Follow @james_tanner123 The Coyotes lost to the Ducks last night 2-1. In typical Coyotes fashion. they spotted their opponent a two goal lead, didn't show up until the third, then thoroughly dominated the game only to fall short due to the team's lack of fire-power.
It was a movie we've seen before. The Coyotes had ten shots through the first two periods. If not for Mike Smith, the Ducks might have had ten goals.
In a weird irony, the only reason they were in this game -Smith - also cost them the game. In comical fashion Smith left his crease to get the pack and fell down, thus leading to an empty net goal by the Ducks.
The thing is, you can hardly blame Smith for this when he is probably the best in the league at playing the puck behind the net. Sure, it was unfortunate, and also hilarious, but it's eventually going to happen to everyone.
And while it turns out that the game probably would have went to over-time if that didn't happen, ensuring the Coyotes at least a point, it's hard to be too mad about it when Smith single-handedly kept the team in the game for two periods in which they played like crap.
After two periods, the shots were 25 to 10 in favour of the Ducks. The Coyotes, shocked at having a chance to still win the game, actually showed up for the third and dominated to the tune of a 17-5 shot advantage.
But they didn't score and it's no surprise.
The Coyotes are 26th in the league in goals-per-game. The problem is that that is worse than it seems because there are three games where they have scored 5 or more. If you take away those games, the Coyotes are pretty much about as offensive as the Sabres - they would sit just slightly higher than worst in the NHL.
The Coyotes have now lost 6 one-goal games, and another one where it would have been a one-goal game if not for the empty netter. If they could have won four of those games then they'd have 13 wins, which is the second most that any team in the West has.
But Max Domi, probably the most talented offensive player in the entire organization couldn't make the team.
Their top scoring forward has 14 points in 22 games.
How long can this go without being addressed? It's a joke.
So, given their strong goaltending and world-class defense, the Coyotes could realistically compete if they could add even one (but preferably two) top-notch scoring forwards.
The frustrating thing about the current situation is that the team is sitting in the middle of the road - not good enough to compete, not bad enough to get McDavid or another top pick.
Perhaps the team should do some research and find out what happens to real Coyotes when they hang out in the middle of the road, as it might be instructive.
What the team needs to do is either immediately move out Doan, Vermette, Korpiskoski, Smith, etc. and work on their losing. Or, they can trade Yandle for a forward.
I don't want to trade Yandle, he's one of my favorite players. But, the team is strong on D and weak on F, so it's pretty damn obvious that that is their move. Plus, OEL and Stone can easily pick up the slack from losing Yandle, which combined with the current value of defensemen of his quality makes trading him a possibility too good to pass up.
The thing is, they need to decide if they are going to tear it down or build it up, and they need to do so right now. If they wait until the trade deadline, it will be too late to be either good or bad and they'll end up in NHL purgatory which is where they always finish - drafting 6th to 12th, which doesn't allow you to get the quality of young player you can build your team around, unless you get very lucky as they did when they got OEL at 6. Can't really bank on that happening again.
And I don't want to hear about attendance. The team is not drawing anyways, so if they have to sacrifice a few thousand gate receipts per night for the rest of this season, then so be it. It's a good investment because I guarantee you that McDavid could do for the Coyotes what Lemieux and then Crosby did for Pittsburgh.
So the move is obvious, get a forward and become a competitive team.
Or get rid of some guys and try to become horribly awful for 60 more games.
Doing nothing and going with the status quo is no longer acceptable - in fact, it's downright dumb.