Penguins fan survey results: Your views on Dubas, Jagr and more

Timing is everything in life.

And were being honest, the timing of this survey now appears to have been ...

not great.

It wasnt too long ago that the Pittsburgh Penguins owned one of the NHL s worst records, were off to the poorest start of the Sidney Crosby era, and collecting NHL Draft Lottery balls not points seemed like the best-case scenario for coach Mike Sullivans group.

That was a mere three weeks ago, when we devised and delivered the questions for an in-season survey of Penguins fans.

Advertisement So, maybe the results, which you can read below, dont perfectly reflect the current vibes surrounding Pittsburghs hockey franchise.

Theyre still interesting and informative.

Lets make a deal: The Penguins were dreadful through 23 games.

Theyve been darn good the past 10.

If they stay darn good, or do better even, for the next 23 games, well do another survey.

That will probably blow up in our faces, too.

Such is the risk you take soliciting opinions about any team in a hard-cap league at peak parity (aka mediocrity).

We asked.

You answered.

Lets get to it, shall we? (Note: The survey required readers to answer all questions.) You read the intro, right? Its hardly surprising readers were in a burn-it-down mode considering where the Penguins were in the standings on Thanksgiving Eve.

More to that point, the team appeared non-competitive against presumed Stanley Cup contenders and struggled to beat opponents that werent exactly Cup dark horses.

Tear down and rebuild have become subjective: They once meant making ashes of the current coaches and roster and going for different voices and younger players.

President of hockey operations and general manager Kyle Dubas has intentionally avoided using those terms, and hes always seemed inclined to let Sullivan and Crosby show him what the current team can do before making significant big-picture decisions.

The readers wanted to blow it up three weeks ago.

They werent alone.

Dubas is a lightning rod for debates on most stories we publish.

Most Penguins fans want to give him time to execute a plan, even if he hasnt detailed that plan to the public, and many Toronto Maple Leafs fans crash the comment sections and drag Dubas as though hes done them personal harm.

Our fear was Maple Leafs fans crashing the survey and influencing it.

There may have been some of that, as a big majority (65.8 percent) graded Dubas worse than a B.

Still, given that even amid their surge, the Penguins remain on track to miss the playoffs for the second time in as many seasons as Dubas tenure, most votes going for a C grade feels fair.

FSG is never going to be beloved.

Unless the group was led by a Crosby/Pat Brisson tandem or, perhaps, Jaromir Jagr, the owners who replaced a group with Mario Lemieux as the co-lead was always going to be far less popular among fans who understandably see Lemieux as the sun, moon, stars and anything else that requires the expertise of the late Stephen Hawking.

Advertisement All FSG has done is keep the Big Three (Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang ) together, put $30 million into PPG Paints Arena upgrades, spend to the cap and afford Dubas any expense to build his hockey operations department.

It also was blamed for the summer dismissals of about 30 employees on the business side.

FSG doesnt seem adored by fans of the Boston Red Sox or Liverpool Football Club, each of which has won championships with the ownership group.

Its complicated for fans with any ownership group in the corporate era because the personal touch isnt the same as family-led groups.

That is especially true for any Penguins owners going forward because Lemieux can do no wrong in Pittsburgh even if the final four seasons of the Lemieux/Ron Burkle ownership deserve scrutiny as the Penguins became stagnant on and off the ice.

Nobody should be shocked that almost 80 percent of readers arent high on FSG.

If the Penguins become a Cup contender again, let alone win it, under FSG, the owners will probably be more embraced.

And by other, most readers suggested Ron Hextall.

The lesson: Never hire a notable former Philadelphia Flyer for a high-profile job with the Penguins.

Again, the Maple Leafs/Dubas dynamic may be in play for him receiving the second-highest percentage of this blame game.

Then again, going into this survey, Tristan Jarry had been assigned to the AHL to figure out how to play NHL-caliber goal, Ryan Graves was a healthy scratch, and Erik Karlsson looked like a shell of a former three-time Norris Trophy winner.

Those guys are all attached to Dubas first offseason, and that offseason probably was on the minds of many readers as the Penguins struggled through the opening seven weeks this season.

If you lived on social media, youd think fans are clamoring for the Big Three to be broken up and Sullivan to be replaced.

This survey suggests that social media and the real world are different places.

And that makes sense: The Big Three and their coach have silver-laced equity with many fans who dont view titles as a birthright.

Remember earlier, when we said Lemieux can do no wrong in Pittsburgh? Same goes for Crosby.

Penguins fans are conditioned to believe an icon is bigger than the franchise.

Lemieux was.

Crosby is.

Thats never going to change.

Sullivan is more popular and certainly more appreciated by Penguins fans than social media would lead people to believe.

He should be, too.

Hes the winningest coach in franchise history.

His teams compete hard.

Hes shown tremendous loyalty to the Big Three and the organization.

He shepherded the Penguins through a tumultuous early part of this decade.

Hes carried himself with class, and he cares.

Hed be hired in a New York minute if he was available.

Penguins fans appear to recognize that hes not part of the problem.

We thought this one would be more competitive, but it shows that bottom-pairing defensemen who struggle (Graves) dont bother readers as much as franchise goalies who flatline (Jarry) and generational offensive defensemen whose mistakes arent outweighed by production (Karlsson).

That said, the Penguins Bizarro Big Three wasnt nearly good enough at the time of this survey, so its not a shock those players felt the heat.

SportsNet Pittsburgh is in its second season, and there have been many changes in front of and behind the cameras.

Readers went with the mostly fresh approach, perhaps because Dan Potash is beloved and remains part of the mix.

That was a smart move, even if Hailey Hunters emergence as an on-site reporter has robbed us of the theme night costumes Potash made famous or infamous, depending on your point of view.

Advertisement Bringing in some Crosby-era former Penguins such as Colby Armstrong and Mike Rupp on color commentary and Max Talbot, Ryan Malone and Tyler Kennedy in studio was a gamble that has paid off.

Fans love them some former champions in Pittsburgh, and former champions of whom high-definition video exists are always a good thing for a TV product.

If youd have asked SNP higher-ups if theyd take B grade from half the fans in Year 2, theyd say yes.

Boo! Booooooooo! The correct answer was other, because other implied any dang job he wants.

Kidding.

But not really.

There could be no better ambassador for the Penguins at this stage in franchise history, approaching their 60th season, than the prodigal son whose official reunion was the story of last season.

Jagr always loved the Penguins but was worried their fans didnt love him back.

They desperately did.

President of business operations Kevin Acklin has befriended Jagr and made it a personal mission to officially work him into the franchise in some capacity.

Team ambassador makes the most sense, but were kidding ourselves if Coach Jags wouldnt be fun for the week it would last.

Bonus question: What design elements would you like to see included in a new Penguins alternate jersey? Were going to ignore the calls for bringing back Robo Penguin.

Been there, done that.

(Still, Robo remains popular, for reasons that confound given its history.) The diagonal PITTSBURGH design for the current alternate uniforms is on the way out.

Readers did have some clever ideas for what a new jersey should include.

Our favorites: (Photo: Minas Panagiotakis / Getty Images).

This article has been shared from the original article on theathleticuk, here is the link to the original article.