What’s wrong with the Tampa Bay Lightning?

Welcome to Bolts Buzz! My name is Greg Smith and I’m your new Tampa Bay Lightning blogger. Ever since a young age, I’ve been a loyal supporter of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Although, I’ve always had a secondary team that I’ve secretly supported. I love the sport of hockey and I can’t wait to begin writing! My goal for this column is to provide consistent coverage and content relating to the Bolts in order to keep the fans up-to-date with the latest. You can expect topics including game reports, news, rumors, and opinion-related articles. A special thanks to Mark Gage and Kevin Lee for giving me this wonderful opportunity to write about the Tampa Bay Lightning, and the NHL. I look forward to sharing my thoughts and opinions with the fans and my fellow ‘buzz’ bloggers. If you have any burning questions or comments, please feel free to send me an email: gregsmith@sportstalkbuzz.com.  

Without further ado, I bring you the first installment of Bolts Buzz…

After the new era of the National Hockey League was ushered in for the 2005-06 season, the belief among all team ownership, management, hockey reporters and right down to the fans was that the most efficient and rewarding method to building a franchise was to enrich it with quality prospects who were selected in previous entry draft’s. That seemed to be the ‘new’ way to do things. Most teams caught on and implemented this system into their plans going forward, although there remain a handful of teams who prefer the quick fix scheme.

A perfect example of this can be made when looking at the New York Rangers. The team from the big apple has spent big bucks year-after-year in order to make the team successful in one year by signing high-priced free agents. Sure they’ll chip in 30 goals and bring a buzz to the city, but it can also be argued that they will not assist your team down the road. Will signing a 32 year old free agent to a five year contract benefit your team in the post-lockout era?

Not a chance.

There are two significant factors that are to be cautious about when a transaction of that stature is made. What happens if that 32 year old has one good season, and then goes into scoring slump and loses his touch? How will a team have the ability to hold the hefty salary of a piece of drift wood? These questions, among others, are what had to be solved over the past few years.

Implementing a salary cap system into the league has been successful in some ways, but has failed in others. The teams who have collected a solid core of organizational depth including prospects and future picks have positioned their team into the right direction for the future. Once those prospects reach full potential, sprinkle in a couple of free agents signed to reasonable contracts, and you have yourself a Stanley Cup Contender.

Now don’t get me wrong, this takes many years of development and for some painful losing seasons in order to get back to the top. It is not a walk in the park to turn a team around with the snap of a finger. Some prospects don’t turn out, or max out into successful NHLers. That is when teams become frustrated and experience a change of mindset.

Does that ring a bell? Was it Jay Feaster who led his team to a Stanley Cup in 2004 and four years later was forced to resign from his position as General Manager? Things can really change quickly. After ownership of the team changed hands, a new attitude, as I like to think, was floating through the bleachers at the St. Petes Times Forum. Suddenly an urge to do things a different way in setting in. The owners, Oren Koules and Len Barrie are full of piss and vinegar and are forcing change to the entire organization.  At first I had faith in the rookie owners with their plans for the future, but now I just felt like they made more off-season transactions to reconstruct the Bolts than was necessary.

It was exciting for the fans to be influenced by such positive, committed owners, although will the actions that occurred this summer effect the team in the long run. The answer to that is yes. Trading draft choices and signing free agents to lengthy contracts were the two biggest errors that were made. The future is in the hands of the beholder. How will the team of Koules/Barrie and recently promoted GM plan for the future if there are no quality prospects in the pipeline? Sure you got Stamkos, but who else really stands out to you?

In the future, when a prospect of the Bolts cracks the big club, how will he be able to have a fighting change if a guy like Ryan Malone is playing the top six minutes? A youngster must receive decent minutes to display what they’ve got. The main lesson learned here is doing go out and sign high calibre free agents to money deals if you are rebuilding your roster. Being forced to juggle this issue down the road will surely come back to bite the Tampa Bay Lightning.

I believe that Tampa Bay became impatient after experiencing losing seasons which lead them to a spending spree in the summer. They wanted their fans to be happy with a winning environment, which that has seemed to have happened. Although the production has not reached what was originally expected. Since there are so many new faces in the locker room, minimal chemistry and identity has been established. One night a guy gets 15 minutes of ice time, the next he gets 5. That is not acceptable and it has to change.

The commotion that has occurred since this past summer has been rattling for some. In my case I never thought it would turn out this way for the team. I thought they would be among the leagues most dominant with a superb cast of forwards. But maybe there is too much of a good thing. Did the Lightning sign more free agents than necessary? Yes. The process was overly rapid and quite frankly, it is leaving a sour taste with a lot of people. Too name a few; Dan Boyle, who left Tampa rather negatively after being, involved with one of many Tampa trades this summer. And another, by the name of Barry Melrose, the former LA Kings coach who was hired over the summer, has only lasted 16 games. On Friday, Melrose was relieved of his head coaching duties. Not a huge surprise, although I didn’t think it would happen this early on. He was said to be not getting along with some of his players, including Vinny Lecavalier. If you can’t deal with your best player, something was bound to have happen.

What’s really wrong with the Tampa Bay Lightning is a forceful ownership that’s acting like two kids in a candy store. Owning an NHL team takes patience, meaning everything shouldn’t be fixed all at once. That’s exactly where the Lightning went wrong over the summer.

Greg – gregsmith@sportstalkbuzz.com

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