There has been some pretty interesting dialog taking place about the Sabres lately. Everyone likes to think they know how to fix the team’s struggles. This post is not my attempt at that. Instead of pulling my hair out speculating why players are not playing well, I’m going to get subjective and analogous. This is just how my brain works sometimes.
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I’ve been fans of Green Day and Incubus since the mid to late ’90s. Those two bands have been in my music catalog for as long as any other musician or musical group. For the purposes of this entry, lets assume that my opinion of their specific albums is an accurate measure of the quality of music each band has produced (which of course, in reality, it is absolutely not).
Incubus’ first three albums are my favorite out of the five records they’ve released. Two of them, Make Yourself and Morning View , I consider among my favorite albums of all time. It seems pretty obvious, to me at least, that their best music was produced in their earliest years. This is pretty common for a lot of bands. For some, once they make a few hit records, they lose the drive or become something other than what made them great in the first place. Incubus is a little different. They’re a band that’s willing and known for their insistence upon trying new things. I still enjoy their most recent music, but it’s different. Their newest music isn’t created from the perspective it once was. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, it’s just not exactly my taste.
Then there is Green Day, an incredibly consistent band. Their sound is fun and very guitar driven with a rock and roll feel to it. It’s difficult to identify music made by Green Day when they were near 20-years-old from that made when they were near 40-years-old. Everyone remembers American Idiot because it was far and away their most commercially and critically successful record to date but honestly, that album was not much different than the four other noteworthy ones that preceded it except for a touch of maturity and a touch less aggressiveness. I grew up listening to their music but I don’t hold any on particular album of theirs in my top-20 of all time.
So on one hand, is Incubus, a band whose music is either amazing or just decent, depending on the place they’re in when they made the record, and the other is Green Day, a band whose music is consistently very good. Both are great bands in their own way. Asking me to choose which group I prefer is like asking me to choose between having the steak or the salmon — it just depends what kind of mood I’m in.
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I think this manner of reflecting on music is applicable to sports too, especially hockey. Hockey players are only as good as the ones they play with. The production of any given player is circumstantial. But for some players, it’s more circumstantial than others.
When I watch a player like Paul Gaustad play, I find myself thinking he would probably play that same way no matter who he plays with or against. He may not be the most talented player, but he is what he is. Players like Gaustad, being so consistent, act like spark plugs for their team. Circumstances do not matter as much for Gaustad. That makes him rare. Players like Gaustad are dependable which is why they’re valuable and usually have long careers.
Then there are players like Jason Pominville. A player with a lot of talent who is capable of playing brilliantly but also poorly. His performance is heavily circumstantial based (who he plays with and against). When Pominville played with Briere, he was one of the more effective even-strength players in the league. Briere and Pominville, for whatever reason, had great chemistry together and were able to consistently produce big numbers.
I think Pominville is the Incubus of hockey players and Gaustad is the Green Day. That’s not to suggest that Pominville’s best days are behind him nor that Gaustad has reached his production ceiling. That’s just how I feel about the potential future of both players having watched their entire professional careers.
The reason I bring all this up is to say that there’s more to evaluating hockey team and players than just simply saying that player-X is talented but doesn’t always give maximum effort. It’s about balancing the roster and, more small scale, balancing the lines. The Sabres have been looking for more balance for a couple of years now and I still don’t think they’ve found it. The players that a team like the Sabres depend upon to win them games need to be put in the right circumstances in order to maximize their production.
Every player, when given the right circumstances, can play better, sure, but my point is there are some whose production fluctuates greater than others. This can be good and bad. The key is to have a right mix of both so that a team is consistently scoring/preventing goals. The problem is it’s impossible to identify younger players as Incubus type players or Green Day type players. Ideally, a team would like to have immensely talented players that are able to produce in any circumstances (high quality Incubus music with Green Day consistency) but the fact of the matter is there are only about three or four of those players in the league.
As a fan, all you can do is hope. I hope that Incubus’ next album is great just like I hope the Sabres get the right mix of players together so they can become great. History suggests there’s reason to believe that both can happen.