NHL: Top 10 scapegoats heading into the 2019-20 season
By Ryan Poirier
Whether it’s fair or not, each team seems to have at least one scapegoat. Here are the biggest scapegoats in the NHL entering the 2019-20 season.
The offseason is a perfect time for the front office staff to come together and discuss what went right and what went wrong in the previous season. For teams not named the St. Louis Blues, much of the four-month layoff is spent trying to crack the improbable code of what it takes to win a Stanley Cup. Re-signing players, trading assets, acquiring draft picks. Whatever it takes.
The single greatest challenge, however, is to rid your team of a particular stench that many outsiders would believe to be a significant deficit to the team. Sometimes, if that player is believed to be such a detriment then they will either be bought out or traded away while retaining the majority of their salary for several seasons to come.
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But that’s the worst-case scenario and it only happens when the you-know-what really hits the fan to the point where the franchise is met with no other option. In most cases, the team will be stuck with that player and allow them to ride out the remainder of their contract.
It’s at this point where their own fans tend to turn on them and hold them accountable for the negativity they’ve brought to the team. Though most of the time, they were never directly involved with losing the game, the failing season will rest heavily on their shoulders.
For example, in the minds of the fans, a defenseman’s hefty contract would hold more weight than the goaltender’s inability to stop pucks. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what a number of people in the sports world would refer to as The Scapegoat.
Though management would never publicly admit to their knowledge of the fans disapproval towards these players, they are normally dealt away pretty swiftly when the season ends. Sometimes, the General Manager will trade away their scapegoat in return for another team’s baggage.
Interestingly enough, this offseason involved a couple of these examples: a six-player trade involving Nikita Zaitsev and Cody Ceci and of course Calgary trading away James Neal for Milan Lucic.
So, without further adieu, here are the top 10 scapegoats in the NHL heading into the 2019-20 season.
Note: The people on this list have been with the team the previous season and will remain so this year as well.