Detroit Red Wings: Roundtable Discussion of Jeff Blashill
By Bob Heyrman
Bob Heyrman;
Sometimes in life, you wish you could reach out and hit a reset button and start over. I remember playing the old Sega Genesis system and falling behind in a game of NHL 93′ and lunging towards the system and holding down the “reset” button until the game restarted. I’m sure Jeff Blashill wishes he could hold down a reset button on this season, or the past couple of seasons for that matter.
It is not entirely Jeff Blashill’s fault, let’s get that straight out of the gate here. Imagine your boss dumping a whole bunch of Ford Tempo parts across your desk or in your workspace and told you to build a Dodge Viper. It just doesn’t make sense.
Jeff Blashill took over for Mike Babcock and inherited a very good hockey team. Blashill finished 3rd winning 41 games and recording 93 points. Jeff hasn’t had an above .500 record since and certainly won’t come close this season. A lot of times when a franchise goes into a “rebuild” mode the head coach becomes a victim of the circumstance. The Ilitch family may not be as loyal as they once were with Mike eating at the head of the table but they still decided to give Ken Holland a two-year extension this past summer. That signaled some loyalty because what has Ken Holland done recently to receive such an extension?
Jeff Blashill hasn’t precisely had top talent to work with since the departure of Pavel Datsyuk. Now he has lost Henrik Zetterberg who has been replaced with Frans Nielsen or Luke Glendening and at times Jacob de La Rose. If I am Jeff Blashill, I find a way for my pen to run out of ink after filling out the top two lines of my lineup card.
Ken Holland has often “gifted” Blashill with aging veterans without sprinkling in many top end talented kids. The desire to keep the 25-year playoff streak alive was a proud feat to accomplish but ended up prolonging the Detroit Red Wings rebuild five or more seasons. The first round exits were mounting, and the fans were becoming restless.
I refuse to put all of the blame on Jeff Blashill for the downfall of the Detroit Red Wings, but I will put 40% of it on him. I don’t know and I likely never will know if the idea of playing the aging and grinding type players over the youthful, skillful players was instructions from Holland to Blashill or his decision on his own.
Dylan Larkin has seemed to turn the corner under Jeff Blashill’s watch, and Tyler Bertuzzi has played well for the Detroit Red Wings. Andreas Athanasiou before his injury was seeing consistent second line ice-time after lobbying for more work this summer. Dennis Choloswski has been sensational for the Wings in the early going and continues to log north of 20 minutes a night on the Detroit Red Wings back-end. So Jeff Blashill needs credit for these advancements.
I have concerns about the depth players; I understand a player needs to “earn” ice-time. I just don’t see how as a coach who has been deemed a player developmental coach, playing young talent around 10 minutes a night develops anyone. Although it has been different for AA this year, nearly all of last year Andreas Athanasiou was playing fourth line minutes. Anthony Mantha has often found himself lost in the darkness of Jeff Blashill’s coaching style. Martin Frk and Michael Rasmussen are often finding themselves scratched or playing 8 minutes a night.
It isn’t as if they are being overlooked for Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk, and Marian Hossa. These guys are losing ice to Luke Glendening, Darren Helm, Jacob de La Rose, and Justin Abdelkader. That is my problem with this situation.
I think Jeff Blashill is paying the price for Ken Holland’s signings. Holland has the Detroit Red Wings locked into a salary cap penitentiary. His love of signing bottom end players to lucrative long-term deals with no trade clauses attached makes roster flexibility a challenge.
Jeff Blashill needed to coach up the young players rather than consistently running Jonathan Ericsson, Trevor Daley, and Nick Jensen onto the ice. Blashill may survive the season as he is entering the final year of his contract. The stage is set for Michigan native Dan Bylsma to take over the controls behind the bench next season or sooner if the Wings slip into a 10-15 game skid.