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We continue our midseason grades by looking at the defensemen, goaltenders and coaches.
Here we go. (Here are my preseason projections again, just so you can
Joni Pitkanen (2-17-19, -13 in 32 GP): It's not so much the fact that you notice Pitkanen when he's in the game. Instead, you notice when he isn't. For all the well-deserved accolades that he receives as the Canes' only true offensively-minded defenseman, it's the under-the-radar plays that really prove Pitkanen's worth and illustrate how much the Canes miss him when he isn't in the lineup. He deserves a bit of the blame for the power play's failings, but the team converts at a nearly 10% higher clip with Pitkanen in the lineup (18.1%) than when he is out of the lineup (8.7%). Even though he has a propensity to take bad penalties at bad times, the Canes without Pitkanen are demonstrably worse than the Canes with Pitkanen. Grade: B
Tim Gleason (5-7-12, -4 in 33 GP): Consider the following list: Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin, Marian Gaborik, Dany Heatley, Ilya Kovalchuk. Their combined totals against the Canes in ten games: 4 goals, 10 assists, 14 points, or 1.4 points per game. Against the rest of the league (you know, the teams that aren't in last place in their conference by ten points): 122-108-230 in 180 games, or 1.3 points per game. Not that it's somehow a good thing when a group has more points per game against one team than versus the field, but you would think that the NHL's elite scorers would simply have a field day against the Canes. The fact that they haven't is a tribute to Gleason, who is my midseason team MVP and a big reason why the Canes' struggles aren't worse than they are. He's an incredible story who is vastly underappreciated playing for a rudderless ship like the Canes, but he is by far the best defenseman the Canes have, and no one else comes anywhere close. Grade: A
Joe Corvo (4-8-12, -10 in 27 GP): We've seen both sides of Corvo this year. At his best, he's a puck mover with passable offensive skills, not an All-Star but a guy who can eat big minutes without being overmatched (he was in the top five in NHL ice time when he was injured). At his worst, he fumbles the puck, is tentative in the offensive zone, shies away from contact and is a liability on defense. Corvo has always been a high-risk, high-reward guy, but we've seen more risks than rewards this year and before his injury he looked to be rounding into form. He's still prime trade bait with an expiring contract, but he'll need to get up to speed quickly before the deadline if Jim Rutherford wants to get anything of value back for him in March. Grade: C-
Aaron Ward (0-6-6, -17 in 40 GP): If nothing else, Ward's play this year has more than validated Zdeno Chara's Norris Trophy last year. Next to an All-Star like Chara, Ward looked like a serviceable minute-munching defenseman. Next to the players the Canes have thrown out as his partner, not so much. Ward looks nothing like the player that was a big contributor to the Stanley Cup champions in 2006, and he got old in a hurry. His continued poor play should earn him a ticket to the press box, but there isn't exactly a parade of defensemen beating down the door to take his place. Thus, we sit and hold our breath every time #4 skates onto the ice, and the reacquisition of Ward increasingly looks like Rutherford's biggest offseason blunder. Grade: F
Andrew Alberts (1-5-6, -1 in 41 GP): Alberts was signed to be a third-pairing defenseman, not really to be a superstar in any one area but to play solid yet unspectacular defense. Mission accomplished; granted, Alberts hasn't exactly faced the caliber of competition that Gleason has, but he also hasn't laid an egg like certain other members of the defensive corps have. He's given Paul Maurice another option, and when Ward really started tanking Alberts picked up the slack and Maurice went largely with a five-defenseman rotation. Like Tom Kostopoulos, Alberts has done what he's paid to do. Grade: B
Niclas Wallin (0-3-3, -5 in 33 GP): Wallin is the Scott Walker of the defensive corps. His heart is in the right place, he would do anything for the team, but his body is just breaking down and he can't really handle the grind anymore. Wallin has found himself a healthy scratch multiple times for the first time in his career, an unfamiliar surrounding but an understandable one given how the speed of the game has simply passed him by. It's never a comfortable situation when a longtime foot soldier like Wallin comes back to earth, and the early part of the season has really exposed Wallin as a sixth defender at best. Grade: D
Bryan Rodney (0-5-5, -4 in 10 GP): When Corvo was injured, Rodney was the consensus replacement. Seeing him on NHL ice, though, it's evident that Rodney, like Zach Boychuk, is still a good distance away from regular NHL contributions. Keeping in mind that Rodney was playing in the ECHL as recently as early 2008, his ascension to occasional NHL fill-in is still a meteoric rise, but unless he can develop his defensive game he has hit his ceiling. It's hard to say Rodney is a disappointment because no one expected him to play significant time in the NHL, but it is a little disappointing that a player with such solid offensive upside can't find full-time NHL work in a year like this. Grade: B-
Jay Harrison (1-4-5, -7 in 18 GP): Harrison was signed to be the seventh defenseman, but he saw much more work than anyone expected with the injuries to Pitkanen and Corvo. His pairing with Andrew Alberts has been quietly effective, and he's been a serviceable fill-in no matter where or how often he's played. Like Stephane Yelle, Harrison's grade is relative to what he was signed to do, so while he hasn't been lights out he's done what was asked of him. Grade: B
Incomplete: It's a little difficult to give a grade to Brett Carson, as there really weren't any expectations on him and he's been nothing more than an injury fill-in. I suppose you could assign him a C, as he's been perfectly average, but we'll be kind and give him a break since almost no one expected much from him this year at the NHL level.
Cam Ward (6-14-5, 3.02, .901): Suffice it to say, it hasn't been a stellar year for Ward. His stats have fallen considerably from last year, when he posted a 2.44/.916 and put the team on his back in the playoffs. The injury to his leg that cost him a month slowed him, and understandably so, but even before he got hurt Ward was shaky. It's an open and valid question whether Ward's unsteady play is a result of a Swiss-cheese defense or if the defense is questionable because they don't have faith in their goaltender, but either way Ward hasn't exactly performed to the level the Canes have become accustomed to. Ward's shown the world that he can answer the bell for extended stretches, so we know that he has it in him. This year, though, he hasn't shown it. Grade: C-
Manny Legace (4-5-2, 3.04, .898): For a guy who couldn't even get an NHL job to start the year, Legace stepped in after Ward's injury and ran with the ball. No, he didn't march in and rip off ten straight wins, but he certainly brought some stability to the position that Michael Leighton was never able to provide. Legace has shown at times why he was unable to keep steady NHL work in the last two seasons, but he's steadily improved to the point that the coaching staff trusts him more than they ever trusted Leighton. He's not as technically sound as Ward, and won't be any threat to Ward's incumbency, but there's no telling what would have happened had the Canes not signed Legace after Ward's injury. Grade: B
Michael Leighton (1-4-0, 4.29, .848): I debated whether to include Leighton on this list, but he was a significant part of the Canes' first half and he deserves a grade. Unfortunately for him, the grade ain't all that great. Leighton was unreliable, he never earned the trust of his defensemen, and he had a horrible propensity to allow multiple goals in short amounts of time. The Canes were forced to sign Legace approximately six minutes after Ward suffered his injury in early November, and wound up pawning Leighton off on the Philadelphia Flyers, who claimed him on re-entry waivers in December and proceeded to win five in a row. Par for the course, although all it proves is that Leighton would have managed better with a more accomplished defense. A goals-against of over four is a death knell, but when a team can't score goals for long stretches it makes it even worse. Best of luck to Leighton, but he earned his bus ticket out of town. Grade: D
Coaches: The moment of the year, for me, from the coaching staff came after the Canes dropped a road game 6-1 to Philadelphia on Halloween, the eighth game of what would become a fourteen-game winless streak. Paul Maurice actually had the audacity to say that he thought the Canes played a pretty good game. Really, he said that. Sorry, but when you lose fourteen straight games, your good games are few and far between, and losing by five goals does not qualify as a good game no matter how well you try to sell it. I am of the opinion that the Canes won't fire Maurice, but he certainly hasn't done much to sell himself. The nightmare scenario I thought could happen last year was delayed, but it eventually hit: the backlash against Maurice's hiring has led to his seat getting toasty way before it would have if any other coach had been hired. It's been obvious that the Canes' coaching staff has been at a loss for what to do to spark the team, and when the coaching staff doesn't have a plan, how in the name of Jan Hlavac can the team have any cohesion? Grade: D-
And that's about all you need to know. What do you think? Do the grades seem accurate?
Back to the live blogging Friday night when the Colorado Avalanche come to town.
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