The Chicoutimi Cucumber

habs29retired, I agree with most of your points, although obviously I wouldn't fire JM. In truth, what I'd be really interested in is a 'what do we do next year' thread. But of course this would be premature.

Well, while you're right that noone can really know what's up except the players and coaches, I think fans are within their rights to make reasonable speculations based on what we're seeing. I'd say there's a few possibilities for what's going on. 1. The team is simply slumping, like all teams do. The timing of the slump - at the tail end of an injury-ravaged season in which Hammer and Price have arguably been way overworked - is just sheer coincidence. 2. The team is exhausted. 3. The team is tired AND knows that the odds are very much in favour of them making the playoffs. So intentionally or otherwise, they're not bringing their lunch-buckets. (IMHO this is most likely what happened last season). 4. The team is not tired. They're just intentionally or unintentionally surfing because they know they're likely to make the playoffs. 5. Losing MaxPac and three of the top-6, without having any young players step up to fill the breach, leaves the team fundamentally exposed. Unless Pouliot or someone else really steps up to plug the whole left by Patches, and unless Weber or someone else really steps up on the blueline, we just don't have the horses to compete. 3 & 4 are the most attractive answers because they suggest that guys are husbanding their energies for a playoff push. Every other scenario is unsettling. One thing I'll say: while all teams go through injuries, this is the third season running where the Habs have massive, season-ending injuries to important players. I'm really sick and tired of it. And it wouldn't surprise me at all if, next year say, the Habs remain healthy and suddenly 'surprise' everyone with a stellar season. Three years in a row is sick. EDIT: is it just me, or is Hamrlik calling out his teammates here? http://www.montrealgazette.com/sports/didn+compete+Hamrlik+says/4532328/story.html 'I'm not happy just to make the playoffs. I want to go deep and win the Cup.' I dunno, he seems to be implying that not all his colleagues feel the same way. Just curious.

You really have to wonder whether the Habs - posibly including Price - are basically done in, exhausted. A small team with an aging defence corps, simultaneously ravaged with injuries, that's a dangerous mix; factor in the psychodrama surrounding Pacioretty and you may have the final X-factor that brings you a team that's fundamentally out of gas. (More an more I think that's the key to the Patches hit: not that it somehow 'destroyed our spirit' but that the hoopla surrounding it was one more drain that the team's collective energy didn't need). This team has been blown out in three of its last seven and shut out in three over that span. The former in particular is worrisome because it's radically out of character. I think we have a burnt-out bunch here. They may make the playoffs, but they're going to need some key guys to find their second wind in order to do any damage at all. (In this vein, it's good that Gomez, Cammy and Pleks are showing signs of life. The question is: what about the D? Do they have anything left?)

I dunno...I think this is too charitable to Gomez. So many of his rushes and offensive zone plays seem to end up with the puck on the other team's stick, it's not even funny; if anything, he sucks the life out of plays more often than he succeeds in kindling them. That's what drives me crazy. It's not just that Gomer is not producing; unlike Cammy and Gio, he seems to be actively hurting the team with some frequency, a point well-documented in analyses such as this: http://habsloyalist....mez-effect.html Certainly he is *not* a good third liner (stats aren't everything, but a +/- of -15 doesn't speak to a good defensive player). And of course he brings absolutely zero physical presence or meaningful 'compete' level along the boards etc.. The bottom line with Gomez is that, despite his limitations as a goal-scorer and his lack of physical prowess, he always was an elite playmaker with great speed. Now his playmaking has almost completely deserted him. The ONLY thing he has left is speed. If he were a rookie, he likely would have been sent down weeks ago, classified as one of those guys who 'shows flashes' but is one-dimensional and still needs to learn the game. Unfortunately he is no rookie. Now, dlbalr is absolutely right that sending him down NOW, or even ranting about what a horrible acquisition he was two years ago (which conveniently overlooks his perfectly adequate performance last season), is counter-productive, Groundhog-Day-type behaviour. Right now, the only other option we have at C is Desharnais; and only a foolish organization would send a Gomez to the minors with 10 games left and hand over the reins to a 5'7 unproven rookie. We are indeed stuck with him. That shouldn't blind us to the fact that this season he has been absolutely (one of?) the WORST second-line C in the NHL and that a solution WILL need to be found for the Gomez Problem. Cammy and Gio are plucky players who are slumping. Gomez is another matter entirely.

dlbar, you are a voice of reason of course. If you look at the post where I used the phrase, you'll find I wrote it less as a direct blast at Gomez and more as a rhetorical parallelism to make a rather different point, a point about basing opinions on performance rather than axiomatic likes and dislikes. Right there is the significant difference between Martin and Gomez, though: namely that JM's results tend to work in his favour and Gomez's don't. Let's face it. When a player's performance has been as catastrophic as Gomez's has been this season - 35 points?? -15??? - there's nothing for it: you're going to get repeated complaining about it, and I don't think there's much that can (or should) be done about that.

That's right, I waited a good length of time before throwing a proven veteran under the bus. What was I thinking.

Yes, I know we've won some games since The Hit. Still, there have been a LOT of listeless performances since then; and the contrast with the spirited, choke-chain-tight team that dominated the Bruins in every facet of the game on March 8 is too stark to ignore. I also realize that it's kind of an odd question, because rationally, there seems to be no tangible reason why that 'hit' would sap the will from a team. But the idea also doesn't seem that far-fetched. I know this because my own spirit as a Habs' fan just hasn't been the same since then. Something about that incident left me profoundly demoralized. It took me two weeks to even bother watching even parts of another game. I'm not really sure why. But it seems to be the case nonetheless. Am I alone in thinking this? Any insights?

Right. So this team without Martin is good for an extra 10-12 wins, I guess. Hate JM all you like, I'm tired of the running argument. EDIT: I just noticed your crack about my 'blind love' of Gomez. Last season Gomez was #20 in the entire league for assists. Therefore I defended him. This year he is wretched in every facet of the game. Therefore I don't defend him. See the difference? I thought not.

Yes, going on the road will, ironically, be likely to help. Hell, it could become just what the doctor ordered, a late-season crucible in which the team can re-bond and recommit to the elements that make it successful. And if you're REALLY looking for optimism...let's remember that 1986 and 1993 (or for that matter 2010) ALL saw the Habs looking awful during late-season slumps (Actually, this season, I would expect the Habs to start gelling - just in time for yet another major injury to decimate Cammy, Subban, Gio, Price or any other combination of key guys. But wait, that's for the Official Negativity Thread!)

Actually, I agree with some of the criticisms made of JM today. Reducing PK's ice-time seems to me sheer folly, for instance, as he has been consistently been the best thing going on this team (except for Price). I understand his decision to keep (doggedly) using Gomer Pyle but disagree with it; by now I would have given up on that idiot and started redistributing his ice time to DD and Eller. But since I come at it from the prior assumption that JM is a good coach, I don't take every single decision I disagree with as MORE PROOF THAT JM IS A JACKASS. Specific decisions aside, the irrationality of constantly blaming Martin every time things don't go our way is exposed the moment you ask who else could have done better with this injury-decimated team all season long. Unless you believe that this really is a 110-point team in disguise, the results prove Martin's worth. So I suppose I should clarify: it's not criticism of this or that decision I mind, it's the endless raving from Habs fans about how Martin is some sort of incompetent dinosaur who needs to go - which is usually the conclusion at play among posters playing Angry Armchair Coach.

Yeah, this powerhouse roster would be right up there with Vancouver for the league lead if we didn't have that stupid boob Jacques Martin

A sad display. Blame, blame, blame. Look, your best players have to perform. Cammy is MIA and has been for too long. Gomez is a marginal NHLer at this stage (and I fully agree that if we cannot move him over the summer, we should just acquire a decent #2 C and send his ass down to Hamilton). Pleks looks like he's not fully healed. Gio is hustling but ineffective. Kosty is playing well. That's about it. There's absolutely no push from the blueline, partly because Hamrlik looks like he's about to drop dead from exhaustion (why do you think all those passes are going astray?). With Patches out, the kiddie corps suddenly looks a lot thinner -Desharnais and Pouliot in particular aren't stepping up - although Eller at least played with some verve tonight. And that, ladies and gentlemen, spells slump. Remember the old adage about not being as bad you look when you're losing. They'll come out of it. I'd expect another few bad games, though, before the ship starts to right itself.

Sending him to the minors NOW would be categorically insane, obviously. This summer, especially if we have an early exit, all bets are off. I believe that, other than re-assembling the defence corps, Gauthier's Job #1 will be to ship Gomer Pyle out of here by hook or by crook. And I hope he doesn't let the Bell Centre doors hit his ass on the way out. As for tonight's sad performance, I said it after the Boston game: we are entering a slump and will suck ass for the next little while. Hunker down and ride it out.

It's false to say that 'either the Habs are contenders or they aren't.' A Habs team playing near 100% is an outside but genuine contender IF they don't have to play Philadelphia. To me it's so obvious that, barring unforseen circumstances (such as a rash of injuries to the Flyers' blueline) Philly has our number, that denying it amounts to delusion. I mean, they completely manhandled us in the playoffs last year; they've killed us all season; they are too big, too strong, too good, and play a style that we generally have trouble with (up-and-down, crash-and-bang). While it's technically true that any outcome is possible in hockey, rational analysis will accept that Philly is the one team against which we have very little chance even if we bring our 'A' game.

If we play Philly at any point, we will lose. Simple as that.

Interesting thought. So the Habs are sort of like Michael Ignatieff - banking on horrendously low expectations working in their favour Washington has looked rather more dangerous over the final third of the season (playing defence, being disciplined, etc.), so I'm not sure I'd want to draw them. As to your wider point, though, I hate to say it, but I really get the feeling that we're slipping into our third significant slump of the season. There's just been too many hurdles to overcome, too many injuries and too much drama (Patches) and too little good news. (I know it won't happen, but they need a shot in the arm, such as Markov coming back early or something). They're basically taking a mental/physical break whether they can afford it or not. Expect the team to look stink-o for the next 4-5 games.

Well, losing 7-0, especially in a much-hyped game against a hated rival, does tend to cast a pall over a team, so the fan response is totally understandable. Nevertheless, it *is* kind of ridiculous to see how many commentators are now writing with absolute certainty that the Habs obviously will never be able to beat Boston in the playoffs. I guess there has been a rupture in the space-time continuum such that the previous game, in which we absolutely dominated them, never happened. The play of core guys like Gomer Pyle and Cammy is genuine cause for concern. Other than that, this game had more to do with weird but temporary psychological effects stemming from Chara's brutal attack, injuries and slumping individual players, a sore Price, and a team that's out of sorts at the moment for all of the above reasons, than about decisively resolving the question of which team will win a playoff series several weeks from now. If you ask me these guys looked in the mirror and concluded that they did not have the will, energy, or physical heath to bring the necessary intensity to that specific game; nor did they wish to make the required sacrifices to win the division - something that would demand a supreme effort from here on in - under these circumstances. That is a very different thing from not having these qualities for the playoffs.

I gave up at 3-0. This was first game watching hockey again...that show didn't exactly make me want to come back. It's too bad, but let's keep some perspective. This is a team caught in that infernal transition between having lots of injuries and lots of bodies coming back. It is all too common for teams in that situation to be out of joint. The healthy guys are exhausted and the returning guys aren't 100% either physically or in terms of timing (usually the results aren't this bad, though). I'm surprised nobody is mentioning that Price has a leg strain. He looked slightly off to me, in the first anyway. Slumps by key cogs don't help either. Cammy is a much better hockey player than he's shown this season. It's hard to know what his problem is, but he will turn it around. Gio was never really a top-3 player, so we have to keep his so-so results in perspective. The real problem in the 'smurf core' is Gomez, who I'm pretty sure Gauthier will work heaven and earth to move in the off-season. Also: let's face facts, these guys NEED MaxPac. They needed a player of that profile all along, and he was becoming it. Without him, and with Pouliot still sort of finding his way, we end up back where we were at the start of 2010: short at least one top six forward. (Short at least two, indeed, if you consider Gomez's disgusting performances). Strange as it sounds, motivation might have been a problem tonight. In a weird way the Habs have proved their point against Boston all season long. Now Chara upped the ante last game in a way that is impossible to process, but that's not something that will matter after tonight. Subconsciously their goal may have been just to escape this essentially meaningless regular season game without another life-threatening injury. I got a weird vibe from them out there. You can call it being 'intimidated' but these guys have shown again and again that they are fighters. I think it's something distinct: they just want to put the whole Patches thing behind them and come back fresh for the playoffs. Despite all the rhetoric, laying it all on the line tonight wasn't in the cards, unless they got some early bounces. Finally: the same bunch looked awful at the end of last season. Between age, injuries and size, may be a team that needs to coast into the dance in order to have enough left in the tank to make a charge. It's not panic time. But they definitely need to give Price a game or two off.

Hoping for a career-ending injury to Mark Recchi, because of some stupid remark he made to the press, is totally out of line. I think Brunet called it - too many players in the Habs' lineup who have sat out too many games. They're not in their groove. (Of course, if Cammy and Gomer were playing decent hockey, that'd help too).

Look. The whole pro-Chara analysis has to do with three things: 1. Intent. 2. Whether you like Chara or at least think he is a good guy, not an SOB like Cooke. 3. Whether you hate the individual Chara destroyed, or the team that individual plays for. Practically ALL of the supporters of Chara in the media and among fans accept at least one of these principles as determinant of whether discipline was warranted. On (1), Chara's 'intent' is of course unclear, but since, at least from some camera angles it looks like the sort of play we see happening fairly routinely in other parts of the arena, he gets the benefit of the doubt. (It also helps if you subscribe to (2) or (3). But you don't have to take those extra steps). Now, I suspect that everybody can intuitively sense the problem with relying on 'intent' - it assumes psychic knowledge of what was in a player's mind. And this is why we've seen all sorts of other 'issues' added to further bolster the argument: it's the building's fault, MaxPac 'put himself' in that position, he 'jumped,' etc., etc. These are all just special pleading designed to distract us from the radical weakness of relying on 'intent' as the basis for a verdict. (2) is even more circular. If you 'know' that Chara 'would never' do that (he's such a swell joe) then you 'know' that the intent wasn't there. This is the Don Cherry school of reasoning, where those deemed to be good guys are always in the right no matter what they do. (3) works the same way. It also works in reverse: some fans would indeed be calling for Chara's head whether or not it was warranted. Recchi is right about that much. The real issues, which are whether this was an illegal play (it was) and a reckless play due to its specific location (it very definitely was) - and whether reckless, dangerous, illegal plays should be punishable - are therefore neatly avoided altogether.

Not with that piece of crap Auld as backup. There's only so many injuries a team can absorb. This is absurd.

The NHL is being widely praised for the Cooke suspension, and I agree they got it right. But on the other hand, it's just more of a smokescreen to disguise the pathologies of their disciplinary regime. The whole thing is predicated on presuming to have psychic insight into a player's 'intent.' What this means in practice is that if a player is a good old boy, respected around the league as a basically decent fellow (Chara) then he gets a free pass. If a player is actively disliked, why then he gets nailed. I can't wait until PK Subban inflicts a controversial hit on someone. Judging from the essential arbitrary nature of such a system, where 'justice' is based on personal likes and dislikes, I would expect him to get a fairly stiff punishment, supported by the same pious media frauds who assured us that Chara is a saint and therefore obviously undeserving of even a token suspension for nearly killing someone with a reckless hit. Subban is a jerk, so he deserves it, see? The entire system works like Don Cherry's mind: axiomatic biases and personal likes and dislikes, dispensed as some sort of Code and Moral Truth.

It is bewildering. Was the concussion deemed 'severe' based just on the visuals of the impact, or on some kind of medical assessment of actual damage done? And I share your concern about Patches' longer-term future. One thing the HBO special made painfully obvious (in the way that both Crosby and Staal were handled) is that it's generally left up to the player as to when they are good to go. Since these players are, first, cocky young guys who 'just wanna play' and have no conception of the implications for the rest of their lives, and second, part of a macho culture of 'sucking it up' rather than admitting 'weakness,' and thus under considerable peer pressure not to look like pansies by protecting their health, this approach is guaranteed to lead to dire consequences. Look at Marc Savard: his desire to play to trumped common sense, which would have dictated that he take a year off. Now he's concussed again and his career is almost certainly over. We don't need Patches suffering the same fate.

The disturbing thing is that, as Wamsley points out, Cole hasn't been the same player since.

Happy to hear this. Finally a bit of good news. I must say, though, that I haven't watched a game since The Hit and still feel no itch to do so. I guess I'm taking Bruce 'The Human Turd' Boudreau's advice to heart.