The Definitive List Of NHL Teams That Have Died In 2016-17 Part 1
It’s that time of year again. Last season, the List of Dead NHL teams published on February 4th and the definition of “dead” was a team that had no shot at making the conference finals. This year I’m doing things a little earlier. Instead of one big blog where 20 teams are pronounced dead, I am going to make this into a series. This first round of dead teams are teams that either can’t make the playoffs, or won’t get out of the first round. So basically if your team is in this blog, it means your team is EXTRA dead. So dead that they’re starting to give off a stench.
Indiana Jones “The Last Crusade”–New York Islanders and Vancouver Canucks
It seemed like the Holy Grail was right there for the Islanders. They had a young and improving team and looked like they were on a path to eternal life as a contender led by one of the best young players in the NHL, John Tavares. Then…Garth Snow grabbed the wrong cup last summer and their hopes melted away. Losing important players in free agency is part of reality in the NHL. Choosing which players you keep and which you let go separates the top teams from the also-rans, and the Isles chose to bring in a veteran LW Andrew Ladd and all of his playoff and leadership experience, and cast off Okposo, Matt Martin, and Nielsen. Now, maybe they would never be able to retain Martin and Nielsen. Those guys got big time money from Toronto and Detroit respectively. The head scratcher was Okposo. For whatever reason, the Islanders never seemed to wrap their arms around him even though he was a homegrown talent, productive player, and seemed to have good chemistry with their most important players since Trottier, Tavares. Ladd at 31 has been declining for a couple years and they gave him 7 years with a $5.5mm AAV. Okposo got 7 years $6mm AAV at 28 years old. So for a difference of $5ook per year the Isles turned their back on one of their key players and perhaps set the franchise back. They chose…poorly, and now they’re dead.
I wrote the following last year about the Canucks and in a year they’ve done nothing to change their situation
The Canucks couldn’t figure out what to do with Luongo and Cory Schneider, and they ended up trading both of them without much of a return. Luongo and Schneider are both legitimate Vezina trophy candidates and the Canucks are over-paying for Ryan Miller. Their leadership group of Kesler and Bieksa have moved on and they are just left with the Sedins and Burrows. Not exactly the type of guys you want leading the locker room.
The Canucks, in theory, had a chance to follow the San Jose Sharks model. The Sharks had a few lean or transition years, but were able to rebuild around young guys like Vlasic, Couture, and Pavelski while keeping their previous core of Thornton and Marleau together. The Canucks stripped down the roster from what it was back in 2011 when they made the Stanley Cup Finals and all that remains are the Sedins and Burrows. What really kind of screwed them in that plan was their drafting. When the Sharks had a high draft pick in their transition time it got them Couture. The Canucks took Cody Hodgsen who was a bust in Vancouver. And then the Canucks flipped him for Zach Kassian who is also a bust. And while Bo Horvat is turning into a nice player, the Canucks missed their window with the Sedins because they drafted poorly and botched their goalie situation.
Sidenote…Special shoutout to my man Happy Jack Capuano. Fired this week. An amazing feat for Jack to stay employed for several years despite constantly looking like he was taking a mugshot after a DUI.
Capuano was hockey’s Jim Tomusula and I loved him. The mens warehouse suits, the do-it-yourself haircuts, the yelling, the complete disregard for possession style hockey. It was a beautiful mess and I will miss him. Your boy ConIsles did a nice farewell blog to him.
Julius Caesar–Detroit Red Wings
For the better part of 25 years the Detroit Red Wings have been the Roman Empire of the NHL. A true dynasty. Perpetual Stanley Cup contenders even as the league changed around them. External forces couldn’t kill the Red Wings though. It was dissension from within. First, the Patriarch of Hockey Operations in Detroit, Scotty Bowman, left to come to Chicago and help his son Stan. Then Red Wings legend Steve Yzerman left for Tampa after GM Ken Holland declined a promotion that would have paved a path for Stevie Y to be the General Manager in Detroit, and Mike Babcock got out while the getting was good and fled across the border to Toronto. The final stab was done by Pavel Datsyuk. The last true link between the modern Red Wings and their early 2000s Cup team. When Datsyuk left for Russia with another year left on his deal, the Wings were dead. Perhaps if he had stayed one final year, he could’ve bridged the gap between this era and the future built around Larkin. Instead, they’re dead. RIP Hockey Town.
Jack–The Devils and Coyotes
Jack, the movie about a kid who ages like four times as fast a regular person and you end up with a 40 year-old man in the 3rd grade. Is he a kid? Is he an adult? Nobody really knows, but he dies “young”.
Just a completely flawed roster construction by Arizona. Instead of tearing everything down and bottoming out like the Maple Leafs, the Coyotes held on to some familiar old asses like Shane Doan and Mike Smith, and then they also added more veterans like Radim Vrbata, Goligoski and Luke Schenn. Yet the true core of their team is their youth. Domi, Duclair, Ekman-Larsson, Chychrun, Dvorak, and Murphy. They’re too young to be good, and simultaneously too old to be good. It’s led to a death too soon.
New Jersey is very similar. They have some nice building block type pieces with Hall, Henrique, Palmieri, and they have a top flight goalie with Schneider. But they lack a true superstar center or anyone who can be a shut down D. Instead of bottoming out and going for a high draft pick to go with some of their young guys, they brought in guys over the years like Fiddler, Quincy, Cammalleri, Parenteau, and gave an old Andy Greene too much money. All to do what? What was the goal of that front office, to get the 8th seed in the playoffs? A half measure and a bridge to nowhere by both of these teams. They were truly DOA.
Oregon Trail–Buffalo Sabres
I wanted a movie about the American West for this one, but couldn’t find a more appropriate analogy than Oregon Trail. Fits the Sabres to a T. They’re setting off to the land of hopes and dreams. They left their old decrepit roster back behind and set out for the promise land. They hitched their wagon to Jack Eichel. That’s a great plan until your wagon breaks a wheel and your party gets dysentary or cholera and you get sick and die. The Sabres didn’t do anything wrong, but they’re also not strong enough to overcome injuries to Eichel and O’Reilly. Its a solid core and a balanced roster. Next year, with some tweaks and perhaps an upgrade in net(Lehner is fine, but there’s some proven goalies available next summer) the Sabres could reach the playoffs.
Blow–Colorado Avalanche
Flash back to 2014 and the Colorado Avalanche we’re riding high. They won the Central Division with a team made up of young stars like Duchene, Landeskog, McKinnon, and Tyson Barrie. Joe Sakic was the GM and his old teammate, Patrick Roy, won Coach of The Year. The Avs had life by the short and curlies. They played fast, they were young, they were hungry, and they were one of the most exciting teams in the NHL. The future looked limitless.
But…they were fatally flawed. Analytics people suggested that the Avalanche couldn’t continue to see that level of success if they continued to play so wrecklessly. That year everything went the Avs way. They got world class goaltending from Varlamov. It was a career year for him. They capitalized on their chances, and didn’t mind giving up a ton of chances the other way because Varlamov always bailed them out. Duchene only played 2 playoff games against the Minnesota Wild that year and the Avs eventually lost in 7 and they’ve never been the same. Despite all of the offensive power, the Avs couldn’t maintain their level of success and there were always rumors that they were kind of a mess off the ice as well. The jig was up. Patrick Roy was fired before the season started, but it didn’t matter. The Avs had too many bad habits and a flawed roster. Now they’re back to the drawing board and likely dismantling the team that had so much promise just 3 years ago.
Monty Python And The Holy Grail–A Lot Of Teams
“He says he’s not dead”
“Yes, he is”
“I’m not dead”
“He’s very ill, he’ll be stone dead in a moment”
There’s a whole mess of teams in this group. Winnipeg, Carolina, Florida, pretty much the entire Atlantic Division. All of these teams have serious flaws, but maybe just maybe with a little bit health, luck, and a deadline pick up they can be a team that goes on to playoffs and maybe the 2nd round. More likely than not, they’ll be stone dead in a moment, but for now we are leaving them alone until they are actually lifeless. Part 2 of this blog will be out in February.