P.K. Subban reminds us great players make mistakes, too (Trending Topics)

One way for an embattled coach to really kick a hornet's nest when things aren't going well is to go after his good players.

In theory, this might work because if the player in question messed up badly enough, all the hornets you just pissed off descend on the player, rather than you. However, because seemingly nothing can go right for Michel Therrien this season, all the problems landed on him again.

Did P.K. Subban screw up on Wednesday night in turning over the puck and allowing the 3-on-3 that went the other way? You can absolutely make that argument. He's an elite player and he got muscled off the puck late in a tie game by a guy who is good and everything but not anywhere near his level. That led to the game-winning goal from Jarome Iginla, another loss for the Canadiens, and the imminent descent of more blame on Therrien's head.

So he basically called Subban selfish. Specifically, he called the play selfish, and said it cost Montreal the game.

But, y'know, this boils down to a “watch the game” issue.

Yes, Subban turned it over, but three seconds later here is what the play looked like. Pretty scary, for sure. (The following is presented with all apologies to Justin Bourne.)

It's a 3-on-1 at the red line, but just barely. Andrei Markov is the only guy back, staring down Iginla (the goalscorer) on the left side, Matt Duchene (the puck carrier) in the middle, and Mikhail Grigorenko free on the right. Jacob De La Rose is coming back on Iginla's left side to pick up that coverage, and way off to the right of this frame you can just barely see the top of Max Pacioretty's head.

The arrows show where these players will head next:

By the time Colorado crosses the blue line it still looks ugly, but De La Rose has contacted Iginla and Pacioretty has shortened the gap between himself and Grigorenko, who filled the middle lane as Duchene cut right, to about one stride. He's still coming hard, while Grigorenko has slowed down to give Duchene an outlet.

In less than half a second, Pacioretty will overtake him.

Everything seems to be fine. Everyone is more or less where they ought to be:

Now switch to the angle over the offensive zone, because it's more instructive. This is where things start to break down badly. As Duchene cuts across to the middle of the ice, Pacioretty drifts into his assignment covering Grigorenko, and then right past it. You can call it puck-watching or not having any idea what to do, but regardless, it leaves Grigorenko wide open to accept the pass after he got to a good, open area.

This is where the goal is effectively scored:

And next we have the other side of the Duchene pass, which pulls De La Rose off Iginla as well. The poor coverage by Pacioretty — you always go man there — gave De La Rose no other option but to try to take away the pass. You can also see here that Pacioretty isn't within 10 feet of an Avalanche player despite getting back in more than enough time to actually make a good play.

Pacioretty and Markov try to come back but it is, of course, fruitless. The puck is in the back of the net before Pacioretty is within a stick-length of Iginla:

You watch this defensive breakdown by Pacioretty, a good player having a not-good season, and you really have to wonder how a coach finds fault with the guy who, admittedly, got knocked off the puck 100 feet in the other direction. If Pacioretty properly picks up the coverage, there might not even be a pass for Grigorenko to receive in the first place.

Now, maybe you say Pacioretty did what he was supposed to do within the Habs' system. I can't imagine why that would ever be the case, but then again we're dealing with Michel Therrien, and “systems” aren't exactly his strong suit. If it feels like scapegoating, that's because it is.

But okay sure, let's assume that everything went as planned after the Subban turnover, except for the fact that Colorado scored. Even if all that is true, scapegoating Subban still doesn't make any sense. You're not gonna believe this, but he was Montreal's best possession player in the game and was on the ice for a full-strength goal for, even if he didn't have a point on it. He played the toughest competition, etc. etc.

And for all that, he was benched. But the thing is, you pay Subban the huge amount of money he makes because you want him to have the puck on his stick. No matter who the player is, sometimes when you have the puck on your stick, you make a mistake.

Did Subban's come at a bad time? Sure. But how many more times will him carrying the water for you result in positive outcomes? It's a lot more than the bad ones, that's for sure.

Even “perfect” defensemen like Bobby Orr understand intrinsically

A quote that's been making the rounds in the last few days is from a 2012 Bobby Orr interview on the unique quality Erik Karlsson brings to the game. It applies, to a similar extent, to Subban.

“I want to say one thing about the coach and whoever is allowing him to do this and I’ve been saying this forever: You get a guy who can skate like that, let him go, for gawd’s sakes.

“He’ll get caught. I got caught. The players understand how he plays. They accept it. He’s fast enough to get back a lot of times. You have kids coming along where (the coach says) shoot the puck up the glass and shoot it in.

“The coach is letting (Karlsson) do it and since they’ve allowed him to do it, this kid has been unbelievable. But, let him do it. That’s how he is most effective. Is he gonna make mistakes? Yup. Is he gonna get caught? Yup. But the pluses are going to outweigh the minuses.

“There are probably some coaches who wouldn’t let him go like he does. They let me go. They let Coffey go. I couldn’t imagine playing any other way and I can’t imagine young Erik playing any other way, either.”

In shorter form: You're always seeking a proper balance between risk and reward, and the risk with Subban carrying the puck is likely no greater than any other defenseman. However, the potential reward is much, much greater.

Let's put it this way: if Nathan Beaulieu blows a tire like that and the Avs take it the other way to score, no one says a damn word about what a selfish player Beaulieu is, regardless of the fact that he should never ever ever try to carry the puck like that. You expect Beaulieu to screw up in that situation.

However, when Subban does it, you notice it for a lot of reasons, but the biggest of them is the fact that he usually doesn't. Coaches have to let the talented players do what they do best, because if they don't, it's just a waste.

The Canadiens canceled practice yesterday, possibly to avoid the massive firestorm that the decision to bench Subban for the final few minutes of the game, and then blame the loss entirely on him, would have caused. That this came the same day as a French-language station in Montreal cited sources claiming Subban was on the outs within the Habs dressing room only makes things worse.

Here's Therrien on Friday:

Therrien is in a tailspin here, no doubt about that. He handled this the exact wrong way. Perhaps the latter has more than a little to do with the former. But he's certainly not the first or last coach to punish a top players for mistakes that you can be they're going to make on occasion. He's not even alone in it this week.

The other example is Benoit Pouliot, who has long been criticized for taking too many penalties, at inopportune times, usually in the offensive zone. This is part and parcel with all the good things Pouliot does to help your team (drive possession, score a bunch, etc.) but any coach who's in charge of putting Pouliot in the lineup on any given night knows just as well as the player himself that there's gonna be a night when he takes a few dumbass minors and costs you a power play goal against.

On Tuesday, Anaheim beat Edmonton 5-3, and after a strong first period, Pouliot got a slashing minor. David Perron scored on the ensuing power play. Then in the second period, Edmonton clawed its way back into the game and seemed to have “momentum”... until Pouliot took another slashing minor less than a minute into the third, and everything shifted Anaheim's way again. He then quickly went from the penalty box to finding his ass stapled to the bench.

Said Pouliot the next day, “It sucks, it’s unfortunate that it happened and it’s something I have to work on for sure. It’s not my first time.”

After the first-period penalty he spent the rest of the game off Connor McDavid's line (the right spot to be on that Oilers lineup), and serving bench minors. Further, last night's game also saw him skating with not-McDavid. Fair enough, really. But it's not like Todd McLellan is out there calling Pouliot selfish, but rather talking about dumb penalties. Moreover, this came after Pouliot scored late in the game to pull Edmonton within one.

There is, to some extent, a motivational aspect here. Carrot-and-stick. However, telling Benoit Pouliot, “You can't take dumbass penalties,” is not the same as telling P.K. Subban, “You can't try to do too much with the puck.” There is no clear way to define “too much” for Subban. Because often he tries to do “too much” and it all works out great. Less often, it results in plays like the Iginla goal. It only becomes “too much,” however, when things go wrong.

Asking Subban not to take the occasional risk is asking him not to be the player that won a Norris and is the highest-paid defenseman in the league. Blaming him when that goes wrong is only the latest in a series of mistakes Montreal has made this season.

Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist. His email is here and his Twitter is here.

All stats via War on Ice unless otherwise stated.

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