Prioritize players over system
Statements such as this one are often exaggerations, but this might just be the area in which Hynes frustrated me most. We know the guy prefers to have a primarily defensive, physical team, but his insistence on his system has compromised his ability to adapt to his team when necessary.
Nashville Predators
We have talked all about the quandary of Rocco Grimaldi and his benching, and whether or not we think he will be on the Predators moving forward. Why is this even a thing?
Because Hynes benched him, most likely due to him being small and subpar defensively. While at the same time, he is one of the hardest-working players on the team, and quietly, an offensively skilled one too.
Who would play in his place from night to night? Brad Richardson and Nick Cousins: two players who did not contribute much of anything all season, but were played likely due to them being physical veterans.
And I wrote a whole piece on Dante Fabbro’s benching during the playoffs, and how shocking it was that Ben Harpur struggling mightily was not enough for Hynes to play Fabbro.
One thing I didn’t mention in that article was that there is a chance that Harpur played due to his physicality, and if that is the case, that was a very rash decision on Hynes’ part.
In the Grimaldi and Fabbro situations, Hynes failed to play his best players, and no matter what kind of system you run as a head coach, you cannot do that. Not every player on the ice has to be super physical, and when that costs a team some quality production and performance, it is absolutely not worth it.