Temp Check on Your Florida Panthers Hot Takes

The Florida Panthers are entering their last game before the holiday break at an even .500, and for many, it seems as if the sky is falling.

Florida does not look like a team coming off of a Presidents’ Trophy-winning season and there are many reasons as to why that is the case.

There are many a reason why the Panthers’ fanbase is upset.

Rightfully so.

FHN fielded those concerns for this month’s edition of the Florida Panthers Temp Check.

As per usual, I pulled hot takes I received on Twitter and assign them a score of 1 to 100 — with 100 being a scorching hot take and 1 being very reasonable.

This will be a monthly feature on FHN, so if you do not want to miss out on the next one, follow me on Twitter at @ColbyDGuy.

Now, let’s see what you had to say…

(Note: Some of these takes were edited for the sake of clarity.)

“The Huberdeau trade was a mistake, not as much for the loss of talent, but because the chemistry hasn’t been right all year.” – Andrew Twiss

Heat Index: 85

While the chemistry has not been where it was last year, I don’t think undoing the trade would have done much to curb it given what has happened this year.

The Panthers had an offseason where they completely shook up the coaching staff and had to revamp its entire roster construction due to cap issues and just about everything that could have gone wrong has gone wrong.

They have been playing through injuries and illness since mid-November at a time when the staff needed to teach the team the new system — Jonathan Huberdeau and MacKenzie Weegar being there does not help much.

Matthew Tkachuk has not been a part of the problem on that front this year.

He is a very popular player in the room, and especially should be after he stood up for Sasha Barkov on Wednesday night.

Tkachuk has fit in next to just about every player the Panthers have put him next to.

He is such a dynamic player in the way that he can get physical and win battles in the corner while playing a skill and speed-based game that he is the type of player you need in situations like these.

Even in a season where Florida has had a tough time scoring, Tkachuk ranks 14th in the league in points (39) and 35th in goals (14) in 31 games.

Huberdeau’s production has dropped to the tune of 22 points in 30 games after his 115-point season last year.

In the long run, the Tkachuk trade is still a no-brainer in the fact that he gives the team what they wanted skill-wise and he extends their window of contention by at least four years — a plus this team definitely is happy it has after the way this season started.

Weegar was likely asking for too much to be in the picture long-term and Huberdeau will slowly start to lose that commanding element to his game, so this trade is the least of Florida’s problems right now.

“At some point injuries/illnesses have to come into the equation. Barkov, Lundell, Knight, Ekblad, Gudas and Hornqvist all missed significant time. Every other game a new player is ill. Tough to build any consistency with a patchwork roster and no clue who’ll be available when.” – Jack Powell

Heat Index: 25

At this point, this has become the hot take, and “Fire Paul Maurice” has become the popular opinion, so this is where I am going to address those swaths of comments as well…

In the first Temp Check of the season where I addressed the firing Maurice take for the first time, I said that a new system requires about two months of regular season hockey before it can really be judged, but at this point, it may be a special case.

Ever since Barkov first got sick on Nov. 15, starting a huge spread of illness throughout the locker room, the Panthers have been 7-9-3.

Definitely not great, but it is a level of inconsistency that hits when there are guys going in and out of the lineup in large quantities.

Looking a the New York Islanders of last season, they missed the playoffs after two-straight appearances to the Eastern Conference finals (also called Semifinal in 2021) after getting hit with a massive COVID-19 outbreak and losing Ryan Pulock and Brock Nelson to injuries in between.

This year, they look like they are back on track with mostly the same roster and a coach that is pretty similar stylistically to Barry Trotz, who ultimately got the axe at the end of the season.

At this point, it has reached the extreme point where Maurice should be given some leeway given everything that has gone on.

Excluding Anthony Duclair, the Panthers have had nine players miss time in the span of just under a month — including two extended stretches of time without Barkov.

When the excuse was given with just Barkov out of the lineup, it can be criticized, but when they are pushing numbers in the double digits of guys who have missed time in such a short span, maybe it’s time to cut him some slack.

Especially so early in a coaching tenure where he is still very much laying the groundwork.

Trotz’s firing following the Islanders’ illness and injury-riddled season could be used as a counterpoint to what I just said, but he and Maurice are in two completely different boats.

Part of the reason why the Islanders fired Trotz was that he was failing to develop younger players like Oliver Wahlstrom, whom he frequently scratched.

As much criticism as Maurice got for doing that in Winnipeg, he has already put his stamp on Eetu Luostarinen‘s career in the way he has utilized him and it has sparked major growth in his game.

If the Panthers’ struggles continue into next season — where they will get some much-needed cap relief to fix a lot of their issues — maybe that will be the time to start pinning blame.

The fans are blaming Maurice, but he didn’t make the roster. Bill Zito did. And Matt Caldwell hired him. Those two need to be held accountable. — Five Line Pass

Heat Index: 50

I am on the fence with this take for several reasons:

For one, there were a lot of issues that Zito inherited that he could not do much about.

He had three big contracts on the books in Mike Matheson, Sergei Bobrovsky and Keith Yandle and did the best he could in navigating that situation very early into his tenure.

He traded Matheson — who has another four seasons left at $4.8 million — for Patric Hornqvist and his $5.3 million contract that ends a whole three years earlier.

That’s a win.

Yandle’s no-movement clause would have likely forced the Panthers to lose Gus Forsling in the expansion draft, so Zito did what he had to do and bought out the remainder of his contract.

It was a move that gave the Panthers more cap room to go all-in on the 2021-22 season but one that they are paying for heavily this year via $5.3 million in buyout money.

Bobrovsky’s $10 million contract is not going anywhere — especially with a full no-movement clause for the next two years — no matter how he performs in net.

Where the hairs start splitting on Zito is the aforementioned all-in push last season.

The Panthers would do the Claude Giroux trade again 10 out of 10 times, even with Owen Tippett on pace to shatter career highs at 10 goals and 16 points through 29 games.

It is not very often that a player of his caliber is available at the deadline and he wanted to be there.

The Ben Chiarot trade is where the questions start to arise.

Zito paid a premium for Chiarot at a deadline where Hampus Lindholm— who is undoubtedly better than Chiarot — was traded (and extended) for a much cheaper price.

And now it leaves the Panthers without a first-round pick in a season where they could very well miss the playoffs.

And, since the pick is not lottery-protected, the Canadiens could very well snag a top pick with Florida’s selection.

He tried to fill out the roster the best he could with the little amount of money he had available but things just keep going wrong this season.

It’s hard to say if one mistake is enough to start talking about firing a guy who has found gems like Forsling and Josh Mahura to fill out a roster that needs hits like that in the cap situation that was handed to him, but this trade has definitely proven to be a disaster.

“The Panthers will finish below the Montreal Canadiens in the standings.” – Matthew M.

Heat Index: 70

While Martin St. Louis has done an excellent job in getting production out of a plethora of young players in Montreal, I do not think that roster is built to be in contention for the whole season.