The Veteran Myth
Otherwise Known as
Finally, Mark Recchi was off
the first power play!

Gary Roberts replaced Mark Recchi on the Penguins first team power play today (finally). The Penguins scored on their first two opportunities with the man-advantage. Coincidence? I think not.

While I wasn’t like the message board poster who made a post begging the God of the universe to get Mark Recchi off the first power play unit, I was basically screaming at Michel Therrien that he needed to do this all week. Allow me to be honest. I like Mark Recchi. Ron Cook is right when he calls him a consummate pro’s pro. Yet a consummate pro’s pro, like Recchi, would understand being removed from a power play for lack of performance. In fact, a consummate pro like Recchi might be upset by such a move, but upset with his own play for warranting such a change.

In any case, watching Recchi’s goal-scoring slump has been painful. While definitely nowhere near the level of John Leclair earlier in the season, Recchi has looked tired, old, and slow on far too many recent occasions. While he certainly wasn’t the team’s only problem while in a power play slump, Recchi wasn’t helping matters, either.

What I want to address at the moment is the "veteran myth" that surrounds players like Recchi and, to some degree, Gary Roberts. I like both players. Both Recchi and Roberts have important roles to play on this Penguins team. As leaders and experienced veterans, those roles will be larger off the ice than on the ice. On the ice, however, veterans such as Roberts and Recchi must play supplementary roles.

Supplementary roles? one cries out in astonishment. Roberts is still capable of poking in goals from the slot on the power play, and Recchi is a 500 goal scorer. Both men are still capable of playing NHL hockey at a high level, the protesters object.

I agree with the objections, and yet I must insist that on the ice, anyhow, Roberts and Recchi must be supplementary players. While it’s an easy thing to cite, it’s important to note that Recchi played third line for Carolina while winning the Cup last season. At this stage of their careers—crafty and knowledgeable veterans who are, admittedly, past their primes—Recchi and Roberts have to play supplementary roles.

The "veteran myth" comes in when the coaching staff decides that since Roberts and Recchi have the experience, they must automatically have primary, rather than supplementary, roles. The coaches say, rather than allow a younger forward (e.g. not Recchi) some time on the first power play unit, better to keep sticking Recchi out there since Recchi is a crafty veteran who knows his stuff. I call this a "veteran myth" because that’s precisely what it is. Imagine Scott Bowman deciding that Bryan Trottier, due to his experience, was better to place on the ice at a time when the Pens needed a goal than a 20-year-old Jaromir Jagr. In retrospect of the ’92 playoffs, such a decision would have appeared as sheer silliness. Of course Trottier had his role to play on that team (and it involved key goals, of course), but Trottier’s role was far more supplementary than was that of a then 20-year-old Jaromir Jagr.

If the Penguins make any noise in the playoffs this spring, they are going to do it because their kids—the children, as I call them—are playing starring roles. Crosby, Malkin, Staal, Whitney, and Fleury, are going to have be stars for the Penguins to make postseason noise. Like it or not, that’s where the team is, and that’s where they are. Roberts and Recchi have roles to play on the team—off the ice and on the ice. Off the ice, their job is teach those kids how to play the starring role (as Recchi and Roberts once did). On the ice, however, their job is supplementary. Roberts and Recchi, despite their "savvy veteran" status, should not be relied upon by Michel Therrien and his staff as the first option. Therrien and his staff must always go to the kids as their first option and properly regard Roberts and Recchi as supplementary players (on the ice, anyhow).

Does this mean that Roberts or Recchi, as so-called supplementary players, can’t play a starring role? Of course not. Roberts can and already has changed the complexion of games he’s played in—and sometimes just by throwing a clean check rather than by scoring a goal. Roberts and Recchi, as the situation warrants, can both play starring roles—but when they play those starring roles, they must play those starring roles as supplementary players.

While I’d love to dream about the Pens winning the Cup this spring, in all likelihood, the team is closer than anybody thought, but not quite ready to win it all this year (caveat: I’ll be glad to be proven wrong). Roberts and Recchi may remain with the team after this season, or not. In future seasons, however, some of the kids Therrien may be forcing into supplementary roles may need to be able to play starring roles. I have to ask the question if it isn’t best to let those children—as dictated by the opponent and situation, of course—get that experience right now.

Exhibit A of this, of course, is Jordan Staal, who relinquished his 5 on 3 power play duty to Gary Roberts upon Roberts’ arrival. Roberts has been doing it forever, as a Pens assistant coach noted, and is quite good at it.

To which I say, Okay, fine. Also okay if you’re not sure that’s the skill you want Staal (who has shown the traits of a top shutdown center) to develop. Also okay if you don’t want one of your best penalty killers also working on the power play. Fair enough. But if you should happen to note that, when playing a specific goalie who has to be screened in order for the shot to get across the goal line, you’ve got to make the change and put Staal in front of the net, experience or lack thereof be darned.

Today, finally, Recchi came off the top power play unit, and Roberts looked great in his place. But if Roberts doesn’t look great (there were other changes made, to be noted), then, at some point, you can’t keep relying on the mantra of "He’s a veteran who’s done it time and time again."

At some point, someone had to give Recchi and Roberts, those savvy, world-wise veterans, the opportunity to get the experience that has made them the sage old men of the team. And Michel Therrien would be wise to deploy his sage veterans as supplementary players and to count upon his children as his starring players and to make adjustments, as necessary, to how his particular players, young and old, experienced and inexperienced, match up against an opponent.