retired nhler, hockey hall of famer, and former head coach adam oates on mitch being scapegoated for the leafs failing to pass the first round again in the 2024 playoffs (video posted may 14th, 2024)
"some of it, for sure, is on him. for sure. but who's helping him? like the power play was one for twenty. if they were five for twenty, they'd still be playing right now ... they wouldn't be complaining right now, would they? ... I feel bad for him ... the winning goal, pastrnak's goal, they they're blaming him ... they were in a neutral zone regroup. so the f1 changed, he jumped over for f1. pastrnak's not his responsibility at all!"
"it's a combination of all five guys ... they threw the puck across the rink and the d that went up missed the poke check ... let the guy make a cross corner dump. morgan rielly pivoted the wrong way ... the d were flat footed because f1 didn't do his job right."
"I'm mad that no one in toronto has come out and said, 'hey, that was a neutral zone forecheck. that's not mitch. stop trying to blame him for everything.' ... management should have. sheldon keefe should have come out and said, 'stop, that's not his responsibility.'"
full transcript below the cut
"mitch marner's getting a lot of attention. obviously he plays in a hot button market. what do you make out of that whole situation, when you watch a player like him with his ability and, in the playoffs it just seems like, I know he's under the microscope-"
"careful, careful."
"yeah."
"careful. their power play was one for twenty."
"yeah."
"is that his fault?"
"no."
"who's?"
"that's what I was going to ask you, is it all his fault? like he, does he take too much heat?"
"well, who's?"
"well, he's part of the power play."
"yeah. he's part of it, yeah. so this is once, once again, a slippery slope, right?"
"yeah, yeah."
"because who's helping him? who's giving him a lifeline? that's an incredibly difficult market, as we know."
"yeah."
"so matthews only got one, tavares only got one, nylander only got one, he only got one. so, why is he the fall guy every year, right? and, and yeah, he's got to take some responsibility himself, of course."
"11 million. that's probably why, they look, they look at his salary, right?"
"yeah. so, so here's another thing, too. so like, let's say the d doesn't break them out. let's say, because we got four front loaded contracts, our d don't break us out. is that marner's fault? we have to produce when we don't get the puck past center [unintelligible]."
"what if he asked for less money?"
"what's that?"
"what if he asked for less money? maybe you can get another defenseman [laughs]."
"maybe [laughs]."
"I mean, I think he's taking heat too, 'cause there's a video of him just kind of like, going and doing the fly by and stuff like that, so it all kind of built up a little bit."
"so, well, they're also looking for it every single time, right?"
"yeah."
"like when nylander yelled at him. well, nylander, first of all, you don't play against everybody's best. you play against everybody's second best. let's get that straight. let's get that straight. you don't play against the best every night. you play against three four. number one. number two, he was mad at matthews for a bad turnover at the blue line. that's what he's mad at. and he's [mitch] also mad and he threw his gloves, why? because he knows tomorrow in the paper, they're going to blame him [mitch]. right? now, some of it, for sure, is on him. for sure. but who's helping him? like the power play was one for twenty. if they were five for twenty, they'd still be playing right now. and he'd have three more points, four more points, they wouldn't be complaining right now, would they? so therefore now you're gonna look at the power play. of course. well, that's two units, ten guys and one coach, right? and the head coach. so like, it's never a one guy, and I feel bad for him, 'cause he's in that market, right? that makes it very difficult. and then, the winning goal, pastrnak's goal, they they're blaming him. and it's like, if anything, if anybody knows anything about hockey, they were in a neutral zone regroup. so the f1 changed, he jumped over for f1. pastrnak's not his responsibility at all!"
"who's is it? d-man's?"
"yeah, it's a combination of all five guys in terms of how we're trying to slow down the neutral zone forecheck, right? so they threw the puck across the rink and the d that went up missed the poke check. that contributes. let the guy, let the guy make a cross corner dump. morgan rielly pivoted the wrong way. and the d were flat footed. the d were flat footed because f1 didn't do his job right. and janssen knows, we worked for, he played for pete deboer, I worked for pete. how much time do we spend on neutral zone forecheck? every day!"
"oh yeah."
"every day. 'cause you don't want these little hiccups. and the goalie probably could have come out and poke checked it."
"yeah, that was another thing. I'm glad you said that because I feel like-"
"I'm mad, honestly, I'm mad that no one in toronto has come out and said, 'hey, that was a neutral zone forecheck. that's not mitch. stop trying to blame him for everything.'"
"well, 'cause they, they just want to get so emotional and, you know-"
"but management should have. sheldon keefe should have come out and said, 'stop, that's not his responsibility.'"
"or, or maybe john tavares, who's who's got the c on his jersey. somebody. you know-"
"I get that."
"because he does take a lot of heat. I feel like the best players are always the lightning rods."
21 jan 2024, wild @ canes | dear diary, today michael tripped a wild player himself and was sent to the box where he waterboarded his nose with biosteel
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Zindagi, rishte, ehsas, khud apna aap bhi
'Main hun' se 'main tha' tak ka safar insan ko ye ehsas dilata hai ke wo apni mein ghaTe ka sauda kar baitha hai
florida panthers head coach paul maurice on mitch being blamed for the series losing goal in the 2024 boston series (video posted may 6th, 2024)
"marner took an awful lot of heat ... the expectation of who's got whose guy, you want to be careful with that one, 'cause you really need to know what the team runs before you call a guy out ... not all the analysis of what happened on that play might be accurate."
full transcript under the cut
"you could see that change, and marner took an awful lot of heat, but they run a different neutral zone than what boston does. so the expectation of who's got whose guy, you want to be careful with that one, 'cause you really need to know what the team runs before you call a guy out. 'cause what we run in our neutral zone is completely different to what boston runs, so we would have a completely different person picking up that wide sling. that's just me telling you that not all the analysis of what happened on that play might be accurate."
