Nashville Predators extend losing streak to 4 in St. Louis

…sometimes a mountain can be made out of a mole hill.

1. Lombardi does not exist. He is a figment of your imagination and we can’t ascribe offensive woes to his absence. Although you have to first be present to be absent……

2. We don’t miss Legwand. He has two goals this year. And both of those were in the first six games…after which, naturally, he disappeared. You can put Spaling in there to do the same thing for 1/9 the price.

3. It can’t be good for the offense for Sully and Erat to be out. Even though Sully has been weak on the puck this year, he is a solid playmaker from time to time, sos that hurts. And I thought Erat just started to got hot…that’s another loss.

4. When Belak plays, our offense goes into the abyss. Trotz (idiotically) starts to mix up the lines and I’ve never seen us play well when he’s doing a lot of line shifting. Ever.

And you’re right about Ward…he’s been very disappointing this year after having two very solid seasons with us. I wonder if he’s injured…..? Frankly, when the team is healthy, he should be the healthy scratch.

There is no way to argue that tonight’s lineup didn’t create enough offensive opportunities to pop just one goal into the net and get this game to overtime. Pekka gave the team a chance to win, but the team didn’t give him anything to work with. Tonight’s lineup was built primarily around strong goaltending and team defense due to the guys you listed being out of the lineup, but hockey is a game that by nature will give each team, no matter how outmatched, chances to score in any given game if they work hard.

Tonight the team worked hard, they got their chances, but they failed to capitalize. Unfortunately, I’m not going to take the easy way out and say that’s a result of the injuries. These guys are NHL players. Even Wade Belak is skilled enough to have carved out a career in the NHL and would school almost everyone down at the local rink when the puck is on his stick. Gotta really credit Jaroslav Halak and the Blues tonight. They executed the Preds tonight when all was said and done. Halak came up with some key saves when tested and Backes put two in the back of the net to propel the Blues to victory.

All that being said, if you want to look at the impact of the Preds injuries, I don’t think there’s any doubt we are a different team with any two of those four guys in the lineup.

Lombardi never really got started, so I’m not going to say anything about him really except to say that with him in the lineup on Opening Night our four centers favorably matched up against the rest of the league.

Legwand’s absence on top of Lombardi’s has really hampered the Preds ability to roll three scoring lines and has affected our scoring depth effectively putting a lot more pressure on our top-six. While Legwand doesn’t create offense on his own, he is very good in a supporting role whether it’s using his speed to create off the rush or by playing strong along the boards or in the slot to support the cycle. Legwand facilitates offense when he’s put with guys that can create. Spaling has played well in his recall to replace Legwand defensively, but Nick is a total non-entity at the offensive end of the rink and even Poile and Trotz said last week to the Ads Roundtable blog that if it wasn’t for the injuries and his defensive play, he’d be back in Milwaukee to try to stimulate his offensive game.

Erat has played injured for most of this year and after finally getting healthy and clicking with Goc and Kostitsyn he’s injured again. I thought Klasen did a good job filling in for him tonight, but without any other consistent offensive threat it was easy for STL to focus in on that line and shut them down. Hopefully Erat is back on Tuesday, which might allow Klasen to move to another offensive line and try to stimulate some type of secondary scoring threat.
 
Lastly, I believe Sullivan has been injured since sometime after that SJ game two weeks ago. His play dropped off tremendously after that, he was losing races to the puck, doing the obligatory “ole” stick wave as guys skated by him, and had lost a lot of the drive he shows at the offensive end of the rink. Clearly he overdid whatever was ailing him vs. Ottawa when he left in the third period (lower body – hamstring/groin/??? – you choose) and needs to honestly stay out until he is healthy again because he was totally ineffective in his last couple games. Since Sullivan was injured, O’Reilly has suffered. Cal got benched in the third vs. Ottawa after Sully went to the locker room, but was a total non-entity before that. Sullivan requested Cal as his center and Cal stepped up to the plate, but without him there to help create offense, it is now on Cal’s shoulders to prove himself again as an NHL player. Everyone has these ups and downs while they are trying to establish themselves, but I think Sullivan’s absence and injury have directly impacted Cal’s performance more than most think…

Hopefully Legwand and Erat are back on Tuesday night vs. Dallas. Legwand has missed a lot of time now and hasn’t had much time to practice with the team, so I’d suspect he’ll be slotted in more of a defensive role with limited ice time to begin with O’Reilly and Goc still centering the top two lines. Unless he really impressed Trotz, Klasen will likely be out with Erat’s return too.

Pending Erat and Legwand returning, maybe we see something like this vs. Dallas:

Wilson – O’Reilly – Hornqvist
Kostitsyn – Goc – Erat
Spaling – Smithson – Ward
Dumont – Legwand – Tootoo

As always, I strongly disagree with SWFP, but we’ve agreed to disagree…so I’ll leave it at that…

Ward, for a good while, was the prototypical Predator – now its Spaling, with a lot less scoring ability. Spaling never gives up on a play.

I have two main pet peeves with the Predators fan base as a whole (of which I am a part, of course):

1. Panicking when the play on the ice gets even remotely poor. We almost lost our team, guys, this too shall pass.

2. Fans highly _under_valuing David Legwand. Don’t make me write a post about this, y’all.

…that’s all I’ve ever said Chris. You can throw Spaling in there and the team doesn’t miss a beat. So he doesn’t fill the role very well…he’s a dude that’s overpaid on a team that’s strapped for cash. In that regard, he brings the team down and offers very little.

…he is our best D man right now. And DEFENSIVELY he’s been our best defenseman for the past couple of years. So, I’m gonna ask a question, and this is not additional “hate mongering” by SWFP, but, Weber is a RFA after this year and Suter is a UFA after next year. They’re both gonna cost $5 million plus (at the very least). In my humblest opinion, we should not sign two defensemen for 10-12 million per year. Do you think we should spend that much on those two? If not, who do you think should go? I think we should trade Weber for a king’s ransom. A shut down defenseman and two scoring forwards. Or something like that. He’s my favorite player, hence the name. But I think Suter is the better Dman and while Weber is NOT expendable, he’s also not affordable. Wadda ya think?