On today’s SHORT SHIFTS episode, Toph wants to talk about the things coaches need to consider when putting lines together - and the guys sound off on the types of players they liked playing with most.
TEN MINUTES STARTING NOW!
We appreciate every listen, download, comment, rating and share on your social sites!
[music] Here we go with another short shifts episode, 10 minutes are on the clock. I'm second this week. I'm second this week. I'm pretty pumped for that. How excited do you think people were when they heard your voice first on Wednesday? Either excited or not excited, I guess, with two choices. I don't know. It's been a long day. Anyways, 10 minutes around the clock, Vex says, "No idea what the topic I'm going to come at him with." Vex, should you choose to accept this challenge, the topic of today is lineup construction. Line up construction. I want to know the types of players you like to play with. I want to know how, if you're a coach, how you like to design your lines, how you like to design your D pairs, I want to know just how you would put together a lineup based on the skill set that you have with your players. You know what I absolutely hated as a player was balancing the lines. Specifically, this happened a lot of European pro leagues that I played in. I played for two coaches who wanted to balance the lines. But in doing that, you didn't let your horse is free. Obviously, first and foremost, who complements who? Let's start with it. Who complements who? Don't put two shooters on the line. Put a shooter with a passer and a grinder, like a pretty simple formula. Do they like each other? Do they get along well? Do they complement each other? First and foremost, it has to all be about chemistry. Now, you can definitely build chemistry and you do build chemistry the more that you play with guys. There's also something to say when you put a line together in the first day, they're just buzzing and they kind of know where each other are. And you could tell, "Ooh, this is going to be a good line." Conversely, you also see it on the opposite side. Guys on the first day, just not happy with each other. Two shooters on the same line, you know, like just so chemistry, put them together is the first thing I would talk about. I would say, you know, usually first line is going to be a little bit heavier skill. Fourth line is going to be less skill, more will. My fourth line guys, I would love to be my penalty killers if possible. Depends on the age. I'm talking older teams here, I guess. Top lines would be more of your power play. Depending on the league and the age too though, like if it's pro, if it's college, you know, like there's guys who really love playing power play and penalty kills. So chemistry, makeup of the individuals, those two are things that matter the most. I think ideally from an offensive standpoint, if you can always get a passer, a shooter, and a guy who's able to go and get the puck, that's a pretty good recipe to make some stuff happen. Absolutely dude, absolutely. I think I go back to my experiences like I was a passer and I loved guys who loved the score. I loved playing with guys who loved the score. Now what does it mean? We were sick together though. Everybody's laughing. We were actually good. I don't know. I'd love to score. I'd love to pass the puck to people here. It was awesome. I wish that we could have played together like in U.S.H.O. College of Pro because we were, I had so much. Playing with you was like playing with. Playing with you is the same as playing with stats. It was like you just knew where I was going to be. You're good looking. I'm an idiot. You're smart. You just had this ability that you knew where guys were. It was so fun playing with you anyway, sorry. What I will say though is it's interesting you talk about balancing it out with a passer, a shooter, and a grinder. I didn't want to play with people who weren't grinders. I hated playing with guys who didn't compete. Hated it. Absolutely hated it. That's a thing for the kids listening. If you want to make yourself more marketable, let's call it. If you want people to want to play with you, compete, get them the puck. Especially if you want to play on an offensive line. Even the guys in the NHL that aren't necessarily what you would think are first or second line guys. But they like love to grind and go get the puck and get it to the skill guys. Then go to the net and they'll get rewarded with goals. You look at Hyman, right? Hyman from Edmonton. Guy just works. Guy just works, gets it to McDavid and goes to the net. How many players playing in the NHL or playing high level hockey or had success at different stops at high level hockey were those type of players? They were just willing. They were just absolutely willing. I think a lot has to be said. Now you have to be smart. Really smart players don't like playing with dumb hockey players. I'll tell you that much. But if you're smart and part of that smartness is just, "Hey, go get the puck and give it to me," and then go to the net. Go to the net. I'll do the rest. Really skilled players are always open. They'll tell you they're always open when they come back to the bench if you don't give it to them. I do think there's something to be said about a grinder-ish type player, a shooter-ish type player, and a dish-er-ish type player. But all three have to have some sort of all three of those abilities too for a line to really work. For the coaches out there, I think one of the things when it comes to putting together a line up, I've always been a big believer in soliciting the advice of your top players on who they want to play with. Always talking to those guys about, "Hey, who do you feel like you're having some chemistry with? Who do you feel like you want to play with?" It doesn't have to be the ultimate decision. Ultimately, it's up to you to put the lines together as a coach. But I always thought it was really important. I always appreciated that when I was a top player on some of the teams that I played for when the coaches came up. They were like, "Hey, who do you feel good with? I think that's important." Also, we haven't talked about D yet. I think that really offensive defensemen like playing with the person who's a little bit more stay-at-home, because it allows them to do their thing. Like you talk to Makar loves playing with Taves. Why? Because Taves is really responsible defensively. There's so many deep pairing throughout the league that have that balance. Some teams actually like to do it like, "Hey, based on their systems and their structure, our right D is a little bit more aggressive. That's going to be a certain type of player. Our left D is going to be, we need to be a little bit more smart. It's going to be this type of player based on the system. Maybe their right D is always up in pinching or something like that. I think a good balance on the D between. Again, it goes back to it like, "You got to be smart." Smart players don't like playing with dumb players. Even if you are kind of a shutdown, you still got to be able to make a breakout pass. You still got to be able to support the puck on a retrieval. Your skill guy going back to get it doesn't get killed. He's got an option when there's a four checker barreling down on them. I think from a defense standpoint, having that balance is good for your lineup construction. Love that. Power play. We can get two good one-tease. Two guys who have the ability to have a one-timer doesn't mean the power play runs through. Both guys, usually one guy is going to be more of a one-time guy. But if you're going to have two threats like that and then for power play, a guy who stands in front, a guy who has no problem standing in front and going to the back wall to get the puck when there's rebounds. You've got those two things. Obviously, a good half wall guy. Guys who can shimmy on the breakout. Everybody's loving the drop pass way back or the double drop pass. If you've got a guy who can hoo as he's coming in the zone, yep, that's a thing. If I only get penalty kill, guys will just do anything to knock it scored on anything. That's what I'm looking for on the PK. Yeah, yeah. Who did you like playing with? You like guys that can get you the puck? But were there any players like if they had this thing you wouldn't want to play with them? I didn't like playing with other shooters. I was a shooter. So, well, that's a lie. Yeah, I guess it was guys who didn't want to pass the puck. It wasn't guys who were shooters. It was guys who wanted to do it all themselves, obviously. I was a guy who would love to go get the puck and give it to a skill guy and go to the net. You do whatever and I'll just be at the freaking net, you know, maddling. And I'm like, I love that I played with a guy named Andrew Sorrower, unbelievable. My favorite line mate I played with in Pro Hockey. I had the best year of my career in Austria when I was crushing that league because he just let me be me. And he was like you and like Staz, maybe a little bit, a little bit more gritty to his game also. And he just, he was able to adapt to what I brought to the table, which is less than him, but bring the best out of me. And he was able to bring the best out of our other line mate who was an absolute sniper. And we just, yeah, there's something to be said about people who make their line mates better. Yeah, yeah, it was, it was awesome. How about you? Yeah. So we got 10 seconds, but I just want to say something real quick in this 10 seconds. I think is really important. The more versatile you are as a player and the more different roles and up and down the lineup, you can be the more ice time you're going to get. The more games you're going to play, the more people are going to want to play with you. So like don't be a one trick pony. Don't be just a passer, just a shooter, just a grind or whatever. Like really work to diversify your skills and be more versatile. And I promise you, you're going to get more ice time and you're going to get more people that are going to want to play with you. So that part of that, watch video, learn what you can do better, get better. Give more and be more share that show. [MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]
On today’s SHORT SHIFTS episode, Toph wants to talk about the things coaches need to consider when putting lines together - and the guys sound off on the types of players they liked playing with most.
TEN MINUTES STARTING NOW!
We appreciate every listen, download, comment, rating and share on your social sites!
