Islanders Bits: 'Hard work' only matters if you keep it up

I want to see final scores where the Islanders have more goals than the other team. Enough of this nonsense. They have to bury their chances. The first Islander goal beat Lumpquest high to the glove side. Keep shooting there. Instead they shoot low and I don’t know why everybody – that includes our boys – continues to try to blast away from the point. Even if it gets through, these overpadded goalies are so positional, it’s almost pointless (pun intended) even with screens. Yeah shoot low, but with no big windup and less speed. Make the goalie think. Mostly, though, the team needs to show more patience on the ice. Bailey had time to bank it out off the boards (not “the wall,” thank you.) Instead he sent it right up the middle. In a pickup game one time, I did exactly what Bailey did and it ended up in the net. one of our defensemen told me, “You do that again, i’ll make you eat that puck.” Next chance, I did what he said and used the boards and started an odd man rush the other way. i don’t remember whether we scored, but the defenseman dropped his stick and gloves and applauded. If I understand that, some guy who makes six or seven figures to play every day certainly should.

Is there any team in the league that blocks more shots than the Rangers?

he does a decent job in the booth.
But I get so tired of hearing about guys or lines having a ‘GREAT shift’ because they controlled the puck down low for 10 seconds or got a couple of shots off.
If they don’t score, it’s not a GREAT shift. It just isn’t.
When Pete Maravich dribbled the ball all around the court until the guy guarding him was dizzy, and then he missed the shot, it wasn’t GREAT play.
He failed to score.

Pete did not miss too many of them.
But I give Butch credit for one call. On one play, Comeau took the puck wide, skated hard, and beat the defenseman to drive the puck to the net, and Butch said “That’s the Comeau we have not seen.”
Indeed. Where has that Comeau been all year?

All the Isles worked hard last night…and still it was a losing effort.
The margin for error on this team is SOOO small.
It was small going into the season, and now its smaller when they get literally no offense from 3 important players they were counting on (Bailey, Ox, and Comeau). What team can fathom the disappearing act of 3 key forwards all at the same time?

Only continues because he was Snow’s error and now a contiuing project.for him. The effect of this is that we are F——d because our super GM won’t admit an error that from time to time all GM’s make. Ditto for picking up over age rejects instead of better players or giving a shot to prospects. Unfortunately besides Wish the D in BPT is smallish and a year or 2 away in any case. The latest round of piks are bigger and better but more years away. If the Philosophy stands we will of course win some games [last night was an excellent effort], but lose more on the D side. If A a major trade is not made soon, the season from a competetive view will be lost by the year’s end. Poor attendance already a problem could reach embarassing numbers. and hopes for goodPR with a winning season will become very negative for gettinga new arena. Snow/Wang must pull the trigger soon on some daring changes . Because this Feb, with the rental deals will be too little too late.

Rolston and Pandalfo are the biggest culprits (Staios too but he’s looked better than the other two). These are guys looking for one more year of the NHL life. Bodies are older and what motivation is there to really push it since they are on the Island and have about zero percent chance of competing for the cup. It feels like the Rangers of the late 90s were players go to retire (minus the bloated contracts and bloated expectations).

Islanders in the second half last year were a team of young’ns, who flew up and down the ice, trying hard to show what they could do to stick. Prospects were hungry. Everyone eager to play for the new coach and show what they could do. They weren’t world-beating but they certainly had a better direction than this years team.

In conclusion, get rid of these two guys, bring in Haley for some quickness and fire and another offensive prospect desperate to show something. And in the future, if we need more “veteran leadership” someone who isn’t toward the end of their career.

to what I think JP suggests about doing whatever is needed to get a big time D-man in here. I’ve been a ‘build from the goal out’ fan my whole life and raved all off season to get a blue chip guy in here. Then I thought they may have enough back there to at least get by until the kids (DeHaan, Donovan, Pedan, Mayfield) are ready, but I think I was wrong. Those guys are a couple or few years away IF they pan out. And it’s obvious that a borderline, just competent D-corps is holding this team back, literally hindering it’s development. I’m back to obsessing that building a bigger, better and more skilled transition D-corps must be THE FIRST priority, and if it means giving up players, picks, prospects, triple-s-blue stamps, trinkets (whatever the hell they are) or his whole baseball card collection, the GM needs to do it if he can. There are 4 guys I flat out would not trade in any deal. Maybe 5. Whatever else it takes, do it.

Read that checking line article from this morning, “Josh Bailey, meet Michael Grabner.” It’s so true. The kid is 22. He tore up the AHL in 11 games last year. He’s struggling at the NHL level, but he’s shown real talent in his few years, albeit marred by inconsistency. He’s going to figure it out at some point and be a really effective second or third line center, at worst. It would be very Mike Milbury-esque to dump Bailey now and watch him become another Olli Jokinen- dumped by the Islanders because of lack of patience, only to flourish with a more patient team.

I think one of the reasons Snow picked him was because he is supposed to be a leader-type and character guy. Well if this doesn’t test character, what else will? (Don’t list them, I know – it’s a rhetorical point.) Bailey won’t become the 70-point scorer some had hoped for him to be, but he may be an effective fourth-line player (him and Kyle). So it’s too early to give up on him.

However, bailing on Pandolfo, Eaton, Jurcina, Mottau, Rolston ane even Comeau (no giveaways, though) should be strongly considered. There has to be some legitimate long-term help down in Bridgeport or for trade.

Another couple of bad games and we may be thinking ahead to next year real soon.

Right now IMO they get a 2 pik for Comeau and a 3 pik for Bailey. or is it a 3 and a 4? its like having an old used car, they may be better kept and used for what they are – than giving it away in a trade in for a big upgrade.

Its brutal, especially with the way we have been going. Two weeks from now we will be either in comeback mode, treading water, or up the famous creek.

One Problem with Bailey is, if he isnt scoring he isnt doing much of anything else, one glaring weakness i noticed since opening night is they dont have any guys going into the corner after pucks, too many guys waiting around for someone else to to go get it, When you have Tavares as your best guy in the corner he might need some help, Blake and Bergenheim come to mind, miss those types, so i hope players like Casey and Ulstrom get here soon, need the bring your lunch pail and hard hat players

Moulson-Tavares-Grabner; Rolston-Nielsen-Parenteau; Comeau-Reasoner-Okposo, Niederreiter; Martin-Bailey-Pandolfo.

1. Because these liines score two measly goals we should roll with them again??
2. 1st line is too top heavy. Swap PA with Grabner. Nielsen and Grabner are both playing well. They will click on the same line like last year.
3. “Comeau-Reasoner-Okposo, Niederreiter” WTF?? Aren’t there other, more thoughtful places to plug in Nino? Are they going to scratch KO again? Why does it seem that certain players in the lineup have property rights in their spots???

These lines show an utter lack of creativity.