year they are 1-3.
Again…all of the one-goal games and the overtime losses simply add to the un-good element because it meant the team was unable to come out on top more often. Unable to because they were unwilling…or unable…to give that extra effort required to finish the job. In order to win most of these games players must give thiiiiiis much more effort…for an entire 60 minutes… more if need be.
And what if Anderson cannot gain a measure of satisfaction from the current squad even after these drastic line changes? Well, as he said after Sunday’s 4-2 loss to the Blues, “We’re going to look at the whole situation, look at what we have, what we have in the minors and figure out what steps have to be taken”.
That would mean the very real possibility of seeing the likes of Colin Stuart, Brett Sterling, Jordan LaVallee …or even Joe Motzko who leads the Wolves with 10 goals and 16 points in 22 games played…playing for the big squad before too long.
Question is, whom would they replace in the lineup? I guess that will be determined by who receives Anderson’s message through the lineup changes, adjusts their attitudes in regards to work ethic and does their part in undoing the un-good aspects surrounding this team right now.
And who doesn’t.
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