Comments on: GDT – Oilers 1, Sabres 3 – Nov 11, 2009 – Game 19

By: Mr.Majestyk

Mr.Majestyk — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:10:02 +0000

I’m with you on this Racki. The Hemsky cross ice pass to Horcoff is great, when its available. When it isn’t, the puck needs to passed around the perimeter and who knows, maybe from the other side there might be a cross ice feed to Hemsky for a one timer. From my perspective, you take what they give you. If they form a tight box(tee hee)then by all means feed it to the point and let the howitzers fly. If they give you room to skate it into the middle for a shot, by all means take that. I just feel like most of what we are able to accomplish is reactionary to what the PK’ers do. Not all teams PK the same way, we need to adjust on the fly and react to what is in front of us. Hockey sense.

By: Racki

Racki — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 16:09:44 +0000

The other wise words on Lowetide (read that article as well) in the comments were from Bruce, I believe. He mentioned that people seem to take any criticism towards Hemsky as being along the lines of “Hemsky sucks, lets trade him!”. He is our best player, and I’ve got no delusions that he should be traded. I just would like to see less Hemsky show on the powerplay. If that cross crease pass isn’t open, get it over to someone else and get the other team moving around.

Hemsky isn’t the only problem on the powerplay either, so I’m not completely focusing on him. Cogliano also made a bad decision on the powerplay in the last game when he decided to pass the puck back towards the blue line rather than get it out front to Penner who was wide open. I honestly don’t get that. There are a few issues that could be fixed on the pp to make it better. And no, not all just Hemsky.

By: Racki

Racki — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:46:58 +0000

Ok, sure, moving it around the perimeter, no problems with that.. but since when is hanging onto the puck and looping around working it around the perimeter? As I’ve said before, I like Hemsky, and I do think he’s a good PP’er but he could be better if he hung on to the puck less and started using his teammates a bit more. Why are people so sensitive to Hemsky criticism? It’s not like I’m saying that we should trade the guy. Just get him to move the puck around a bit more whether that’s getting the puck on net, or using the guy down low, or whatever.

By: Steve-O

Steve-O — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:00:33 +0000

I disagree. I really really disagree.

A good powerplay doesn’t throw the puck at the net as thats where the goalie can cover it up (and have you seen the team at faceoffs?) and the entire other team. You make their job easier. A good powerplay works the puck around the perimeter (either down low or up along the points) which in turn gets the defenders moving and opening up holes, and also has the goalie moving. All the good powerplays in the league do this.

Now we are crapping on our statistically best powerplay player (best player period). It makes no sense. I think the post Lowetide has on it is correct, where in the comments people mentioned that the shitty powerplay was blamed on Mac T, and now that we can’t do that Hemsky is being blamed.

By: Racki

Racki — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:20:17 +0000

Agreed on that. Hemsky is fully capable of making some beauty cross crease passes, but he’s also just as much, or more capable of running the clock down. They don’t all have to be pretty goals. Get them on net for Penner to bang in.

By: Horpensky

Horpensky — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:42:35 +0000

Hemsky just has to be a little less selfish with the puck. When he hangs on to it, the other team has time to regroup. We need to create a little chaos for their PK’ers, and getting shots and moving the puck around quickly is the best way to do that.

By: Racki

Racki — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:11:36 +0000

Not saying take him away from the PP (and I don’t think Horpensky is either). Saying he needs to improve his repertoire of moves. The “Hemsky delay” (not to be confused with the awesome Gretzky delay) is a good method of killing penalties. It does manage to work on occasion, but more often than not it only manages to kill time off the penalty clock and the Oilers don’t get a shot on net.

I think even Quinn commented about it before the start of the season how he carries the puck too much (in one of his vague nameless player bashings). I like Hemsky as much as the next, but the powerplay looks a lot more dangerous when puck possession for given linemates are a bit more balanced. He’s not the only guy that carries it too much though. Penner stands in front of the net with his stick in good position to tip or one time it, and guys never risk firing it in there to him from down low.

By: Steve-O

Steve-O — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:00:05 +0000

Lets not over-react people…take Hemsky away from the powerplay and it gets worse, not better

By: Racki

Racki — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:32:30 +0000

There is a site that tracks a stat they call CHIP (Cap Hit of Injured Players), however they don’t really keep it up to date. They did it for October and the Oil were #2 on the list, behind Vancouver.

Edit: I just noticed that LNOF had a comment held for moderation (the site will do that if you post a couple of links or more) saying the same thing.

By: LateNightOilFan

LateNightOilFan — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:39:02 +0000

OilerTyler: Does anyone know of a site that tracks man games lost due to injury?This is getting ridiculous

Try this:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tgh-xnPo1T0gc3i4G9MDi9A&output=html

Linked from this guy’s blog. http://springingmalik.blogspot.com/2009/11/ow-that-really-hurts_02.html

He was comparing the cap hit of the man games lost to injury. As of Nov 2 we were 2nd to VAN