As we sit in the doldrums of summer amidst the wreckage of our first Steve Staios off-season, we can look back at the season that was during the last gasp of Pierre Dorion’s incompetent run. The above charts are courtesy of an article from The Athletic who talk about their pre-season projections: “it turns out we should’ve expected something a lot closer to his [Korpisalo’s] usual body of work.” And “From just Kubalik and Korpisalo struggling immensely the Senators were 10 points worse than we thought.” Chychrun and Chabot were horrible defensively (the latter with the easiest minutes on the team and, of course, his usual injury problems). The above relies heavily on numbers and we know the current Sens’ administration (just like the one it replaced) fears and mistrusts numbers, so they will have learned nothing from this.
There’s definitely context to the above and it’s best not to simply glance at it as-is and think those at the top were fantastic and those at the bottom were awful (Kelly and Joseph could only go up from their awful 22-23 seasons, and both are marginal players and gone regardless). There’s not much surprising in the above, even if we all might adjust players a few places depending on what’s valued, their role, how much they played, and so on. It’s not hard to define the issues of the 23-24 season: horrible goaltending, a weak defensecorps (which is now weaker), and lack of production throughout the forward lineup (which hasn’t been addressed).
I’ve mentioned a few times (cf) the pick Pierre Dorion frittered away that became Justus Annunen, a young goaltender who continues to excel in Colorado. It’s one of many examples of how Dorion threw away picks for nothing and we see a similar tendency already with Staios (the Jamieson Rees deal was the first instance, albeit a 6th is less of a gamble than the 3rd used for Annunen). We can also mention Josh Doan, another pick Dorion discarded when he inexplicably brought in Derek Stepan, or the one discarded for Ian Cole that has become Alex Laferriere in LA. Asset management with Dorion was always awful and that trend has continued with Staios (for those with good memories, Pius Suter could have been signed years ago as a FA tryout).
While the fandom in Ottawa seems over the moon with the offseason, no one outside the market is under any such illusions. Courtesy of The Athletic we can see the abysmal impression elsewhere and I am heartened that, at least among its readers, Sens fans are being more realistic than what I see elsewhere. Optimism is a fine thing, but you have to be honest with what’s been done and how anyone can be happy with the moves overall (short-term or long) is beyond me. The one move that gets praised the most is acquiring Ullmark, but beyond the fact he’s never had a starting goaltender’s workload (cf), how will you keep him? If he goes, or if he bombs out, nothing has been achieved.
In terms of contracts overall, the Norris deal was always a gamble and it’s actually better that he be injured than play poorly–with the amount of money he makes, he either has to be excellent or off the payroll (they can use some of that Vegas magic with the cap perhaps). The Perron deal was ridiculous and Amadio could turn into a Joseph-like problem as well, but we will have to wait and see (the former would be impossible to move, which is why his deal is much worse as a gamble). The Jensen deal will be something fans will hate very quickly and the guy is basically unmovable at that salary.
The Sens have also fumbled the cap for no discernable reason. They should have plenty of room to make additions, but they don’t. The contracts that expire next season free up a lot of cash (and get rid of two players who serve no purpose on the roster, Forsberg and Hamonic), but there’s no replacing Giroux who will likely have to be dealt at the deadline if the team isn’t making the playoffs (which I don’t expect them to do). Given the sort of returns Staios is getting on trades, I expect to get rolled Chychrun-style again, likely acquiring some declining, broken down older player with salary carryover.
This isn’t the place to project forward, but nothing I’ve seen seems better than the Dorion regime. All this has done for me is confirm that Andlauer has no idea what he’s doing when it comes to the team and is easily exploited by people who simply talk the talk. The best fans can hope for is that I’m wrong and everything works out.
This article was written by Peter Levi
eyeonthesens 