donlever wrote: ↑Sat Jan 18, 2025 4:40 pm
Interesting hypothesis PoC.
Affirms we have a room full replete with Petunias if so.
Unless a player is having liberties with another player's wife or a dude is acting like the angry drunk whose wife just left him every day and making the workplace objectively insufferable for everyone else, for the "room" to throw off a bunch of pro athletes such that they lose all their mojo is for that room to be a bunch of petunias.
An easier explanation for Miller's mediocre play is that he's taking shifts off, often the back half of shifts where he could get off the ice and doesn't. An easier explanation for EP40s mediocre play is that he isn't moving his feet. (He did against Edmonton -- quite a difference).
But let's just say that petunias can still win hockey games, and therefore speculating wildly about their personal relationship about which we have very little insight will inform whether players should be or should have been moved, because, you know, moving out bad eggs or keeping good ones will help petunias stay...where's this analogy going...in bloom?
On Kuzmenko, the theory isn't silly. Off the ice, he brought joy and smiles and laughter. On the ice, he brought fun and creativity. (Tockey beat it out of him so well that he didn't recover it after the trade).
Most groups benefit from the guy that makes it more enjoyable to be at work. Esprit de corps and whatnot. So long as the guy isn't a slacker who meaningfully increases burdens on others, all other things being equal, its better to have a good time while doing good work than having a miserable time while doing good work. In the latter circumstance, players/employees are more apt to have one eye on the next opportunity.
The thing is, John Tanner Pearson Miller and EP40 are *really* intense. Miller's intensity is often expressed outwardly and explosively; Pettersson's usually internally. Hughes is better described as serious as opposed to intense -- a serious professional who's commitment doesn't have the collateral effect of a recommendation to a psychologist. But none strike me as "fun." Indeed, Quinn Hughes, who is the franchise's best ever defenseman and the reason to watch the Canucks, is pretty low on my list of "hockey players I'd like to have dinner with." The only other core player on this team is Thatcher Demko, who is a goalie and therefore must expend all mental energy on maintaining sanity as an occupational hazard.
The explosive people tend to explode on other people. Its gross. The guts and blood. It gets everywhere, and its often indiscriminate. Frustrations taken out externally -- you might be the next target. Eggshell walking environments -- wait, are eggshells good for petunia beds?
EP40 could be strange, could be antisocial or uninviting (I have no idea, its all speculation assuming pentunianish!), but those people in the workplace you just kind of leave alone. Its what they want, its what's most comfortable, and it doesn't hurt male feelings for another dude to not want to "talk." Unless those male people are the emotionally explosive and needy types.
Ergo, scientifically, if this team is a bunch of petunias, Miller should be moved for the retool and the return should include a french Canadian. Or a Dane. Or a Russian who enjoys a good cheeseburger. Because they are inherently comical.
